DirtyCoast is cooler than StL-Style

I hate to say it, but DirtyCoast.com is way cooler than her sista up the riva, StL-Style.com.

I am really loving their Crawfish (known to Me as a crawDAD) ...crawSOMETHING shirt. Its cool, and I want to get it for my dad, so he can again be accidentally cool.

Why!? I hope they really use the "everyone loves a good tshirt" (hello Threadless) to the advantage of St. Louis at large, b/c i think they totally could. Why NOT?! New Orleans makes me jealous.

I love the revolving flash banner thing, (Look at the smorgasboarrd over there on the right) whose image changes faster than I change my mind about whether I like StL or NOLA more, and I love the "Be Hot, Be Local" tagline bigtime. I know of quite a few Stlsters who'd be pretty enthused to banner themselves up, not to mention to be hot and local.

Plus Mr. DirtyCoast gave me a nice list of NOLA blogs to read - that was rather kind of him.

StLStyle, you could be such a force for good, and you already are, a little.
Fry the big (craw)fish, already! I just don't think its possible to start up another tshirt company, create dissent, etc... in a town that needs all the unity it could get.

There are at least 20 local foods/traditions/whatever that, with a good design and a clever little somethin', would look nice on anyone's chest.

Sigh.

Magic hair products, internet lamentations and stuff

This product is saving my hair from french destruction. I remembered reading - back in 1998 probably -- about how Jennifer Aniston used it, and now I have it, and my hair feels like hair again. Thank you Kiehl's!

In other news, I've spent about 5 hours here at Raconte-moi La Terre (tell me about the earth) Cafe and I am just feeling the pain of not having internet as a part of my everyday life. I can feel myself using internet differently, and I don't like it. I really do prefer intermittent (sp?) internet usage, rather than the desperate mid-day 5 hour binges I go on now - it's just not healthy, kids. I realize this debate just makes no sense to anyone living in america b/c you have Internet integrated into your lives.
well, hey.

I was talking to this english gal, and she's about to move to a place with internet, and we were just talking about how nice it is to look things up whenever you want, but when you don't have internet, you have to write them down, and then when you look them up, its just not as exciting. Sigh. Also, reading all the bajilz of blogs I am into takes some time, but I'm willing, b/c they're good and informative!

I won't give up the fight for internet in my dorm, though I might just try being pragmatic and using my fellow ex-pats internet connections and hospitality (paid back with groceries, booze and friendship of course! a fair trade, i'd say) so that I can get things underway with things.

I'm sure its not the internet itself I miss, but the whole connected and amazing magic of it all.

Sidenote: my buddy Becky was telling me about this show, HEROES and it sounds awesome. I am missing such good TV, huh? I'm getting to see good Cathedrals and foreign stuff, though - I suppose this is a fair trade, too.

My winter vacation is coming up - Blythe is comin' down for some italian back-door galavanting (yay) and then I'm going to northern europe, hopefully with my friend Jen, who is generous enough to come with me! It will be fun, and I'm going to see the WWII memorial, and I'm pretty much stoked.

Internet adventure – missed caroline, but my pictures are up

I am an internet nomad. I travel around Lyon with my laptop in search of Wifi.

I have my stand-bys….Fnac, The Black Lion…but I know there are more out there! I managed to find a totally cool wifi bar within MINUTES of arriving in Zurich…why can’t france be the same? I will explore. Might find some cool non wifi bars in the process.

I didn't get to chill with Caro, which was a bummer, but I am Cinderella sometimes, and I have to leave before midnight.

Adventures in Interneting

At doris’ there was really fast internet, and it was in a home. Something I have not experienced for about 4 months. Needless to say, magical. Thanks to the Violands for allowing me to use the computer – I hope I did not seem to be an internet creeper.

I saw something funny on the comedy central insider blog, so I decided to email this fella Chris Locke, who also happens to have been the author of the book I was then reading (and I finished the book and it was awesome). Chris Locke being pretty much asesome and all, emailed me back! Throuch him I discovered that The Daily Show is taking their videos off YouTube…not cool! Chris Locke however, cool. Sortof an amazing moment.

Also, I found a gal who has linked to testimo in her blog…she lived in LA and she loves her some Testimo, so of course I loves me some her. We emailed, etc… it should be a happy friendship…maybe she can give me some insight into the testimo-customer-mind, so that I can write better descrips, and possible blog better when the time comes for the TestimoBlog.

I also discovered on the internet… http://www.elfyourself.com, http://www.photojojo.com, and subway parties, and Mr. Nola dirtycoast.com guy who may or may not be sending me a t-shirt to the Sweetbriar homestead for that kooky little “C-ray” thing I have to the right.

Awesome!

Onto real, not e-life....
On the last night, we watched Coupling, a british sitcom, with Doris’ buddies, and I thought…wwwwaaay too obviously “Friends” in british, but still it was cute. And english, which was very genrous of my austrian buddies.

The next day for lunch we had some “birds” – which were really like, beef wrapped around pork wrapped around a pickle = delish – and I peaced out to Zurich on a lovely swiss train ride.

