Daily Slow Chat

5 comments

1. I’m officially the (well, not so) proud owner of my first ever car – a Chevy Impala from 2014 (one of the few Chevy models that officially don’t suck). Because of some stupid California law, I have to wait 2 weeks until my insurance kicks in, so it’ll just be sitting in my garage before then.

   And also, now I can’t use “What was your first car” as my security question anymore, because now I *do* actually have a first car.

2. God I hate fruit, wish it was not mandatory for a healthy lifestyle, just give me a pill with all the necessary crap in it.

3. Biking in Germany is interesting. If you see a “bike road” on the map, it could be anything. Is it an actual paved bike road, separated from the main street? Is it a forest path? Is it a stony footpath that’s more suited for goats and sheep, and may only be safely travelled with a pair of Alpine hiking boots? Is it a narrow trail in tall grass and nettle opened with the toil of many bike riders, that you can only cross by following the single narrow tire print? Or is it deep mud that you may certainly cross with your bike, but not on it? Is it the rightmost side of a Bundesstrasse where cars are passing by with 80 kph and not quite enough distance?

   In any case, I did finish a 40 km bike ride already that had all these features. I even found a large row of sun-facing blackberries, which I will pick tomorrow after work.

   My husband has this weird superpower. He is so good at spotting stuff. “Oh, look, a squirrel!” The squirrel is on top of a tall tree 30 m away. “Oh, did you see the cat?” It’s a black cat in a dark alley. Today, we were riding on a path with dense forest on either side. Suddenly, he stopped. “Come here, there’s a deer looking at us”. There was this tiny narrow clearing to the left, and like 50 m away, there was a deer. How did you even see that? Crazy.

4. Finally went to see Oppenheimer yesterday and I absolutely loved it. I was kinda afraid that it had become overhyped due to the Barbenheimer meme, but it was one of my favourite viewing experiences in a long time.

   We also went to see it in one of only two cinemas in the Benelux that still uses a 70mm film projector and we got to take a look in the projector room while the credits were rolling. Seeing how massive that roll of film was and how they are still able to show it with a 70+ year old projector was also really interesting.

5. Lmao I finally got my new stereo and cassette player hooked up in my 80s French shitbox of a Citroen, and honestly throwing a Françoise Hardy cassette in there while driving down the boulevard with a warm sun shining through the trees shading the street is such a vibe.

   ”You were sweeter than the blossom on the trees,
   I was as proud as any girl could be
   As if the mayor had offered me the key to Paris”

   This is how I feel. Only, I’m not a woman in love, I’m a grown man living the Francophile experience.