Written 18 February 2011
Today, there will be no distractions
10:27 AM: Café Linne
The café has no internet, but I’m glad I chose it over the one on the corner down by the river. This place is cozy in a way that only familiar things are. I walked into the place on the corner down by the river, and it too was cozy, but not in a soul-inviting way. They probably did have internet because they had a small sign on the counter encouraging students to stay and study while eating their sandwiches. My chair is very comfortable, the kind you’d find in a grandmother’s apartment that’s been moved around her various living spaces for years. It’s not overly large like a new watch, and it does not recline, but seems to have been designed for a generation that did not desire large things, like wrist watches, but instead things that were the right size and made you sit up straight, but in a comfortable way. It’s not the kind of chair you’d have trouble getting out of, but one that instead encourages you to remain seated because it was made for that.
I do no remember the last time I was here, but it’s been at least a year and a half, probably over two years at this point and perhaps not since Mia and I last lived here. I will stay her for the morning, having purchased by bottomless cup of coffee which was ten kronor cheaper than a latter, and bottomless. I will get very high on coffee today, but because I plan (desire) to do so, I will not notice my fingers getting jittery, and if I do, I will not mind. I will sleep wonderfully tonight.
This chair is too low for the table. I feel like a six year old trying to sit in the dining room with the adults and feel normal, but am obviously out of place because I can’t rest my elbows on the table in a natural way, and this is probably apparent to the adults I try to mingle with. The computer is slightly above me, almost out of reach, and I have to prop it up on a book so that the keyboard is tilted in such a way as to allow me to see the keyboard. I will not wear my headphones today. I want to go get another cup of coffee, but I will have to push the table away from me to get out of this chair, and not because the chair is the type that is difficult to get out of, but because the table is slightly too high for this type of chair, requiring me to pull it closer so I can sit here and type. Charming, but right now, frustrating.
I am already high on this coffee. I will drink a lot of it today because it is not hot enough.
10:50 AM:
Two long-haired weiner dogs just walked by the window I am sitting at. It reminds me of the card I got Kate for her birthday, in anticipation. On the front there is a picture of two weiner dogs playing Wii, - it says “Wii-ner Dogs!” I find it hilarious.
11:12 AM:
Coffee cup number three. They are small.
11:16 AM:
I am laughing, out loud in this café, at a photo of Nate sitting before his dessert at the German place in Pompano. His expression is pure Nate.
12:07 PM:
Time to eat lunch. With my coffee spoon, which is very little. Small bites…small bites.
12:33 PM:
Interrupted…by the proprietor of the café, or more likely, one of his employees. He told me, in Swedish, that I couldn’t eat my packed lunch in that café, presumably because they had their own food for sale and I was somehow robbing him of a potential meal sold, despite the fact that I wouldn’t have bought anything had I not even had food. I accepted this, and left. Now I’m in the library and cannot get on the Internet. I stole one of the café’s coffee spoons and finished my lunch with it.
1:26 PM:
I could survive here, in the wintertime, with a bicycle. It would be better than riding the subway in Stockholm. Stockholm is too big, but it’s perfect here in Uppsala. This is my kind of town. Vibrant, buzzing, but small enough to feel like home.
Another café now, and another coffee (a latte this time). Though I was very tempted to get a beer, and might do so before the afternoon is out. I have a seat by the window, on a stool, my computer resting on a bar of sorts, and I’m watching the people go buy on foot and on bikes and with strollers. There are more walkers than cars, another reason why I like this town, and I can see the river flowing underneath a bridge nearby, it’s edges frozen and covered in snow with ducks sleeping on the ice.
4:04 PM:
Still at Café Magnusson. The upstairs Stork place didn’t have internet, though it was mighty cozy and offered a delightful view of the square through the upstairs windows. I was tempted to get a beer at Café Magnusson, but got a café latte instead. I’ve peed about sixteen times today. The food smells awesome.
4:25 PM:
Lemon Jelly. Oh yeah.