Seriously, it was super precious, the swiss countryside, and I like it that it’s a mountain fortress. I liken it to the mountain fortress in the movie big, and I feel very safe there knowing that, in the event of an invasion, Switzerland could blow up all access to its country by land. I’m not sure about the planes, but I’m sure they have that covered to. Neurtrality or die! Also, with knives like that, the army has to be good. I think its sortof neato that the army is famous for a knife that they probably never really use, b/c the army never fights (unless there are like, Swiss Jack Bauers…they would use those knives).

Backbeat, the word is on the street

That I am no longer 12.

I learned Wonderwall on my guitar, (it’s a pretty easy song to play, but its also pretty easy to forget, as its all fancy finger moves and not memorable chords, durn) and since realized that my students probably do not know this song, as I liked it when I was 13. Oasis is an old band! Geez!

I remember - I met my first net-friend, Wendy from New Jersey, on the Oasis messageboard. Wendy was the shit! She was so fun and sarcastic, and we shared tips about how to make frames on our websites. How geeky, but how awesome...oh the days when I was on the cutting edge of HTML.

In other early net adventures, I also was on some swing music mailing list when the Squirrel Nut Daddie’s song, “hell” (I believe) made it on MTV and people on the list were freaking out. It was pretty cool to be a part of that, no matter how small, when everyone on the list was like, from San Fran, and I was some 13 year old from STL. I am old school.

President of the Internet book

I read this book called the starfish and the spider, and it had a sortof incredibly hilarious part where this early internet dude is trying to pitch the Internet to some French business men, and they’re like, “Yees, but who eez zee President?” and the internet dude is like, “well actually there is no president” and the French are like, Sacre bleu, no president? We will not invest. So push comes to shove, and this guy is just like, “I am the President of the Internet.”
Oh, France.

This whole scenario is funny for many reasons, the least of which being that it all happened in France, the most of which being that it’s really really fun to tell people (or yourself) that you are president of the internet. In a sense, we all are! It feels good. Tell someone today that you are the president of the Internet. You are!

The book itself rules. It had a very cool, Tipping Point sortof thing going for itself. I remember that Dr. H told me that he thought Malcom Gladwell was some young punk thinking he knew what was up with the business world writing The Tipping Point. Famous last words, I think. I was sortof stunned to silence by someone thinking you had to be old to write/understand what seemed like pretty simple and compelling points made by Mr. G. I wish I’d told Dr. H that not liking the Tipping Point is sorta lame. Anyway, I totally dug the Tipping Point, and The Starfish and the Spider, while probs not as salient to everyday experience as The TP (haha), was super cool, and thought provoking in a major way. The part about the terrorists was like, whoa. I dug it! Thank GOD for amazon.com used books and affordable international shipping rates!
*Gift idea: Amazon.com gift certifs….so useful to me! *

Quest for internet

Francoise, who shares the name (and a country of origin) with a favorite Kirkwood mom of mine, is a teacher who believes that it should not be that hard for me to get internet, really. I have not checked in with her lately, but last time I checked she had asked the computer man -- who is always happy, according to her…and also according to her, and I am inclined to agree, his overt, blatant, unclandestine happiness quite sets him apart from the average teacher at La Martin --- if it wouldn’t be too hard to extend the nurse connection (the nurses office is below me, yes I’ve been researching) into our dorms…he said it’d be actually really easy (!) – all we need is to drill a hole in the floor. The hard part, however, is getting some French mechanic to come and drill the hole. I admit, in the twilight hours when I’ve listened to everysinglesong in my itunes library for the 5th time, I have had dark thoughts of taking to that floor with my blunt butter knife, but I have resisted. Will Francoise cut the red tape and do the diplomacy dance to get internet (I believe it is a right, france believes it’s a nuisance/privilege? No way) to poor teaching assistants? We’ll see.

I am American! I am made to be intrepid and cross rough terrain and discover new things. My ancestors were revolutionaries! I think some of them were Puritans! They cut My people have a long legacy of cutting red tape! Though recently I’ll admit, we’ve been pretty good at creating a bit of the red tape ourselves, also ok, my ancestors did some pretty crappy things too, witch trials and slavery probably the most buzz worthy Ooopsies.

Still -- if the founding fathers could say peace out to a King, I can say, hey crazy French administration and bureaucracy, let’s get some internet in my dorm room that doesn’t even have a phone. So far I can talk the talk, but we’ll see about me walking the walk. I will try to be Ben Franklin and charm the French with my love of wine and song.

In case of the need for contingencies, Plan B is becoming friends with the nurses (should I develop a chronic some sort of illness?), and getting them on my side/getting them to give me the key to the internet.

-- ps I can sneak onto the 2nd floor, but sadly, the office with internet is locked. Ok, its not sad, b/c offices need to be locked, but I would like to check my email … I am an American! --

Plan C is to somehow steal a key to the nurses office and then sneak in there to use the internet and do terrible things like, talk to my mom! Its times like these where I really wish I did have the super spy skills I have always dreamed of aquiring.

Its amazing all the time I have to think since I don’t have internet. Most of it I use to think of ways to get the internet.