Dear Diary...

Good evening, greetings to all, yo! "How have you been ?", I wish I could say and actually get a reply. I've been fine, I suppose. No, actually that's a lie. I've been mostly depressed, and isn't it sort of the definition that you never really know why? I got the Sunday blues last week after having an actually delightful weekend. Then the Sunday blues became Monday blues, until they were entire week blues. Most of my thoughts have been "dear diary" ones, which is why I haven't posted anything. I refuse to make this blog that kind of diary-like nonsense and I doubt anyone would be interested in reading about it anyway. Instead I can tell you, I spent last weekend at a place by the sea, called Sounio, and dreamed about a cat with a black mustache that was actually me. The reason I'm telling you this is because I thought it extremely odd and wondered intensely about what it could mean. I also played Monopoly which brings out my seriously scary, competitive self, even scarier this time due to the fact I was drunk! What must be noted is that there are probably four people that I can call my favorite in the entire world and whom I love to bits and I got to spend two days with 2 of them. Yet I came back full of melancholy. All I wanted to do was listen to Ed Sheeran, which then turned into eating a large pizza by myself, that made things somewhat better. Still, I felt like a pile of crap, just waiting to be stepped on and ruin someone's day. Not even the Black Keys could make me smile. I had been planning for months to go see them in London and then the opportunity to see them in Paris came. I swore they would never ever come to Greece anyway. A few days later they announced they were playing in Athens in May. I was almost in tears and secretly thought to myself that I willed it to happen! Even Christmas, though I put up my adorable pink Christmas tree, seemed futile! I'd been a while since I felt this bad and had forgotten what it feels like. It's surprising how easy you get used to it again. Functioning as if everything is normal, getting work done, when actually you have difficulty standing up straight let alone walking, where every breath you take is physically exhausting and all you want to do is stay in bed and watch "When Harry met Sally"(well that part is optional but you get the point). It's quite easy to find yourself in this situation, and whether it's just sadness or depression to you it might feel like the end of the world, at least that's what it feels like for me. It's truly devastating and it takes time to re-introduce yourself to being, well, okay, I guess. Personally when times get tough as it were, I like to talk, even to myself, just to get it all out. I'll cry and I'll scream and I'll get angry and then sad again but that's alright. I figure that as long as I feel better at some point and as long as I still find things to laugh about it's okay to feel miserable at times and even to try and self-diagnose(even that is part of a human need to label or explain things that are happening to them). This horrid week is coming to its curtain call and I'm glad to say I survived, maybe not completely sane but lighter somehow. And in my scrambling for myself I discovered a video in which they've synced Taylor Swift's "Shake it off" with an 80s gymnastics video and found myself laughing uncontrollably and aspired to be more like that one black guy who you know is just having the time of his life! It's silly really but it did get me smiling again! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IlJI-GqB-6Y

Athens Speciale

There's a real good chance I smell as if I fell into a tank of tzatziki, onions and meat grease and marinated in it for 3 days. I don't think I've ever eaten that much souvlaki in my whole life! And I'm Greek! Well half-Greek but I haven't drank that much tea either as half-English. Truth be told, it's fun running around the city, finding the most surreal places to eat, and Athens is a lot bigger and more bizarre than it seems. For many reasons it is odd and even contradictory that I ended up as food writer. Reasons I will discuss later.What excited me most in the beginning was the idea of writing professionally for a famous chef who also happens to be a close friend so the chemistry isn't lacking. Soon I discovered the absolute turn-on of being privy to the luxurious and lavish as well as the hidden and often forgotten. I always loved this city. The deafening sounds of traffic and construction, the never ending chatter that starts becoming white-noise after a while, the foul odors of garbage mixed with the mouth-watering aromas of souvlaki being grilled at almost every corner. It seems I am discovering a new, almost cinematic, side of her. The first frame has us running to cross the high trafficked street amidst violent honks and mad drivers to get to the quietest little tavern to eat traditional Greek food and chill under the shadowy trees. We are then eating legendary pizza next to a homeless person sleeping on the sidewalk and a hooker giving a john a blowjob in the middle of the street, just minutes away from a nearby fancy neighborhood where we have sushi as if we were native New Yorkers in Manhattan. Since we are never far from a grill we immediately after feast like Greeks on some filthy souvlaki which is not particularly to anyone's liking(that happens too). The final shot closes in on Vasilis Kallidis, my chef extraordinaire holding a giant ice-cream while the rest of us behind the scenes are stuffing desserts in our already full stomachs. Now back home, I'm kinda reveling in my intense body fragrance, which I like to call eau de κρεατίλα (meaty), as it reminds of how much I truly love my job!