Day 51: Fri 30 Jan

Man, today was awful :/

It took us ages to get anywhere. It was very long, cold, tiring and stressful.

We missed the bus at least 3 times and ended up walking around in circles a lot.
Perhaps we should invest in a map of St Louis; that could be handy.

Had a really good bagel for late brunch though, from Einstein Bros Bagels and some really nice fish & chips from Blueberry Hill. Finally got that damn book returned; and bought The Metaphysical Club instead. The guy working there said it was a really really great book, and asked if I was a philosophy major LOL

We got out two more DVDs on the way home, after returning the other 3. We got The Boondock Saints and Tekkon Kinkreet. I think we're going to watch The boondock saints with the 5's on Sunday- we're writing them a note at the moment. (The 5's being our across-the-hall neighbours)

Day 50: Thurs 29 Jan

This huge big air mattress is doing me wonders- I ended up sleeping all day until 9pm ^^;;;

Train and I are going to watch the movie But I'm a Cheerleader later tonight.

It's supposed to be really funny.

Tomorrow I'm going to return that John Perkins book for store credit and look for something more worthy of reading. Also, I'm going to find stamps to send the postcards I've got- I should have done this ages ago!!

Thank you for the wonderful christmas card, Ngarie, it arrived sometime last week :)
And yes, couchsurfing in st louis does sound like a fun idea; I'll have to talk to Train about it and see if he's keen. It'd be a good way to meet some new people !

I'm getting pretty excited for my trip to North Carolina, I leave in just under 2 weeks :D
Staying with Curtis in Fayetteville over there, and we're driving up to Raleigh the first weekend because they have lots of cool art galleries and museums and things aparently, and after that I'm heading to Greensboro to stay with my friend Daniel.

And yes, Dad, in regards to the plastic bags in my shoes- they really do do a good job of keeping watery snow out :) Now I just need to find some that work with hands as well, and I'll be set :P

Day 49: Weds 28 Jan; SLEDDING

SLEDDING!

The bed guy came with Train's new bed at around 9:15am this morning, and I helped Train to set it up. We moved the air mattress into the lounge/my room and then we both went to sleep for a while (we stayed up all night until the bed guy came)

Woke up at about 5:30pm and got a txt from Ted telling us that sledding was a go, so we baked a chocolate cake, had showers and things, had pancakes for tea and got layered up.

Ted picked us up at about 9:45pm and we went to go and get Sadie from her night course at Webster.

We went to Whitecliff Park (rather appropriate name, I think) and went sledding, and made snow creations :D

Here are a few pics:

Here is a link to some more pictures: SNOW!

Day 48: Tues 27 Jan

SNOW!

Today it snowed.
A lot.

There's at least 10cm of snow which has settled on the ground and even up to about 20cm in some parts, I'd say :D

I had a lot of fun jumping around in it on the way to seeing the guy about the bed today, and on the way home again! I didn't have my camera so I couldn't take any pictures, but I'll dig it out tomorrow and go and play some more. It's meant to be snowing for the next few days as well :DDD

Tomorrow night at 10pm me, Train and our friends Ted, Sadie and Emily are all going sledding in Whitcliff Park which is quite a while away from us, but will apparently be good for sledding on :)
Here's a google map to it from our house:

View Larger Map

The guy we bought the bed from is dropping it around tomorrow morning at about 9am, so Train and I are tidying and cleaning the apartment to make room for it. All is well.

Day 47: Mon 26 Jan

We went to apply for Food Stamps today; it turned out fine- and didn't take nearly as long as we thought it was going to.

Train's getting a card on Friday with $30 on it (because it's already the end of the month pretty much) but from next month onwards he'll be getting $176 a month to spend on food :)
They're also going to send him to this thing which is like a career helping person or something, to help him get a job.

After that we found this little cafe near by which was set up inside an old church. They made really good hot chocolates :) And- it's a not-for-profit place, so there's no tax on it!

We also organised to look at the bed tomorrow, we're going to bus to the place and take a look sometime around 3pm I think.

At the moment, it's -8C outside and snowing- we almost froze walking 3 blocks to the cafe today- I don't think I'm going to be able to walk 4.5 miles to the goodwill, although I think I may have been to that one before :) It's pretty big in there and we managed to find a few things- but we still need to get our hands on a sewing machine so we can fix them up.

I'll definitely check out the CAMP place, there are a couple of other cool stores on Cherokee, as well as the Black Bear Bakery so next time we're around that way we'll have a look out for it :)!

