While living in Austria is not like college, I feel I have sort of extended my college-like life. I nap a lot. I drink a lot. I go out a lot. I sort of feel as if many people have graduated more than I have. I was happy that while in Amsterdam I was identified as a nineteen year old. Twenty-three sounds terribly old and wrinkly.

My dad is the best.

Today we had croissants for breakfast, walked around Brussels, he bought me shoes as a birthday present as my old shoes were falling apart, then we had salmon for lunch, took a long nap, went out for a huge dinner of shrimp, mussels, and frites.

Leaving tomorrow morning after only spending a day with my dad is going to be so sad.

Here is a brief description of my vacation:

Flew to Brussels, met Canadians, got crazy drunk, went to a party in the metro station, went to a bar where we were the only white people.

Met up with Becca ate Italian food for my birthday dinner and watched a super funny old BBC show and fell asleep.

Met Andrew, a guy getting a masters in Paris, walked around Brussels, ate fries and chocolate and drank loads of beer. Met some upper Austrians. Belgium beer is the best!

Went to Amsterdam. Was intimidated by the 10 other people in our room. Went for drinks in the Red Light district. Got asked "Are you two girls really here to play cards?" We said yes.

Went to the Anne Frank house. Felt very sad and teary eyed. Want to re-read Anne Franks Diary.

Went on a pub crawl. Had too much jaeger. Decided I didn't like jaeger anymore and kept drinking it anyway, using beer as a chaser. Met some English boys. They were nice.

Went to an Irish pub. I love BLTs. Am moving to Britain due to superior food options. Went to the Van Gogh Museum. Loved somethings, hated others. Saw "The Kings Speech." Am going to marry Colin Firth when I move to Britain.

Went to Cologne. Train ticket way too expensive. Saw Mallory! Surprise! Really happy to see Mallory. Ate Mexican food. Went out for drinks in student area. Fun.

Walked around Cologne. Impressed by Cathedral. Walked around shopping area. Found the best postcard shop. Found postcards for some people that have nothing to

Picture A being a girl from Minnesota walking around the red light district in Amsterdam. Picture B as an English boy walking around the red light district in Amsterdam in a t-shirt. 

A: Why aren't you wearing a jacket?
B: Because I didn't think I would need one in Amsterdam. 
A: But it's February.
B: Well before you looked fuckin' sexy and now you're wearing a jacket and it's ruining everything.

Really good logic. 

I wish I could post longer and obsessively, but I lack access to the internet. I met up with Becca, had a nice birthday dinner, spent the next day hanging out with a kid from New York, went to a flie market, had french fries, chocolate, drank lots of beer at the 2000+ types of beer place, met some kids from upper Austria, traveled to Amsterdam. Vacation is good.

Met some girl from Canada. Had about a million drinks for my birthday. Found out that Belgium durums have french fries in them.

I love watching people try to go through the locked door.

I am in Munich hostel alone. Feel like a social-outcast type who is very tired because they are used to taking daily nap in quiet apartment in Austrian dorf. Pretending I am cool-type person who is used to traveling alone and isn't at all bothered by all the loud drunk-seeming people.

I want to go to sleep. Right now.

Last time I went the place I am going I decided to go to a Germany speaking country after I graduated. Look where I am now. I wonder what I will decide this time. Hopefully nothing crazy. Now that's it February I'm sort of okay with the fact that I am still excited to go home. It would be dreadful if I liked Austria too much and wanted to stay forever. I already like the Twin Cities too much. Liking two places too much would be like being in love with two boys who could never actually be with you. I don't actually like liking anything, people, places. It  makes everything painful and awful. Of course, I do like people and places. And I do like Austria. I just am excited to go home.

Because I am a bad blogger and you probably have no idea what life in Austria is like based off of reading my blog I am going to post a picture of typical Austrian dress:

This is what everyone dresses like all the time. Especially the giraffe ears. 

I need to calm down. I am about to have a panic attack from over excitement.

BELGIUM AND THE NETHERLANDS!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Staring at the downloading progress meter can actually be quite stimulating.

I was too drunk to properly display the jaeger but not drunk enough to dance all night at the black music club. 

Look how much cuter I am with short hair/in St. Paul. I now have this pattern where I look at the me of several months ago every several months and decide I used to be cute and wonder what happened even though I probably look the same. 

Mcdo's on Valentine's Day.

I got hot chocolate instead of tea to comfort myself.

Pretending it is not Valentine's Day is not very effective. I just miss Glo all day because for the past two years we have gone out together.

I have like a million hostel reservations. Traveling is so complicated. But I like it a lot.

Also I am pretending it is not Valentine's day. This is really easy to do when you live by yourself.

