Ninjas STILL can't catch you if you're on fire

AND ALREADY IT SEEMS LIKE 5 HOURS HAVE PASSED BY IN AN INSTANT. I have a bazillion tabs open at the moment, am currently trying to catch up with assorted internet happenings and am right-click-saving my way through the assorted rahmbamarama EPIC SPAM POSTS like a crazy person. Oh the fact that I can actually save pictures at a normal speed now is a gift that could not have come at a better time *pets laptop gratefully*.

My trip back to Vienna was thankfully not as full of UTTER FAIL!!1 as the first leg of my annual 'Let's go visit the grandpaaaaaaarents' journey was. The bus to Zell was punctual and nice and the train that DIRECTLY WENT TO VIENNA FROM ZELL AM SEE was so fucking glorious that I am seriously considering never to travel by train using the Salzburg connection ever again. So what if it's a late one and I end up getting in Vienna at nearly 10PM. I could park my ass in my reserved train compartment and not move for 5 hours! Life was goood.

AAAND I admit the ride was kind of sweetened by the fact that the dude who ended up in our compartment from Salzburg to St. Pölten turned out to be this artsy comic and eastern kung-fu movie buff called Marc with whom I ended up having a really fun and profanity-filled conversation with (much to the consternation of the mother of two bratty boys who was also there). We ended up trading numbers and vague promises to 'totally meet up in Vienna or something sometime' to geek out some more, hee. And of course, the moment he left and I settled back to chillax and wait to finally arrive in Vienna, I realized that I couldn't actually really describe his looks to you guys. He was cute enough though, in this normal and slightly scruffy way, with light brown hair that was slightly messy. One of these hip-hop fans who actually writes their own stuff too (but thankfully not (dressed like) a total tool). I actually was mostly distracted from his face because I was trying to squint at the weird tattoo he had on his left arm (...a skeleton on a playing cards background?), the right arm had the usual skater/hip-hopper star thing. It is also probably a depressing thing to note about my taste in guys, but I was kind of charmed by how his favorite adjective to designate something super awesome was "fresh". Please, if you can, imagine the following statement with the fresh being said in this austro-accent: "Des ist einfach voll fresh, oida!" akfhfakjsdhf, daww ♥
BUT WELL THAT ASIDE, I actually looked like shit myself, d'oh travelfaaaaaaaace >_>;; Should probably slap up some awesome links for him tomorrow in an email or something though, lol.

I LEAVE YOU ALL NOW WITH A PICTORIAL REPRESENTATION OF MY CURRENT STATE:

Dearest Sabrina has somehow managed to eff up her key situation again! This time managing to forget her keys in her friend's car in Niederösterreich! Man, is she ever so lucky that I am a total internet addict and thus always to be found awake and at home, even at a quarter to 1AM. But seriously, this is now the THIRD TIME THIS YEAR ALONE that she has lost and in this case, 'misplaced' her keys. Is a part of her somehow morally opposed to the things? Does she not like the safety of a security lock clicking shut?? How can one person keep losing their keys so often? I grope for my keys in my bags basically every other hour to make sure that they're there, and I have em attached to these giant keychains and all. I forced myself to actually talk about what to do about this with her though, as I am leaving on Monday for winter hols at my grandparents, and like fuck am I not gonna be doing so without locking the shit out of our front door thing as well. So I shall probably be making a pit-stop to the Keysmith's at the MC tomorrow! I hope they can get a duplicate done in a day, ahh. But I also hope they charge a buttfuck of cash for it, Sabrina gave me 50€ for it after all (I drew the line at actually offering to pay for it in advance myself lol eff no).

