Rainbows and...Capricorns

So I had visions of myself going swimming every day (see previous post). Right. The weather had other plans and I only managed to swim in the lake 4 times. I guess that's better than nothing and I should be grateful for seeing rainbows. There were no unicorns, though (neither capricorns. My boss recently butchered the proverb by saying "it's not all rainbows and capricorns"). Of course I am lucky that it was not a vacation involving expensive travel and/or accommodation and thus my mood did not match an angry emoticon, but rather this one :-/ Let's call it semi-happy. Weather aside, I once more realised that a change in scenery does not necessarily mean a cleaning of the slate of things that go on in your strange little mind (cue: obsessively checking certain apps on my phone). On the bright side, I managed to read my backlog of magazines, catch up with friends, make several bracelets, order a new sofa-bed for my guest bedroom in Vienna, visit Ljubljana on the new bus that runs between KLU and LJU 4 times a day, etc., etc.

Gone Swimming

I'm in KLU for a week and while the weather forecast is not too great I am planning to seize every ray of sun and be at the lake as often as possible. The plan is to stay away from Macbook (possible) and smartphone (unlikely) as best as I can, so don't expect much action here this week. See you!

The Other Prague

In contrast to the touristy and super-crowded old town of Prague, I experienced a rather chilled Saturday morning. Since I only had half the day, I had asked colleagues if there was anything to do in the area of my hotel (near "Andel" metro station in Prague 5) and the recommendation was to walk across Palackého bridge and have a coffee at the nice market there. I did exactly that and apart from the coffee (I got excited when I found a stall that offered flat whites, but the one I got was nasty and bitter) it really was charming and just what I had been looking for. I didn't buy anything other than said coffee and a pastry, but just enjoyed looking at the things offered and watching people. If you are ever in the area on Saturdays (I don't know if there is a market on other days of the week, too) and have already ticked off the touristy must-dos on your list, make sure to stop by.

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I bought quite some bits in Nice (surprise! surprise! Not) that I am not planning to share here in their entirety. If you want, you can stalk the Instagram widget. Since I am writing this in Prague where I just picked up a pair of "almost free" Bata shoes, I thought I'd share two shoe bargains. I in fact have more (pairs of) shoes than I own handbags, which is definitely a feat as we know that I own A LOT of handbags. I haven't counted, but I think I might have crossed the 3-digits-threshold long ago. Ahem. I digress.

I picked up a pair of cute rose-gold flats with a cherry-detail in Niche when Chiquita and I were on our way back from Antibes and walking from the central train station to the beach. We both picked up a pair of casual shoes from a sports shop on the way and in my defense my usually more restrained cousin had actually bought a pair of shoes in Juan les Pins earlier that day already. There you go! The cuties below were 50% off and cost about €25 if I remember correctly. I intend to pair them with my rose-gold Alexander Wang bag and use them as spares when out dancing in (what I consider) heels.

I am almost looking forward to colder days when I can pair them with skinny jeans. The shoes I likewise wasn't planning to buy in Prague are also for spring and autumn and since I am a big fan of the quality and price-tag of Bata shoes I compulsively need to pop into a store in any country that has them. Needless to say, the choice is best in the home-country of this brand and so I had to check out the sales racks here. Well, this nice nude pair of loafers (leather with leather lining) was 70% off and cost a mere €20 converted from the original CZK price. Seriously, I HAD to adopt them. They are dainty enough to be worn with a skirt, too.

A bit of shoe-decluttering might be in order to remedy the crammed situation in my shoe-closet...

People!

I am currently in Prague and took the opportunity to stroll around the old town on the past two evenings. I had not been to Prague at this time of the year in a long time and was shocked about the sheer number of tourists milling around there. Even Vienna pales in comparison, it was more reminiscent of Venice and a bit too much for my liking. Here are some pictures to illustrate the fact that I was not the only visitor...

 

Other than the crowds, what really struck me was how...trashy...this elegant city has become in its touristy parts at least. I don't think I've ever seen so many souvenir shops, jewellers and weird "museums" in one place and on top of that, there are aggressively advertised thai massage places in pretty much every street. I suppose stag parties are their main target group. Here's a picture of one such establishment on St. Wenceslas Square. The man-sized shark is used to advertise its fish spa, I guess:

Decline into trashiness or not, Prague is still beautiful and definitely worth a visit. Having taken the train from Vienna which takes about the same time as the one to my native Klagenfurt, I once more realised how close the two capitals are geographically and that there's a reason why (Asian) tourists (in particular) always like to combine Vienna, Budapest and Prague.

