I like to surround myself with gorgeous people

Sven, an AFSer from Germany, and me in Vienna

Joyce from Hong Kong, with whom I shared Halloween this year

MPM. I love you guys :D So I wake up in the morning feeling like Beethoven

They are not just gorgeous, they are sexy beasts. I miss y'all.

Violists for the win!

Aren't they lovely? MPM strikes again!

Yeah, I had a leaf fight with gorgeous people. Be oh so jealous.

My lovely ladies, all dressed up for mini-christmas

Hirone, rocking her first skirt ever, believe it or not. She put us all to shame...

My chilean mamasita. We were on a ferris wheel!

My host mum. We were beach bums in Barcelona.

The fam, and my wonderful cousin, Michal

I miss this girl like no other.

Canadian, eh? See you next summer, Berta!

We rocked that Beethoven.

Kanackies!!!!!

MY PAPA. He should be less busy and skype more.

And we will all fry together when we fry!

Cingular. Raising the bar!

That was one big chair!

EMILY!!!!!

FLEEBAJEEBABINGBAMBOOMOGOGGLEGOGGLEEEGOGGLEEE

Yeah. I miss you, thunderthighs!

My ray of sunshine

Mumsies. Christmas won't be the same without your expert leg-crossed present opening expertise.

Lovingly referred to as "the thai girls," Silk, Chompu, Mo and Bow. And Mizuha, from Japan, in the corner!

Philo! CHICKENCHICKENCHICKEN!

Leonie, who I haven't seen in way too long.

That was one helluva good day in Ostrava :D

So, this obsession with beautiful friends has been going on for a while. I know I missed a whole bunch, and I love you all the more dearly and think of you as radiantly attractive. I guess really, I should get some help for this issue, but for now, I will keep picking the pretty ones :D

Lots of love, and Merry Christmas!

Meghan :P

humbadumbadum

Verbs I miss being able to use:

To sketch on

to creep on

to pull a Clare

"Imma"

to ninja

to be pissed

to freak out

to be like "RAWR!"

Unfortunately, I have picked up some new favorite expressions. Ones my mum would not approve of so much. But bad words stick really easily in your head. I can swear in like 8 languages, and it is so fun to see people's reactions. Just like I find it absolutely hysterical when Czech people swear in English, most of my friends react the same way. Not the most tasteful icebreaker, but definitely not the worst! Especially since I do not mean them, and speak like a 3 year old the rest of the time. Oh well. I just hope I do not fall into any patterns!

So, I realized that in like my first post, I had a Czech status update. then never did it again. So here it it:

Currently reading Animal Farm, with an average of 10 words per page being dictionaried. Yeah. it's a verb. I still speak like about a 4 or maybe 5 year old with not all my wires connected, but I am understanding physics at school, a bit! My writing is horrendous, and plurals still make me dizzy.

Christmas is coming quickly! I made my sister's present today and wrapped soem for the rest of my family. And, I gave myself a present last friday, when I bought an accordion! It is huge, and heavy, but I love it. Yeah, so I am going to go play before it gets to late! čau! Merry Christmas, Happy late Chanukah, and enjoy your Kwanzaa!

Love y'all!

My first turkey!

I said they were coming...

Halloween. It was intense.

I love Barcelona. This is one of my over 600 pictures :p.

Vienna

I love them. We were dressed up for our mini Christmas at our orientation.

Instead...

In the Czech Republic, instead...

of salt on the road and sidewalks, they use rocks. Like piles of gravel on the side walks. I guess it must be more ecofriendly, but it must be a mess in the spring.

of spices in their food, they use fat and salt.

of Coca Cola, we drink Kofola. Which is much better by the way.

of going by car, we wait for the bus.

of rebelling by dying their hair a funny color and talking back to their teachers, kids drink and smoke. yuck.

of 4 tones for 130 people to tune to, each violin, viola and cello gets individually tuned (quite sharp, too!) with each string matched to the first violin. twice. oj!

of real meals, I eat bread, chocolate and mandarin oranges.

of spending pretty much no time alone, from Tuesday night to Thursday night, I only bump into my family as we are leaving, and one late night ride home.
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It has been a tough last few weeks for me here. I have been pretty busy, hosting thanksgiving dinner and playing a few concerts, but it has been pretty dull over all. I am having some huge adjustment problems, and hopefully everything will get sorted out soon, and christmas will be fun!

