Lilac Colored Glasses

Better late than never I hope, here’s the post Ruprecht sent me (on my Lilacspecs mail, hence the lateness…and then I forgot to schedule it to post, hence the uberlateness). I met Rupe through Plurk (although I no longer Plurk much myself although I do still occasionally tweet) and I think it’s great that he reads and comments here. He usually has a comment that is pretty much the opposite view of what the majority of the people who read here have, so I like to see what his input generates.

Rupe volunteered to blog in Lilacspecs’ absence.

Amazingly, she accepted.

Answer the items below. Extra points for originality. Winner gets a prize.

…………….. Ruprecht

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You’re standing in front of three garbage cans holding a sack full of trash. Which can do you deposit your load in? Explain.

There are three forks in the road and you have to get to your destination quickly. Which fork do you take? (You’re right – this IS a trick question. Answer carefully.)

There are three sides to a coin. Name’em?

The past you’ll forget, the present you might remember and the future holds the unknown. Where do want to go and why?

How long is a Chinaman?

If you can’t snow the snowman ….. what, then, do you do?

You lose three of your five senses. Which ones?

One, two or three? Explain.

Lastly: You can take three things with you. What are they and why?

To people who have noticed my extended absence: I’m almost ready to come back and start writing again. I had to just take a bit of time away from the computer and away from writing. But no worries! My brain has started pumping fresh material lately, so I think it’s just about time to get back to regular blogging.

December 25th will mark a year since I packed up most of what remained of my wordly posessions and moved myself over here to Belgium.  Plenty has happened since then and I’ve kept much of it chronicled here.  You’ve followed me through my 9 month crash course in Dutch, my inebriated yakking in Cabandad’s car, my unwitting fashion faux pas of the purple coat, the confusing period of registering for university courses and many other memorable moments.  And now? Now I’m moving on into a different phase of my life, especially my life in another country.

On December 4th I will be going to the town hall, yet again, to start the process of getting my electronic identity card with my new “partner” status.  It means I’ll no longer be here as a student, but rather, as the partner of CB.  I’ll be able to work full time and my status will be good for 5 years.  So I’ll finally be a more permanent resident here.  I will also have to get new working papers. Again. But that’s okay because those will be good for a year.  This upcoming weekend I get to celebrate my first Sinter Klaas (I think it’s similar to Michaelmas, if that helps) and I can’t wait to take pictures of the Kerstmarkt and other holiday trappings that are going up in the city center to show you all.  In the meantime I’ll also be spending much of December preparing for my final exams.  From what I can tell the exams here are far more rigorous than any I ever took as an undergrad, but at least my professors are willing to translate them into english for me.

As for the other part of my life that will be changing…we’ve set the wedding date for May 29th, 2010. The day before my 29th birthday.  Right now that’s the only really solid thing, but I’ll definitely be keeping you all updated.

The winners of my giveaway were chosen and contacted.  It’s possible that someone may have attempted to refuse the prize based on shipping costs or the fact that they commented on my mom’s blog for fun, not the contest.  Well, that’s all well and good, but I never said you had to comment strictly for the contest to win, nor did I ever say shipping was a restriction.  So too bad winners, you won anyway and my Mama will be contacting you for shipping info.  Congratulations to Bubblewench for her numerous comments, Jen in MI for randomness and Kelley for having my mom’s favorite comment!!

Chances are it will take my parents a few days to recoup and send me the photos from the trip, but once they do I’ll be blogging a bit about some of what we did while they were here.  Suffice it to say that we did have a wonderful time.  CB likes them very much and enjoyed getting to know them better and vice versa.  I know I was a much happier person while they were here, although now I feel like I used to at the end of an awesome house party in college.  The fun has been had, the guests are all gone and I’m surrounded by empty beer cups, muddy footprints and I think someone clogged the toilet.

Okay, okay.  More like, the guests are gone, I have too much homework (and almost 200 posts clogging my Google Reader), the litter boxes need scooped and CB’s ears are clogged.

Calgon, take me away.

My family arrived on Friday and we had no trouble getting them and their luggage from the airport to Gent.  CB took Scooter to the house to settle him in while I waited with my parents at the B&B until their room was ready.  Afterwards we went to Het Pand, the university “club” building for a lovely dinner, dropped my parents off at their place and went out for some drinks and late night fries with my brother.  I can’t decide if he was more impressed by the alcohol content in Duvel or the huts on the side of the road for guys to pee in.  Either way we had a fun time before turning in for the evening, aside from the air mattress for my brother deflating (the lack of comfortable sleeping arrangments and his allergies ended in us finding him a few rooms at different B&B’s around Gent so that he could sleep on an actual bed).

CB’s parents picked my mom up on Saturday morning and took her to their house to make Thanksgiving dinner.  My mom is a real trooper, offering to make a meal for 7 people after travelling across the Atlantic the day before, but she was determined to have Thanksgiving with both of our families and it was so wonderful for me to have a traditional Thanksgiving dinner this year.  While Mom was in Lochristi cooking, dad and I took a walk around some parts of the city center and had a cup of coffee (he has a new found love of koffie verkeerd, which is simply espresso and a whole lot of steamed milk).  CB hung out with my brother for a few hours before coming to pick up dad and I in Cabanadad’s car.  We went to CB’s parents’ house in Lochristi and had a delicious dinner: roast turkey, stuffing, green bean casserole, cranberry chutney, salad, pumpkin pie, chocolate cake and homemade ice cream from CB’s mom and CB finally told his parents the big news.

We’ve been engaged for 2 weeks.

Yes, CB proposed to me two weeks ago on Saturday and I said yes and we are officially engaged!!!!!!
I have been wanting to tell you all SO BAD but I had to wait until CB told his parents and sister first because they read this blog and well, yeah, you understand I hope.