BUT THAT ASIDE: I HAVE NO MORE EXAMS THIS SEMESTER! NO MORE IMMEDIATE DEADLINES! JUST THE LOOMING ONES OF JANUARY THAT I WILL HAVE TO ADDRESS NEXT WEEK ALREADY BECAUSE I WILL BE SCREWED OTHERWISE! WOOO! The Soziologie exam went okay, as always it could've been better, but I am still hoping and praying for just a pass. LET ME PASS THIS LAST ELECTIVE COURSE PLEASE OH PLEASE. The Bakk1 assignment that I was supposed to hand in this Tuesday, didn't and just effed something down in MS Word in a blind panic and gave the print-out to the teacher this session was also okay, she apparently is really super chill. I mean okay, she said to give a 'status report' of what we have done so far, and mine is basically: "UHHH I copied about 400 pages that I have stuck in binders and not read yet? HERE HAVE A VAGUE INDEX. AND A PARAGRAPH OF INTRODUCTION. WITH PARENTHESIZES. AND SOME 85 WORDS ON WHY I WANT TO DO IT :DD PLEASE DON'T FAIL ME (YET) I DIDN'T KNOW EVERYBODY ELSE WOULD ALREADY HAVE SO MUCH DONE AHHHHH."
To end this academic BAWW-ing on a more positive note though: I got the HIST and PR exam grades back! PR was an admittedly embarrassing 4 (I TOOK THE EXAM TWICE AND STILL BARELY PASSED *headdesk*), but I was pleasantly suprised by the 2!! I got in HIST. A TWO!! Motherfuck! :DD

Tomorrow I attempt to get my remaining Christmas shopping done! And start getting used to not seeing Carmen again until January :( ...lol the worst part for both of us is always the first few days not at the dorms where you realize you suddenly CAN'T always call the other person 24-7 for no real reason other than to just share deep, deep thoughts like 'DUDE HAVE YOU SEEN WEBSITE XY' and 'I'M BORED WHAT ARE YOU DOING'. Though I did possibly save her from missing her flight tomorrow morning, because I tried calling her after my BAKK1 to complain about how cold it was at the bus station and that the bus just left (=like I said, we have deep conversations) and it didn't work because she still had her phone on silent mode from the exam, and would've forgotten to switch it back to normal otherwise XDD. GOOD DEED OF THE DAY, KER-DONE!

SO these past few days, I have managed to:

♥ go to bed LATE AS FUCK (3AM-4AM baaaw), but also wake up LATE AS FUCK (1PM-2PM) so I hope this at least means my amount of sleep stored is somewhat back to normal. Thank god for long weekends! Now if only my L-esque eye-rings would go awaaay.
♥ finish YULETART! Sent it off on the 7th, and I must say that even if I think my uh 'concept' was better last year, this year was much for fun to color! I GOT TO USE MORE THAN BLACK, SHADES OF GREY, YELLOW AND DARK RED WOO XDD. Shall slap on a link here when the entries all go up!
♥ marvel at the fact that the new Firefox is THE BESTEST THING EVER. I do not know what suddenly happened with this update, but I am now able to actually save things on the computer when I'm surfing without having to not touch anything on the browser for 5 seconds, lest everything suddenly hang and CRASH. This. This feeling ...is it freedom?? Picspam entries, I am fucking ready for you again!
♥ get waaaaaaaay too excited by the awesome happenings at rahmbamarama! Everyone is so crazy-awesome-enthusiastic there and the sheer volume of fantastic fanworks, I am so not used to being so 'active' in commenting! MUST GET ASS AROUND TO POSTING SOMETHING. Also helloooooo new friends from that awesome friending meme! Man, I really need to get some new superlatives/adjectives. I am already wearing out AWESOME and OH MY GOD as it is XDD
♥ ignore uni things! THIS WILL PROBABLY END ONCE THE GRADES OF HIST AND PR ARE POSTED AND I AM OVERCOME BY A CRIPPLING SENSE OF FAILURE, but until then? *BOOGIES*

Warm-up for ~*YULETART TIME*~ (deadline this sunday aaaah) meaaaaaans: PRACTICE DOODLING! I am apparently still able to draw, after all! Am working myself up to actually turning my sketchy Yuletart ideas into the finished product, and wow have I suddenly forgotten how to color seriously.

