How I procrastinated today

Everything makes more sense when framed in terms of my shower.

You may or may not have been informed that I'm in the midst of trying to write a story about my recent trip to Poland, which probably should be pretty easy considering the volume of notes I've taken. However, the copy that would make up such a story (at least a newspaper worthy version of it) is kind of like the hot water in my bathroom -- is doesn't really want to come out, and in fact there may not be very much of it. To continue the simile, there is also the problem that, sometimes so much comes at one time that I don't know what to do with it, and I end up pouring a good bit of it down the drain unused, while I stand around naked waiting to get warm.

Hopefully you get the idea. Some literary people call this "writer's block," but I think that term should really only be applied to successful authors; just because I have a website and an attitude, it doesn't really make me capable of having "writer's block," although there are plenty of people out there that would tell you otherwise.

So, for my edification as much as yours, I present to you just a few of the unnecessary activities in which I took part today, aside from compiling this list:

The other Polish "L." I spent a good 15 minutes or so searching the Internet for the proper way to type the Polish "L with line through it," which actually makes a sound similar to the English 'W.' Had I been able to find a quick answer, this might actually have been helpful. But instead I ended up reading a Polish typographer's report about the character which, while interesting, brought me no closer to making it appear on my computer screen, as you have probably gathered.

A passport issue resolved. Thereafter, I stared nervously into my computer screen for another 20 minutes or so like a teenager looking at pornography at the Internet cafe. Then my computer's robotic voice informed me that it was now 2:00, which meant that my countrymen at the Embassy would now be accepting phonecalls. The clerk on the other end was slow to pick up the phone, but did answer and -- to my great surprise -- swiftly and politely fielded my inquiries regarding adding additional pages to my travel document. So now I can plan for my next trip outside of Germany, although clearly this does little to help resolve the issues pertaining to my last journey.

In search of beverages. I can't say this was entirely as waste of time, actually, because of the various chores I needed to get done today, there is nothing more amusing to me than going to the beverage shop that's kitty corner from our building. In there you can get at least 10 different juices, 20 brands of beer, and countless varieties of wine.

Reading about other American Berliners. I found a page with a list of several other Berliner "bloggers" (I hate that word) on the Internet, which I won't list here because then you might click on it. Let it suffice for me to opine that most of the other online journals written by Americans living in Berlin are either sickeningly similar to mine (attempts at wry, off the cuff remarks about being or aspiring to be an author) or about food (I mean of the "here's how to make Maultaschen" variety), the last of which, after some consideration, I might actually print out, because now I'm starting to get hungry. I wonder what we have in the kitchen?