Les Avantages et Les Inconvénients

Things I love about France:

• The food

• The wine

• The fashion, and the way a woman can look totally pulled together without her pants or dress having to be spray painted on (as I saw in Italy and CR)

• Did I mention the food?

• The cheese, which I guess is a subset of the food

• All the people have normal, 1940s-sized bodies… OK maybe I should go with 1950s-sized, since during the 1940s people were either in the throes of global conflict, or existing on government issued food ration coupons and the mysterious disappearance of various neighborhood pets

• The subset of society that originally embraced the hippie movement, and the youths from each generation who keep this social experiment alive (would that I had had bigger cojones in my own youth, to follow my natural inclination).

• Hanging teaspoons

Things I'm not really crazy about in France:

• While you're sitting on the sidewalk under trees, eating the aforementioned fabulous food, unbeknownst to you cannibal ants are also dining - on you - leaving the freakin itchiest bites you can imagine... which you scratch bloody in your sleep... and then they serve to mark your legs for all to see as definitely not belonging to an elegant French woman

• a dearth of strong, secure wi-fi in any hotel

• the advertised whiff of wifi in the train stations which will register on your phone but will not allow you to perform any operation on said phone

• the T****-esque 5000-foot-high digital wall that immediately renders Italian or Spanish cellular coverage null and void the minute you cross the border

• unfathomable highway directions

• after spending 2 years in Spain where lunch BEGINS at 2, I arrive with my Madrid-conditioned stomach to France where lunch strictly begins at 12 and ends at 2. Sharp.

• They don’t pick up the poo! They turn dogs of all shapes and sizes into well-mannered family members, living elbow to snout with them in 5 story walkups. But they cannot be bothered to pick up the poo on the street where they live! It reminds me of a Chris Rock - Jesse Jackson interview I once saw, where Chris kept pressing the point of cleaning up your own yard. (Coulda got him slapped!)

……….. except Parisians.

When learning French during the 1970s, we were told that French-language purists were very vigilant at keeping English-isms out of their language... all while ironically being tested on "le pullover" and "supermarche" in our weekly vocab tests.

And I think we're all aware that the French remain somewhat peeved that French (which I studied as "the global language of diplomacy") was replaced by English as "the global language of business, diplomacy, and coolness" approximately 50 years ago. ("Somewhat peeved" being a vast understatement - and actually I think this peeve-ment only relates to Parisians.)

And I've always been led to believe by US-news-outlets, that ALL THE FRENCH hate Americans (after 1950, when the chocolate and stockings ran out) but again, this appears to be only Parisians (as noted in my previous trip to Provence and as shown today in Marseille).

While strolling down a typical non-touristic street today, I heard a car BLASTING Elvis... the real Elvis, not a bad Euro cover of an Elvis song, but THE REAL ELVIS... and when I say blasting I mean blowing the shatter-proof glass out.

And then tonight... Bastille Day, btw... before the fireworks…. the loud bar down the street has a band blasting over crickly speakers, singing Beatles hits in Anglais including Sgt Pepper's and Come Together.

So………….. Again, as I experienced in 2017, we’re all the same………….. except Parisians.

The Bugle

In 2017 I decided that I could no longer watch actual US news - no need to offer justification, I think most people can relate to ostrichizationalism.

Initially my rubber-necker curiosity was quenched by watching late night comedians, but I began to worry that Colbert's barely contained rage at the existence of Mar-a-Lardo would lead to a stroke (his, and ultimately my own), and I quickly went from peering through the cracks between my fingers, to shoving my eyes brainward with increasing force, to watching even the shittiest Netflix in order to avoid any US newsiness (even with the laughs).

But participation and interest in progressive politics that started with the '68 election (oh George, we hardly knew ye) cannot be so easily abandoned, and simultaneously I really needed to hear native English being spoken (by someone other than myself… to myself… with both sides of the conversations being aloud). And so during COVID somehow I found The Bugle Podcast.

Initially started by John Oliver and his mate Andy Zaltzman, The Bugle is an almost-weekly comedic discussion of the politics of English-speaking-countries. While John (Eddie Murphy to Zaltzman's Arsenio) has moved on to other things, Andy (of the Ronald McDonald hair) has since modified The Bugle’s format to include himself plus two other comedians (guest appearing from the UK, the US, India, Australia, New Zealand and whichever of those Irelands isn't in the UK but remains in the EU - I don't recall any Canadians or South Africans but don't quote me on it). Plus Producer Chris - fuck you, Chris.

