Cover of the Rolling Stone...

So as a direct result of having the best mommy ever, I received a well-stuffed care package last week containing, amongst many other wonderful things - most notably baked alcohol-infused goodness- December's issue of Rolling Stone. Sigh. After having read it cover to cover about 4 1/2 times now, I'd like to share some high-lights and facts I didn't know after being in Africa for five months.

Barack Obama got a slap on the hand by the Editor of RS (fair). Bruce Springsteen is still hot stuff (no kidding). Glee is apparently saving B-list singer's careers (?). People still care about the Jonas Brothers (why?). Dave Grohl and Jack White are demi-gods (fact). Britney lip-synchs in Australia (durrr). Taylor Lautner is hot (durrr). Tom Petty is a brilliant hippie red-neck (the best kind). GAP has really cute clothes (grr adverts you torture me). A kid named Justin Beiber exists (wtf?).

Also... The Dead Weather??? Them Crooked Vultures??? Where have I been??? In Morocco it seems.

(Random interjection - writing this at 10am and just got fresh baked bread delivered to my house by my 8 year old host brother. Speaking of awesome moms, my host-mom is pretty lovely too.)

That brings up a couple other random musical pop-culture references I've associated lately. So my goofy-go-lucky CBT-mate Pete introduced me to the awesome-ness that is A Band of Bees back in September and I've been loving them ever since. Despite not knowing their name, I knew I had heard a couple of their songs before. Being UK based, I figured Radio 1 had something to do with that, but recent epiphonies explain why 'A Minha' is so damned familiar - Citroen and Magners commercials. Go figure. Great tune, however. Give it a go.

Also, as of late, I've been working my way through Tom Robbins' Skinny Legs and All. It's a rather kooky tale full of bizarre-o characters pushing buttons on religion, politics, and family landmarked by random inanimate objects throughout. I love it. So with about 50 pages to go I was like 'What the balls is the background of this book and who is this fella Mr. Robbins?' So turns out he also wrote Still Life with Woodpecker which is something I've been craving to read since a friend at home raved about it. Randomly enough, it's also the book that Drew Barrymore's character is reading in the diner everyday in 50 First Dates. Always been intrigued. Annnnd turns out a beloved band of my brother and I, badass Aussie rockers Wolfmother, also borrowed their name from Skinny Legs and All. Six degrees of Kevin Bacon?

I've kind of had She & Him Volume 1 on repeat this week. Dancing around alone in my house kareokeing the hell out this album is pretty much pure joy by definition.

I booked London this week! No I'm not playing the O2 any time soon, I'm flying out ridiculously cheaply at the end of April for the May Day bank holiday weekend. I absolutely cannot wait and anyone within a two-country-radius had better be there. Eeeeee.

Last weekend the local soccer team and I were interviewed by a Portuguese newspaper, The Record, covering women's football in Morocco. Basically these three, yes good looking, Portuguese dudes are travelling from Portugal to South Africa for the World Cup, discovering and documenting the football culture in every African country they pass through along the way. Sounds like a pretty stellar six months to me. It was truly a great experience for the team. The day of the interview, Saturday, was a huge day for boys soccer in town, so having a foreign newspaper focusing on the few girls there rather than the few hundred boys was such a rush for them. The validation, motivation, and self-esteem boost was greater than anything the journalists could have imagined. It being a small town in Morocco, the entire city knew about them within the hour and my host-sister was star of the show. Couldn't have been prouder.

The guys needed a place to crash that night, so I let them stay in my house instead of blowing money on a more-than-likely crappy hotel-hostel within the town. First instinct was to sit and chat over dinner before crashing at my host-families for the night. They were well travelled dudes with interesting backgrounds, so hi new friends. After five seconds of contemplating said scenario I remembered which country I was in and bolted for the door. Again, it being a small town in Morocco, spending more than two minutes with them in my house would have been Hashuma bizef (seriously shameful) and my reputation would have sunk faster than Ben Affleck's career after Gigli. So I bee-lined it for my host-fam's and basically told the Portuguese - mi casa es su casa. Too bad it's Spanish.

Yesterday, I had a wee trip into Kech to meet up with the regional lady friend volunteers - Kate, Sarah, and Rachel - over some coffee and msimmon (delicious flat fry bread) with cheese. The cafe owner is kind of in love with Kate and gave us a banana chocolate msimmon of sorts on the house. Delish. So over our fried treats we had some work chat (Spelling Bees... Art Newsletters... Volunteer clubs... Moroccan Clue) and normal girl chat (scarves... shaving schedules or lack there of... shopping in Malls). The last topic I found slightly humorous as the mall Kate had shopped in was called the Two Towers in Casablanca. I asked her if she had seen any Orcs running around. Note to self: save Lord of the Rings themed jokes for the company of dudes. Or maybe just my brother.