Among pretty colourful presents I got a more… technical one. I love my new camera lens but I don’t know how to use it! I’m not going to make a fool of my myself and admit that I manhandled it from the first day but at least I’ve read some reviews and in theory I should be able to use it without a problem.

But until spring arrives and I can go outside with my camera without fearing that I might slip and land on it, here are a couple of pics taken with the Lensbaby Composer.

I’m blogging while a nice lady is cleaning the apartment. I should feel guilty for not doing it myself but we’ve come to the conclusion that our free time is more important than having a tidy place. In Baia Mare we’ve had a cleaning lady since I was 13. I’ve always been a bit of a hoarder, clinging to things I didn’t use and not being able to throw them away, so it was good that there was someone who made me give up lots of useless things. I’ve recently opened my desk drawer and it’s so full that I can’t put anything inside anymore. I have to take it out, empty it and throw away everything that I don’t need. I’ll probably open it 50 more times until I’ll manage to clean it. I don’t know why I’m so attached to stupid useless things, why I can’t get rid of them.

I don’t know how long it takes to start climbing as if you know the technique but I’m definitely not there yet. I’m going there for fun and for the exercise and I don’t focus on how to get up, I just do. Sometimes when I’m at the middle of the panel I realise that I don’t know what to do next and I laugh and lose my balance. On the other hand, it feels so good when I reach the top and I’m out of breath and out of strength. I love each and every bruise I get from climbing and every callosity (is this the right term?) on my palms. I think that physical activity is very rewarding but the real challenge is to find an activity that suits you.

Lately it’s all been about me, me, me. Three days a week I go climbing and one evening I go and talk to A., my therapist. And it feels great to have such things to fill my time with. I’m very active and I wouldn’t miss one of those session for anything in the world. I finally realise how important it is to put myself first. I’m really pampering myself and it shows. *And they can’t take that away from me

The only thing that bothers me is that I can’t find the right settings for my camera. I’ve played a bit with the contrast and the white balance and everything and I still haven’t found the perfect combination. The colours are not bright enough and the pics look as if they were taken in the ’70s or something. I don’t have the patience to read miles and miles of articles about how to set your white balance but I think I’ll have to resort to that in the end…

There are two things I love about Sibiu: the buildings from the city center and the food. I could go there and eat all day and just walk around the same beautiful streets all day long. It’s such a pity that Bucharest doesn’t have such a pedestrian area. Lipscani is so small and so… small. You go up on one street, come down on another one and that’s that. (But I do appreciate all the pubs there! )

Now I’m back in Bucharest and I’m miserable cause I have to do go to work. It’s absolutely horrible to do something which you don’t like, to be forced to do it. It’s not that I don’t like my actual work – I like it, I really do! – but OMG how difficult it is for me to have a schedule, to spend 8h on a chair, to go there every bloody day. On the other hand, it’d be depressed if I just stayed at home and did nothing and had no money. A part-time job would fit me like a glove but they don’t grow on trees and I get no answers to the CVs I send. I have to stop complaining, look harder for a new job and get the hell out of there!

Up until now I’ve had a great time home. Tiring but great. I don’t feel that I’ve missed much by not keeping in touch with many people. Yes, I miss some of my classmates but I’m not as sociable as I used to be, I’m not that open. I hate it when people don’t mix, when there are awkward pauses in the conversation and I feel good only with people I’ve know for years and whom I can rely on. The night I went out with Steve and M. was fantastic from my point of view. We had something to drink, the conversation was great and I felt that we were going to meet for many more years to come. I think one of my resolutions will be to let go of people who don’t mean that much to me and stick to the ones who deserve it. There are things I can get over and there are things that are a deal breaker. And for my peace of mind I’m not going to accept any deal breakers.