The past three Valentine's days have been karma for the fact that I had a boyfriend on Valetine's day from ages 15-20. I should've had fewer boyfriends when I was younger and then I wouldn't be the fragile full-of-baggage person I am today and might be able to handle a functional relationship.

I am also pretending that no boys read this and thus will never know or realize that I am fragile and full of baggage.

I wrote a novella I titled Baggage when I was eighteen and rewrote it when I was twenty-one. This is so indicative of everything in my life.

Why isn't Glo here to celebrate Valetine's Daz with me?

I am in school, checking my email and reading blogs because I can't afford internet and have become too much of a recluse to go to Mcdonalds.

Things that have happened in my life lately:
I had a birthday party with dirndls and lederhosen and it was really good for awhile until I became too sober at the black music club (yes, we went to the black music club) and then spent a long time sort of dancing while I thought about how I think too much and that I primarily like drinking and dancing because I don't think while I'm doing it and clearly the problem was that I was not drunk enough and then had a very strange conversation about why I was upset, which confused me because I wasn't really upset at all, but grew increasingly agitated and upset as the conversation went on. I went home the next day in an outrageously crabby mood and put on my pajamas and moped about all day and took a nap until seven at night.
I will post pictures.

My students made American breakfast this morning and it was really good. We had scrambled eggs and hashbrowns and french toast and pancakes and real maple syrup. I stood around awkwardly most of the time because that is my main role as a teaching assistant in Austria, to stand around awkwardly pretending to be an expert on the English language purely because I am a native speaker. I am the really terrible sort of shy where I am fine speaking in front of a group of people, but as soon as I am supposed to do anymore interaction I shut down and cross my arms and give everyone who speaks to me a blank wide-eyed stare because I am so surprised they are talking to me. 

Nothing else has happened really. I am starting to enjoy being by myself all the time, which I find disconcerting. I want to want to be around other people, but most of the time I don't. I've decided this is because I need a vacation from my eternal vacation and when I go on vacation next week I will be extremely happy and pleased the whole time and everything will be fixed (though nothing is really wrong aside from the fact that I continue to be homesick and become more and more of a recluse everday).

I always look really happy and cheerful at Mcdo's.

Secretly I want to be a skinny indie girl who likes to take pictures, but in reality I hate taking pictures and I am going to go home and make fajitas and all my delusions about my confusion being endearing are false. Oh well.

William (on Saturday): that beer got cold really fast.

Today I realized my fridge has been turned all the way up for day and half my food is frozen. Sucksss.

I was so drunk on Saturday I've been having dreams about things that I did and don't remember and can't remember whether the things in the dreams actually happened or not.

And I sent the drunkest message ever and the only part I remember is "Whatever, I'm sick of your shit" and I'm too scared to go read it again. But you know, messages that start in "Whatever, I'm sick of your shit" usually are friendship killers anyway, so I'm not that concerned.

There are so many people here eating Tasches.

I made my flight for a day early. I emailed them to change it. They haven't emailed me back. Guess I'm spending a day alone in Brussels?

I'm making American breakfast with 3 of my classes next Monday. I am so pumped.

Also I am going to try not to buy internet until February 28th when I will have returned from my semester break and so I might be somewhat absent in the next three weeks.

The nice thing about being upset while very very very drunk is that in the morning you only sort of remember being upset. It's always like this though. I get upset and then realize everything is better this way and then stop crying about it and I love not crying and I continue to not cry until it starts up again, but it can never ever start up again this time, even though that's what I said last time and it still did. But this time it really can't and I am never ever going to cry about it again.

My birthday party is so soon!

I am the most hungover person ever.

My head hurts so bad. I am still drunk.

If I stay up late enough I become sober.

Fuck everyone.

Enough telling myself I am pretty and intelligent, because I am and it's not enough. What is enough? If I were skinnier what that be enough? If I were smarter would that be enough?  If I were in America would that be enough? Nothing would be enough. But you know what, fuck you, I am fine alone, I am fine reading fucking books alone, doing puzzles alone, I have people who like me. Maddie, and Blair, and William, and Becca, and Julia like me. People like me. Fuck you. I am a capable human being. FUCK YOU. Fuck, I am not even going to delete this in the morning as other people would because it is already too late. FUCK YOU. I am my own person. FUCK EVERYTHING YOU ARE. I don't care  if you read this. This has gone on too long. I am too self conscious. I want  to be everything. Perfect academic suburban pretty girl who can go out and have fun, but I am not all these things. I am lonely girl who writes about being lonely. FUCK YOU.  FUCK YOU.

I hate everybody. Why am I only good enough for drunk Austrians? Fuck everyone. I am going to be pretty and cry by myself. But guess what? I am the prettiest girl in the bar according to my land lords son. So fuck you. I am pretty and smart.

