How to waste your time and money on pointless shit now that the Schueberfouer is over
Sending a stool sample to someone you don’t know is no longer considered socially unacceptable. If anything, it’s a sign of self care.
Too much money burning a hole in your pocket now that the Schueberfouer funfair has ended? Check out these must-have, yet absolutely un-needed accessories for your Luxembourg expat lifestyle.
Cocktails
Cocktail bars are hoovering up space in the capital quicker than you can say: “sex on ze bitch”. If you’ve ever confected a cocktail yourself, you’ll know that it’s easier than making a sandwich though less acceptable to bring to the office rec room. Sometimes they’re served with cute ickle umbrellas (am I in Bermuda? Er no, you’re in Esch, Sir), and a big dose of audacity,: €18 for a fancy drink that’s half ice cubes?! Hey, if you’re that strapped for cash, you might be able to sell your tears as a magic ingredient to an experimental cocktail bar! In any case, you’ll be pissing it all down the ceramic throne within hours. Money well spent, François!
Bottled water
Do you like your water like you like your Michelin-starred meals? Overpriced and packed with extra words that you don’t understand? The content claims on mineral water are often confusing if you don’t know your periodic table. “Packed with Mg + Fe” makes it sound like the dude in advertising is laughing in our faces with his gen z lingo (Mg + Fe = my god, feral eggs?). Yep, buying bottled water is confusing. Also expensive.
Buy a refillable water bottle
Should be cheaper, right? Not if, like me, you’ve left the last 5 bottles on the train to Edinburgh, at Ernster, the dentist’s waiting room and on a beach in Poland. If this sounds familiar, you could also spend your hard-earned cash on a survival course where you learn to build a rainwater collector, to wear on your backpack, on your way to the office. Alternatively, lap up water from a nearby puddle. This is Europe, so it must be drinkable, right?!
At-home microbiome testing kits
Research into the gut microbiome has boomed in the last two decades, which means that sending a stool sample to someone you don’t know is no longer considered socially unacceptable. If anything, it’s a sign of self care. For a tidy fee, laboratories will pore over your poop to understand the community of microorganisms which make up your gut microbiome and maybe explain why you’re such a moodhoover, Gary!
Don’t worry if you get a shitty score (groan), send more cash and the nice people in white coats will suggest productivity tips for your colon bacteria to get back to doing what they do best: making your poop tipp topp! Alternatively, skip the middleman and just wash back some sauerkraut with a bowl of miso soup, and a cup of kombucha. Your fermented food shopping list will probably cost the same as the test and the results will be just as shitty.
Cold water plunging
With the amount of cold water just sitting around in Luxembourg, you’d think that it would cost nothing to dip your bod in a pool of freezing water. Wrong! Savvy entrepreneurs have turned the simple act of having a cold bath into a business. Damn, why didn’t I think of that? Research suggests that ice water reduces inflammation, speeding up the repair of muscles. It can also impact metabolic activity, hormone production and blood flow and give you hypothermia. Fun! Unless your boiler is broken at home, maybe pay the expert the money to avoid turning into a human popsicle.
Pastries
For the price of five fancy doughnuts or cinnamon buns, you could buy your own doughnut maker. Just remember to feed him and pay for his dental care.
Bubble tea
I have a theory that these bubble tea shops were created by a cabal of dentists, serving cavity-inducing confections, designed to fill up their patient lists. I recently had a bubble tea that was so full of sugar, I woke up with a toothache, in the Alzette river, naked except for a cinnamon bun, two cocktail umbrellas and the sense that my gut microbiome was finally seeing the world.
Fresh herbs
You know the fresh herbs that come with their roots still attached, to make you foolishly believe that unlike your past relationships: “Maybe I can keep this one alive!”
Unless you own a grow room (and no, having mould in your bathroom doesn’t count), UV lights and a finger so green you might wanna get it checked for gangrene, then chances are high that little bastard of a basil plant you paid €5 for in Cactus will likely go harakiri before you can say “hey pesto!”.
Gym membership
Let’s face it, you’re not using that Basic Fit subscription! Can I please borrow your membership card? I’d like to expand my cocktail empire into your locker where I can make killer cocktails that will make you forget about the sweaty feet smell in the changing rooms. I’m working on some new recipes. How do you like the sound of “Pecs on the beach”, “Pis-cold shower” and the “Quadfather”? The drinks are packed with expensive herbs that your gut will love, not forgetting tonnes of Mg + Fe and a very widely available ingredient: the tears of an expat living beyond their means. If you like, we can split the gym membership cost?