( TWO scribblings made in OC lie beyondddd )

MAN AM I LOOKING FORWARD TO HAVING THE WHOLE DAY TOMORROW TO PREPARE A PRESENTATION FOR THAT EVENING 8DDDD *headdesk*

Man, I really wish La and Angie would be more obsessively addicted to the internet and refreshing their email like yours truly, because there are currently 1€ airberlin flights to München and back and it would be a hella sweet way to travel, especially versus the 4 hours traaaaaaaaaain BUT I need their input that the dates for our March 2009 meet-up are fix. ARGH. I really hope I'll hear from them tomorrow and that the flights will still be 1€=60€ plus taxes etc etc... *CROSSES FINGERS* ALSO: gwy, kann sein dass ich ein batzen früher bzw. länger dann in München bleiben werde, könnten uns ja dann auf delicious fooooood etc mal treffen dann oder?? :DD?

Yesterday was a combination of being really studious and actually getting some uni work done at the uni library with Carmen, and later going to see Joachim's band play a gig. So of course the usual suspects were all there (even if Lis&Nathalie and Harry all came waaaay later) and ohoho how amusing the feeling of a ~*friendship cold war*~ is.
( TBC under the cut to spare the uninterested lol )

ALSO--stolen from RINRINRIN, the following meme: Pick any aspect of my life you're curious about, and tell me to take a picture of it. My room, my car, my closet, the toilet, the fridge, you name it, I'll probably take a picture of it. (And lol feel free to make multiple choices, as I might as well take a few pics while I'm at it)

Apparently the shit is going doooown back home! Clashes in front of Gov. House in Bangkok! "Hostage situations"! HELICOPTERS! Chavalit fucking finally resigned, yessss, oh man that was one seriously slimy and fucking CREEPY looking politician. Man, I seriously can't see an answer to the whole problem coming soon, and this is only just fit to drag the economy down even more than it already was from the fall-out from the State of Emergency declaration a while back :/// But then again, maybe the losses won't be all TOO bad, given the way the entire financial world seems to be collectively losing their shit, at the moment. HMM.

AND apparently good ol' Apirak gets to keep his position as the governor of Bangkok after all! I had no idea that Prapas was so popular, thought he'd actually get tarred by the PPP brush that is oh-so-hated by the Bangkokians (or at least the ones camped out at Gov. House lol) and I personally thought he was a smarmy mofo, so. CHUWIT SHOULD HAVE CAME IN THIRD. He was so great, I will always love his election ad posters ♥ So hilarious and awesome. This website has an extensive selection of the posters ALL the candidates used, super fun surfing! Scroll down nearly to the end of the page ('Sept 9') and marvel at the brilliance of the image of Chuwit on the back of a motorcycle taxi, binoculars in hand and the text going "Where's the problem? I'M ON IT/I'll be there" ahjjaghfkj ahahaha. Also you all may marvel at the garishness of "Leena Jung" and lol at candidate no.12 who notable declared that King Rama the V came to her in a dream to tell her to run for governor, and that she wouldn't have to campaign because if she wins it would be a decree from heaven. Heaven seemingly saw fit to give her 852 votes though! OOH.

So uh contrary to my expectations, Philipp called and ~*DATE CONFIRMED*~, I guess! Tomorrow evening, 9.30PM at the Donau club, which as far as I can remember was this really dark trippy club that played electro and had really drugged-out people dancing spastically lolol okay, it WAS 3.30AM when we were there last time, but yeah... We shall see what happens! I am already quite nervous ajhjskf what to doooo and this time I will be without the safety of mah wingwoman Carmen too, ach! Should I look up make-out tips on the internet now or what--

