Listen, I cannot stress this point enough: everyone should have a BIG BONE BARRETTE, preferably the glossy version. Amongst other things it goes very well with vintage Comma, jackets found on flea markets.   -   I figure all my financial troubles are over now, since there is a huge pile of marten shit right next to my front door, which basically means "der Teufel" started shitting "auf den größten Haufen", AKA money makes money. Now I just have to wait and see.   -   Since I am really into sentimental bavarian songs, I inscribed two BUBBLE PENDANTS with lines of the "Erzherzog Johann Jodler" and the "Isarmärchen": WO ICH GEH UND STEH TUT MIR MEIN HERZ SO WEH and WENN ICH DICH NUR SEH SCHWINDET LEID UND WEH (these are not listed in the shop, so in case you want one of those, just let me know)   -   You are going to see so many pictures of all that enameling going on in our workshop, soon you will be sick and tiered of it. I know that I posted some of those pictures up there twice, but I am suffering from decision-fatigue and couldn´t decide with combination I liked best.

The linden trees are in bloom over a month too early, their smell makes me most sentimental. It smells like the Summer holidays are about to begin, there is an ease creeping into the days and excitement, too. It also makes me feel slightly lovey-dovey, without knowing for whom or what, maybe in love with light sticky nights and heat induced dozi- and dizziness, having to put my stiffly swollen feet in a bowl of ice cold water to keep me from sticking to the keyboard. Probably I just #lovesummerhateeverythingelse. Now everyone wonders what might be left for August then, July even. 

One Saturday I come across another hen night, as usual during the weekend even in our small town, and I am thinking this one might be different than all the others after all, since all girls are holding up those matte pink menstruation cups. Then I realize those are actually just champagne flutes.

I can´t stop blogging, I can see how anachronistic that is, but who can time their needs to all those current trends. I did go with the begonias, succulents and cacti, and on the food side bee pollen, chia, turmeric and now hemp seeds, all pretty and delicious, but apart from than that I am not very on trend. Something I am really good at by now is that so called "self-care" - I am doing it very much my way however. The term makes me very queasy, since a lot of the advice is just downright selfish, which should be very alluring to me, since I am a really selfish person myself. Maybe it stings a bit because I am indeed feeling guilty because of being that way. For example I am really good at saying "No", saying "No" is basically the story of my life now, I say "No" so often it isn´t even special anymore. I won´t bore with all the things I say "No" to, it would be a long, tedious list. Also basically all the time is "Me Time", there is so much me time, it drives me nuts. Whenever I hear and read about someone taking time to "curl up with a book", my intestines curl up, too - reading is not something special for me, but an escape, a way to kill time until my eyes start to flicker or my neck gets sore. Or this thing about having a cup of "steaming tea" by themselves for a treat, it makes me steam, too, thinking about those endless pots of tea, making me get up at night at least three times to pee, since tea is all I do, all day long. I even vividly dream of having to pee and then peeing for the longest time, all because of all that tea drinking. Also I do not have to "carve out time for myself", I am trapped with myself, always and forever. The way I "provide" for myself is by making sure there is always a good stock of essentials at home, so I never run out of toilet paper, gluten free rolled oats and cat´s favorite food, since there might be times, when it could be a bit complicated to replace it. I also have a cup of GREEN MATCHA TEA every day and on a hot day, or basically all Summer long, I prepare a pot of green or herbal tea in the morning to drink cold when I return home in the afternoon. Later on I do a bit more peeing. There are a lot of double batches of roasted vegetables made in this household to spare me one round of cooking, eaten with spicy peanut butter sauce made with orange juice, pepper flakes, yeast powder and vinegar. Of course I do at least a triple dose, I have been a fan of peanut sauces ever since I found a recipe on 101cookbooks.com (simply can not find the recipe anymore, sorry!) when still a student and have been tweaking my version ever since. And I do a lot of PICNIC BREADS, too, probably because it is just an other opportunity to use mustard. On a quest of using up everything in my drawers before it needs to be thrown out, I am now doing a lot of precooked grains. I have now come to like salads made with millet (and cucumber, paprika, spinach and basil) so much, I had to restock it, so the whole endeavour was in vain. And to feel on top of things: constant obsessive tidying, tidying on the go. It might not look like that, but the heaps found in my flat are there on purpose, for decorative reasons. Everything else gets put away all the time, punctuated by some local deep tidying once in a while. The one thing I am not suffering from, is putting off dealing with little things, those get done in a flash. Bigger stuff deserves a bit of procrastination, but I have realized by now, that some of my projects just need a lot of stewing. It actually does them a lot of good. Like when I looked at those fancy stones for over a year, drawing up version upon versions of ear rings to make with them, starting work on those and deconstructing them again, twice, to turn them into something completely different. So worth it, all the lost gold dust even - you just wait and see (and save money, those are going to be quite pricey). Everything else however just gets churned out at once. Riding my bike home after leaving the workshop, I feel a rush of happy-high flooding through me, it has always been that way, working there makes me just so glad. And despite the fact that I am not able to actually do that much anymore, this still works. I am wondering if it has something to do with the fumes, since working on the computer can never achieve the same results, but I doubt it. One day I almost double over in pain after such a bike ride, but there is still that elating feeling. Work IS my self-care, no matter what anyone says. So, this trend I kind of get, but then it has been around for awhile now. So to cut this long story short: I am still into blogging. Too slow for things like Insta-Stories.

