Madrid t-shirt update

One that says:

"Are you ready for THIS?"

From Mango.

The Madrid Sound

So far, Spain is full of:

bats
stray kittens
tiny coffee
tiny nail polish
t-shirts that say "ALLO OUI" and "CZECH IT OUT"
sideways closets
juice mixed with milk
wine mixed with coke
pickled white asparagus
ham mixed with pasta
ham mixed with beets
Mexican-smelling laundry detergent
tiny chairs


I know the word for:

slower
knee
ball
table
to-go
air conditioned
suburb
curly
nutri-sweet
wine mixed with coke
scrambled eggs
schedule of classes
hair dryer
scanner
forgot

Travel briefing

According to Time Out, the greater Madrid area has very good water. My taxi driver from the airport was listening to Belle & Sebastian. Sandwiches here are not as good as sandwiches in the U.K., but the shampoo is the same. Oh, and did you know that the last Habsburg king was Charles II of Spain? He was retarded and had a big tongue.

People thought it was caused by sorcery.

So far, that's all I know about Spain. I told Charlie what I'd learned and it turns out he already knew about Charles II -- he's very knowledgeable about the Spanish monarchy!

I thought I'd be able to go to the mall to buy a hair-dryer when I got here, but all I had time for was bus-ing into the center of the town where I'm staying and buying a drink made with carrot juice and powdered milk.

Right now I'm in my residencia listening to music that other people are "sharing" through iTunes. Someone has: the entire soundtrack to Wicked, the NSync Christmas album (Home for Christmas, in case you don't know), both the live and album versions of "Unwritten" by Natasha Bedingfield, entire albums by Rockell, Pebbles, the Postal Service, Broken Social Scene, Ryan Cabrera, Ryan TEDDER, Hoobastank, Air, and Daft Punk, the soundtrack to High School Musical II, a cover of "Umbrella" by Mandy Moore, a million songs that are from video games, and many other hits. Who is this person? 24=year-old Korean male? 37-year-old gay white guy? Spanish teenager at soccer camp?

The place where I'm staying has a lot of wandering cats. There's a little white one walking by my window right now, and I'm listening to someone else's Matisyahu mp3.

I think it must be a soccer camp teenager who has all this music, because there are five more "shared libraries" that also have the Postal Service and Metric and the soundtrack to Wicked, and what are the chances of that in a sleepy exurb in the middle of Spain? Total summer camp effect.

Yesterday I was in London, experiencing the best that Hackney has to offer. I sat on a blanket and watched a dog eating a beer can in the park, for example.

The day before that I was still in Berlin! I already miss it.

JD was in Berlin, and she took this picture. It is a picture of me learning that the German word for cervix is gebärmutterhals.

We berlong

I've been saving this story up: Two days ago I was walking home from a haircut and on Houston and Elizabeth I heard a tiny child say, "Are we on the Lower East Side?" His mom replied, "I am NOT going to answer that question."

Now I'm in Berlin and it's fun. I guess I miss America, but the boys here are cute and the beer tastes better. Plus, I like how pressure-free my life is when I don't speak the language.

Is it really racist if I say that Berlin is kind of the Portland of Europe? I guess maybe it's more accurate to say that it's the Kelly Taylor of Germany. Or, maybe, the Coney Island of your mind?

Known and unknown

There is probably only one person who grew up on the Lower East Side of New York City and decided that it would be a good idea to move to Winnipeg, Manitoba. Lucky for me, we used to get on the school bus at the same stop, which is how I ended up driving 840 miles (1,340 kilometers) in a rental car to Prince Edward Island this weekend to see Karen get married at her now-husband's family's summer cottage.

I don't know what you were doing on Saturday night, but I was making fingernail marks on Delia's hand and crying like a 14 year old girl watching "A Walk To Remember" as we witnessed the best wedding of July 2008. Ocean view at sunset? Check. Family-members singing Leonard Cohen song? No problem. Lobsters and lentil pilaf? Oh, no big whoop.

