This Has No Theme

So I moved to Korea. I'm in a small-ish city (by Korean standards I'm in the 'countryside'). It's around 90 minutes away from Seoul. I'm teaching English here. 
I hope that this has never been a wanky travel blog and that it never will be. 

With that being said, I will share a few little things from my new life here:

• The list of ways I feel like a pirate is definitely adding up 1.) I can't speak good. 2.) The fruit and vege situation here points to me getting scurvy.
• No one runs outside here. People stare at me because I am white, and because I am running. 
• Portland was like a facial hair oasis. I may not have appreciated this enough. First Korean man I see with some nice beard/moustache/maybe-just-a-bit-of-stubble won't know what hit him.  

Here's a list things that I made. I don't think they are related. Let's not even look for a theme, okay? 

• Recently I went without caffeine for about a week. I learnt something new about myself: Me without caffeine is horrific. My whole body hurts, especially my head. Even if I actually like you, I don't like you. I will stare at you and say 'I'm grumpy', while squinting my eyes and expecting you to do something about it. 
• Bananas are actually berries.
• At my old job, I was trying to sell 'water resistant' things to people by saying they're 'kind of waterproof'. I did this for a LONG time. This doesn't even make sense! 
• Elephants can stop a rolling apple without bruising it 'coz they have mad foot skillz. 
• Carpe diem.
• So there's this thing called breakfast pizza. Maybe you should make it. 
• Fuck this suggestion:

 

• Ben and Jerry's can disappoint. A few weeks ago before I left the USA I brought a pint of the Cheesecake Brownie flavour, and I'm thinking 'Well isn't this just going to be yummy! I like cheesecake and brownies!' Then I eat some and the icecream doesn't even taste like cheesecake and there are hardly any of the little brownie chunks. Lesson: If you want cheesecake and brownies, just eat cheesecake and brownies. 
• Thanks to 'Murica (esp. Portland), I am now quite fond of bridges. Like, bridges are actually really great. 
• If I ever own a boat, it WILL look like a pirate ship. 
• Here's a quote from my good friend Paige, and a great philosophy: "I like calluses. If your skin's too soft, you're not doing life right." 
• Moving and not wasting anything in my kitchen cupboards is a talent that I have yet to master. 

Thoughts from me THIS week:

• Let's share feelings on brushing your teeth in the shower. Do you do it? Have you tried it? I've tried it, and I think it's warm and weird, and I don't like the toothpaste swimming around my feet for some reason. 
• Something in life that I dislike is that feeling right before you go to bed where you don't know if you need to pee or not. 
• I suppose I should try and make you watch some kind of video now. I do that. This is my friend Eli. He does comedy and he's great. 

Thanks for reading! 

I like you all.

Liz Tritops

xoxo

My Relationship Between Stress and Ice Cream

I haven't written in ages. I've been super busy running around and doing activities. I started reading about Harry Potter again, because I still don't know who dies and who lives. I've also been trying to figure out what to do with my life because America is about to kick me out.
Sometimes I'm not too stressed about leaving very soon. I still don't know what I'm doing or where I am going. Other times, reality hits and I have an internal freakout. What happens when I tell people that I'm leaving is that they ask me what I'm doing next. Then when I think about it, that's when I have another mental panic. 

I have stress symptoms. Here are some things that happen. 

• I don't talk, or,
• I talk too much about everything which is mundane to most people but exciting to me, and generally has no relevance to life. Cue dinos, animals, and 'would you rather' questions.
• Watch TV to take my mind off all the things I should be doing. End up having more things to do because I have been watching TV. 
• Decide I have no time to run. I actually do have time to run, because I have somehow been making time for TV. Get more stressed because I'm not running. 
• Stop being hungry, but
• I eating all the things because it makes me feel like I am being productive. People need to eat, right? 

