limerick day

So we're sitting at The Gate eating overly greasy pizza and meeting Valerie's (frankly somewhat bizarre) physics friend, when someone brings up the fact that Teddy likes to write limericks in his spare time.
I find it necessary to compose one about Andrew on the spot.

There once was a young man named Bower
Who lived in a very tall tower
His roommate was home
But he wasn't alone
So he banged his girlfriend in the shower

Not my best work, but in my opinion, impressive under the circumstances. It appears that I've started something. Suddenly we're on a roll.

There once was a boy from new york
Whose penis was damaged by torque
He screamed out in pain
(She'd thought that he came)
But she left him unable to pork

This went on for quite a while, and believe me when I say I've posted the tamest of the limericks. They were raunchy (which is the best way for a limerick to be).
Coincidentally, May 12th is Limerick Day. I swear to god, we didn't know this.

Love always,
Clara

good christians

My mother used to tell me that her parents would go out on a saturday night, have a wild time, and stay out late enough to stumble into church on sunday in the same clothes.
I'd like to say that I have made time to change my clothes.
Therefore, I'm not quite as badass as my grandparents.

Yet.

Last night was pretty fun though. I'm getting better at beer pong.
The turning point, for me, was beginning to use the Stefan method, which is rather unlike most other methods. I couldn't describe it because I don't know the right words to use (flicking? backhand? topspin?) but he should definitely make instructional videos sometime. I held my own last night, which is a first.

This has been tales of debauchery on Easter Weekend, with your host, Clara Beyer.

Love always,
Clara

five st. patrick's days

I'm going to take a stab at blogging about my personal life, because all of the events I'm about to discuss happened so long ago that they're no longer relevant. That's a disclaimer.

2007.
I'm a freshman, living in America. It's second semester, and I feel like I've got high school more or less figured out. All I remember about that particular day (my memory aided of course by blog posts that you will never see) is that I talked to Katie in the dark room about my crush (oh to be fourteen again) during photography, and we bitched about our mothers.

2008.
I'm in Germany with chorus, and I'm dating a boy named Will. This day does not go as planned.
We spend the afternoon in Munich. I go shopping with Summer and some of her friends, and we have a long conversation comparing sexual activity to clothing chains in Europe (which, by the way, is a big place). Will is with the senior boys at an irish pub, drinking beer, which is legal for sixteen year olds in Germany (not to say that he was sixteen at all). I am not sure whether to be annoyed with him for drinking or for not inviting me.
Later we're at the hotel and he tries to take off my new sweater (pink, striped, from H&M, I hate that sweater and cannot wear it without thinking of this moment). I don't let him, and that put the nail in our coffin.

2009.
I'm in Italy with latin class. Those of us who are feeling rebellious at the particular moment (a figure guaranteed to be above 50% in a given group of high school students) are absolutely determined to get drunk. It's my first time hitting the town, as it were. If Will were here, he would make us find an Irish pub in Rome, but he's not, and none of us like beer anyway. Katie, Eleni and I wind up sitting in a cafe with a bottle of cheap red wine. Then Lindsay turns up, we finish the wine, and we tumble out into the streets of Rome. Lindsay finds a bar, and asks for something "hard and delicious." She takes the chaser shot of grapefruit juice first and it is abundantly clear that none of us have any idea what we are doing. I find a twisted pleasure in the fact that it has been one year since last St. Patrick's Day.

2010.
I have hit my stride in Switzerland. I have also found myself in a position of rebellion once again. I am generally dissatisfied with the administration at my high school, for reasons I can't remember (except that March tends to be the time for that kind of thing, don't you think?). Regardless, I'm feeling good about living there, even though no one at all seems to understand me. I wear green today, and ask others why they're not, and no one knows what I'm talking about. I guess St. Patrick's Day is a bigger deal in a country full of immigrants (some of whom are bound to be Irish) than a country decidedly opposed to immigrants.

2011.
I'm back in the states. It has only just occurred to me that this is the first St. Patrick's Day for which I've been in America since freshman year. It's a good day so far. I was only at post- until 2:30 last night, and I woke up at eleven feeling rested and excited. I'm wearing green.
Today is going to be good.

Love always,
Clara

valentine's day

Happy Valentine's day!

