You only give me your funny paper

I might like banking better here than in the US. [Money again, I know, but I'm not talking about my money, this is more general. And I never claimed to be consistent.] They don't seem to use checks here at all. At first I thought that was weird, but really checks are pretty 20th century. They can get stolen, or lost, or torn, or misread or.... Exchange of money here often happens directly by bank transfer. That's how I pay my rent. The bank transfers feel very modern--you can do them online, even. What feels very 1950's are the passbooks you get with your bank account. They're actually pretty convenient, though, because you don't have to fill out deposit slips--you just give your deposit and passbook to the bank teller who does everything for you. Also, I have a special account for foreigners through the University and the bank has a branch right across from my building. There's this super huggable older guy who works there. He looks kinda like Uncle Jun on The Sopranos, and I can email him personally if I have questions or problems. Fuck you, Washington Mutual.

Every once in a while I overreact a little bit about the weather. It hasn't been soooo bad here, at least not by northeast corridor standards. The weekend was cold and rainy and shitty, but it could have been worse. (I can be rational now that the sun has come back out.) It wasn't just me freaking out, though. Everyone here was freaking out about the weather, and everyone must include people who don't overreact insanely to bad weather the way I tend to. I'm taking that as a good sign that it shouldn't ever get much worse here than 40° F (that's about 4° C) and rainy. Which isn't soooo bad.