Where to Begin!

The real trouble with not being consistant with blogging is that you get behind... and then it's just so difficult to know where to start.

(It is the last day of May and after a beautiful, sunny, warm day, the skies have opened up and let loose.  It is hailing at the moment!  Thunder just roared overhead and I'm glad that I decided to walk Bela early today!  Tomorrow we're supposed to have a BBQ with the family...I hope the weather clears up by then.)

I've been absent from my blog for such a long time that many of you have probably stopped checking in!  Sorry about that.  This week marks then end of most of my private classes so that means more free time and in therefore more time to share news with you.  So don't despair!

In the past few weeks, we've been doing a number of home-improvement tasks.  Thankfully, this house doesn't need a lot of improvement, but there are always little things to be done.  One of the exterior walls of the house had been left in bare brick after construction, which in itself isn't a problem except that the construction bricks used here have hollow spaces in them in order to easily run electric wires etc.  Those spaces, if they're left out in the open are a haven for wasp nests we discovered last summer.  The entire wall was filled with wasps that would of course fly over the wall into the patio for water and shade.  The simplest way to fix the problem was of course cementing over the wall.  So that was the first order of business once the weather was warm enough.

While the brick layers were here working on the wall, we wrangled them into fixing the floor tiles in our garage as well.  There were a number of loose tiles in the garage that Angelines and I had tried to fix ourselves, pulling up the tiles and sticking them back down with a really strong silicone glue.  But all our hard work resulted in many broken tiles and very few that actually held.  We have been living with shattered floor tiles in the garage for a good eight months, but that, too, has finally been fixed.  The garage looks new! :)

Our other major project on the to-do list was getting our old air conditioner installed.  If you remember we bought an AC way back when we lived in the piso and only a year after buying it we moved.  We never put it in at the house we moved to, because it wasn't really necessary.  The thick, 100-year-old walls did a pretty good job of maintaining the inside temperature.  So for three and a half years our AC sat in the garage collecting dust and our move to this house didn't change that.

Although downstairs is fairly cool in summer and the fireplace keeps us toasty all winter, the upstairs of the house tends to be hot in summer and cooler in winter.  We discovered last year when my parents were visiting and my handy-man dad was fixing things left and right, that in fact the rooms upstairs were all "wired" so to speak for air conditioning.  So installing our AC would be simple.  It has just been one of those things we haven't really gotten around to until recently though.  Sure enough, when the electrician came to put it all in, he was done in one morning and there was no extra drilling needed--painless.  This summer, I might end up moving upstairs during the hotter months. ;)

And finally, in that same upstairs bedroom, the guest room, we are getting around to painting the walls.  Some of you will remember from my house tour video that there were some pretty outrageous colors upstairs?  This room was fucsia pink...not at all relaxing.  I appologise to all our guests so far who have had to try and relax with such "noisy" walls.  We're currently just trying to cover the pink which means at least three coats of white paint.  In the end I think we'll go for some shade of green, blue-gray or perhaps earth-tone.  It will be much more subdued, that's for sure.

That's it for house projects at the moment, though there are more on the horizon.  Ahhh the joys of home-ownership. ;)

More soon (I promise)

Un año más...

Those of you who know me and know anything about La Roda and her festivals know that the romería for San Pancracio (Saint Pancras...not Pancreas!) is the highlight of the year for me.  This year was especially fun because we had a visit from our good friend Adam and his partner María.  They came down from Madrid for the weekend.  It's always fun to have visitors for these kinds of celebrations because it's like seeing and doing it all anew.

Unfortunately, I caught some kind of 24-hour stomach flu Thursday night and was in bed all day Friday.  Aside from being a completely useless hostess when my guests arrived,  I obviously wasn't feeling well enough to accompany the Saint on his way down from the hermitage this year either.  It's the first time in seven years that I haven't done the Friday night walk.  

Saturday I was feeling better and so María and I dressed up in flamenco garb (I loaned her a dress of mine) and went to the evening mass and procession around town afterwards.  This year is bittersweet because many of the parts of the romería that have been traditions in the past will be changing next year.  The Saint is finally being recognized by the local church which means that he will stay in the church year round instead of in his hermitage.  The Friday night walk to town, for example, will never happen again... so I was especially sad about my untimely illness.  

The procession around town and the street celebration will also change.  There will still be some of that, but the Saint himself won't be present at the party (matters of respect).  Because in the past the Saint wasn't allowed in the church, the hosting street would make up an alter for him in one of the neighbor's garages.  They are always beautifully decorated, and I think quite fit for a Saint, but...  what do I know.  

Anyway, this year procession was a bit more subdued than other years mostly because some of the key people who usually accompany me and a group of kids in singing sevillanas were out of town.  I couldn't help being a little disappointed that this "last year" felt somehow less celebrated.

Sunday dawned cloudless and hot.  Two years ago when my sister was here for the romería it was over 100F on our 8k walk up to the hermitage.  This year wasn't that extreme, but it was 96F and above from about 10am onward.  It was indeed a scorcher!  This year, I did not do the entire camino.  Part of it was the heat.  I walked with the crowds to the edge of town and then María and I (she was suffering a major allergic reaction to the olive pollen) turned around and headed home to cool off a bit before meeting up with the group just before the hermitage.  Once again, I'm sorry that I didn't do the walk, another first for me, but it was really very hot and in the end I think it was a smart decision.

When all was finished--the Saint placed back in his hermitage--we dug into a potluck lunch and very shortly thereafter, I had to take Adam and María to catch the train back to Madrid.  It was a very quick visit, and with so much celebrating going on it went by even quicker, but it was lovely to see them after so much time and great share the party with them, too.

I owe you more than one back-blog about my Aunt's visit and other goings on in town...but for now they'll have to wait.