We had our mid-stay orientation this last weekend. We were staying at the coolest building near Oloumoc. Some people, nudgenudge Papa, may have called it too "crunchy granola," but everything was so nice. There were these great chairs shaped like bananas, and there are just so many ways to sit on them! We enjoyed exploring the possibilities. We had a mini christmas, and ate way to many cookies. I love everyone who was there though. They are strong, beautiful, talented and just plain amazing people, and I am so happy to have met all of them.

Stealing from a fellow AFSer, Cordelia, the girl with the coolest glasses ever in Argentina, I would LOVE to get some letters and emails. They always brighten my day!

Lots of love,
Meghan

Happy Thanksgiving!

Well, not yet here. I have warned my family that I am going to be making a huge American dinner, so December 4 will be a big day. I have invited some friends, so we will see who can come. It is my big chance to prove that at least one night a year, we eat more than McDonalds.

Life here continues to have its ups and downs. I can have a great day, just because lunch was edible and French class was fun. Tuesdays are quickly becoming my favorite days, because I have music for 2 of my seven hours at school, and languages for 4 more. That is always nice. And then, I have had skype lessons with Sherri in the afternoons, which is the cherry on top. But I seem to be able to have a sucky one just as easily. I guess I have something more to work on!

Moje čeština ještě je strašná, ale je nejtěšši jazyk. Pretty much all of that was spelled wrong, and my word oreder is horrendous. But, it continues to improve. When we are doing something I have already learned, I understand about 70 percent of math class. I understand all of one French class, and only the textbook of the other. German is still way over my head, but I am slowly builing a vocabulary through all of my quatrilingual pictures in lists. Well, they are mostly trilingual, because Spanish is long gone. But it will come back. So, no worries.

I have started trying a little bit more in my classes. I still am not doing all of the lab write-ups and aktualitas, whatever those are, but more. I wrote a little ditty on antimatter and recited it for the class in Physics. Not going win the Pulitzer any time soon, but you have to start somewhere.

I have been thinking a lot about what I want to do when I get home. It really hit me that life is going on without me when I saw a new relationship status on an American classmate´s facebook. I could not believe it! Those two? Really? But I think that some things will just click back when I get home. Or at least I hope so. I have already been thinking a lot about college, and what I am looking for. The school I was planning on working towards, Middlebury, does not have Czech. and being without music for a few months really woke me up to how much it measn to me and how much of a music snob I am. I realized that if I wan to play with an orchetra that sounds great as an adult, I need to have some quality music study behind me. Lots of thoughts. But one thing I do know is that nxt year, I am going to work my bunda off.

Next week, I will be a third done! I cannot believe it! I have done so much, but also so little. I have traveled around Europe, Vienna, Barcelona and the High Tatras. I have ridden a cross country train home by myself. I have passed a few tests, and failed a few (a lot. Most of the time, I do not get grades...). I have learned Czech, German, Portuguese, Turkish, and brushed up my Japanese. I have learned how to give good hugs, at least better, and the power of physical contact. I have learned how much I really love everyone in my life in the US, and started to love new people too. I now know that I AM a picky eater, and a glass of fresh milk that does not come in a shelf stable box can make my day.

Oh, and I have been meaning to give you all a breakdown of Czech names.

For girls,

Verča/Kačka something-ova

for boys,

Kuba/Honza/Martin/Marek something related to fruit or animals

Neither have middle names. They do not do that here. As you may have noticed, names have a lot less variation here. I blame that on the fact that the Czech Republic is certainly no ethnic mixing pot, and also, they celebrate Name Days, meaning that since each day has a name, there are only like 365 names. Throw in the Czech equivalent of Smith, and everyone has pretty much the same name. Czech people solve this issue by having an obsession with nicknames. A certain little fellow I have babysat would not enjoy this. I have become Meg or Meggy, which I have adjusted to, but soem peopel have so many choices! Let us take for example

Kateřína-Kateřínka- Kačka- Katka- Kitka- Kačyska- Kočka- Kači-Kiki

So, I may have thrown in one or two words that just happened to start with K, but you get the idea. So, coming in as the new person in an established world, I spent my first month or so knowing no names. I could recognize people, but names? Still, I interact with peopel and have no idea what to call them. Pretty embarassing, but I am working on it. Just like I am working on getting those pictures up...