My holistic orthopedic sizes me up for insoles and has me take 50 steps with my eyes closed, hands stretched out in front. When I open my eyes again I have taken a turn by almost 60 degrees during those steps and I feel utterly embarrassed by this. I am so ashamed by this failure he tricked me into displaying. He then tells me a story how, with closed eyes, I would end up at the wrong table at the coffee place if I had been walking up to my boyfriend sitting there - this irks me even more. According to him that boyfriend would also know if I´d snore or grind my teeth at night. Why should I walk up to a boyfriend and why should such a thing lie next to me in bed? So all I say is "Ok, toll." The last time I went there, he chuckled because my legs are so short. I am not sure if I will go again, but he is the only one still willing to try things. Things after his own bible, but still.

I want to read everything on that WHOLE LIST - they had me a the line by Anne Truitt, which sounds so common to me: "All told, I now have available about one hundred dollars in ready money. It´s too low an ebb. Yesterday my heart pounded all day and my left eye is jumping and jerking." And I am very much into those cover designs, too.

On a dark winter night I met RICARDA (auch HIER) on the historical stone bridge for a few very delightful minutes (I was just recovering from a stomach flue and didn´t want to drag her into it, too), she seemed like such a nice sprite, emerging from the misty darkness (and wearing the perfect trousers and jacket). I told everyone how glad I was to have ventured out that night, still feeling sickly to meet such a lovely person. Now I am a GIRL CRUSH and reading her words made me blush quite a bit.

(That iris I am awkwardly holding up in those pictures is not the one I am talking about later on, but a rather lovely variety, unfortunately with stems too weak to hold up the bloom.)




When walking is an option, I often take strolls with W and since the weather is so excellent these days, there is so much to see.  Of course we also prefer the weekend or holidays for maximun entertainment, during the week it might just be plain boring with nobody about. This time around we spot a tiny wiener dog puppy being trained. He is taking such an effort to circle around all these withered narcissus stems in his way when racing back and forth, it is the cutest thing ever. I try to make W write one of his poems about it.

Two weeks before my 35th birthday I buy a bottle of rum to soak some raisins in and get asked to show my ID - this is hilarious. Buying alcohol always makes me feel a bit guilty, even more so when I also buy a bag of sugar and it looks like I am trying to cover up the fact that I am indeed only out getting the rum. Later on I find out they actually do this all the time, probably to promote customer loyalty.

