the war on terror

Should I not say that? Should I not say that if I am referring to little mice? BUT, are mice NOT little terrorists? Invading my Amsterdam abode?

I’m gonna step away from it just in case. I’ve got a BUNCCHHH of updates for you guys onnnn….

I got Dani to make this logo. SWEET.

Anyways, I BE KILLING MICE! The happiness and thrill that I feel when I have a mouse in the trap is one that borders on alarming and weird. I don’t know. I can’t explain it. I just love when they get caught BEING STUPID VERMIN.

(Pablo, another MAS kid and intern here thinks I’m a terrible human and is sometimes, I think, genuinely mad at me. He threatened to kill me if the mice didn’t die a quick harmless death. I wonder if the P in PETA is for Pablo.)

Anyways, as you all know…I didn’t have a trap last time. I was relying on the force of gravity, a toilet paper roll, and some good luck. (Was fresh out of that.)

Thank GOD a guy at the agency let me borrow his trap. HERE IT IS!

I let this puppy fly on fb and instagram and you all seemed pretty excited about it. Probably not as excited as me though. Let me describe.

It’s a wild little thing…and it has a ‘clean kill.’ THANK GOD. What happens is the stupid idiot mouse walks in like a dumbass and is all oh cool look at this bread with some peanut butter I WONDER WHY it’s stuck to this weird hook HOW SO VERY ODD maybe this is a trap and I shouldn’t do this? Oh wait no, I’m a stupid worthless mouse so I’m just going to pull on this until

SNAP!!!! The thing SHOOTS UP from the bottom and legit like…puts them in the gallows. (Thank you Isabel for giving me the right name) because I was wrongly referring to it as a guillotine. Which would mean the little mouse head would legit BE CHOPPED OFF. And just roll around…I guess? And I don’t think I could handle that.

Anyways, It like snaps their neck/body/I don’t know mouse anatomy? Right away. Clean kill. Bye. Peace. Idiot.

So…the first KILL. Dani told me we had one and I was so excited. FINALLY! The little bastards! Score one for the home team I was so so excited but then it’s like. Wait. There is a dead mouse…and I have to deal with it. Because we all know DANI WASN’T GOING TO!!!!

This is when my iron exterior faltered a little. First off, its tail was SO GROSS!!! And, this is before we really understood that they were in the gallows, aka raised up, and so from the tail and photo this looked SERIOUSLY like a RAT. Like a huge baby got back RAT. I was concerned.

Also, I kept imagining it was going to somehow come to life and make a little rat scream or whatever when I tried to get it loose. You have to push it back down and it frees the body and ugh.

How much do I want to put a photo of this up? HOW MUCH!?!??!?! (so much.)

But, alas, I won’t. Because it’s gross I guess. I mean it’s not bloody or anything its just like…whatever. People frown upon that kinda shit. If you want to see it ask me and I won’t think you’re weird.

If you’re one of my friends you know I sent it to you out of nowhere so HAHAHAAHAH. I’m so good.

Anyways, I freed it into a little bag where I looked at it. No blood. Just...crunched a little. Dani asked me if it was cute and like…I’ll admit…yah. It was kind of cute. In a disgusting, useless vermin way. (Cuter dead.)

Fast-forward a few days and the death toll is at 3. I’m still pretty excited about this except the one time I wanted to make sloppy joes right away and didn’t want to deal with the discarding of vermin. OBVIOUSLY WE HAD ONE.

I didn’t feel like taking it out to the trash so I put it in it’s little bag and put it outside the window where it probably turned into a little mouse popsicle (mousicle,) where its friend joined it the next day and I took them to their death trashcan. (After I held the bag in the air and spoke to Dani in a little mouse voice.)

By the way I am getting a tear tattoo every time I kill one. So, I’m at three right now. Gotta scout out the best place to get them done. I want it to be artistic, and have meaning you know. Like everyone with tattoos.

