Back to where I was...

*It's like forgetting the words to your favourite song
You can't believe it, you were always singing along
It was so easy, and the words so sweet
You can't remember, you try to feel the beat*
~Regina Spektor~

It's been quite a while, hasn't it! I guess I needed a break from everything, just for a little while. But now here I am again, starting to sing along again and slowly remembering the words, feeling the beat. Thanks for sticking around and bearing with me during my time away from this blog. I do always very much appreciate you all reading my ramblings, and I always love hearing from you in return too :) I love it that I still get to keep in touch with so many of you through these blogs, so let me start by saying a big thanks to all of you for caring enough to read them still after all these years, even despite my recent lack in messages. You're awesome :)

Now because it's been quite a while I won't tell you everything that's been happening since my last proper blog, which - I just realised - was somewhere in March already. One, it would be too much to tell, and two, it's been so long even I don't really remember everything anymore. But I will tell you this...

Over the past couple of months, my thesis on women in the armed forces has been my main time- and energy consumer. So far it's been far from a smooth and easy ride for me for lots of reasons - not all necessarily related to my thesis as such - but now it's finally picking up and I finally feel I'm doing something useful with my time again and actually working on something really really exciting :) Like I've mentioned in previous blogs, it's been hard to keep my motivation up this time around, but with the help, love and quiet support of some beautiful people, I'm working on that and I'm slowly finding my motivation again. Also, at the start of this month I began doing my interviews with military women, which is definitely helping to keep me motivated too. I'm absolutely loving these interviews so far! The stories these women have to tell and the passion with which they talk about their jobs, it's just awesome :) I would almost be compelled to join the armed forces myself if it wasn't for those pesky physical fitness tests I know I'd fail miserably for, haha. I mean, let's be honest here, I'm not the most sporty person around... Still, hearing these women's stories and getting a sneak peak into military life gives me energy, when for the first few months my thesis was much more draining me. So that's a nice change :)

The World Cup that was on last month proved to be a very nice distraction from my thesis. Especially because the Dutchies made it all the way into the finals! Unfortunately, as I'm sure all of you know, they didn't win, but you should have heard the noise outside when the Orange squad beat Brazil in the quarter finals! That was one of the best games... I had two footy tippings going over (part of) the World Cup and unfortunately lost the one I had going with my fam, but had a sweet sweet last-minute victory in the other one I had going with my good friend Coen. NIce :) I always surprise myself how much I get into the World Cup, but I just love it. Countries against each other makes it seem like there's really something to play for, while in normal team-competition it all seems a bit useless. Sorry if I just offended the soccer lovers amongst you...

Another one of my highlights of the past couple of months was the Newton Faulkner concert I went to not too long ago. I posted some pics of that last time... He was so good and he made me laugh with his funny stories he told between songs, which was just what I needed after I'd had a tough morning, so for that alone, I already thought he was awesome :) Oh, and I just love live music, it's just something special...

Something else that's worth mentioning is my housemate Maaike leaving for Peru almost 3 weeks ago now. She's gone back to Lima for a year to give love a chance (she spent 7 months there last year on an internship and met someone then), which I think is incredibly brave. But anyway, so she had her goodbye party the other week, and seeing as it's high Summer over here by now, we had a picnic outside before heading into the city for a night on the town. It was a lovely night, with lots of fun & laughter, so a good way to say goodbye. Even though Li-Shi and I only really said goodbye a couple of days later, when she actually left. It's now strangely quiet in the room beside me, and the weekends are a bit more lonely too, as Maaike and I were often the only ones staying in Utrecht over the weekend. Now it's just me!

But I've found the perfect distraction for when I find myself home alone on the weekends: playing guitar and working on my photoalbum. When no one else is home, I just pretend our up- and downstairs neighbours can't hear me play either, so I get my guitar out and just play. Lovely :) And I've re-started my Australia 2008 photo-album, and this time I'm actually hoping to stick to it a bit more. So whenever I don't have any plans outside the house on the weekend, I get my photos out and turn my bedroom floor into absolute chaos :) It's kind of therapeutic in a way too, haha. And with my America trip with the boys coming up next month - where I'll no doubt take heaps and heaps of photos too - it's good to get as much done of my previous travels as possible, or I'll be swamped in photos when we get back!

Which brings me to my US roadtrip with my dear friends Jelmer and Rick! Our planning hasn't stopped over the past few months, and by now we've booked our hostel for our first few nights, and have our route more or less determined. We'll probably be driving about 4000km in just over 3 weeks in our massive RV, taking us past beautiful National Parks like Grand Canyon, Monument Valley and Yosemite Park, big cities such as LA, Las Vegas and San Francisco, and hopefully nice and sunny beaches all along the Californian coast. The closer we get to our flying out date, the more excited I'm getting about the trip, even though the driving scares me a bit at this point. I'll probably get over that though once we hit the road :) I hope...

Other than that, there's not much else to tell, really. The rest is just details, or not really something for this blog. Hopefully I'll be able to update you a bit more regularly again from now on, though truth be told, I'm staring at my computer screen a lot already these days because of my thesis, so I'm trying to limit that in my free time. My plan for the coming month is to keep doing interviews and to keep working on my thesis, while simultaneously trying to enjoy a bit of Summer with friends until I leave for the big US of A! But I'll tell you about that next time :) I'd love to hear what you all have been up to lately as well, so please leave a message and tell me all about it. Hope you're all doing well with whatever's keeping you busy. Sending lots of love to all corners of the world, wherever you may be :)
xx Carine