Work in the morning, still no job waiting for me this summer, twenty-some pages to write in the next week, and a two-hour commute to the FedEx office (hate!) somewhere in my future.

And yet I'm excited.

I leave for Germany on the 15th. Just eight days until good beer, good volk, and, well, being in Germany without feeling that I need to speak German 24/7. For the first time ever.

I'll never live down that time I tried to use the bottle opener backwards, but with Genglish finally fair game, perhaps the Reutlingen people will think I sound less stupid.

I did bring them King's Cup, after all. An act roughly analogous to when Prometheus brought fire to mankind.

There's also the matter of spending time with Graham. We talk on IM all the time (more than I talk to anyone else, in any case) but for several years now I've only been able to see him on weekends, every so often.

It would almost be funny to find out that we hate each other — but like the rest of my capital-F friendships, my friendship with Graham has ceased to be a tentative, dynamic thing and become, simply, the premise for all of our interactions.

I can disagree with my friends, but they're still exempt from my evil eye. It's weird, actually.

Sort of like that rule Jubb and I came up with at Lawrence when cabin fever was looming, to keep inter-roommate conflicts in check: the Core Assumption. Something along the lines of "We like each other."

Ah, I've forgotten it. It only sort of worked anyways.

The only hitch in my travel plans so far has been my inability to get in touch with former exchange-student Flo, whose email address I've totally misplaced. I met up with him three years ago during my term abroad; the hope is that he could put me in touch with some of the gang from Konstanz, who I haven't seen in a chasm-like six years.

Germany = more exciting than Hyde Park. But let's not make that list.