I woke up this morning to the sound of the Keeney fire alarm. It was not ideal. So I started the day in a sort of disgruntled fog. I went to classes, failed to focus, had lunch, induced a sugar high, and promptly came home and crashed. After napping for a couple hours I felt much better.

At that point I remembered that I really like holidays, regardless of my relationship status or romantic prospects at the moment. I had not fully embraced that which is valentine's day.

Valentine's day can be about dating people, but it also has a lot to do with chocolate and the color pink, which are things that I like.

I put on my purple tights and red and pink mardi gras beads. The day got a lot better from there.

Nick the neighbor came by to serenade Genevieve and I. That was pretty cool. Then, when I was sitting on John's floor cutting bits out of magazines, two guys named Sam and JP showed up and serenaded us as well. I've been serenaded three times in the past four days, and I am loving it.

Also, if I might reiterate, chocolate.

That is all.

Love always,

Clara

bread pudding!

I spent two hours in the kitchen today pouring sugar and cinnamon and milk on bits of bread and calling it culinary.

The end result was delicious so I am beyond thrilled.

Literally had bread pudding cupcake things (cupcake here is a loose term indicating that they were discrete, and roundish) for lunch and dinner. Turns out, they don't provide a ton of lasting energy (hello carbohydrates, how are you doing today?) so then I had some peanuts.

I win nutrition.

Tonight I discovered that my mother owns a bright lime green corset. I want to steal it. It's not a lingerie-type corset; it's a top-part-of-a-gown-type corset. I'm sure there's a word for it.

Anyway, it fits and I kind of want to wear it around like it's a normal thing to wear. Bring it into style. Rock it with jeans and sunglasses.

Maybe I'm just on a prolonged sugar high.

That is a plausible explanation of my mood.

Also the fact that I haven't left the house all day. That always does crazy things to my head. I couldn't be bothered though. There's nothing to do on Sundays in this country anyway. And I had discrete-and-round bread puddings to make. And eat.

This is what things are like these days. Luckily I'll be back at school in two weeks, where at least my insanity is in good company.

Quotes without Context: Holiday edition #4

"Your screw is loose! Do you want me to drive it?!"

Did I imply above that there are not many insane people right here? I retract that implication.

Love always,

Clara

it's been said before

I'm five years old.

In half an hour I have to go to the dentist and I kind of want to cry. I just don't want to go.

They're going to poke me with needles and yell at me in german and strip me of my autonomy and make my mouth hurt.

I don't like any of these things.

I've never had a good relationship with dentists.

I take sick pleasure in the fact that they have one of the highest suicide rates of any profession. I say, yeah, fuck you dentists, go kill yourselves.

(Which, I acknowledge, is a just terrible thought to have)

The worst part is that I actually know some dentists personally and they're fine people. I wouldn't say they're the most stimulating company, but they're not the kind of people I would wish death upon under normal circumstances.

But... dentists. It's unforgivable, really.

Quote without context: Holiday edition #2

"Can Simone touch them?"

Love always,

Clara

with the parents again

Mom: Want some vino? Your dad and I are going to watch Rome.

Sometimes it occurs to me that I may as well not have left college. Things are actually not all that different over here.

Although watching graphic sex scenes at school is totally okay, and watching graphic sex scenes with my parents is totally not okay.

In related news, we watched The Kids are All Right tonight. It was great, except for all of those graphic sex scenes with my parents in the room.

There is something decidedly gross about that.

I, naturally, thought the happy ending was when the oldest daughter got to go away to college and escape the madness that was her domestic situation. I was literally cheering for it.

I think that every day for the next week, I'm going to post a quote without context from new years, because there are so many great ones.

So, here we go.

Quotes without context: Holiday edition #1

"If you let her film you, she'll tell you about her vagina in winter"

Love always,

Clara

goodbye, 2010, hello 2011

Last night was fantastic. It completely lived up to everyone's high hopes. I haven't had such a hilarious time in town in ages.

Also, I love champagne.

Me: I want to take a picture of the bottle of champagne in the snow and be like... poppin bottles on ice, like a blizzard.

I totally did do that, for the record.

Now it's 2011 and it's time to make resolutions! I'l try. No promises. I'm not big on having flaws to begin with (read: acknowledging flaws out loud).