And with the introduction of COVID into our global lifestyle, came the introduction of the Zoom podcast, and several episodes being available on Youtube.

I've learned a lot about the global political scene of English speakers - and Cricket statistics and Cricket players, though nothing actually about the rules of Cricket (sadly? luckily? the jury's still out). Most importantly I've learned that we are not the only ones crying into the blizzard of blatant gaslighting..... And I've learned that Boris really is just like T****, except he can read........

And as a bonus usually I come away with a busted gut from laughter.

I find The Bugle on Apple Podcasts, and can no longer find it on Spotify. But remember, I'm outside the US, so my outlets may be different than yours. I think you'll like it.

Plus Jamais Ça

I’ve seen it stated that “As the US goes, so goes the world.”

While anyone who travels knows this definitely applies to Converse All Stars, baseball caps and hip hop culture, since the Putin-assisted election of Trump (and the close first, hinterland-pushed Brexit movement… and the actual first, the 2014 Modi election in India which we always forget as out of sight out of mind… ) everywhere you look there is this no-longer-needing-to-be-insidious surge of socially conservative (read that, pseudo religious) politics.

As I sit on the trains looking around at those feigning ignorance of English, I’ve wanted to strike up a conversation to ask how the real people feel about that Nazi-in-nationalist’s-clothing Marine Le Pen. But a train is close quarters, and French Low Talkers are, by nature, Low Listeners, and I just don’t want to start an educated-city-dweller vs religious-village-nutter riot on a day when the trains are running. So I’ve held ma langue (which I think is a serendipitous double entendre on my part! Yay me!).

Yet today, walking down the street I saw this call to arms pour les femmes, which suggested unequivocally that those with similar beliefs to me are watching, preparing, and fearing.

As seen in Marseille

It says:

Never again! Before the legalization of abortion, women had abortions with the help of knitting needles and coat hangers. Today the cancellation of the law allowing access to abortion in the US shows us that the right (to have an abortion) will never be (safe). Women, let us remain vigilant! Abortion is my right: it's my body, it's my choice, no one has the right to tell me what to do with my belly.

So, the ripple effect has indeed been noted by people outside of the US, our struggles are indeed serving as harbingers, and women (at least in France) are gearing up for a fight. Good to know! I wish you luck! Bonne chance!

(I’ve had the conversation of abortion rights with my Spanish women students, who laugh at the idea that this clamping of control on female rights could spread to Spain. While there are those in Spain who long, dewy-eyed, for the days of Franco-esque Catholic Fascism (where the loss of female autonomy falls succinctly under the category of pero por supuesto / mais bien sûr), they are only a tiny minority, usually old-moneyed, titular males comparable to angry limp-dicked old white men in the States. But the very nature of the Socialist government and society in Spain ensures extreme knee jerk reactions against any movement toward power by these Franco Fascists. Spanish women are safe - at least for now.)

Not sure I agree with the use of Plus jamais ça as the rallying cry for Pro Choice, as this seems to have been long used as the French slogan for remembering The Holocaust. Too often minor inconveniences are compared as equal to The Holocaust, by marketers with poor understanding of history, statistics, and language.

I found this article interesting, and can only attribute this to the idea that conservative Catholics are often better educated and more traveled than their Evangelical brethern.

Don't Cry for Me, Barthelona

Today I leave Spain.

I’ve been here since October 2020 - arriving right smack in the middle of the COVID kerfuffle - so my time here definitely wasn’t as exciting and tour-filled as it would have been otherwise. I learned a lot about Spain’s alternative experiences during the 1930-1940s, tending their own fascist fires and only peripherially exposed to the brand of totalitarianism that swept much of Europe. I learned a lot about the Basque region’s desires to become their own country - and I learned that the absolute best food to be had in Spain will be found in Bilbao and San Sebastian (usually cooked by men, escaping the matriarchy of the home)..

I met lots of really great people, and made inroads into the language. I found a work family that I hope I can keep for the next few years, no matter where my travels may take me. And I’ve learned so much about teaching English, plus a lot of new technical skills.

Now it’s time to go.

I'm currently in Barcelona, a fabulous city I didn't visit enough. This afternoon I begin a 10 day meander through the French Riviera, meeting up with a friend next Saturday. The following Tuesday we drive back to her home in Milan.

Before she heads off to the States (and I hang out, babysitting her puppy), we hit a few of the northern Italy sites Imissed while I was here before - Verona, Venice, maybe we’ll go George-peeping in Lake Como.

