Disclaimer: I wrote this months ago and forgot to put it up. By now, I am fully socialised with three other interns who are absolute dolls and with whom I happily share bottles of red. But read on to learn about the time before, will you?

I have wonderful friends. Gorgeous and fun and witty and smart friends. But they're currently being all these amazing things back at home, while I'm here in Hamburg, sitting on my beautiful red couch on a blue Sunday night.

Well, doesn't that sound perky already. Just wait for the rest of this.

I haven't been living here for a significant amount of time, and I haven't exactly been to many social gatherings, so it's not like I've tried and tried and not made any friends, but the outcome is the same, being that I don't really know anyone which leads to the following conclusions:

I don't know where the cool kids go. That's a bit of a vicious circle, too; because I have no idea where to go to meet people who would know where to go to have a good time, I neither meet those people nor do I learn about any insider locations where I could have those "only in Hamburg" experiences. Those places simply do not show up in tourist guides, small cafés with the best homemade hot chocolate, restaurants where they sing the menu to you, bars where the drinks are cheap but the music is good. Stores where quirky girls work the counter and take you dancing after hours.

Me when I was so bored I had to take pictures of myself for fun

I don't go out alone, therefore I don't meet people to go out with. I want to try and bring myself to go somewhere on Friday or Saturday nights, but apart from the "being a girl out in the dark with a semi heavy handbag as her only weapon" situation, which I could overlook, it's just so weird to find a table to yourself and then stare at groups of young people and try to telepathically make them like you. Is that how adults make friends? It seems awkward.

Maybe I should try harder to get on with the other interns, but even though we chat nicely at lunch I can't picture us grouped around my coffee table with a bottle of red, talking about life and the way we want our hair to look when we get married. (See, those were different interns back then)

My visitors from last weekend have friends here, so we met up with them and I instantly liked them, but we didn't make plans to get together when it's just me - how do these things happen? Is making new friends like dating, only even harder because you have to convince multiple people at once that you're a desirable addition to their circle?

If you have the answer, do tell.

Love,

Rosy Smith

Someone took a picture

Behold, I am wearing a sweatshirt, for the first time in years. I will not keep it on when I'm leaving the house tonight. That would be sheer madness.

So, it is the first real day of the year (because really, who gets anything done on January 1st?) and it's time to start wrapping our heads around what that means....

'Tis the year I'll graduate. Huh. I almost wanna say I wasn't prepared for this, but who would believe me, after I've practically been counting down the hours since my first semester. Do I have to start looking for a job now? Do I feel capable of doing one of those? Lots of amusing things to think about at night. But honestly - if I did get one, I could finally buy myself a microwave and display all the candle holders and cakestands from my dowry box (you'd think I was kidding, but na-ah).

'Tis the year my loveliest friend goes off to Milano for four months. Tonight's the last time I see her before we both leave for our respective places abroad - that is, until I go visit sometime in between moving home and starting the semester. I'm so gonna do it. We'll be back to being belle ragazze in bella Italia, just like the summer before last (throwback here), and it'll be fantastico.

'Tis the year I started with an accidental mini-fringe. Let's just say that I have developed an understanding of that urge to clip off your hair with some nail scissors, and that got mixed with a sudden admiration for the hairstyle that Leah Remini sports in the first season of The King Of Queens that I've been rewatching. I have some sort of semi-permanent hair dye left from the office, too, so we shall see what we're gonna make of that.

Sounds like the plan is a very loose one this time around - leaves more space for imagination, though.  So it's really up to what we come up with.

Love,

Rosy Smith