Hugs full of love,

Meghan :D

Home again home again back the same day

Vienna is a nice city. But it is even nicer when you are with people you love. The AFS trip was far too short, but definitely worth every minute I spent waiting in the Brno train station. My friend Aurelie has only ventured out of that station once in Brno, to the KFC across the street. I got the grand tour from my lovely Brazilian friend Marina.

We did not see to many sights in Vienna, but it was a lot of fun. I learned how to make friends with body language from like 5 different countries, along with numerous words that will not make you any friends :D I still love it when people see someone from their own country and start speaking together in their native language. It is always so cool. I wish I had one that nobody would understand, but oh well. I like being able to talk to everyone. And now, I am fluent(coughcough) in Japanese and Portuguese, so I am on my way.

Nothing too exciting happening at home these days. I slept 12 hours last night, and man did it feel good! I had a skype lesson yesterday with my violin and viola teacher from the US. It was so nice to see her, and to have a lesson! School is still chugging along, and sometimes I understand more than others. I have gotten a bit lax lately about workign on my Czech. I want to have the best Czech when we finish this year, well besides Tari from Italy whose mom is Czech, so already is fluent. So, I have better get working!

Unfortunately, my camera was dead on the Vienna trip, but you can look at facebook and probably see most of the pictures.

Lots of love to all of you!

totally overdue.

Sorry about how long it took me to update! I have been pretty darn busy the last couple of weeks, and they have been some of the best weeks of my life. Barcelona is the San Francisco of the world, and I was ready to wave my amazign family who I love very much goodbye and stay there! The metro, Gaudi, the Picasso Museum, The sunshine, the ocean, the food, the hustle and bustle. It was a dream. We also stayed in the nicest hotel room of my life. If any of you visit Barcelona, czech out :D Just Style Apartments. Sounds corny, but it was gorgeous and they had a full kitchen and did your dishes. Yeah. I am in love. They didn't provide breakfast, so no way they can touch the Hyatt Regency in Delhi on that one. But the room was spectacular.

We got home and I had a day, then my lovely friend Joyce, originally from Hong Kong, came to stay with me for a couple of days. We celebrated Halloween, carving an intense pumpkin and eating candy corn. Yesterday, I finally got the box of Halloween goodies Nani, my grandmother, sent, but unfortunately, Halloween had already passed. Oh well! But one of my classmates said next week we are going to "celebrate" halloween in english class. I guess I will have to share that last bag of candy corn....

Saturday, we were in Praha. My plan was to finally go to Prague Castle, since I have wanted to since I got here, and it was my fourth visit. We went shopping instead. :D I got a cute shirt from H and M and some tights, and I ended up being the only who got anything! We saw "the first Czech hit musical", Děti Ráje. All I got out of it was Showboat, minus Old Man River and gorgeous sets, plus smoking and a diskoteka. Oh, and Czech. haha. It was so hot in the theater, but I was glad that I went.

Sunday, I spent the day with some AFS friends. They had slept over at Aurelie's, but we got back to late at night for that. We went to the pool, but my friend Sven's swim trunks were too long. Apparently, at this pool, you have to wear a speedo .They offered him some he could borrow, but funnily, he decided to go out for coffee instead. Silly Sven!! haha, but it was a lot of fun anyways.

I have started running again, partially because I really do like it, and partially because I cannot find Czech jeans I like, so mine have to fit for a while yet! All these chocolate bars take their toll! But, I am just living to what AFS stands for. Another Fat Student. :D

I feel like my czech would be improving a lot quicker if Czech songs were the ones stuck in my head. On the radio, they play mostly American pop hits. And I do not own any Czech music, besides a bit of Dvořák, so I am really not listening to it much. hmmm. I guess I have a project!

Life here isn't perfect, but it is pretty darn close. Lots of love to all of you, and pictures to come, once I pick a few out of the 600 I took,

Čau!

yuhmuhyuhpuh

aka JMJP

aka "Ježíš Maria, JE PÁTEK!!!!"

I cannot believe I am already ONE FIFTH done with this year. Holy smokes! It feels remarkably short. It has been no ride down lazy river, but once you get on the Screaming Eagle, and stay while they lower the restraints :D, it is so worth waiting in line. I know that made absolutely no sense, btu my mind is already on vacation, since we are off to

BARCELONA

in a few hours

We will miss Monday and Tuesday of school, then we have the rest of the week off for vacation. My friend Joyce, originally from Hong Kong, now from Bohemia, is coming to visit me for a few days, and we are going to hang out and carve pumpkins and go to the pool and other good things. Off to Prague again on Saturday to have a girls day on the town. We are going to see something at the theater, so that should be buckets of fun.

