California Gurls

Abigail Breslin is featured in this month's issue of Bullett, which I only mention because she's one of two celebrities I served at Starbucks (the second being Wolf Blitzer, who ordered a venti skim latte and tipped pretty generously):

She definitely looked a lot different two years ago when she ordered a quad venti vanilla latte (I agree with her friend's sentiment in that, like, Abigail, you're 13, do you even know what a quad venti latte is? Because it's six shots of espresso and I hate to condescend but like, you only need that much caffeine if you've been in the library for the past 18 hours or have been partying for the past 18 hours or OH I DON'T KNOW have been working at Starbucks since 5:30 AM. Just saying. I don't think I was even allowed to order a Frappucino when I was her age.) and a bottle of Ethos water for her dog. But still, it's pretty cool being one degree of separation from the rich and famous. And Wolf Blitzer. Did I mention Wolf Blitzer?

This post thus far has nothing to do about being abroad, so I'll add that I'm making a concerted effort to neutralize my various accents. Since being here, I've gotten pegged with some bizarre American accents, most notably Midwestern and southern Californian. The professor who asked me if I was from the Midwest actually taught at Gustavus Adolphus college, which is 15 miles from my dad's hometown of Mankato, Minnesota, and it's actually kind of scary that he could pick up that faint trace of an accent. When I was headed back from the bar tonight and talking to Katrijn while waiting for the tram, a Swedish girl noticed my accent, and asked me where I was from in the States. Turns out she had lived in Santa Barbara for two and a half years, and she thought my accent sounded very Cali. I vehemently denied this, but the more I thought about it, the more I realized that my speech was peppered with "RIGHT????" "like, you know?" "oh, yeah, like, whatever, like, absolutely" and "oh my god totally." This awful filler + drawn out consonants and dropped final consonants is a recipe for disaster, and over my dead body will I once again be mistaken for a West Coaster. You all have permission to slap me if I slip into the dreaded Valley Girl dialect and start talking about how awesome roller blading is and what a great day it is for surfing. The weather is great for a day at the beach! 60 degrees and sunny, AS PER UJE. NO SEASONS ALLOWED.