Hey Guys!

Ever been walking down the street and remember something funny that happened a while ago and then you can't stop smiling? But in present tense?

Here, let me put it in other terms. You smile at a memory. But that smile exists in present tense.

It's kind of like starting a blog in the past tense and then at some point along the way switching into present tense. Get it now?

I knew that analogy would work.

But anyway, as Lthomps told you, we're down on our luck. Down on our god dang luck. and you know what? Fuck that. Just fuck it. Because seriously, we were supposed to be back in the U.S. by now. And I'm going to be totally frank here, I'm pissed the fuck off.

But don't worry, I'm resourceful. I can turn situations around by changing my mood and outlook toward them. For example, my motherfucking astronomy professor made his final as hard as fucking possible. So when he told me, "Merry Christmas" I looked him dead in the eye and said, "I'm Jewish."

Needless to say, he was humiliated. I felt much better (after I slashed his tires).

When I was walking toward Lauren with a big grin on my face I was actually just thinking of how good it felt to slash his tires. But when I saw the look on her face I knew I had to make something up quick. So I invented this story about Tiger Woods agreeing to pay for the rest of our gas money (and fixing some of the Versa's damage) if we have sex with him.

I honestly don't know why she believed that. How would our having sex with him help him with his little problem? Isn't his little problem that he is involved in an embarrassing sex scandal? Wouldn't his having sex with us only exacerbate the problem. I think Lauren's been in Russia for too long.

Although, I recently made an observation wise beyond my years: It's a Sylvia Plath Life. It's a Sylvia Plath world.

Damnnnnn put that shit on mugs and t-shirts why dontcha? eh? C'est la VIE!!!!!!!

So yeah, we fucked him.

What?

Don't look at me like that.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. You with all your damn morals. You've always been so perfect, haven't you? You would never fuck Tiger Woods for the money and the 15 minutes of fame. You're too busy working hard and saving up. You always think things through, don't you?

But hey, before you get on your high horse, remember this: I'm not the one who hasn't talked to her sister in 15 years.


Long story short: we now have the money to fix the fuckin car. we're going home. we'll probably start driving back to the U.S next entry. RIGHT?! I think so. I hope so. I really really hope so. I fucking hate Russia. and it's like negative a million degrees here. http://www.wunderground.com/global/stations/26063.html

there believe me now? ok so we're going home soon. thanks @tigerwoods. oops wrong website.

I love whiskey.

My Nips iz Hard Cuz it Cold Out

Five degrees fahrenheit, and ten days until the birth of our Lord.

Basically I'm telling you that it's fucking cold outside, and it's really close to Christmas.

And now, on top of being jobless, V-D and I are homeless thanks to this overzealous feminist housekeeper at the St. Petersburg Holiday Inn Express.

Just when we thought humanity had reached it's lowest.
Nazi Germany.
Rwanda.
9/11.
Chimp eats woman's face.

And now this bullshit.

I'm sitting outside the Red Club, with visions of our extravagant summer nightlife dancing in my head. And Veronica's walking back towards me with a giant grin on her face.

She says she knows someone who is willing to help us with our little problem if we could help him with his....little problem.



Hey, it worked for every other woman in America. It can work for Me and V-Ron.

College Students Should'nt Travel Because They Are Supposed to Be Poor. What Were We Thinking.

Have you ever gone on a week-long trip abroad that turned into four months of debauchery and delusions of grandeur?

Well, let me assure you. It happens. This blog is living PROOF that it happens. I, Lauren Ashley Thompson, do hereby certify the authenticity of this trip and the verisimilitude of each detail we have accounted within Faux Travails. I'm sorry I couldn't provide you with that kind of guarantee before now. But hey, I'm no Bob's Discount Furniture. If you want the guaranteed lowest price on a sectional with built in cup holders and with armrests that fold out of the middle, don't come crying to me. I'm just a world-class traveler, guys, not Barack Obama.



Speaking of, I'm really pissed that there are people out there trading in their clunkers for brand0-new Versas. And are therefore getting those brando-new Versas for $3-4,500 cheaper than I did back in the Summer of '06. I hope to Jesus our lord and savior that when they take their own Trans-Arctic voyage into Eurasia, that their makeshift rafts won't bear the weight of their INFLATED EGOS.

There really is nothing worse than a gloater who gets things for a lot cheaper than they should.

Says one girl to another, "That's a cute purse! Where did you get it?"

"Oh this old thing, I got it at Goodwill for four dollars in Porter Square."

GUNSHOTS RING OUT. BLOOD EVERYWHERE. SCENE.

Momma didn't raise no fool. WHAT I AM SAYING IS THAT MY MOTHER DIDN'T RAISE ME TO BE A FOOL. And you should know that if I catch you with a government-subsidized Nissan Versa, a receipt from Bob's Discount Furniture, AND a Goodwill handbag, you will be swimming with the fishes at the bottom of the Mystic.

I'm really sorry, guys. I'm just really stressed out about money right now. In my carefree youth, I would drive past Ryan Tepperman's house and shout, "POOR!" Because it was the worst insult I could think of to shout from a moving vehicle. How far away those happy times seem.

Me and V-Dubbs have not been winning Russian Roullette as often as we are used to, and all of those Russian studs keep telling us we're beautiful, and that they are just as big as the black guys we're usually into....so we keep buying rounds of Stolichnaya..... and the next thing you know, Alexei from the American Apparel t-shirt table encounter isn't texting me anymore and our laptops are getting all water-damaged and fucked up.

