Six Months of Success and One Day of Failure

So I am very proud to announce that I have lasted just over six months living in a foreign country, tackling an impossible language, and fending off European men. The road has gotten a little rough at times and I have hit a few potholes, but overall I would say that I have rocked at life since my move... until today.

I was sitting at the dinner table, enjoying a well-prepared meal by yours truly, and chatting with the host family about my upcoming travel aspirations. I had just fixed myself a perfect piece of bread with avocado, cheese, and salami and after finishing the open faced sandwich and licking my fingers, my host mom looks at me and says, "You know that was horse salami....right?" FAIL.

I believe it was in one of my first blogs where I outlined my disgust of a culture that would eat beautiful creatures like horses and swore that, along with cats and dogs, I would never eat horse. And the worst part? I do the grocery shopping. So not only had I eaten Thunder, but I had paid for, thus condoned, the slaughter of him too. 

I'm a Broncos fan. I feel sick.

Swagger

It has come to my attention over the past five and a half months that I regularly have miscommunications with people in Switzerland. I realize that being American and living in a European country that has 4 official national languages, a ridiculous amount of dialects, and a population consisting of 20% foreign immigrants, that miscommunication comes with the territory. However, there is one word that I have made reference to countless amount of times and without fail, it is always followed by a blank stare. Every. Single. Time. The reason I am devoting an entire blog to this word is because if you don't understand this concept you will never fully understand me.

So listen up Switzerland and all the inhabitants of the world reading my blog who are unfamiliar with the word "Swagger," 'cause you're about to get a crash course:

Swagger: (swgr) intransitive verb. The way one presents themselves, from outward appearance to attitude and conduct, that exudes bold confidence often in attempts to impress others.

Now I need to break it down a little further because it isn't as simple as just being confident. The way in which someone carries themselves as they walk down the street, the manner in which one styles their wardrobe, the words they choose in conversation, the music they listen to, the car they drive, etc., are all combined to make "Swagger."

Like most personality traits, there is a positive and negative side of swagger and it is important to outline the differences because you should never mistake one for the other. To make it clear which swagger I am talking about, positive swagger will be referred to as "Swagger" and negative swagger will be referred to as just "swagger."

"Swagger": Positive swagger (left) attracts you, turns a glance into a gaze, and captures your attention for an unexplainable reason. The outward appearance catches your eye initially, but it's the attitude that draws you in. There is a certain underplayed confidence and superiority that is intriguing. Positive swagger has a sense of class, refinement, and exclusivity that negative swagger lacks. Swagger has a certain poise and polish that takes a specific personality type to perfect. It is the understatement of superiority combined with independence that is all wraped into one delicious piece of eye candy.

"swagger": Negative swagger (right) is when you look at someone and think to yourself that under normal circumstances you might be attracted to them, but for some reason you aren't, and in fact, you are a little repulsed. It's like the feeling you get when you get a whiff of strong cologne that, had it been in a much smaller dose, might actually have smelled nice. Negative swagger doesn't yell in your face, it screams. It is the attention whore who is so desperate to be in the spotlight that they might actually bring their own to the party. Flavor Flav is the extreme case of bad swagger with his gawdy jewlery and oversized accessories. Pauly D (pictured right) is a better example of a certain kind of pathetic swagger that is more commonly seen. Under normal circumstances, had he conducted himself with an ounce of class, one might notice that he isn't so unfortunate looking. But add a bad suit, high-top haircut, fist pumping, and pointing at cameras in almost every photoshoot, and you have yourself a pretty good example of behavior that should never be repeated.

One needs to be careful in distinguishing between the two types of swagger because bad swagger often tries to disguise itself as good Swagger. Immediate behavioral indicators of negative swagger is that the person is always doing something to get noticed. If you have Swagger, there is no need to draw attention to yourself because you already have attention (and trust me, you know it). Swagger is sitting in the corner sipping on a glass of their choice drink while swagger is dancing on the table with the whole bottle.

I hope that you have found my Swagger lesson to be informative and you now know what I am talking about when I say the word. Oh, and in case you were wondering, Switzerland has neither positive nor negative Swagger. Nope, none at all.

100 Day Countdown

It is official, people. In T-100 days, I will be back in the good ol' US of A. Get excited. (Notice the countdown to the right)

I know that since I left, there have been nunorous things that have gone terribly wrong in the states; things that I can only assume went wrong as a direct result of my absence and not because of any other outer forces.