Anyways, it’s been two days since then with NO KILLS. But, Melissa told me to “Think about the movie Ratatouille…” (……………...k………..) and that I probably have a bunch more because Ratatouille the cooking mouse had a lot of friends. So that’s basically real life*

One other thing I need to talk about in regards to this is something really serious. For like two days, we didn’t catch anything even though we KNEW we had them. One of them is smarter than the rest and SOMEHOW escaped the trap. NOTHING enrages me more than seeing the trap set off with no CORPSE.

So like. I’m a dog person. Like I love my dog. I don’t really like cats. A cat scratched me when I was younger and I never forgave it or any of its kind for that kind of pain and betrayal.

BUT, if you will recall my post on BAR CATS… I now sincerely want to rent-a-cat. Like, I could deal with minor feline snuggles if it meant that the vermin were being hunted by a skilled hunter. So, I seriously started looking into this. I found a cat shelter here that is actually a houseboat. A catboat. Pretty much.

I found their twitter and I tried.

Aka I want to use it as 75% killing machine, 25% friend and companion.
They replied.

so……yah………WHAT??????? Something about kittens. Babies having babies??? TEEN MOM???? But not now? Safe?? The kittens are safe? That's good? 

So yah we don’t have a cat.

That’s probably good. We will continue this war on our own. Will keep you updated….but I’m hoping we got most of them and/or news has traveled through the mice vine that this place ain't nothing to F with and the girl that lives there is a CRAZY BITCH who takes pictures of her kills and poses with the bag of them. (Yep. Did that.)

So that’s it for MouseHunters this time. We’ll see what happens.

OH and by the way I AM SO SORRY for the delay on this! Some of you (Isabel…mostly Isabel) expressed a need for ‘moar blog’

and I replied, erroneously, with a SOON meme…but that was before our concept got picked by the client and we began a series of very late nights at the agency. (Translates to very big morning bitch…btw.)

I guess I should talk about what I’m actually doing here along with my misadventures. But, alas, that is for another day. I promise I will keep up. I do enjoy writing all of this and I enjoy all of you for reading it even more.

You’re the real stars.

xo tay

*...there is actually validity to Melissa's statement, I just don't know why she decided to cite Ratatouille rather than just...how mice are. love you melissa.

cats in bars.

It’s a thing here.

It’s a thing that happens. Just, normally. It’s normal. A cat in a bar. Just walking around. Chilling hard.

It was super weird at first. So, so weird. Especially like what if you’re allergic???? Isn’t that so bad if you walk into a bar and there’s your like allergy nemesis in a place where it really just shouldn’t be??

Anyways. Katie is allergic. But it didn’t really bother her that much. It also didn’t stop her from making the BarCat perform the drum solo from Phil Collins “In the Air Tonight” as you can THANKFULLY SEE because I took a video of it.

Yes, that is me snorting. Yes, I am beautiful and perfect in that way. Yes, I am single. I don’t see what that has to do with it.

BUT ANYWAYS, I guess the whole story about BarCats is that they catch THE MICE!!!! Which, I guess, when you think about it is pretty legit. I can’t help but kind of still be weirded out because it’s like….an animal…with hair….and it’s a hairy animal in a place where I eat and it’s right next to the grill where you made my burger and am I eating a cat hair?

But…that day was also BEFORE we found out we had A MOUSE!

Or mice. I don’t know. A writer here asked me how big it was and I said pretty small and he said “You probably have a bunch then”

And, despite my best efforts…I cannot unhear that statement.

So yah. The BarCat thing makes sense now and I have literally been trying to locate a Rent-A-Cat or something because if it could eradicate the vermin then I suppose I would let it cuddle on my lap sometimes.

But yah. This is all bringing me to the latest Mouse Hunters update. I attempted to macgyver a trap. ANDDDDD

ROUND ONE GOES TO:

The mouse.

The rival team. The enemy. The Yankees. Any team that isn’t the Patriots. The dark side (for the nerds.)

Point is. I didn’t get the bastard(s.)

THIS TIME.