Late August, after my friend returns from the US, I’ll take a whirlwind ‘heritage tour’ through Edinburgh and Dublin, including whiskey tours into the hinterlands. And then a direct flight Dublin to CLT in September.

Plans are to be in the States for 6 weeks or so (please, don't let the Gilead coup happen until after I'm safely away!), and then head back to Costa Rica - the land of fresh food, beautiful beaches, and warm feet year round.

I’m excited to get this party started.

(I saw that The Handmaid's Tale is being banned in some school districts. I guess only the fathers are allowed to read this bit of prophesy - if they can read, that is.)

Terrifying read from 2020.

Bull!

Take a look at this article – over the weekend a guy was killed running with the bulls just a few miles south of my fair city.

Here’s a fun fact – this bull running remains prevalent throughout Spain. Nope, not just in Pamplona, though that town has the festival most widely known by outsiders.

(I’m thinking it’s because it’s just so fun to say… “Pamplona… Pam-plo-na”. If your mind immediately goes to Dennis Miller saying “Uma… U-ma… U-ma”, then your official diagnosis is Old, and I don’t care what your new wife says, grandpa, that’s what you pay her for! But I digress.)

Yep, in September, right here in Peniscola, we had the Virgin of the Hermitage Festival, where various battles between Christians and Muslims are fought and we’re treated to “heifers on the beach”.  (‘Course, I didn’t go, because I was (and remain) extremely COVID paranoid. So close to the excitement, yet so far away. Sigh.)

Often, the running scared through narrow village streets is only the first terror for the bulls that day. They may then be participants in the bull fight.

A 2020 poll suggests that 47% of Spaniards would ban this long-held cultural festivity, while only 19% believes bull running should continue.

The Twenty Year Shitshow

I'm watching Turning Point: 9/11 on NetFlix... not a whole lot of info I haven't seen in documentaries before... but gathered together in this semi-chronological way with new interviews... it's just so upsetting.

The series brought me back to that Tuesday morning... I clearly remember... I was on a call... a meeting... with this guy who was working from home... and he said "oh shit, a plane has just hit the World Trade Center... I'm watching it on The Today Show... I gotta call you back."

My employer at the time had moved to Charlotte from Manhattan, and still maintained our legal offices in the WTC, and some of our employees had spouses, relatives, etc. who were first responders. So it was personal in our office - we were worried about people we knew! A New Yorker friend was led out of the building in hysterics - I only found out later that her daughter worked in the WTC and all the phone circuits to the Northeast were down so she couldn't contact her.

About noon, the entire staff gathered in front of the building to pray and sing songs like "God Bless America". We were dismissed at 1-ish, and told to stay home on Wednesday. Nancy and I met at a bar in our neighborhood and watched the news in NY, DC and PA over several beers.

What a horrible day... a horrible week... a fucking horrible time in our history.

But damn, the snow job that followed leading to the police state and covert monitoring of our CITIZENS under the Patriot Act, enhanced interrogation that never produced viable intel, blatant lies around WMDs, the inhumanity of Abu Ghraib...... for me this aftermath is even more horrible than the Tuesday morning. I mean that - sue me. Twenty years of horror.

This series interviews many insiders turned whistle-blowers who were saying the same things we all were thinking. One guy actually said that adding Iraq into the mix, plus torture, is what led us on this 20-year path.

Damn, damn, damn........ Iraq was so unnecessary... was the door that led us to the shitshow where we are today. And was definitely the door that led to the decisions that I've made in my life over the last 10 years.

It's worth your time to watch it.

Dispatches from the Olympics

It’s been really interesting watching the Olympics from Spain.

Not that I’m a huge Olympics watcher, but my friend Barb is visiting from Milan and she enjoys watching, so we have been. (Especially, since we’re not going out into the COVID-infused air.)

One of Barb’s dog park friends is running track for Italy and yesterday we actually saw a heat where she came in 3rd. Yay Italy!

The coverage jumps around a lot and we’re seeing events that we don’t usually see – the key being that they televise the Spanish team if at all possible, and a medal match or the EEUU (USA) if Spain is not playing during a particular timeslot. So, in addition to swimming and the long jump, we’re watching a lot of women’s beach volleyball, skeet shooting, and “hand ball” (which seems to be a soccer-like game, where the ball is carried and passed by hand, using a bouncy ball a little bigger than a softball, played indoors on a kinda-sorta basketball court). We’ve seen only a little swimming and absolutely no gymnastics.  

