from happyrobot - updated 6/9/2026 3:08:58 AM https://www.happyrobot.net/words/kiene_angst.asp en-us https://www.happyrobot.net/words/kiene_angst.asp?id=3361 Not because its a dread desease but because its put every area I'm qualified to work in out of business.

I've come to the realization that I don't understand anything about how the world works - or at least the parts of the world that they talk about in the newspapers.

For example: The Canadian dollar is rising steadily out of its siesta in the low sixties. For the last few years all I've heard from my business friends (not that I have many) and from serving the rich suits at Morton's is "we have to bolster the currency to be taken serious in the world market" Now all I hear is that our dollar is too high and we're losing business from trade and goods to film contracts etc. Why is this? Is it actually a no win situation?

My grandparents (old lefty jews) cry the lament of Isreal and love to hate Sharon. Now that there are actual talks of peace (not that I'm naive enough to believe it for a second or blind enough not to see the American governements agenda) they have changed to a song that sings, "peace is impossible" and "You can't trust the palastinians" I hate this.

Are people actually happier being miserable?

On an entirly different note - in my growong desperation to get employment I went to a orientation night for the NIB - National Institute of Broadcasting. They do a voice test and then a "celebrity" speaker comes and gives a long talk about how its a reputable place and subtly (if not gracefully) drops hints as to how much money he makes from his career doing voice work for commercials etc.
Then he tells you that Jim Carrey went there. Then he tells you it costs between four and eight thousand dollars. And they don't guarantee anything.

The man we got was Micheal Banks. His claim to fame comes from a prank he played on Howard Cosell several decades ago - he called Cosell during halftime at a football game and had a lenghy conversation impersonating Mohamad Ali's voice. Cosell ate it up, spent the remaining quarters crowing about a personal phone call from Ali in Africa (Rumble in the Jungle era)... and then told the press Banks should go to jail for "lying". Ali loved and took Banks on as part of his entourage.

We were given a much photocopied Globe article detailing this event with the copy of the script for the voice test.

As we were shuffling out clutching our personal envelopes with the test tapes and a sheaf of further endorsements, he stopped me and said "Hang on, I want to tell you something". Thinking for a second that I was so brilliant that I was going to be givin a full scholorship and instant employment I waited. I'm not proud.

He said, "You have the most beautiful eyes I've ever seen."

And suddenly the lobby looked shabby, the carpet became a sea of cigarette stains, the walls grew scrapes and gouges - and the short balding man in front of me became a sleazy little rat who takes his commission from the talk and then tries to get his extras from the young hopefuls he just told had a brilliant future.

(sigh)

I still need a job though.]]> https://www.happyrobot.net/words/kiene_angst.asp?id=3343 I seem to have taken a semi-conscious hiatus from my writing duties - For which I truely appologize and promise to do better in the future.

I've moved back to Toronto and all the responcibilities that that implies. It took a lot of time and money. And now that I'm here...

So far I have not: got a job, an appartment, approached anybody about any of the meaningful projects for which I returned, or started to excersize, do yoga, pilates and attempt to strip two years of rust off my bicycle.

I have: eaten too much every day, felt sorry for myself, gone to see the worst of the Hollywood fair (Matrix 2, Bruce Almighty -don't hate me), and used up four phone cards weeping copious tears into Stefan's far away ears.

My knowledge of physics is limited, but I suspect this all has to do with inertia.

I did, however, manage to see a few of the "Doors Open Toronto" architectural wonders - hidden ballrooms and banquet halls tucked into unused corners of buildings I see every day... when I bother to look up. Beautiful and remarkable places that reminded me that Toronto is more and better than I was coming to fear.

Now I have to write that screenplay.

Europe Shmurope!!


]]> https://www.happyrobot.net/words/kiene_angst.asp?id=3279

About a year ago I wrote about her seeming indestructability and my mother's melodramatic musings on her sexual orientation. After spending two weeks with her and the rest of the Victoria clan I have this to add: She has decided she is going to live to one hundred and six.