1. Be less flakey.
2. I am only allowed to take out the trash when it is actually full.
3. Work out at least once a week.
4. Keep yourself organized.
5. If I'm going to take a nap, I should set an alarm to wake me up at a designated time.
6. Drink more water.
7. Be confident, because I'm fantastic.

Okay.

I think I can stick to most of those.

If not, I can just flake out. And break more. And be problematic. But fantastic!

Love always,

Clara

merry christmas!

I hope you enjoyed that last brief post. I enjoyed it.

Merry christmas everyone, for real. My holiday was lovely. I've discovered yet again that it is when I get tired of people that I come out and act like myself.

I'm trying to think of a better way to phrase that but nothing comes to mind.

As I've said before, I really do love my family. Really.

But when my cousins are talking about the details of their respective fourth grade little league careers with my uncle, at a certain point I can't not make fun of them. It's just too easy, and I can only hold back for so long.

We had to cook today. Only the womenfolk. I think the logic of this, on the surface, was that we were the ones who knew how to cook, and the men would be useless. I pointed out later that if we were really electing chefs by that standard, then mom and I should have stayed the hell out.

I think the relatives are trying to domesticate us.

I, for one, will not stand for that.

The problem is, I can't see myself being much of a breadwinner, but I am most certainly not housewife material. I am curious to discover my role in my own family when I find someone willing to marry me.

I sure hope he can cook.

Love always,

Clara

x rated

Hey guys.

I'm not supposed to be participating in free labor over the long weekend, hence the lack of blogging.

Have to share a few thanksgiving real conversations though.

Dave: Kathy, who won the Redskins game last week?

Kathy: ... the Redskins.

Dave: And who's going to win next week?

Kathy: ... not you!

Weetie: Clara, tell us your most embarrassing college story.

Jordy: What about your best x-rated story?

Carly: Grampy's here!

Buck: I'll cover one ear.

I opted out anyways. Not sure my x-rated stories are very interesting. The funniest ones are probably on the risque end of PG-13 anyway.

Now I'm staying with the Gee fam, because they are wonderful.

Tonight will be one for the history books, I feel.

Love always,

Clara

what a weekend

This weekend was insane.

Let's just go through this step by step.

FRIDAY

1:00 - Get out of class.

1:15 - Catch a cab to the airport.

1:40 - Go through security. Get searched, because I'm going to DC and not checking any luggage, which is suspicious. Find it weird, anyway, that they had to pat me down, seeing as the clothing I tend to wear is pretty tight. Where would I be hiding anything?

2:15 - Hang out at the airport bookstore. Move Glenn Beck's books to the children's section. Feel clever, although I certainly hope no children really pick that book up. Yikes.

2:50 - Flight takes off.

4:15 - Land at National. See house. Get unduly excited at the thought of being back in my hometown.

One thing I've noticed about the life itinerant is that perhaps, rather than being more or less homeless, everywhere I go is home. This weekend I went home, and then I went back home, and I'm going home again over thanksgiving, going home, going home over winter break, going home at the end of january, and then going home again sometime in March or April to see my baby niece (!!!!)

4:17 - Get on the Metro. I love not checking baggage. SO worth the awkward pat-down.

5:30 - Meet Vivian in Rockville. Go back to her house. Eat Brazilian food.

6:3o--1:00 - Do weird things. Vivian and I read through our entire Wall-to-Wall looking for quotes without context. I catch Vivian up on the past season and a half of Gossip Girl. Daphna calls. I try to learn how to play the ukelele.

Me: So Serena is like "ohhhh I don't know what to dooo everybody just likes me!" and Juliette is like "*obvious scheming*" and Nate is like "You like me? OK! You're teaching dentistry to midgets? OK!"

1:15 - Go to bed.

SATURDAY

8:30 - Wake up.

9:30 - Go to Vivian's friend's house for breakfast. It turns out, Vivian's friend's dad is a columnist that I used to read all the time (back when I got the Washington Post). Get excited.

10:20 - Get to the Silver Spring Metro stop. Get seats, because it's early and Silver Spring is near the end of the line.

10:25 - Realize that the crowd on this Metro is only a taste of what is certainly to come. Feel like a sardine.

