36 hours

The official countdown is on.. we are down to the final hours before takeoff and I cannot wait.

The week has been a wild blur of saying goodbye to people in all parts of this beautiful province, tears of sadness and joy and a lot of laughs.

I still have a crazy amount of stuff to do before I go again, but I feel confident that I will get everything sorted.

For now, I am still stressed and writing this with dye in my hair, laundry in the washer and a list a mile long... that's why this is so short. Haha (or jaja en espanol)

Hasta luego!

Things and Tings I'll Miss About Spain

I'll miss sleeping in until 9 or 10 am and going to the gym to swim or do weights. I'll miss the green peppers.  They are soooo much sweeter than the green peppers in Canada. I'll miss braves, and tortilla de patata. Especially the bravas on Santalo: SO GOOD! I'll miss the fantastic metro system, and walking to half of the places I need to go.  I'll miss walking anywhere. I'll miss the fact that everything I NEED is within walking distance of my house (the bank, two grocery stores and a fruit and vegetable stand, a Chinese market, restaurants, bars, downtown, montjuic, the Greek theatre, football, three metro lines, the hairdresser, and the copy place.) "I'm going to have to buy my bananas in bunches! Who does that?!" I'll miss Saturday morning football practice with my friends, Liverpool and Barbados and a bunch of random spanish guys (and pretending like I know how to play) I'll miss my balcony and sunbathing in the middle of the afternoon, while reading or writing.  I'll miss hanging my laundry right outside my bedroom and having it literally within reach to be checked or brought in.  I'll miss hearing "quieras?" and having Colombia stand outside my door with a plate full of some delicious food she's made and is sharing with me. I'll miss walking around randomly with Seatle in Gracia, Morrocan food with North Carolina,  and drinking tea with Colorado.  I'll miss not knowing (and therefore caring) what people around me are saying, and not being able to understand everything they say. I may be seen in Canada this summer, posing as a non-native speaker saying "no entiendo" and walking away from random strangers, especially men haha.  But most of all, I have to say that I will miss Barbados the most. Barbados has been my best friend for nearly the entire time I've been in Spain. We do many, many things together, including doing nothing at all. Barbados has shown me many a film this year that I really should have seen long ago (Lord of the Rings, Pulp Fiction, James Bond.. Yes, these are films I had not seen until this year.) Barbados and I have taken turns buying each other food and drink and paying for things. In some ways, I feel like this year would have been nearly impossible without this friendship. (let's not get the idea that without it I would have wimped out and come back to Canada sooner, I would have stayed, it just would have been REALLY REALLY hard.) This is the person that I talk to the most, and the person I've learned the most from. This is the person whose cooking I will miss the most and whose company I hate to be without the most.  But goodbyes have been said and now all that is left to do is throw the last few things into my bags and get on the plane.  Es el momento de ser fuerte.  See you soon, Canada!

Stressalona

I HATE PACKING!!!!!!

Things I Miss About Canada...

First and foremost, I miss my friends and family. I miss playing with my nieces and nephew, and swimming in my parent's pool. I miss making cookies with them and being the best aunt ever and having sleepovers and hugs first thing in the morning! I miss my parents, and their coffee maker (we'll be reacquainting soon enough). I miss my grandparents and stopping by their house just in time for a meal (you have to know just when to get there to get roast beef dinner and potatoes. But really, I could show up anytime and get food!) I miss going for Starbucks with my bestie and ending up walking around Walmart at 2am (and finding fabulous shoes, which I go back for and end up being the best purchase of the summer!) I miss going to Windsor and spending WAY too much money at Suzy Shier and Jacob, simply because I need new work clothes. We only buy what looks good though. I miss going to Jay's games, heckling and making Chris laugh at my comments about each of the players. And eating more chicken wings than I ever thought I could! I miss going for beer with Kyle and pretending to be a bad influence, and trying to learn French (somehow something must have stuck, because I can still READ French, even though je ne parle pas francais). I miss going swimming or running with Donia and seeing random wildlife in downtown Toronto (that happened while running, not swimming). And dying my hair every other month just because... Though, I still sort of do that... And I have a hair-dying friend here! I miss barbecued steak and roasted potatoes. I miss barbecued anything! I miss dill pickle chips (and most other flavours) and toast done in the toaster. I miss Indian food from Little India on Queen, and sushi and Thai Express. I miss eggs Benny from Fran's and poutine and wings from SkalBar. I miss Dixie and her sweet stylish nature, and my apartment in Toronto. I miss Jenn and Heather and Shenela and Sheena and Val... And everyone else from work. I miss someone I'm not supposed to miss and I hope he knows I think of him and hope he's well, even though he's not allowed to talk to me. (I secretly cheer for ManU whenever they're playing, and I hope England does well in the Euros, even though Spain is going to kick their asses!) I miss driving. I miss my cat, and even my sister's cat, but I'm sure that will pass within 5 minutes of seeing it next. I miss watching tv on a screen bigger than 15 inches. I miss talking on the phone. I miss canoeing. I miss my good running shoes (why did I ever leave Canada without them?!) I miss painting. I guess it's okay that I miss these things now, because I'll be in Canada in two weeks time and can indulge in all things HOME. Yes, that's right! June 27th I return to Canada. Hit me up if you wanna hang out, because I'll only be there for three months! My return to Spain is on September 27th, exactly three months after I'm back, so please, please, please, let's hang out this summer!! See you soon, oh Canada!