I don't think any of these problems are related. But you know what? When you're poor, all of you're problems seem to melt together as previously described.

It's a dark time. I don't think Veronica and I can even afford the return trip anymore.

Veronica Lydia, if you're reading this, I think we need to start looking for jobs.

If you hear about any part-time work available in the St. Petersburg metro area, please contact us. We are two customer-service oriented females with strong backs and a lust for learning. Wages starting at $1500 rubles a month, Hablemos espanol.

I hope $1500 rubles a month is enough. I didn't check with customs. I also hope it's not too unprofessional to say the word "lust" in a For Hire ad. Or tactless to reveal that we know Spanish...

Confessions of an American Tourist

Our stay in St. Petersburg was coming to an end and Lauren and I were in no mood to go back to the oppressive reality that is the U.S. Privately, I was feeling anxious about the return trip. Especially since a fucking Moses-like character had specifically warned us about it. If only this elderly gentleman really were Moses, then he could part the Atlantic and we could just drive straight home, avoiding Southern roads for the most part. But I guess life just isn't like that. And maybe Lauren and I will learn something about sticking it out when all we want to do is take a damn flight home. Oh well. We never spoke about this to each other, but I suspect she had similar anxieties... because she wrote them to me on a post-it note which she put on the shower wall in the hotel bathroom.

It was about 2 o'clock in the afternoon when Lauren said she wanted to see a silly "rom-com" to brighten her mood. I wasn't sure how much a simple movie would be able to brighten her mood since for years now she's been gambling as a mood enhancer, but I agreed that a movie would be nice. We went by a charming theater down a strange alley. The one movie they were playing was "Confessions of a Shopaholic". "How bad could it be?", Lauren said. "Yeah I mean, I'm sure it's charming and adorable. Lets not be pretentious." I responded. We both decided not to be pretentious right there and then.

So there we were, two unsuspecting American girls, buying tickets to go see a movie about a girl with a weakness for chicness. And we saw that movie. we saw it all the way through.

...but we almost didn't. This movie is particularly atrocious. Yeah, I gotta bring out the fifty-cent words for this one.

First of all, the whole plot of the movie forces the viewer to look through the lens of Capitalism and economy. And once Ryan Tepperman told me that the economy in the U.S. is very bad right now (I did not know this because my family has a pool with a waterfall). So this movie is sending a really backwards message to its audience. Isla Fisher was MUCH more entertaining as a shopaholic than she was as a person finding some kind of absurd version of peace.

But anyway, before I get carried away, I'll just admit that Lauren and I actually did not see the movie all the way through. Sorry guys, I was just too embarrassed to admit my own shortcomings. But in our defense, it had nothing to do with our ability to endure. Lauren and I are enduring creatures, or creatures of great endurance. What went down was a little bit of Russian hospitality a la Cold War Era buuhhhllllllsshhhhittt.

In other words, guess who didn't like the heavy overtones of capitalism in "Confessions of a Shopaholic"? Russia.
And guess who also didn't like the "touchy/feely" confession format of the movie? Russia.
And guess whose red hair caused us problems yet again???.....LAUREN. FUCKING LIABILITY....her red hair is a liability.

The Russian cops came in towards the end of the movie, but just early enough so that we still don't know if she made it to her friend's wedding. (YO HOLLA AT ME IF YOU KNOW IF SHE DID, 978-835-1712). And as we were all grumpily filing out of the theater one of the cops spotted Lauren and thought she was Isla Fisher. He coldly separated us from the group and pushed Lauren and I into a van. He blind-folded us which made me very uncomfortable, however it made Lauren much more comfortable thanks to her lifestyle choices (see: Slob on my Knob). After driving for about 20 minutes he stopped the car and took our blind-folds off. We were in an empty parking garage that had murder written all over it. But just when I was beginning to give up all hope the Russian officer broke down in tears. He explained to us (in broken english) that he was a HUGE Isla Fisher fan and couldn't stand to see her killed, which would surely have been our fate if the other officers had seen Lauren. He told us he would give us until midnight that night to get out of St. Petersburg. We told him we were grateful for his mercy and fled the scene.

The second we knew we were far enough away we both exclaimed, "CHRIST ALMIGHTY! PRAISE HIM!". We made our way to the Versa.


It was time.

How to Find Love Abroad

I was really starting to lose it. I didn't tell Veronica this, but the chief thing I was looking to discover in St. Petey's was LOVE. And, like she told you all blasé and nonplussed, we didn't fall in love with anyone at the hotel that night.

This is worse news than young V-Ron could know.

No Love? I thought, as I wandered in a daze around Vladik and Anya's honeymoon suite.
What?
They were asleep, they didn't even know I was watching.
Oh, shit, but now they do because Vladik is the one person in this world who actually does follow this blog.

Well, Vladik, I'm sorry. I was really lonely and felt an impulse to intrude on your special night with Anya. I know it was your first time having sex with her, because I saw you trying on different-sized condoms for fit.SIDE NOTE: I HAD NO IDEA THAT PEOPLE CAN BE ELITIST ABOUT CONDOMS, TOO. Larry Murphy just couldn't roll on a generic, could he.

