Sunday morning thoughts, November 19, 2023

Another mixed bag

Some housekeeping first. I have created a separate section for Sunday morning thoughts. That way you can catch up with just these newsletters if you like or opt out of receiving email notifications for them. They will still appear in the main feed. So, if you’re all happy – you don’t need to do anything.

Then there’s yesterday’s food truck article. I’m reliably informed that köfte is available in the US and is called kofta - at least in the DC area.

Also, I need to mention that even when I don’t say anything, there are people who know just what I need. There’s this - sometimes a little scary but wonderful - connection. Turns out yesterday it was a specific song. Thank you!

I don’t always find time to reply to all your reactions. Especially when they come in by e-mail. I try to get to them, I promise. Just need to dig them out sometimes. And then the phone app puts them all together, so I see one message instead of three. Not helpful!

So much going on in my mind and I don’t want to scare you. I’ll just keep typing and see what happens.

Well, that didn’t work. My fingers were all “what do you want us to do?”. Okay then. Let’s talk rent. I told some of you that my rent went up by CHF 150 (USD 170) a month. They told us to use the new payment slip or change the standing order starting November. Of course, they meant for the November rent which is due at the end of October. Well, I got a registered letter with a payment reminder and a threat of eviction. I thought that was a bit OTT. Part of me is tempted to see if they’d go through with it. Then again, I like my apartment. So, I probably shouldn’t.

By the way, I have all my windows open - lüften is key especially in winter. It’s 50°F/10°C outside and still raining. I don’t think it stopped raining much this week. On Wednesday, I went outside during lunch, and it rained, then the sun came out for 5 minutes and it started raining again. The picture I’m adding to this is from that 5-minute sunny period. That’s the old church in Fluntern. Tramline 5 stops there and tramline 6 goes further up to the zoo. Since tramline 5 turns around here there’s a loop and all those overhead lines. I kind of like them. There’s a bigger church up on the hill that’s visible from way down below that’t the new church.

Alte Kirche Fluntern

You guys know that I don’t believe in a God. I do believe that the universe is trying to tell me something though and keeps pulling me in one direction. And by the universe I mean the dream that’s hidden inside and that gets scary whenever I do something to get closer to it. It’s been quite a ride. I’m taking some steps. Baby steps for now, but it feels really right. So, we’ll see what happens.

Oh, and somebody asked me this week if I’d ever thought of becoming a shrink. Well, sort of, but I don’t think I have another university degree in me. I mean I got three already. And as I do have a BSc in Psychology there might be something I could do with that. Stay tuned.

There’s like no possible transitions to how my brain is jumping around - bear with me.

Some days I love my brain. I just closed all the windows and watered the plants because they looked sad. Yes, they did look sad and now I remember that I need to go write down the day I watered them because otherwise I will totally kill them by forgetting to water them or by forgetting that I already watered them.

I’m just really proud that I have kept five of the six plants I got alive for this long. Nobody thought I could do it. I might have killed one. A little tiny one. But I might be able to revive it. I’ll keep you posted. I’m talking to it. And it likes music. Oh, maybe it speaks foreign. I’ll try different languages. There’s a plan.

Do you guys have to do lists? My brain is not good with them. We’re trying something new. And by “we” I mean my brain and I. I’ve done this before but got distracted. Never stopped me from trying again. I put my to dos on a window in pink. I should have really written them on my fridge. I tend to open that more often than I actually get something off my list done. Now there’s a thought.

I can’t have my list on my phone – too many distractions or on my laptop – same thing. If I put them on a piece of paper that gets lost somehow.

Anyway, there’s this narrow passage between the French window that opens up onto the balcony and my fridge. It’s 116 cm or 3.8 ft wide. The perfect place for a to do list on a window. I see it when I go to the fridge. I’ll let you know how it goes. It also says “hydrate” on it and I count how many time I actually remember to drink something – preferably water or tea. Of course, I’m currently drinking something entirely different. It’s chocolate-related …

Which brings me to John Oliver’s Last Week Tonight episode on chocolate. I think it was two weeks ago or something. I can watch it on YT but apparently, it’s geo blocked in other countries. Sorry if that’s the case where you are. I love John Oliver but did he have to ruin chocolate for me? I might have bought some revenge chocolate. That’ll show him!

They sell this special chocolate at a vending machine at work and I just have to share with you.

Human love - sparkling, stimulating, playful - 69% cacao.

That’s a picture of a moorhen and on the side there is the Swiss German word for it “Taucherli”. Now, Taucher is the German word for diver – so with the -li ending it means “little diver”. Makes perfect sense. There is no umlaut here because it’s a diphthong. We have moorhen in English (boring!), we have Taucherli in Swiss German (cute and makes perfect sense) and we have waterhoentje in Dutch (that’s just too cute a word, sorry). And of course, it needed to have 69% cacao with that description (see caption). That’s just obvious.

Anyway, hope you guys have a great week. Hugs all around.