Spending time with my extended family was okish except that the kids become tiring the third morning and at one point the grown-ups surrounded me with stupid questions: ‘When are you getting married?’ ‘Why hasn’t he joined you here?’ ‘Are you still with him?’ ‘Do you still have feelings for him?’ etc. etc. etc. I know that they always do that and I know that I can’t stop them (that much I’ve learned by going to therapy) but sometimes I wish I could put them on mute and explain that I never ask them about their personal business and that I hate it when they’re trying to be funny by asking me such idiotic questions but I’m pretty sure that next time they would ask the same questions all over again. So I just took a deep breath, told them I’m not getting married and changed the subject. But it bothers me that they still don’t know me/understand me and that they think that I’ll change my mind and do what’s expected of me.

I can’t believe I’m the oldest one among my cousins and other relatives! That I’m an aunt who brings them presents for Christmas and who has a fancy phone and who got a cool haircut and colours her hair! I remember vividly the times when I looked up to my cousins and now it’s scary that there are others who look up to me. Even tough we are so different we are still bound together by this thing called ‘family’. This concept still puzzles me and 50% of time I want to be as far as possible from it (family) and the other half I’d give anything to be closer… I can only hope that one day I’ll know what I actually want.

*Bon Iver – Blood Bank

This is my third day in Baia Mare and I still can’t sleep properly. I used to love the bed here and whenever I got home I just put my head on the pillow and I was asleep. And now I toss and turn and nothing. Not even the two duvets and the overheated room don’t make things easier for me.

But it’s good to be back home, I have to admit that. I have already met some of my dear friends from here and I still have many more to meet. I haven’t had time for myself but I managed to have my hair cut (yes, A., now you won’t have to see the ugly cut from the back of my head anymore ), buy some winter shoes and spend quality time with Mum. Oh, it’s soooo good to eat cooked food again! I’m sick and tired of falafel and pizza! At the top of my list with resolution I should put ‘cook more’. But who actually keeps track of those silly resolutions? I think they sound nice, they give you the impression that the year that’s just starting is going to be different, better and then you end up doing the same stupid things all over again.

I’m eating tangerines like there’s no tomorrow. I envy that my father has a green thumb. Yeah, their apartment gets more sunlight than ours, but still… They have so many plants and flowers and so few casualties. All the plants that I buy wither either because I water them too much or too less or because they don’t have enough light. I want to bright up the place and I can’t. I such a loser in so many ways…

This snow is such a bitch! When I woke up there was a thin layer of snow everywhere and it was snowing beautifully with big fat flakes and now it’s gone I really can’t picture Christmas without it and the city looks so sad and muddy and ugly. But there are still some days left and I still have hope.

I want to go back to bed and read all day but I don’t know if I have the patience to do that. I’m really mad at myself for not reading as much as I used to. I have to change that but how? Reading is something so personal, so mood-dependent. I can’t force myself to read if I’m not in the right mood and because I have other activities in the evenings I don’t have much time to read. It’s a horrible vicious circle!

*DeYarmond Edison - As long as I can go

The only problem is my laziness and the fact that I don’t know anyone there. I talked to some people and we helped each other but it’s still not the same as going there with a friend or with someone you know. I’ve realised that I hate being alone, apart, outside. The people there all know one another, they all help each other out, they’re like one big family. I don’t want to make new friends, I just want to feel less awkward. But I should probably give it more time.

These last weeks all I did was work, work, work and then work some more. Honestly, I’m sick and tired of it, I need a long holiday, which I intent to have for Christmas. I’m less depressed and sad, now I’m simply overworked. I always feel tired in the morning, I hate going to work everyday and I hate the fact that everything is urgent, that everybody wants everything NOW!

