This March, it will be ten years since I first came to Liverpool. Which means I’m old, my wild youth is firmly behind me, and time really does fly.
Expat Ramblings: Ten Years on

This March, it will be ten years since I first came to Liverpool. Which means I’m old, my wild youth is firmly behind me, and time really does fly.
A few weeks ago, I sat down and looked through my memory boxes. There in amongst photographs and letters was a bra to remember.
I’ve lived in Oregon for nearly eight years. Besides my Keens, my Decemberists shirts, and my reusable bags, the most Portland thing about me is that I take pictures of my food.
I miss German Christmases.
I’ve been noodling on what I’d say for my take on this theme for a little while now. I’ve been writing down the things I want to say, then sleeping on them, to make sure I still want to say them the next day. Good thing, too: You’ve dodged some bullets.
Happy Monday! This is one of my earliest musical memories, courtesy of my dad’s mix tapes. It needs to be shared.
I’m home. The sun is shining, and it’s all good, but after the greatest summer in my hometown, I feel I need a lot more time to properly arrive. I’m still coming to terms with all the memories that hit me around the head at every street corner. Suddenly, it seems impossibly hard to make […]
Hello m’dears, and Happy Monday! I’m writing to you from the past. Well, kind of. I’ve been staying in my childhood home for four weeks now; the weather has been glorious, and we’ve done a lot to bring back precious memories – zoo trips, ice cream by the fountain, and travelling old school in an actual […]
Enough with the moaning! There will be no anti-heat/bug/humidity sentiments here, just stories of great summers past and wonderful holidays to come!
I find myself trying to excavate memories, chipping around the edges of what I do remember, looking for something else that may be poking out and within reach.
I am what is known as the opposite of crafty. The polar opposite of crafty. But, as they say in the movie Robots, “see a need, fill a need,” and I saw a need.
I was going to write about some scents I recommend for summer, but then I thought I’d better back up and talk about fragrance in general. While a small number of people can’t wear it due to sensitivities, lots of people are scared of it. And with good reason: they’ve been around people who wear […]
I’ve been café sitting for a long time. I’ve sat in some great cafés and a few mediocre ones and even in a couple of pretty decent chain cafés (yeah, I’m looking at you, Starbucks across from my apartment in Beijing, you surprising devil, you). A good café can give birth to anything, from the […]
After she passed in 2005, I had a hard time going into her sewing room. I”™d gone in during one early, wine-fueled blitz with my first sister-in-law, Vonda, to divvy up Mom”™s fabric stash, but we”™d agreed that the machine should stay there for a while. For Dad.
Ah, the television of my youth! Do television shows these days even have theme songs you can memorize the lyrics to? I don’t know. At any rate, with the arrival of the much-hyped ’90s resurrection on TeenNick, I guess I’ve been feeling a bit nostalgic lately. But not for Clarissa Explains it All, Salute Your […]