Eurovision weekend

Once again the last few weeks have gone by like a crazy blurrish whirl but let me give you a -hopefully shorter than last time - update on my latest antics.

1. Funnest Bank Holiday in the world ever!
A few weeks ago things weren't going so well for a few days in the world of S.H. work was stressful, my housemates remained as mute as ever, I’d been given the edge and the Hotel had no visitors for once so I was feeling a bit gloomy... but then the bank holiday arrived. yip yip... and the fun began..

On Friday I just could not wait to get out of work and go home, but when Maria from work invited me to go and see some flamenco with her.. well you know me.. I can't bear to miss out and I'm soooooo glad I went..
The bar we went to was tiny and absolutely packed by the time we got there - 45 minutes before the show began – all the seats were long gone so we had no choice but to squeeze ourselves on the steps down on the side of the stage, can’t complain too much., apart from an extremely numb backside we had a great view of an amazing performance..

The guitarist played like a god – and the singer had such an incredible voice .. it made the hairs on the back of your neck stand up . Unfortunately I do not have the words to describe how awesome they were - like the philharmonic orchestra of flamenco, so, so good. Anyway at the end the guitarist’s father also joined him on stage to play guitar and then the whole gypsy family got involved. It was excellent. Best flamenco I have ever seen or heard by far.

And if that wasn't enough excitement for one weekend in the early hours of Friday morning my Barcelona Bessie Jack's motorbike arrived in a huge truck from the UK. As well as this his friend from Switzerland had biked down to Barcelona for the weekend and so it was road trip time!!

Having never been on a 'proper motorbike' before the prospect absolutely terrified me, especially as I was to ride on the back of Nico's bike, and boy had Jack regaled me with some stories of his crazy Swiss biker friend Nico and here I was about to jump on the back of his bike... but anyway.. it was a gorgeous day and so I bit the bullet, hopped on and off to Sitges (really nice beach town not so far from Barcelona.. famous for carnival parades in Feb.. big gay population) we went...

Randomly Jack had found some Mossos de Esquadra (basically police) shirts in his apartment (!?) so he and Nico decided to adorn them on our little adventure. It was fairly amusing when Spanish people showed respect for the shirts especially when Jack pulled up alongside cars behaving badly and gave them a flash of his badge. However I think this backfired in two ways; Firstly riding along on bikes with British and Swiss number plates somehow gives the game away… and secondly I think it became clear they weren't really mossos when any attempts to speak Spanish let alone Catalan failed miserably. they should have kept their mouths closed.. Mossos de esquadra

Sitges was fun though. Laid on the beach, had a delicious ice-cream and got accosted by a pack of smurfs that were on the beach. The road from Sitges to Barcelona has really nice views of the coast line and mountains so I was able to take my mind off being on a motorbike and admire the scenery

We arrived back in Barcelona that evening with Barcelona FC having just won the league.. MAYHEM.com .. As we stood on Jack's attic terrace drinking cava, watching the fireworks all over Barcelona city and playing Freddy Mercury´s BARCELOOONA at full volume and listening to the hoots, shouts and cheers all around us it was f-king excellent! We then stuck on Land of Hope and Glory - didn't want the Catalans to get to big for their boots. Awesome.

My street that night was absolute chaos, it seemed to have become the epicentre for celebration in Barcelona with total gridlock and everyone beeping their horns at the same time .. if anyone wanted to sleep that night they didn't have much hope.. I’ve never seen anything like it.. even my boss and his mate drove around beeping.. He said it was fun.

Anyway I couldn't not go out and celebrate that night! so it was off to the multi levelled party mansion that is Danzatoria.. I love that place! After a heavy night of celebrations I headed on down to the beach the next day, laid down my towel and promptly fell fast asleep. I awoke to find a beer seller perched on the end of my towel!

'Beer?' he says..

”What the hell are you doing on my towel?” I said

'Fanta, coca cola, water ?' replies the guy

'Er no.. get the f*** off my towel'

'Have a beer'.. and tries to put one on my hand

Completely flabbergasted by his lack of understanding of the word no I shook him off my towel and went off to watch the celebratory parade.. Barcelonians are bloody crazy.. they were sitting on top of bus-stops, newspaper kiosks, madness.. at least they got a good view of the team though. The celebratory buses past by and I took a few snapshots.. I was quite pleased with my one of Ronaldhino (sp?) and they were followed by about a thousand mopeds all beeping

Anyways was pretty tired that night especially after the weekends activities and needed to prepare for the final excursion of the bank holiday.. I'd been broken in gently and now it was time for ultimate biking Road Trip of destiny.com..