I had a busy week. I went to a dance on monday. Here, almost everyone takes a dance course during their high school years. They master the waltz, polka, chacha, disco, and many more. The dance was a chance for them to show what they had learned and I am sure somebody benefited from the ticket prices. It was a lot of fun though. Everyone had gorgeous dresses, though some were a little too short for my tastes.

Wednesday, We had a big concert to celebrate a local composer. I swear that every piece of music I have played or sung here had been arranged by him. It was long, but it was nice to chill and talk with the chorus people. They are all super sweet, maybe even more than my classmates! but I guess they do not have to deal with me for as much time, so it is easier to be sweet!

Thursday, I came home and slept for three hours. Got up and had soem yoghurt and bread for dinner, listened to Jana§s presentation on Scotland, and went back to bed. And I was still tired yesterday! Oj!

Friday was good too! I just love it here! I will get a more sane post with some pictures up when we come home! Love you all!

Zelí

off topic, but trucks are cool too.
lots of peeling was involved
Apple cider machine, since I did not take any pictures while we were using it.
celery root? I was waiting for them to start screaming like in Harry Potter. I swear those were mandrakes.
:P Jealous yet?
individual buckets

Buckets and buckets. And there was more.

Happy as a banana from Panama in East Germany during the 1960's

chamber of deputees

BROWNIES!
The walk up to our house
the two boys in Morava
some friends from sbor
My house! It is gorgeous!
With Gabriella from Chile
Over due form our high tatras trip :D

Over 8 weeks now.

A basic run down of the last two weeks (in no particular order)

Visited the chamber of deputees in Prague- I have to admit, it was pretty lame.

helped MAKE apple cider!

drank mineral water from a tap in Kralovná Studanská

made Brownies! Jana and I used my mum§s amazing recipe, and they came out fine.

inhaled way to much cigarette smoke thanks to those wonderful people who persist in killing themselves

spent much more money than I should have- I even got ripped off by the bus man on my way home! He owes me 10 korun!

got an amazing box of goodies from home- shoulder rest for my viola, candy corn, an cozy purple sweater that I have been wearing non-stop for the last 3 days, silk long underwear and peanut butter were some of the highlights.

Failed my first test- like ever. Yay for Physics!!! It was destined to happen, though!

got to the Prague train station at 8:05 for a 8:11 train. Without a ticket. And I made it. Well, with some help from my Norwegian friend, Guro.

Donned some rain boots and stomped some cabbage into oblivion. Sauerkraut, here we come!

had another sleepover with my awesome host-sister, Jana. She lives down the hall :D

Taught Egyptian Rat Screw in Czech, semi successfully. Though Crazy Eights was a bigger hit.

Cried after hearing the last few bars of a song I have sung played.

Realized how much I love it here. Then forgot. Then remembered again.

Had a night with more drama than my favorite soap opera, ULICE!

Took the nap I have been meaning to take since I got here. And man, it was good.

By the way, when you are cold, you can borrow my bunda :p

6 weeks, chico chico chack!

I just got back from my AFS orientation, and it was so great. We spent the whole time hugging, talking, complaining, laughing, and just being with each other. I miss everyone already. It was just the students in Moravia, and I missed some of my friend sin Bohemia, but it was a really great group. There were about 20 of us, I think, but only two boys! It was so much fun to hear the little differences that other people are noticing. Like, my family has this amaying magnetic soap. In the shower and the bathroom sink, the soap has a little metal disk that lets it stick to a magnet next to the sink .Then it doen§t get soggy or anything. I thought it was great, and that all czech people do it that way. Turns out, it isn§t too common! It is always funny when you do not even realize you are making assumptions, then it turns out the norm is something totally different.

So, I have been with my host family for 6 weeks, as of today! At the same tiem, it feels like ages and like such a short time. Looking forward to when I go home seems simultaneously like I have forever until I get to see my friends back home again,a nd so close that I have already decided what I want my first meal home to be! If you are wondering, I am leaning towards thai curry, corn on the cob, fruit salad and strawberry rhubarb pie. Yum! Notice the strong presence of vegetables!

This is harder than I ever could have imagined. I have a great host family, and my Czech is coming relatively quickly, I think. But it is so hard for me to not be able to communicate easily everythign that I am feeling. I knew I loved to talk, but now that is is so much harder, I really appreciate every little thing more. There are definitely ups and downs though!