And by the way, Vladik, you don't wear condoms when it's your wife that you're fucking. Married women reject pork casing--they don't need a penis to be wrapped all tight because it doesn't matter if her vagina gets loose anymore....it's not like the next guy she has sex with is going to look at that cooter and say, "Cor bloody hell, you've gone and got your nonny all helter-skelter"...because the next guy she has sex with will not be Ringo Starr. It will be you.

God, this is a painful subject.

I guess this is as good of a time as any to talk about the Russian man who broke this American girl's heart.

(big, exaggerated sigh.)

I saw him across the t-shirt table at American Apparel. And for all you hipsters out there who are confused, forgive me if that's not specific enough of a location. I do understand that there is a difference between t-shirt tables at American Apparel but I've only gone to Emerson College for one year and don't fully understand what separates the Tri-Blend short sleeve from the Mélange short sleeve. I do know that Alexei, the dream man, looks downright saucy in a fine-spun V-neck jersey.

Aside from being able to tell from his sense of style, I knew by the twinkle in his eye and devilish grin that he was the man I've been waiting for. I only hope he's heard the rumors about the sex drives of redheads and Lebanese girls...and of course, relayed that info to his attractive brothers and coworkers and arms dealers.

ALEXEI, CALL ME!!!! Let's paint the town red!

And as soon as I texted him that, I remembered how difficult it would be to find a single inch of Russia that isn't already painted red.

American Womans

Cooch to cooch, this trip was starting to get really motherfucking trippy. For one thing, Lauren never explained to me why she was in a Bellhop's uniform. All she told me was that her other clothing had been covered in blood, and that she had been kidnapped by what was left of the Russian Monarchy. She also mumbled some things about Anastasia... maybe I would have believed such a one of a kind story if Lauren didn't blame ALL of her promiscuous adventures on Anastasia, more or less.

I forgave LT for her terrible beer/mescaline-goggle judgment and we decided to go site-seein'. Lauren and I are feminists at heart, so we decided to first visit the Monument to Catherine the Great. We did not know Catherine personally, but from her monument she seemed nice. Great seems like a lot to say about anyone. But again, neither of us knew her so we can't say. Next we went to the Alexander Column. That one is pretty self-explanatory. We decided to cleanse our souls real quick at Smolny Cathedral. Lthomp's made me throw holy water on her and sing some Russian hymns. When I was done she looked up at me, soaking wet, and asked if she looked more pure. Honestly, she looked a lot worse, but I didn't have the heart to tell her.

After this Lauren and I were looking for a nice place to just sit down and eat lunch somewhere. We chose the Moscow Victory Park. There is a bit of a NYC vs. Boston rivalry between Moscow and St. Petersburg. We were once again on the right side of that animosity. While at this park we encountered a couple other tourists. They were from London, and boy did they show it. For one thing they made the largest mistake possible, they thought Stalin's body was somewhere buried in St. Petersburg.

"Ello chaps, have you any idea where we may pay homage to Stalin's grave?"

To which I replied:

"Well you can find his mummified body in Moscow...duh." reppin' 'Merica.

You've never seen two angrier commie's. They turned beat red with anger. Lauren tried to make a witty joke about them being members of the red party, but she accidentally rhymed a couple words in the joke, losing all credibility. Well at least she didn't have the hiccups, because then I would have thought she were drunk.

Finally, we came to Dostoyevsky's monument. We really had to pay our respects to this man, we probably wouldn't have made it across the ocean if it hadn't been for his constant nagging and worrying. While visiting this monument something bizarre happened. A crazy old man with googly eyes and a scraggly beard limped up to me and told me to beware the southern route. "BEWARE THE SOUTHERN ROUTE", he exclaimed. Confused and taken aback, I asked him why but he said nothing.



Shit, Lauren and I thought (after you drive through Canada with someone you end up thinking just like them), we have to begin our trip through the southern roads of Canada in a matter of days. We tried to distract ourselves from such an obvious omen by taking classes to learn how to paint those crazy eggs. But nothing could cheer us up.

We decided to call it a night, we stayed a decent hotel. I can't recall the name of it at the moment. But it was nice. We didn't fall in love with any of the employees or anything, but it was nice.

You Can't Make Me Like Regina Spektor

Its true. I really want nothing to do with her. Which is kind of bad, because the Russians treat her like their very own JonBenet Ramsey (clearly Regina's American counterpart.)

At least that is what Ronny and I were trying to persuade our rather closed-minded Russian counterparts, Petra, Lena, and Rinna. If your wondering how three Russian beauties equates to two American cuties, it totally does. I did the math and for every American girl there must be 1.5 Russian girls to match the criteria of wit, poise, and moral fiber (piety). I CALL RINNA!

Petra, Lena, Rinna looking totes fly at Red Club

But more on piety.

One of the key reasons V-Ron and I decided to journey to St. Petersburg in the first place is because of our strict moral code and devotion to all things puritanical. St. Petersburg has alarming bribery and robbery rates, and equestrianism literally runs rampant. These things may scare off traditional American tourists, but they don't scare off traditional American missionaries. So they don't scare us.

They might scare the Russian waifs a little bit, though. So we dressed up in UNICEF garb and passed out Hershey bars, Happy Meals, and Kotex with wings until they felt more comfortable with us again. Then we peeled off the humanitarian clothes and got right back into "swinging singles mode." Personally, I'm just coming out of a relationship, so I'm just looking to have a good time. V on the other hand is here to look for that special someone, because she's sick of going to Buggaboo Creek alone....or worse. Stachey's.

