I bought a toaster

So now I can prepare any of my top 4 dishes, toasted.

The good times just keep getting better.

Iberian picture show

Here are some pics from the last few weeks. If you're somewhere cold or rainy (like I am now), it might be best to stop reading now. Also, one of the captions may or may not give away the ending of the most recent Harry Potter book.

All pictures were taken by me using this camera.

Lagos, in The Algarve, Portugal (can easily be confused with Lagos, Nigeria). It's a really beautiful region.

Just beaches and hot bods.

Next I went to this villa in São Brás de Alportel (still in The Algarve).

Albufeira. Also in The Algarve. There were several women on these beaches who FORGOT HALF OF THEIR BIKINI.

Madrid.

A classy restaurant called The Ham Museum, and Real Madrid's stadium.

SummerCase Music Festival.

Portuguese sounds kind of like Russian sometimes, and kind of like French other times. The Spain Spanish-with-a-lisp thing will always bother me a little, but life's a compromise. Salud.

I deserve this weekend

This week in statistics:

16 meetings
2 cities (Madrid and London)
39*2=78 handshakes (one coming and one going - I'm destined for a cold)
4 taxi rides
13 trips on the Tube
6 trips on the DLR (Docklands Light Rail)
10 complimentary bottles of water
1 cup of tea
3 cookies

Assuming the meetings lasted about an hour each and that I talked for about 75% of each, that means I talked for 720 minutes or about 12 hours. About pretty much the same stuff over and over again.

Next week I have 17 meetings. My life is incredibly difficult.

Testimonials from houseguests at the 191

"The flat was really pretty clean, surprisingly. Unless you look really close. And it's really a nice flat. Unless you look really close."
-- Ashley Kraybill

"The aerobed slept like a dream, eh? And we were given cheese and juice before bed, which caused me to have strange dreams aboot strange things."
-- Allan Reesor-McDowell

"It was a little bizarre that there wasn't any silverware or plates, but I managed to cook an entire Mexican buffet using only aluminum foil and chopsticks. No problems with the kitchen appliances though -- they're ace."
-- Anisa Garnett

"I was forced -- even tricked -- into watching soccer, or whatever they call it in that cold, rainy city. So I mostly just sulked. The place was nice though and I can't complain about the stocked fridge. Or can I?"
-- Ashok Tholpady


Now accepting reservations for people whose names start with letters other than "A".

Foodie

I've learned my lesson once and for all regarding: ordering food from a menu I can't read.

Last weekend in Madrid I was at a tapas restaurant, and thought I could translate enough words within the menu items and descriptions to rally up a delicious feast. Historically I've not been good at guessing what to order -- in Morocco a few years ago I accidentally ordered smoked salmon for 3 consecutive dinners. I've not really enjoyed salmon since.

This meal didn't really turn out any better. I just pointed at a few things and figured that because there were words mixed in that identified cheese, bread, ham and chicken that the result would be a good one. Instead I ordered two nearly identical HUGE dishes, and a COLD OLIVE SALAD. I don't typically like cold salady things, and olives are honestly one of the more disgusting things in the world (they're brown or green and wet? come on.) I also hate wasting food so the fact that I had more food than I could ever eat even if I liked the food was upsetting.

So after eating bits and pieces I decided to get a takeaway box (which was a whole other exciting Lost in Translation exchange), thinking that I'd give my extras to one of the many homeless people I'd seen around town during the afternoon and prior night. Someone who liked olives. So then of course I couldn't find a homeless person anywhere. eh-neh-wair. I walked around for 2 hours. How unlucky can one person be? (I of course realize this is an ironic statement when juxtapositioned with actual homelessness.)

Finally I found a guy sleeping and I left the food by his bags. A few steps later I passed another homeless guy and immediately had whatever the opposite of shopper's remorse is.

Also learned during that walk that, like most countries in Europe, The Simpson's are huge in Spain. And also that the Spanish really enjoy large Bingo halls.

Back for the long haul

Okay travels are done... until August.

Madrid was good fun. On Sunday I was able to utter one of the more impressive responses to the question "What did you do last night?". That response was: "I saw Arcade Fire perform in Madrid".

It didn't really have the impact it could have, since I was still in Madrid the next day and most everyone else was at the concert (I went to Saturday night of the SummerCase music festival) as well. And also because no one there speaks English. I need to work on hablo'ing Espanol.

Apart from Arcade Fire there were some other fantastic performances. I also caught:

LCD Soundsystem
The Maccabees
Lily Allen
The Flaming Lips
Bloc Party
Scissor Sisters (who headlined the festival and started their set at 3:30am)
Belle & Sebastian (DJing though, not playing an actual show)
Editors

Arcade Fire was easily the best. It was their first show in Madrid and I was a bit confused as to how they were so popular there. Turns out that although the Spanish don't understand the lyrics (and do the whole 'singing the sounds of the words instead of the actual words' that captures my attention whenever I'm traveling), the melodies that the violins and trumpets and accordians produce sound kind of like soccer/football chants. I think even the band was pretty intrigued when the crowd started singing 'ole, ole, ole, ole' -- but to the tune of No Cars Go.

Smile like you mean it

So today there was a section in the morning paper about how improve your happiness quotient. (Eat more quotients! I mean croissants!) And one thing it said to do was to just smile for no reason... which was strange timing because I've been doing this from time to time lately (in addition to sitting up straight, eating breakfast regularly and drinking more water), and it f'ing works!

After a few awkward minutes, the world really just brightens up. We all have a lot to be thankful for. Like last evening when I was doing this, I suddenly started realizing how many beautiful birds were walking past me (birds are girls, Mom). And then I heard music playing -- something I hadn't noticed earlier when I was just walking around trying to look important. And then I went and ate sushi, and it was the BEST SUSHI EVER. But that part doesn't really count because it really was just the best sushi ever.

So try to smile more people, and not just when you're reading this blog. We are all blessed. Some with talents, some with wisdom, some with the ability to wind people up and others with the ability to calm people down. And some with trips to Madrid tomorrow so I won't be writing again until Tuesday.

Adios muchachos!