Boys, Friends, Professional Life, USA

What I’ve been up to

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So I was bitching about some of the groceries here so let me just mention that Daisy Sour Cream is really good. I usually don’t like sour cream just like that and only eat it in baked potatoes but Daisy’s tastes like German Schmand and doesn’t have that bitter after taste or that texture that makes you think baking soda is in it. So, yay! Having said that, I cooked twice so far this year, which is still pretty bad (2x in 10 days) but much more than this past month so I’m happy. I missed it! Can you believe that?! I had to cook almost every bloody day at home but I’ve really started to miss it. So I made asparagus with ham and potatoes the other day and tonight I had garlic shrimp pasta with fresh tomatoes and sour cream. Yummy!

Work has been going well. I saved the company some money by changing a booth at a trade show and designed some flyers. I was very shocked when my boss who normally doesn’t really give praise wrote “good job” and my other boss said “good job you can go home early”. Normally they don’t say anything or just a short “cool” so I was very happy. Timing is good for their outcries of praise because we need to discuss my next visa. Yikes!

Had a good time outside of work as well with lots of dinners with friends, a birthday party and my new subscription to Netflix. I’ve missed that! Tomorrow night Richard is flying in and we should have a fun weekend around Charlotte.

Oh yeah something random. About a month ago (actually when we were baking cookies) my ex from high school and early college sent me a message and after replying to him he wrote back this looooong one. Well turned out he and his girlfriend have broken up and now he wants to be friends with me. Don’t really see the point after 5 years of not hearing a single thing but oh-kay, I’m a friendly person. Very strange though. I’m so neutral towards him now, he feels like a stranger so I’m not quite sure how he imagines this whole friendship thing. Naja, lets see.

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Internet

Vote for Me!

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So the presidential candidates are still doing a bit campaigning and in the meantime won’t you vote for me? Well for my submission anyway…..

Kai Blum is having a competition on his website for best US blog entry in 2007. I nominated:

“Das merkwuerdige Verhalten amerikanischer Gross-Staedter in der Rush Hour (Dr.Apple goes Pepper!)”

So why don’t you please go to his site http://tausendkleinedinge.blogspot.com/ and send him an email at kaiblum”AT”yahoo.com saying that you vote for “Das merkwuerdige Verhalten amerikanischer Gross-Staedter in der Rush Hour (Dr.Apple goes Pepper!)” so maybe I can win a book for nominating a winner. 😉

THANKSSS!

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Me, Myself & I

Bye-bye Two Thousand Seven

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Eight more hours of 2007 are left here for me and it’s time for the traditional year-end blog entry. It has definitely been a year of changes just like some astrologer on TV had predicted a year ago. The first half of the year I was in Ireland, which was a brilliant experience. The island and I never really hit it off but looking back it was cool to see so much of it and I hope to go back and visit at some point.
I finished university and with that came soul searching for what I want to do in life and where the job hunt would take me. I am unbelievably thankful for how life took it’s course in that area. What are the chances, I visit a friend at a trade show in my home city that is only held every 2 years. He introduces me to his boss who wants my resume, I fly out to Charlotte for three weeks in the summer and get a job offer. Despite all the hurdles in the way, we managed to get a visa for me and wow, now I am here in Charlotte and I really like my job and the city.
People had always asked me what I really want to do later on and I was never quite sure. The only thing that came to my mind was to go back to Charlotte. Feels kind of strange having achieved that goal now. What’s next?! Well, getting a longer visa, which might be another pain (though out of fairness that should be super easy now after that last pain in the butt visa ;-)).
Other than the antagonizing visa fight, this summer and fall I was blessed to spend a lot of time with my friends and family (maybe sometimes too much with the family ;-)), which was awesome. Sadly, my grand-mother passed over at 79 years but there will be a new addition to our family early next year and I can’t wait to see the little one.
New year’s resolution? Hmmm, I don’t really have one. Speak more Italian, look less scary when I’m hungover at work, cook more, join the YMCA, meet more cute guys, the usual….

Happy New Year’s everybody, I hope it’ll be a good one!

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Culture, shopping, USA

Quality

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Having lived in the US for a total of more than 2.5 years, most things here don’t seem strange to me anymore and what might be amazing, irritating, or weird to some newcomers has long become normal to me. However, there is one thing that keeps making me say I miss that from Germany! I’m talking about the quality of groceries. You’d think oranges and tangerines were fantastic here but the oranges at the supermarket are all kind of funky looking with white stuff over them and then they’re partly green and hmpf! The tangerines I bough had a ridiculous amount of seeds in them (think 1-3 per SLICE) and the olives in the glass were partly falling apart like a 3rd grade mushroom in Germany. My baby carrots had some weird portions (not too bad but still) and I don’t have to talk about ham and the like or chocolate, do I?
To be fair, there are some groceries here that are fantastic, like shrimps and beef and most fruits and veggies aren’t too bad. In general though I’d say the quality standards of a lot of German super markets and/or manufacturers are higher (prolly consumer driver).
But who cares about groceries when you can eat out or have TV dinner any day of the week, anyway, right?! (yuk) 😀
Now moving on to face care. Ahhhhhh! Nightmare here! Actually, not fair, it’s only really make-up remover clothes that suck. Spending almost 10$ on them compared to 2Euro in Germany you would expect them to work wonders. Uhm yeah no. Not that great. Same goes for cotton swabs. They practically fall apart here and you’ve got this huge fuzzy thing in your hand after cleaning your ears. Not good! The face cleaner I used in Ireland smells super weird here and is not 100% as effective as the one from there. Hmpf!
One thing I did find to have the same great quality as in Germany though is NIVEA Smooth Sensation Body Lotion but you know, that’s German engineering ;-).

(Just to be fair, there are a lot of items here that I find ok or great or feckin’ brilliant like make-up, my macbook, greeting cards, chex mix, scented candles, ice-cream,…)

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