To start us off

When I was nine I started swim team. Back in the "olden days" of my swimmer years, practice started at 6:30 in the morning, and we rode our bikes to practice, up hill both ways (okay well down hill on the way there, but what sense did that make when I was biking uphill to go home after three hours of Finish spoken torture done by my coach Essi.)

Each morning, we were asked a few vital questions:

1. Did you take your Juice Plus?

2. Did you eat breakfast?

3. Where is your water bottle?

and most importantly

4. Why is your chest bare?

Now don't take that the wrong way, it wasn't that she was worried about our modesty. We were swimmers, after all, and I blame that for what my mother calls immodest behavior involving me walking around in undies regularly. Luckily I learned that my future roommate for the coming fall also enjoys a lack of clothing, so perhaps if the economy stays like this we shall join a nudist colony following college. Although I have thought of that and decided the only nudist colony I'd want to join would be one exclusively involving celebrities and models, with the exception of myself obviously.

The first three questions are pretty standard: take your vitamins, drink water, eat breakfast, yeah yeah yeah. But the fourth one I found to be pretty pointless. According to Essi, the second your chest is bare in cold weather, you will get sick. Upon arriving to Spain I was subject to the same tirade of questions from my host mom. It turns out that the theory is not simply embedded into the Finish mind of Essi, but into Europeans in general. Luckily for them, scarves are a must have fashion staple. And luckily for me I am prone to addiction and following fashion trends set forth by people with a better fashion taste than my own, which involves lots of fleece and jeans and tank tops. I left for Spain with four scarves and returned with 14.

You know those dreams you have where you forget to put on your pants and show up at school? I have those a lot. Normally I am about six years old, show up at Soda Creek Elementary and realize that I not only forgot my pants but also my undies. The dream-me progresses to hide under the playground structure all day while it rains. My return to America has been very much like that dream, but in reverse. I see people without scarves and immediately feel the urge to scream at them: YOU WILL GET A COLD AND DIE, PIENSA IDIOTA, QUE HACES???? What are you thinking?! Go home and get your scarf right this second.

You are naked without a scarf. So go invest in a few, because within three weeks of being home I am on an antibiotic for a cough I can't kick and each night I hear Tete yelling at me "NO HAS LLEVADO UN FULAR." You have not worn your scarf! Shame. On. You.