Can You Picture This

Seriously, I never, ever, in my sweet macaronic life, even knew those end-of-year-recapping-how-accomplished-our-family-is Christmas letters existed, until I started receiving them when I was in my late twenties.

Presumably, I never knew because I am a Jew.

And Jews don't send end-of-year-recapping-how-accomplished-our-family-is Christmas letters.

Not because we don't celebrate Christmas.

  

Because there is no way Jews are going to wait months and months and months just to brag about ourselves.

I spent the past three weeks opening those damn letters and wondering how anyone can be so self-absorbed as to believe the rest of the world cares about every picayune detail of her/his life.

It was so time consuming, I haven't been able to blog you with every picayune detail of my life.

So instead, here's a little pictorial overview of the year past.  These are some of the digital photos I took in 2008 (my camera is the size of a pack of cigarettes—easy to carry and just as addictive).  

Random moments, in random order:

Here's hoping your 2009 is full of picayune details of whimsical weirdness.  

'Cause heaven knows, this blog will be.

Queer Eye to Supersize the Small Fry

Style. It transforms the mundane into the marvelous.

Here in the land of Nethers, evidence of this ab fab phenomenon abounds.

Chanel has taken the Oma Fiets (literally Grandma Bike - think of it as the Ford K-Car of the Netherlands)

Grandma, what a dull sedan you have.

The better to haul my huge grandmotherly bloomers in.




and made it Haute Couture
Note the signature Chanel leather on the paniers, seat, handle bar grips, and pump.
Who says fashion can't be practical? This is the perfect vehicle . . . if all you ever need to transport is your lipstick, your cigarettes, and your extremely small lap dog.

But it takes more than just your average sense of style to turn this


into this






Able to mute primary colors into pastels . . .
Aesthetically powerful enough to turn McDonald's Playland into Camp Play

Is it a songbird?
Is it a flight attendant?

Is it Superman?

No! It's even gayer!


Gayer than a man who flounces around town in tights?
Prithee tell, what is gayer than Superman?

That would have to be - Sissyboys!

And they are more powerful too. Par example:

At brunch (the gayest of all meals), George ordered the gelati of the day without the waitress telling him what they were.

But Oliver took just one lick of each mystery ball, and his superpalate was able to detect all the subtle flavorings, from amaretto to apricot.



George and Oliver's design firm UXUS has designed the new look for McDonald's Playland. So thanks to them, we can all start calling those Happy Meals by their rightful name.

Amsterdam 90210

Everyone in Amsterdam speaks English.

It is exceedingly convenient.

It also makes me feel like a heel.

Here I am, third trip to the Netherlands, and I don't even try to say two words in Dutch. I know people from the US, England, Australia - even people from non-English speaking countries - who have lived here for years and haven't bothered learning Dutch, because they know they can get by with English.

I want to believe I'm different, that I really care about other cultures. So yesterday, on a long train ride, I grabbed the local newspaper and vowed to decipher as much as I could.

It turns out, my Dutch is better than I thought. I was able to understand this entire article of huge international import.

Here I sit, in the land of dairy, contemplating the cognate boobjob and bewonderen to myelf about the multiple and possibly terrifying meanings of the phrase "breaking news."