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We arrived in Haro, in the Rioja wine region, a few hours ago and found out that the hotel has free Internet access. Since it’s raining and we’re all pooped, what better time for an update on our travels?

The weather has not been what we hoped. Rain has been a central feature of this trip and the locals keep telling us that the weather is unusual for this time of year. When we visited Spain in April 2003, we were fairly baked before we left with the temps regularly in the high 80’s. In contrast, we have really only had one or two days of full-on sun in the couple weeks we have been here and most days have been at least partly cloudy, with the weather often clearing in the afternoon. Still, we both only packed a single pair of pants figuring it would be hot. Not so.

Everything in the south was exactly how we remembered it, except for those few new places we visited, like Córdoba, which we liked just fine. We found the people in Asturias and Cantabria in the north (in the region of the stunning Picos de Europa range of mountains) to be more reserved and slightly less friendly than their southern countrymen. This isn’t to say people were rude, but more businesslike and less likely to open up. The folks in Bilbao and San Sebastián, however, were extremely friendly and I ended up really liking both cities more than I expected to.

Since meeting up with Brother Todd and Stephanie, we have accomplised very little except eating and drinking. This region is known for their pintxos (pronounced PEEN-chos), which are like single-serving tapas. The variety was exceptional as was the quality. Happily I took tons of pictures of the food so examples will be forthcoming. Haro, where we are tonight and tomorrow, is known for its tapas so we are looking forward to digging in. I have officially thrown moderation out the window and plan on going on a crash diet when I get back home, which makes me feel less guilty about binging now. This food is worth getting fat for.

Other than that, things are still going great but we miss the dog. We have made lots of canine friends here to help get us by. Hopefully another update soon…

Current Mood: Cansado |

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Right so we’re heading down the home stretch of our trip. I have been having problems posting to the blog, and I’m not sure if it was an IE problem (most of the Internet places have been few and far between and have only had IE) but whatever.

Things have been going very well. I have decided I was Spanish in another life. I love this country, I really do. We met Brother Todd and Stephanie in Bilbao yesterday and overindulged in tapas, wine, and beer last night. But mostly beer. And today we are all moving very slowly but managed to stumble another hour down the coast to San Sebastian.

Coming up on 1000 pictures taken so the trip will be well-documented. The food has been fantastic, the language has been a lot of fun for the most part, but the weather has not been as warm and sunny as we would have wished. Lots of funny stories, but those will have to wait.

Happy, healthy, and looking forward to coming home soon! Love and kisses to friends and family.

Current Mood: Spain |

NOTE: This post is stale due to posting problems from Europe, hence the radio silence.

Right, so Internet cafe stops have been few and far between this trip. We are coming up on the half-way point of the trip, having seen Madrid, Toledo, Sevilla, Arcos, several White Hill Towns, and now Ronda. Tomorrow we head to Granada for a night, then on to Cordoba to see Amy´s parents off before heading north to Oviedo to start the second part of our trip.

Overall, things have been fantastic. I think I must have been Spanish in another life because I absolutely love it here. We were worried that Spain might be catering to tourists more than they did five years ago when we first visited, but that´s not the case at all. There are a few things that are new, like English explanations of art in the Prado and an English advisory on the AVE train to Sevilla, but that hardly counts as spoiling a true Spanish experience.

Our Spanish is so-so. We are understood but we have a hard time understanding, especially here in the Pueblos Blancos where the Castillan accent is exceptionally thick. But generally, we do fine and probably take for granted how much having a good dose of language training actually does help.

Lots of stories, lots of (hopefully) great pictures, but those will have to wait. Hopefully another update sooner than later, but we´ll have to see. Hello and love out to all our friends and family, including my ´rents whom we left in Toledo and were continuing on through Provence up to Zurich and beyond. Hope all is well at home!

Current Mood: Bueno |

Spring is apparently the time to be terrified of dogs. Today on our walk around the block, not one but two separate people gave Athena a long, hard look before crossing the street so they wouldn’t have to pass her on the sidewalk. But would you be afraid of this face?

That has goof ball written all over it. This is also the scarf that Athena likes to dress up as a Hungarian immigrant circa 1912. Well, like might be too strong of a word—she tolerates it like a champ.

The worst part about traveling is leaving the Bean behind. She goes into deep depression when her peeps leave her, and for the next three weeks she’ll be splitting time in three different locales (our friends’ place, our place, and at leashless, lawless Camp Beulah with Amy’s parents). We’re betting we return to a basket case.