11:30 - Arrive in Metro Center. Try to meet Sam at Caribou Coffee but he is not there. Get caught up in the general enthusiasm of the day, and probably rant about the impossibility of meeting people anywhere else, because there are literally hundreds of thousands of people here.

12:15 - Get to a crowd of people dense enough that it must be considered the Rally.

12:23 - See some cool signs.

12:48 - Get stepped on.

12:57 - Try to hear something. Realize that this is futile.

(lather, rinse, repeat)

Angry Guy: PUT DOWN YOUR SIGN! WE CAN'T SEE! PUT DOWN YOUR SIGN PLEASE!

Me: Yeah, and if everyone could shrink by about a foot, that would be great too!

People around me: *giggles*

1:30 - Reason that while we've had the Rally experience, the rational thing to do would be to locate a TV in a warm food-serving environment from which we could watch the end of the Rally.

1:50 - Get out of the densest part of the crowd. Use our awesome DC-native knowledge to navigate to Union Station.

2:00 - Go to UNO's. Have some deep dish pizza. Have a sassy waiter named Tommy. Tommy inexplicably hates us, because we ordered an appetizer or something.

2:50 - Catch the metro to the airport.

4:15 - Buy a Washington DC shot glass. Buying an Alexandria one is on my to-do list.

4:35 - Get on the bus from the terminal to the actual airplane. Strike up conversation with a family from Indiana who was at the Rally as well. Engage in intelligent political discourse with various bus passengers. Make a friend.

4:59 - Take off for Philadelphia.

5:45 - The kid from the bus runs after me to exchange facebook-friendship. I may have been short with him. I was in a hurry. Regardless, we are now facebook friends.

5:55 - Board flight for Providence.

7:30 - Land.

7:40 - Catch a cab back to campus. I had a very nice cab driver. He was probably around my age, going to college during the day and driving taxis at night. He was from Syria, and wanted to go to med school. I told him to rock on.

8:00 - Get back to school. Change into my Halloween costume. Spend a good amount of time trying to make myself look like Marie Antoinette.

9:45 - Go with Hannah to Jameson. Chill there for a bit. Realize that most people are dressed with a Harry Potter theme. Audrey drew a sick Dark Mark on Scott's arm.

10:20 - The hallway party is dissolving. Jump on the bandwagon going to the Harry Potter party. Decide that for the purposes of this party, I'm a veela. Realize too late that John and Alex are still in the back, taking pictures of themselves and uploading them to facebook.

10:30 - Get to the Harry Potter party. Drink Butterbeer which involves cream soda and is actually delicious. Meet a "Hipster Harry Potter". Meet a girl with whom I'm friends on facebook.

later - Decide to leave. Get my tiara tangled in the fake spiderwebs on the stairs.

Me: Oh my god! I'm a spider web!

Guy: You're a spider web? That's not very sexy.

Me: I know! It's a problem!

later - Go into a chinese restaurant to use the bathroom. Commit some crimes.

later - Hit up the frat scene. Make some friends. Lose Hannah. Find Hannah. Go outdoors.

later - Meet some guys who were either seriously from Yale, or dressed up as guys from Yale. They said their costume was "Ivy League Douches". Yale kids seem cool enough to make fun of themselves that way, but they might have been serious.

later - Meet someone dressed up as "Security" who is trying to mess with people, telling us not to stand in certain places and whatnot. I tell him that I'm Princess Peach and that he does not want to fuck with royalty.

later - I seem to recall talking to someone about the fact that I'm a shiksa? i.e. a non-jewish girl? I'm not sure how anyone got onto this topic.

later - I want food. Hannah and I go to the new cone place. The new cone place serves pizza and other food items in a cone. I get eggplant parmesan ... in a cone. We meet Jackie and her friend, who are dressed as sexy founding fathers.

Jacqueline: we the white male landowners, in order to serve our corporate interests, do delcare:
1. all founding fathers look the same.
2. if it's not slutty, it's not halloween

2:00ish? - Go home. Fall asleep.

SUNDAY

10:30 - Decide that church bells are a tool of the devil, ironically.

11:00 - Actually get out of bed.

1:00 - Go to the library. Actually get shit done for the first time this weekend.

2:30 - Walk to the other side of campus to try to arrange Hakuna Matata.

3:00 - Try to teach said arrangement to other people. Feel ineffective.

