hola from wet madrid

mike and i are having a great time. enjoying tapas and la marcha and each other. lots of walking. lots of museums. its been rainy and wet a lot. in an internet cafe now because michael didn´t use a travel wallet and got pickpocketed on the metro. no bueno. it´s been wonderful, though, but it´s time to leave the hustle and bustle of the city for hopefully a little less action in granada. talk soon. adios from miguel and maribel...

Dona Maribel Dreams of Spain

I am so embarrased by myself, as I am so very much geeked out about our trip to Spain. I can't stop thinking about it! We leave so soon and I'm having a difficult time concentrating....

(enter dreamlike nostalgic state)
Back in 1998, I left the U.S. and my then-serious boyfriend, very reluctantly and was pretty much forced to board a TWA flight for a 6 month stint studying at la Universidad Complutense de Madrid by my wise parents. It was completely unsettling to go from my comfortable life at Marquette, my friends, my boyfriend and classes to being a complete minority. Despite the fact that at that point I had studied Spanish for 8 years, I realized that my spoken Spanish was crap. I lived with three sisters Rosa (34), Pilar (32) and Elena (27) near Quevedo and felt extremely out of place and had no idea what they were saying about 60% of the time. I walked down the street and also stood out, because of my appearance. Blonde hair and light eyes was quite attention-getting over there. "Guapa! Guapa!" At that point, I wasn't eating meat, so simply trying to find sustenance was also a challenge.

As we were all in the same boat, a lot of bonding went on between the different MU and other university students there. I formed some great friendships with Nancy, Amy, Holly, Stephanie, Erin, Katie, Brian, Dan Brown Brown Dan, Sam, Jack and Arturo. God, I was nuts about Arturo. He pretty much focused all his attention and energy on me for about 3 months and I couldn't get enough of it. It was pretty unhealthy. I didn't spend much time with anyone after that because we were together all the time. Smoking cigarettes, talking about the Simpsons and being at VIPS until the wee hours of the morning. Then I got back to the States and he stayed over there. I wrote him a letter, but he fell off the face of the earth, breaking my heart into shreds. It was crazy to go from complete and utter codependence with someone to them completely, unexplicably falling off the face of the earth and causing a lot of heartache and then heartbreak for me. It was a crazy time.

Other than being married, it was the best long-term experience of my life so far. I gained so much independence in being a minority. I loved the siestas, the wine, the fact that their dance clubs play popular music, people watching under my favorite Retiro tree and writing poetry, not wearing a watch and being on "madrid time"... So so much. I did not want to come back. It changed me forever.

Anyway, something that was missing in my last visit over there was the joy in visiting the romantic surroundings with someone whom I love and trust. I cannot wait to take Michael there. We used to go to this super cool discoteca called El Viso. Karen Marie came and visited and we had such a great night there. I seem to remember doing some interpretive dances to Backstreet Boys that night. I did a google search and I think it's still open! Definitely on the list of must-sees, along with a tour of my old neighborhood, walking down to C. Princesa and possibly taking the bus to the complutense for a drink, tapas in Pl. Santa Ana and a stop in to the Fontana de Oro to see if the flirty guys still serve cidra there, the Prado (since I took the class there, I should be able to describe every Goya, Zurburan, Murillo and Velasquez displayed, right? ughhh) and ending it up by my tree in Retiro.

Can't wait. Maybe I'll run into Nancy and Jose and Javier at Scruffy in Moncloa like the old days.... or having calimocho off of C. Princesa at the place I can't remember. I see it all in my mind, but can't remember names. Was it Casa de la Cerveza? Should be interesting.

The countdown

Had the family over for mother's day dinner last night. Not only did I get out the china and revel in the joy of using, it, but I had a great time entertaining. It was not entertaining like in the past, where I get all frazzled and spend days looking through the cookbooks to try a gazillion "sure to dazzle" recipes a la Bridget Jones blue soup and am nervous and distracted and can't relax when everyone's there, but the kind where I kept it simple. I did this a few months ago with a pre"prepped" ziti and sopapilla cheesecake bars for the in-laws right after we moved in. Last night, I tried two new recipes, one that I made prior to everyone getting there (cobbler) and a new recipe that I almost had done when they got there, just needed to bake (fish). The other things were cooking at the same time so nothing burned. I hope I can continue this trend. My menu for last night was a good example of the balanced MB entertaining: Macadamia Nut Encrusted Sea Bass was divine (you should try it), did fancy frozen green beans and frozen biscuits, easy risotto and super simple Nest Cobbler recipe:

Cobbler
preheat oven to 350. put the dish in the oven with 1 stick of butter (for the pan to heat/ butter to melt)
in the meantime, combine 1 c. sugar, 1 c. self-rising flour (or reg. flour with a 1/2 tsp of baking soda), 1 c. milk. whisk until not lumpy.
get your filling ready. for me, this means "open the can of blackberries"
after the butter is bubbling, pull the pan out, and pour in the batter. you will see it immediately starting to cook towards the edges.
pour in your fruit (towards the center) with the juice.
use a fork/spoon to spread towards (not all the way) the edges. you want to leave enough edge to have a good crust.
put back in the oven for 25-30 min. the cobbler is done when the top is a dark golden color and you can see the butter bubbling up the sides.