This is her reasoning; she is living in a retirement complex, this differs from a nursing home in that the inmates have a private unit and feed themselves breakfast. And trust me the distinction is extremely important to those that live there. It means they still have some illusion if independance and are therefore a step further from death than thier less fortunate friends. "did you hear about Fred? He had to go into a 'home'." "No, and he was only 80." Note: Fred is already in that past tense. In other words Fred has entered the world of the living dead far more effectively than George A. Romero ever conceived.

She has a lovely one bedroom unit and a lively social sphere. One of her friends, Rose, is what, I suspect, used to be refered to as a "firecracker." Stefan and I showed up for Bingo night and Rose won two times. There was much disgusted shaking of unsteady grey and white heads but it was mingled with an odd relief that even at their age there are some that win and some that don't. The second time she won she declined the $1.50 cash prize, nodded at Stefan and said, "I'll take him instead" The phrase, 'I laughed fit to kill' almost took on new meaning. Mary, not to be outdone told a joke with the punchline, "not all your hair goes white" (shudder)

Anyway, where was I? Mary is survivng on a CPR pension, the only good thing that Max ever did for her, but at her current rate of expenditure it will run out by 2013. She will be 104.

In the the same conversation in which she forced me to take inventory of her worldy possessions and choose what I wanted after she had "gone" she explained to me that she was getting rid of a few of the smaller things locally because she was on the waiting list for a bachelor unit. I said, "you want to move?" She said, "well, not really dear but I'd rather be in a smaller unit now than have to rely on the kindness of family when I'm 105." ...

Not much you can say to that.
]]> https://www.happyrobot.net/words/kiene_angst.asp?id=3108 Still in Blissfull B.C.

But I'm starting to realize the little differences between country mouse and city mouse protocol.

We went to see 'Far From Heaven' last thursday. The local theatre show "artsy" movies one night a week to give the local cuture hounds a break from 'Kangaroo Jack'. For those of you that haven't seen it, 'Heaven' is a spot on period piece and homage to Douglas Sirk and his excellent fifties melodramas. I was in rapture from the first moment. Not just because of the movie - just to be in a dark theatre and smell popcorn and hear the low murmer of the audience.

Until the low murmer focussed into one grating voice right behind me.

This woman seemed determined to deliver a running commentary throughout the entire bloody picture. She started fairly reasonably with, "thats just perfect" then, "my mother had a dress just like that," and, "how do they get their hair to stay in those perfect curls (sigh)".

Irritating, but I figured some people just need to voice these things. Its like enjoying something through your mouth. Sharing? I'm not sure. But I blame it on VCR's. They've taken the respect away from movie going and made it commonplace. Nobody can keep their mouth shut in a theatre anymore.

But then came, "No, you don't mean he's a - whatd'ya callit - fag type...," then, "that just wouldn't never have happened in the fifties!"

At which point I turned around and said, "Can you please not talk so much?" And stunned silence.

Everybody in every direction turned and stared - at me! I was the one who had dared to tell someone to shut-up. The local woman we had come with started to edge as far away from me as she could get in her seat. I had obviously broken some serious rule of the country. People just don't impose themselves on each other. And if the Lady needs to filter her thoughts through her mouth to enjoy things who am I to tell not to.

Gulp.

Am I cold and desensitized. Has the city mouse crushed out the country mouse's "good upbringing." Is it rude to tell someone to shut up even in a movie theatre?