Even though my general reason for agreeing to the date is more due to the sheer novelty of actually getting asked out by a guy who is not a)creepily old, b)creepy or c)a gigantic creepazoid Asian fetishist, I must say that looks-wise, the dude is quite cute. Kind of a scruffy, hippy vibe (a vergleichende Literaturwissenschaft/comparative Lit sciences student) with longish blond hair and some beard scruff, but he has pretty blue-green eyes behind the glasses, so. He also gains points for being quite adorable on the phone though-- 'asking his friends for tips on where to go', and the whole "(weird joke) ...and that was a lame joke to end this conversation, ahhh so you know what you are getting yourself into tomorrow night!". I admit, I am vaguely charmed already. If only he were taller (either a wee bit taller than I am or around my height, I can't remember), ahhh must remember to wear ballet flats tomorrow.

SO LET'S SEE HOW FAST I CAN SCREW THIS UP BY ACTING INTENSELY AWKWARD IN THE FACE OF POTENTIAL PHYSICAL CONTACT TO HIDE OR EVEN ACCENTUATE MY UTTER LACK OF EXPERIENCE, YEAHHHHHH.

Halt the presses! I have returned to bring you news that the good town of Pattaya still remains the filthy morass of sin and depravity we all know and mostly ignore! Now with an added air of desperation, as the numbers of girlie bars and suspect tailors all try to vie for the attentions of the vastly decimated number of tourists. I mean, there are still your usual suspects of fat, sun-burned and beached-whale-esque Germans/Swiss/Brits/Russians/Amis that either are attempting to tan themselves to oblivion or are already parked at their dive of choice at noon, surrounded by bargirls or the packs of Middle Eastern 'tour groups'--but still not as many as yesteryear. It is particularly depressing to see the empty seafood restaurants and their pathetic displays. AND STILL, people are building like crazy. Condos and hotels are popping up like mushroom! The mind, it boggles.

The hols were still fun though, because the Amari hotel we stayed at was fully renovated since the last time I was there, and looks utterly stunning and FAB. We got upgraded to the Executive Floor and had a super swank room (albeit with 18th floor views of the construction going on at the Holiday Inn next door, lol). And the hours spent lolling around the INFINITY POOL!1, sunning and reading was excellent. The sea around the beach in Pattaya is not fit for swimming, anyways, though it HAS greatly improved and manages to look quite pretty from afar! Managed to get myself a nice touch of color to tide me through the winter months in Vienna (FUCK I DON'T WANT TO GOOO TOMORROW) and have some delicious food, most suprisingly in the local Hard Rock Cafe. Mhh, hickory smoked ribs and beef brisket!

Meant to write this yesterday when we got back, but regaining internets after not having been online for these few days was too much for my feeble addicted soul. Heh. I must now pack, but perhaps a shower would be in order first. Why is it 5PM already??

PS David Cook's new single 'Light On' is fucking fantastic, good god has he got a wonderful voice.

But currently, I feel nothing! Yay for half of my mouth being still numb from the wisdom teeth extraction appointment I had at 2PM. Turns out it really was a better idea NOT to do all four at once, would have been a drooling mess instead, I figure. The dentist surgeon dude was also great and the actual extraction did not really hurt at all, which made the fact that I burst out in panicked tears before he even finished with the numbing injections in my gums all the more embarrassing... >_<;; And the worse part was that after that I took far too long to get settled again because he kept trying to console me and was really sweet, but that just served to set me off anew again because I was so embarrassed about being such a damn pussy. Ahh. Now I am just biting down on some new gauze, because the blood hasn't quite clotted yet and the taste of watery blood in one's mouth is not surprisingly, super disgusting. They even gave me my teeth to take home and lol I am torn between being fascinated by the freaky ass roots I have or grossed out by the slight bits of gum that are still sticking to it.

Got to stay in the hotel yesterday though (complementary room wooo!) and had a lovely dinner with Ginger in town: KOREAN BBQ at the Emporium! SO tasty~ and full of meat ♥.