I guess we do this in the States – only show the sports that we participate in (or excel in) but I’ve never really thought about it like this. Maybe because the US participates in most of the activities?

A big discussion in our house has been the uniforms. My US-centric understanding of the Olympics is that the uniforms are based on the flag of the country. I clearly remember lusting after the one-piece girl’s bathing suit from the 1972 Olympics. Mark Spitz, anyone?  Maybe this works for us because we have a cool flag that lends itself easily to graphic design.

And while many of the teams do follow this (perhaps mistakenly assumed) rule, of matching their flag – some with eye-scorching results – other go so far afield that it’s almost impossible to know the country from the uniform. And some uniform decisions are just kooky – like Italy doesn’t use the green, white, red, of their tricolore flag, in favor of a pretty blue, because they say the entire country is surrounded by the sea. (That seems like a stretch.)

Another big discussion for us has been about transgender athletes. Without previous discussion, we both believe that a male who has transitioned into a female has inherent advantages over natural born females. For me, I believe if person remained a boy until his voice changed and he sprouted hair ‘round his boy parts, he probably also has increased muscle development that will not be reduced with female hormone therapy. This is an unfair advantage over other females, similar to the runner whose carbon-fiber prosthetics made him "unnaturally tall".

One... Two... Tie My Shoe........

A few weeks ago I spent a day in Barcelona. While I absolutely have plans to go back and stay longer, the sheer number of people on the streets made my COVID agoraphobia start whispering shit in my ears... I'll go back when the world gets back to normal.

But while there I did an AirBNB Experience that combined my love of tangible results from my own hands, learning new things as part of my travel experience, and shoes. I made a pair of espadrilles.

OK, so I didn't make the shoes. I learned how they are made, learned the history of the shoe, decorated my own pair with the ribbons that keep them on, and learned several ways to tie them.

It was so much fun… and really interesting to understand how this vivacious couple had creatively saved their business during COVID by creating video workshops for people trapped in their homes.

The finished product…. Just waiting for an occasion.

Mercat de Colón

Before my appointment with the government, I had breakfast in the Mercat de Colón (the Columbus Market). Again I splurged with fresh squeezed Valencia orange juice and hot chocolate the consistency of pudding which I savored spoon by spoon. All around me was Spanish, French, and accented English.

Another Art Nouveau gem, this pavilion was built 1914 - 1916 as a market for a growing neighborhood. A refurbishment in 2003 has brought it to the foodie haven it is today, lined with restaurants and bars on two floor.

A Cool Hotel in Valencia

Today I'm in Valencia. I came on the train to gather some documents for my visa renewal.

I'm staying in a fabulous Art Nouveau building in the Eixample barrio. It has heavy carved wood doors, carrara marble stairs, huge stained glass windows in the stairwells, textured glass in the windows and room doors, and molding on the ceilings.

It seems there were/are three huge apartments on each floor, some remaining apartments while others have been transformed into doctor's offices and other commercial ventures.

My room is on the 6th floor in one of the large apartments - Apartment 16 - which has been sectioned into eight hotel rooms - 4 single rooms with a shared bathroom and four other rooms with private baths.

Several apartments in the building have been partitioned like this and are being rented through a hotel service. There's a check-in station on the second floor - a machine like an ATM takes your check-in info and spits out a plastic key card and a ticket with your apartment number, a room number inside that apartment, and the wifi password.

As I skipped down the stairs down I saw that there were hotel names outside of several different doors. I think this is a really great way to finance an apartment in a fantastic building. Let someone else pay the mortgage , then you move in when your home is free and clear.

Microclimate

A little train ride to Valencia illustrates how lucky I am to live in Peñíscola, where a microclimate keeps us cool and breezy.

Non-binary update!

This evening I got the report from my student on how the Spanish language is handling the non-binary situation. While this is not officially sanctioned by the Dictionary Police, it is being fostered throughout the Spanish-speaking world by the woke (guess “woke” translates to “despertó”, doesn’t have quite the same one-syllable punch). A third non-binary ending of “e” will be used - so as not to use the “it” form.

