Longing
I was walking through Chinatown on lunch the other day and passed through a park full of old Chinese, mostly men gambling, sitting and talking. The sight and sound of them talking, along with the chill in the air broken by a bit of sun, took me back to Europe for a moment. Not so much the sound of Chinese, but the overall foreigness (and familiarity) of it all--parks, pensioners, chilly weather, autumn-type sun and that brief sensation that I could have been anywhere at that moment. For the most part I've felt comfortable with my decision to stay here a while, but that moment made me long for being elsewhere, for the excitement of living in a place where everything's new, and even going to the store is an adventure in its own way.

had the weirdest dream last night. Was at HDC 2008, not to work but just dropping by. The IPC was in shambles--no baking, no espresso, no food, just 6-7 workers standing round not doing much and looking lost. Boxes everywhere, nothing unpacked. No decorations on the walls. No sofas to lounge on. No customers. A small ice cream display case, with much of the ice cream melting (close the door!). When I scooped some for myself I found a long hair in it. Nasty.

Is this what will happen if I don't return this summer?!

BBC NEWS | UK | Scotland | Glasgow, Lanarkshire and West | Bike sex case sparks legal debate

And people say Americans are uptight...

For fuck's sake! No wonder the American attention span is about 1 minute long. I've been watching "Heroes" on tv and for every 5 or so minutes of show, there's 3 minutes of commercials. Plus they run these annoying little mini-ads at the bottom of the screen. Picture in picture is definitely an American invention.

Ya know, when I lived in Europe I wrote of much more interesting things than this...

Alright everyone. Is it just me or does simply being in America make you want to buy stuff? Why is that? Is it because I can actually understand the ads here and they thus influence me? Is it because I'm working regularly here and thus have a little more dosh to splash out? Is it because there are shops almost everywhere? Or is it because shops are not closed on weekends, and instead stay open almost every day of the week (and stay open late at that)?

Or is it because life here is so much about consumerism and ths unfulfilling in the end, which in turn causes us to try to consume more and more in a futile attempt to find satisfaction and wholeness in our next purchase?

I never felt the pressure to consume the way I do in the US. Then again, there weren't as many opportunities to spend lots of money on stuff in the Baltics.

Aftonbladet: Herr�ng lockar hela v�rlden

Did I mention I was in a Swedish newspaper (and TV interview)?

ILM.EE — Ilmategija Internetis
Why is it the weather in Tallinn of all places is better than San Francisco's?!

Hmmmm...maybe I should move again.

Nicked this from a long-lost once-upon-a-time friend's blog. Not sure where she found it but I thought it was amusing.

"The problem with defending the English language is that the English language is as pure as a crib-house whore. It not only borrows words from other languages; it has on occasion chased other languages down dark alleyways, clubbed them unconscious and rifled their pockets for vocabulary."

~ James Nicoll