The MORNING started off on a lovely note, as Ma and Andy overslept and we didn't have to go merit making at 5am! The bad thing is we are doing so tomorrow which means I should be long asleep now WHOOPS. Gave Ma a congratulatory hugggggg and I LOVE YOUUUU, and handed her the present --a dazzling feat of uncreativity of my part this year, woe is me who actually bought my mother a tiny stuffed cat that kind of maybe looks like AJ and a set of cat-shaped paperclips, as well as a (suprisingly cool) hedgehog-shaped paperclip magnet holder. Why? Because Ma's Thai nickname is "Meow" of course! Lol faiiiil. The original plan of a swank jewellery box went up in flames once Ma happily showed me the one she already bought for herself (oh how I mentally screamed CURSSSSSSES and yet was also happy I hadn't actually got one already yet because I was lazy).

BUT THEN I switched on the TV and was greeted by the twin news of A)finally managing to tune in to Anderson Cooper 360 on time on CNN  and B) finding out ROGER FEDERER WON THE US OPEN!!!1!!!ELEVENTY!!!!!1 Go Rog! Fuck yeah, and how he beat- no,  trounced Andy Murray! Man I hope that match comes up on rerun on True's sportschannels at some point akjhaskf. And it is intensely validating to go around and read all the news articles now on how MAAAAYBE the pundits were all a little bit too hasty in writing off Federer. Well, duh you fooools. The US Open official website has some nice articles, as well as a cool "Top 50 Expected and Unexpected Moments of the US Open 08" page, that amongst other hilarity features this on Federer: "EXPECTED: Federer glides silently about the court UNEXPECTED: Emits howls & screams in anguish in several languages" ...ahaha this still makes me giggle when I read it XDD

The AFTERNOON was spent tagging along Ma and Andy's grand shopping tour for the new house, with the looong waits being made bearable by playing copious amounts of Pokemon Trozei!, addictive little game that is, and bumming around in BigC. Made the most extraordinary find when the cheap-ass export clothes shop I checked out of boredom turned out to have American Eagle Outfitter(or however that brand is called), GAP, H&M and Old Navy tops and longsleeves... for an average price of 79-150 baht. AND THEY WERE ALL SO AWESOME. Ended up getting 5 ytops for around 550 baht, which is the average price you might pay for ONE standard local brand top here. AHH :D. The shopping experience was made all the sweeter because the going US dollar/Euro prices were also still attached, so in your face 15 Euro H&M white wool v-neck! I got you for 150 fricken baaaht! *shopping gleeee*

The EVENING was spent prepping for and then going for a delightful and utterly delicious dinner at the Mandarin Oriental Dhara Dhevi Hotel aka THE CASTLE IN THE SKYYYY. God, it is even more imposing and gorgeous at night, with scores of little candles lighting the way to the main Chedi-building-type thing and you get carted around in a chaffeured pimped-out golf cart and the staff! Oh the staff are so fantastically attentive, it actually makes you feel really bad to be served on hand and foot. I requested some mosquito spray becase we were dining outside (Mediterrean food, mhhh) and the lady just about kneeled on the floor and was ready to spray my legs for me before I could stop gaping. Akjhdskjh. The food was sheer poetry, from starting course to dessert. Had thinly sliced extra-virgin olive oil -marinated tuna with endive salad for starters, RACK OF LAAAAAAAAAMB (SO TENDER) with rosemary jus, grilled potatoes and ratatouille for main and topped that off with some warm rosemary cake and lemon sorbet (it had candied rosemary sprigs! Which were quite tasty mhhh) and a salty caramel macaroon that was chewy and delightful. Still didn't manage to finish my ONE glass of wine throughout the entire meal though, ahh a drinker I am not and apparently will never be.

ALSO one last LOLYEAH before I go pass out in bed regarding Thai politics: SAMAK BAI BAI. Lolol I love how his cooking show eventually came to kick him right back in the ass. Yessss.