sorry

Dear readers,

So sorry I've been neglecting this blog. Honestly, I'm pretty bored with this whole web 2.0 deal, tired of hearing about twitter, facebook, blogs and all that crap. It suddenly feels very stupid and meaningless to me. I'm trying to discover a new way to relate to the web that feels a little less voyeristic and more refreshing than before. It's been working so far, and I finally feel a tiny urge to write here again.

Things are GOOD in almost every aspect of life.

Last weekend I was in Curitiba for the second time this month. I absolutely love that city, it's one of the cleanest and most organized places you'll ever see. The people are ridiculously beautiful, polite and well dressed. I have the best reception every time I'm there and have made a few good friends. I spent a couple of days in town and went to this beautiful, green campus were I've been attending some classes. Look at that big lake! Unfortunately they have that big geese issue there as well, and, as some of you may know, I'm terrified of geese, so no need to say I didn't go anywhere near the water. Thank God for the zoom in my camera.

the little black book

My friend who went to India took with him a little black book. On the first page, he wrote instructions on what to do with it: leave a mark, take it somewhere and pass it on. He also left the URL of a blog and a physical address where the it should be returned to once all the pages are filled. Little black book should be somewhere in Germany now. We're hoping whoever comes in contact with it will visit the blog and leave a comment. That's the story of how "traveling with black book" was born.

IPCO, the creamy snuff: "alive with pleasure"

My friend just came back from a month vacation in India and, unlike any other normal/boring person who would buy tons of fabrics, jewelry, art, etc, he came back with giant baloons and precious little novelties - which we are loving to try out. Our favorite one so far: IPCO creamy snuff. It's a mix of toothpaste, tobacco, and some misterious substance that will give you a buzz and make you feel "alive with pleasure". You're supposed to rub it on your gums for 3 - 4 minutes, rinse it off and spit. Here's how it went:

PS: Since @Alelex88 brought it up: i'm not crazy to put that nasty shit in my mouth. 20mg of Lexapro daily and a few beers here and there give me all the "alive with pleasure" I need.

go to Argentina, have a good ol' time. ask me how.

I just came back from a lovely trip to Argentina that's consumed every ounce of energy I had and that checked-off my "to-do-before-I-die list" a couple of items.

First, I SAW MADONNA LIVE!!! Yes, me – the crowd-avoider, que "don't-touch-more-than-once-or-i'll-hit-you", the "get-me-out-of-here-it's-too-damn-hot"!! I f*cking did it. And loved every minute of it.




I'm too tired to talk about the whole trip right now, but I plan on writing something decent sometime this week. For now, you can check out my flickr. If I look happy and a little tipsy in the pictures, it's because I was.

II Bienal Brasileira de Design

I'll post more about this week soon. For now, here are the pictures of some beautiful architecture and a few amazing people.

in the heart of brazil

I'm in Brasília for a Design convention that's going on here:

This is my first time in the city and so far I'm not sure what to think besides that it's all very different. The streets don't have names: they whole city is divided into "sectors", "blocks", and "numbers". The city is shaped like an airplane, so people refer to "wings" to talk about locations. Weird and awesome, right? The avenues are wide, there are no sidewalks AT ALL. The architecture is UNBELIEVABLE. I've traveled a lot and I have yet to see something that compares to the visual impact that all the huge white monuments here have.

You can see some beautiful pictures here, here and here.

Now I'm going to bed. Tomorrow will be a long, long day. Pictures to come.

go see

Henry Rollins on twitter.

“A man must travel to places that he does not know to break this arrogance that makes us see the world as we imagine it, and not simply as it is or can be. That makes us teachers and doctors of what we have not seen, when we should be students, and simply go see ”
(Amyr Klink)

on my way to see the legend

Excuse my absence and my negligence with this blog lately. Things have been busy but good. Tomorrow I'm flying to Salvador, one of the most wonderful places I know. I'm going to see Joao Gilberto's concert tomorrow night, and that in itself is reason enough to be excited. If you know Bossa Nova at all, then you should know about him. I'm staying until Monday, and hopefully I'll be able to go to the beach, eat some shrimp, drink some beer, and all that good stuff. Just to remind you: it's winter here now. How awesome is that, huh???

Well, It's 2:06am now and I need to be at the airport by 8, so gotta go.

wouldn't sell him for the world

Ok, let's all pretend we didn't notice I made this in about 30 seconds. I still love it, though.

Novos Paulistas #1 (post in portuguese, sorry!)

Estou em São Paulo me divertindo horrores há dois dias. Bruno, meu companheiro de viagem, é um mineiro praticamente paulista, o que vocês podem obviamente perceber pelo vídeo acima. (É tudo brincadeirinha com amor, prometo.)

Hoje teve Bossa Nova na Oca (recomendo!), Duchamp no MAM e MAC de dia. Cervejinha no fim de tarde. Noite: jantar no Tiger, sessão de risadas e Wii na casa do Gêmulo, meu paulista preferido.