Not that she doesn't have anyone in North Andover who would love to take her to either. Mental patients, drug addicts, and certain CVS coworkers seem to vie for her affections constantly. But none of these candidates have that certain je ne sais quoi....AM I RIGHT, SERGEI??!!


Sergei always agrees for a Hershey bar.

Dostoyevksy called it. He said that St. Petersburg is "the most abstract and intentional city in the world." Luckily, Viv and I know all about both, thanks to good old American smarts and pop culture.

Wife Swap, the Russian Deluxe Edition

So after that crazy night in the bar (from which Lauren returned with a beard) we were very exhausted. We decided to stay at a nice hotel for a few nights. Well actually, Lauren INSISTED that we stay in a nice hotel, I didn't really think we had the money for it, but I trust Lthomps.

We stayed in a place called the Kempinski Hotel. When we arrived at the hotel we realized that they didn't give us two beds. I was a little uncomfortable sleeping in the same bed as Lauren because I hate all things lesbian. But once again Lauren was INSISTENT that we sleep in the same bed. Whatever, I'm not gay. So I will do this to prove that I am not gay. Not that I am against homosexuals, I have many homosexual friends. But the very thought of what they do in their spare time makes me sick. Even when what they are doing is not sexual at all. Like puzzles and such.. makes me sick. But like I said, I'm not homophobic or anything like that.

Before we went to bed, Lthomps ordered a shit ton of room service. She got spaghetti and meatballs, steak, cookies, and ice cream! Then she spent about two hours in the bathroom. All of this really surprised me especially because Lauren never poops. I started thinking about all the changes she had gone through since the night of partying. I became suspicious.

When Lauren came out of the bathroom I asked, "Lauren... are you feeling ok? You're worrying me."
"I'm fine it's just my period" Lauren growled.

Nuff said, I thought. Case closed.


But that night I woke up to Lauren trying to feel me up.
"WHAT THE HELL LAUREN, I THOUGHT THIS WAS A PLATONIC RELATIONSHIP???"
But all Lauren did was laugh. That's when I realized she was actually a full grown man!

"WHERE IS THE REAL LAUREN?"
Once again my question was met with nothing but laughter. So I ran out of the room and down to the lobby. And who is standing there but Lauren Ashley Thompson.

Dressed as a Bellhop.

White Russians are the Most Redundant Drinks

I mean, it hurts to be called redundant---I know from experience (ooooooh my bad....my emergency therapy session with Dr. Chechnya Herzog was for nothing---the Doc expressly told me I need to forgive Veronica "Nico" Sheehan (sp?) for calling me that.) Well, I guess it's like they say, old wounds are salty and close funny but they can open again even though sometimes they just heal normally...but sometimes you don't know when you're pregnant.

That is what they say? Right?

Anyways, Nico wasn't joshin' ya guys when she said Red Club night got out of hand. But for more reasons than she yet knows. The thing is....I still haven't brought myself to tell her what really happened that night. It's more from the lack of trust than the shock value, though.

First of all, that bearded version of me that told her not to ask about the beard?
NOT ME. It was a decoy bearded Lauren vested with all kinds of bizarre charms. After all, who in their right mind wouldn't ask where their hot gal pal got a big surly beard???? I know we drove through Canada and everything, but some things should still shock us.

Secondly, while I was dancin up on some tall dark Russian lads, an old man with a glass eye swiveled on his barstool to get a better look at me. He was approximately one hundred and forty years old, and well remembered the siege of the Romanov Palace before the Revolution.

Well...guess who he mistook me for with my fiery hair and iron will??


HOLY SHIT. The Russians really care about long lost royalty, almost as much as they care about British Literature. But yeah, somehow a nineteen year old redhead on holiday in 2009 equates to a redhead Tsarina named Anastasia who was killed in 1918....

What I'm trying to say is that I'm writing from my perch in the Alexander Palace, with a bunch of hemophiliacs bleeding all over me and insisting that we're distant relatives.

Which means that the person with V Dubbs...


It's really a shame. I have no idea how Ronny's going to explain this to all the irate single mothers.

RYAN MCCANN

Day TWO (or something) in St. Petersburg Russia.

What a beautiful city, what a stunning and lovely place. We marveled at the centuries old architecture, and considered what role we might have played here three hundred years ago. It truly is a spectacular place. And while we were looking at this beautiful place we decided to get plastered as soon as possible. I mean, you have to remember, this is fucking spring break. This isn't thanksgiving break or some bull shit like that.

We decided on a place called "Red Club" because it seemed like the most dangerous place.

Red Club.

The best place for those who like all kinds of good club music: from Techno and House to Lounge and live Nu Jazz, Rock, Nu Wave Music. Mach more different events, concerts, night parties. Youth public, friendly atmosphere, good music. Nice place.

Address: Poltavskaya str. #7.

Location: M. Ploshad' Vostaniya. From Moskowsky Train Station (Moskovskiy Vokzal) turn right to a small street, Goncharnaya, and follow it to the end, then turn right again and 40 meters further you will find it.Tel.: 7(812)717 13 60, 7(812)717 0000. web: http://www.clubred.ru/

We were not disappointed by this club. We had an amazing time. We began the night slowly with a couple of beers, which gave us the courage to put our guards down. We began telling Russian strangers of our trip. No one believed us. That's when things got a little out of hand. I'm gonna have to take the blame for this one... I've just always wanted to fight someone with a broken beer bottle.