4:15 - Go to the Brown Bookstore. Chill there for a while.

5:00 - Post- meeting.

6:30 - Get dinner. Feel like soup. Feel a head-cold coming on.

8:00 - Try to do linguistics. Feel the desire to hit my head against the wall. Repeatedly.

9:00--12:00 - Watch three hours of Law and Order.

12:30 - Go to bed.

And now it's Monday and I have class and almost definitely a sinus infection. But it's so cold! Shouldn't the cold have frozen all of the allergens? Does that even make sense?

I don't know. My ears hurt. And my head feels strange.

Well, if this weakened-immune-system was brought on by anything this weekend... it was worth it.

Love always,

Clara

an awesome birthday and self-tanner

Apparently, wearing a slightly sparkly dress in a grocery store at 9 o'clock is a sketchy thing to do, judging by the creepy looks that just about every guy in the Migros gave me.

I was just buying a Coke!

I discovered a cool thing today that I will share, not because I think I'm some kind of expert beauty blogger or something, but because it's legit useful for the useless people among us. Myself included.

I have this tanning moisturizer. And it works. Well. Maybe a little too well, because I never rub it in enough, or the right way, or something, and I end up looking half-tan-half-not like some kind of freaky orange zebra.

I haven't had good experiences with self-tanners in general. I had always assumed the spray ones were more even, but I have had a chemical phobia since I was like, eleven, so spraying potentially toxic molecules all over my 8-square-foot bathroom did not ever feel like a good idea.

But it was spring of eighth grade, and the peer pressure was beginning to take hold. I'd gone skiing that spring break, so obviously that wasn't the best opportunity to work on remedying my paleness, so I figured I'd give tan-in-a-can a go.

I wake up the next morning looking like my legs got into a fight, but the bruises turned orange.

Now, if most people had such a disastrous self-tanning fail, they'd just cover up until it faded. I didn't even have that option. The school uniform in eighth grade was a kilt and a polo shirt.

And in the afternoon I had to play softball.

It was embarrassing.

Anyway, that was the worst, but not the last of my epic self-tanner escapades (because I have my mom's terrible pale irish skin, and I don't really tan naturally at all).

The point of this whole rant, is that I discovered today that if your tanning moisturizer is too legit, you can mix it with regular moisturizer, and then it's easier to rub it in because there's more of it.

Cool, right?

Anyway, I'm totally unashamed of the fact that I spend time thinking about these things.

Also, I'm wiped. Goodnight.

Love always,
Clara

merry christmas!

I love holidays.

Most of the fam is at church. I'm embracing my secular side.

Merry Christmas!

Love always,
Clara

super busy with family and such

I'm on my dad's computer right now. I will admit, I sort of hate his keyboard a lot, so I'm going to keep this short.

We currently have eleven family members besides ourselves living in my house. It's always exciting.

Chilidog ate chocolate the other day and started acting like it was cocaine or something. He goes from zero to lunatic in about two minutes, if chocolate is involved. We took him to the vet and now he's fine, but his sugar high was sort of scary/hilarious while it lasted.

Last minute Christmas shopping is a blast and a half.

Picking up holgapics that I should have gotten developed months ago is always a fun and surprising experience.

New rule for Clara's photography: Portraits portraits portraits. Taking portraits is more interesting than taking random architecture shots, which was basically my modus operandi for the past while.

We ate fondue in the garage last night. I mean, they managed to turn the garage into like, a shrine to christmas, so it was a very classy festive event. All I have to say about that is, melty cheese is wonderful.

I sure do love melty cheese.

For the Christians and non-religious-christmas-celebrators (such as myself) out there, happy Christmas Eve!

Love always,
Clara

it's christmastime!

I'm not a huge fan of religion.
However, I am a huge fan of Christmas.
Eggnog lattes, little lights, and christmas music, please. There are less than two weeks until my favorite holiday, so I'm getting pumped.

This is Clemens, in the student lounge, covered in Christmas lights that I bought at Coop the other day. He was our christmas tree for about two minutes. The lights now hang over the computers. It's very festive, and I'm a huge fan.

Sufjan Stevens has a song called "Come on! Let's Boogey to the Elf Dance!" and I think everyone needs to know about it. Also, Lady GaGa has an incredibly sexual christmas song called "Christmas Tree"

light me up, put me on top
let's fa la la la la la la la
the only place you'll want to be
is underneath my christmas tree

Um, whoa.