Team S.H.. : Me (Shameless) Nico (Mosso) Jack (MinYon)
Destination: Costa Brava's best beaches
Plan: Find some sandy shores, clear waters, beautiful surroundings and soak up the rays

The day didn't start as smoothly as planned with us barely managing to get out of Barcelona.. what with roundabouts and Minyon going one way and us going another.. coupled with the fact that M had my phone and there was no way of communicating between us .. it was slight chaos.. we eventually found each other and M ordered me to get on his bike as Nico wasn't going fast enough (I'd warned him of the consequences if he did)... I naturally refused to be ordered about by a minyon, Nico promised to go faster and off we went. for the second time.

This time we eventually made it on our way through the mountains along the coastal road. Breathtaking views and the most gorgeous little coves.. we arrived at our first destination Tossa del Mar where we stopped for a quick drink and an opportunity to buy postcards with Tossa written on them.. simple things..

Off we went again.. in between Tossa and our next destination there were 327 bends.. M went off ahead and we followed behind slightly slower to admire the scenery (I think Nico realised his life was in danger if he went any faster than I so desired). We soon came across Jack stopped at a view point. We set down and took the opportunity to take some cool 'bike shots' and M decided that he fancied swapping bikes.. so that Nico could have a go with his. “How generous” I thought until later it transpired that the reason M wanted to swap was that he had taken the curves too fast and had a near miss with one of the not very ample practically nonexistent barriers and had scared himself silly. Hence the reason for the photo stop.. a near game over for Jack.. I wasn't too pleased to find this out after we had got home and I had been Jack's passenger. game over hussy, was not on the agenda!


We made it alive to our next destinations and stopped to admire some beaches on the way before finally arriving at La Fosca 4 hours after we had originally set off.. at 5pm this was somewhat later than planned but this did not stop me from venturing into the clearer than clear waters and going for a swim..


All was going swimmingly heh heh.. I got out, got dressed and prepared myself to head back to Barcelona when Jack thought it would be funny to throw my flip flop into sea.. I was unwilling to get undressed and go back into the water so I asked Mosso whether he would be kind enough to retrieve it for me as he was yet to get dressed.. but no.. He wanted to carry me into the water so that I could retrieve it myself.. having little choice in the matter I was taken kicking and screaming down to shore.. ‘Please don’t drop me please don’t drop me.. I don’t have any other clothes’ Nico carried on regardless wading into the water.. the flip flop was in sight.. I just had to reach down.. SPLASH.. Nico had amazingly "accidentally" lost his footing and I found myself in the med with ALL of my clothes on.. apart from my flip flop which continued to float along.. M was rolling around on the beach in tears of laughter.. I was not amused.



Having no clothes to wear Nico was obliged to lend me his shorts, leaving him wearing his swimming trunks.. and this is how we made our way back to Barcelona.. as the skies had started to cloud over and a storm seemed imminent we roosted it down the motorway to the strangest of looks from passing cars.. I guess you don’t see people riding motorbikes in their swimming trunks everyday.. We arrived back in Barcelona at 10pm.. I was so tired couldn’t be arsed to walk home and ended up crashing at Jacks..

Well how can you top the funnest bank holiday ever?

2. Eurovision weekend

Any weekend involving the Eurovision song contest has a damn good chance.

Decided to start my next weekend on Thursday night.. not the best idea.. I had planned to be home by 2am but as is always the case.. I got in at 5… the prospect of work was not appealing so I was pleased when amazingly I woke up with a sore throat and was unable to go to work.. Even more amazing was the fact that it had gone by 1400 and ever the trooper I managed to go in for a few hours in the afternoon…

As I was feeling much better I headed out for dinner with a few friends to a Mexican style restaurant and cocktail bar.. it’s pretty small but the cocktails are tasty.. I think the best and most random thing about it is that they have a massive metal hook from the ceiling so that various performers can attach their equipment and do their stuff.. very bizarre.. I have now seen a trapeze artist and one of those that loops material around themselves and swings up and down.. Another late night.. it did not bode well for the next morning when I had planned to visit the science museum.. I know! It was actually not so bad.. and at least I’ve visited a museum now.. I also learnt 2 interesting things

1. Squirrels live in nests
2. The Capybara is the world’s largest rodent.. The museum had a sunken forest area where the capybara’s were swimming and running about.. strange little buggars.


I didn’t have too much time to absorb many more interesting facts as I had a Eurovision and Mojito party to host! Provisions had to be bought and more importantly I had to learn how to make mojitos having invited everyone round to sample them. Food was to provided by our very own French chef Mr France and his Austrian sous-chef Ludwig. It was a plan and a half.

