Cold or warm, all relative.

Youngest complained the other day that she was tired of wearing long pants and wants to get back into shorts again. I told her the Canadian Embassy would come and take her passport away. It is February for crying out loud and she can wear shorts at least once or twice a week. What is she complaining about. In TO we would have been out of shorts by the end of September and not back into them until at least the end of May, here there are about 6 weeks where she will only wear them about once every two weeks, maybe less...the rest of the time, I am thinking of sandals. I suppose it is all a matter of what you are used to. Then again, we viewed shorts as unnecessarily sweaty in the Bahamas....

Now I don't want to seem to be rubbing it in, cause this post is more about gratitude then showing off, or at least that is my intention, I took some photos of flowers that are growing around here to show all of you who are still snowed under. When I was in TO I would have appreciated the opportunity to recognise that the darned things still exist...and that some day.....

Back up at the top, that is some kind of sweet little flower tucked in with the long-grass. Undoubtedly a weed of some sort, but lovely.

Below is a succulent, I think, and I can tell you no more in any language.


An almond tree in blossom. How I love them.


I even saw ants today!!!! LOTS of them!!!! WOW!

And no, I haven't approached the wifi again since the last post, no emotional stamina.

Whoever writes this sh*t will spend a long long time in h*ll

Can you read that? You don't want to. It is the user's manual for an end-user, like me. Aside from the poor grammar and missing verbs, this is a piece of sh*t. Click on that to read a little of the full glory of this bit of crap.

It even tells me to plug my pen drive into the wireless router that this is the manual for. The wireless router doesn't have a port for a pen drive. Nice shooting Tex.

I'll RTFM when you write one worth reading you dick heads.

This manual brought to you by Edimax.

SITGES!!!

ROAD TRIP!!!!

Except we went by bus and train....

We went to Sitges....a major party town near BCN.....However it was Sunday morning, so fairly quiet. Used to be a fishing village, now, not so much shall we say.


There is however still sailing, these are called patins, which are mighty cool little boats, they are catamarans, which means they have two hulls side by side, and no rudder or tiller, which means there is no official system for steering, you do it by moving your weight back and forth and by adjusting the sails.

WAY cool, I haven't been out in one. Yet.


Sitges LOVES a deep deep brilliant blue...it was trim in the streets, on the windows, in the walls and archways, and I loved this one with the leaf prints.

Sitges was also home to a Catalan painter Santiago Rusinyol who built a house there, imported some El Grecos, was buddies with Picasso when he was still young, and there are several of his paintings there, as well as Ramon Casas, another brilliant Catalan painter.... we went to the museum, which was amazing, quite small, and didn't allow photos. *sulk*


The streets had lovely tile work,


Some more modern. The old part of town was all whitewashed, and narrow and it reminded us all of Seville quite a bit....


Well, except for the sea, and the Catalan...whatever.


I love doors, you can see more of the blue trim here as well.

These guys looked like something is going on. What do you think it night be?

The little fellow on the right looks like he is having a hard time.

Go girl!

First things first, Youngest had a game today and they played AMAZINGLY well. We all thought it was going to be a massacre when the other team had scored 24 points to our 2 in the first 6 minutes. This doesn't seem like something you are going to climb out of.

BUT THEY DID!!!!

They all played really really really well, every last one of them,

and they WON!!!


Youngest didn't get any points, but they would not have won if every single person wasn't playing their very best, and they were great.

Kudos.

The other thing I want to talk about, is once again....Chuck, and maybe poo and pee.

You see, every now and then Chuck really really wants to roll in the grass or moss, or dirt or on a rock. I don't know why. Sometimes we can tell, cause he is rolling in horse poo or something (eew I know, but it is a dog). Sometimes I have no idea at all why he's rolling in a certain spot.

I have a confession to make. The other day, there was a rock he was frantically trying to roll himself all over, ALL OVER....and falling down and sliding off. There was NOTHING on that rock. Nothing. So I went over and sniffed it.

Ladies and gentlemen there was nothing there I could smell. Looked completely normal to me.

Weird.

Then again, they are supposed to have much better sniffers that we do, and that does seem to be true.

I took a video of the mutt in the hills today rolling gleefully in something I could not sense in any way...let's see if I can load it up....