I was told by the same guy that convinced me I now have 750 mice that I could attempt a homemade trap using only a toilet paper roll, pindakaas (peanut butter,) and…gravity.

You put some PINDAKAAS (like my favorite dutch word ever) at the end of the roll, and you balance the roll on the counter with a trashcan undernearth it. The idea is that the stupid dumb disgusting mouse essentially walks the plank.

We didn’t have a toilet roll…So I ripped up a pizza box and…ta-da:

I used the greasy part because I thought that would be even more tempting.

I WAS PSYCHED! Like so psyched. I went to bed like it was Christmas Eve. When I woke up, Dani informed me that her brother (who is visiting) thought he heard two PLUNKS INTO THE TRASH. Aka two little evil mice soon to be dead. I was ecstatic.

WELL DANI AND HER BROTHER ARE LIARS!!!!

Also they are twins so it's totally possibly they could lie together without even deciding that but just twinning it, you know?

Exhibit A: 

Liar!

About the mice part.

The genius part is true.

Ugh. Anyways…they aren’t liars. They truly believed it had happened and…all of the evidence was there!! The pizza box pindakaas was in trash and I was so so excited. But, when I lifted the bag out, we saw nothing. Heard nothing. We were all incredibly disappointed.

So, either it could have fallen over by itself…ORRRR it fell over and the freaking psycho mouse like 1. Flew across the room or 2. Fell conveniently to the left or right of the trash can.

If 1: We’re screwed. Like actually. Flying mice.

If 2: I hope that stupid little thing has head trauma or something.

So…yah. Defeat…FOR NOW!

The guy at the office is going to lend me his REUSABLE trap that apparently catches them every time and breaks their little necks and it’s a ‘clean kill.’

I literally cannot wait. Wish me luck.

Die vermin, die.

xo tay

the curse of the blog

I’m cursed. I’m 100% cursed. This is why I’ve never updated a blog more than twice. I was, (unknowingly) AVOIDING A CURSE!!!!!

Now that I have a venue to tell stories my life has given me stories. And, mostly, they are inconvenient. Or annoying. Or ridiculous. And we have taken to referring to it as ‘the curse of the blog.’

For instance: the water was turned off the other day. That was a treat. When I tried to turn it on it sputtered and went all crazy until it just…didn’t do anything.

It was immediately in this moment that I realized how thirsty I was. How I was going to die if I didn’t have any water and I hadn’t filled up the cup of water on my nightstand and I drank my water bottle and oh my god I am going to die of thirst right now.

THEN we went to this restaurant we’ve been to before because they have 7 jager shots for 12 euros. That is literally the only reason anyone should go there ever because the place sucks. The second time we decided to get food. It’s a tempting place because out front they have a menu and it’s like ALL AMERICAN FOOD. And we miss American food! We miss it so much!

So I look at the menu. It says ‘Nachos with chili.” NACHOS WITH CHILI! I want that!!! I want that so bad!!!! So I order it.

What do I get?

WHAT DO I GET?????

I LITERALLY GOT nacho cheese DORITOS with a little thing of CHILI SAUCE!!!!!!! I could have died. CURSE OF THE BLOG!!!!!

I begrudgingly ate them, kind of, but I’ve hated doritos ever since we had an assignment to do that stupid superbowl ad thing and I ate probably 34209889483942 of them. And…chili sauce. I just can’t. Ugh. UGHHHHH.

Unless they are cool Americans. I love those. Here I am being a cool American eating cool Americans.

But yah. We’re never going back there. Ever.

Oh yah and the mouse. That little a-hole. Dani and I were watching our shows the other day on the little couch in the living room and I thought I saw something out of the corner of my eye.

I’ve developed like serious hunter instincts and stuff with my COCKROACH HUNTING in Miami. I can’t really decide which is worse. But probably the cockroaches because those things are RELENTLESS and multiply and are disgusting and ugh. Miami.

Anyways. It’s bright in the room. We’re watching shows. Lights on. Sitting RIGHT THERE. And the little bastard just runs around!!