Here's what happened: A couple of russian punks claimed that we were liars and that no one could possibly drive from the Boston to St. Petersburg. I said, "OH YEAH? tell me that one more time you son of a bitch!" I wipped out our beautiful scrapbook that we'd been working on and yelled, "WHAT NOW PLAYOVSKY HATAHHH??".

That's when all hell broke loose. Some Russian biddy spilled her beverage all over the scrapbook. I took my beer bottle, smashed it against the bar, and went for the first Russian I could get my hands on. I was able to gash him in the arm before the bouncer came over and kicked me out.

While I was sitting outside the club on the curb, down on my luck, thinking things couldn't get worse, I realized that Lauren was still inside. God DAMNIT! I saw an image of the single, working class mothers laughing at me. What a night, that is the last time I shoot dope.

Three hours later, Lauren came out with a beard and shifty eyes that told me not to ask about the beard.

So I didn't.

Nothing Shocks Me Anymore

Look familiar, Bostonians? 

WHAT A RUSSIA!!!!

When we rolled into sunny and funny St. Petersburg, we could have sworn that the city itself opened its outstretched arms to us and pulled us into a sensual embrace, as if to say, "Thank you L. Thomps and V. Dubbs, for believing in me, and for making the perilous transsiberian journey to be here---to be here with me."

V.Dubbs wasn't buyin' that shit, though. She was quick to remind the city of St. Petersburg that we had also endured Canada and all of that bullshit before we even crossed into Siberia! St. Petersburg grew very quiet. DAMMIT. We were off to such a great friendship before VeeTard had to remind them that a place like Canada existed.

FAUX PAUX.

What Ronny failed to realize is that Russia is one of those fun and fancy-free nations that likes to believe everything is all rainbows and smiles and Purple Hearts showering over a field of Unicorn horns filled with Svedka Vodka. They don't like to be reminded of the suffering of citizens in countries like Canada, you know, what with the endless lines at hospitals to receive medical attention after brutal chainsaw massacres/logrolling gone bad/inevitable French overthrow of Montreal. So it was pretty tactless of us to bring it up, and forced me into a difficult ass-kissing situation.

I quickly recovered by presenting the mayor, Valentina Matviyenko, with a bottle of castor oil. And, true to form, V Dubbs jigged like a jigger ought to, which is great because after the twelve hours of driving and not finding anything good in northern Russia, I was starting to really blame her for everything bad that had happened. I also resented her. She kept saying that I was redundant, and I didn't like that. But don't worry guys, it's okay. I called her ignorant and irrelevant, and then we just didn't talk for the rest of the drive!
Anyways, Valentina was thrilled (and she did give us permission to call her Val, but we told her it confused us, because of Val's diner in North Andover. She completely understood...or at least we thought she did....until....

What are the odds that a woman can be both mayor of world class city, AND the owner of a DINER?!!!! Man, Russia is so progressive!!!! It's a beacon of light for all of us hopeless American girls toiling away in the Lowell textile mills yearning for a brighter future for our daughters and granddaughters.....and Ronny and I get to be the harbingers of this beautiful notion.

WE WILL NOT STOP UNTIL WE GET SUFFRAGE!

By the way, Val's Beetroot Borsche is DELISH.

Dah Islands

After our adventures at sea, Lthomps and I found ourselves on Ellesmere Island. And when I say we found ourselves I am not trying to convey the fact that we were on the island (which we were), but rather I mean that we found ourselves. We found ourselves...in that other way (see: The Tao of Pooh).

We were pretty lonely on Ellesmere Island as the population doesn't even hit 150. I have a population of 150 requirement for me to not be lonely, so yeah this wasnt cool. Also, people on this friggen island are either scientists or ruthless Dorset hunters. Also some people referred to themselves as "neoeskimos" which hit a little too close to neo-tribalists for our liking. In any event, we were constantly dodging bullets which the hunters claimed to be aiming at a mysterious moose behind us. I never once so this so-called moose, I think these people wanted to kill us. Actually, they eventually told us this over a couple of drinks, we all had a good laugh.

Now, I feel I must confess something, I think I may be giving a biased account of this visit. You see, I am a Debby Downer, always have been. But Lauren is a Positive Penny (???) and she had a god damn blast on Ellesmere. She danced around, she was constantly smiling, she was finally able to forgive her second grade teacher. I have no idea what made her so happy. When I asked her all she said was, "It's the colors, all the colors, white and blue...". The thing about Ellesmere Island is that there are basically no colors. But w/e.

After we had a complete tour of the island (which was horrendous) we had to get busy constructing a raft upon which we would float gracefully into SIBERIA/RUSSIA. Oh my God, you don't even KNOW how we felt. So close to our destination on such a long journey. I was grinning ear tah ear!

The raft we had used to get to Ellesmere would work as a nice skeleton for the one we would take over to Siberia. But we would definitely need to make some adjustments. For one thing, we needed some steel and a Sail. We also needed a gun to ward of jellyfish. We got busy constructing our new raft.

Three days later and we had a beautiful raft. Now, the easy part: sail that shit across the Arctic Ocean and land somewhere in Russia, then drive to St. Petersburg and LIVE IT UP. We said goodbye to Ellesmere and began our journey. .a journey which was incredibly strange in that it was not strange at all. You'd think two teenage girls and a nissan versa rafting across the Arctic Ocean would create some bomb-ass stories, but no. The trip was pretty self explanatory, we sailed, there was water, there was no storm, there was no great white shark, wtf. Well, Lauren did catch some fucking salmon or something at one point. Big whoop, I catch that shit all the time in Lake Cochichewick.