Yesterday was also the end of my Lilacspec’s Mama’s Birthday Giveaway.  My mama will be telling me her favorite comment tomorrow and later tonight I will be tallying who commented the most as well as throwing all the commentor’s names into the random number generator so that I can contact the winners before our trip to Antwerp on Wednesday.  tomorrow we’re going to Bruges for the day and Tuesday we’ll spend in Gent.  My mom is taking plenty of pictures so I’ll try to post some good ones in the next few days.

Until yesterday, these were my glasses:

Those babies are somewhere between 3 and 5 years old and if I remember correctly, they have been through, amongst other things: at least one fraternity house brawl, Sigma Chi Derby Day mud wrestling, numerous thefts by Rex as a kitten and numerous inadvertant thwaps in the face by toddlers.  A few months ago I began getting headaches in my language class and CB mentioned that I might need new glasses.  But at the time we didn’t have the extra funds at hand for new glasses, so I waited for them to go on sale, which they did about 2 weeks ago at Pearle.  In the meantime, I’ve been walking around with this look on my face:

“Dude, what the hell is that? And what makes you think the daily migraines are caused by my glasses? You mean this strained, squinty eye thing isn’t normal?“

And as for the tint, I have no idea what’s up with that…the lenses weren’t tinted so I’m thinking I was just that tired.  And don’t wig out mom, I haven’t lost as much weight as it looks, it just comes off quickly in my face.  And yes Gram, they do have Nair in Belgium, I’ve just been slacking a bit…helps me fit in with the surlier Eastern European women in the neighborhood.

Anyway, moving on, last Tuesday I went to Pearle and found out the perscription in my left eye has changed and the one I was using was too strong.  I also decided (encouraged by the disgusted curl of the optician’s lip when he looked at my old pair) that I might as well get some new frames too.  There weren’t any decent lilac colored glasses to be found and the other shades of purple were those huge, chunky, what Sarah Palin probably wore as a kid style frames, so I went for a classy pair of brown ones instead.

I picked them up yesterday, put them on and suddenly? I could SEE! I felt like when one of those crazy baptist faith healer guys smacks the crippled person on the forehead and all of a sudden they stand up.  It was that miraculous! So I came home looking like this ( well, I had the other shirt on, but you get the idea):

“Hallelujah, I can see! Now if only I could find a second pair of magic glasses that translate Dutch into English! Then, and only then, will I be able to take over the world! Muahaha”

And no Gram, despite seeing the pictures yesterday, I have yet to make use of the Nair.

And don’t forget to check out my Lilacspecs’ “Momma’s Birthday Giveaway”, where you can win yummy smelling, organic bath stuff from Lush.  And starting now, if you would like an extra chance or two at getting stuff, you can post this banner, linking to my post about the giveaway or you can blog about the giveaway on your own blog:

I’ll add your name one extra time for posting the banner, one extra time for blogging about the giveaway, and 3 extra times if you do both, mostly cause I’m proud of myself for making a banner without anyone’s help.

Now go! Enter! Win!

I know that my posts have either been “wallowing in depression”-y or relatively vacant over the past few weeks.  And I guess the only excuse I have (not like a really need an excuse, it’s my blog, dammit) is the combination of working and class has made it hard to really think about quality writing.  When I was at CHCC I could incorporate work into my writing and I think that was some of my best, most entertaining work…in fact, if you are finding my writing bland lately, feel free to go check out the first 7 months of my blog.  I have a lot of daycare stories that were pretty cute that I bet most of you have never seen.

I was truly back on point with my pixie post but believe it or not I find that quality of writing physically draining and I’m often tapped out for days afterwards.  Plus I got so many wonderful responses that I’m sort of afraid to post another slew of mediocrity and dissapoint you.

So that’s what led me to this morning’s idea: a random giveaway!  Wheee! I love giveaways and I’m sure most of you do as well.  I do think that the chocolate has been overdone though (no, I’m not on drugs or anything, it just gets dull only giving chocolate away) so I’ve decided to offer some products from Lush, an organic bath and body store that I have been positively dying to shop in, but have had no valid reason for spending our meager extra cash on.  After all, what good is a bath bomb when you have no functioning tub, right?

I’ll bet you’re wondering what the catch is, since you know I don’t give something for nothing, at least not as far as this blog goes.  That’s right, you gotta work for your prizes, Meat!

Anywho, before I totally lose you all together, here are the rules for Lilacspecs’ Momma’s Birthday Giveaway:

1. Go visit and read my momma’s blog, The Pittsburgh Deli.
2. Comment on my momma’s blog sometime between today and her birthday, which is November 21.
3. I will give 3 prizes*; a bath bomb for the person who comments the most (but please, quality comments, ok? I’m not encouraging anyone to go and jam up her comments box with “yahoo” or “hi” every day for the next month, a bubble bar for the comment my momma likes the best (it is her birthday, after all), and a handmade soap for a third person selected by random number generator.
4. Winners will be selected one month from today, the day after my family arrives in Gent.  That way I’m not making my jet lagged momma pick through blog comments on her birthday.

So what are you waiting for people? Get on over to my momma’s blog and start reading! Without your participation I have no excuse to shop won’t be able to send you lovely, eco friendly bath products, so hop to it!

*-I will contact winners via e-mail to confirm shipping information and choice of scent.  If you are a winner and want to discuss a different, equivalent product from Lush (yes they have guy stuff too), that is absolutely ok…I’m not going to hold you to a bath bomb if you really want to try the butter cream.  Do keep in mind though that I am limited to the selection of products from the Lush store in Antwerp, so that might limit choices somewhat.  But no worries, my momma and I WILL go shopping and we WILL buy out the store you stuff too! Good luck!