The nerve.

So now, I am fueled even more. I can’t wait to kill him. Poison him. Trap him. I just need someone to tell me where to go to get this stuff because I just don't get the stores here. I miss CVS. I miss Walgreens. I miss it all.

BUT I found basically the equivalent of Target (ish) so the world won't implode...thank god.

Anyways, the mouse will die soon.

Oh and Dani fell up the stairs the other day at a department store while she was quoting ‘jizz in my pants.’

That’s probably not the curse of the blog but it is seriously hilarious. I just kept walking. Hahahaahahahahahah.

Anyways. I feel like there is more…but I can’t remember. Things have been wild. Lots of thinking. Lots of pitching. Will talk more about that one day.

Can’t wait to watch the bachelor tomorrow. A day after all of you. F MY LIFE. I might post my thoughts up here next round but…I don’t even make the effort to memorize girls names until it looks like they are gonna stick around.

Also I gotta write up about the portions here. I get the whole thing about how fat America is with our big portions and bags of food and etc. But this. THIS IS RIDICULOUS! I’ll starve here. I mean it. I will.

But if I don't, I’ll update you.

xo Tay

if you give a mouse a

NOTHING!! I’m giving it nothing and it better get the hell out of my apartment!!!!! Unless it wants to die and I mean die like slowly for days whichever way is the worst way because get out of my apartment.

So we have a mouse.

Which is better than a ghost, which is what we thought it was originally. Well Dani did and I made the ‘old house, many sounds’ argument and she claimed a baguette essentially flew across the room. (Okay, she said it moved on the table.)

Anyways. Jet lag was a BETCH and I was waking up like 4-6am every day. It was so dumb. So then I’m finally sleeping this night and Dani runs down into my room. Since I was almost dead I don’t recall most of the convo but the gist of it was that Dani, who sleeps in a loft bed over the living room/kitchen area (SO EURO,) heard weird crinkling noises and then when she looked down into the kitchen a supernatural force had moved the bread.

Miraculously she RAN down her ladder and our death spiral stairs and into my bed where we discussed if it was a ghost. Then Dani was convinced she heard footsteps, andddddddd then I remembered the entire American Horror Story season I watched a week earlier and my mind had a field day.

But seriously would it even be fun to haunt us? Like we speak English so if it wanted to say something badass like ‘I’m going to brutally kill you and suck your blood’ or some crap it would be like

“Ik ga op brute wijze te vermoorden u en uw bloed te zuigen”

and I would be like sorry, what? And it would be like ugh stupid American and move on to the next one.

Anyways, eventually the sun rises and I’ve had no sleep and I’m just demon sleepy Taylor and so this ghost thing really wasn’t going to work for me for the rest of the quarter.

So we go upstairs…and we see…’LEAVE AMSTERDAM’ WRITTEN IN BLOOD ALL OVER THE ROOM.

But seriously there was our beloved baguette with pieces of its packaging STREWN EVERYWHERE! Tiny little white pieces of paper and then, a perfect little chunk taken out of it. That little mouse had a freaking FEAST! LITERALLY! The little bastard! THE NERVE! How I did not take a photo of this is beyond me actually seeing as I take pics of things that are much less exciting than this. I think this is a testament to how much of a morning bitch I am.  Just SO COMPLETELY out of character. Right? RIGHT??

Anyways, I located the place where it had pushed through the steel wool blocked hole under the cabinet and I fumed the fire of a thousand fires.

And I will have my revenge.

This mouse is public enemy number 1 right now and I spent my whole day at work figuring out how I should kill it. Trap? Poison? Glue trap? Humane trap? (HAHA NO! Revenge will be had, rodent (VERMIN) lovers…sorry bout it.)

I wanted to buy a trap but then I realized that I could watch the Bachelor here FINALLY (so long after everyone else, terrible) and so I kind of lost the passion to go out and find one so that’s for another day I suppose.

