So I recently started bike riding a lot more in life....I am living in the DC area right now, and there is a 7.5 mile trail going from the next town over in Maryland to Georgetown. It is a rail trail, which means it is a converted train line built sometime in the 20s I would suspect. What this mean also is that it is nearly entirely wooded-over....it crosses roads exactly twice in 7.5 miles....there are about 4 variably-sized bridges, and an amazing old train tunnel. Now here's the weird part. Because I have been bike-riding on safe trails and hiking a lot and driving a lot, I have been listening to audiobooks on my ipod nonstop. For the last week or so I have been listening to William Vollmann's Europe Central, which is about in short: Nazis and Soviets during WWII, with a specific focus on figures whose creativity and individuality are particularly curbed by the respective authoritarian regimes. Now...since I am hearing this book, and I am biking, and I am on a trail that is sorta 20th century timeless....and since the book puts you in the precarious spot of sympathizing with Nazis (yeah I already have a fond place in my heart for Commies)....all this works out to this strange experience in which I feel like I need to pick sides and that I am living in the 30s in Europe.
But which side do I pick? Russians have more heart. Nazis have better clothes. Russians have better beards. Nazis have better weather. Russians have molotov cocktails. Nazis have.....
Well you can see my dilemma no?
But which side do I pick? Russians have more heart. Nazis have better clothes. Russians have better beards. Nazis have better weather. Russians have molotov cocktails. Nazis have.....
Well you can see my dilemma no?
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missshell:
i/m a beard woman myself, so i say russians all the way
_bossanova_:
Russians! In a heartbeat. The language sounds much sexier (no contest, seriously), and the literature...don't even get me started.