Celebrating Sunny Days

In Galicia we've had a pretty horrendous summer this year. Just the other day when a cold front came in Jose said, "Well, looks like spring's over!" Yeah, we never really had a summer. So we cherished every drop of sunshine that came our way. "Ooo, is that a ray? Let's go to the beach!" That sort of thing.

Today is actually an absolutely gorgeous day here in Santiago, so I decided to do a little gardening on the terrace. Here are the results...

I even splurged a few weeks back and made some homemade lemonade.

It was a little tart.

The Boat Hunter is Back

The day has finally come. Just yesterday we received a package in the mail with 9 books inside. The author of which is my husband!! We're still waiting for the other 16 books that will arrive in September, but that's ok. It's published!!

It was a long journey, but definitely worth the wait. This is Jose's 5th published book, it's by far his best, and by far the most difficult to get published! Why you ask? Because it's over 800 pages long. That's pretty much a publisher's nightmare. They want quick and easy money, and this book is comparable to an encyclopedia. But much to our surprise and excitement, the Spanish Ministry of Defense was more than happy to get their hands on it!

I can't explain in depth what it's about yet, because it won't be out on the street until September, but I will leave you with this...

Taking the Train

Every few months or so we have a board meeting with all 3 Heads of Studies and the Directors in La Coruña. The main reason I like these meetings, apart from all of the brainstorming we get done, is that I take the train. It's about a one hour commute there and one hour back. So that's two hours of alone time, where my cell phone has no signal (because of all the tunnels) so no one can call from work, no students or teachers coming to me with their problems, no dishes to clean and no laundry to be done. Just 2 hours of sitting back and reading a book or listening to my iPod and watching the green landscape out the window.

I'm a person who needs time during the day to be alone. Where I work that's utterly impossible! I'm with people and talking ALL DAY LONG. I'm not complaining, because I have some really awesome co-workers...I couldn't ask for better relationships in the workplace. But after all that talking, I come home and, of course, I want to spend time with Jose, so that means more talking! For those of you who know me... I'm not a talker. I could spend hours on end.... in silence :)

So I have to admit that those 2 hours of silence were a little piece of heaven. But I'm really glad to be home back in Santiago, and anxiously waiting for Jose to get home, because I really want to talk some more.

Little Treats

We went to Portosin again this weekend for a quick gettaway. I forgot to take my camera but it was a nice breather from the city. We ate a whole bag of sunflower seeds together on the beach, watched a school of dolphins feeding in the ría, and laughed a lot. Good times. My lips are all shrivelled up from so many sunflower seeds, but it was worth it.

Falling Kudzu

Not much has really happened since my last post. Just monotonous daily routine stuff. The most exciting part of my day today has been watching a man outside a window at work cutting down all the ivy. I wish he would stop...the kudzu was actually pretty, the plain dirty wall behind it is not.

Pudimos! 1-0

It's been 44 years since Spain has been Eurocup Champions!!!!






(photos taken from El País)

We Made it to the Eurocup Finals!!!

Last Thursday we played in the Semi-finals against Russia, and won 3-0. I'm not a huge soccer fan, but I love watching the "selección" play.

This is one of the things I love about Spain...they know how to have fun! Take a look.





This video is from early in the night. A little later on, everyone was in the fountain and people were throwing buckets of water out from the windows...just for fun.

Tonight's the big night. The final match between Spain and Germany. ¡España! ¡España!

See more Eurocup fever here

Hot, homemade meals at last!

Most of you know that I work pretty long hours. This means I don't get home until 8PM most days and some days I'm at work until 9:45 PM. That's the bad part about working at a school that teaches morning, afternoon and night classes. Anyway, because of my schedule I have absolutely no time nor desire to cook anything resembling a hot meal. We've pretty much been living off of salads, pasta, sandwiches, pizza, chinese take-out and the occassional grilled fish when we realized we need to eat healthier.

Last week we received the most amazing gift ever...La Cocinera.



Holy, freakin' cow.

It's like a Crock-Pot on acid.

This machine will cook anything and will have it ready by whenever you want. So far I've made rice with clams, mussels and "berberechos", roasted sea bream, pinenut cake, roquefort bowtie pasta. All I have to do is add the ingredients and press "start". I don't even have to mix...it does it for me. I haven't been this excited since I heard the New Kids on the Block were back together :)

What's in the News

So there are a few hot news stories going on in Spain lately.

1. Transportation / Distribution Strike: due to high gas prices (although I'm sure it's probably a little more complicated than that), truck drivers all throughout Spain have been on strike since June 8th. You can just imagine what the supermarket shelves look like around here. No fruit, no vegetables, no fresh fish, no yoghurt...nada.