Unfortunately as is the way of the world things never quite go quite as expected. Mr F fell down the stairs of the Metro and sprained his ankle.. and I found out just how difficult it is to buy limes in Spain. However this did not deter us.. Mr F cooked on one leg helped by the anesthetic qualities of rum and mojitos were made with lemons instead, perfect!

Great night, good Eurovision show and I was pleased to see that my two favourite songs (Romania and Greece) did well.. I was less pleased to see that the 4 main countries in Europe

We headed off to Danzatoria after the contest was over (where else for a Saturday night full of fun) and I can now say that I have used up 5 of my 15 minutes of fame being interviewed for a random Dutch/German/Swedish .. (I never did find out) TV show..

When Danzatoria closed we headed over the road to the emporium of cheese that is atlantica to dance the rest of the night away to the likes of the Vengaboys and O-zone.. euro-cheese… yes!

The Unedited Stuff

Oh! There's some juicy tales today! I truly have been living up to my namesake..
So when I say I'd been given the edge and was feeling a bit gloomy what I mean is Mr C dumped me.

The weekend hadn't been going so well with him. We hadn't seen each other in 3 weeks yet and on the Friday night I persuaded him to stay over and come out with me and Jo and my cousin to a club.

Beforehand we went for dinner and ended up having a big argument about the night in Danzatoria a few weeks ago where it turns out that the English girl wanted to pull him.

Mr C to English girl: Sorry I have a girlfriend

EG to Mr C: Doesn't matter - I'm not jealous

Mr C: Well she is. And she's downstairs and will probably kill both of us.

What happened next.. I have no idea.. all I know is, when we came out of the club there was a group of girls giggling and pointing at my man,

look look that's (insert mr C's real name)

Me: How do they know your name?

Mr C: I don't know

Me: They must know it somehow

Mr C: They must have guessed

Me: Really? Guessed? I'm curious as to how I can also attain their telepathic witch-like mind reading powers

Mr C: Shrugs

Over the following days and weeks, this subject is brought up again and again until it comes to a head at the aforementioned dinner when he told me how they really knew his name.. Needless to say I was raging that he had lied.. and lied .. and lied.. he told me I was being childish, immature, ridiculous bla bla bla

Anyway he stayed on Friday, but as he still lives with Mummy and Daddy, he wasn't allowed to stay more than one night. (Really, I know how ridiculous that sounds for someone of 25 (yes read it again folks) years old) but we had arranged to go for coffee on Sunday afternoon instead.

HC was off to Gava, a nice beach outside Bcn and asked me and Jo if we would like to join him.. I thought this would be nice, so I called Mr C to let him know I would be around later than expected as I was going to the beach.

Furious does not even describe his reaction. He told me that I was behaving extremely badly and I was left flabbergasted.. For what? Postponing a coffee by a couple of hours.. Hel-lo?

Anyway, by Wednesday I had heard nothing from him so I decided to call him, he told me that he had had no intention of calling me, and this was the guy calling me childish. I went out and got drunk. On Sunday we arranged to meet - and well - he dumped me - needed stability blah blah - his parents agreed .. need I say more? He dropped me home where I started to cry and he started to try and lure me into bed for a goodbye shag. Yeh right. I sent him on his way and prepared to get ready for a date with a a guy I met on Wednesday night when I'd gone out to drown my sorrows.

The date was not a success. I guess the puffy, teary eyed look just ain't fashion.Besides Ricardo, wasn't exactly my type.. with his skin tight trousers and zip up skin tight shirt and the way he flicked his hair back and forth.. I had my doubts from the moment he picked me up. When he then started to inform me of his mono-diet consisting of turkey and plain boiled rice for breakfast, lunch and dinner to keep in with his body building regime.. I knew it wasn't going anywhere.. the icing on the cake, however, was after our parting kiss, he turned and called, "Call me - it's your turn" ?!?!?

It took me about 2-3 days to get over Mr C, and by getting over Mr C, I mean licking my wounded ego as he had dumped me before I got a chance to dump him but let us look at the best bits:

Sex on the sofa at work - did I not mention that.. oops.

Having a quickie in his room with the door open with his parents watching TV next door.

Getting to spend time doing traditional stuff in the country with his family

Watching the hilarious spanglish banter between him and J

Obviously still reeling from being a dumpee I had a bit of a crazy month.

Although not my type at all, I ended up in bed with Nico. I now thoroughly regret it as I could now maybe classify his behaviour as stalker like. He has already confessed
undying love etc. I am now scared. Jack has no idea, he would kill me or him or both.