I spent about twenty minutes slumped in my seat feeling cruel and mean. But the movie was so good it didn't last long.


close the window
]]> https://www.happyrobot.net/words/kiene_angst.asp?id=3081 Relaxation is Bliss.
Escaping the family is Bliss.
Snow covered mountains with sleepy valleys and icy rivers are bliss.
Spending a languid evening floating from a good mexican restaurant to an evening in a natural hot springs is really Blissful. And even better when its lightly snowing, creating a misty white dome over your head.
Waking up to a fresh chilly morning surrounded by a peaceful snow covered world is Blissfully relaxing. Especially when a very happy Stefan is already up and building a fire in the old fashioned pot-bellied stove.
Hanging out with a friend so old that you were at each other's birth respectively (me prenatal - he in swaddling clothes) is also Blissfully uncomplicated.
And best of all I have three weeks of this ahead of me.

Even the city mouse is in a state of Bliss.

Oddly, the only tiny edge of stress is in thinking up something special to do for our two year anniversary. Any suggestions?]]> https://www.happyrobot.net/words/kiene_angst.asp?id=3036 There is always something disconcerting about how quickly the world moves while you are away...

Then again I wouldn't want to live in Pleasantville either.

We have been here almost two weeks already and I still feel displaced dislodged and disoriented.

And I still hate spending time with my family. After three days of visiting my cheeks hurt from the unnatural smile, my feet hurt from wearing heels, and my eyes were swolen from a reaction to mascara. And if you said why not just be yourself, you've never met my Nana!

She's 84 years old and still worries about her wieght - still gets fake pink claws filled weekly and still never lets my grandfather get a word in edgewise... then again he's too busy fixing her rye and waters to do much talking anyway. They have finally moved into a retirement complex (call it a nursing home and all hell breaks loose) with enough goings on to keep her active and full of gossip.

Aunt Mary is still going at 94 years old. She plays bridge four times a week and invited us for "Beef Pot Pie and Bingo" night at her retirement complex. I haven't felt such a competitive attmosphere since being on the swim team in high school.

After, we were in her unit for tea and she asked me what I wanted when she was gone. It was such a blunt statement and I had a hard time answering. She collects Royal Dulton figurines and various other chachkas. But the matter of fact - write your name on the bottom - free for all made me uncomfortable. In fact most of what she talked about was death and jokes about dying or being old.

Her favourite: A ninety-nine year old lady asked how she was replied, "I won't be here much longer, but where I'm going, the food'll be a lot better that's for sure!" She laughed fit to kill (so to speak) when she told us that one.

Stefan has escaped for some solo winter camping. I'm taking a breather in Vancouver before going back for the next round... in which I expect to deal with: "He's a good one, now you just have to get that ring on your finger" and "Don't wait too long dear, you looks start to fade after thrity" and "Gee you look pretty with make-up."




]]> https://www.happyrobot.net/words/kiene_angst.asp?id=2989 Tonight I rented 'Deconstructing Harry' from the local library (possibly Woody Allen's last watchable film).

After a few minutes Stefan poked his head out of the office and said, "I've never heard Woody Allen's real voice before... its awful! ... The German one's better"

This gave me thoughts to mull over.

Is it possible to recreate the Woody Allens of this world into other languages (and cultures)? Does New York translate?

Sometimes its good to be reminded that Stefan really is from an entirely other world and culture... where Woody Allen is angst ridden in a whole different sense of the word. Where 'Knight Rider is still in regular rotation.

The audiences here definitley respond more to physical humour - slapstick - then to verbal banter. Sarcasm is tragically lost on them - and now that I can read the subtitles with fairly decent comprehension - its obvious the translators either can't do it justice or don't bother.

Is it just as odd for them to hear an actors real voice as it is for us to hear a dubbed one? What an odd concept of reality.

We were watching 'The Fifth Element' on TV last week. In the opening act peaceful aliens come to egypt to recue some sacred stones from the encroaching effects of the second world war. An old Archeologist stutteers at them, "Are ... are you Germans?"

In the Dubbed version he said, "Are ... are you from the Earth?"

