Re: Bonjour

Hey Jason,

Every time i get on a train, i (bad-)habitually thumb through Lonely Planet Britain and the terse, get-to-the-point writing is rubbing off on me. For example, Beautiful York is situated between the two mighty rivers Ouse and Foss. From here you can see York Minster, England’s largest gothic cathedral….etc. Not the kind of style you’d like to pick up. Anyway, i just read a hilarious book called Playing the Moldovans at Tennis, where the author makes a bet with his friend to go to Moldova, find all 11 of the soccer players from the national team and beat them at tennis. The loser has to stand naked on a High Street and sing the Moldovan national anthem. If you didn’t guess already, it’s not really about tennis or Moldovan soccer players. It’s a really enlightening book and you should pick it up for a quick read (it’s less than 300pp and you can fly through it like a Vonnegut novel). It’s buy Tony Hawks, a well-known (at least over here) British writer and stand-up comedian.

Anyway, sorry about your teeth.

It seems that the Brits know more fun stuff about American politics than we do. For example, this guy told me this morning that a lot of Clinton’s office workers took the “W” keys out of the keyboards at the White House before they left. Although most people read the tabloids, I try to stick to the Times, which seems to be pretty reputable (The Guardian is really far left and sometimes a little bleeding-heart for my tastes and the Independent is a little conservative [think Sioux City Journal]). The news here is more fun–it’s more interesting, global, and there’s not as much emphasis on the stock markets and money-making and all that. I do miss the comics, however (only one or two strips per 30 pages of newspaper).

My dad told me on Valentine’s Day that he’s getting engaged to this woman that he went to high school with. That means whenever i go home for Christmas or whatever, that means a strange woman will be in my house and my dad will be trying his best to impress her and trying to be a different person. So i think i’m getting the picture of what it’s like with your mom and her boyfriend (at least i get to come home to the same house, however).

My 3 1/2 week spring break is coming up soon and i don’t know what the hell i’m doing. I’m spending way to much money so i think it’s time to go somewhere where the US dollar actually has some value. Like Prague, Budapest, Vienna, and maybe some Croatian beaches. Who knows though. It’s also convenient to have some friends over here that i can visit, hehe.

Well, i best be going. I’m out of razors and haven’t shaved in a week and a half. Gotta go downtown.

Hope to hear from you soon.

Ryan