We did stuff some plastic bags in the hole so GOOD LUCK EATING THAT, IDIOT MOUSE.

Anyways, all of our food is in our breadbox now….where I suppose it should have been the whole time…but…I dare that little thing to come face to face with ME!!

….also I’m talking tough but every time I open a cabinet I expect it to fly out at me like some kind of flying squirrel madness and just latch on to my face or something and I picture myself going to the ER and being like a mouse bit me what do I do what disease do I have etc, etc.

Anyways, stay tuned for the next episode of taylor garrett international mouse hunter.

Oh and by the way the other day at the agency there was a dead mouse on the balcony that had been there so long it seems to have…almost…become something else. Obviously I found this fascinating and while EVERYONE was on the balcony I walked out and stared at it for a very long time. Like everyone should have seen me hunched over for a very long time doing this. Shortly after that Pablo accidently stepped on it and it turned into what Matt referred to as “mouse Pâté” and I couldn’t stop laughing about it/I referenced it 6,000 times and still do very often now.

So just think about that. Visualize it. HAHAAHAHAHAH oh my god.

Anyways. Mouse wars. Will let you know.

xo tay

I got electrocuted and a fuse was blown.

Not at the same time…but wouldn’t that be dramatic??????

But seriously I almost regret making this blog because I genuinely feel like life is GIVING me things to talk about now. Life challenges that I don’t feel like dealing with such as...

Clogs. (of gross stuff not gross wooden shoes.)

Fuse boxes. (sorry, what?)

Mice. YAH STAY TUNED.

So. Converters/Adapters. Confusing stuff.

Still don’t really get the whole thing and honestly I don’t feel like googling it. I mostly just ask Katie (our resident Europe expert since she was in Hamburg last quarter) the same question 700 times. She really is a saint for putting up with me.

 I have a universal adapter I think? Which means I can plug my computer in and all that junk.

But a converter? I guess converts the power to a lower something something science I don’t know.

But I guess it’s important.

Dani’s adapter is weird and I was trying to plug it in and in retrospect I was essentially sticking my fingers in the socket. Like, probably the first thing you EVER LEARN in life: don’t do that.

Anyways next thing I know I’M ELECTROCUTED. Yeah I’m using that word for hyperbole basically, but I got seriously zapped. Like numbed my two fingers, my hand, and all the way up my arm until my reaction time decided to kick in and I jumped up.

Needless to say I talked about it for the next like 5 hours blaming/crediting everything to it.

Am I a superhero now? What if this makes me a bad copywriter? What if this makes me a good copywriter? What if this makes me a bitch(ier person)???????????

Only time will tell, but thank god I survived AMIRITE?

Moving along.

First day of our internship. We had to be in at 15:00. Lol military time. Aka 3pm. Btw I have no desire to learn military time and am taking a stubborn stand against it. Too much math.

So the interns have decided to meet up for lunch beforehand, and with this crazy lack of communication…aka we can only speak to each other when on wifi (thank god for imessage,) we have a meeting time and it’s strict.

Dani needs to dry her hair. Sticks the hairdryer into my adapter. Not converter. Do you get it now? I still don’t. She presses the button and

EPIC SPARK. Lights go out.

By the way it has been consistently dark here. Sun has come out TWICE. It’s still beautiful but like……shits dark.

So now here we are staring at each other in the dark. Shit.

By the way our apartment is a 17^th century little place. It’s old. It’s an old house that makes a lot of old creaky noises and the stairs go STRAIGHT UP and, yah, I don’t know where the fuse box is.

Sweet google image pic. That's our door right there next to the Hempshopper. yep.

So I open a few weird cupboards and there are a lot of little pipes that look like they are probably water related. NOT touching those. Honestly wouldn't have known what to do if I found the fuse box anyways.

So now we have to put our make up on…in the dark. And I knew I was either going to be showing up to my internship as one of the following.

1. Insane Clown Posse.

2. A geisha.

 3. Tan mom.

But we have to deal with it. We’re out the door.