I wonder what they do with real Nazi movies?
]]> https://www.happyrobot.net/words/kiene_angst.asp?id=2969 A tiny elderly woman in a crochetted hat turned to me, as we stood, strangers united by the imposing multi-tiered wall of Christmas cards and said something in Bern dialect to fast for me to understand - except for the word "Juden."
A word I have developed an almost unconscious hackles up reaction to in my time here.

Desperatley afraid that she would say something anti-semitic and that I would have to decide whether to challenge or withdraw, I said, " Noch einmal bitte, mein Deutsch ist nicht sehr gut"

She immediatley switched to perfect english with a slight Oxford edge and repeated, "My daughter married a Jewish man and I have no idea what to do about Christmas cards."

Ah, I thought, this I can handle. I told her I had a similiarly split family and shared the same quandry. My mother is a non-practising Jew (who loves christmas - which she celibrates without any aknowledgment of Christ what so ever... and really, its not hard to do since its only a small step from its pagan roots anyway), my father is a recovering Anglican, I was raised completely without religion... BUT; My father's common law wife with whom he has two small children is an increasingly devout Jew.

So we joined in the diffecult search for cards that not only didn't say "Christmas" but didn't look it either.

I told her that although I had no interest in following a religious life - I still bristled at the slightest hint of anti-semitism - which is much worse here than I'm used to.
I've even had to confront Stefan on a few things which are so ingrained into speech that he was unaware of the origins.
Then again, to the Swiss, Jews are just another sort of Auslander (a catch all catagory for those not born in Switzerland, French, Serbian, Vietnamese - doesn't matter) - which seems horribly racist from the outside (and certainly hasn't helped my integration) but starts to seem oddly explainable when you have lived here awhile. But more on that another day.

She told me that the last year had been something of a revelation. She had been invited to join her inlaws for Seder, for Rosh Hashona and so forth. It was difficult, she said, to get comfortable at first. She felt as though she had to appologize for the war - for the gold - for the entire last century. "But, my dear, I don't really like what Sharon is doing in Isreal either"

I know the feeling. I don't either. But never make the mistake that being jewish and supporting Isreal are the same thing. She seemed a bit relieved about that.

I told her about my Anglican Nana tearfully asking me why she wasn't allowed to give her grandchildren Christmas presents. She tried for a year or so and then retreated into the safety of cheques enclosed in cards marked "Happy Holidays" and sent some random time in December as a blind stab at Hanukah. I've never understood why they can't just let her respect her ways and they respect theirs.

And I told her about my own discomfort at suddenly being expected to BE JEWISH for my father's new family - Rather as though my pedigree made it easier for them to except him.

She looked at me for a moment and asked me if I believed in anything, "You know, dear, a powerful spirit - one that can't be seen, only felt."

And I do. But I can't explain it, and I don't really feel the need to.

She smiled and said that that was enough to get me through, "to really belive in nothing, that would be a tragedy."

Eventually we both found cards - I, a box of artsy shots of candles, she, a series of pictures of snow covered Bern. They were a little on the christmasy side - but she'll get away with it.

And I left the store feeling good. I had had an intimate, random conversation with a total stranger, which is one of my very favourite things. I realized that this time of year is suposed to be a fun break from the misery of cold and darkness - whether you celibrate Christmas, Hanukah, Quanza or the pagan solstice - and its getting lost in family politics...

And I am entertaining thoughts of starting my own temple, devoted to the intangable SOMETHING. With a sign on the door reading: Accepted: cards of good wishes from any denomination!

That ought to confuse them.

]]> https://www.happyrobot.net/words/kiene_angst.asp?id=2959 I used to wish I had been born into a really rich family, like in the Hodgeson Burnett books before the ubiquitous tragedy strikes.

Then I met the fourth richest woman in Switzerland. Talk about poor little rich girl.

She is the lonliest woman I've ever met - who is constantly surrounded by people. She has a house with fifteen rooms and a built in stable, two horses that are worth more than the average budget of a hollywood film, a butler, a ladies maid of the type found in Austen novels (who knew they still existed?), and a chauffer for her three cars and horse mover.