And then we were in Siberia. Well actually, we weren't quite in Siberia. But we also weren't quite in European Russia either, at least in my opinion, and also in Dostoyevsky's opinion (it is worth mentioning that Joseph Conrad had a different opinion but he is technically an English author so fuck him.... Tolstoy was just real stony-eyed about the whole subject). The town is called Naryan-Mar, or as Lauren kept saying, "Maryanne Nar". Dumb ass..

From here we filled the Nissan Versa (still in perfect condition) with gas and hit the road for St. Petersburg. We drove all night and made it there in 12 hours.

PHASE TWO COMMENCE, et. al, i.e, What the fuck now?!

So, V-D and I were real idiot assholes about this whole procedure. WE TRIED TO PUT MORE IN OUR MOUTHS THAN WE COULD CHEW--or in Ronny's case, and mine sometimes, and maybe even yours if you're into that-SWALLOW.
We packed the snacks. We consorted with Canadian locals. We prepared questions in case we met our maker. Can you guess what we didn't bring?

A raft. Which we would need if we were gonna island hop from Ellesmere to Russia.

F-U-C-?

THEN I REMEMBERED!!!

Sometimes, you really do have the tools you need to succeed, even when you think you don't.
Remember how we brought goods to trade with the Inuits/Russians in case of emergencies? And remember how one of those things was Ryan McCann, Spanish teacher extraordinaire, et. al?

Well, we didn't need him for anything.

BUT! I opened the collector's edition Blue Crush DVD and discovered that Kayla put the wrong movie back in.....that's right. in it's place, was

Without a Paddle 2!!!!!!!!!!!



We realized we had to get clever, just like those wild and crazy men did in Nature's Calling.
This was pretty much our opportunity to correct the chauvinist, anti-neo-tribalist and anti-Americans/Marines ideologies that we had been struggling against since high school.

We built our own goddamn raft. And we FJIORGED our way north up the Baffin Sea inlet.

Unbelievable pun just now.

Some things we encountered in the stormy Baffin Sea, which by the way, took us maybe three hours to sail:
1. Nothing.
2. Ice.
3. Icebergs.
4. Iceberg lettuce growing in its natural habitat.
5. Jack Dawson.
6. The Heart of the Ocean, which those assholes in the movie were right--he did steal it. Rose should have let him drown in that room where he was handcuffed to the pole. But actually, no, because then we wouldn't have gotten to see Kate Winslet swinging that axe and dripping like a wet tee-shirt contestant, 1912-style.

BUT I DIGRESS.

You wouldn't tell a Jigger not to Jig

I had a dream, which was not all a dream.
The bright sun was extinguish'd, and the stars
Did wander darkling in the eternal space,
Rayless, and pathless, and the icy earth
Swung blind and blackening in the moonless air;
Morn came and went--and came, and brought no day,
And men forgot their passions in the dread
Of this their desolation; and all hearts
Were chill'd into a selfish prayer for light:

-Lord Byron (Ryan McCan)

So when we last left off we were in Thompson, Manitoba Canada. I had quite a time there as Lauren told you. This surprised us both as we thought she would be the one to have fun in this town. Now, Lauren just had to go to Thompson, Manitoba, something about a pilgrimage and "I wouldn't understand something so anglo-saxon". But it was ok because now we were way the fuck up there and that was all we ever wanted. The only trouble with being this far North was that Lthomps couldn't stop shaking uncontrollably; she just couldn't come to terms with how far we were from the equator. That poor Emerson Dance major, I just wish the real world hadn't been so shocking to her.

But anyway, it was our duty to continue on. From here we traveled for quite a while on creepy ass roads until we got to Troy Lake. Well actually, all of Canada at this point was made up of creepy roads. And I got the heebee geebees pretty bad. So between Lauren's seizures and my general fright, we were quite the pair!

Once we got passed Lake Troy we no longer knew where we were at all. We just vaguely (and ironically, of course) knew we were going North. We saw blurry images of snow and trees whizz by us, made all the more disturbing by our attempts to cheer each other up with songs like, "My Life Would Suck Without You" and "Oh Girl". Not to mention Lauren's random Marxist exclamations. Somewhere way the fuck up there, we stopped at a gas station, and the unthinkable happened. We were ambushed by neo-tribalists! They came crawling out from under the tires in the body shop, they jumped down from the roof, they slid out of the vending machines!




"You, 'AMERICANS', take a look at our pamphlets. You may have a chance to be saved from your erroneous lifestyles after all."


"Please just leave us alone", Lauren screamed as she doused them in precious gasoline.


"HOW DARE YOU POUR THAT GOVERNMENT PROPAGANDA ON OUR VIRGIN BODIES!" Yelled the neo-tribalists.


"Lets get out of here, Lauren!", I exclaimed.


"WAIT! We just want to show you that you are merely pawns in a game of chess. PAWNS."


But we were gone. We found out later it was a miracle that, that amount of douche bag intake didn't kill us. Oh, but we were lucky more than once on our trip.