Train and I have just finished watching Das Experiment which is a german thriller movie. I'm not going to try and explain it, because I'm not good at that, but the above link goes to imdb :)

It's really good, and sort of scary, but in an awesome way :D

Not sure what the plans are for tomorrow, but we're definitely heading to look at the bed, and sometime in the very near future I need to buy stamps to send those postcards I bought awhile ago. We're also planning to go and see the arch, city museum, science center, have a surprise party for our friend Booker, have a birthday party for B and Train and hang out with Kyle and Nate (who we met at New Years) Busy busy busy.

The forecast is snow and -10C for the next 3 days :/
I like snow and all, but it's not enough to build snowmen with, unless I make a tiny one, and it's just cold; but! it's nice and powdery snow- not like the slushy stuff we usually get in NZ.

Miss 5 from across the hall has sent us a note inviting us to come and watch a movie with her and Mr 5 sometime, to say thank you for the cookies we made her the other week. She had made us some in return, but Mr 5 got to them before she had a chance to give them to us. They're very nice people. :)

Day 46: Sun 25 Jan

Another absolutely useless day; I'm having too many of these :/

I ended up sleeping til about 6pm and getting up and not doing much. I've been in my pjs all day.

Tomorrow we're getting up at 10am and going to the place on the other side of town so Train can apply to get food stamps.

We've been looking around for more places to apply for jobs, too, but haven't found any others that would be suitable yet.

I really really need to clean this place up; my things are strewn about over the floor and everywhere. I'm getting sick of not having a proper bed, so I'm going to help Train find one which he can have, and I can have his big air mattress, as opposed to my tiny one which is really low to the ground, or the couch.

Day 45: Sat 24 Jan: BARRY'S 23RD

Today was pretty neat, actually.

We went to a party with my friend Kyle; it was his friend Barry's 23rd birthday and he was having a kegger. We caught the bus, half way there, but the connecting bus we were supposed to catch either didn't come- or came too early for us to get it. We waited ages and then Kyle was nice and came to pick us up. (it's like -5C out)

It was a good thing we didn't get there as early as we were going to, because no-one else would have been there. Kyle came to pick us up around 8:30pm from the Schrewsbury Metrolink station and he had two of his other friends (Hannah and Liz) in the car too; they're both really nice girls- both 19 and go to Webster College with Kyle. We called Barry when we were on our way there (at about 8:50pm or so) and he informed us that he wasn't even there yet, so we decided to stop and get some food. We went to "steak & shake" and had a bit to eat, it was alright- I had some chicken strips and a coffee. At around 10pm we headed back to Barry's party and there were some people there, maybe 20 or so, who had only arrived like 10 minutes before us or something.

They had a band playing called "The Daze"; they were a classic-rock band who were pretty good actually, but their drummer wasn't the best at keeping in perfect time and they played a little too loud for everyone's liking.

I met a bunch of fun new people :)
Everyone I talked to was really friendly.
I did my first ever shot; it was cheap lime flavoured vodka and it actually didn't go down too badly.

Accidently ended up leaving my black zip-up polyprop at the house when we went to go and get some food around 2:30am. We went to a 24 hour diner place called "Uncle Bill's" and we had waffles and more coffee :)

The next part was a real pain; when everyone left to go home, Train and I called a taxi (around 4:20-4:30am) it didn't end up coming for an hour D:
We were very exasperated, tired and cold.

Finally got home, now I'm writing this, and I'm about to go to sleep.

All in all, a fantastic night, minus the horrible taxi service. It was called County Cabs or something.
I'm never using them ever again.

Here are some pictures I got off someone else's camera:

Left to right: Caitlin, Sadie (wearing my hat), Hannah, Kyle, Barry, Liz.


Left to right: Emily, Sadie, Kyle, Me.


Top to bottom, then left to right: Sadie, Kelsey, Hannah, Emily.


Left to right: Caitlin, Liz, Kyle


Left to right: Emily, Hannah, Cat (short for Catherine)


Rob (the guy whose house it was) doing a kegstand.


On the far left is Train sitting on the couch. The guy with the messy dark hair in the middle (you can only see the back of his head) he had a creepy looking Hitler moustache.


Barry giving Emily a lapdance


At Uncle Bill's diner; Hannah and Cat.


Liz and Kyle (I'm hiding behind Kyle and Train is next to me)

Day 44: Fri 23 Jan

Train's interview went well, he said. After that, we headed to the loop to look around for a bit and I ended up buying two books: Philosophy for Beginners, and Confessions of an Economic Hitman.