I can't believe we leave for Spain in 6 days. I am so excited that I was dreaming/anxious about speaking in Spanish and hotels last night. Over the weekend, we made our plane and train reservations and I found our Madrid and Nerja hotels. I am struggling to find an affordable Granada hotel. I have two options but both are 80-92 euro a night and at 3 nights, that goes above our budget. Let's hear it for two star hotels! All you do in your hotel is sleep anyway... Let's hope we get to relax and enjoy a bit amidst the planes, trains and automobiles. DH needs it and I can't wait to show him "my" Spain.

Texas Baked Beans

I just rediscovered this recipe today. Oh my, they are my favoritest baked beans ever. I got this recipe from allrecipes, but made a few modifications. These will be showing up at our houswarming party next week. A wonderful fruit for a summertime get-together!

Texas Baked Beans
1 pound jimmy dean smokehouse sausage
4 (16 ounce) cans baked beans with pork
1 (4 ounce) can canned chopped green chili peppers
1 small Vidalia onion, peeled and chopped
1 cup barbeque sauce
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 tablespoon garlic powder
1 tablespoon chili powder
3 tablespoons hot pepper sauce (e.g. Tabasco™), or to taste
In a skillet over medium heat, brown the sausage until no longer pink; drain fat, and set aside. In a 3 1/2 quart or larger slow cooker, combine the snausage, baked beans, green chilies, onion and barbeque sauce. Season with brown sugar, garlic powder, chili powder and hot pepper sauce. Cook on HIGH for 2 hours, or low for 4 to 5 hours.

Where I've been

...I've been driving through Central California.
....staying in lonely hotels
....not running or exercising
.....reading emails on my blackberry
.......frantically planning trip to espana
............planning future of my company
................ seeing matthew's adoptive parents and running into the bathroom
......................reading books. in the past two weeks, i've read- gods in alabama, the namesake, water for elephants and an elizabeth george about a murder on an english island. water for elephants was very good. it was fun to read about the circus during the depression. i giggled and cried and was shocked in my dreamy reading state.

trip to london, espana and paris is coming together. still have a few days to map out and hotels to find, but this is exciting! i am going to eat my weight in aceitunas and drink my weight in sangria soon!

ac: spontaneity

Surfer MB

Hawaii was great, despite the fact that I spent 8 lonely days away from my husband. The only thing I had to fill that void was mai tais, lots of mai tais and pina coladas, the kinship of some fun insurance people, the gorgeous hawaiian scenery and sunny skies. Not bad, but I missed him terribly. On my trip, I saw a dolphin swimming by our snorkel sailboat, a sea turtle under water while snorkeling and a whale as i was sitting by the pool. it was amazing to see these animals outside the zoo. i am really reflecting a lot on our environment lately. it is so important to me to sustain our earth for my kids. i think this is going to force me to vote Democratic this election. not sure which candidate. who do you like?

It's pretty great that I got the gift of this trip, with our trip to spain coming up so soon after. I even took a surf lesson, which was an unexpected joy and Courtney's idea. I hate how I am never the initiator for stuff like this. Maybe my permanent role is the "I'll try it once" girl. After seeing some Real Worlders on TV a few years back try to surf and fall over and over, I thought it would be pretty frustrating, but thanks to the patient instructions of our instructor "paddle, paddle, up! up!" I actually managed to stand a few times. My coworker got video, which I am guessing was pretty funny and hopefully not as embarassing as I think it will be. Paddling out on the water, looking for the next big wave and then letting it carry me in was pretty uplifting to my soul, but I imagine my hiney might have been exposed as I tried to hoist myself up on the board with my surf shirt weighing me down like a waterlogged eel.

Had a pretty grumpy day yesterday and realized that I need to work on curbing my criticism towards Mike. When I've got the blues, everything is wrong and I really need to not take that out on him. This is not one of my most attractive attributes.

Last night at WSF we talked about how everything on this earth, no matter how mundane was created for God's glory. Even the dust on my computer or the booming thunderstorm last night or the annoying people in my office. I think this is an interesting thought.

Thanks to all for the kind thoughts and blessings on the MC. It will get better.

AC: Synthesis