I'm not the first person to have this revelation, but weddings are just about the most fun thing that there is. I wish I could go to one every weekend! I am so serious and sincere about this that I can't even bring myself to make a single joke about Prince Edward Island. There is none to make. Everything was just perfect! Even Charlottetown was good because right when we were about to decide it was the most boring place ever, two guys dressed as Matthew Cuthbert walked down the street!

Now I'm back in NYC for three days before I head east once again, this time for Berlin, London, Madrid, and then who knows where. Seriously!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DEBBIE!!!!!!!!!!!!

I know it's two days early, but I'm only human!









Never forget!!!!!!




Bittersweet!!!!

This blog entry is dedicated to the O-Town CD that Debbie keeps in her car. Love ya Debs!!!! Happy birthday forever!!!!!!

P.S., Everyone should go read Debbie's blog about Intervention.

Where do I belong?

Tonight I was eating a salad from Angelica's Kitchen To Go, and there was a bright green beetle on one of the pea sprouts. The beetle looked happy and healthy, so I took the beetle and the pea sprout and dumped them out the window, and then I ate the rest of my salad.

As I was eating the salad I thought about how the world is really divided into people who would eat the salad, people who would throw away the salad, and people who would return the salad to the restaurant. I was thinking that I hoped most of my friends would have eaten the salad. Because otherwise, what good are they?

Right then, Eddie called me. I told him about the beetle. He told me that he'd had an experience last year with insect larva on a piece of broccoli from a Chinese restaurant. He threw away the broc and never went back!

I said that while I didn't blame him under the circumstances (worms plus cheap Chinese food), I still thought I made the right choice. I mean, Angelica's uses all organic and local food or whatever. So, chances are, that beetle didn't just hatch from some grubs that were laid on a broccoli stalk that had been sitting in the kitchen for too long. That beetle is probably from somewhere nice, like West Hurley or Ashoken.

Anyway, after that, I felt kind of mixed about eating the salad. I like to think I have the moral edge over the people who would just throw it away, but do I?? Maybe I'm just lazy!

And then I remembered the time that Mrs. Goldsmith made Karen throw her ice cream away at the beginning of science lab, and at the end of lab Kar got it out of the garbage again and kept eating it. That really settled everything for me.

Also, Charlie told me that he heard on the radio that every bottle of water that gets produced uses 1/4 of a bottle worth of crude oil! Even the kind they sell at Starbucks.

Dippity Do-ed

I guess it's hard to stay bummed out when my favorite holiday is just around the corner! I can't wait for the fireworks and red, white & blue cake!

Did you know that Canada also has a July 4th, of sorts? And it's on July 1st! Does this mean that Canada became independent four days before the U.S.? I'm picturing it being kind of like V-E Day and V-J Day. But I'm pretty sure we would have learned about that in Social Studies if that's really how 1776 went down. I guess I should look it up on Wikipedia.

Anyway though, I'm going to a Canada Day barbecue tonight at Francey's house, and I made some potato salad and cole slaw. I used a combination of red and white potatoes in honor of the Canadian flag. I have some doubts about the cole slaw, but I see this as an opportunity to practice my cole slaw before the big day on Friday!

Did you know that there are new episodes of Law and Order Criminal Intent on the USA Network all summer? Well, it's true. Annie and I tried to watch one last week but we ended up catching a rerun instead. It was basically the craziest thing I have ever seen on television, except for Twin Peaks and that dream-within-a-dream Halloween episode of Facts of Life.

It was guest-starring Karen from the Wonder Years as an American Studies professor who bought really expensive shoes for this graduate student and pretended to have an affair with him so that he would kill the chair of their department. Or at least, that's what it started out being about.

I don't want to give away the whole ending, but during the five minutes that Annie was brushing her teeth, Karen Wonder Years turned out to be having a lesbian affair with another professor (played by the corporate lawyer from "North Country"), the graduate student got poisoned by peanut oil injected into his nicotine gum, and the detectives discovered that Karen Wonder Years was (a) Australian, (b) a former inmate in a Thai prison, and (c) impersonating an American Studies professor, not an actual American Studies professor. The detectives already made the joke about how she had lots of time to catch up on her reading while she was in Thai prison, so I won't. But anyway, it was crazier than anything Tootie Ramsay or Dale Cooper have ever dreamt.