And now she has a gardener. Stefan.

I supose Landscape Architect is a more appropriate term. She has hired him to give her Bern estate a face lift and completely redesign the grounds around her castle in France.

She got his number from her Interior designer - a very entertaining ex-icecapades dancer, he told us a story about a performance in Mexico city with the entire cast suffering from Monctezuma's revenge... as satisfying a scattalogical mishap as you can imagine.

Stefan and his friend and working partner, Dimitri, have been there for most of this week (installing Christmas decorations (700$) despite the fact that she is leaving next week for the holdays.) She never speaks to Dimitri, except yesterday, she asked Stefan if Dimitri would be there the next day, he said not and she walked over to Dimitri and wordlessly handed him a fifty franc note. A man came from the garage to pick up the Mercedes for service and bring her a temporary one in its place, of course the temporary one doesn't have bullet proof glass and siding so it won't be driven - its just for show. As he walked away I saw him looking perplexed at the key, which had been wrapped in another fifty.

She was polite and gracious with me, but looked a little uncomfortable because, I suspect, she had no reason to just give me money and walk away.

The whole place left me feeling a little sad and a little jealous. She has everything money can buy. But her best - and only real - friends are her six Jack Russel terriors, a Pyranee Mountain dog, a large family of Guinea Pigs and another of Rabbits that live in the stable, and of course, the horses.

So, old money makes people remote and scared... and a little strange. Also, ultimately, completely helpless.

But I am looking forward to a month in a french castle next spring, and not least for the oppurtunity to spend more time in this curious world with the lonely princess and her menagerie]]> https://www.happyrobot.net/words/kiene_angst.asp?id=2940 Stefan has decided on his ideal holiday:

A month in the wilds of the BC Rockies. He wants vast open spaces of glorious snow blanketed nature. He wants to ski in foot deep powder, camp in all his newly aquired MEC thermal gear, and hike to places that he can easily convince himself have only been visited by caribou, until he sullies them with his virgin footprints.

For me a trip to BC means:

visiting my (very scary) paternal family ALL of whom live on Vancouver Island. Dad didn't have to become a hippy to achieve his "black sheep" status, he just had to leave the island!

visiting my home town and having to repeatedly answer "what am I doing with my life" to people who I haven't seen since I was ten. And I really hate that question at the moment.

And deal with the kids I grew up with, all very defensive because they never left and suspect that they missed something.
But we never really got along anyway.

As a compromise we are also going California, home of my maternal family. I'm half American (puts a whole new spin on the "Bowling for Columbine rant, doesn't it? ) and I'm curious to see how I feel there. Its been a few years.

My grandmother is a old lefty activist - she spent a few months in jail for refusing to testify in a Commie case in the fifties - and has decided she did her part for the world by becoming (much to all our surprise) a giggling princess type.
My Aunt is an obese bitch who can cook like you've never had and I love her dearly. Unfortunatley she has emphasema and has decided that smoking is more fun than living.

I never thought I would be the type to go on "duty holiday." Maybe its part of growing up. I don't like it.]]> https://www.happyrobot.net/words/kiene_angst.asp?id=2938 Seeing Bowling for Columbine (Mike Moore's latest diatribe against his culture) in Europe was a revelation. If Canadians thought we had the edge on anti-American sentiment, boy were we wrong!

Then again, with a movie like that its always a case of preaching to the converted. Unless of course you can take the people who should see it and tie them to their cinema seats.

One Swiss woman I spoke to said, "the only time I felt myself relax was when he went up to Canada." She said the entire film put her in knots of fear and frustration. That there was no hope for the world if everything Moore says is true. "except" she said, "I had no idea that Canadians were so different"

My turn to ponder. Are we so different? Moore makes a very convincing argument. But he also chooses not to show that something like %80 of our media is fed from the States. That we can watch COPS or 911 or any of that sensationalist fear inducing crap every day of the week if we choose. And many do. CBC is a house of quality programming. But I rarely ever watched it. I preferred brain deadening re-runs of Friends or even Fraser. I'm not proud. But I think thats part of the problem.

