austria nore we're going to austria. spike is really great. 030212 ... nore The adjoining rooms on the third floor that my sister Denise and I shared. Decorated by my uncle Otti. (I loved seeing him through the style of those rooms. A black and white poster of all kinds of different people's feet. Sand-colored wooden floors. Shaggy, woven rugs in a motley of colors. White, roughly textured walls -- like the walls of an old California mission -- glowing brightly in the soft but exultant sunlight that shines, rejoices through so many waist-level, deeply cut windows.) Omi's room -- where I lay, tucked in to her still unmade bed at seven o'clock in the morning when I'd gotten up so early because there was no clock in my room. How old was I? Eight? Eleven? "Komm, geh zurueck ins Bett," she'd urged me gently, lovingly, and her voice was as smooth as the vanilla pudding she cooked on her stove. I lay there in her bed, listening to the impassioned "TICK! TICK! TICK" of her alarm clock. It was so frantically loud. In my head, it was the rhythm for a repeating song: "Sie hatt ein . . . itsy bitsy, teenie weenie, Honolulu, strand bikini . . . and -- I'm -- going -- to -- die." (My mind added that last part, for lack of knowledge of the real lyrics, and I fought against it because it was Bad.) The song, the clock, wouldn't stop. I heard Omi bustling around in the kitchen, preparing breakfast, chatting on the telephone. The white cloud of a comforter that enfolded me glowed in the yellow morning light. I couldn't sleep. I finally gave up and, braving the cold tile floor of her room on my bare feet, padded out to the kitchen again. 030212 ... nore we're going to austria next year because my thyroid came out this year. appreciate your thyroid. 030819 what's it to you? who go blather from