2. 65-hour Work Weeks?: the European Union thinks it would be a good idea to raise the work week from 40 hours to 65 hours. What the???? Have they completely lost it?? That means the normal work week would be Monday to Saturday almost 11 hours a day. The world has gone mad.

3. Droughts and Floods: every year on the east coast of Spain the following occurs - one minute there are major droughts and politicians want to transfer water from the River Ebro, completely changing its normal course, and then a month later it starts to rain and doesn't stop, causing major floods and damage. What I want to know is...there's gotta be someone smart enough out there who can figure out how to catch all that water when it rains and store it for later. Like chipmunks.

4. Any Soccer Fans?: I'm not all that keen on it but, today Spain plays Sweden in the 2008 Eurocup. España! España! Ooooweeeh, ooweh, ooweh, ooweh, oooweeeeeh, ooooweeeeeeh

Here comes the sun...

It's a miracle...we can finally emerge from the ark and let the animals go. It's been a looong 3 months of rain.

Lucky Seven

Seven years together...

Few and Far Between

This is something that we've been talking a lot about lately. Friends. They are hard to find. Being in the working world leaves little time to go out and make friends. And in a small town like Santiago it's even harder. Friendships here go almost all the way back to pre-school, which is great, but you can just imagine how hard it is to try and squeeze into an already long established circle of friends. It's just not going to happen.

With this in mind, we were fortunate to spend time with old friends, Lindsey and Caleb, who were in town a few weekends ago from Barcelona. It was great to sit in a café with Lindsey and just talk for a few hours. I think we both really needed it, and I had really missed that. I also got to see her two amazing kids and watch a little bit of Monsters with them. Thank you Jonas for watering my flowers and picking weeds :)

And if that weren't enough, the same weekend Sarah and her husband Miquel were also in town. We took them to a few of our favorite places to eat out. Did you know you can find NC BBQ in Galicia? We're not all that different after all!

New and Improved

I'm not sure if it's really improved much, but it is new. I thought it was time for a new look.

What to do, what to do...

Jose and I are going to spend our summer vacation with Jose's brother Sergio, who lives in Oviedo, and his wife and daughter, Ana and Iria. We all really like the idea of going camping together. The only problem is that we don't know where. Last year Jose and I camped for two weeks in the province of Cadiz (southern Spain), and we loved it. We were thinking about maybe the coast of France this year. Any ideas from savvy European campers would be great!

Out and About

It's been raining non-stop for the past two weeks, but this weekend spring rushed in for a quick visit. Not knowing how long it was going to last, we jumped in the car Friday night after work and went to the coast. We did a little exploring in the nooks and crannys of an area that we frequent a lot. We stopped at beaches that we never normally stop at, went to a few fishing villages that we normally just pass by, and ate dinner at places I'd never even noticed before. All we really wanted was a break from the routine. Most of the time we just do "sota, caballo y rey" (meaning "same old, same old). And I'm sure we miss out on so much. We are starting to get out of our comfort zone and explore a little bit more.

As my father-in-law always says, "Tomorrow it's going to rain", but at least we soaked up a little sun while it lasted.

One Spring Day Last Year

We're hoping it will stop raining and the sun will come out, so we can eat jello under the awning.

Reunited

It had been about 2 years since I had seen my brother, Brian. It was nice to see that we hadn't changed a bit. We are both just a dorky as ever.

I'm hoping I won't have to wait another 2 years to see him again, though.

An Eastern North Carolina Delight

This post is dedicated to Doug Sessoms.

While travelling the past two weeks, we took a break from visiting friends and family and took a detour through eastern NC. Most people try to avoid this area at all cost, or if they do happen to stumble upon it they try to get out fast. Well not us. We headed straight towards it. Head on. Non-stop to Windsor, NC.

The highlight of the day was having NC barbecue at Bunn's Bar-B-Q. Best barbecue EVER. So if you're ever in the Windsor, NC area...don't miss it!

All our bags are packed...

...we're ready to go...

Actually, no, they're not. Some people pack a week in advance just to practice. We're not those people. I always pack at the last minute...and very light. Everyone thinks it's really funny how Jose and I travel. We all go to baggage claim to pick up our "luggage", I pick our camping pack off the belt, and the reaction we always get is, "That's all?"

Yes sir, that's all. We pack LIGHT.

But we always leave a lot heavier (in every sense of the word).

In a few hours we'll be bound for America. For those of you who'll be at RDU on Monday...just look for the zombie faced couple with the camping pack.

Elections 2008

Today was election day here in Spain, with Prime Minister Zapatero winning for a second 4-year term.

It's been pretty interesting with spanish and american elections happening at the same time. I've been able to compare the two systems and see the advantages and disadvantages of each.

One of the most blatant and abysmal differences is the length of the presidential campaign:

US - over a year long
Spain - 14 days