Аз: Ябълките сладки ли са?
Той: Сладки, сладки … топят се в устата.
Аз: А, ок. Мерси. (И тръгвам към следващата сергия, щото ги обичам кисели).
Той: Ама леко киселеят.
Аз (шокирана леко): Вие сериозно ли???
Той (с игриво намигване): Усетих аз, че не трябва да са много сладки!

Купих си, щото ме изкефи тази реплика. Фор дъ рекърд: бяха перфектни.

- Ванка, и ти ли бичиш слайдове?
- А, не. Аз съм в отпуска.

(Минутка мълчание).

- А що си с костюм?
- Е, вторник е все пак. По дънки ли да дойда?!?!

So, last summer I was making reservations for a hotel at the beach. Amongst my friends we figured that I will transfer the deposit, since it is easier for me (see the disclaimer above). So I talked to the hotel, we agreed on a 30% deposit, I wired it and that was that.

The vacation was short, but absolutely lovely. The last day, we go to check out and pay for our stay. The receptionist looks quite bewildered as she’s looking at our bills so I ask what the matter is.

- I am just trying to understand what happened with the deposit – she says.

- Something wrong? I ask.

- It’s just … the amount is really weird, she replies. I remember it being something like 96 EUR and 27 cents. At this point I honestly have no idea what she’s talking about and confirm that they asked for 30% and that’s what I transferred.

- Well, see, normal people don’t do that – she explains. They just round off the amount to the next whole number.

Така се случва тази година, че в началото на месец март тя е в Берлин заедно с нейна приятелка. Разхождат се наоколо, разглеждат града (който много ги впечатлява, btw, май е време и аз да намина), не обръщат много внимание на хората около тях и си бъбрят на български.

Изведнъж моята приятелка се сепва, тъй като някой я дръпва за ръката. Изненадата й е още по-голяма, когато се обръща и вижда напълно непозната възрастна дама, която видимо се вълнува много от нещо. Озадаченият поглед от страна на нашите хора е посрещнат от въпорс, зададен на развален български със силен дойч акцент:

- Вие от България сте?

- Ъхъ …

- Познах ви аз!! Защото имате … МАРТЕНИШОК!

And since today is a nice sunny day which seems to call for story sharing, here’s one of my favorite stories:

A few years ago, a couple of us were in Brussels for a friend’s wedding. Since the wedding wedding was scheduled for a couple of months later, we were there – just a few friends – for the “official” part.  At night, when the formal program was over, we went to a bar in one of the nicer hotels in Brussels with the newlyweds and the bride’s father. From what I know, the dad could have easily bought the hotel if he wanted to. Come to think of, he may have actually owned it. I had never met him before this day but I knew of him: he started from scratch and did really well for himself – he was one of the most respected and wealthiest businessmen in the city. To add to that, he was one of the kindest and most modest people I had ever come across and also an adoring father. When we sat down in the bar, the waiter obviously recognized him and flew to our table to take the order. The conversation went like this:

Awestruck waiter: Good evening, Sir. What shall it be, Sir.
Supercool dad: And a good evening to you. A cognac, please.
Awestruck waiter: Yes, Sir. What kind of cognac, Sir? [he was Sir-ing way too much, I tell ya]
Supercool dad: A good one.
Awestruck waiter: For you, Sir, I have the very best cognac, Sir.
Supercool dad: No, not the best one, thank you. A good one. 

I was so impressed, I will remember this story for as long as I live.

Today is day 16 and I have only smoked two cigarettes (which don’t count) – one on day 7 and one on day 12. So here are a couple of observations without the obvious health-related cliches:

Pluses:

1 ) I have so much more time on my hands. Seriously, it’s ridiculous. On average, a cigarette took up five minutes to smoke. With a pack a day that adds up to an hour and 40 minutes. All this time is now freed up for other activities.

2 ) My perfume smells much nicer than I already thought it did. All the way through the evening.

3 ) I need to go to the ATM a lot less often than before.

4 ) I feel a certain sense of freedom.

5 ) Walking through all of IKEA or a similar-sized store does not bother me anymore. Before I could only stand about two sections and then I wanted out – to have a cigarette.