This is a story about icecream.*

Usually I have icecream in the house because of Icecream Sunday. Icecream Sunday is the day where I am allowed to eat icecream. (I have days designated to exciting things in my life. Click here for more!) I have some 'Everything but the...' in the freezer. I'm telling you, this flavour is like a quarter of an orgasm, for reals. It has vanilla and chocolate icecream with white chocolate chunks, peanut butter cups, Heath bar chunks, and chocolate covered almonds. 
Stressed Liz needs an activity = worst icecream eating method ever. 
The problem with icecream that has so many yummy chunks is that I only want to eat the chunks. This turns into a game. I find a peanut butter cup, eat it, then I find some white chocolate, so I eat that, then oh my freaking gosh there's some Heath bar! A tiny piece of another peanut butter cup is exposed I have to fucking dig the shit out of the icecream. All the chunks must be mined!!!! FIND ALL THE WHITE CHOCOLATE! EAT ALL THE PIECES OF EVERYTHING!
What am I left with? A small amount of semi-melted and churned up icecream with no more chunks of fun :( 
I proceed to put on some fat pants (should have done this before icecream eating, duh Liz) and crawl into fetal position. Exact positioning must be strategic, to ensure maximum comfort and also so that I can see what's going on on episode of Hoarders. Hint: Weird people are hoarding things.
Eyes close.
Time elapses. 
Wake up some time later. What year is it? Who knows. Did I wake up from the best party in the world? Answer = no.
Squirrels have invaded apartment.
Flatmate is on other couch, also looking deranged.
Room is full of Ben and Jerry's containers. Most are empty, some have melted icecream, but don't even think that you could find remaining peanut butter cup hunks. Na-ah, gurlfriend. 
No, we don't have great hair. 
Apartment smells like failure, and possibly dead cats. 

THE END

*May or may not be based on a true story. 

Because of occurrences like this, I have been avoiding telling people that I WILL BE LEAVING PORTLAND IN LYK OMG 7 DAYS.

Other thoughts from me this week:

• There are some things that I know I don't know. a) Do friendly goats exist? b) What Blu-ray is. I care enough to be aware that I don't know what it is, but I don't care enough to Google it to find out. I don't have time for that shiz. Usually I just imagine a bright blue stingray being all like 'hey guys! I'm blue!
• I will refuse to drink peppermint and chamomile tea on a regular basis. Not only do they taste like  I'm eating flowers, but I fear that I will turn into an aggressively calm person. 
• Watch this!

The End

Love you all

Liz Tritops

xoxo

Day Hacks

Sometimes life can be a bit shit. I know we aren't starving orphans where having no socks is the least of our problems. Let's be realistic. But there are times when daily life can be a little mundane. We wake up. We shower. We commute to work. We work. We commute back home. Blah blah blah. Repeat. Maybe we get to throw in a cheeky impromptu pun, or some tequila, or a game of Twister. Suddenly life becomes a little more fun. Could it be better? Yes. This is where my day hacks come in. 

To break the humdrum of the day-to-day drag, I made a few day hacks which I get maybe a little too excited about. 

Martini Monday
A martini must be taken on any given Monday. The preference is that you dress smart. If I were a man, the ideal outfit would be a pinstripe suit and a fancy hat. I'm not a man, and I don't own a pinstripe suit. I also don't know how I feel about pant suits, but one day I might give it a go. 
One of my friends has a philosophy which goes like this: Dress well, test well. He would dress nicely in hope of this influencing how well he does in his exam. My new philosophy is this: Dress well, martini well. Yeah I just made 'martini' into a verb. DEAL. I haven't actually done Martini Monday yet, and to be fair, I've only had one martini in my life. I don't even think it was a proper martini. My friend and I ordered them at our lodgings in Samoa. I'm pretty sure they didn't know how to make a martini and it was quite rank. 
Martini Monday WILL happen the next Monday, and I'll let you know how it goes for me.  


Whiquila Wednesday 
Whiquila is a drink which I made up. It's a shot of whisky and tequila together! It has all the benefits of both, being that it makes you fun and more fun. The bonus is that it doesn't make you horny or angry or sleepy! It tastes okay, and everyone thinks it's gonna be gross but then I make them take a shot with me and they love it! 