We are proud of the differences - we revel in being put higher than Americans in the judgement of others. We bristle at anyone mistaking us for American. But we are sliding ever faster into becoming exactly what we hate. And only a very small fraction is speaking out against the Americanization of our schools, our health care and our foriegn policy.

Living in Switzwerland, a country for whom change is physically painful, I am astonished to see how much and how fast Canada has changed since I've been away. Its an odd feeling to be afraid of what I'll see when I go home for the Holidays.
]]> https://www.happyrobot.net/words/kiene_angst.asp?id=2530 My father is here for a visit and for some reason every night I'm dreaming about dead animals. Or more precisely, last night it was almost dead animals.

I dreamt I killed a fly on my arm and as I watched it's death throes it grew into an odd mouse-like creature but with bigger ears and an almost humanly expressive face. My cat appeared and circled my feet questioningly . I knodded, she seized the odd animal and ran around the corner to tear it apart.

But she came back in less than a minute with the thing held more delicatly in her mouth and placed it gently at my feet. I could see it was still moving and picked it up thinking I could help somehow. It made very human moans and writhed in pain. I could feel blood, sticky, on my hands. I carried it to another room lay it on the floor and left, carefully closing the door behind me. Too scared to put it out of its misery and horrified by the thought of having killed something that could meet my eyes and feel pain.

Not surprisingly, my father looks old. I guess it takes distance and time to see the changes in people closest to you.
]]> https://www.happyrobot.net/words/kiene_angst.asp?id=2444 Stefan can not live unless something big is happening around him. He thrives on the chaos of change.

Which means I spend most of the time stepping over huge piles of the contents of whatever space he is improving at the moment. Currently the bathroom and the "entertainment centre" are under construction - the double whammy is unusual but I suspect a product of the anxiety inherant in a visit from potential inlaws... my father arrives in two weeks.

It started with moving the stove (an oil heater which is our main source of heat. Central heating is a fairly new innovation in these parts and not found in 400 year old converted water mills)
Which meant not using it for three very cold weeks because it had just been cleaned and it took him that long to get around to it.

We also have a wood stove.

I chopped wood.

City girls aren't suposed to do this. Especially born again ones like me.
I was raised by "back to the land" hippy parents. I did my time in the pioneer lifestyle. I lived in a teepee (or is tipee, tipi?)
for two years while my parents attempted to build their house. And even at four years I understood two things. First, that I wasn't going to spend my life in my parents style. Second, that they weren't meant to any more than I was.

They accomplished a sturdy foundation and sold it to a man who finished the rest in half the time.
Years later, when we moved from somewhere in the middle of the Rocky Mountains to Toronto, my father took me up to the site and said proudly (and sadly) "That was my dream house"

Which means, I think, that he will be very understanding when he arrives to all the comforts of a construction zone.]]> https://www.happyrobot.net/words/kiene_angst.asp?id=2426 One day my 93 year old Great Aunt Mary and her good friend Ingrid were walking through a mall in Greater Victoria, Ingrid had a massive coronary and died. As Ingrid fell, she knocked into Mary’s walker and she also fell and broke her hip. She lay helpless and in pain under the body of her dead friend for half an hour before anyone noticed what had happened.

Mary is a tough old bird and is now (after a brief wallow in questioning fate and the order of the universe) up and again frequenting every matinee and garden party she can find. She is also the terror of her Bridge Club.