No. Seems I can't. Now. Why would Picasa 3, a google product, not have a capability to convert video to a format readable by Blogger, a google product. Hello? Anyone listening out there?

It is too late to try and figure this out, I'll have to tackle it another time. Here's a couple of stills I took, he rolled for a LOng long long time.





I think it felt really good.

If anyone has any hints on uploading videos, I'd welcome them...

and one more thing, the Catalans are obsessive about washing their dogs. Most dogs go to the hairdresser every month. Not all, but many many many.

How often do you wash your dog and why?

Just cause it's time? Cause he stinks? Cause he'll get itchy?

Need to know here, so experienced dog owners out there...help please!

I am so pathetic

This is a sad sad thing.

Most people get excited about going out to a cinema, or going out for a fabulous meal (although the Man just informed me that he has read of a place in BCN that does great burgers...that would be cool).

Anyway

I am ALL excited about the Catalan class I just went to.

This was not one of the serious ones that actually aims toward some kind of certificate, it is offered here in town, and is mostly aimed at all the people who never learned to write Catalan at school.

There are many many of them. (That Franco thing).

Today we studied the apostrophe. I TOLD you I was pathetic. I was so excited.

Now the apostrophe, you would think would be a fairly straight forward little number. In English it is reasonably managable, barring some issues with the whole its/it's thing, and the whole Santa Claus' issue with possessives.

I am hear to assure you, ladies and gentlemen, that we English speakers have NO problems when it comes to apostrophes.

NONE.

You see, in Catalan, there is a system

First, you have to decide whether the word is eligible for an apostrophe, it must start with an a, e, i, o, u, or h...or an s if it is an imported word that hasn't been Catalanised and is pronounced like estop rather than stop.

IF it qualifies, you then need to decide if it is masculine or feminine. This is the single most difficult step for non-native speakers and is the place where I mess up HORRIBLY.

If it is masculine, things are simple...you apostrophise it. Period. That's it.

If it is feminine however, things get more complicated. A, e, and o can all be apostrophised, and h can as well, IF the following letter is an a,e or an o, and the h is silent. You see imported words like 'hippy' and 'hardware' are not Catalanised, and so are pronounced with the Spanish *slightly horking* h, and they cannot be apostrophised.

Still with me?

This leaves us with feminine nouns starting with i and u, plus a few stray h's. Now you have to decide if the stress of the word falls on that first vowel or anywhere else in the word. *slightly tricky for those of us with poor pronunciation.*

IF it falls on the that first opening vowel, then go ahead and use the apostrophe.

IF NOT, not. *famous Catalan oath*

Would you like to hear this (semi) famous Catalan oath? It is great, sort of a reward for wading through this grammar.

This was a medieval oath of fealty, you know, one of those feudal things...Henry the Eigth loved them.

"We, who are as good as you, swear to you, who are no better than us, to accept you as our king and sovereign lord, provided you observe all our liberties and laws - but if not, not."

I am not sure Henry "Divorced, beheaded, died" would have been fond of this oath.

They ended the lesson off by saying that apostrophes are easy and straight forward. I guess by that they meant there are some rules to the whole mess. There are also exceptions (of course) I won't get into them here, it might get disheartening.

Let me just finish by saying that it was GREAT.

I am so pathetic.



oh! and for the nosey parkers in the crowd, like me, there are two more bathroom drawers/cupboards to check out, BooksBeth, and Doug both have shots up! Brave and valiant souls. There are also links to all the photos so far.

Eldest home sick

Oh my goodness,

right on the heels of the overwhelmed post Eldest is home sick. Not so sick that it is serious, but enough that I have to hang out too. She slept all morning or watched movies...

I

......*inhale*

studiedCatalan-studiedSpanish-didYoga-read-didlaundry-cleanedouttwodrawersandacupboard-readblogs-reademail-nursedthesickchild-marked-examinedtheleakinyoungest'sroom-

......*gasp*

.......*inhale*

made a whole new calender and plan for this term, drawn out and colour coded. I like doing this by hand, and I would post a photo, but I'm bagged.

As the Catalan's would put it, "he aprofitat els meus temps"

I have profited my time.... (semi-literal translation)

I didn't:

get to the dentist appointment
teach two classes
walk the dog in the hills

and that's OK too.

let's see those medicine cabinet photos...c'mon, fess up, I am not the only one tempted to check out the bathroom doors and drawers at other people's houses...and this way it's legit...I've got links up to the two I know of, mine and Bhodi's....

feelin' nosey over here.