Oh, asparagus smelling pee time! How much do I love you! Since there is so much of that stuff grown in our area, you can get it really cheap now and most times there is an even better deal on the tiny slim green ones, which are my favorite anyway. Since I am quite into smalltalk and any kind of spontaneous banter, I now know that none of my favored asparagus sellers is ever eating any kind themselves, they also despise the strawberries they also have on offer and do not get what the fuss might possibly be about. They are more into cats, cats are huge for them. My cat looses so much fur these days, she is currently walking around in an aura of floating hair.

Getting my hair cut is an ordeal, almost the whole family is like that, which makes us a spectacular too long haired bunch. But by now it had gotten so bad, I just needed to get it over with. So I go to a place just around the corner called "Evelyn´s Friseurstübchen", where there are copper coloured wall stencils, a family of plaster marmots sitting in the window and the hairdressers wear apron dresses and get out their rolls stuffed with ham from a roll shaped Tupper box to snack on, while their ancient client is whiling away under the hood dryer. Every Thursday and Friday you can stop by without an appointment and I will now do so as long as I live here and they keep this establishment going, since I probably got the best dry haircut ever at Evelyn´s and it was so cheap it suited by broke state a lot. I tipped in abundance, I simply could not help myself, being so relieved to have it over with and so happy to have found such a treasure.

Despite he fact that I am in quite a bit of discomfort these days and sometimes in a foul mood, there are so many things I find delight in. First of all the smell - everything is just burning up in flower in such speed right now, the mixture being different every day. Heady with lily of the valley and lilac even - or especially - at night, and the elderflower is just waiting to join the chorus. I also enjoy things like the nerve racking, almost ultrasonic hiss of my recently decalcified tap aerator when the water is running. Also I really like to dress again, to put jewellery on - it never totally stopped, but it always needed to be something that would come off again in a second in case an emergency should arise. Now I like digging up stuff from my closet I got ages ago, things that feel like they have just been waiting for me all that time. I am so glad I never joined the Marie Kondo cult - in case some pieces just do not work anymore, I bring them over to my mum. It turns out she looks quite eclectic in turquoise pants, I just felt ridiculous wearing them. When the pain isn´t too distracting or frustrating, it actually can coexist with delight. This is fairly new to me, for a long time those two thing felt exclusive too me. In a few months I will celebrate a decade of being in massive pain. During these festivities I will not be able to share any wisdom with you, there won´t be slideshows, impressive before and after pictures, no inspirational tale of how I made it to the other side using only my iron willpower. There is no other side and the iron bits are rusty, flakey, crumbling away under the softest touch. I have not overcome a single thing, nor am I stronger than before - I have not risen from the ashes. I did the hospital stay that should have turned my life around and the diet that was supposed to change my existence, now it is probably all down to the fact that I haven´t had a hydrocolontherapy and never take a look at the organ watch. And maybe things just haven´t changed because I am simply not happy enough and not able to do any yoga, also I only meditate while riding my bike. And though I listened closely, I still have no idea what my body might want to tell my so urgently, or what possible use that pain could be for me. The answers making most sense to me so far, are "nothing" and "none" and being asked those questions sets a fire to my fury, has me reeling from hot red (or white, depending on the setting) rage. Also I do not think I am punishing myself with all this, for things that are not supposed to be punished in such a way, in any way. Things like lying to my grandmother about a singing and dancing game in the school yard that never actually happened in third grade or an ill advised hookup, leading to an undetected chlamydia infection that might have turned on my spine. My body does not strike me that vindictive and biblical and even if it would have turned all Old Testament and plage-style on me, you should think I would have atoned for my sins by now, leading a martyr nun life. I might get even beatified, if I wasn´t so pissed and angry, but of glorious endurance instead. 

