Birthdays at casa az traditionally start off with breakfast in bed consisting of lovely hot coffee and these fabulous arabic pastries. And so when I finally re-awoke around 9.30 yesterday morning, Nog brought in the birthday brekkie. It turned out to be a good thing that I hadn’t gone to yoga because I found out today that the first yoga class after the holidays will be tomorrow … imagine how awful it would have been if I had dragged myself out of my warm bed and walked over to the gym in the dark only to find nobody there! So that was a lucky start to what turned out to be rather a serendipitous birthday …
When I finally did get out of bed I just had time to ride the dreaded exercise bike for 45 minutes before taking a shower and getting ready to go out for lunch with Pipocas. We ended up going to one of my favourite tapa bars Enrique Becerra, because Pip had never been there before. So I introduced her to everyone and we had a wonderful lunch, including a bottle of birthday cava that ended up being “on the house”.
smoked salmon & cream cheese
organic beef burger (with José & Rafa)
cod in filo pastry
grilled beef tenderloin with garlic
Pip and I had a wonderful time “catching up” over lunch and when we finally rolled out of the bar around 4pm the idea was that I would head home and Pip would go back to work. But then we saw Pablo standing with some friends on the corner. They had just had lunch next door at La Taberna and were deciding what to do next. I mean, seriously, what are the odds? And so we all ended up going for after lunch birthday cocktails at a nearby Irish pub …
Pablo & Pipocas
Karen & Matías
Pablo & harem (me, Pip, Luisa, Karen)
Pip bailed on us after about an hour because she really did have to get back to work. As did Luisa, who it turns out teaches Pilates at my gym. Then Matías had to leave for a doctor’s appointment and his wife Karen needed to get home to pack for her trip back to the States the next day. Which seemingly left Pablo & I with no option but to walk into the next Irish pub we came across (my favourite one in Sevilla – Flaherty). Gerry the owner was there and bought us a round of birthday drinks and it seemed prudent at this time to also order a snack of Irish nachos …
I had texted Nog to invite him to meet us at Flaherty but he had an impromptu English class and so met us after that was over. And then suddenly it was 10 o’clock! So we said goodnight to Pablo and then wandered home, passing through the prettiest square in all of Sevilla …
It really was a wonderful birthday, even though I woke up around 4am trying to remember how I’d got into bed. There was a cat curled up and sleeping on either side of my head and the (still unnamed) iPhone was lying on my chest. 🙂
I think I’ll be spending the rest of today rehydrating and trying to figure out why I can’t plug the iPhone into my laptop without getting the blue screen of death before it crashes … it works okay when it’s plugged into Nog’s laptop. Any ideas?
And now I really must get up and get on that damn bike…
silverstar98121 said:
I see you managed to get a picture of your iphone in the picture of the Irish nachos, whatever the heck that is. And I can understand why you don’t remember getting in bed. Oh well, enjoy it now.
LikeLike
Linda aka Beatrice said:
Mmm, those Irish nachos look very tasty! You can keep yer filo pastry 😉
Hope the hangover’s not too bad
LikeLike
niece ( deanna) said:
the food looks delicous i’ve never had food from spain before. It looks like your b.day went well im happy for you .
LikeLike
azahar said:
Hey deanna – great to see you here! 🙂
Nah, the hangover wasn’t too bad, though I did take things pretty easy today and drank a lot of water. Went out for a walk before lunch, made a curry, watched a couple of 24 episodes on DVD, read a bit, played email scrabble, played with the iPhone (it’s still crashing my laptop) … oh, and I stopped by the gym to sort out my card for this month. So tomorrow morning I’ll be going to yoga!
LikeLike
truce said:
Glad to see you had such a fab birthday (and that your friends there were able to use it as a good excuse to have a fantastic day, too!) 🙂
iPhone crashing your mac laptop, eh? BAD iPhone. Speak sternly to it, that’s my advice.
LikeLike
archiearchive FCD said:
Wahhhh – Missed your birthday – I am so bad! Glad it was such fun and filled with wonderful food and people. As for the iPhone; if it keeps misbehaving like this, start calling it a mactini and look meaningfully at it – – –
LikeLike
Dan | thesamovar said:
Belated happy birthday az! Looks like you had a good one! Mmmm, pastries for breakfast in bed…
LikeLike
sledpress said:
I second the curiosity about what the hell is an Irish nacho. What was in them?
LikeLike
B'Elana said:
Sorry, I haven’t checked in here for a few days. Happy belated birthday! I’m glad it was such a splendid one for you. (hug)
LikeLike
azahar said:
Irish nachos are, um, nachos served in an Irish pub. Sorry that answer wasn’t more interesting. 🙂
I almost never eat sweet things, Dan, but those arabic pastries are amazing. Nuts, honey and flaky pastry …mmmm…
Apparently it’s my laptop that’s the problem, not the iPhone. In any case, I can’t configure anything until I have a name for it because the first thing that iTunes asks for is the name of the device. Maybe Pippin…
LikeLike
Matiax said:
Hola compañera, ya estoy aquí de vuelta tras haber pasado unos días magníficos. A ver si la próxima vez nos reunimos y nos hacemos un homenaje gastronómico. Un beso muy grande desde Salem,OR.
You rock!!
LikeLike
azahar said:
Hola Matías! Did Karen receive my email? Looking forward to seeing you both again … soon? Or will I have to wait until my next birthday? Also looking forward to seeing the interview (Pablo says he has it on DVD) as I missed it on television.
Hasta la proxima! And thanks again for helping make my birthday extra special.
LikeLike
Pingback: pablito’s belated birthday lunch « casa az
Pingback: just another sunday… « casa az