We had pizza from a local pizzeria in the loop called St Louis Pizzahaus and it was really really good :)

A fight broke out on the bus home, between a really sassy up-in-your-face black woman and a black man, just a bit after we got on. It was really crowded, and kind of scary. They got kicked off the bus, and apparently the lady was 'whooping tha otha guys ass' :/
I couldn't tell from their accents/dialect what the fight was about or how it even started.

We didn't do much else.

Stopped off at the dollar store on the way home and picked up a few bits and pieces.

I've spent a lot of money today.

Day 43: Thurs 22 Jan

Today was a pretty good day.
We finally got a set of house keys, watched 101 dalmations and baked heart shaped apple and cinnamon muffins!

Train has a job interview tomorrow! At a restaurant on the other side of town; it's just one bus away which is good. I hope it goes well for him.

Day 42: Weds 21 Jan

We went to the other dollar store today; it's called "Deals". We bought a bunch of things, they were all really cheap:
2 wire cooling racks for $1
a silicon spatula $1
24 cute thick tinfoil stuff heart shaped cupcake tins $1
box of devils food cake mix (betty crocker) $1.25
tub of betty crocker chocolate icing $1.75
tin of hershey's baking cocoa $2.50

Anyway~ we went to Penn Station East Coast Subs for a late lunch/early dinner and used one of the coupons we got on the back of one of our supermarket dockets a while back, which was buy one sub get one free. They were really good :)

We also went to the supermarket which was just next store and bought sugar and brown sugar and a big tub of shortening to use instead of buying butter (because butter is expensive) and also- we figured we were just wasting money buying shortening in sticks, because we use quite a lot of it anyway. 3 sticks of shortening is $2.98 but the big tub which we bought, which is equal to 8 sticks, was $4.50 or something.

They had one of those toy grabby machines at the supermarket, which cost 50c a turn. I gave Train a dollar and he won me a Garfield toy :)


We both baked brownies when we got home; Train likes really gooey fudgey ones, and I don't so we both used different recipes. Then we watched Inspector Gadget 2.


It was okay, not great. No idea what tomorrow has in store just yet.

Day 41: Tues 20 Jan

Oops, sorry for the late update; I'm sure I did it yesterday :/ nevermind.

I was meant to be going to the science center, but we didnt end up going; Train said he'd wake me up at 9am so we could get ready to go out; he came in to wake me up, said "wake up, Country"
me; mkmsfdn -half asleep still noise-
him; what time did you go to sleep?
me; 4:30
him; -walks back out-
I figured he'd come and bother me again and tell me we have to leave in half an hour or something, but he didn't. I lay there half asleep, waiting to be told to get up, for the next 3 and a half hours after that; it's mostly my own fault for not having my watch on, but whatever.
Got up and got dressed and was going to go to the loop and walk around, but by the time I had walked to the bus stop, I got the feeling that I didn't really want to go on the bus for an hour just to wander around some other part of town, so we caught a different bus and went to get lunch at Urban Eats and went to south county mall after that. Then back home. Had a long, firm discussion with Train about money and things today; and pretty much told him he had to get his ass into gear or I'm sending him back home to Massachusetts. I've told him if he hasn't found a job by the time I get back from NC, I'm buying him a plane ticket and sending him back home to live with his mother. He really doesn't like his family, but I'd rather he was unhappy and had some place to live and not starve to death, than be unhappy, be homeless and starving and things.

I was going to bake brownies, too, but we didn't have any sugar. We're going to the store tomorrow.

Day 40: Mon 19 Jan

Today Train and I slept in and watched Lock Stock and Two Smoking Barrels


It was really really good.

I've also decided that going to New York and Boston might not be such a great idea; I worked out the prices and things today (roughly) and it's going to cost at least $750 US just for the transport and things, not including accommodation or food or anything like that.

Instead, however, I'm going to go and stay with Curtis in North Carolina for a week, and then stay in Chicago with Train for 3 nights sometime after that. It'll be a lot cheaper and probably a lot less stressful and more fun; plus I'll have more money to do things.

We're going to the science center tomorrow! I should really get to bed, haha :)

Day 39: Sun 18 Jan

Oh golly.
You guys aren't going to like me.
I only just realised when I was fiddling around with the settings of my blog, that you can change the permissions for who posts comments.
-_-;
So! Good news! I've changed it so anyone can post comments now and it shouldn't block you or anything like it has done in the past :) Try on this blog entry, if you'd like.

Anyway; today was a day of resting and catching up on missed sleep from our exciting Chicago adventure yesterday.

