So.  It turns out all the crazy-talk and disorientation...  is because I have the flu.  I spent nearly all day confined to the region of my bed yesterday.  It turns out that one of the symptoms of this particular flu, though, is that it hinders the sleep.  So even though I went to bed at the nice, early time of 11:00 last night, I was unable to get ( Read more... )

Being in Tabor was a strange feeling.  I got there too late in the day to actually do much of anything, so I contented myself with walking around and exploring.  Itś a beautiful small-to-medium town with rural bits and urban bits and a wonderful lake with a crazy bridge on it.  And my name is plastered all over everything!  Mesto Tabor, which means ( Read more... )

Today my goal is to get to Tabor and hopefully to explore it a little bit before I have to turn around and head back toward Prague.  The trip is more complicated than I'd been led to believe, though - I switched trains at the Benesov station, and now am on a train that I believe might take me where I want to go.  Mid-transfer, I got a beer for a ( Read more... )

Poll Hair.

There cannot be any rain anywhere else.  All of the world's rain must be in Prague, right now.

When Jan Svankmajer's newest film, "Lunacy," played in Los Angeles, I sadly missed it.  It just got away too fast.  I would not have been sad if I'd known that I would have an opportunity to see it in the summer, in a park, in Prague, in the most massive ( Read more... )

One thing I've been looking for since I got here is a reason.  Why did Franz Kafka come from here?  Jan Svankmajer?  Why is this the city that staged the Residents' "Freak Show"?  The country that gave birth to Tom Stoppard?
There are a lot of sort-of answers, I'm finding, to do with a special synthesis of cultures: Czech, German, Jewish, Romanian ( Read more... )

A list of expenditures and justifications on a "heavy spending day."

1. Internet, 30 mins, ~22Kč  - Must check on response to recent post and see if I can hunt Liesel down for chatting before she goes to sleep.
2. Coffee, drip, medium, ~30Kč - Disgruntling headache will not go away.  Disappears magically at first sip of above.
3. Cafeteria-style lunch: ( Read more... )

Martin is an investment banker who looks like Ewan McGregor aged by 10 years, if he were a Czech investment banker. He stumbles over to me between bars, looking for conversation. The first thing he wants me to know is that he's between girlfriends, (all this in drunken, swaying, second-language English) which is frustrating, but at least he doesn't ( Read more... )

Things are still happening, but I'm instead going to take a moment to talk about music. Firstly, I've been listening to a playlist of Man Man's Six Demon Bag, Menomena's Friend and Foe, and i monster's Neveroddoreven. I call it Neverfriendordemon by Man Men Mon. Which is appealing because of the name, but it also comprises a mega-album that ( Read more... )

My Poor Feet
-or-
Adding Insole To Injury

( Miscellany. )