full of hot air

Well, it was a possible medical emergency for about 4 hours.

What happened was I woke up Monday morning feeling just awful. At first I put it down to being hungover as the previous evening I had been out with you know who , so I reckoned I’d feel better after a bit of coffee and breakfast. Instead I was suddenly hit with the most amazing lower abdominal pain, as if the Alien creature was trying to bust out of my guts . . .

counting my blessings

It started off as a nice day yesterday …

new vacuum cleaner

I blame guspemar . . .

Seriously. I mean, I haven’t owned a vacuum cleaner for about 25 years.

microwave dependence

So okay, I’ve had this microwave oven for about 5-6 years now. And the other day while I was making some popcorn I heard an extra loud POP and it turned out that the spinning plate had exploded. Um … why? Is it normal for a plate to explode like this? Has this ever happened to you?

I’ve since found a place where I can buy a replacement plate, but because of the stupid Feria I won’t be able to pick it up now until Monday. Which means I will have been without a working microwave for a week!

All of which has made me realise how much I depend on my microwave for those few small but significant things in my life. I mean, I never actually ‘cook’ food in the thing. In fact, I only ever use it for making popcorn, reheating coffee and defrosting stuff. But I didn’t realise until this week that those things are almost daily occurrences at casa az.

What do you use your microwave for?

new picture

This is my new picture of Tavira doors

(click on it if you’d like a better look)

Many people have pointed out how minimalist casa az is, which I can understand as there isn’t much`superfluous’ furniture here. But mostly they notice that the walls are bare - this seems to strike people as very strange. Thing is, it isn’t that I want my walls to be bare, but I’ve never been one for putting up any old thing just to fill up wall space or ‘add a bit of colour’ to my rooms. I’ve been in homes where the walls were almost totally covered in pictures and somehow it worked in those places, but it’s just not for me. I always figured that I’d find things I liked poco á poco, that seemed to ‘belong’ somewhere in my home. So getting a new picture is kind of a big deal for me . . .

six feet under

Thanks to Pipocas I am now addicted to Six Feet Under.

She lent me the first series a couple of weeks ago, which I devoured pretty quickly. Then I picked up series 2 when we met for lunch yesterday (and did another dvd/book swap) at Casa Roman - missed a couple of good photo ops for the tapas blog that I’m still kicking myself about .

Also inadvertently spoiled a couple of upcoming surprises in the series by glancing through that Wiki link. But after getting through a slightly drunken post-lunch recuperation English class yesterday evening I made some Orville’s (hey - new popcorn mule coming in on Sunday!) and watched a couple of episodes. Does anyone else like this series as much as Pipocas and I do?

[Note to self: do not schedule classes after lunches with Pipocas]

home again

I love coming home!

No matter how fun and exciting it is to go somewhere new I always love that feeling when I’m back in Sevilla and come through my front door. I also love my bed and I am going to really enjoy sleeping with cats piled on top of me tonight.

Photos of Tavira mañana (if I ever get through the blog backlog…)

please, señorita, can we have some more?

Do you reckon they practice when I’m not home?

fruit

Do you eat five pieces of fruit a day?

I know it’s the recommended daily amount, but I’ve never understood how people find the time to eat so much fruit in one day. I eat maybe five pieces a month, though I do eat lots of veg and also have some sort of fruit juice every day (and no, not just grape juice ). It isn’t that I don’t like fruit, it’s just that I never get round to eating it.

But thanks to my friend “S” (aka Pipocas, popcorn mule and international woman of mystery) and my student & friend Paco (aka iskenderum ) that’s all about to change . . .

the best laid schemes…

. . . o’ mice an’ women, gang aft agley

Boy, do they ever! Yesterday I thought I had it all planned. Yoga first thing in the morning, then two ‘recuperation classes’ with a couple of students who’d missed classes this past week, then lunch with my new friend Traci and later on I was going to meet up with my other new friend “S” (aka Pipocas, popcorn mule and international woman of mystery) to catch up, have a couple of vinitos, and pick up my Orville’s. But then . . .