We really need to return those DVDs tomorrow. It's lucky that places here don't have late fees! ^^;;;

We're heading into the loop again next week to get our hair cut. It should be pretty exciting. Perhaps we'll try to get to the science center too :D

Day 41: Tues 20 Jan

We didn't get to the science center today, but we did end up going back to Urban Eats and then to South County mall.

We found a couple of neat things as presents for our friends Dart and B, whose birthdays are coming up soon :)

Other than that, we didn't really get up to much. It's still cold here, but tomorrow and Thursday are meant to be getting warmer.

Day 37: Friday 16 Jan

Went to the laundromat today, had cheese pizza for dinner, baked vegan chocolate chippies (we had run out of butter and eggs)

Chicago tomorrow! Super early!

Day 36: Thurs 15 Jan

Coldest day ever today; luckily we were wrapped up and warm inside.

Watched A Clockwork Orange with Train after dinner.

Going to the laundromat tomorrow and cleaning up the bathroom and things; off to Chicago on Saturday morning at 5am.

Day 35: Weds 14 Jan

I wasted the whole of today doing nothing but sleeping.

I didn't end up going to sleep until like, 6:30am; got woken up at 8:30am when the maintenance guy came and fixed the ceiling in our bathroom and put down mouse traps (we haven't managed to catch Fredrick yet, either :( We set up a bucket to catch him in, but he managed to eat the bait and get back out again, sneaky little bugger) and I went to sleep again after he'd left.
Woke up at 4:30pm with a sore stomach, but then went back to sleep to try and sleep it off.
Woke up agaaaain at about 9pm to find Train in the kitchen having a horrible time trying to make pancakes; he'd spilled half the mixture on the floor, and a bunch of other things just weren't going well for him either.

Tomorrow is the coldest day of the year; -12C to -18C is the forecast. We're staying inside with DVDs etc.

On Saturday (at 5am!) we're going to go to Chicago with our friend Booker, so he can audition for a movie with Alec Baldwin, Meryl Streep and Steve Martin in it, or something. It'll be fun anyway :)

Day 34: Tues 13 Jan: FITZ'S and The Loop

I wish I had brought my camera with me today; Train and I had so much fun :)

We caught the bus into town at 2pm- well, we had to leave at 2 because the bus comes at like 2:09 or something. We ended up leaving late and hurrying to the bus stop which is just under half a mile away, maybe like, 0.4miles or something. We got there in the nick of time, seriously. We saw the bus just about to pull up to our stop as we were running across the road. It was wonderful.

Bussed into town, got there around 3pm-ish. Wandered around for awhile, found a cafe where I went and got a coffee. Then we paced around on the pavement outside while Train lit his cigarette and I sipped at my coffee, before sitting down on some plastic chairs outside the store next to the cafe.

This guy came out of the store we were sitting in front of, and at first I thought he was a customer, then I thought he was going to tell us off for sitting on the chairs because we're not customers of whatever shop it was, then he stood in front of us and put his palms together and Train thought he was going to say something preachy to us, but really he just asked Train (really rather nicely) for a cigarette.

He sat down on the plastic chairs next to us, and talked to us for a bit. His name was Malik (ma-leek? I don't know how to spell it) he was a black guy with loooong, really cool thickish dreads. He worked at the shop we were sitting in front of; it turned out to be a beauty salon. He was telling us about how he's an artist and likes doing creative things, and we talked about ourselves a little, and we all talked about travelling, and about how much you can learn from strangers and about other cultures and how you meet really cool people when you travel and things. He said we should come and get our hair cut there sometime, which we are definitely going to do because he's super nice and we both need hair cuts :P

after he'd finished his cigarette, we talked for a little bit more, then he had to go back inside and Train and I got up and walked around for a bit more, looked in a bunch of vintage clothing stores, a book publishing place- like subterranean books, or something, and eventually ended up at Fitz's where we had planned to have dinner. It was quarter to five at this stage and it was really empty, which was nice. The meals were reaaaallly big but we managed to finish them nonetheless. After that we wandered around some more, went to starbucks (-shudder-cringe-) and got a coffee, just so we had an excuse to sit inside in the warm and wait for the bus for a bit.

Ended up missing our bus, by about 20 seconds, so we went into rag-o-rama, which is sort of like a thrift store I guess. Waited outside again for our bus, ended up seeing our friend Joshua walking along and talked to him for a minute- he thought we hated him because we hadn't talked to him in like a week- when really it was him who hadn't talked to us :/

blah blah blah, got on the bus, got off, waited around, caught our second bus, and walked home and here I am. :)

The forecast for the next few days is bitterly cold. It'll be getting as low as -17C on Thursday DDDD:
Time to return our dvds tomorrow and get a bunch more out in preparation for a long day at home rugged up on the couch with dvds and hot cocoa and thick woolen socks.