I am tired and get teary eyed every time I read the obituaries and that line pops up with the way becoming to hard and steep and God seeing this, putting his arm around you, telling you to come home. This God seems so nice and I really like him. Also I really, really want to go there, home. Not dead-home, but pain-free-home. But I will admit that thinking about dead-home also gives me a lot of comfort, which makes this definitely not a saddening thing. Sometimes the sun shining outside is just not "true" for you, because you are in sick- and pain-land and this is not actually life. Life is what everyone else is doing, they own the sun and they also own Sun-days, to enjoy and be free. You do not have those. And every time you wish someone a happy weekend, you are wondering what that might look like. When you do not know where any of this is leading, or if it will indeed ever end and you feel so out of options, no solutions on the horizon and just going on, plain survival is definitely not one - bam - there it is! A new idea, one of those cherished light-at-the-end-of-the-tunnel moments! You realize you can actually always put that end to it all - it is up to you, at last. Oh, that is a cheering thought! So you put on some high-waisted white jeans you will have to unbutton all the way down again when you are trying to sit down for the first time (you will never wear those again), but you do look like a very hot doctor and you meet up with your friends and go to an event in some park that makes everyone attending feel very fancy. Pants undone, looking profesh, thinking happily "I can kill myself any time I want, you fuckers - isn´t that just awesome?!". And let me tell you, that thought is so much more relieving than unbuttoning those pants and allowing that belly to expand in abundance, but just like that there is freedom and deep breathing again. An odd kind of happiness in this turmoil, a tiny bit of ease in distress.

In this neighbourhood the only excuse for an overgrown garden or even worse - lawn, is being gravely ill or indeed dead. But even then you are not totally excused for this disgrace, since what you should have done, when feeling the early onsets of old age, the shadow of death, is pouring concrete all over your place or at least fill it up with deranged zen-style pebble. Better yet, have the common sense and turn the whole thing over to someone young and neat before your decay sets in. The plaster covering my house is crumbling, my paths are covered in ornamental lichen, my fence barely held together by a clematis hard at work. My lawn is always parched and my hedges uncut (who would bother with giving their box woods a trimm, when the box wood moth is just waiting around the corner to take it down?). I (accidentially) breed escargots and tiny pink snails (my favorite) and the little yellow ones with the brown stripes, because my garden walls are made of limestone, which is good for building their shells. Thyme, chives and hollyhocks (and grass, of course, and dandelion) grow in the cracks between the paving stones and I won´t put an end to it. One of my neighbours is desperately offering me moss killers. No plant, not even the hundreds of shrill bright red 50s tulips can be contained to their beds. (Actually I am just about to tear those out every season, only stopping myself knowing they fade within a couple of days anyway. So far I haven´t found a way to tone them down with some kind of plant partners, neither the awful variety of two-toned violet bearded iris appearing a few weeks later.) This is an affront in the country of highly effective weed killers, flame throwers and high-pressure cleaners. Where the young and old can be found hurrying to the nearby cemetery at all times, carrying a watering can, since there is no greater shame then an unkempt and under-watered family grave. I´ll say - with a preachery gesture to match: "Let my grave be a wasteland." And I do not mean that in a poetic give-me-all-the-wildflowers that-will-be-so-good-for-the-bees, this-is-an-excellent-idea-I-am-going-to-be-bee-food-when-I-am-dead way, no, I actually mean wasteland. That nice God has taken me home and I do not feel a fucking thing, so why would I care if I am covered in trash, annoying the hood.

(I have to admit however, that there is indeed one resident who is by far surpassing my tame attempts at garden rioting with a property in such constant disarray, an everlasting construction site. Whenever I spot him taking on a new, and soon to be abandoned, messy and nonsensical project, I mentally applaud him. I am not badass enough to create or tolerate such a display of chaos, so he is definitely the king of suburban pandemonium.)

(The tiny red and green dollhouse sized tulips are called SAMANTHA and are really very cute - just in case you need them in your garden next year. So far I can´t tell you if these are one-hit wonders or of the faithfully retuning kind. And basking in the sun is an ARROW BRACELET, in case you need that for yourself.)

