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I'm glad I'm not...

I'm glad I'm not blind. That would be soo hard. Maybe it is the same for everyone else who is now away from Terre Haute, but I have been in Hannover for 3 weeks and I have seen 3 different blind people. One of them I see every other morning when I make my connection to take the subway to work. I saw one in the bank today and he had his suitcase right next to him but he couldn't find it. At first, I somehow overlooked his "I'm blind cane" and saw him reaching. He was an old man and at first, I just thought the wear and tear on his joints prevented him from reaching the handle, but then I realized he didn't have a clue where it was. Then there's the girl who gets on the subway every morning. I swear, I have no idea how she does it. She comes down to the right platform all on her own, presumably from another train, and manages to get right in front of where the door is going to open. I can't even do that and I can see where the train stops every time.

I'm glad I'm not a pigeon in the subway station. Those poor birds are smart. They know which way to look for the train. I see them look left down the tube closest to them, then right down the far tube EVERY time before they fly across to the other side. But not smart enough to get on the train to a station closer to the park or something. Maybe one closer to the birdseed store. They are pretty funny though. They sit on the edge of the platform, where the different tiles are (which, I now think, are to help the blind people know where the edge is before they fall down on to the tracks below.) and look down the tube like they are waiting for their damned train. Its incredible. Ridiculous. Hilarious. And incredible.

I'm glad I'm not living some place with fewer dishes than I have. I have to choose between eating and doing dishes every three to four days. I know, I know. You guys are all saying "We get it with the dishes already, Kyle. Let it go." But I just want to bitch one more time. When I finally muster the energy to wash the dishes, I'm screwed because I have no place to store the clean, but still wet dishes so they can dry. So I have just enough energy and motivation to wash the dishes, but then I have to dry them too. I get so angry at that point. As a side note, I did an absolutely shitty job of washing dishes today. They all came out just as clean as usual, but I had this uncanny ability to move 1/3 of whatever water was in the sink onto my pants or onto the floor with every single dish I washed.

I'm glad I AM working with so many people of different backgrounds. I am working with people from all over the US (there is a heavy concentration [3 of 6 Americans] in the 100 mile radius surrounding Detroit); Orange County, California, Pheonix, Arizona, and Chicago, Illinois. But also, I get to work with a lot of cool people from around the world. Hui-Fang and King Lai from China, Daniel from Brazil, Said (Sah-eed) from France, and Dr. Albrecht, Annette, Dr. Ruth, and Diana from Germany. And that is just in our trainee pool. There are associate trainees who I believe come from Germany, Belgium, Ireland, maybe, and so on. Most of my colleages on the job are Germans, but there are a few Americans and others sprinkled throughout. I feel really lucky to have this chance to meet so many people from around the world. Oh, there's an italian woman in my department, too.

I thought it important to mention that the extra in the German movie I'm watching was humping the pinball table.

Just once, for shits, crush up an aspirin and drink it mixed in a glass of water. It's delicious. Actually, it tastes like crap, but I don't think they sell swallowable pills in Germany.

Oops, nevermind, its an American movie. But I can't tell if this 13 year old is a boy or a girl. (S)he appeared to be on a date with another young child of questionable gender. I only thought the movie was German because Kinder-It number 2 was smoking, which is unquestionably popular for people of every age and gender here. The baseball was the tip off to its American-ness.

I was going to make an incredibly whitty Dane Cook reference, but I had to get up to cook. I would have written it down, but I never have a fucking pen. That sucks.

I think England is the political "Little America", but I'm also starting to think that Germany is the cultural and economic "Little America". If you chose almost any of the biggest brands in each consumer product category, z.B. - Soda, Toothpaste, Toilet paper, etc. you can replace the .com with .de and find a website. What's even better, if a commercial has a song in it, its quite likely to be in English. The language "Neu Deutsch" (New German) contains many English words in it.

Its always funny when a 13 year old on TV tries hitting on a 35 year old MHLF, as if he knew what F'in was. It's even funnier in real life.

I am quite certain that Raguletta sells the best pasta sauces made by human hands. Or made by machines made by human hands, which is probably more likely.

One more comment. PETA (I think thats the one) pisses me off. They, for some reason, wish to devote their time and resources to making sure that animals in this country are treated like people when they could be spending their time and resources trying to prevent the people in some countries from being treated like animals. Makes me so angry. FU, PETA. UNT, IAO. P.