Currently Playing: "Light A Match" by Thursday
I'm tired of playing tough. I'm tired of keeping my mouth shut.
I'm homesick and I want to go home - it's as simple as that. I've realized that being homesick doesn't consitute someone as being weak like I originally figured. It simply means that my heart isn't here where I am now, but at home -- where it belongs. At home with all of my old routines and habits that I used to wish I could get so far away from. At home with my unconditionally loving family and close friends that I've taken for granted for so many years.
My heart is in America, the land of overly-patriotic patriots, where one can take a shower for as long as he/she pleases, where one can get in his/her car and go anywhere without planning his/her route of public transportation ahead of time, where one can order a pepsi and expect ice cubes in it, where one eats oven pizzas, hot-pockets, ramen noodles, and Kraft maccaroni & cheese and considers it his/her nutritious diet, where one can wake up nearly every day to sunny blue skies with the occasional drab gray one - the complete opposite from here.
I won't settle for just anywhere in America or even Lawrence, though, for that matter. I want my Overland Park back.
Even with a new project at work, occasional concerts, legal drinking, and a kick ass host-family, I still long for my home.
June 20th. Two months, two weeks, and five days until I touch down in the land of Oz.
I miss you, Kansas City.
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I went with my buddy Deniz to see one of the best/most famous comedians and entertainers in all of Germany on Monday night. We've been planning on going to this show for the last three months now, which paid off when we found out the show is sold out for this whole week. It was twenty euros just to get our back row seats.
Helge Schneider is an amazing character, doing everything one can think of at the age of fifty or so. He has a number of hilarious characters he acts out, combined with his incredible music talents as he plays the piano with his left hand, the trumpet with his right, the tambourine with his left foot, and the bass drum with his right. The guy plays every instrument you can imagine and every genre on top of that, too.
Come on, look at the guy! Even his appearance is great.
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Last night I went to a concert I've been looking forward to for a longgggg time now: Eighteen Visions, Misery Signals, and a band called Emanuel. For some reason, Misery Signals opened for the other two bands (even though no one knows who the heck Emanuel is) and played one of the most perfect sets I've heard in a long time -- for twenty five minutes. That was it. That's roughly five songs.
I noticed throughout the MS set that I was the only one enjoying the band, while everyone else looked on as if they were confused. Then I noticed something funny: little Korn/Orgy/Limp Bizkit teeny-boppers walking into the venue with their moms and their "I'm a trendy suicidal gothic rock fan, fuck the world-attitude" clothes/safety pins/etc. Then Emanuel played -- a good band but not my type of music. During the Emanuel set, I noticed even more trendy kids walking in, but this time including those one would find in a poppy MTV dance video .. at a metal/hardcore concert?
Why? I wasn't sure until I noticed them all snapping photos of the Eighteen Visions boys before fanning themselves when the singer would undo a button on his shirt or the bassist humped his guitar. They jumped up and down shouting "Oh my God!" (in German) and taking more pictures before engaging in what they figured was a really mean moshpit: gently pushing their friends back and forth, laughing the whole time because they were "moshing!" WOO!
To top off the teeny-boppers and their moms, there were paparazzi's throughout the entire crowd taking every chance they could get to capture the Eighteen Visions boys' choreographed rock moves and wonderful poses.
Did Eighteen Visions play any of their older original music? Of course not. Just the trendy new material.
So for the first time ever, I walked out of a concert.
Ef you, Eighteen Visions.
.. sorry, Ted. I <3 you still.
Misery Signals ripping shit up
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My beautiful French girl visited me for the third time last week and we had the times of our lives - again! The week consisted of tons of walks around and through the city, a nice boat ride on the harbor, a night at the local annual fair, cooking each other meals, lots of sleeping, lots of movies, grocery shopping, visiting an exhibit, talking about what it'll finally be like at home, eating Thai food, stopping numerous times at Burger King, Easter brunch and chocolate, lots of kissing, and an indescribable amount of being madly in love.
Not to mention a bunch of pictures ..
She can even talk with ducks! It doesn't get any better than this!
 
 
 
Sporting those stars and stripes at the airport
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The new cool thing to do now (because I said so) is webcamming on MSN .. if you're one of the many insomniacs I know, get at me any weekday between 2 and 10am Kansas time. Pwease?
MSN: transformationa@hotmail.com
Take care,
Alex | 