For a few days in early spring, when all the mirabelle trees growing unchecked in my backyard are in full bloom, looking out of my bathroom window makes me feel like I am living in a cloud of foam. Then it is also time to visit the plum tree at the car repair shop in my neighbourhood - I think you know him by now. This year, the day I brought my camera along was quite stormy, so I also took a few videos of the flower shower. As I type this, all of it is already gone, now everything is covered in a pale yellow coat of pollen instead - not only outside, inside too. My dust rags will be yellow coloured for weeks to come. It is also the time when I start picking ticks off of the cat, cut them in half with nail scissors and drown them in the toilet, a total over kill.

A very trustful client reached out, asking me to turn her unworn silver necklaces and bracelets into a custom made SILVER RECYCLING NECKLACE, using up all the bits that would work and I think it turned out pretty great. So this is now a thing - in case you have some unloved silver bits and pieces idling away in your drawers, get in touch and we will see if we can give a serious upgrade! Please note: we are not able to turn junk into magic, so it is best to send pictures beforehand and we will estimate what could be done.

You can also send me pieces from your fashion brand and I will wear them in the workshop, trying not to light them on fire or get caught in machines. Then everyone will see how amazing I look wearing them and you will get lots of new customers - you know, the influencer way. I am trying really hard theses days to find new ways of business. I have no credentials whatsoever, people sometimes do buy the jewellery I have been seen wearing however.  What other services could I offer?

I long for a different frame - angular, delicate, lean. Slimslimslim. But in my eyes I will always stay compact, squishy and soft. A forever protruding stomach, the product of the ludicrously shaped spine and a troublesome tummy. A laughable exaggeratedly arched shape. I seem to be drawn more to women of the slender built and contained forms, but I am at the same time scared of their magical thinness power. I think those shaped like myself out of control, bleeding and sagging, loose fleshed. and shamefully sprawling. The burst veins, the sickly paleness, the bloatiness, the red and swollen feet - all of this I consider the fault of the inhabitants of those bodies, my fault. I have started out with the complicated body of a much older woman, it has always been just too much, sticking out indecently and suggesting things I am not, things I know nothing about. And then it started getting even more complicated, becoming even more present, taking up so much space. I turned to drapey clothing quite some time ago, so at least no one would know my outlines. Loose pants, dresses and shirts make me feel safe from my own body, in hiding. Liberated in a way, from what myself and others might see in my outside shape. As soon as I can´t make out my body, I am looking good. Then we are on equal terms and my body stops being the sole dominator of me and my life. Hidden are not only sights, all those malfunctions seem to disappear for a bit, too. When I am feeling especially huge, I consult the scale and it tells me I am not only deranged but also delusional. But those numbers seem to get it all wrong, I see different things in the mirror. And it looks like delusions are the hardest to fight anyway. I am undressing to take a shower, when my sister calls to tell me the story of one of her coworkers who had an aneurism while being stationed on a research station in the sea, a bit like an oil platform, to watch bird migration offshore. The charger of my phone is plugged into the socket next to my full-body-length-mirror and I am forced to acknowledge that I am indeed tiny and completely undeformed looking. The guy is as good as new, they flew him out, since they are trained in a way that makes them call a medivac as soon as you wake up vomiting and have a headache.

And on the topic of undressing: you can spot my sister E performing at the Marina Abramovic exhibition THE CLEANER at Bundeskunsthalle Bonn up until August - since I can´t make it myself, please keep the PICTURES coming!

HOW DO WE WRITE NOW (of course via JESSICA STANLEY)

It is BOOK CLUB time again and we are reading UNTER LEUTEN by JULI ZEH - welcome to a parallel universe in the middle of Brandenburg nowhere, where you meet a spectacular set of Unterleuten´ inhabitants - all tangled up in a huge dispute spinning out of control, about bird protection and a looming wind power station to be built in their midst, while still battling the aftermath of the former DDR.

In case you want to read along and meet a group of nice book lovers, let me know and I will set you up with the details! We will meet again on 16.5., 7.30 pm at our favorite spot in Regensburg.