Love always,
Clara

HAPPY FOURTH OF JULY!

What a lovely holiday.

I like fireworks and america. I also like the opportunity to play dress up that every holiday seems to bring. Right now I'm wearing white jeans, a blue obama t-shirt, and my red and pink heart necklaces from valentine's day. They were from CVS. I might go to CVS later today, because I have to pick up my Holgas in about an hour, and I might find myself buying more patriotic costumery there.

Last night a bunch of us went and hung out at this playground in mclean and watched the neighbors set off fireworks. It was cool.

More picnics like that need to happen.

Tonight I'm going into McLean again to watch more fireworks. It's going to be awesome. I kind of have to relish these things now, because I know that for the next few years, my Independence Day celebrations will be more official affairs. Although I'm hoping they'll still let me play dress up in Switzerland.

This fourth of july is pretty cool too, because it's the first one in a while where I like the president. I suppose I've liked America for the past nine years, but it's hard to get enthusiastic when you're not a fan of G. Dubs.

America is pretty great though.

Weird thought- Once I move and get swiss friends (NOTE TO SWISS PEOPLE- BE FRIENDS WITH ME!) maybe they'll read this and it will seem foreign to them, seeing as they are not american. 

I don't know what to make of that.

I don't know what to make of a lot of things lately. Not helping the insomnia (which is still going strong, by the way). If the blogging seems sparse, it's because I don't know what to make of anything. I blog when I think I know what's going on. I am, right now, as they say, uncertain about a lot of things, mostly having to do with moving.

My god. I'm so cliche. Sorry, ignore me.

Love always,
Clara

Happy Valentine's Day!

Valentine's day is an interesting holiday.

Pros:

• It's festive
• Pink is among my favorite colors
• Love is a great thing
• Candy is wonderful
• Cupid is kind of cute
• It's an excuse to be enthusiastic
• If you're in a relationship, you can go out and be romantic and whatnot

Cons:

• Some single people get mopey about it (I talked to a few people yesterday who said they were going to wear all black in spirit of 'singles awareness day')
• It's kind of awkward if you're in a relationship
• It's rather awkward if you're not, but good friends of yours are
• There's nothing to do that night if you're not, because other people are out.
• Red isn't a flattering color
• Ask Daphne and Apollo; Cupid's a vicious little brat

In the end, I like holidays. So yeah, I basically wore head to toe pink today, with cheap CVS beads and everything.

On another note, I've decided tiaras need to be in style. Because I almost wore one today (it was pink). And I didn't, but I decided it was a good look for me.

So I might rock that look in the near future.

Love always,
Clara

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

Yayyyy!
I hope your new year's eve happenings were as entertaining as mine.
Don't expect any powerblogging from me in the near future. My computer is throwing a hissyfit and I'm going to have to take it to the apple place once I get back in town.
I do not want to wait.
I do not want to use this computer that I am currently using, because the keyboard is really quite annoying.

These people around me are so hungover it's hilarious.

Love always,
Clara

Interesting phenomenon

This morning, the facebook statuses were mostly "Merry christmas!" or "yay new iPhone! need your numbers!" or "loving the holiday spirit :)"

Generally happy holiday-oriented statuses. There's the odd athiest/jew/other random non-christmas person, whose status is like "very cold" or random song lyrics or something completely related, of course, but in general, happiness.

By the end of the day, say, 10 PM, the statuses sing a different tune.

"Emily has an extremely disfunctional family"

"Kelsey is wishing she liked her family more"

and the most dramatic...

"Liam is man f*** my family, f***ing drunkass passive agressive [sic] f***ers"

So I'm kind of getting the impression that the holidays are getting a little old...

Just an observation.

Love always,

Clara

Late Last Night...

IM conversations on christmas eve are fun...

"Maybe he doesn't want baby vishnu to know either?"

--Me. Can't really explain.

Real Conversation late last night:

[redacted]: Why cant he be a normal unconfusing boy 

[redacted]: and that would be that?

Me: hahahaHAHAHAHahahaha

Me: Boy?

Me: Unconfusing?

Me: what world are you LIVING in?

Love always,
Clara