Yeah so this happened again. But luckily I have whiskey and friends so fuck you!b I will ojmly be sad when my friends are gone tomorrow so right now I am happy.

I fuckingh hate you.

I like reading everyones drunken blog posts before they wake up sober and delete them.

I am excited to get drunk with Maddie and William tonight.

When I like boys that like music I can't listen to music without thinking about them. When I like boys that speak German I start liking the German language a lot. When I like boys who read books, I can't read books without thinking of them.

I need to stop liking boys who like things that I like. I am ruining the world for myself. I want to share every single page that I read and it's all really stupid. I feel like I'm in seventh grade and spent all summer liking a boy and go back to school to realize I am a complete nonentity to him (this happened).

Last night, while drunk, I decided it's good that I'm not coming back to Austria next year, because I don't write here and writing should be the most important thing. Somehow in the U.S. I was always almost able to convince myself of this. It's harder here. Writing seems less relevant, less of a real thing. Maybe this is why I am into writers more than I normally am and I normally am a lot. I watch Jess on Gilmore Girls and salivate. Dylan Thomas is my desktop background. I just need people to make it real.

My birthday party this year is probably going to be the biggest one I've ever had. It is now a triple birthday party. I am so excited.

I'm writing. About boys. It has no plot. This is exactly like everything else I've ever written.

I've been asked if I make party so many times today.

On Sunday I will be back on the pill and will stop crying while watching Gilmore Girls.

I'm going to bed. It's really important that everyone know this.

I keep thinking that the sentence "Betrunken Tasha is going to go schlafen," rhymes and I think maybe it does, but it's also in two languages.

Go to my birthday party.

My tolerance is too high. Fucking shit. A bottle of wine should cause all sorts of chaos.

Wine is so tasty.

I haven't stood up in a long time.

I probably should.

I think I might be quite drunk.

The bottle is almost gone.

Ooooo nooo.


This is okay.

I am not an alcholic.
I do not have to go to rehab like in the book I am reading.

I already have been dependent on things.

Not drugs.

But things.

If you know me, you probably know.

Wine night includes singing along to Gilmore Girls theme song and considering how much a bottle of wine entitles me to do.

Almost cried in school today while reading Infinite Jest which I thought was a really funny book until I got to the long section about things you learn in rehab, which probably shouldn't make me cry because I've never been in rehab and I've never been addicted to a drug, but it made me think of my mother and boy I am not supposed to think about (who I consequently end up thinking about constantly) and about other things in my life and I just wanted to sit down and have a really serious talk probably while drunk, but no one actually likes having serious talks and so I had a serious talk in my head and thus almost cried in the teachers room and then I considered whether this is because I am on my off-week for birth control so my hormones are probably off and then I concluded that must be it, because having feelings would be a much more atrocious conclusion.

I am getting over-excited for my party and liking everyone's comments. This makes me seem slightly desperate. I am going to have the hottest birthday party ever.

My dad is adorable:

My flight arrives in Brussels Saturday, 2/25, at 8 AM. I'm clueless as to what to do after I get to the airport. I'm as nervous as you were last September.

This is made more adorable by the fact that Saturday is the 26th.

I am dying of excitement to see my dad and to travel around the Netherlands/Belgium/Germany with Becca and it's not for several weeks.

Life is just so exciting sometimes.

I am dying of excitement for my birthday party and it's not for a week and a half.

EVERYONE SHOULD GO TO MY BIRTHDAY PARTY.

HE WILL BE THERE:

I'm pretty sure I am now "the American that sometimes comes into Freistadt Mcdonalds." They've alllllll started speaking English to me.

Another question: the Mcdonald's menu is in English. Tonight I wanted a hot chocolate. On the menu it says "dark chocolate" and "white chocolate," but I'm fairly certain if I were to order either of those it would be confusing and so I ordered "ein heisse Schokolade." How do you translate a Mcdo's menu?

Everyone is Galesburg, Illinois is celebrating with a snow day (which seems to largely consist of posting statuses about snow days) and I am waking up while it's still dark in order to go to work.

Sometimes life is really lame.

Trying to go to bed at 9:30 pm is a dumb idea.

Being sick in a small town is lovely. I get to pretend that lying around is purposeful, that I must lie around and do nothing because I feel poorly. Never mind that I do this everyday. I went to the store and stared at the soup section for a long time hoping chicken noodle would appear and it never did. I spent all last night crying along to Gilmore Girls and thinking about how utterly ridiculous it was that I was spending all night crying along to Gilmore Girls. I keep considering that idea that if I didn't say I was upset, no one would know. I tell people because I like to talk about it, because talking about it is the only thing that keeps it real.