The Child in Me

I have already confessed to embracing my inner twen more than the average person my age. In addition to that I am also really, really childish. You might want to call it immature, but let's stick to childish, k?

Case in point - an invitation to Amica's lovely weekend/summer house last Saturday, together with the Mademoiselle. I had been looking forward to try out their new pool (a dream!) complete with counter current system and had almost forgotten that they had a big trampoline in the garden as well. Show me a body of water warmer than 15° and I have to go in and splash about/swim. Show me a trampoline and I go crazy. Like, seriously. I love trampolines and ever since I was shown an "Oaschler" ("Arsch/Oasch"=bum) by a kid when jumping on one with M.C. several years ago, this has become my "signature jump" so to speak. I was happy to be able to teach it to one of Amica's twins and we practiced doing it in parallel for the greater part of the afternoon. I am sure he did not have sore muscles for 2 days afterwards, but I certainly did! My back felt as if somebody had beat it with a baseball bat...a rude awakening to the fact that I am 42 and not 12 after all. Oh, well. The biggest reward, however, was when Amica called me on Monday to tell me I had climbed up several notches in her kids' appreciation by doing all kinds of sporty activities in water and on land with them and they told guests on Sunday that I was super cool and despite being "actually a friend of Mum, she is our friend too." A lovely compliment if ever there was one! Now I only need to work on impressing men beyond primary school age to the same degree...

Marc-Meier-Syndrome

cover of a notepad the Mademoiselle gave me. The pages inside have funny quotes such as "pain was too good for him" ;-)

This is officially the year of over-sharing on this blog. Now that you have already been invited to my cringe-worthy pity-party a couple of months ago when I tried to convince myself I was in love and then that I was heart-broken - both not really true in retrospect - I feel that we have reached a new level of (forced) intimacy here. One of the reasons why I have been able to tick off the subject of my springtime obsession so quickly and ultimately rather painlessly was because shortly afterwards somebody unexpectedly crossed my path who ticked more boxes I even knew existed. The only drawback being that he is none other than the previously mentioned infamous "Psycho" in my contacts list, ahem. Yes, so much about deleting all messages. There are new ones now. Chiquita, who was present when we first met and who has been my confidante on all things Psycho repeatedly asked me what on EARTH I liked about this creature (other than the fact that he is seriously good-looking). This past Sunday she had a sudden brainwave when watching her favourite TV-series, Doctor's Diary.  When we met on Sunday night, she solemnly told me: "I get it now! It's Marc-Meier-Syndrome" Genius! I couldn't agree more and since I admittedly had asked myself the same question, it felt like THE ultimate scientific answer to one of life's big riddles... Like my cousin, I loved "Doctor's Diary" and had a crush on Florian David Fitz, the actor who plays the evil Dr. Meier. Seriously, I want to eat him alive. If you don't know this extremely funny show, Marc Meier pretty much behaves like an asshole to the female protagonist all the time, which does not stop her from fancying him. As a spectator you sometimes flinch at his (verbal) cruelty but yet can understand her as he is simply so hot. Plus he's not a stupid brute after all, but a doctor, so can't be all bad. Since I don't have a worse inferiority complex than the average person and no masochistic tendencies that I know of, I didn't think I would ever have a soft spot for somebody with seriously rude and selfish behavior, but there you go: I'm a certified sufferer of MMS, what can I do?

And Nice it Was!

I came back from Nice on Thursday night and in keeping with my current "party mood" and to prolong the holiday spirit went out dancing with the girls that same night.

I have shared many pictures of Nice and other places at the Cote d'Azur here before so have decided to include a "by night" picture of the famous Promenade des Anglais in Nice for a change.

Mademoiselle, Chiquita and I had a great time and got on well with one another. We enjoyed the tried-and-tested formula of swimming, sunbathing, reading and people-watching on the beach, eating lots of goat cheese and salad with carottes râpées every day, getting value for money on the Ligne d'Azur buses to neighbouring towns (including a MAD driver on the way back from Menton who must have been practicing for the F1 race in Monaco), doing quite a bit of sale shopping with 3ème démarque being the magic words...all in all a lovely week that hopefully will be repeated next year!