But like A., my therapist, said, I am very good at spotting the bad parts. I have to focus my attention on the good ones, so here’s a list with good things which I’m looking forward to:

• going climbing
• snow
• going to Baia Mare
• Christmas
• editing another book
• going to the Radiohead concert in Berlin next July!!!
• writing my dissertation (should be fun)
• my Tuesday therapy sessions
• going to Sibiu at the end of the year (who’s coming out for a beer with us except Béranger and Yuki?)
• meeting friends I haven’t seen in more than a year!
• giving presents

*Radiohead – Climbing up the walls

Also, I am very good at fucking things up. I was so happy that autumn has finally arrived! I was walking down the street with this huge smile on my face and I couldn’t get enough of that cold crisp air promising new adventures and good times. I was bursting with joy! And then today… oh, today it was horrible! After I had finally mustered up my courage to go to my boss and ask for a 2-day leave from work, I had my mind set on buying an autumn coat. It was a complete failure! I had seen some very nice jackets online but they were so different IRL! Disappointingly different… I don’t get it: it’s an autumn jacket, it means it should protect me from the cold. I don’t need a pretty expensive thiiiin coat cause I don’t want to freeze to death! Also, I don’t want to wear my winter jacket from late October to early March cause that would be too depressing. I want something in between! And also, who the fuck wears fur on their collar??? Anyways… I’ll give it one more try tomorrow, otherwise I’ll just wear my very old jackets. Too bad that I don’t know any good second hand shops here and I don’t have time to go to BM and shop there…

17 more days till we’ll be on a plane to Köln! It will be quite a trip getting from the airport to the hotel (we land at midnight) but we’ll manage somehow. After that everything will be more than words can say: the concert, the girls, the city, the wandering around, the pictures… This is going to be my 4th autumn trip abroad. I like this tradition and I should do everything to make it happen year after year. Every trip abroad is more than a breath of fresh air… it’s normality. I need it!!! I want it!!!

Sometimes I feel like I’m on autopilot: get up, go to work, be productive, come home, waste time, go to sleep, start all over again next morning. Most of the time I want to break this ugly ugly routine but almost every day I return home without having taken a picture, without having stopped by Cărturești, without doing anything nice! I am so mad at myself for that… In order to make things better, I’ll go to a book release tomorrow and on Friday I’ll go to the cinema. Bloody small things, how you can’t live without them!

For example, I’ve realised that I need my life to be structured, organised to the point where I need to control everything: time, feelings, thoughts. I don’t like changes of plans, things that are not according to the schedule I’ve set, and I don’t like to rely on people – because I can’t control them. I get upset, angry, sometimes panicky if things don’t turn out as I want them to. No, I haven’t learned how to manage this… need, I’m just fascinated with how clear everything seems once I talk about it, acknowledge it and accept it.

I’m thinking of making a schedule for each evening: cooking, going out, blogging, watching a movie, photowalking etc. I should try to benefit from this need: control my life, organise it, give it the shape I want. I don’t know if that would make me happier, but I can give it a try, can’t I?

*Kate Nash – Navy Taxi

I can’t believe that I have three more days here and then I’m off to Baia Mare! These next days will simply fly by and then I’ll have six well-deserved days of doing nothing. Well, not exactly nothing as I have many and great plans. We’re celebrating Mum’s birthday next weekend, I want us (me and Mum) to go out a lot (drink coffee/tea, walk around, shop, just be together as much as possible), I want to take my parents to a fish farm/restaurant (I had the best bread in the world there!) and, of course, I’ll meet all my friends. I am very excited about this holiday.

I have so many things to pack! I haven’t decided if I take the huge suitcase or the normal one and I’m afraid that I’ll forget something at home (I already had a nightmare about that). Right now my couch if full of books, cables, presents and I keep adding things to the pile. But it doesn’t matter – I’ll take everything that I think I’ll want/need ’cause I want this holiday to be perfect!

I want to smash the phone when the alarm rings every morning at 7.
I want to sue the heating company for providing water that’s colder than my body temperature instead of hot water.
I want to attack with my book the people who get too close to me on the tube.
I want my skirts and dresses not to go up when I bike.

I want this weather to bloody decide already if it wants to be summer or autumn so I can dress accordingly.
I want rain boots not to be so expensive, it’s just plastic anyway!
I want to be able to save money.
I want to be able to speak German. And to learn Spanish.
I want to actually do something (with my life). (But I don’t know what.)

Inertia, baby, it’s all about inertia!