1.30.2010

things that don't make sense

  • Most of my thoughts
  • Most conversations I have with anyone who twitters
  • Dreams, usually
  • People with whom you lose touch, and seeing them again
  • Black ice
  • Bitchiness
  • Little tiny bags of pretzels on airplanes
  • Metal songs (and the intelligibility of their words)
  • Rap songs (and their lyrics)
  • My headaches
  • Maps of mountains
  • My desk's organization
In other news, President Obama rocked my world recently. I just want to throw that out there.

Love always,
Clara

1.29.2010

ski days: episode three

It was freezing today. I mean, it's always cold, but it was particularly cold and windy today. I decided to wear a pretty scarf instead of my blue fleece turtleneck thing. Bad idea. Fleece things don't get frozen and stiff. Scarves do, no matter how pretty they are.
We went on black slopes, which was fun, but the light was terrible and you couldn't tell what was packed snow and what was powder. Which meant we ended up doing a lot of inadvertent powder skiing. Which meant we did a lot of inadvertent falling on our faces.
It was fun though. Falling in powder isn't bad. Powder is soft.

David: This is how crush babies are made. You put them on the back of your brain to marinate, and then you put it on the stove and it's either done and smells good and delicious, or it burns and you throw it out...

David and I are chatting about the various interesting aspects of our respective love lives. It's a great convo.

Me: Oh I love great convos. Great convos are... great.
David: Let's converse about great convos!

I have a theory: David and I are geniuses. We think in analogies. We've turned life into an olympic sport, people into forests and settlers, and crushes into cancerous embryos marinating. That takes a certain degree of brilliance. Abstract thinking. Neurons performing unconventional activities.
I'd like to go with the "We're geniuses" theory and not the "We're mentally retarded" theory.

Me: [taps camera] Am I doing something?
David: Yes. Congratulations.

Maybe it's just me who's [retarded/a genius, take your pick].

Love always,
Clara

1.28.2010

it's true. look at me, and you will see blondeness.

Robert
your blonder than you look
clara
i look pretty blonde
We're having a chat. As we tend to do.
I hate when people say things like that though. When you say "You're xxxx-er than you look," it's supposed to be something that they don't look! I look pretty blonde! How could I possibly be more blonde than I look?

In related news, Firefox doesn't think 'blonde' is a correctly-spelled word. I don't care though.

It snowed today. It was gorgeous big-flake snow at warm-for-snow temperatures. I loved it.

Natalia: I hate this weather I hate this weather I hate this weather I hate this weather I hate this weather
Me: I like this weather!

I like all weather though, with one notable (and annoying) exception.
Weather I like:
  • Snow
  • Rain
  • Cold and sunny
  • Warm and sunny
  • Epic tunderstorms
  • Warm and cloudy (especially when followed by epic thunderstorms)
Weather I don't like:
  • Cold and cloudy
Weather Switzerland is notorious for:
  • Cold and cloudy
What. The. Hell. This. Is. Not. Fair.

Love always,
Clara

1.27.2010

balloons on the mountain


balloons on the mountain, originally uploaded by csb324.

I am tired. And I just spent like three hours doing physics homework and I didn't even finish the last problem, so I'm going to bed feeling incomplete. I hate that feeling but I've had it basically every night for the past month.
Schoolwork is a pain.

But tomorrow is another day, and the day after that is friday, and friday is ski day. And I'm definitely not as stressed out as I would be in America. I really can't complain.

Love always,
Clara

it's the only way to go

They've blocked facebook at school (in light of recent events that I'm really not going to go into. Just let it be known that the facebook-blocking is not justified.)
This annoys me.
But at least blogger still works.

Edward Burger: Let's draw a picture; it's the only way to go. No, that sounds didactic. It's the only way I go. You can do whatever you want, I guess.

The best part of this is that on the video, at the bottom of the screen (where 'tips' tend to go), it says, "Tip: Drawing a picture of the solid is the only way Professor Burger goes."

God, I love math.

Love always,
Clara

yesterday, in brief

I didn't blog yesterday and for that I apologize because I really wasn't doing anything more valuable with my time.