Fun Cereal Friday
I got this idea when I was still in high school. One of my friends Eli and I used to have Pie Day Friday. We would each take turns to buy us both pies from the school canteen. This stopped when we got into a fight about whose turn it was to buy the pies. To this day I swear Eli still owes me three pies. I mean, I'm over it though. Like, I don't even care anymore.
I don't even eat pies so of corse it doesn't even matter. It was eight years ago. 
Also, the pies were making me a little round.
Point is, I decided to do another fun thing on Friday to replace Pie Day Friday which had ended most abruptly. For this I did Fun Cereal Friday which is where I had cocoa pops on Friday because they were more fun than the healthier breakfast I had on the other days.
Now that I am in the States, there is whole new world of cereals available for me to sample every week. Rules: The cereal must look fun (it probably has a puzzle on the back of the package or some kind of cereal mascot like Cap'n Crunch), and it must be quite unhealthy. I'm not supposed to feel wholesome when I'm eating it, I'm supposed to feel slightly rebellious. 
Some of us went through this phase when we left home where we are all like "Screw you, Mum. I can eat whatever I want for breakfast!" So we did. Then we probably stopped. Now I'm starting again. But just on a Friday. Hopefully all the little balls of sugary-coated delight wont all cut my mouth open so much. We all know the cereal rule: The better it tastes, the more it cuts your mouth up.  

Icecream Sunday - See what I did there? Eh? Eeeehh? If you know my points system, you know I get a point when I eat icecream. As a family, we used to have icecream for pudding on Sunday. My brother thought it was kind of dumb. He's all: "Why the fuck can't we have icecream whenever we want?" And then Mum's all: "BECAUSE I SAID SO NAGNAGNAG!" Kidding. She doesn't really sound like that. Whenever Mum wasn't home, we would make Dad give us icecream even on a Wednesday or something CRAZY like that. 
I'm a big fan of the icecream on a Sunday rule. It means that I don't eat it every day, since I know Sunday must be only six or fewer days away.  The great thing about Portland is that there are all kinds of icecream shops where you can get all kinds of different icecream like honey lavender and maple bacon and chevre with bourbon pecan caramel if you're a food snob, and eggnog custard imuststopthisbeforeihaveanicecreamgasm!!!!

I still have three more days of the week to make up day hacks for. I need them to sound snappy. I need it to be fun but easy. Thoughts: Yours please. 

Other thoughts from me this week:

• What's up with the patterns on bus seats? Seriously. What are they? 
• Maybe I should just have Angry Thursday. Thursday is my Monday, therefore I don't like it. Nothing good can happen!
• Microwave minute > washing machine minute > normal minute. 
• Watch this please thank you. 

Thanks for reading

Liz Tritops

xoxo

My 100 Favorite Things - Part V

I know I reached 100, but I thought of some more things which I really, really like! There are so many awesome things! 
You can find my other favourite things by clicking these links:

Part I
Part II
Part III
Part IV


Here is the fifth installment: 

1. When people carry children on their back becuase they live in the Andes AND it's practical. The cloths are called aguayos and I like them a lot. LOOK! When I was in Bolivia I often wondered at what age it was acceptable to still be carried. Remember when you were a child and you would pretend you were too little and weak to walk but really you were just being a lazy shithead? Same goes for the kids in these cloths. One time, I swear I saw a kid who was pushing seven years. Poor mum. 
2. Mochi icecream. I can't believe I only discovered mochi this year. That means that I have 22 years of mochi icecream-eating to catch up on. 
3. A cappella, but only when men do it. (In 1913, some suffragette living in some place, threw herself under the King's horse. You may have thought this was me. Hint: It wasn't me.)
4. The smell of tent. You might think it's kinda gross because I guess it smells like stale AND damp at the same time, but to me it smells more like memories and happiness and freedom.
5. City lights at night. Especially when there is water. Then you get city lights, water, and city lights coming off the water!
6. Little dogs who aren't of the rat variety and have the attitude of big dogs. 
7. When it's dark outside but it actually isn't, because there is snow on the ground!
8. Believing that Audrey Hepburn invented breakfast. Thanks, babe.
9. Tiny sombreros.
10. Animals wearing tiny sombreros. Here's a hedgehog/furzepig! Here's a thing! Maybe it's a bear‽
11. Sleeping on my face with my limbs flayed everywhere. Is 'flayed' the right word? (Don't tell me to Google that shit. I'm not on my laptop.)
12. Flirty baristas. HELLO! I didn't just come into this cafe to get a 2% capp and a platonic experience.
13. Power ballads. All of us need an emotive chorus from time to time. Don't fight it!
14. Doing a thing that your family did that you keep on doing even though there's no reason behind it and you don't even live with them anymore. SUNDAY NIGHT ICECREAM!
15. The colour of honey when sunlight shines through it. 
16. Sticking your middle finger up to the weather by eating icecream when it's cold and drinking coffee when it's hot. (I feel like I talk about icecream A LOT. Whatever. I like icecream. YOLO, bitchez!)
17. Milkmen and how they used to deliver milk in glass bottles based on how many glass bottles you left out. I guess they got rid of this system because it was inefficient. For once, I say fuck efficiency. I want nostalgia and regular visits from someone just like Tevye. 
18. Going to a new city/town that's just a little bit shit and realising that you're thankful that home is home.
19. When you find things that look like dinosaurs. This one time I saw a chicken fillet thing that looked more like a velociraptor than a chicken fillet thing and it made my life complete. 
20. Santa when he's not white. Asian santa. Black santa. Latino santa. Latino santa looks like a creeper. 
21. Finding some food which has gone bad and deciding to keep it as a science experiment and NOT getting sick by all the spores which are taking over the whole apartment. (Apparently apple butter is supposed to go in the fridge. No big loss. LET'S SEE HOW WEIRD IT CAN GET!)
22. Pretending you're a tortoise when you're having beers, because in tortoise years, you've only had four!
23. When you're carrying something dangerous in your bag like a banana or yoghurt or some juicy food in a flimsy container and it doesn't leak/explode over all your school books or your sweater and ruin your life. 
24. Telling people the answers to yes/no questions in binary.
25. Seeing people run to catch the bus because it isn't you!

