April 2009
34 posts
Recently I’ve been alternating my eating between meals of packaged cookies topped with peanut butter and dining out. And whenever I’m looking for places to eat out, if I find a Western style restaurant, I’ll normally choose that thinking something along the lines of “Yes! Finally a break from meals of piles of carbs covered in sauce!” But I’ve actually come across a bunch of Westerny...
Commuting to Lushoto from Moshi involves taking a bus to Mombo and then a daladala (gutted out van) up a mountain to Lushoto. The bus ride was fine, actually, no. Better than fine. They gave out cookies and mango juice. It was a total delight.
The daladala ride almost did me in though. First, just for background info, daladalas never leave on a schedule. They leave when they’re full. ...
Excerpted from my journal: Having to pee this bad on a long distance bus ride actually makes me miss the sweltering heat of Mali. I’d take chronic dehydration over chronic wee wee dancing any day of the week.
I left Moshi feeling like I was just starting the “alone” part of my travels, even though technically I’d been on the dusty African road solo since I left for my safari. But if you ever don’t want to feel lonely, try sharing a tiny tent with two strangers, three mosquitoes, and everyone’s luggage (and mosquitoes don’t pack light). That’s what I did on the safari, so I wasn’t exactly feeling...
So this trip to Moshi has taken a turn for the tax deductible. It all started with a botched meet up with a friend of a friend. I wound up spending some time in a closed bar and hitting it off with the owner. To be fair, hitting it off with this guy is like hitting a t-ball…everyone’s his pal. When he found out that I was a writer, he put me to work, giving me all of the copy from his website...
And I’m off Tanzania-ing for the next two weeks!
Q: But, Julie, didn’t you just post about having malaria and taking it easy?
A: Yeah, but I’m feeling a ton better, so I’m going to take advantage of the short time I have left here and see this country. I’m kind of going about this the same way I did when I didn’t let mono stop me from binge drinking sophomore year. I can’t say what effects...
Filed under: Prouder of Myself Than I Should Be
It took me at least six, maybe even six and a half minutes after getting diagnosed with malaria to think about the potential weight loss generated by being sick. Yet another sign that I’m so on my way to being a real, live grown up. Or at least six to six and a half minutes closer to being a real, live grown up.
While running, a group of kids starting running with me. Just to play with them, I started to sprint and they picked it up too. After a few seconds, I was a decent amount ahead of them. I actually thought to myself, “Wow, I can’t believe I’m kicking their asses so hard” and felt rather proud. They couldn’t have been more than six years old. When I realized that,...
“I guess Apatow turns ‘em around extra fast. The rest of us have to deal...”
– diablocody (diablocody) on Twitter
Started following Diablo Cody on Twitter and woman tweets the truth. I come across the metaphorical Sanjaya joke all the time…and the literal one too. Hot Mess for sure has a Sanjaya reference.
28 Days Left On This Trip
This message brought to you by my new pack of birth control.
Recently, some banana muffins found their way into the volunteer compound. Obviously, I attacked the tray like tiger who hasn’t fed in a weeks. As I was chomping through a muffin, my roommate asked, “Are they good?”
“Yeah,” I said, crumbs flying out of my mouth.
She picked one up, took a bite, and then made a disgusted face. ”You like these?” she...
E-mail convo with mom
Mom: Have a good Passover
Me: Thanks. What are you guys doing?
Mom: I let Dad buy a jar of gefilte fish, but he can't eat it within smelling distance of me.
Me: I walked by the dried fish stand today in the market...does that count as celebrating?
Mom: Yes, indeed. Did you find the affikomin?
Me: You hid it in the market? Was it behind the guy screaming "Welcome to my store, please, whitey!"
Mom: Yes, and it was chocolate covered too.
Me: Crap. Can't believe I missed that.
I miss home.
If I found a magic lamp, I'd wish for...
Wish #1: I wish I had prescription sunglasses.
Wish #2: I wish I weren’t nerdy enough to be wishing for prescription sunglasses.
Wish #3: I wish I hadn’t wasted my first two wishes like that.
The volunteers and nannies are on this somewhat complicated nine day rotation of shifts here. Because of this, days of the week and a general sense of time have kind of stopped mattering to me. Like most days, not until I insert a date/time stamp in my journal document will I know what day it is and then I’ll immediately forget once I’ve written enough to push that line off my...
I just tweeted for the first time. Also, just set up my blog to auto-update to twitter. Watch out, last year’s technology craze, here I come!
I’m not a fan of going to the doctor, so I just don’t go and do a lot of waiting and seeing. This pretty much always works in my favor…if you exclude the walking pneumonia freshman year, that is.
Anyway, since I’m my own doctor normally, I do a lot of internet-diagnoses. This doesn’t work in my favor so much as when I type in my symptoms, WebMD typically shoots...