São Paulo nunca esteve tão bonita.

gotta go

I'm leaving for São Paulo tomorrow and I'll be back on Monday. I need to get away ASAP, to see different people, breath some new air and gain some sort of perspective. I hadn't stood still in one place for this long in quite a while, so getting away is almost a necessity right now. See ya'll when I get back. Hopefully in a much better mood.

back from the beach

don't hate me

This is where I'll be for a week, starting tomorrow. YAY for summer in January!! (click on the image to see it large)

Almost gone

Gate E12. That's where I'm at. At the airport in Atlanta. I've checked Puppy in and cryed my eyes out. That makes me think that I will put myself through hell if I'm ever a mother.

It's 7:03pm and our flight to Rio leaves at 8:40pm. This has been a crazy, crazy day and I'm so overwhelmed I can't even put it into words. A huge part of me wants to run out of here and go back to my good old life in Indianapolis, but anothe - the 2% sane part of me - is keeping me here and telling me I need to get in that flight and go.

I really hope I don't regret this. I really do.

I'll miss all of this.

All of right here.

Indianapolis, Atlanta, Brazil

Dear people,

I'm in Atlanta, writing from the hotel bar, using my new 17'' Mac Book Pro with which I am fucking in love. (I can't imagine how I lived 26 years of my life without it. Capitalism - you fucking complete me.)

We - me, my dad and Pupps - drove 8 long hours yesterday from Indianapolis to Atlanta, and got here only to crash. We're staying at this really cute hotel in midtown, and Puppy fucking hates the elevator. He clings to the floor like spiderman, it's hillarious. Because I don't want to leave him at the hotel by himself barking his ass off, I haven't been able to do much without him. I drove around, got lost a few times, walked around a cute little place with a bunch of small art galleries, saw where Portfolio Center is, then got lost again and got harassed by two crackheads, then went back to the hotel. Pupps is upstairs with my dad, sleeping, and I'm here at this bar watching a group of middle aged men drink Pinot Noir and make small talk.

I'm leaving to Brazil tomorrow, which means these are my last 24 hours in America, at least for now. My plan is to come back to visit next Fall, but right now it just sounds sooo far from here! I didn't get to say goodbye to all of my friends. This past week was insanely busy and I still can't believe I managed to pack all my shit and ship it to Brazil.

I'm sad. Really sad, and most of all, I'm afraid I will regret this move. But it's something I have to do now. I want to be with my family now, and I miss that part of my life. But who knows what's going to happen... One thing that I've learned these past two months is that life doesn't give a fuck about your plans, so I'm doing my best to just go with it and try to make the right decisions for now, and only hope that things will work out for me, wherever I end up at.

Love,
a very overwhelmed me.

visitors

So I know I mentioned a while ago that one of my BESTEST EVER FRIEND was coming to visit me. He did, we had a great time, we drank lots of beer, we went to Chicago, we had a picnic in the canal downtown, than we drank some more, laughed some more, then cracked ourselves up. We also made up dances and slangs, we cooked, hung out, and I miss them terribly already. (by them I mean him and Marcela, his friend who's also my friend now.) Love them!

NYC

Just got back from a few days in New York. You can check out new photos here!

Me lately

I haven't blogged in a while because I really just don't feel like it. Lots of good stuff have happened. Here's a list:

1. Things with my new roommate are gravy. He's the sweetest thing and we're hitting off really well. I like him.

2. I got MVP of the month at work and a small cash reward. Woot, woot, represent!

3. I met someone. I'm getting back in the game. But I'm still nervous and very careful about it.

4. I went to Detroit a couple of weekends ago to see Justin Timberlake. Don't fucking judge me, I took one for the team. (I kinda liked it, though)

5. I'm going to NY in less than two weeks to meet with my brother and my dad. I'll be there for a couple of days. Yay for NYC!

That's the news from me. Please, pray that men won't suck again for me. I need all the help I can get. Amen.

Back to business as usual

So here's a few reasons I haven't posted anything for the past week or so:

1. I was at Key West too busy getting tanned, throwing up on a boat trip, eat crab cakes, and wearing summer clothes.
2. I'm back at work after almost a month, and I'm trying to catch up and relearning the great craft of design.
3. I had too much laundry to do.
4. I've been at a friend's house who has cable TV, and it's not like I'm going to be blogging when "How do I look" and "I love New York" is on. Please!

But new photos have been uploaded to flickr. So go and check it out.

Crazy PDA

Ok, so there's this asian couple next to me at this bar/cafe/restaurant at the airport that is just going at it. Their faces have been attached together for the past 10 minutes or so and I'm am this close to grabbing my camera and recording this totally weird moment for you. I have actually just made sure the flash is off so I can make this very odd public display of affection available to you all over there on the internet. I have looked at them at they don't really move their faces. It's like they are just there, glued together, with each other's tongue in each other's mouth, just waiting until it's their time to board.

Oh, damn... they just stopped. Sorry, internets. You'll have to find your own freaky asians.