6 ) The thought “I don’t smoke” is a actually a nice one, if it manages to squeeze itself in between gimmeacigarettegimmeacigarettegimmeacigarettegimmeacigarettegimmeacigarette
gimmeacigarettegimmeacigarettegimmeacigarette. Still does not happen very often…

7 ) It is easier to be seated in a restaurant without waiting.

8 ) I actually eat less. Because you know that false sense that you get that a cigarette is like a digestive? Now that I don’t have it, I don’t eat as much so that I wouldn’t get a heavy feeling.

9 ) The constant fear is gone. Well, almost.

Minuses:

1 ) Waiting. People and public transportation in Bulgaria are always late. I never really liked waiting, but it was so much easier with a cigarette.

2 ) I feel like I should talk more. A cigarette is such a good excuse to be quiet, to sit back, relax and mind your won business without appearing anti-social.

3 ) Work breaks. Smoking breaks are legit. Back when I used to work in pubs, people actually started smoking, so they could have a break during the shift. No manager ever questioned a bartender who took a cigarette break, but if you just wanted to sit down on a chair and do nothing for five minutes – that was not acceptable. It is not much different in the corporate world.

4 ) I am finding it extremely hard to concentate at work.  Reading an A4 page is quite a challenge. Less now, but during the first week it was practically impossible.

5 ) Writing is even tougher than reading. For some reason, I write much better while smoking. Regardless of what I am writing – an e-mail, a blog post, a research paper or something for work. I feel that my talent lied in heavy nicotine consumption.

6 ) I miss my lighter. I have a gorgeous pink Givenchy metal lighter which stays at home now.

7 ) I get very nervous in bars.

8 ) All of the above can be summarized as: I REALLY miss it. And it is very very hard. One in every three thoughts is “I want a cigarette SO badly”. And that’s an improvement: the first three days that was every single one of my thoughts. I honestly do not recall any of the conversations with people from this time.

Funny observations:

1 ) The habit lies in purely physical routines as well. For example, Vesko and I have a Saturday morning tradition: he wakes up earlier than me, bakes croissants and brings up a gorgeous breakfast tray with which he wakes me up (am I the luckiest girl in the world, or what?). So I’d get up, pick up my tea mug and go to the window to have a cigarette. This past Saturday, without thinking, I did the same thing and just started laughing when I suddenly found myself standing by the window thinking “I don’t need to be here”.

2 ) I have to “manually” correct my train of thought when it runs on “automatic”. For example there is this monthly meeting at work which I really don’t enjoy going to, because it is long, completely outside my competences and therefore boring for me. It was this week and when I got the Outlook reminder my thoughts ran like this: “Oh, yuck. This meeting again. I have to go down early and smoke at least two cigarettes. Wait a minute. I don’t do that anymore. Crap. Now what?”

3 ) Besides cigarettes, for some reason, I am constantly craving cheese sandwiches. Go figure.

I really want to write a good review about it since I honestly do not remember the last book, which had such an effect on me. But at the same time, I am a little nervous; as I am afraid my writing couldn’t possibly do the book its due justice.

If I could sum it up in one sentence it would be: Every sentence is a pleasure. Kelly Byrne’s writing is like an endorphin for those minds that seek pleasure in the written word as such. Every single word is in its right place; nothing left to be desired. Her style is smart, honest, in your face (in a good way), daring. She will have you almost in tears and then all out of a sudden, when you least expect it, she’ll have you laugh out loud wherever you are [in my case, an open-space bank office]. And then she’ll have you in tears again. Resistance is futile. The book is just a wee bit predictable – so much that the reader feels a virtual pat on the back from the author, as if Byrne was saying Good job, you’re fallowing right along. But then every chapter has a twist and takes you by surprise. My personal favorite is the silent commentary that Kate does on everything that happens. Which made me laugh. Every time. To add to that, there are several sentences in the book after which you just have to take a minute to take a breath. There was one about validation of loss that screamed so true and loud that it made my whole body tremble (I won’t quote it on purpose in order not to ruin it, but you’ll know exactly what I am talking about when you get there).

