copa mundial, modorra total & spanish drag queens

spain in july is hot...

really really hot, like city, no-circulation hotness, hot. i´m here sweating a lot, and have (finally) learned to drink water -- i still don´t like it, parse, however, it is simply too expensive to buy soda/juice/whatever as a substitute.

also, i´m addicted to the world cup (i´m currently hoping france wins, my logic -- france beat spain, so if france wins, at least we lost to the winners, make sense, yeah, whatever) also, instead of fighting the constant heckling/reminding of French Futbol superiority by Alex, i´m biting the bullet and routing (rooting??) for "his" frenchy team.

work is good, going at a more constant pace, although i used to be the sole intern of the "dept. of investigation" i´m now a part of the other 2 dept´s that are here in the office...ole. monday i met the mayor of madrid and the "city councilor" (who turns out to be ex-president Aznar´s wife -- apparently this is kinda a big deal, but whatever spain). it pretty much was just me getting the little "kiss kiss" on the cheek from both of them and then having my boss say "this is emily barry, our becaria from the US"

how cool am i??? um... right

another note, i don´t like international keyboards, i´ve been trying to get used to it for quite some time now, its simply not working for me. I can´t remember where the "slash" is, nor the quotations and absolutely hate that the @ symbol is not a convenient key to type.

i just got back from lunch, it´s around 4, and i´m so tired. alas, there is no siesta built into an office schedule, just a lunch break.

apparently this tiredness post eating is called MODORRA, fun word to know and use... so yeah, i want to be asleep right now. this could also be due to the fact that NOBODY, seriously NOBODY in the country of spain gets enough sleep, eating dinner at 10, running errands after work until 9, waking up at 7:30...i haven´t really gone out the last two weekends just because i get so tired at 2. i need to do a marathon night out thou sometime soon, otherwise my "social" experience will just be a fracaso total. (total failure)

i appologize, in advance, for slipping into spanish when we get back in the fall. i´m looking for translator jobs here, probably for the gov´t, at least for a couple years before i apply to law school, or maybe apply and defer or something...regardless, that´s the plan, because i really really do like it here, even thou spain can be REDICIOUSLY frustrating at times.

this past weekend was the gay pride parade, we had "front row, 8th story" seats to it as thousands of LBGTQ human rights, equal op, etc groups marched down Gran Via (my street). During the night i went to Chueca, the gay neighbourhood of Madrid, and enjoyed the craziness of gay pride weekend for a few hours. there were 3 different stages aroudn the neighbourhood, every street was packed, me and cat (catherine senatore, also from conncoll) watched & danced at the drag queen "kareoke esque" show, and then went and disco-d it up in the Plaza de Chueca to euro techno/house/etc. overall a short (only til 1ish) but really awesome night.

so the post is a little "all over the place" but it´s an attempt to keep everybody updated.

take care, y vos hecho muuuuuucho de menos,
mil besos,
emilia