Yesterday was awkward. One awkward moment basically defined January 26, 2009.
I was in the computer lab working on yearbook. A class of ninth graders was in there. I gave them a survey ("What's your favorite thing about grade nine? What do you do on the weekend?") for yearbook purposes.
I was listening to music the whole time, by the way, which I feel justifies my actions at least a little bit.
Anyway, after a little while, the survey made its way around the room and back to me. I looked at it and realized, much to my dismay, that the ninth graders answered the "What's your best memory of this year?" question in the exact same way as the 8th graders. And the 7th graders. Apparently everyone loves Ski Days and Village Camps (which is their annual camping trip/bonding experience).

Me: Wow, you guys love ski days. [awkward pause] I mean, ski days are great, but y'all are just like the seventh and eighth graders! Except... older. Wow. I'm talking to myself in a very quiet room. I'm digging a hole for myself... okay.
Room: [silence]

It was awkward. Robert came up to me later like "Ooh, ninth graders are like eighth graders, but older!" and I tried to explain what was going through my head but I did not succeed in this, and now the ISBerne class of 2013 thinks I'm crazy.
I mean, it was only a matter of time.

Love always,
Clara

1.25.2010

music binge courtesy of thomas

This isn't even all of the music that he sent me that I liked. There are a few songs that are only for people who live in England (silly U.S. iTunes store needs to keep up), so I'm going to make him send those ones to me.

For now, we have these.

You've Got the Love - Florence + The Machine
Rabbit Heart (Raise it Up) - Florence + The Machine
Cosmic Love - Florence + The Machine
On / Off - Snow Patrol
An Olive Grove Facing the Sea - Snow Patrol
Little Lion Man - Mumford & Sons
Ghosts - Laura Marling
Blue Skies - Noah and the Whale
Unfaithful - Stornoway
L.A. - Amy MacDonald
My Delirium - Ladyhawke
Daisy Dares You - Daisy Dares You
Song for No One - Miike Snow (that's not a typo)
Machines - Biffy Clyro
Shark In the Water (Acoustic) - V V Brown
Stars - The XX
VCR - The XX
Sweet Disposition - The Temper Trap
Running for Life - Eliza Doolittle (My Fair Lady reference! Hooray! Or it's her real name, in which case, that is also cool)
Skeleton Boy - Friendly Fires

I'm loving the overwhelming British-ness of it.

Love always,
Clara

1.24.2010

intelligence test


dog, originally uploaded by csb324.

The online psychology course has decided to "simulate" an intelligence test.
Among the better multiple-choice questions and answers were the following-

How is a bird like an airplane?
Both cause problems for people.

Why do most highways have speed limits?
To annoy drivers.

When people say, "The squeaky wheel gets the grease," what do they mean?
Grease will stop the squeaking.

Online classes are cracking me up lately.

Love always,
Clara

so i totally was focusing but...

Edward Burger: We're going to fill in this area with stripes. People don't wear enough stripes. Or plaid! Would you be caught dead in plaid? I probably would. That's the difference between you and me. But I digress. Anyway, it's this region that we want, and I'll do plaid, in honor-- in case you golf. Maybe some of you are golfers! You know, a lot of golfing people take calculus... you know, to get the ball's velocity... into the hole. Hole in one? Where do you think that phrase comes from? Calculus!

Reasons I love math, #584

Also, I would definitely take fashion advice from this man.

Edward Burger: This probably isn't to scale... I can make 1 anywhere. Do you know how much power I feel, knowing that I can just mark down anywhere I want and call it 1? ... It's not that much power.

Edward Burger: We're going to work through this, but first I'm going to cough. *cough cough* Okay. You know, when you cough, one of two things happens. You either want to cough again, or you feel really great. I'm not going to tell you how I feel.

Love always,
Clara

i've been given an award? or something? lemonade!



I'm not exactly sure what this is. The person who gave it to me (who is a fellow blogger, by the way, and she is pretty cool, and here is a link) doesn't really know what to make of it either, but she was awarded it (lemonade?) and so she awarded a few other people.
Blogger appreciation? Cool.

Anyway, it's been a pretty boring day. Sundays in general are pretty lame in Switzerland. In America, Sundays were my errand-doing-days. Oh, I need new pens! Time to walk to CVS! And take some pictures! And drop off film! And buy more film! And go wander around the bookstore because this is a totally productive activity!
In Switzerland, almost everything is geschlossen. Which means closed, if you don't speak german like the cool kids do, you loser.
(I know that was a biting remark. I'm sorry if it hurt your feelings but welcome to my life. Living abroad is hard and I am taking it out on the people around me)
Which means there can be no CVS trips or RITZ-Camera runs or Books-A-Million wanderings. Also, there are no CVSs or RITZ-Cameras or Books-A-Millions.