(Texts I send to my sister at age 34 - she almost never replies. In the end I tell the singer of the band that I liked the concert more than the exhibition I actually came for and congratulate him for being nice and not arrogant on stage. He says they do try their best. When I unlock my bike I come face to face with said cute bass player - he´s apparently having an earnest discussion, sitting down on some grimy stairs with a pretty girl and I know when I´m defeated. So what do I do in my weird crouching position? I ask him what an "aerostat" is, since the band is called that way. When he tells me it´s a Luftschiff, I say something like "so it´s basically a yellow submarine, but in red and up in the air". Calling my sister on my return home, she tells me that this is an excellent pick up line. Well, at least I made them laugh. I take a hot shower, check for early spring ticks and scary bruises my physiotherapist might have left behind with his cupping tool, trying to make my legs feel less numb - none and none. Then cat gets a chin tickle and I tell her I love her so. In bed before 10. My life is hilarious.)
(I have been wearing those shoes for over 20 years now. The leather is getting a bit stiff, but so am I.)
(By looking at our workshop you can definitely make out who is the Silberschiedemeister and who just isn´t. W started working on that turquoise bracelet about 30 years ago and is currently finishing it for my birthday - so excited!)

I always had to use the bathroom a lot, but with this vegan diet I am starting to feel like a bird or a mouse, digestion-wise. When you put something in, something else falls out - maybe even a bit like those dolls you feed with a tiny bottle, just so they would start to pee right away. Never had one of those, they were made of evil plastic, but I still left the toy catalogue laying open at the page with the thing on it, hoping my parents would somehow get the clue. All in vain, of course. Probably this diet is actually more fitting for the naturally constipated amongst us. 

I read, read, read. Brilliant essays online, wonderful newsletters, magazines, so many books. Without  Medimops, I would be broke by now because of my book buying habit - my mum actually thought I was ordering insane amounts of pet medication, because it says "Medi" and "Mops" on the packaging. These days I am down to exclusively female writers now, I rarely bother with the male ones. I grow impatient with them and become fidgety. I read so much, it is impossible to keep it all neatly stored and easily accessible in my brain. This makes me impatient and fidgety too, especially when I wake up at night - usually because my cat starts bouncing on my chest. Then my mind starts spinning with things I should look up, look at, look like and I am having a hard time falling asleep again. I think most of the available brain space is actually clogged up with food stuff, recipes I spotted somewhere and want to try someday. Like where did I find that vegan BANANA COOKIE RECIPE and did I bookmark the one with the SPICY PEANUT NOODLES I could have with the tiny winter radishes I found on the farmers market? For what did I buy the nutritional yeast for - a VEGAN CEASAR SALAD? Did I make a note somewhere of the ingredient list for that fabulous chickpea salad I had, when going out for lunch with my friend? The chickpeas were like none I ever had, so silky and fresh, like falling right down from the chickpea tree/plant/whatever and straight into my mouth... I´ll put it down here real quick: I seem to remember cucumbers, dates, celery and fresh coconut flakes, covered in a turmeric dressing. And I did read an exceptional article on how we view WOMEN´S STORIES, didn´t I, but why can´t I remember a thing about it? THE FOLDED CLOCK sat on on of my bookshelves for two years now, unread, which is shocking to me now, just shocking! But on the other hand, I am so happy to be able to read it now - maybe we were both just waiting for each other and for the right time. (There is a lovely The Lit Up Show EPISODE, which I greatly enjoyed, too - the one with Jennifer Egan is brilliant, too.) It definitely looks like I HAVE FORGOTTEN HOW TO READ. I would like to dive into all those topics, submerge and drown, but all I do is look at shiny surfaces and reflections. 