So, to commemorate my first six weeks, I decided to give you six lists of six things!

6 reasons my family would love it here:

1. Mum-They drink tea A LOT!
2. Mum, again-Light dinners. Lunch is usually the only hot meal I have, if I have it at school.
3. Dad- well, it is famous for its beer, though I do not personally know. And they have really beautiful churches around here.
4. Pretty much everybody- So much here is just gorgeous.
5. Benjamin- MEATMEATMEAT- And bacon
6. Nani- Czech monopoly is about horses. yeah. nuff said.

6 reasons I love it here

1. Castles!!!
2. I love hearing Czech people swear in english. Their accents are adorable.
3. Food is relatively cheap. I can get two giant croissant-y chocolate dipped things at school for the equivalent of 60 cents. yum!
4. Guláš with Knedlíky
5. How close all of Europe is. It is still amazing to me.
6. AFSers!!!!

6 more reasons I love it

1. Kofola and Tatranky
2. Bright colors everywhere
3. That I can now sleep over my amazing AFS friends
4. Hearing little stories, about how neighbors were either Russian or German during WWII, and you needed your passport to go to the local pizzeria from our neighborhood.
5. How people react when you say you are from New York. Sometimes, I do not bother to explain that I am not from the city. :p
6. Magnetic Soap

6 things I miss

1. My family!
2. All of my friends
3. RPYO
4. Kanack
5. Warmth- they only turned on the heating at school today, and people do not hug as much here :(
6. Vegetables and Fruit!!!!!! If I ever hear somebody complain about Harley lunches again, I am going to sock them.

6 songs that have been floating around in my head

1. Alors On Danse
2. Lady Marmalade
3. My Beautiful Coat- It was Cruella§s solo when I played her in 101 Dalmatians.
4. Airplane- It always makes me think of Horizons :D
5. Hey Soul Sista- I hated this song in the US. But here, I am always humming it.
6. Folding Chair by Regina Spektor- who incidentally did a concert in Ostrava like 1 month before I came :p

6 things that made my day

1. freshly picked raspberries
2. My unbelievably sweet classmates
3. Hugs
4. My new neon yellow sweatshirt
5. Reading a postcard from my favorite person in Ottawa
6. Having like 6 conversations going at once on facebook- I feel so popular :D

BIIIIIIGGGG

So, I brought Big Booty to the Czech Republic today. Please hold your applause. Quakadillyoma, too. Chemistry was really fun, as you may have figured out. Lots of love to all my pals back home, and to my newer ones here :)

And there is this girl who is doing a year abroad in Argentina, and I think we have the same glasses! Coolio! This may seem like a losse connection, but they are pretty distinctive glasses! "Czech" out her blog:

http://dontcryformecalifornia.com

Dreads.

chillin in the car
So, my (most) impulsive buy on saturday was one of those suicidal bunny books. I saw it, and it made me smile, so I bought it. I felt this picture would really reach out to all my Amurrrican friends.
so, there was this stamp. On the bread. Our whole family had to taste a piece to see if it was legitimately a bread stamp. It was.
They are even in Praha.
what the inside of clock towers looks like. Pretty cool, huh?
Starý Jičín
On one of our walks
Sun shining in at the Hrád
the hrád, again

Don't worry. I am not worried or trying out a new hairdo. I am just trying a more Dan Brownish writing style. Now, the protagonist needs an attractive female family member of yours to go solve mysteries about secret societies with.

Wow. I have gone like a whole week without blogging! Does this mean I actually have a life? Sort of. Last weekend was super busy,and super expensive. I went shopping in Ostrava with Jana on Saturday, then spent Sunday in Praha with a bunch of AFS friends. It was really fun, but I spent almost twice as much time on busses and trains than I did in Praha.

The zoo was cool, and we spent quite a while discussing how different languages call sloths. Most translate to lazy animal, which I guess the english does, too. I still feel so spoiled because English is the language everyone speaks in, and I was the only one who has it as a native language. Our little hang out group has kind of become Europe, minus Italy, Brazil and me. Sometimes, I hang out with the Asian girls, too. And the third group is Italy and South/Central America, minus Brazil. They always seem to have a lot of fun. We are not cliquey, but the whole AFS group is just too big to hang out with everyone.