Books-A-Million was always a sort of terrible bookstore anyway, to be honest. But it was close, and it was basically across the street from the RITZ-Camera, so it was a nice way to waste time. We used to have a better bookstore in Old Town but then it closed because it turns out people don't like books after all, and then I moved to Switzerland.

Anyway, Sundays are boring over here and so I've been spending most of the day watching videos on youtube, which is a pretty giant waste of time.
Super-productivity begins NOW (or in a few moments).

Oh, also, at Thomas's request, George is getting his own tag, so that you can locate his george-isms quickly and efficiently. And Thomas if you read this, I intend to look up your music recommendations tomorrow, because that would make sense in the grand scheme of my music-blogging-schedule.

Okay. Really. Working beings now.

Love always,
Clara

1.23.2010

vlog vlog vlog


Song: 7/4 (Shoreline) - Broken Social Scene

Basically, I needed cereal and figured, there is a boring way to buy cereal, and there is a fun way to buy cereal. That, and Vivian showed me an awesome vlogger the other day, which has inspired me.

Love always,
Clara

1.22.2010

ski days: episode two

Went skiing with school today. It was phenomenal. I love skiing.
The deal with having ski days on fridays though, is that I'm always too tired to do anything that night. And so is everyone else.
This tendency isn't really a problem. It fits in nicely with my introversion- a full day of social interaction, from morning to night, sort of tires me out anyway. Friday nights are movie nights for Clara.

It's great. I rent something I've never seen on iTunes at watch it by myself. It sounds way more depressing than it is, I swear.

Friday nights actually used to be the perfect television-catch-up nights, but then my favorite quasi-legal online television site shut down. I can't find anything even similar. And don't tell me to go watch hulu; it only works in the states.
Whomever owns hulu, I want you to know: You are withholding your data from the rest of the world, and it is leading us to lives of crime. Just fyi.

Yesterday, Thomas sent me a facebook message of music he thinks I would like (because I mentioned Vampire Weekend in the hallway once). He asked me about it today.

Thomas: So did you check out the songs I sent you?
Me: Well.... okay. Here's the deal. You know I keep a blog? I do. And whenever I download new music, I post my new music on this blog. And I just posted a music-related-post a couple days ago. So I really don't want to check out your music, enjoy it, buy it, and then blog about it, because that would be too many music-related posts in a too-short period of time, see? So I'm definitely going to listen to your songs... in a couple days.
Thomas: ... what?
Me: My life is complicated!

I think I make my life complicated on purpose.

Random fact: Today I discovered that there are zippers on the inner thigh of my ski pants, and the zippers reveal mesh. I think this is for if your inner thighs get too warm while you ski. I have never had that happen, but it's good to know that the ski-pants-makers are prepared for anything.

This has been, altogether, a very random post.
I'm tired. You know how I get.

Love always,
Clara

1.21.2010

Again, not much to say

This is what always happens when my life takes a turn for the personal- I get less to blog about.
For that, I deeply apologize.
To compensate, here is a Real Conversation.

Percy: Look at this girl's teeth! Aren't they sexy? I love it when a girl has really nice teeth.
George: Not that I'm a pervert, but the first thing that came to mind when I heard the words "sexy teeth" was vagina dentata.
Me: *dies*

For those who are unaware, the movie Teeth was based on the (fictional) condition above.

George may or may not be a pervert, but he is certainly a character.

Love always,
Clara

1.20.2010

it's been an interesting few days

I went to school again today. I'm glad I did. It keeps my head on straight (which is something of dire importance).
Tomorrow I have school at the usual hour, which will be less than preferable. I liked this whole roll-out-of-bed-at-whatever-hour-I-please thing. Alas; all good things must come to an end.

I just had a great music binge.

Two Is Better Than One - Boys Like Girls (feat. Taylor Swift)
Girlfriend - Phoenix
Little Secrets - Passion Pit
Sleepyhead - Passion Pit
Ghost Under Rocks - Ra Ra Riot
Got Nuffin - Spoon
Today Was a Fairytale - Taylor Swift
Heartbeat - Nneka
Time of our Lives - Miley Cyrus
Release Me - Agnes

A truly productive 24 hours. On top of all of that, I got some work done!
Not much... but some.