I hope you liked my list of things and that you had a great day.

Will blog again sooooon yay!

Liz Tritops

xoxo

How I Get Points

I play a game with myself to make life better.

Basically, I get a point for doing or seeing certain things. If I get 10 points, I get to eat icecream. This is fantastic, because I really like icecream.

How I accrue a point:

• I eat cheese. Note: If I eat more than one 'cheese unit' I don't get more than one point. 
• I see a squirrel.
• I see an animal which I have never seen before. Let's go to the zoo!
• I wake up just before my alarm goes off.
• I go for a run when it's dark and I don't get attacked by clowns, rapists, or drop bears.
• I think about someone who I never see and then I see them on the same day!
• I eat icecream.
• I get to say hello to a new dog that I haven't said hello to before.
• I see a penny farthing. 
• I see someone in a pinstripe suit. 
• I can hold my breath until the bus comes (usually I start holding my breath when the bus is between one and two minutes away). Yes I catch the bus sometimes. No I am not smelly or angry.
• I have i-Tunes on shuffle when there are people around and an embarrassing song doesn't play. 
• I see a man order a hot chocolate.
• I see a someone smoking a cigar.

See the 7th bullet point? Look what I did! So if I already have nine points then all I have to do is eat icecream then I get more icecream. WHADDUP GENIUS. 

I still haven't got to 10 points.

Other thoughts from me this week:

• Party-pooper. That's a weird thing to say. Imagine someone who just goes into a party, shits on the floor, and then leaves. 
• I never had a rubber duck as a bath toy. Who even did? Was I missing out? Was a rubby ducky that quintessential of a bathtime play-thang? OMG bath toys existed! I haven't even thought about bath toys in years. I guess it's one of those thingys where if you are not a child and don't have one, you never talk about or even see bathtoys. Kids gotta play, right.
• Would chicken toes sell as well as chicken fingers?
• I really really really miss baking things. 
• What was up with this craze? 
• Watch this! It's real cute!

I gotta go now. 

Well, not really.

I don't have to work today. So I'm gonna sleep some more and watch Community and read and write. YAY!

Lots of love

Liz Tritops

xoxo

I Really Suck at Packing

I'm going to Chicago tomorrow to see some friends and do some other fun things (I don't know what these things will be, but one of my best habits is making nearly everything fun, so I smell success!). Also, I just brought a million new socks, so everywhere I walk will feel really soft.


It is around 11PM. I should be packing. Often I get really really excited about packing because I'm usually going to have an adventure. 