Mary is the second youngest of five sisters, my Nana being the youngest. She is the only one to not have children and she subsequently adopted us... my Nana not being the most loving woman in the world, we happily accepted this arrangement. She met her husband, Max, in a logging camp in Jasper on the Alberta border. She was driving a logging truck and he worked the rails. He was also one of the most obnoxious people I've ever met. When he got served last for tea he would, without fail, shout out, “what am I the Nigger or something?” It was the first time I ever heard the word and my Mother spent most of the following day explaining why it was BAD and why I should never repeat it. This was before the word had been (mostly) stripped of its power by being rapped over every media a million times per day. The family legend is that Max never let her have children because then his status as her only child might slip. I suspect this might be true.

My mother thinks Mary is a lesbian, or at least would have been if the times had allowed.

I think if she ever suggested it, Mary would have been the one dying of a coronary. I also think Mom might be right... and I still have no idea how she ended up driving a truck in Jasper.

My mother likes to find interesting and slightly scandalous explanations for things - especially if it concerns a woman staying with the wrong kind of man. In her mind an oppressive society is to blame for most of woman kind’s mistakes. Her mother (my grandmother) ran away with her husband’s (my grandfather’s) father’s female secretary when Mom was seventeen. That might be where it started. She likes to lecture me on how ungrateful my generation is for all that her generation did for us. I like to tell her that they did it so we wouldn't have to be grateful for what we have seeing as we never knew it any other way. But that‘s mostly just to irritate her.

She was a real hippy back when it meant something. She hitchhiked from New Jersey to San Francisco in 1969 to demonstrate, and did really trippy embroidery and weaving in her spare time. She was at Altamont which is, I admit, one of the more dubious 60’s landmark events. But its always been preferable to me. Everybody’s parents were at Woodstock.

She got bored at some point and took a ride off a board to Vancouver. She said there were two, one going to Arizona and one up to Canada. She went home and dreamed about water so she decided to go to Canada. Thirty-one years later she still lives there and doesn't seem to have any plans to go back. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

I’m 28 years old now. I live in Switzerland, in Bern, with my boyfriend who is the only reason that I live in Switzerland. A couple days ago I was walking down the street and a tiny old woman was walking about ten meters ahead. She was distracted by a flower stall and her foot got caught on a hidden water hose. She tripped and fell face first onto the sidewalk but her momentum was such that she slid about two feet further, head first into a sandwich board. The first person to reach her was an Arabic man. He tried to help her up but she wouldn't let him touch her, “get away filthy Arab!” She started shaking and wept hysterically. A group of people gathered around most of them a little afraid to try to help her. Finally a woman knelt down and tried to lift her up. The woman slowly raised her face. A mess of blood and tears and make-up. Her eyes had the look of deep mortification only found in someone with too much pride to begin with. This is a common Swiss failing. It made me think of my Great Aunt and her racist husband and I suddenly felt more sympathy for the Arabic man who was just trying to help.
]]> https://www.happyrobot.net/words/kiene_angst.asp?id=2425 Today I am going to A Toy Expo with my new friend Morag and her 11 month old son, Lewis. Meeting people here is about as stressful as your first day of school, ever.

And, ironically, we bonded at Starbucks. She was interviewing a very pretty young Polish woman as a babysitter. I needed a table (and was physically - desperately drawn to the sound of english spoken aloud... even if it was almost incomprehensible Scottish) and we all bonded in the way that only "auslanders" can.

I said something horribly sarcastic (don't remember what anymore) and she smiled the knowing smile. And so these things are forged.

Sarcasm is the thing that forever separates english speakers from the rest of the world. After three months of German lessons I understand it isn't just that they don't get it - its that the language itself doesn't allow for it. It isn't built that way and only people (like the long suffering Stefan) who are exposed to smart ass english speakers (like me)for a long time, develop a sense of this excellent linguistic tool.

There was some movie in the 80's that added "not" after every sarcastic comment. At the time I thought it just a way for stupid people to feel more comfortable with sarcasm... maybe it would be a good learning tool.

But it is an amazing relief to have a conversation without constantly editing out all of the $5 words and character.]]>