(Typical Neo-Tribalist)

Finally we reached Kugaaruk, Nunavut and it was time to begin the long hard journey of island hopping. Holy Hell, you should just bow to us for being able to do this. For Christ's sake, it really is physically impossible, but if we knew one thing about Russians, it's that Dostoyevsky was probably the first existentialist. Using this knowledge we concluded that just because something is fact doesnt mean it can stop us from driving to Russia. That's what I wish I could get through to the single, working class moms. But they told me to fuck off and try working two jobs and then see if I have time to be smart. I tried to tell them that I can't work because I'm in college and college is incredibly difficult, but they just kept flipping me off. Poor misguided fools.



But I digress...





IF YOU OR ANYONE YOU KNOW HAS BEEN HARMED OR VERBALLY HARRASSED BY A NEO-TRIBALIST CALL THIS NUMBER NOW: 978-835-1712.

The Canadian Frightfest

March 8-11, 2009
Montreal, Quebec to Thompson, Manitoba...both in Canada. 3,000 miles off the beaten path.

We never got a chance to hang out in Montreal, as much as we wanted to beat up some fake French kids. We were too excited to get to the cave clubs up North that we'd heard so much about...man, we weren't disappointed.

The Versa held up really well under the pressure of driving a thousand miles a day. To appease her, we stayed mostly on the King's highways so she felt more royal. In fact, we mostly wanted to take the King's highways just so that we could intimidate the Canadian drivers and show them that we
A.) Are American, and therefore impervious to their witchcraft and northerly trickery,
B.) Are superior drivers, therefore not held to the "2 Mississippi" rule when it comes to following distance to the car in front of us....yeah...Versa Rule #1 is that if you can see the license plate of the car, you aren't driving close enough,
C.) holla'd at a bunch of hottie Canadian women. Canadian men were too busy hanging from Pine Trees in flannel watching hockey or making free doctor's appointments. SO YEAH, these were some of the bitties we hit up in Thunder Bay:

(courtesy discovervancouver.com)
As you can see, Ronny and I were spreading Spring Break cheer long before we hit the U.S.S.R.

The best part about the second day of the trip was that I knew where we were headed, and V-Ron didn't. I told her that kind of information was privileged to only those who know how to drive vehicles outfitted with a manual transmission. Since we were the only two bitches on the trip, that means I was the only one driving, and the only one knowing where we were headed:



HELLO???!! A town in Manitoba called Thompson? you KNOW we're hittin that shit up. The only bullshit part of the whole she-bang is that, according to GoogleMaps, there is no easy way to drive to Thompson.

Whaaa????!!!! How is that possible? Terrain is terrain, no matter how you look at it. And Canadian terrain is utterly driveable.


Manitobans were the best part about Manitoba. We rarely encountered any, so we assumed they were cool with/understanding of our discomfort with being around Canadians. Why can't more Canadians be as compassionate as the Manitobans???? And when we did have to interact face to face with them, they were still cool. In fact, when we checked into the Thompson Days Inn at around 8:45 pm, They didn't even charge us when I gave them my Visa Platinum CheckCard and they saw my last name. Probably because they'd never seen a credit card before, but we gave them the benefit of the doubt. I then insisted we stay in the royal suite, considering we'd been traveling on the King's Highway for most of the day anyway.

A few things about Thompson, MB, Canada:
1.) it is the third largest city in Manitoba with a WHOPPING 13,000 people.
2.) average temperature during the month of March is 20 degrees. YUMMY.
3.) IT'S REKNOWNED IN MUSIC and FOLKLORE!!!! The city was used in the Tragically Hip song "Thompson Girl". The song is set both in and north of Thompson, and is about the title character, a Thompson girl. One of the band members, rumor has it, dated a teacher from Thompson's daughter for a brief period, and thus the song was inspired.
WOW.

I went to the bathroom to change into my bathing suit before we headed down to the hotel pool, but when I came out I saw Veronica passed out on the bed. There was an empty bottle of Quaaluds next to her.
I sighed. I didn't realize how taxing the journey could be on her frail little Lithuanian body. So I tucked her in and then went down to the pool alone to play with some vacationing couple's kids.

we still have maybe 10,000 miles to travel before we get to St. Petersburg! That's 16,000 kilometers to you, Canucks.

National Geographic?

Note: All of this has been translated from our original Russian blog. This explains any grammatical/spelling errors.

A couple years ago a good friend of mine told me that the most sought after job is being a photojournalist for national geographic. You get paid a ton, you get to travel, you get to express yourself, and you get plenty of recognition. This is relevent to the travel's of Lthomp's and myself insofar as it proves that geography is something everyone secretly loves. It also points to the beauty of the Lthomps-Veron John partnership. Lthomps goes to Emerson College, and as we all know that is a silly school in which people major in things such as "love" and "dance". However people there also major in photography. So she's got that side covered. I, on the other hand, go to a real university. Life is hard, I have to take classes like "biology" and "latin". But I also took a geography class. So you see, Lthomp's knows the photojournalism, and I know the important things.

Great, so now that I have convinced you that Lewis and Clark had nothing on us perhaps I can interest you in a story. A story concerning our first and most talked about trip:

St. Petersburg Russia.