Lunch and, well, toilets still.

Isn't that a lovely combination? Lunch and toilets? Though I suppose they are related.

I had a totally delicious lunch and I just had to share, though it seems I was so excited by the food that my hands couldn't stop shaking, either that or I was so starving I was too weak to hold the camera....

That was little red potatoes, fresh from the earth, with utterly delectable fresh green beans, from the neighbouring village, boiled together with a little of the fat from the ham there, sliced it off the leg myself....and then topped with lots of salt and pepper, amazing local olive oil and more of the ham.

I was totally intimidated by that hoof-bearing hair-wearing leg of ham that we had last year, but this year, I am GOOD to go. I was just telling the man that we should get ourselves another one when this one runs out!



See this photo here? (of course you do, you're still with me here) See the movement? The action? That would be Chuck sniffing out the ham on my lunch. He thinks we should get another leg too....all for him.


And this photo? This photo is Chuck making absolutely certain that I am aware that he would like some of the ham. You see, he is staring fixedly at the plate on the table. No distracting him now.

Onto the toilets.

As you are no doubt aware, a bit of a poo/toilet theme has been slinking into the corners around here, and since BooksBeth has a very funny post up about her bathroom, I felt compelled to respond. You see, she was commenting on things she doesn't like about her bathroom, and one of them is the clutter. A sentiment I can wholeheartedly agree with. I am a great purger.

oops, not in the toilet way, more in the Goodwill donation way

moving right along,

A while ago, a lovely blogger named Lulu from Egypt,who sadly hasn't been posting lately after she accidentally deleted her entire blog, which would make me pretty darned despondent as well, I miss you Lulu...come on out and play.

On that note, everyone, please back up your blog....I have every post automatically sent to my e-mail address as well as slurping it to another off-air, on-line blog....

Hang on, I am digressing, in huge run-on sentences.

Lulu one time had an idea that everyone could post a picture of what they could see out their kitchen window, and it was a roaring success. It made me wonder, in a horribly nosey way, what is inside people's bathroom cupboards and drawers. Now you can't ask other folks to do what you wouldn't do yourselves, so here, unchanged from actual reality, is my bathroom cupboard and one of the drawers....






So what have we here: cold medicine, nail clippers, toothbrushes, lots of different types of sunscreen (at least four), face cream, gel for giving youngest a mohawk for school, FLOSS (hey, at least I've got some) and a whole lot of varied generic medicines all in Spanish, which I have to write on in marker so I don't give someone anti-biotics when they have a headache or something like that.


And in here...band aids, empty band aid wrappers, a supply of toothpaste, razors, unused FLOSSERS for the kids, medical tape, lip goo...I have no idea what is in that scary looking silver tube....

So, what's in your drawers...if you decide to post, let me know and I'll put up a link.

Come out and play, m'kay?

Overwhelmed

Do you ever feel like the to do list is bigger than you are?

OMG.

I mean, I sort of have two lists, the day to day list -which I can assure you is long enough at any given moment, and then there is the big picture to-do list: off the top of my head we have,

1. Become fluent in Catalan (or as near as I can manage)

2. Learn Spanish

3. Ensure the girls learn Spanish

4. Ensure the girls can write English excellently

5. Get my teeth all fixed up

6. Get a physical and all the other follow ups done

7. Get all the follow ups for the look under the hood done

8. Get the kids Spanish citizenship

9. Floss - it interests me that the dentist here doesn't try and fill us with guilt and self-loathing because we don't floss three times a day. Instead she praises our level of hygiene and gives us some hints about how to improve. I am actually doing better than I ever have. Canadian dentists, are you listening???

10. Read

11. Figure out what I'm going to be when I grow up.

12. All the stuff for my work in Canada

13. All the stuff for my work here.

14. Wife/mother stuff.

15. Practice basketball with youngest

16 Yoga (I did that at least once in September anyway)

17. Stay/get in shape

18. Paint

OMG.

No wonder I read blogs. Short, enjoyable and clearly finished when it is done.

Start.

Enjoy.

Finish.

I think I'll stop here too.

Am I the only one?