The first thing I will mention is the wildfires in Boulder, Colorado beginning in the month of September. These fires, which burned well through September, October and part of November, destroyed over 196 structures, and burned over 152 acres of land. Clearly, since it began around the same time that I left, one can only conclude that the city nearly self-combusted from lack of my presence.

The second thing I would like to mention is the NFL. I am talking about the entire industry of American Football starting with the pre-season draft all the way to the Superbowl. From Brady Quinn (dont get me started on Brady Quinn) to Brad Childress, to Josh McDaniels, to....omg, just the entire season. I don't know what happened, but I have never seen so many teams unravel at the seams all at the same time. I am honestly glad that this happened while I was gone,  because I am pretty sure I would have resorted to some pretty outlandish behavior had I actually witnessed it. And at the end of it all, the Broncos finished second worst in the league and just hired the former coach of the worst team in the league...do I have to say more.

The third thing, which actually breaks my heart, is that Justin Beiber didn't win Best New Artist at the Grammys. Are. You. Kidding. Me. I am almost 25 years old and even I have a fan t-shirt. I know all the words to his songs and I am in love with a man that knows all his dance moves. Need I say more. The kid came out of Nowheresville, Canada, eh?, and blew up the charts like never before (with the exception of Michael Jackson, but there's just no comparison there). He is so adorable I want to pinch his cheeks and I am pretty sure that if I was 10 years younger his picture would be plastered all over my locker. "Beiber Fever" has spread farther and wider than swine flu and west nile combined and while it may not be as deadly, it is much more difficult to cure. And the kid did it all before his 18th birthday. Who is Esperanza Spalding anyways? Ok, college at 16 and professor at Birkley College of Music at 20 is impressive, but can she roll with Ludacris? Case. In. Point.

So America - listen closely. You have 100 days to get your act together because I dont want to have to pick up the pieces when I get back. Thanks.

Woke Up in the Morning Feelin' Like P. Diddy

Oh wait, no. No I did not. The last time I checked P. Diddy's daily crisis is not the location of the pacifier or the stuffed horse Hugo. And I am definitely not making anything close to resembing Gs.

I know that I swore I would never blog about work to respect the privacy of the family, but I have convinced myelf that the daily tasks and lifestyle of an Au Pair is free game since the following information is general knowledge about the profession and not directed towards any party in particular.

I have been thrust into the postition of unglorified household glue. I am the silent adhesive that keeps things from falling apart due to the busy schedules of two parents with offspring. The laundry gets washed, hung to dry, and folded, the dishes make it into the diswasher and back onto the shelves again for the next day's culinary adventures, and the toys magically make it back onto the shelves. As fun as it would be to imagine that all of these objects come to life like in Toy Story and take care of themselves, Mom was right when she said, "Someone's got to do it." And that person happens to be me.

Well like any career change (I assure you, this is NOT my career), adjustments are inevitable. For example, when I was working as an interior designer, I used to have conversations about dimensions of floor plans, furniture arrangements and color selection, and the highlight of my week was using my creativity to its fullest potential and composing a Photoshop masterpiece. Now that I am an Au Pair, I talk about the different phases of child development, what colors and shapes the kid learned at school today, and Gymboree and playdates are the highlight of my week. Words like floor plan, elevation, and rendering have now been replaced with caca, nuggi, and that's not a toy.

However intellectually wasteful raising a two year old may be, there are a few perks to the job. For example, there is no commute seeing as my bedroom is about ten paces from "the office," I can wear pajamas all day, and no one will care if I skip a shower. Unfortunately, living at work as its drawbacks too, such as I live at work. There is no way to leave work at the office when the office is your home and your work is a two year old that is smart enough to know that you are his permanent playmate. There is also a grand lack of privacy with paper thin walls, sharing a bathroom with your boss, and nowhere to hide. When you live at work it is hard to determine the line between working and living. I will be honest, there have been more times than I can count on my fingers and toes that I have sacrificed food for privacy simply because I didn't dare leave the solitude of my room for a snack in fear that I would get caught up in the next fish game.

This is my life. I cook, I clean, I discipline. Everyday, for an entire year. Future Au Pairs should be aware that this job is difficult, things are never a walk in the park, and you have on heck of a responsibility shaping the life/lives of the children for the future. After all, if the job were easy, the parents would do it themselves.