Love always,
Clara

1.19.2010

that's impressive

Edward Burger: Well, now you know how to find the derivative of functions, and you know how to find functions whose derivative is a certain thing, but what can we do with this? Besides impressing your friends at cocktail parties, what is this good for?

I went to school today to work on some things (physics homework, yearbook stuff, having a life, not falling into a hermit-like state).
It was fun. I'm glad I got out of the house.

George: My goodness!
Me: ... My goodness. (sort of making fun of him)
George: Well you can't expect me to say 'My God' if I'm a nonbeliever.

This is true, I suppose. His rationale is just so funny though.

Love always,
Clara

1.18.2010

definitely not okay

clara
this is me trying to be articulate
Mehdi
ok
clara
ok mehdi
Mehdi
ok clara
clara
ok
Sourabh
not ok mehdi and clara
I've figured out how to have a three-way msn conversation. It's vexing my family.

Dad: Can I read to you?
Me: Oh I'd love to... but I'm in the middle of like, five conversations right now.

Mom and Dad and I went skiing today. It was fun, except the only lifts were pull-lifts that drag you along. You sort of have to squat while you ride them, which meant between the lift and the skiing your legs got no break at all.
Then we wandered around Neuchatel and ate lunch.
Switzerland's not so bad.

Also, I am still looking for interview topic ideas! I've gotten a few good ones though...

Love always,
Clara

1.17.2010

new thing!

I am feeling a little bit uninspired. It's probably all of this sitting-around-at-home that I've been doing (mostly against my will, for the record. I jump at any opportunity to leave the house).

Anyway, I have an idea! I am going to interview people about things.
I just don't know what things.

This is where you come in, blog-readers. Strangers, friends, whoever you are, comment below. What are you interested in? What would be a good interview topic? What question do you think would be really awkward (and thusly hilarious) for me to ask someone?
This is your opportunity to make me look like a lunatic!

As if I don't do enough of that on my own.

Oh, on that note, yesterday I went to go see Avatar with the gang. I need a name for the group of 11th grade boys. They're definitely name-worthy. During intermission (because movies have intermissions here), they were all telling jokes.

Danny: ... And so the blonde goes "T. G. I.F. ... thank god it's friday?" and the guy goes "S. H. I. T. ... sorry honey, it's thursday"
Matt: That's so stupid.
Me: Yeah... Oh something like that happened to me once!
Everyone else: [uncontrollable laughter]

They wouldn't let me explain either. It wasn't really me!
This was at camp. There was a weird tension between us nerds and the ballerinas that we shared the camp with already, but that tension escalates on Drag day and Goth/Emo day.
I could ramble on about the intricacies of Nerd/Rina relations at CTY, but the point of the story is that a little dancer was wearing a shirt that said "happy fourth of july!" everywhere... on July 3rd.

Of course, they did not listen to this story. Thomas heard the middle part though.

Thomas: Wait, what was that? I just heard something about goths and ballet. What are you talking to yourself about?

Love always,
Clara

1.15.2010

five guys...

Chris and I were debating hamburgers. I assert that while we Americans may not have invented hamburgers, we pretty much dominate the market now.
He mentioned some kind of awesome German hamburger thing.
clara
okay but you have never had five guys
which is a burger place
in america
Chris
oh
i thought this story was going down a different path
clara
yeah as soon as i typed that i was like '...wait... that's going to be misinterpreted'
That story was going straight to the Five Guys off of King St. God I miss that place.

Love always,
Clara

just keep skiing, skiing, skiing

We went skiing today! It was fun! Hooray!
How long do endorphins last? I'm curious as to whether my mood is a physiological or psychological side effect of skiing. I guess in any case it's psychological. Never mind.

Anyway.

I had to get up earlier to get the train to Zweisimmen, so mom brought me breakfast, which was very nice of her. However, she clearly has no idea how I usually eat breakfast.
My standard breakfast is a cup of coffee (to keep me awake until lunch) and a bowl of swiss-brand Raisin Bran (for all of its fiber and protein and whatever else it is that keeps you full). This morning I had a croissant and a glass of orange juice.
Which was delicious and much appreciated.
But by eleven I was starving, and ready for a nap.