• Third person singular

  • Masculine - el

  • Feminine - ella

  • Non-binary - elle (which actually looks French)

• Third person plural

  • Masculine - ellos

  • Feminine - ellas

  • Non-binary - elles

This “e” would then also ripple throughout the articles, adjectives, and other nouns:

• Friend - amigo, amiga, amige; amigos, amigas, amiges

• The - el, la, le; los, las, les

• This - esto, esta, este; estos, estas, estes

• Tall - alto, alta, alte; altos, altas, altes

• Red - rojo, roja, roje; rojos, rojas, rojes

At what point does Microsoft add these woke words to the spellcheck/autocorrect? Before or after blessing from the Dictionary Police?

Think before dialing 9-1-1

This morning while I was booting up for work, I somehow accidentally clicked on MS News. I typically avoid US news like the plague because I get too worked up and emotional.

Michael Flynn is revving up the nutters of QAnon while his brother is the commander of all US forces in the Pacific? A black man in SC was killed by police while they were forcibly dragging him from his cell?

(How do you guys do it, cope with all the shit? But I’m not going to waste keystrokes on a rant here.)

I had to escape all this news pounding my eyes fast! I should have X-ed in the upper right corner but I was in a panic, so I quickly clicked on a link that promised some escapism - advertised as an article in Spanish listing the US presidents with the lowest IQs.

It proceeded to list ALL the US presidents and give a little bio and their IQs. At first it seemed to go from lowest to highest, but then after JFK at 159.5 it started to be a jumble. It definitely wasn’t chronological. I never figured out the order, but whew! So glad to see that GWB really was actually pretty low on the scale (as we all knew). Obama is not as high as I would expect. And Bill was the same as JFK (in so many ways!). Now, that I’m thinking about it… they didn’t show Trump. Hmmmmmmmmm, maybe the article had a lower limit… a floor?

But they did show George Washington, John Adams, James Madison…. And so instead of getting to work, I went down the rabbit hole to research IQ tests. I wanted to find out how long they’ve been around and how did we possibly know the IQ of George Washington.

Developed in 1905 by Alfred Binet, upon request by the French government, the Binet-Simon Scale was used to identify which students would need remedial assistance. This altruistic beginning was sent in a sad new direction when Stanford psychologist Lewis Terman introduced the American version of the IQ test in 1916.

Terman believed the IQ score showed the absolute limit of a person. This belief, espoused by a renowned doctor, was co-opted by eugenicists, who viewed intelligence and other social behaviors as being determined by biology and race. Results from these tests were then used to deny immigrants admittance into the US and to impose sterilization on people.

Use of the IQ test has matured and the abuses have been done away with, however one thing I read this morning brought me to a full stop:

“Some districts in the US have recently employed a maximum IQ score for admission into the police force. The fear was that those who scored too highly would eventually find the work boring and leave — after significant time and resources had been put towards their training.”

Let me say that again. Police in the US have an IQ ceiling – which the courts have upheld.

Never did find Trump’s IQ. Probably less than the Thin Blue ceiling, though.

My little Town

Peñíscola has this sweet long skinny park about 2 blocks from the beach. There are walkways on both sides with benches, and several bridges over the water. The park is filled with ducks and pigeons.

The rental umbrellas provided by the city are thatched, like the huts on Gilligan’s Island.

And apparently sailboats anchor here for the weekend.

Kiosk in the park

Michael Duckson. (There was a pigeon with better markings, but I couldn’t make the wording work as well.)

Sleeping in the parking lot across from the park.

This specific type of palm tree here reminds me of the hairstyle of some actor from the 80s… but I can’t remember who! Either that… or that guy from Bazooka Joe in the red turtleneck.

but an American does not smell as sweet

At any rate. One political correctness bandwagon that I am riding is the “America” problem, in which citizens of the USA (and its government actually) believe that they are the only ones that should be called Americans. Even though the two entire continents and the connecting isthmus, containing 34 separate nations in addition to the USA, are called America.

I guess I first became aware of the resentment felt by our neighbors about 10 years ago from comments made by a Canadian friend – because we Americans are nothing if not self-aware. Am I right? And it’s really come to be in the forefront of my mind after being in Costa Rica and now while I’m in Spain. Here I’ve met so many people from Latin America – Venezuela, Argentina, Colombia, etc. I noticed that when these folks asked me where I’m from, if I slipped up and said “I’m American” instead of “US”, everything would get really quiet. It didn’t take me long to connect the dots… Because… duh… they are too. Americans, that is.

