Most Things Taste Better Than Skinny Feels

The calendar and I are in a fight. The calendar wants to say that it's almost November, but I'm pretty sure that it's only late September.

Spoiler: the calendar is going to win. 

As it tends to do, time has started moving at hyper speed. Time is like a hamster: strolling along on its wheel until you look away for one second; then, it uses its tiny legs to spin that thing like a race car tire. I cannot believe I have only around 6 weeks left in Prague. Franz Kafka once said, "Prague never lets you go. This dear little mother has sharp claws." There is actually no better way for me to put that. It's absolutely true. 

Instead of getting depressing, I'll fill you in on my ever-so-enchanting life in the dear little mother that is Prague. 

This past Monday, October 28th, we didn't have classes! We weren't celebrating Cristopher Colombus or laborers; however, this holiday is the Czechoslovak Independence day.  For anyone confused, there is no Czechoslovakia anymore, but the Czechs still celebrate like it's 1918!!!  And how did we celebrate? We went to Plzen, of course. 

If you have heard of Plzen, color me impressed. Pre-abroad, if I was on Who Wants to be a Millionaire and the final question was "Where is Plzen?" or "What is Plzen?" or "Is Plzen a real thing?" I would have either lost or won $1,000,000 solely on luck. Plzen is a town about an hour and a half outside of Prague. It has a beautiful church, a historical underground, and (our favorite part) the Pilsner Urquell brewery. 

Now that I have toured the Heineken brewery in Amsterdam and the Pilsner brewery in Plzen I think it's safe to say that my beer knowledge has gone from about a -4 to a 5 or even 6. Touring the breweries have actually been one of the more enjoyable "touristy" activities we've done (informative and fun?? Is this a School of Rock Video or a brewery tour??).

We also celebrated the Independence Day by treating ourselves to large amounts of tasty Czech food. I realized a while ago that Czech food should probably be a rare occurrence in my diet, lest I wish to roll onto the airplane and deal with heart problems later in life.  American chef, Anthony Bourdain, once referred to Prague as "Porkopolis .The land vegetables forgot."  So one hand, Czech food is not good for you. But on the other hand, it's delicious. Besides, how I am going to disprove the "Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels" idea unless I frequently eat all the food which tastes so much better than skinny feels (or at least, how I assume skinny feels).  

Note: I really do think "Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels" is one of less intelligent sayings I've ever heard. In fact, I think almost the opposite is true: "Most things taste better than skinny feels." Now that's a quote I could get behind.  So take that, healthy eaters! You can keep your vitamins, and lack of health issues, and muscles and...you know what, I'll just stop there. 

Obviously you are reading this very closely, possibly committing it to memory, and noticed that I mentioned Amsterdam earlier. That's right, two weeks ago I traveled to the Netherlands to see the sights. When I first told my mom I was going to Amsterdam she responded "Caroline. Did you know they sell legal pot brownies there??" She then went on to ensure that I would be careful to inspect any chocolate I was buying for possible drugs. 

Besides crumbling up chocolate bars in search of marijuana, we also visited the Heineken brewery, the Red Light district, and Anne Frank's house. We also saw some of the city by water when we took a canal tour. The Red Light district was easily one the more depressing streets I've walked on, but besides that Amsterdam was a beautiful place. The leaves had just changed and with all of the canals and old architecture there was never a loss of potential kodak moments. In my mind, Amsterdam felt like a wonderful combination between Paris and Venice (for anyone who thinks is totally off, you're probably right, but I just felt that way OKAY??). 

This week I look forward to Wake friends visiting and, of course, HALLOWEEN! Who cares if Czechs don't really celebrate it, I'll take any excuse to wear a costume and buy myself value size bags of candy.