This is how I pack right now:

• Discuss with everyone that I'm about to leave to have fun without them. 
• Go into room and think 'Liz. You should make a list.'
• Rethink list idea, based on the fact that I only had one suitcase when I came to America. Surely I can just look around bedroom and bathroom and grab things that I might need for a week. It's only a week, right? I don't have many things to look at and decide. Process should be simple.  
• Apparently it's not. 
• Get worried when I realise that I haven't washed my clothing yet. Shitfuck. 
• Wish I had a maid to wash my clothing for me. 
• Make Pros and Cons list about wether it would be better to have my washing done for the rest of my life or have my meals cooked for me for the rest of my life. Get confused because the pros of one list are the cons of the other. WHAT'S HAPPENING‽ 
• Put washing in machine. Because let's get real, I don't have a fucking maid.
• Boil water to make cup of tea. 
• Have conversation with flatmate about why babies don't need IDs to get on planes. We decided they didn't need IDs because they're not counted as real people since they don't have to pay. Also decided that baby IDs would probably be silly because they might all look the same. Why then, do Asians have IDs? LOL LOL JK. 
• Get angry that jug doesn't turn off automatically because it makes high-pitched squealing noise like those annoying tea pots which talked to each other on some old cartoon movie that I can't remember what it was called or even what it was about.  
• Realise it's too fucking hot for a cup of tea. Still haven't found an appropriate drink to replace English Breakfast Tea in the summer. THIS IS NOT OK. 
• See this picture of a circle bed which some guy made to look like a hamburger. I really want a round bed. It may be confusing which part to sleep on, but I'm ok with that. I sleep on my face like this: 

• I don't see a logistical problem.
• I don't think there would have been a 'logistical' problem anyway. 
• I like to say things are logistical nightmares, but I hope I am never a person who has to deal with logistical nightmares.  I've kind of secretly always wanted to have a nightmare about logistics so I can say it and really mean it. Like a bad dream about a lorry taking some timber to the wrong port, and then when it eventually goes to the right port the wrong kind of ship has come to get the timber, like a pirate ship. You know what they say: Pirates can't take timber. 
• Resume packing. Grab heaps of things that I will probably need when I am away and put them in a pile in my room. DON'T EVEN THINK ABOUT PUTTING THEM IN APPROPRIATE BAG. For some reason, maybe double handling WILL be efficient. 
• Get super confused about what I will and won't need tomorrow before I leave. Cannot pack toothpaste now. Cannot pack shoes because I will be wearing them. Cannot pack band aids because I haven't made a mini first aid kit. 
• Realise I don't have time to make mini first aid kit. I used to carry first aid supplies around in an empty hair-gel pottle when I was at high school. It was super cute and people would go to me if they wanted plasters or Panadol and I would feel useful and wanted. 
• Get distracted by the internetz when I am learning about luggage policy. On the list of things to be STOWED away during take-off and landing is virtual pets. What if I need to feed my tamagotchi‽ 
• Write list of things I will need to do tomorrow morning. I even write down ridiculously obvious things because I am so overwhelmed by all the things I have to remember not to forget that I might forget the things that I will always remember. Just writing down 'towel' would be ambiguous and may lead to confusion. Must write 'put towel in bag after shower', AND 'shower'. 
• Decide to be defiant to the weather and have cup of tea.
• Take washing out of dryer. 
• Pack running things so I can pretend I will run when I am on holiday.
• Cup of tea has made me really hot. 
• Lie belly-up on the floor because I want to cool down and I feel slightly hopeless. . 
• Eat ice cream because it's hot. This icecream is the one that Stephen Colbert made with the bits of chocolate covered waffle cone and caramel in it. I Am Pole and So Can You. 
• Wonder WTF I am doing eating icecream at 1AM. Simultaneously wonder why I have gained 4kg since coming to America. 
• Maybe I should finish packing tomorrow? By 'finish', I more mean 'start'. 
• Attempt to put things in bag and realise I have probably gathered too many things to take with me. 
• Cry a little on the inside, because I don't know what to take out and leave in.
• Fabric softener that Americans use doesn't soften fabric. I think it just makes things big. That's why my clothes won't fit in my bag. 
• Sleep on couch because I just made bed and I want to come back to it nice and tidy. Also, couch is actually comfier than bed, and lounge is cooler than bedroom. Seriously contemplate moving bedside lamp into lounge. Decide against it, because nek minnit all my things will be in lounge. 
• Go to bed at 2.30AM. 
• Don't sleep very much because I am freaking out that I won't wake up in time to do all the things I have to tomorrow. Also I'm very excited.
• Conclude that I suck at packing. 