Day 33: Mon 12 Jan

I ended up staying awake til 5am this morning, then sleeping in til 4pm.
Had left over curry for dinner, did 40 minutes of dance aerobics in my underwear, went to the park and ran around for a bit, then went grocery shopping with Train.
We bought lots of fruit! So we can be healthy and things.
The tap water still tastes like a swimming pool, so I'm drinking bottled water instead now.
Didn't end up going to the science center so that can be saved for another day.
Going to the loop tomorrow afternoon!

Day 32: Sun 11 Jan: ZOO

We went to the zoo today with B and her friend Jonathan.

They came over for tea and we had japanese curry and watched that boxing movie again because B wanted to see it.

Here are my pictures from the zoo:
Click here!

Day 31: Sat 10 Jan

Didn't get up until 3:30pm today, although I woke up at 8am.
I don't think I ate breakfast or lunch, but I had some cheese and marmite crackers and a few glasses of milk and my multivitamin. Train drew for most of the day, he has a few commissions that he is doing for someone he knows online. We baked a chocolate cake this afternoon, too. B didn't come over because she couldn't get a ride, Dart was in the loop for dinner with the kids from the cabin on New Years and didn't call us back.
We watched more Yu Yu Hakusho at about 10:45pm and now we're going to bed.

Brunch and the zoo tomorrow! Out the door at 9:30am~

Day 30: Fri 9 Jan: TABLE & CHAIRS

Goodness, what a day!
Woke up at 10am ish and waited for Tassels (mike) to come and pick us up so we could go and get the table and chairs which we found on craigslist (usa equivalent to TradeMe).
We should have known the day would take a turn for the worse after we caught every red light down South Grand. We ended up going round in circles a few times, getting lost as to which direction we were meant to take on the highway, rear-ending a car and having to wait 20 minutes or so for the cops to show up, Mike lost his number plate off the front of his truck from hitting the car in front (luckily no-one was hurt) Couldn't find the right building to pick up the table and chairs from, walked around a bit, asked a UPS guy (courier man) where the building was, and it turns out it was on the other side of the street from where we'd been looking for about 10 minutes. Finally got to the place and grabbed the table and 4 chairs, also bought a tiny bookcase/shelf they were selling for $10 because I only had two $20 notes and they needed to get rid of it anyway. We took Tassels out for lunch to say thank you for helping us get the stuff; we went to a Thai restaurant and the food there was pretty good- a bit spicy, but nice nonetheless. Got back in his truck and drove down the street to Aldi's (supermarket) to grab 2 bottles of milk because we were running out at home. Realised we had a parking ticket ($10 fine) for not putting change in the parking meter before we went to lunch. Finally arrived back at the apartment and had a wee bit of difficulty getting everything inside, but it wasn't too bad :)
We have furniture now! It looks wonderful!
I gave Tassels some ginger cookies and let him play with my kiwi toy which is named Rupert. Tassels left after that, and Train and I cleaned up and things. I looked out the kitchen window, and saw something odd over by the brick wall and the fence out in the shared backyard so I went to investigate. It was a rather large bench thing, which might have been a shelf of some sort in a previous life, sitting awkwardly inside a shopping trolley and looking forgotten and unloved. Bingo! I thought. Just what we need! Called Train outside to help me bring it in (it was quite warm today about 6-10C) so we lugged it inside and cleaned the top of it a bit because it was covered in dust and put it against the wall by our couches and the door. It's another wonderful addition to the room!

Hopefully B can still come over tomorrow night, she took her driving test today and was going to drive over tomorrow, but she failed it because the driver was mean and very nit-picky. If she can get a ride, she's coming over :)

Train and I just got back from walking to Blockbuster to rent A Clockwork Orange on DVD so we can watch it tomorrow if B comes over. We paid for it using a whole heap of change, it was amusing. ($1.99 in 1c, 5c, and 10c pieces)

Day 29: Thurs 8 Jan

I woke up at 8:30am today, but did nothing all day as Train slept in til 3:30pm :/
We had leftover macaroni cheese for dinner and watched some Yu Yu Hakusho (anime) before getting ready for bed.

Tomorrow Tassels (mike) is helping up pick up the table and chairs we're buying.
On Saturday, B is coming over for a sleepover and bringing her kitty whose name is Liam :D
We're going to make curry for tea on Saturday.
On Sunday we plan to go to Black Bear Bakery for breakfast again (lol @ alliteration) and perhaps meet Kyle there.
Monday, nothing at this stage
Tuesday hopefully meet Choco (dan) in the Loop and find some postcards to send people.

