26 may 2005, p.m.
Today it was 27 degrees out, which for you Fahrenheit losers is pretty damn hot. Unfortunately, I slept until 2pm, missing much of the sunshine; fortunately, I got out of bed at 2pm to seek out the aforementioned quiche.
To my great surprise, Maria and Lance were sitting red-eyed in the Weesperstraat sixth floor kitchen when I arrived. Lance actually groaned when he saw me come through the door.
“Quiche?” I asked.
“Quiche!” Maria demanded.
Lance is Dutch, very tall and lanky, with messy, curly brown hair. He is a national chess champion. He doesn’t say a lot but what he says is very sharp, and you somehow just know that he is a genius, and that the mere mortals who inhabit the earth must be to him a constant source of exasperation. Between the weight of this reality and his height, Lance is usually stooping: stooping over a chessboard, stooping over a bar, stooping over a table holding a cigarette. Lance does much of this stooping at the Doos; he’s usually bent into the last barstool, unless he’s downstairs doing assorted drugs with the barstaff. Last nite was no exception.
At two pm in the kitchen, Lance got up to gather the ingredients with a tremendous show of strength.
I cut broccoli and mushrooms while Lance arranged the puff pastry. Maria went to shower. Maria is Polish-American, pale white skin, short jet black hair. Tattoos. Maria likes to put on the most innocent expression possible just before saying the most inappropriate thing possible in any situation. It makes her really fun to be around. You never know when a new customer will walk into the Doos and be greeted by Maria smiling, “What can I get for you, Sir or Madam? And how's that rash?” I attribute the high quality of the Doos clientele to the fact that everyone in there has been insulted by Maria and stayed for a drink.
Maria lives on the same floor as Lance, but in her room are six rats and a large collection of pills.
As Lance and I cooked, Blanche taped architectural drawings to the kitchen wall. She is working on her final project, making an animated film about a house. Then Peter showed up. He looks like the psycho blond guy who blows up the spacecraft in Contact. He is from Louisiana, but he hasn’t lived in the States for five years. He started playing guitar.
We ate a delicious broccoli mushroom quiche, warm and brown from the oven. We got on our bikes and went to Vondelpark, lay in the sun on Peter’s old curtains, threw a frisbee back and forth. Everyone came to my place for dinner.
I love my Doos friends. I think they have no idea how much they mean to me, and they would brush it off if I told them. They are older than my exchange student friends, and sometimes the difference between 22 and 28 is surprisingly insurmountable. And they are witty. They are linguists and travelers and musicians and so on, and they drink too much and they are just the right amount of mean to each other. If I were to stay another six months – which I will not be doing, but which I would like to do – I would stay to know them better.
To my great surprise, Maria and Lance were sitting red-eyed in the Weesperstraat sixth floor kitchen when I arrived. Lance actually groaned when he saw me come through the door.
“Quiche?” I asked.
“Quiche!” Maria demanded.
Lance is Dutch, very tall and lanky, with messy, curly brown hair. He is a national chess champion. He doesn’t say a lot but what he says is very sharp, and you somehow just know that he is a genius, and that the mere mortals who inhabit the earth must be to him a constant source of exasperation. Between the weight of this reality and his height, Lance is usually stooping: stooping over a chessboard, stooping over a bar, stooping over a table holding a cigarette. Lance does much of this stooping at the Doos; he’s usually bent into the last barstool, unless he’s downstairs doing assorted drugs with the barstaff. Last nite was no exception.
At two pm in the kitchen, Lance got up to gather the ingredients with a tremendous show of strength.
I cut broccoli and mushrooms while Lance arranged the puff pastry. Maria went to shower. Maria is Polish-American, pale white skin, short jet black hair. Tattoos. Maria likes to put on the most innocent expression possible just before saying the most inappropriate thing possible in any situation. It makes her really fun to be around. You never know when a new customer will walk into the Doos and be greeted by Maria smiling, “What can I get for you, Sir or Madam? And how's that rash?” I attribute the high quality of the Doos clientele to the fact that everyone in there has been insulted by Maria and stayed for a drink.
Maria lives on the same floor as Lance, but in her room are six rats and a large collection of pills.
As Lance and I cooked, Blanche taped architectural drawings to the kitchen wall. She is working on her final project, making an animated film about a house. Then Peter showed up. He looks like the psycho blond guy who blows up the spacecraft in Contact. He is from Louisiana, but he hasn’t lived in the States for five years. He started playing guitar.
We ate a delicious broccoli mushroom quiche, warm and brown from the oven. We got on our bikes and went to Vondelpark, lay in the sun on Peter’s old curtains, threw a frisbee back and forth. Everyone came to my place for dinner.
I love my Doos friends. I think they have no idea how much they mean to me, and they would brush it off if I told them. They are older than my exchange student friends, and sometimes the difference between 22 and 28 is surprisingly insurmountable. And they are witty. They are linguists and travelers and musicians and so on, and they drink too much and they are just the right amount of mean to each other. If I were to stay another six months – which I will not be doing, but which I would like to do – I would stay to know them better.
posted by tortaluga at 11:51 PM
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