April 23

Yeah, it’s been a little bit longer than I thought. I’m battling my worst tendencies here, okay? My drive for posterity and remembrance is coming into direct collision with decades of slacking off and getting away with it. It’s hard man. But in my absence, which no doubt you felt intimately, I hope you lived on, formed your own memories, maybe even some to carry with you into your later years. Remember when this whole thing started back in January? It’s still 2022, baby, which means it’s still our time. the year stretches on, and if you’re anything like me, it means that beginning May 1, we have 5 months of summer ahead of us. That’s right: May counts and the end of September counts. It’s all summer to me. And man is there a lot to look forward to. But first let’s look right here, to these past 12 days. This is a more nebulous post since some days I took no pictures, and others I have already forgotten. So here’s the extracted essence, the stuff worth remembering. Some would call it an admission of failure. I call it me setting the standards for myself to live up to. So settle in, enjoy some pictures, and have a laugh. If you’re reading this from afar, it means you were with me in spirit, anyway.

Still not used to this beguiling orange surface.
Tobi’s gf Isabel. She DJ’d most of the night, crushed it.
Vici was not at this party, but this cup got me thinking that maybe she just didn’t want me to know she was there.
Yo this place was verrrry dark before the flash, crazy how bright it got.
The Germans discovered pong in 2018. And yet… I fared no better than the rest. Embarrassing.
This guy was cool, told me where to get good margaritas and Mexican food in Frankfurt.
Don’t even remember taking this, Must’ve been right before the vomit.

So it begins. Hard slides and orange dust in the air. Or at least, I would slide if my ankle didn’t give out like an origami door hinge the last time I tried. Tennis season has begun, and I’m in a pretty serious league. Which is to say they all train as hard as possible but still smoke three cigarettes directly after practice like absolute psychopaths. As usual my calves tightened up like importable bricks and my shins behaved as if they had an extra circuit of nerves dialed up to 11 installed, but come on. It’s tennis, the most beautiful sport in the world.

Then of course was my friend Tobi’s party. He’s the one who looks like Weird Al on molly in the second picture above. It’s his last months in a subsidized student housing thing, and he and his neighbor said ‘fuck it’ and commandeered the entire entrance and turned it into its own party space. Plenty of beer, good old fashioned pong, and music so loud you couldn’t even scream you were having a heart attack when the bass dropped. Oh, me? I stuck to vodka redbulls for the first time in like 4 years. Only puked a tiny tiny bit as well, so huge success!

April 24

Hangover day, but not a bad one. Went for a bike ride in the late afternoon along the riverbank, still getting used to the new ride, but she does indeed cruise. What else can I say? You know how Sundays are.

April 25 – April 27

It’s Monday thennn, it’s Tuesday Wednesday what! So yeah these days are a blur except for one key moment that shocked me then, shocks me now, and ultimately will bury itself deep in my imposter syndrome for the rest of my life. What you see above is the final page of my Thesis advisor’s report. It’s in German, yes, but its translation and the number at the end do not lie. I was ready for a C, maybe a B if I was lucky. I was not ready for a 1,0, which is 4.0 in American (be honest, you thought I failed, didn’t you). Even crazier is that due to the weighted points of the thesis, I ended my entire MA with the same grade. Remember just a few paragraphs above when I said that thing about decades of slacking going completely unpunished? It feels like I pulled a major ruse, a sting, the long-con, whatever. I paid their measly tuppence, drank their wine, used their infrastructure to my heart’s content, and they said “here you are sir, please go on, slack some more”. My comeuppance seems to be impossible. Famous last words? Doubt it.

April 28 – April 30

These days are not a blur. But they are bunched together here for thematic reasons: it was my trip to Brussels!

Frankfurt airport train station, looking dope in the morning sun,
These ticket machines for the Brussels subway took 5 minutes per ticket! Insane!
Patience is rewarded.
We got lost immediately.
This place was awesome. Right across from our hotel. Called it Shitty Okays the whole weekend but ended up there with a Guinness on Saturday, and bummed a cigarette off two French diplomats to the EU.
Our hotel. Had an irresponsible amount of bacon and eggs each morning.
Vici and Tobi at the mannequin de pis.

My friend Elif beat this street chess master at his own game! Legit though, she really won, kind of crazy.
Isa, Tobi and Elif looking mad cool.
Inside Kitty O’shea’s, got me liking Guinness again.
Duck.
I, as the drunk maskless American, accidentally set off the emergency alarm inside the bus and the driver rattled off a series of yells and commands I’m grateful I didn’t understand. Got off at the next stop.
Somehow wound up in an arm wrestling match at 3am in a British pub with carpet everywhere. Passed out soon after!

Brussels is like the Washington D.C. of Europe, bureaucrats and officials walking around, strutting to the joy of their own power, only instead of logging onto to twitter in their off time, they get drunk off 9% ABV Belgian beer downtown and call it a day. Job well done. In all seriousness the sights were awesome, the fried food was dope, the beer even better, and the overall atmosphere is just its own thing. At the Delirium bar in central Brussels (which carries over 200 beers), we met a Scottish Stag party who’d been drinking since 5 am, and it was already 7pm. I kid you not, they were more sober than I was after only two beers. And I got word that my friend Elif met some famous Irish singer as well, and that he asked her and her husband if they do orgies. You just can’t make this stuff up.

May 1 – May 6

Okay, hear me out: the night we got back from Brussels we passed out at like 9pm and slept til noon the next day. Even then, our bodies were shot. This week was as lowkey as lowkey gets. I played some more tennis, sure, but mostly I read a bunch, worked on a couple key videos for work that took up most of my time, and took care of some errands.

For example, I have a new visa! But still not the final version. When my diploma arrives, then we’ll be in business. Otherwise, it really was just work and sleep week. After the last two weeks, I can live with that. But I did go for a very nice bike ride on Thursday over the train tracks to a park overlooking the river.

What’s that? What about today? Friday? Dude, peep this post. You’re looking at it. My brand of inconsistency requires precise bursts of energy and inconvenience to keep up with my goals. Tonight was writing night.

Anyway, I’ll see you tomorrow.

Nick