Winter Break, et cetera

Dear diary,

It's 2:04am on a Saturday night, and I, being a lame old man, find that there is nothing more exhilarating to do than to update my stupid blahg. But truth be told, I felt too lazy to shave, pick slutty clothes, put them on and walk aaaaall the way to the club (which is 3 blocks away), dance to the same songs I danced to last night and see the same people I saw last night.

But I digress, I was going to tell the fabulous story about my winter break in Bulgaria. As I indicated in my last Facebook note (which really should have been an entry in here), there were some interesting aspects of my getting there. But eventually I did, and I arrived with the same flight to Varna as a guy from Paris who, just like me, had been stranded there for a day. My mom met me at the airport, and politely used my interpreter skills to explain to the young Parisian gentleman that no, in fact it's not a good idea to take one of the cabs waiting right outside the terminal exit. There are some aspects of Bulgarian cab services that would require their own blog entry.

So she called us two cabs, one for me and her and one for the guy, since he had to get to some hotel on Golden Sands. He gave me his name and asked me to find him on Facebook, so we could maybe hang out in the city while we were both there. I tried but his profile was not available to everyone on Facebook, so we never really met. I still hope that didn't make too bad of an impression.

Since I got to Bulgaria on December 23, I had to do all my Christmas shopping on the 24th. I'm pretty convinced that confession would bring a heart attack to most American families, but I had no choice. Seattle was ice-bound right before I left so I didn't want to break my backbone while searching for an extravagant coffee cup gift. I was hoping I would arrive in Sofia on the 22nd, but that didn't happen either. So I was stuck with the Day Before Christmas. We decided to buy a microwave for the house as a family gift, plus a little something for everyone to feel a bit spoiled. I had withdrawn 400 Bulgarian leva from an ATM as I thought that was the transaction limit.

Later that night my mom and I decided to hit the stores. Having worked at Microsoft for several months now, I had something in my credit card and I wanted to show off a bit, so we went to a somewhat pricy jeans store, and I told my mom to choose whatever she wants. I myself picked three post-modernist pairs of jeans, and a couple of half-dressy, half-yes-I-will-fuck-you shirts, and combined we had a bill of about 800 leva. I went to the nearest ATM, and guess what! The 400 leva limit was not per transaction, but per day. Needless to say that was embarrassing, but we had enough money to buy half the shit, and the other half I paid for the next day. The moral - thou shalt not be boastful, or something.

All the while, I was thinking how I was going to surprise the guy I was dating at the time with my new outfits. I knew he liked how I look in black, so one of the shirts was an insanely hot black shirt. However, as it happened, he never wrote or call me the whole break, and I broke up with him shortly after my return to the New Continent. But that's besides the point.

What's really fun and bonkers is that 2 days later, I got sick. Really sick. I proceeded to get sicker the entire frickin' break, and I missed all there was to miss - my HS class reunion, my friends' reunion, nights out with folks I had been planning on for a while. What made it worse is that we don't really happen to be in Varna at the same time anymore - a lot of the people I know, just like me, went somewhere around the world, or are at least always in transit, so it's hard to arrange for all of us to be there at the same time. This vacation was one of those times, so I was, well, fucked (and not even the good way).

But my ailment deserves a special mention - I was sick with tonsilitis. Nothing weird so far, but my tonsils were actually removed when I was 4.5 years old, or so the doctors said. But as it happens, 18 years later, I discovered that yes, I do have tonsils (or fractions thereof) which are sufficient to get me sick. I remember arguing with the doctor who was shining a flashlight at my throat, and then with the second doctor who also gave it a try, and then their astonished looks as both of them concluded that either I was absolutely insane, or they were absolutely blind.

I got better right when I had to leave, so there isn't much more to say really. The one week that I was sick was really awful - I hadn't been so sick in many years. But I couldn't even be sick in private - my mom and grandma, who hadn't see me sick since before I left Bulgaria in 2004, really panicked and made sure they gave me their constant, undivided, forceful yet loving, and helpful yet utterly annoying, attention. But perhaps that only made me get better faster :)

Then I came to the US and ended my love life, and started focusing rather on my work and hobbies. It's been a nice break, and I learned a lot about what I need, want, and can accept. Now that we have mid-year performance reviews at MSFT, things are looking good and I'm looking optimistic about what the new year is going to bring me.

Hasta la vista!