The book follows a young disturbed woman called Kate [Katie, Kathryn, Bits] and a five-year old wonder, who inserts itself uninvited into Kate’s life, named Sadie Beck. The cocktail contains vodka, setting ex’s garages on fire, kidnapping², fear, lust and a very unexpected friendship.

Kate is totally my type. She is a messed-up 28-year old who has come to accept (without really accepting it) that inner peace is not her thing. To say the least. The girl has gone through a lot and does not have it in her to forgive others’ mistakes. Quite the contrary: she sets stuff on fire.

Then despite her best efforts, a five-year old worldly angel with ginger pigtails installs itself into her runaway jeep. Enter Sadie [and my God, what an entrance it is!]. At first, I felt a little resentment at the almost-instant love Kate developed for Sadie. See, in life as well as in art, I am a sucker for the badass girl – the one who drinks and drives, who scratches the hell out of collectible items for the sake of revenge, who will start a fire without having her jeans on. The one who has her shit together. Except that she doesn’t. My resentment lasted all of two pages before I gave in to Sadie’s’ magic. See, Sadie is the type of kid which people like me, who don’t want to have kids, actually want to have. And I could see that my selfish desire for entertainment was not fair on Kate – she couldn’t possibly continue on living like this – with open-ended unanswered questions, self-destructive and detrimental to others.

Her care for Sadie, whom she inadvertently kidnapped, is touching. The badass runaway makes it her first priority to save Sadie, all the while being completely oblivious to the fact that Sadie is the one doing all the saving.

Their relationship is very special as well: it reminds me of another favorite book of mine: The Time Traveler’s Wife. Often one feels like Sadie is Kate from a past life who traveled through time. She knows things she shouldn’t; she brings out all those things Kate does not have the strength to confront.

Both the characters have incredible depth: you feel like you’ve known Kate all your life and Sadie – she feels so real that when she cries on paper you actually feel her warm tears on your skin. Her magic is that in her grief she manages to laugh so truthfully that she soothes all your troubles. Hell, I’d kidnap her, too.

Another reader said in her review on Amazon “I would urge everyone with a heart to buy this.” I completely second that. Best couple of bucks you’d spend this time of year.

In my defense, my summer was so cool and eventful that I almost forgot the admin password for my own blog. Then I had problems with my beloved pink VAIO and more precisely with Sony’s “customer care” (quotation marks intended to show sarcasm). Two things I know for sure: 1) I shall probably never buy a Sony product again and 2) my next laptop will finally be a MacBook.

The thing is, I love, love, love writing. And going to the gym. There is one main similarity between the two: once I get into it I can’t stop. But it is so damn hard to get into it in the first place.

So once again, I shall make a silent promise to myself to hit the treadmill – both on and offline. Let’s see how far I get this time.

In the era of new-age communications the newest form of peer pressure is the infamous Facebook “like” button. What do you really like?

I have a friend who posts something, likes her own post, then comments on it and likes her own comment. With depressing regularity. Some “like” everything that goes on their wall. Others give the thumbs up for pretty much every single post their friends have  (including stuff like “I am having such a crappy day” and “my dog who was totally my best friend in the world just died”). Seriously … every so often (read: at least once a day) I feel like screaming What exactly IS it that you like about that, dude???

Tonight I saw a new high/low: Bogomil Bonev, who was one of the finalists in Bulgaria’s X factor edition (or one of his PR peeps) posted on his page “Good evening. :*” – you know the *simple* kiss sign, without even bothering to include the hyphen. Within seconds – literally seconds!! – that got 609 likes.

Granted, the boy is polite, but does that really deserve all that hype?

I often find myself wondering whether I will offend someone by not liking their post. You know, people have been known to get offended by far less than that. But it leaves me wondering … What do YOU like on Facebook?

Dimiter was not alone. He was with an American friend of his, who was released less than 24 hours after the arrest.

And people wonder why I lack patriotism…

As for now, I am just praying that Dimiter comes home soon and in good shape. And (once again) I am feeling ashamed of my country’s lack of … well, you name it.