That's the plan so far at least :)
My throat is feeling a lot better, too.

Day 28: Weds 7 Jan

Slept in til 3pm today because I'm still not feeling that great.

We got a letter back from our next door neighbours, it was slipped under our door.

B and her friend Booker might be coming over tonight.
We need to go to the supermarket to buy some cream, we want to make chocolate mousse.
Train and I didn't end up watching that DVD last night, so perhaps tonight or tomorrow.

B and Booker did come over. B has died her hair blonde now, and has hair extensions, it's strange.

We tried to make chocolate mousse but it failed miserably. Next time we'll just get a packet of it instead, they always work. We ended up watching the movie, too, it was really good :)

Day 27: Tues 6 Jan

Here's a super brief account of today's events: neighbor's kitchen caught fire, she went to the hospital, we made her cookies, left them and ran and bought flowers and groceries.


I've also had a rather in depth conversation with Curtis about determinism and free will, my head is rather sore and I can't understand all of what he's saying, but I'm finding it interesting nonetheless.

Train and I are going to watch a DVD later- it's called "beautiful boxer" I think. Here's the thing of it.

Tassels is going to help us pick up the table and chairs from Craigslist on Friday morning.

Day 26: Mon 5 Jan: GOODWILL

Today was a pretty alright day.
It was rather chilly, but not as cold as it has been other days. About -3C I think.

Train and I caught the #93 bus at 10:50am to the Goodwill (opshop/thrift store) near Forest Park, which is an hours bus ride from our house, but only 20mins or so by car, as it usually is with busses and things :/

On the way, we stopped at a cafe called 6North and got some breakfast; which consisted of a hot cocoa and a vegetarian sandwich which Train and I shared. This is what the outside of the building looked like:


After that, we walked to goodwill and bought a couple of things (mostly old clothing which we can fix up later) and a cutlery rack and some glasses for our kitchen cupboard, mostly for when guests come over.

Headed home sometime after that, and I had a long hot soak in the bath. The only thing which would have made it nicer, was if there wasn't paint and plaster peeling off from everywhere around me, but nonetheless it's what you need on a cold afternoon- the bath that is, not the falling apart house.

We watched velvet goldmine after that, and decided we'd buy some chairs and a table off of Craigslist.

OHHHH
I FORGOT TO PUT YESTERDAY: WE FOUND TWO COUCHES ON THE SIDE OF THE ROAD WHICH SOMEONE WAS THROWING OUT. THEY'RE BLUE AND HAVE A COUPLE OF SUSPICIOUS WHITE STAINS ON THEM AND NO BACK LEGS, BUT BESIDES THAT THEY'RE AWESOME :DDDD
We got tassels to help us carry them back here and squeeze them inside. It looks a lot more homey now.

On a slightly duller note; I'm getting sick.
Just like all my friends.
Everyone has got sore throats and I'm getting one too.
I'm going to buy some cough medicine tomorrow.

Day 25: Sun 4 Jan: BBB & TWO COUCHES

Black Bear Bakery.

Oh my god, this place is fucking amazing.
Ngarie and Della would absolutely love this place.


Train and I caught the bus at 9:40am and came here, it's only about a 10 or 15 min ride from our house to this place. Upon first walking in, the place seemed quite empty; one table with 3 middle aged people at it, and the girl (maybe mid 20s?) behind the counter. We kind of stood there awkwardly for a moment, looking around, wondering what to have. I asked the girl what she'd recommend for breakfast, and she said the chef Chris who was on today was really great at cooking everything. Everything here is either Vegetarian or Vegan, and most of it is organic and fairtrade too :)

Train decided to have buttermilk pancakes with maple syrup and some cooked apple and pear and an earl grey tea and I had scrambled eggs on toast with cooked potatoes and a mocha. The girl behind the counter (named Marta) said she didn't know how to use the espresso machine, and I told her I'd been using them for 2 years and so she let me make my own drink. It was the best fucking coffee I'd had in America so far. Proper organic fairtrade coffee and everything. She was impressed that I made a little heart on top of it, I was ecstatic :D

She said she works from Weds-Sun every week and that I could come in and make myself a coffee whenever she was working :) There is a lot of anarchist art and reading material adorning the walls, and they have some rad tshirts for sale for $5. The food was really decently priced too, I think both of our meals and drinks came to $16 all up.