My hair is too long and looks drab, my face always scrunched up, a vertical line sits between my eyebrows - there is nothing photogenic about that, nothing to successfully instagram. I can´t even fake beauty, create an idea of myself from scratch, some kind of voice. What do I sound like? I am wondering if there is a place for me in that chorus out there, where and what I want to be and what I have to do to get there.  On the other hand I have just entered a new phase of unshakeable, leaden tiredness that keeps me just where I am. It is a kind of tiredness that doesn´t respond to freshly squeezed orange juice or spicy food or going out anyway. I only return shaking, with a ringing in my head and a desperate need to go to bed immediately. On one of those days I have to lie down in the afternoon and stand up again with a dislocated jaw an hour later. Chewing hurts and I massage my face using a bit of soothing oil while watching Friends. It turns out watching Friends has become unbearable in this new feminist era - Ross really is the worst of all (E says "he has always been a problematic character") and suddenly JOEY is the way better option. But maybe my voice is the one with the drab hair after all, living in the equally drab suburb and on a weird diet that makes her poop a lot. Maybe it doesn´t matter that I don´t drink a lot of WINE in a lot of places and drinking no wine in no places and writing about that down is just as legit. I really like the story of her Riesling nameplate by the way and I am thinking about which one I could get for myself - "Toilet"? "Emergency Exit"? My sister E suggests "Overly Excited" and wants something like "Easily Butthurt Feminazi" for herself.

At the flea market I find five plates and a bowl in the same blue pattern as two cups I greatly admired as child. I thought my mother so fancy for owning those, and their matching saucers. Looking at the dark blue flower at the bottom of the cup, covered by yellow coloured tea, made me feel cozy and warm. There was a turquoise enamel tea pot - now used for watering plants, a vintage leather berber bucket bag with fringes and a necklace with a tiny pearl and moon stone my dad made for her, that I also thought very grand. Taking a look in my cupboards, you wouldn´t think I live alone, you wouldn´t even think I was raising a big family. You would think I was hosting endless dinner parties instead, with mismatched dinner ware and lots of candles. None of this is happening however. It did, quite a few years ago, when dinner parties where my favorite thing. I don´t know if they were any good, but I liked coming up with a theme and preparing it all. And on each of those evenings I thought "Now your life is actually starting, that is actually how it is supposed to be. Never mind what happened until just now." I also think so every time I get a new dress.

Since I haven´t celebrated my birthday for over ten years now, I am thinking of maybe doing so this year. Well, only if my sister comes to help me "entertain", otherwise this would be too much pressure for me. What I want is a gathering of friends, sunshine (or not, I actually don´t care), pretty birthday dresses and delightful cakes with matcha and raspberries and the one with the rum soaked raisins in it. I want buttermilk scones, sugar and basil marinated strawberries with cream and I want pretty pictures as proof - those with the blurry sunspots and shallow depth of field. And I want my mother´s cheese crackers, sprinkled with seeds and spices, too, egg wash and all.

Last Easter Sunday a period of bad stomach pain started with a little twinge behind my pubic bone, when watching ELVIS on Youtube, which always makes W so excited. I tried to walk it off in the sun, by the river - the pain however didn´t give a fuck about a walk. It had come to stay, to spread and morph. This year I put a lot of brie and BLOOD ORANGE MARMALADE my mum has made on a lot of slices of sweet Easter bread. Then I take a walk with W, during which we don´t find a solution for my current cash flow problems, but I don´t really mind. After that he tells me the engineering for my new pieces is completely wrong. He is right about that, of course, but I don´t mind either. There is a storm that evening and the rain comes down slanting heavily from every direction, washing away everything but the throw up in front of the brothel I ride by every day. On Eastern Monday I eat even more of that yeasted bread with raisins and almonds and we take an other walk. I break a sweat in my new leather jacket, since the sun is out again and we pick up some earnings from one of my local STOCKISTS to ease the cash flow problem. Then we discuss our engineering issues in a very leisurely way. I haven´t felt that much like on holidays in, like, forever.

There is an Instagram ad for a vacuum cleaner attachment I am freakishly drawn to - it let´s you suck tiny bits of dust from your cutlery drawers with fuses so narrow, you don´t even have to remove the things in it. Now I desperately wish for that kind of thing and spot nooks all over the place I´d like to deep-clean with it.

I tell my parents I won´t be able to chip in on the new heating system we´ll need in the near future, since I have to save every cent to have my cat cloned one day.