Let’s put it in terms not so close to home. Imagine if, after the establishment of the European Union, Belgium said “Oh, the EU parliament is in our country, so we’re gonna be calling ourselves Europeans from now on”. People who heard this would look at each other and say, ummm, yeah, ok, weird but whatever…? And then these new Europeans proceeded to rename their governmental offices in countries around the globe the European Embassy, the European Consulate. And soon people needing to do business with the EU would come to these offices only to be told after standing in the line for four hours “Oooh, you’ll need to go to an EU office for that; here we only do the business for the country of Belgium, yeah.”  And the confused and exhausted person would say “But the sign says ‘European Embassy’”, and the Embassy guy would say, “Oooh, yeah, that’s because in Belgium our citizens are called Europeans, pretty cool, eh?” (Not sure why my Belgique has a Canadian accent, but hey, this shit writes itself.) The confused person would say “No, not cool, because there’s a trade alliance called the European Union! And there’s a land mass called Europe that’s been around since long before either Belgium or the European Union existed! And you people in Belgium calling yourselves Europeans is just confusing shit! Not to mention showing arrogant disregard for all those other countries in the EU… or in Europe… or both!”   

In taking Spanish classes, I noticed that while the books identify a female citizen of Italy an italiana (yep, no cap, ending with ‘a’ for female) and a male citizen of China as a chino (ending with ‘o’ for male), in the main Spanish language a US citizen (male or female, yay! for gender equality!!) is called estadounidense, which would translate into United-States-ese.

And so, since change begins at home, and even though you’ve got a lot more to worry about - what with the empire crumbling around you – maybe you can find it in your heart to stop calling yourselves Americans and say “I’m a United Statesian.” Don’t do it for me. Do it for your gardener.

A rose is a rose is a rose

I’m becoming more and more disgruntled with the expectation that I conform to what I see as increasingly rigid political correctness (although, I’m thinking it’s no longer called “political correctness” because maybe that phrase or one of the words offends 0.000093% of the population”).

I had a fun (and funny!) lesson with a 25-year-old student, explaining to him that non-binary people want to be called “they” in English so as to remove the taint of gender. We couldn’t decide if we would use the first-person-singular of the verb if there was only one person, or if we should use first-person-plural to match the “they” pronoun. They goes vs. they go. They is vs. they are. Don’t want to offend the numerically-sensitive.

Then we moved on to the same questions but for Spanish – where all nouns have a gender and the article (a, an, the, etc.) and the adjective (red, hot, fast, tall, etc.) have masculine and feminine forms which must match the noun/pronoun used (gender and numerical-sensitivity).

A masculine and feminine form, but not neutral form (as I’ve been told is present in German). So, is Spanish now expected to spontaneously generate a new neutral pronoun plus all the non-gendered articles and adjectives associated? He’s going to ask one of his more “woke” friends about the plans to combat this looming crisis and report back.

This is also the student that explained to me, in a previous class when we were discussing cultural differences, the path Spanish women took in their Liberation journey.

In the US, my recollection is that the Women’s Lib movement espoused the ideal that women should not be treated differently from men by insisting that women doing the same work shouldn’t be called a different title than men. So the suffix “-ess” became a symbol of the denigration of women’s contributions and male toxicity. Yada yada yada, so many burnt foundation garments later, now we have only Ac-Tors. Ta daaaaah! Triumph through inclusivity.

In Spain the tactic was opposite. Since nouns all have genders, and since many jobs were only done by men, some jobs only had the male gender word. Doctor or attorney, for example. And women who became doctors or attorneys refused to use the male word, insisting that a female version be created for their use. So that anyone reading their name in the phone book or on a sign on the door would know that yes, this is a doctor who is a female. Triumph through exclusivity.  

I think it’s interesting to consider that the basic grammar of a language might play a part in different responses being utilized in a worldwide issue affecting more than 50% of the global population.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhh

On my morning walks I take off my shoes at the turnaround spot and walk a good ways back in the water… to acclimate. I’ve read that by July the water will reach the same temps as we enjoy in the Carolinas, but right now it’s damned cold. It feels good to exercise again, after 15 months of self-imposed lockdown. I’m only up to 5.5 km per hour, but I’ll keep working.

Saw this cool “Police Vespa” this morning. He had parked and was manning the crosswalk at the school.

Temperatures are still a little cool here in Peñíscola, 60s F at night, 70s F during the days.

This post contains videos which cannot be scene via the RSS email. Scene… and you call yourself an English teacher!

Amputation

Someone with no sense of humor removed Jesus’ peace sign ✌🏻

Ready for the sun

My first attempt at sangria