Other thoughts from me this week:

• Hey, let's add peaches and cream and maple syrup and bananas to porridge so it isn't relavent to poor people anymore. 
• How did I live for 22 years without learning that pumpkin is a fruit?  
• I just saw the house that was in Home Alone. Yeah, you should be jealous. 
• This is the best thing since unsliced bread. Watch it! 

GTG BRB LOLZ MUM

Ok bye guys. 

Liz Tritops

xoxo

How Did They Come Up With This‽‽‽

There are a few things that baffle my mind as to how they even exist. Here are some of them:

• Ballet. I can imagine a few guys (there would obviously be no ladies) sitting around a  table in a boardroom and watching some other guy pitch an idea to them. It's called ballet. He proceeds to put on some crazy as shoes and hears one of the other dudes say "Oi! Those look like girls shoes!!!" He shrugs in a 'it's no big deal' kind of a way. He then flails his arms and legs around everywhere and chucks in some really cool twirls and a few plié(s?). Everyone in the room was thinking THAT. WAS. FUCKING. AMAZING. After his little show, he explains that when the leg is not bent, it's stretched completely or put behind in a semi-classical position where the leg is slightly bent, but not completely. That's really what sold the idea. Don't try and tell me that dance isn't invented in boardrooms; I know that it is. 
• Rum and raisin icecream. I think what happened here is that someone (probably by the name of Warren) was trying to make rum icecream, which would be quite nice. Then he tweaks out a little and accidentally bumps a whole massive box of raisins into the vat (icecream is made in vats, yes?). Warren was worried that he would lose his job because he's actually a bit shit at life and making icecream is the only thing he can (vaguely) do. Turns out it the rum and raisin icecream was a little uncouth and was unusually textured, but tasted quite palatable. Nowadays, Sun Maid raisin packets come with little inspirational quotes on them such as: 'Work hard. Play fair. Sleep well', and 'Help a friend'. My favourite one is 'Do your homework first, play later'. The first one EVER was dedicated to Warren and it said 'Don't worry if you accidentally drop raisins into the rum icecream which you are trying to make, because you won't get fired and a few people will fucking love this new icecream flavour'. 
• Penny farthings. How would anyone ever think that one massive wheel and one tiny wheel would make a good bicycle? This guy crashed. Apparently, you don't have to move your legs very much..to...actually....pedal the...in terms of...
• Wingdings. I can understand wanting the pictures, but why would you have it as a font after the invention of clipart? After the absurdity of Wingdings (the original), they had the audacity to create Wingdings 2, incase you needed to replace a letter with a pair of scissors which is on a slightly different angle to the other four scissors offered in the original Wingdings. Admittedly, it was fun when I was six to write things in Wingdings so people couldn't understand. It was like a secret code, except it was quite a useless secret code because I didn't have it memorised either. All you had to do was change the font back to Comic Sans. BAM. Problem solved. They words now look more casual and fun and slightly humorous. What I should have done was make it into my own kind of PHYSICAL SIGN LANGUAGE between me and a friend (let's imagine that I had one.) Sign language Wingdings style would be easy. Scissors! Jew star! Pencil! Book! Plus many more! 
• Creed.

Other thoughts from me this week:

• Did you know that people eat more M&Ms out of a bowl with 7 colours than they do with 4 colours? WHADUP psychology. I guess you gotta eat all the colours.  
• I find it so awkward when people ask me about koalas and kangaroos in New Zealand. It doesn't make me mad, but it just hurts a little that we actually don't have ANY cool animals. Mostly I just walk away. 
• Maybe we can change the world if we think about snowflakes enough. <3 Slacktivism. 
• My friend from work is getting me to read science fiction. I don't like science fiction. I HATE SCIENCE FICTION. Then I realised that I'm being genreist. I dont think that's a word. Being genreist is almost as bad as being racist or sexist, right? I'm already jizzing myself over racy cover illustrations... 
• I actually love this show. When you're looking at horses, you're not thinking about the other things in your life. 

Gotta run!!

Have a great day.

Liz Tritops

xoxo