Current Mood: Anticipating Travel |

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After I put the finishing touches on one more paper, I’ll be officially done with school for the 2007-08 academic year. It was a very good semester as I really liked all my classes but man, it was a lot of work too. I’m on 33 books read for the year. Next year is still up in the air because the TA positions haven’t all shaken out yet, but the outlook is not good. There’s a chance I’ll get an admin position within the department to help out, but the numbers would have to work out for me to do it, so I don’t even know for sure what I’ll be taking next semester due to schedules and finances. Grad school—it’s not lovely.

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We leave for Madrid on Wednesday morning and I came down with a bad cold on Friday. Lots of wheezing, hacking, sore throatiness and stiffness. Nothing a nine-hour flight won’t cure, I’m sure.

I’m bringing four books on my trip: Love Medicine and The Bingo Palace by Louise Erdrich, and Child of God and The Orchard Keeper by Cormac McCarthy. Four books sounds like a lot but all but the first one are relatively short, and I have the better part of two days in airports waiting for connections. I don’t like running out of things to read while traveling so I figure better safe than sorry. I also have an e-verision of John Kessel’s Baum Plan for Financial Independence on my Blackberry just in case. (You should go download it from Creative Commons now—Kessel is awesome.)

There were some games happening in England yesterday. Man Ure won the league with the lowest point total since 2002, Fulham stayed up, Reading and Birmingham went down. All in all, a very entertaining year in the Premier League. Normally I would say I don’t know how I am going to survive the summer without any football to watch, but happily it’s the year of the European Championship, and all the games are on ESPN/ESPN2. We’re lucky. We really are. Did I mention it kicks off about two days after we get home? Lovely.

Current Mood: Sick |
Currently Listening To - Eddie Vedder - “Into the Wild Soundtrack”

There’s a neat tradition in world soccer called the “guard of honor” that some teams perform when their opponent has already wrapped up the league title with games yet to play. Rather than entering the pitch together, the champions are honored by their opponents forming this honor guard and applauding as they take the field. This is sportsmanship, sure, but it’s also supposed to be a motivational tactic as its also rather humbling for the squad doing the clapping.

Barcelona and Real Madrid share a particularly warm rivalry and one would think that the Catalans did not appreciate congratulating their long-time foes, especially since they went into the game a massive 14 points off the top of the table. That whole ‘guard of honor’ thing didn’t really work so much to rally the troops: Barça got whipped 4-1 to the delight of the Madrid faithful. Oops.

Gotta say that England title race has been the most interesting this year, what with Ars*nal’s fast start followed by a remarkable capitulation down the home stretch to a far superior Man Ure and far more consistent Chelski.

The battles for fourth and fifth place rather fizzled (although Villa could still pinch 5th with some luck this weekend) but the relegation battle has been frankly amazing. Right now, I would have to bet that Reading, Birmingham, and of Derby go down but the scenarios are ridiculous—if Fulham wins, Reading and Birmingham go down. If either Reading or Birmingham win and Fulham draws or loses, Fulham go down. If Birmingham wins and Reading and Fulham draw or lose, those two go down. And so on.

The bottom line: on the last day of the season, these teams are separated by a single point and two of them will get relegated. Fulham, against all odds, now control their own fate. Sunday is going to be unbelievable.

Right, the radio silence has been due to schoolwork, in case you were wondering. I have the first draft of one paper done, I’m about 5 pages deep in the other, I finished the last novel of the semester Monday, had my last class for one course yesterday, completed a live group project yesterday, finished reading the last short stories for workshop last night…it’s all coming to a close in a relatively organized flurry.

And in a cunning move, the university IT department decided now would be the right time to upgrade campus email. That’s right, the last week of classes. The week before finals. It’s been taking, no lie, about two minutes for the Inbox to open and then another minute or so to open new emails. Were they not aware that 90% of the users will be off campus in two weeks?

So between now and Tuesday I have to revise one paper and finish and revise another. That’s six days. My aim is to be done by the weekend so I square things away for Spain. Can’t come soon enough.