Frantically emailed my landlord again, this time I refrained from generalizing all of Europe with slang.

Long story short: the fuse box is in our downstairs neighbor’s kitchen. So, yah, we screwed her over too.

We prayed that when we got home that night it would be on. It was all we could do. Poor, helpless us.

AND IT WAS. That was close. I need to write the neighbor a thank you note. Remind me.

But, yah, I’m still surviving, except the fact that WE HAVE A MOUSE VISITOR.

That’ll be next.

Missing everyone (the bachelor) in the states.

jk I watched the bachelor.

More to come.

xo tay

can you haggle here??

I’m not sure, but I did it.

As everyone knows I have an affinity for cheap wine. I had three wishes in Miami, which was INCREDIBLE. $2.99 for a bottle of Chard (although I identify as a Pinot Grigio girl.) Life was hard when I went to San Francisco with no Whole Foods in sight.

So I went to Trader Joes and ventured on to the notorious ‘Two Buck Chuck.’ Cue Elizabeth and my DEATH HANGOVER, which resulted in us on the couch the entire day fighting the urge to yuke at a Red Lobster commercial that had shrimp flying across the screen. I don’t recommend it, and we never indulged in it again. Sometimes the extra dollar is worth it.

Actually, that’s unfair. 2 buck chuck can be fine just keep in mind that just because the Patriots won doesn’t mean you have to drink 15 bottles of it.

So here I am in Amsterdam and I’m tryna find my fix. Venturing to the grocery store, Albert Heijn, aka the site of my first almost panic attack, I located a 4 euro wine which, actually, happens to be named “Garrett.” Fate.

Fast forward two nights later and my friends Katie and Jimmy have arrived and we’re ready to celebrate. After running promptly out of wine I tried to tell them how to get to Albert Heijn but with no directions on our phone, WE’RE DYING. So they went to a tiny little shop and bought 9 euro wine or something. Hurts my soul.

When we run out of that Katie and I ventured down to the market near my apt. I tell the man I want white wine and he digs and digs until he produces some, unnamed, unsure what kind bottle of white. I guess I don’t really discriminate except for the demon wine they call Moscato.

“9 euro.”

See. Herein lies the problem. I don’t BUY wine that is 9 euro aka $11.78 AHAH like what??? Double digit wine?????

Anyways, I’m a few glasses in so this is when I get brave.

“9 euro? Really? I’ve found it much cheaper.”

“No, I don’t think so. It’s 9 euro”

“No, I really have. You don’t believe me?”

Mildly combative…usually my way.

“No.”

“Okay I’m going to go walk across the street and I’ll come back and show you.”

As I flip my hair with tipsy righteousness and turn to walk out (definitely looked cool,) he yells out.

“Fine, 8 euro.”

“7.”

“No.”

“Alright, thank you. I’m not interested.”

This is when we face off. A moment. AN ETERNITY. Staring into the face of this man who, now that I think about it, had such a round little face. And with the emotions I was forcing him to have his face looked much like the straight line mouth emoji.

“Fine, 7 euro.”

The look on his face! He didn’t seem pleased. He certainly did not. But I was just so psyched. That 2 euro, that 2 dollars and 62 cents. Dreams of the possibilities.

“I live down the street, I’ll be back. I’m loyal.”

He stared. Same stare. Silent anger.

SO I PROBABLY WON’T BE BACK, for I am much LESS BRAVE when I am not aided by white wine. Instead I will hide my face and run past my new enemy to Albert Heijn to get my Garrett White Wine.

Plus, I don’t know if I’ll ever haggle again. I prefer to quit while I’m ahead. I’m not trying to ruin my 100% success rate on this one. Kind of like how I retired shortly after my college championship flag football season. HTLN forever, we are the champions.

xo tay

I’m missing the bachelor tonight.

LIKE. I AM MISSING THE BACHELOR TONIGHT. Stop reminding me!!!! But, I live in Amsterdam right now so I guess you win some you lose some.