Note to self: Awesome girl punk band: Bratmobile. Song I like: Cherry Bomb

Day 24: Sat 3rd Jan

Another sort of stressful day.
Which could have been prevented had we gotten a little more sleep over the past few.

Train and I didn't get any sleep til something like, 7:30am this morning, and were meant to be out the door at 9:30am but ended up sleeping in an extra hour or so and being in a blind rush to get to the bank. The number 11 bus was late again, it always seems to be :/
We managed to get to the bank 10 minutes before it closed though, which was good.

I ate a BBQ chicken burger from this place called Lee's. It was actually pretty nice; it was fairly decent for only costing 99c lol. (the above picture is a link to their website, if you'd like to take a look)
Nothing fancy, just some cheap fast food.

I've paid Train all the bills etc for the entire month of January, and we also got enough money out to buy furniture off craigslist, but we were too slow and the person we were going to go see about it had already sold everything by the time I txted. Ah well.

Also got the DVDs returned, which was good, they were going to start charging a lot of money if we'd kept them any longer. We wandered around the Delmar Loop for a while today, it's a pretty nice part of town, very trendy and a lot of cool wee shops and things! I bought Train some boba tea, and he made me try one of the tapioca ball things, THEY'RE SO WEIRD. Their texture creeps me out.

Here's a picture, those creepy blackish purple balls at the bottom are tapioca, or 'boba' (boh-bah) They don't really taste like anything, but have a weird jellyish squishy fleshy texture to them. They're really odd.

I caved in and bought a starbucks coffee; that's how desperate I was. It still wasn't great, not even average tasting, by NZ standards, but it was coffee. I asked for an extra shot in it, because they only usually put one in, but it didn't taste any stronger. Next time perhaps I should ask for like, 4 extra shots or something, perhaps then it might taste a little better. The sugar free vanilla syrup probably didn't help matters either.

After being thoroughly disgusted by yet another american coffee, Train and I kept walking around the loop and went into this second hand clothing store called Rag-O-Rama; (no good pictures on their website, which is sort of poorly made anyway) well, it sells second hand stuff as well as a lot of new bits and pieces, a lot of old vintage overpriced things, but you can find the odd nice thing or two if you really look. We scoured the whole store, and found this pink and white patterened dress, which Train said he'd alter for me and turn it into something fabulous. I'm not going to put any pictures of it up just yet. It cost $14, which was a bit more than what I'd usually pay for something second hand, but Train was convinced it'd be well worth it in the end, so we bought it.

It wasn't too cold today, which was good, about 10-15C I think, which was nice for a change. I've had a really sore eye for the past few days, my right one, and it's been a bit bloodshot. I finally managed to get some eyedrops on the way home, they cost me like $10 though!

I ended up getting more crappy fast food for dinner on the way home, Train was falling asleep so after going to Walgreens (big pharmacy store thing, 24 hours) to get my eye drops, he headed back to the apartment and went to sleep while I stopped and got myself some white castle for dinner.

I walked home by myself down Spring for a good probably 10 blocks. I felt perfectly safe and it wasn't dark yet. I saw my second ever squirrel! It managed to dash away before I had time to grab my camera out though, sadly :( It was on someone's front lawn, and it kinda teased me for a bit, unsure whether to run away or stay around for a while. It ended up popping under their gate. I tried to make some sort of squirrel noise to make it come over and see me, but I don't know what type of noises they make or what they like, so I just kind of did that whole "heeeeeeeere squirrel squirrel squirrelllll" which obviously didn't work, so I'll have to try another approach next time and hone my skills :P

Got home, ate my crappy food and finally got around to putting my eyedrops in. Hardest thing to do ever. I'd never done it to myself before, and had to ask someone for advice. I ended up going into the bathroom and peering at myself in the mirror while trying to do it. My first attempt failed completely and it hit my eyelashes and ran down my cheek. The second one worked, and I got the biggest fright when the drop actually hit my eye, but after a few seconds and some blinking, things started to feel a little better.