Dog stuff

Meet Nona, a dear friend's dog, and Chuck's best bud. Please note that she is allowed on our couch, but Chuck isn't. She's also a girl dog, and Chuck, well, Chuck's not.

They are resting between wrestling matches.

Doesn't she look elegant?
She is too, and a princessa, and very independent.

Posting about pooches today.

Chuck and I went on a walk in the hills near us today and we had an interesting time.

We often meet a friend and Nona in a particular spot. Chuck luuuuuvvvvvsssss Nona; so once he realised where we were going, he knew that in all likelihood we would be meeting his BFF. He dragged me up the hill to our normal spot, a crossroad with four roads joining up at odd angles and a huge driveway. He carefully peered up each road, then turned around the way we came, which is where our buds normally come from too, sat down with ears perked and waited.
I was surprised and impressed.

Massive excitement when he caught sight of them.

Later, we were walking up in the hills which are lovely, but there is an area that is really gross. There is an old abandoned road that cuts through and all the young thugs go there to, well, to do stuff in their cars. Also to empty out their cars. There is garbage. The dogs love this. The dogs sometimes get diarrea after a walk there. (What a lot about poo lately). Sorry.

SO anyway, I had put his Chuck-y-ness on a leash to keep the garbage eating to a minimum, and the subsequent digestive chaos as well. We went on down the hill, and once we were, I thought, far enough away, I let him off the leash again.

The rotten dog positively TORE back up the hill, with me roaring at him as he went, so he cut off into the bushes beside the road. Suspiciously I assumed he was going to cut up the hill in the long grass so I wouldn't know what he is doing. Like my teenager, he is frequently convinced I am stupid.

I went on down the hill, cause Chuckbacca is nothing if not greedy, and I had a pocket full of cookies. As I was half-way down, Chuck flushed out a pheasant!!!! (sorry, scared out a pheasant...note to self, enough about toilets) The little stinker had scented a bird and was madly trying to find it. He did however seem quite unaware that it had flown away. Nona also seemed to have missed this fact.

Ah well.

Final surprising doggie moment today....Chuckster was lyin' around the house doing nothin' as dogs so often do, when he abruptly decided to get up, go into my bedroom, where the only phone is, sit down and stare at it fixedly. He loves the phone too. Gets him all excited. A moment later, the phone rang.

Freaky. Never seen him do it before.

The man asked if it was Nona calling.

Nooooo....her owner.

Weird.

Though it would have been weirder if the greyhound had managed to phone for herself. Next thing I know they'd be on messenger together and I would never get at the computer.

Shelf toilets

No photo for this one, you wouldn't want it.

I have to wonder though.

If you have traveled in Germany or Holland, and possibly elsewhere in Northern Europe, you may have noticed that some of the toilets are what are known as shelf toilets. These (gross) babies are designed so that your more, shall we say solid offerings rest above the waterline in clear sight with no obstructions, the liquids and the paper land elsewhere.

I assume the idea is so that you can inspect these stinky relics of past meals for, well, I cannot imagine why you would want to inspect them.

As far as I am concerned that would fall into the category of too much information. No?

I like my Spanish toilet here, it is a light grey-ish brown/dark beige colour with a narrow deep hole at the bottom. By the time you finish your business and drop the paper in, everything is decently covered and it is all dark enough to obscure any details. Flush and it all disappears without any alarmingly visible swirling and mixing, like you get in N.A. Swoosh and it's gone.

Just the way I like it.

One of the little asides of travel: the variety of toilets. Another day I may post about the truly disgusting French toilets. How do those restaurants stay open without passing cholera around I will never know. Public Spanish toilets are quite hit and miss, but NOTHING compared to the Parisian ones. The toilets on the trains in Russia in the winter with the giant sh*tsicles that had to be knocked off periodically. The loos in the trains in India where the men (bless their disgusting souls) mistakenly believe they can aim accurately through the narrow hole in the floor while standing in a swaying train; leaving a pond of *liquid* with two foot-sized islands bracketing the hole requiring you to leap onto them, spin around and squat over them all while holding your skirts up to keep them dry.

Ugh.

Too much information.

Sorry.

Shelf toilets are still weird.

I have to admit, I would love some toilet stories in the comments if you are up to it and are still reading and not retching over your own porcelain god after this gross-me-green post. C'mon, I know you have some.