Plus thank god I’m beating the system and can get on American sites to see ~my shows~ or else I would die. Wouldn’t even be writing this. Dead.

But I have to wait until tomorrow. Curses.

Alright so let’s get real. Some of you may have seen my FB status about the fact that I happen to have, in my adorable little dutch apartment: (I’ll do a post on this when I feel like taking pictures…not on this day. Follow me on instagram** it’s slowing coming out) A WET ROOM.

So when I got to the apartment I was greeted with this:

Sorry, what? Where is the shower? I see a shower head, one tiny glass pane, and a toilet…right there. What is happening. How my bff Kathleen’s brother Connor put it, “you can poop when you’re showering.”

That’s one way to look at it. ANYWAYS, decide to get my hygiene on after time traveling time zones and immediately, I’m freaking out. The water is rising. It’s overtaking everything. I pull up the trashcan and put it on the toilet along with the mat. It’s filling. What is this. It’s taking over the ENTIRE BATHROOM. It look’s like a wave pool at a creepy water park.

Still showering. I’m freaking out. THERE ARE ACTUAL WAVES NOW! Heading towards the doorway into my room! Is this happening? Will I flood the place?

I end my shower quicker than planned. This can’t be right. Oh by the way, before this I didn’t know it was, technically a ‘wet room.’

So I’m googling. “European shower fills whole room” or something, I don’t remember, but I’m really good at googling. Find out about this ‘wet room’ phenomemon. PEOPLE ARE RAVING ABOUT IT. LOVE IT. I can’t even deal.

I send an email to my landlord. I will own it here:

“As for the shower, I am from the US so I am very unfamiliar with the way the bathroom is set up. After a little research I think it's what you guys over here call a wet room? Haha, I am so out of touch!! But, I took my first shower today and was terrified that the water was going to overflow into the bedroom, as it doesn't drain very quickly. I just thought I would reach out to you for reassurance. Is there a danger of overflow? I rushed through a shower in fear just in case! And after, does it all dry itself? “

What a polite little n00b I am.

In retrospect though why did I refer to the entirety of Europe as 'you guys'???

Anyways, fast forward a few hours I’ve had a few glasses of wine and I am brushing my teeth. I feel brave. I stare at the drain and can’t help but think that: THIS CAN’T BE RIGHT.

So I do it. I manage to pull off the drain top and…

SJFKDSAKLJFJKLSAJLDFLJKSA

It was so disgusting. Oh my god. OMG. I don’t know how I didn’t PUKE!!!!

You’re all thinking hair. You are. BUT IT WAS SO MUCH WORSE!!!

Hair, yes!!!! But, shampoo? Conditioner? Soap? A DEAD CAT, PERHAPS??? I don’t know. It was a disaster.

But I am brave so I take some toilet paper and I start…dealing with it.

IT SMELLS LIKE HIGH TIDE!! OH MY GOD!!! YES IT DOES! It smells like DEAD HERMIT CRABS and critters of that nature left behind on Craigville beach dead, dying, and ruining my life!!!!!!

So I disposed of it. It is gone. I’m a hero, and the water drains properly now.

And now I'm really tired. I had my first day at the agency today and I gotta go sleeps because today was a trying day. I'll tell you tomorrow.

But, meanwhile, I still don’t like my wet room.

AND I'm still missing the Bachelor tonight.

You win some you lose some.

More to come, I promise.

xo tay

*My instagram name is @taygarrett. I really hope you scrolled to find this star.

first impressions

The Flight:

My flight from Boston to Amsterdam was, miraculously, only 6 hours long. I expected much longer of course, and had a plan to take advantage of the free wine and beer clause in order to make it through.

Of course, 6 hours is no longer than my flight to San Francisco but I just couldn’t shake my previous idea, which is why I downed three giant wines. Like, fate tried to intervene when I was in the bathroom when they did the 3^rd run through, but my enabling old man seat mate urged me to press my flight attendant call button and continue my wine drinking. We were on the same page until I promptly fell, probably drooling, asleep, and he had three more whiskeys. Impressive.