OKAY! Onto my plans for tomorrow, then I'm heading off to bed.
I was talking to my friend Kyle from here, who I haven't actually met in person yet, and he was telling me about the super neat cafe/bakery place called the Brown Bear Bakery, which is in south city, not too far from where Train and I live. They make amazing bread and baked goods, and serve all fresh organic natural local vegan and vegetarian food! I thought to myself, gosh, Ngarie would really love this place, by the sounds of it! Apparently their coffee is amazing too- and it's organic fair trade, so I've decided I'm going to take Train out there for brunch tomorrow, then let him come back home and get some more rest, he's getting really sick- sore throat, losing his voice, sniffly nose and just looking terrible. I'm going to make him start taking his multivitamins. I'm going to start taking them too, I'm not feeling so flash either, and I'm certainly not eating as well as I probably could or should.
Also on the agenda for tomorrow is doing the dishes and tidying up our pantry. I really don't want to have to do this, but we're going to need to get rid of Fredrick, our kitchen mouse. It really can't be very healthy having him get into all our food and things. I'd love to keep him as a pet, but we don't really have the time or the space for one. We're going to trap him like this:

I hope it works. Train said mice live outside, but I don't want him to freeze to death. Comments? Does anyone know if a wee house mouse like Fredrick would survive outside in the middle of winter? Or should we attempt to keep him as a pet, if we find a cage or something, or at least just something to keep him out of our pantry. The good thing is we haven't seen a single mouse poop, just Fredrick scampering across the floor every night or two, between the pantry, fridge and back of our sink cabinets and things. Whenever we do, it's always like "Oh look- there he goes again! :D" well, from me at least. From Train it's more of a "Oh look, there he goes again; Countryyy, we have to get rid of that mouse :/" nonetheless, I'm sure we'll work it out.

Yay for a long and detailed (and hopefully interesting!) blog entry!! It's probably 'cause I'm delerious from my lack of sleep and sore eyes and things. Ah well. I'm going to sleep now, and not getting up for a good long time. Expect another fantastic blog tomorrow (hopefully!) I think Kyle may be meeting Train and I for brunch at the bakery place, they have free wifi there too, so I'll make Train bring his laptop, as he has a nice wee compact case for it, unlike my big bulky thing.

Day 23: Friday 2nd Jan 2009

I still really can't believe it's 2009.
Where the hell has the time all gone?

We woke up this morning at probably 3pm and Joshua left to go home, take a shower and sleep some more. I had a shower and got changed into fresh pjs, it's the nicest feeling. Train and I made dinner and started to tidy the apartment. We need to go to the bank tomorrow; money is still being a real problem and Train hasn't paid rent yet, and there's a power bill which hasn't been paid either.

Our New York trip still hasn't been planned. I'm going to make sure we plan that this week. Joshua starts school again on the 20th.

It's only 7:23pm, but I'm still really tired. I wish I had some berrocca but they don't have that here in America. We're both going to sleep well before midnight tonight, and going to the bank in the morning.

Alex took pictures of new years, so I'll get those off her and put them on here.

Day 21 and 22: New Years Eve and New Years Day (wed 31 Dec- thurs 1 jan)

New years eve was a hectic one. Please bear with me, this is a long story.

So the plan was for Joshua to take Train and I to this cabin place in the middle of nowhere and meet a bunch of his friends there. Everyone was meant to meet at 6pm there or something, but it turned out that everyone met earlier and we were really really late. Joshua picked up Train and I at something like, 7:30pm and we drove north and then west for ages.

We met his friends Alex, Emily and Nate at a Walmart in Wentzville. Gosh, this part of the tale is like an adventure and a half by itself.

We went into walmart so Joshua could buy us alcohol because the drinking age is 21 over here, and we wandered around for a bit then waited for him outside. When he tried to buy it, they said they were going to call the police because he was trying to buy for minors so he just left the store and came quickly to the car and we drove off. Alex, Emily and Nate were in Alex's car and we just drove around a bit more, trying to work out what to do. Alex kept freaking out that she was going to get pulled over and arrested because she had an open bottle of alcohol in the boot of her car and she's underage too. Joshua stopped at a petrol station, and bought us alcohol there instead.

Alex got pulled over.
But it was because she didn't have her headlights on bright enough or something, she got a $60 fine.

After that big debacle, we carried on to the cabin. It literally was in the middle of nowhere. Once I find out what the place is called, I'll try to find the vague location on a map somewhere.

We got to the cabin in the middle of nowhere at around 10:30pm I think. The whole night consisted of drunken ramblings, a myriad of music playing and smoking outside on the porch in the freezing cold.
We got a fire going down in this fire pit thing outside at one point, and we screamed at the top of our lungs. There were fireworks, too, wayyyy off in the distance. I drank too much that night, but I wasn't sick or anything.

I ate meat, too. Finished my vegetarianism. I ate a roast beef sandwich, it tasted so good.

The next morning was just super lol. Everyone slept in, and Joshua drove Train and I home at about 4pm I think. Stopped and got St Louis Bread Co. for dinner, it was nice. I had a spicy chicken and bacon toasted sandwich. Joshua stayed the night at our apartment. We were all really tired and just slept and slept.