Ode to a Cool Ranch Dorito

I made the mistake today of going to the store in the embassy whilst hungry. Every processed, calorie-laden food was calling out to me. "Don't leave me here on the shelf! Take me with you!"

And so I did.

I made it as far as the bus stop before I had to open the Doritos. The first crunchy chip made me proud to be an American. Where snack food is done right.

Don't worry, I didn't actually write a poem to my chip. After all, I've written poetry on the blog before, and I think once was enough. Although it paid a lovely homage to a family that I tore apart, if I do say so myself.

And I do.

So. It's Monday, it's sunny and warm, I will be picking the kids up this afternoon with nary a jacket on, and I'm blogging with a bag of cool ranch doritos at my side.

I can ask nothing more from life. At this precise moment. Later I will ask more things of life.


We had a nice weekend. On Saturday we spent some time biking and skating in the park. When we came out of the tunnel entrance into Retiro, I felt like I was back on the diag at the University of Michigan on the first warm day of spring. There were people everywhere, laying out in the grass on blankets, having picnics, throwing frisbees...

You know, like the images they put on the university brochure, when they don't want you to think about what it will look like on the diag for the 75% of the school year where gray snow-sludge covers the paths and the idea of cute co-eds in short shorts looks more like gender-unidentifiable mummies wrapped up in parkas and the freshman fifteen.

Saturday night Josh and I had dinner plans with our friends, the Garcias. They agreed to eat "early" with us, since they know we're the strange Americans. So our reservation was at 9pm.
Ha! Early!
When Anna comes to babysit for us, she stays the night because she lives outside of the city center and the night busses run few and far between. So we didn't have any reason to rush our evening out. After dinner, we wandered around with our friends while they showed us some cool local spots. We hit a couple of places to stop for a copita, and finally got home at 3 in the morning!
It was my latest night so far in Madrid, but to see the streets full of people, dressed nicely, going in and out of restaurants, you would think it was 10pm.

At 1:30 in the morning we went up to the terrace of this building, because it's apparently not at all strange to be able to walk into city hall in the middle of the night to have an aparitivo y bebida.

Josh and I slept in the next day, went to the late service at church, and chilled out at home the rest of the evening. In a rare twist of events, the children invented a superheroes game and played together nicely for hours.

I have to write that down lest I forget it actually happened.

Now I feel the need to devote my full attention to the Doritos.

Goodbye.