Many people said that this trip couldn't be. "Northern Canada and Northern Russia don't connect." True, but what this working class, single mom didn't know is that the two places don't need to connect at all. They only need to sort of connect. We only need the two continents to be close enough together so that a sort of "skimming" (trademark) phenomenon can occur. Luckily in Lthomp's and myself's Harvard day we learned many things about Russia, in a book that I can't help but reference: "Born to Kvetch". We learned from our comrades at Harvard that Dostoyevsky and Tolstoy are two major Russian authors. We also knew from our nobel tutor Prof. DelleChaiae that Joseph Conrad was originally from Russia but later moved to England. Using this knowledge we decided that we would prove the nay-saying, working class, single moms WRONG.

And then came the big let down: the facebook group tease. We created a facebook group to see if anyone would like to join us for Spring break in St. Petersburg (not florida LOL), and many people-to our delight- responded with an affirmative YES. We began to make the preparations. I stole $50 worth of snack from CVS risking my LIFE, Lthomp's cleaned out her car (which involved reliving many painful memories for her), and we both were all a-giggle as the long anticipated day approached.

And then the day came. And Lthomp's and I were the only one's there. What a great way to start the trip: rejection. Mother Fucking REJECTION.

But we went anyway, we weren't going to let those working class, single moms have the last laugh. Ohhhh no, then they'd have everything. So we packed up the car (mostly the snacks) and left our home of Boston. As we saw that beautiful city shrink in the rear view mirror of Lthomp's Versa, we shed a tear, one tear between the two of us, and remembered that we had actually not spent most of our lives in Boston and identified more with cities like Lowell and Lawrence. But still...

We made our way North deciding to try to make it to Montreal that day (we didn't want to drive much the first day because our hearts were heavy with the pains of rejection). We took the way I took to get to UVM (the university I attended this past year but am transferring from in order to further enhance my cartographing skills), 93 to 89. We blasted through the three hours entertaining ourselves with stories and porn. When we got to Burlington Lthomp's and I found it quite impossible not to smoke a J as they say in that fine town, and then we just sort of fell asleep for 3 hours in a field of hippies. When we woke up we were quite angry to discover our folly. "What fools we are!" I exclaimed to Lthomps. "Why yes, how inconvenient." We promptly got supplies from KKD's and then hit the road for Montreal, only an hour and a half from Burlington.

We found no problems at the border, apart from the fact that the passport attendent thought Lthomp's was black and so held her for further questioning. But luckily she convinced him that she was not black and so was able to cross the border. Then it was basically a straight shot to MTL (montreal). When we got to the city it was 11:30 pm (eastern standard time) and we decided to stay in a hostel despite that movie that was made 2 years ago. And from there it is history....

Dreams of a Russian Paradise

Just one of the many visions dancing in our heads the eve of our sojourn across the great North.

Spring Break '09: St. Petersburg, Russia

Spring Break is a tradition that has been honored by college kids at least since MTV invented it in the early 90s.
Ronny and I live for MTV. We also live for Coronas and limes and bikinis. So what better course of action do we have, other than to hit 'em up style last March, in the sunniest, and funniest, place on Earth?

THIS IS THE ORIGINAL PROPOSAL FOR THE TRIP:

So, where were you originally planning to go, Spring Breakers?
Cancun?
Aspen?
Toronto? London?

WRONG.

This is the plan:
Between March 7th and the 15th, a bunch of us will be driving my little hatchback to Russia. THE PARTY SCENE IN ST. PETERSBURG IS OUT OF THIS MUHFUGGIN WORLD. It's totally worth the few thousand dollars in gas. And the arctic chills and skirmishes. We will drive north until it is south, essentially.
In further detail....
We will set out from Boston, make way north via Ontario, to Manitoba, and even Nunavut, Canada. But we insist on getting ALL OF IT.
From Nunavut, we will keep driving over the ice peaks parallel to the Baffin Sea. we may have to stop to construct rafts to ferry over the Versa, but it will feel like Island hopping. ELLEESMEERE ISLAND

After a rousing stop in Ellesmere Island, we will continue to drive (South?) into Siberia. We will then forge on southwest until we make it to sunny, and funny, St. Petersburg!!!!!!!

At. Route: For the fainter of heart, we are also entertaining the idea of driving westbound to St. AWESOME, through Alaska, and just raft over into Eastern Russia. But then we would miss an integral lesson in Viking survival (?) Right?

Still unsure of where we will stay...so many places cater the college set.....will keep you posted!!! Hope you can come!!!!

This is the beginning of one hell of a break.

Google Earth 5.0

(St. Petersburg)

Better than any douchy GPS system.

MISSION STATEMENT

Hi. My name is Lauren. This here is my friend Veronica. We are two girls, looking to have a good time, preferably in your neighborhood. If there's room. But only if it is
TOTALLY EXOTIC.
These are the supplies we have:
1. 2007 Nissan Versa hatchback in Powder White, manual transmission. That's stick-shift, beehotches.
2. GoogleMaps. Even though they say it's impossible for us to calculate a trip to St. Petersburg, Russia, from North Andover---they are mistaken, but we will still use them.
3. SNACKS. Veronica stole a TON of them from CVS.
4. Invaluable goods to trade with natives. This includes, but is not limited to:
A. A copy of Damien, by Herman Hesse.
B. Boxes of Nips.
C. Ryan McCann et. al. I don't know what et. al. means. Clearly.
D. A collector's edition of Blue Crush.
E. Virgins.
5. Castor oil. I heard this is a useful thing to have for basic medicinal purposes...we don't know how to get our hands on Penicillin.

We're going to get going soon to our first location, so we have to talk to you later. But listen, if you want to come, there's a lot of room in the Versa. Not so many snacks, though.