Morning Beach Walk

I wrote this yesterday morning... On the beach. I decided this morning that instead of waking up to a fridge full of spoiled food (long story, but essentially my roommate defrosted the fridge with my chicken, cheese, milk etc still inside.) I would wake up and walk on the beach. The beach is a bit of a trek from my house, but it's actually a beautiful beach if you can drag yourself the distance to get there.  So here I sit, feet in the sand, sun on my face, and I think about how much I love this place. It's so peaceful right now, but the sun is hot and the air is fresh.  Lovely.

Quality Control... Somebody's Gotta Do It!

I find myself with another quiet day, after the long weekend, and simply because it is summer I decided to take a day to do whatever I wanted. So with my day off, I decided to be somewhat productive. I realized that I have been telling myself for weeks now that I would bake cookies. Peanut butter cookies. With chocolate chips. So, ignoring the heat, I decided to bake some cookies to share with whoever comes over to my house in the next few days. (who am I kidding, no one comes over. It's just me and Colombia, and I know she'll eat a cookie or two) so I made a batch... I've quality control tested the batter and five cookies. I think they're good!! So if anyone wants to come over and eat some cookies with me, I suggest you get here quickly!

May

Well, it's been almost a month since I've posted, so I guess it's that time again. I haven't meant to be so neglectful this month, it just happened. Here's s quick re-cap on how I've been spending my days and what I've been up to: The beginning of the month brought about an uneasy anticipation. Things are happening very quickly these days in terms of the show and my life. I've been working out regularly and I feel better than I ever have before in life. It's a great feeling getting up every day at 9 am and going to the gym (not a stuffy office) and working out your muscles. I've swimming a little more regularily, as well as lifting my own body weight in press-ups and chin-up fashion. (well, that's with some assistance from the machine I'm using, but I swear I'm doing most of it myself!) men in the gym stare at me, and I'm sure at first it was because they were checking me out (I don't consider it a compliment, they would, check out a hippo if it had the face of a woman) but it think now it's out of jealous hatred. If I do say so myself, I'm looking quite good these days. My gym buddy (aka personal trainer, aka biggest critic) called me The Terminator this morning. Along with things moving quickly, many things also stopped. My BlackBerry stopped. And them my laptop stopped. Literally within days of each other. I had had my BB fixed just weeks before, and though she was being sensitive and somewhat cranky some days, she's no different than any other woman, so it's just something to deal with. But then she just stopped one day and refused to let me even BEG her to do anything (the trackpad stopped tracking...). I borrowed a friend's old BB as a replacement, and had just gotten it unlocked so as to be able to use it here when before I could update anything or load my contacts, my laptop decided to give up and die. I had come home very late from rehearsal on the Tuesday before my birthday and was just about to settle in to watch an episode of Game of Thrones when she shut off. Just like that. No goodnight, no see ya tomorrow, just nothing. I unplugged her. I plugged her back in. Nothing. I did it again. Nothing. I didn't even sigh, I just turned to my bed, crawled in and went to sleep. Two days later, I found out that it was her motherboard that died, so it would cost me roughly 3-400€ to fix it. Uumm.. On a 4 year old computer, I'm not sure that's my best option. So... I asked a friend if it's possible to rescue information off a computer without a motherboard and he said yes. Wonderful. Cut to me researching new computers and still having rehearsals every night as well as turning 28. Yes I've now had a birthday celebrated outside my lovely homeland, Canada! I celebrated by having lunch with my good friend Seattle, and going to the theatre for a 9:30-11:30pm rehearsal. ... Okay, that's not really celebrating. (During rehearsal I also had to put out fires, metaphorically, and analyse a precarios situation concerning missing beer and the idea that the play was cursed because someone said something you NEVER say in a theatre EVER a few weeks ago. We never did get the beer back). After rehearsal, I went to a friend's house. He had bought me flowers and really nice bottle of wine. I had one drink and was drunk. It's not often that I am drunk, and certainly not on one glass of red wine. That was when I remembered that my last and only meal was with Seattle. At noon. Le sigh. I drank a lot of water and went to bed. The next day, we went to play football, which is quickly becoming a tradition on our Saturday mornings as Barbados and his roommate Liverpool used to play quite regularily back home and cannot stand to let a week pass without kicking it around a bit. Barbados is teaching me, yes me, some tricks to handling the ball, and while I think we both know I'm somewhat of of a lost cause when it comes to sports, I think it's sweet that he takes the time to show me how to do something right. After that, it was on to the beach to laze around, soak up the sun and have a few drinks. We met more friends there and had a great time. Dinner came next and back to a friend's for more hanging out it was late to bed and early to the gym the next day, but it was worth it. In all, 28 doesn't seem so bad just yet. Since my birthday, I have also completed stage managing a show. The Secret of Annabelle Veritas happened this last weekend. It was loads of stress and many late nights filled with working out logistics and making sure my actors and director keep it together, but it worked out because the shows were a success. The audiences were good, though smaller than we had hoped for, and the actors had a great time performing. My stage hands were fantastic and in between every scene change we strategized the next move so that by Sunday night we just had to look at each other to know what everyone was doing. Yesterday, after much debate, and many trips to ask questions and bother sales people, along with researching products online, I finally made my final decision and purchased my new device to replace my laptop. I went with the iPad 3! It will do everything I currently (and foreseeable future) require, and it is lightweight, super portable and easy to use. I have nothing bad to say about it and I've even stated to get used to typing on it! (that, and I'm kicking ass as Barry Steakfries in the Jetpack game I downloaded yesterday- seriously, if you can, get it, it's fun!) So that's all for now for me. We'll see what adventures June will bring when it gets here. Tell me what is going on with you :)