Current Mood: Okay |

On the other side of this semester’s finish line lies Spain:

We’re going for three weeks. Here’s the general itinerary:

Days 01-03 - Madrid & Toledo w/both sets of parents
Days 04-08 - Sevilla & Pueblos Blancos w/Amy’s parents
Days 09-11 - Granada & Cordoba w/Amy’s parents
Days 12-13 - Picos de Europa
Days 14-16 - Bilbao & San Sebastian w/Todd & Steph
Days 17-19 - Rioja Region via Haro w/Todd & Steph
Days 20-22 - Pyrenees & Zaragoza

We have already done the first 9 days when we visited Spain back in 2003, but back then we went from Granada to Barcelona and then on to France. Now we’re doing a broad sweep of the northern part of the country.

This trip takes another sizable chunk out of our Iberian campaign of conquest. The areas that we will still not have seen include the far northwest of Spain (Santiago & A Coruña), east of Madrid and down the coast (south of Barcelona to Valencia to Almería), the northern region from Madrid (Salamanca & Segovia), and the southern Algarve Coast in Portugal (Lagos to Faro).

But that’ll have to be another trip or two. Far, far in the future unless we strike it rich or the Euro’s value is cut in half. We planned this trip a few years ago long before the dollar tanked and the Euro skyrocketed. We’re thinking it will be interesting to compare the Spain of ‘03 to the Spain of ‘08, as we believe tourism has been on the rise. The fact that Spain did not cater to tourists made us fall in love the country. We hope that still exists.

Oh, and I should mention that our attack dog Athena will staying at home with a sitter, so don’t even think about trying to break in while we’re gone or she will feast on your blood. Seriously.

Current Mood: Procrastinating Paper Writing |

Bad news for Amy because early reviews for Iron Man have been overwhelmingly positive. Watching the trailer a few weeks back I was nervous because I thought it, like most comic book adaptations, could be really great or oh-so-wrong. Critics tend not to fall on the side of nostalgia so I have to believe that the movie is worth seeing on the big screen. I read a lot of comic books in my past, and Iron Man was one of the staples. I would like to add that casting Robert Downey Jr. as the alcoholic Tony Stark was pure genius. I doubt that gets played up in the movie though.

I also have had the great fortune to catch one the best movies of all time, Conan the Barbarian, on cable a couple times in the past few weeks. I think I could watch it from beginning to end a dozen times without getting tired of it. Paired with The Terminator, this blows away the rest of Arnie’s catalog. Well, maybe not Twins or Kindergarten Cop.

Anyway, I understand that there’s a remake in the works. One question: why? The original is perfect, the sequel couldn’t have been much worse. I am sincerely hoping that this is just another Conan movie and not a sequel per se, just like how Batman Begins was not a sequel to the other barfy series.

I have read very little of Robert Howard’s Conan, but what I’ve read is a wonderful guilty pleasure. Like most comic book characters, Conan has an enormous mythology to mine for a decent existing storyline or (tremble) to write a new one. From what I understand, Conan the Barbarian was cobbled together from a number of different story lines, but it works as a cohesive whole.

Making another Conan movie is a huge risk regardless because there’s only one Arnie. Let’s hope that they don’t screw it up too badly…

Current Mood: Weekend Looking |

Awhile back when I was reading a lot Cormac McCarthy I wrote a post on the Western genre, which I didn’t know too much about but had some general impressions. I wasn’t so far off.

I’m listening to Owen Wister’s The Virginian right now, the book that more or less launched the genre, and it’s friggin’ fascinating. In the aforementioned post I made a comment about the Western being an aristocratic genre; I’m only a fraction into The Virginian but that point is being shouted out loud and clear. The Virginian of the story is a rugged gentleman, a point where sweat and sophistication meet in perfect harmony. He and his ilk have already been referred to as “chivalrous” and it’s clear that the Virginian is a Western knight-errant. And then there’s this whole notion of what the American West means and who belongs there. (I’m also keeping one ear out for any mention of the American Indian, which is a different topic entirely)

I’m a big fan of the revisionist Westerns like McCarthy’s Blood Meridian and Border Trilogy, Eastwood’s Unforgiven, and David Milch’s Deadwood. In fact, I know these far better than I do the traditional John Wayne Western, so it’s interesting to come back to the starting point, so to speak. Of course, I also have some revisionist alternate history Westerns in mind for a novel or two, so this helps inform that yet-to-be-started project as well.

While this may be less than surprising, I’m also discovering that I have an easier time critically engaging texts that I don’t necessarily agree with. For instance, Hemingway fascinates me in spite of (or because of?) his portrayal of gender roles. Tolkien fascinates me even though I don’t subscribe to the theology that makes his world tick. And I’m finding Wister fascinates me for the depiction of a West that never was.

Current Mood: Good |