Then I was awoken by the flight attendant slamming breakfast on my tray table and I was greeted with a BAAANNGG headache. Wine, why do you do this to me???

The Apartment:

Landed, did immigration, got my bags, and was soon on my way to the APT. Had no idea how to call dutch numbers therefore I called the wrong person about 700 times at 7 in the morning. My Bad? Finally got a hold of “Jan,” which I of course assumed was a woman named Jan, short for Janet, but was of course a very nice dutch man named Jan, like, Yan. Oops.

My apartment is above a “Hempshopper,” obviously!! Hahaha. Also it’s wicked dark here in the morning?? Which is NOT going to bode well for me waking up as anyone who has ever tried to wake me up will know.

THE STAIRCASE in my apartment is terrifying!!!! Straight up, tiny, spiral staircase. I have, literally, been crawling up it. That’s going to be interesting.

Also my key looks like it opens a treasure chest.

Our apartment is two floors. My bed and bathroom on the bottom, middle floor living room and nice little kitchen, which goes up to a loft with a nice double bed where Dani will be sleeping. We also have another little loft with two beds. VISITORS??? The flight is only 6 hours, don’t drink that much.

The Grocery Store

So, I’m starving and in a city I’ve never been to. No idea what to do. I finally got brave enough (I’m a baby) to go to the grocery store flanked with my ipod and hiding behind glasses. Figured this trip would be easy enough.

WRONG!! SO WRONG!! I can’t read A THING!!! Figured mac and cheese would be safe?? But there was literally, only one box of mac and cheese in the whole place. Meanwhile, everyone here is tall, skinny, and in a beanie. I now understand the skinny part because the size of the things they sell here are teeny. I get why Americans are so fat now, but like………….CAN YOU SUPERSIZE THIS PLEASE?

So yah, there are also a lot of containers of different color mush?????? I don’t know what to do with that really.

I got crackers, bread, cheese, milk that I hoped was skim, and eggs. I will get more adventurous later, I hope. We’ll see.

I got home and translated. It was skim. Phew.

Oh and wine. They have lots of wine, thank god. Hard to mess that one up.

There are more stories to tell which I will slowly unravel, like, my first experience in a ‘wet room,’ ughhhhh. My friends are finally arriving today which is good because I was so lost with what to do with myself that I’ve basically been a little hermit in here. In my defense, I had unpacking to do and had to force myself to bed to adjust to the time difference, but, I can’t help but feel like the people waiting for the tram outside have started an urban legend about me similar to the hunchback of notre dame.

The random American girl that moved in and has only come out once. I hear she survives on only wine and cheese. I hear she is afraid of the wet room. I hear she almost actually died when Netflix wouldn’t work.

Half of that is true.

Anyways, I’ll keep you updated I hope!

xo tay

take 1

I’ve tried starting a blog probably 150 times. I’m a copywriter. I should be able to do this, and keep up with it. Alas, all of my previous attempts have failed. Maybe because I didn’t have enough to write about? Or not enough time? Or I had TV to watch?

Fortunately I’ve had some success keeping up with my Wine for Dinner food blog that I share with the lovely Melissa Kern. (winefordinner.wordpress.com) BUT OF COURSE I am behind on that too right now. I promise I will do it soon, Mel. My b.

But, I figured there has never been a more exciting time in my life than right now because I have moved to AMSTERDAM for the next 11 weeks! AHHH, I know. It’s weird. I can’t believe I’m here. BUT I figure I need a way to update my adoring fans at home. (My mom….and…..my mom, mostly.)

By the way I am sure my AD friends are going to just puke at the lack of art direction on this page but WHATEVER GUYS! I don't even get this stuff! At least it's not comic sans?? I don't know!

So…stay tuned. I’m really going to try to keep this going. I REALLY AM!!! I PROMISE!!! I promise? I think? Kick my ass if I don’t, seriously.

Here goes?

xo tay