We ate lunch on the mountain, on picnic tables outside. There were little kids running around, because the whole school goes skiing on ski days. I mean like, second grade to twelfth grade. It's kind of awesome. Anyway, these little kids start throwing snowballs at each other, and the 9th grade guys join in, because 9th grade guys are really mature. So Robert-the-freshman invokes the wrath of some fourth grader and decides I am a good shield.
I end up covered in snow, and pissed.
Honestly, I don't get angry very often. Maybe it was just the shock of the cold (on my neck...), but something made me flip out.
Emily commiserated with me. She'd been hit too.

Emily: I usually don't want people to be afraid of me, but times like this, I just want these kids to have a little fear!

So, here is the lesson- Children, respect your elders. Especially if they're cranky because they didn't have coffee this morning.

I told Emily and Rashmeen my epic chair-lift nerdiness. If I'm on a decently long lift and the chairs have numbers (and the numbers go in order), you can ask me at basically any time how many chairs there are to the top or the bottom and I'll be able to answer one of those questions. It's a compulsive thing I think. I like to do math.
I also told them about these songs I know about the parts of speech. I only told them about the songs because I started singing one and I was afraid they would think I was weird.
... Wait. That may have backfired.
Anyway, there was some computer game where you got to explore a treehouse or something, and there were songs about adjectives and such. I remember the words really clearly.

An adjective is the type of word that describes things
(Which one?)
(Whose is it?)
(How many?)
(What kind of?)
See that little green bird?
She's smart and you can hear it!
She can say seven words.
My pretty pretty panama parrot!
That... Little... Green... Smart...
Seven... Pretty... Pretty... Panama!

I may be going out tonight. We will just see about that.
I mean, I might be too busy reliving my youth and singing songs about adjectives.

File this under: I am a bigger dork than you could possibly imagine.

Love always,
Clara

1.14.2010

getting out of the house

That had been on my to-do list for a while. Thank god I did it today.

Here's my day, in a nutshell-

10 am: Wake up. Get on facebook. Harass the crazy Bible Lit. kids who are still awake at 4 am EST writing their essays. They need to get their priorities straight. Sleep trumps everything. Even school. I mean it.

11 am: Figure out math. Thank goodness. The second part of the fundamental theorem of calculus was trying to kill me. But I vanquished it!
Sometimes I like to pretend things like math and physics are little tiny battles. Huzzah!

12 pm: Get ready to go to school.
12:32 pm: Watch the 12:31 tram leave. Wait in the cold for the next one. Write in a notebook sitting on a snowy bench. Don't write about cold benches. Write about snow instead.

1 pm: Yearbook meeting! We didn't really have much to say. I brought my Potomac yearbook (from last year) in because I thought it was really good, and I'm secretly trying to turn this school into my old school, from the inside. Percy went through the pages looking for hot girls. He found quite a few, naturally. Margo, if you read this, you have a fan in Switzerland.

2 pm: Sit in the computer lab and work on yearbook by myself.

3 pm: Oren joins me in the computer lab. I try to explain what I'm trying to do. He doesn't get it. He asks me a question about enthalpy. I don't remember anything about it. So it goes.

4 pm: Leave school. Take tram. Meet Mehdi and Sourabh on the tram. They invite Oren and I to join them for chicken. There is one rule- we must eat with our hands.
We go to Migros and buy chicken. We eat it with our hands. I feel very unladylike, but I must prove myself. Using a fork is blasphemy in this crowd. I cannot afford to blow this opportunity to join the League of Extraordinary Chicken-Eating Gentlemen (which is their name). It's delicious, anyway, and my sense of dignity is pretty much used to being pushed aside by now. Then we gossip for a while. Guys pretend they don't gossip, but they do. I'm just reporting the facts.
I tell them epic stories of my life. They formulate a plan that I am definitely not going to carry out. They judge girls who walk by. Fun is had by all.

6:30 pm: I realize I never really told anyone where I was going, I forgot my phone at home, and I've been gone for like, six hours. I return. Mom is excited to see me. She's like Chili-dog sometimes.

And then I get back to my routine- do some work, waste some time, waste more time, get back to work, repeat.

Also, I just downloaded Contra (Vampire Weekend). I'm a fan. I'm really liking this buying-albums thing.
Favorite songs off of Contra- Diplomat's Son, Giving Up the Gun, Holiday, I Think Ur a Contra

Love always,
Clara