I got my first and second "1"s at school today. One in music, taught by my favorite Czech/music teacher, and finally a one in math. Last time, I got a 2 because I said that three times nine was eighteen. Good old Dewan math talent right there! But at least I got partial credit, because it was only a two question test.

Music is hard to find when you live in a town of 25,000, so that has been a bit frustrating. Though, I am happy because yesterday,my music teacher invited me to be in the school chorus, which travels and does other fun stuff. I don§t know why she wanted me though, because I have a bit of a cold and can only sing on la when we are singing in Czech. They just go too fast! But, she, and pretty much all of my other teachers, have been super nice and understanding to me. Some just ignore me, which is fine with me, and some go out of their way to explain things for me, which is really sweet. I do feel really bad though, because I am running a little low on sleep, and I nodded off during biologie yesterday. And I was sitting in the front row. Oops!

I do not know what is wrong with American guys, but guys from other countries are totally different. They are gentlemen, and taller and sweet and not as shy, and it is really nice. I am not trying to sound gushy, but you American men really need to get cracking! One downside, I was traveling on the bus with my friend, Vinny, from Brazil, and we had to wait forever to get off, because he let all the women coming from the front get off first! But, I can deal with that. Speaking of that 5 hour bus ride from Nový Jičín to Praha, the guy in front of us was a party. He had pretty much the biggest hair I have ever seen, and it was crazy and curly and dreaded in parts. EW! White people with bad dreads is scarily common here. Not a fan. But he would shake out his hair and flop it over the seat, and there would always be one dread that lingered in front of Vinny. It was so horrible, we could not stop laughing. We tried to take pictures, but our timing was off.

We have had PE a few times now. It is fine. It is actaully really nice to just have a small group of girls for your PE class. We are doing shotput, so I can pretend to be learning quickly. Then, she will expect me to be decent when we get to sports requiring thinking, and boy, is she in for a surprise. But maybe, all these sausages and chocolate bars will make me better at sports. Seems unlikely, but hey, I am not in Kansas anymore. You never know.

I gave you guys my schedule last week, but there has been a change. I am thinking no Spanish, but putting Chemistry back in. Seems silly, and I don§t know why I would want to, but Chemistry is semi understandable now. Writing on the board makes a big difference, and he has started repeating everything in English. Writing on the board does me no good in Biologie. There, she only writes about half of what she wants on the board, and writes that in cursive with like every word abbreviated. I would be screwed if some words were not the same, like lipidy and saccharides. But some days are better than others

I am really starting to feel at home here. I can find most classrooms if I know what the number I am looking is. I have sort of figured out the devil that is školaonline.cz. The family dog and I are having a bit of a power struggle, but he will come around. After talking to my sister, yesterday, I think I have a hypothesis about the behavioral problems present in many dogs here. Between not being neutered and no obediance training, these dogs are just full of reasons to go nuts. And it drives me bananas!

So, this has been one long day. I had nula class this morning, sbor and then took the bus to Ostrava for orchestra. I have another viola. It has a price tag on it for about 15 dollars, but it sounds better than the other one. Chorus was reall nice. They sound awesome, and people actually know how to blend. I am a mezzo soprano, which is nice and comfy. And we sang some songs in English. Easy enough. Orchestr was good. It is easy, I came in as first stand viola, but there doesn§t seem to be anything harder. I just want to plant Nový Jičín in the middle of Prague. I love my family, my school and the town, just not the lack of music.

I am becoming slightly Czech-ier, I think. Along with occasionally forgetting English words, I have adjusted to the keyboard. And, I am addicted to a Czech soap opera, Ulice. I understood the drama for the first time the other day. Everyone thought he was gay, but apparently not. I think I am just in Glee withdrawal because hulu is witchy and won§t let you watch internationally.

It is funny. There are so many things here that you would get sued for in the US. Like the coffee vending machines that serve it in a little plastic cup, not the insulated ones. In fact, besides pictures of a friend sipping Starbucks, I haven§t seen an insulated cup anywhere. And, you see ads that are unbelievably sketchy. Like a giant teddy bear following a line of children. It just wouldn§t fly in the US. Talking with one of my European friends, he said this is probably because suing is much more expensive here,and really cheap in the USA. Though many silly precautions are taken in the US because of our sue-happy lifestyle, I do miss insulated cups.

Lots of random thoughts tonight. I did buy like 14 postcards in Praha, so if you want one, just drop me a line. Also, if you have any questions or things you want to hear me whine about. And candy corn makes me really happy. Thanks, Mums and Pops.