The following week, the weekend of Eurovision, I accidentally (yes it's the truth) forgot my keys and ended up going home with Mr F. I think I am in love. He is so sweet and nice. Although I find it incredible that I could like a French guy (he thinks the same about liking an English girl). I had an amazing night and day with him but I don't think it's gonna go anywhere as he is moving back to Paris :(

This would never happen in Germany

Been nearly a month since I last wrote.. amazing how quickly time flies.. I seem to have done loads this month so I'll break it down into easi(er) reading and hopefully chronological.. but you know me and my tangents..

1. Christening of my gorgeous baby cousins - 16th April
Background: My 2 6 month old twin cousins were recently christened down in Andalucia (south of Spain where Mummy is from - about 900km from Barcelona).. I had never seen them!

After deciding not to pay 300 Euro for a flight down to Seville my only other option was to travel down on the train.. unfortunately for me, my Auntie had chosen to have the christening of my baby cousins on the same weekend as Feria de Sevilla ( a HUGE fair/festival/week long binge of drinking dancing and eating in Seville) so this meant most trains were full and I had no choice but to get the slow trains. The one on the way down was not so bad an overnight journey on 'hotel train' (not as nifty as The Hotel) where everyone has one tiny little bunk in an even tinier boat cabin type room that you share with 3 other randoms. It wasn't so bad, although I don't know if I’d do it again. The way back was terrible though, I had to get the day train, 13 hours of pure boredom hell with nothing to do and not even a tiny bunk bed to sleep on..

Anyway once I got there it was ok. My cousin's are absolutely gorge!! The christening was really nice, loads of yummy food and about 60 extended family members telling me how much I'd grown (?!). As my train was leaving from Seville on Sunday morning I used the opportunity to head to Seville the Saturday night with one of my cousins, R, and sample the delights of the infamous Feria... it was such a laugh! We were up until 6 dancing Sevillanas (sort of like flamenco) and drinking this foul stuff called rebujito which is typical of the feria but is made of some sherry type wine mixed with lemonade.. bleugh.. although after about 5 glasses it doesn't taste so bad, and I even started to quite like it. One of R's friends (gay) was also a fellow jumper on the dance floor - what a mover - between us we tore the dance floor up with our spectacular moves and jumps.
I also took the opportunity to ogle a few Andalucian guys as they are far more good looking than those from Barcelona.. I think Catalunya is too close to France to have any hope of having any good looking locals. Damnit!
At least I got a cheeky snog with my cousin's mate, L, .. tall, dark and hot AND Andalucian.. the accent makes me melt, what more can a hussy ask for

2. Birthday Fun and games!
Headed back to the UK for my bday with an American friend (California)from Barcelona who decided to get involved
Had an awesome time. Colin and J provided much comedy banter which made for an extremely comical weekend filled with Jammy dodgers and a crazy fun trip to Alton Towers where I managed to get whiplash on Nemesis - not the way forward.. Maisy and Colin's attempt to recreate the lift from Dirty Dancing and failing miserably also pleased me as did J's new mullet..

And what birthday or in fact any day would be complete without a rendition of you've lost that loving feeling and a bday cake food fight.. I wouldn't have minded so much if I'd at least got to try a mouthful..

I now have a hilarious collection of photos.. I particularly like the one's of J and Cali downing shots at 1020 am before our trip to Alton Towers and then promptly passing out in the car.. alcohol and stomach churning rides do not mix!! All in all it was a good day.. we did almost get thrown out of the park after someone (Cali) took their camera on a ride and tried to take photos.. the ride got stopped halfway up, the camera was confiscated and we were sent on our merry way around the rollercoaster or doom with a stern warning that we'd be chucked out if we tried any more stunts like that.. i would say the rest of the day went smoothly but to be fair..with Colin and Neilio getting kicked off most rides.. smooth it was not.

3. The Hotel - Latest visitor
Lately I have had the pleasure of welcoming Jo to the Hotel. Fun times were had by all.. and we managed a little trip down to a nearby beach where I amused myself collecting pebbles from the shoreline,simple things, having collected enough pebbles to start a small rock collectors museum I started to try and skim across the water instead. Unfortunately I am totally lame and my pebbles sank without a trace after 2 (max) skims. Jo managed 7.
We also went to Barcelona's version of the Feria de Sevilla - this is like trying to recreate the full moon party on Bognor beach.. lame.com.. however we tried our hand at Sevillanas and shoved some flowers in our hair and did our best to inject some Andalucian spirit into the whole event. olé!
Jo was also invited to the chicken club sailing boat event in July.. cannot wait!

4. International Car show - This weekend headed on down to the Car Show that was in Barcelona. To be honest cars have never been my thing so I don't have much to say about this other than they had an exhibit where some all terrain vehicles go up REALLY steep slopes practically vertical. We had a ride in one. It was fun.
My cousin A's boyfriend (Rat Steinberger) (who we went with) had a large white line across his forehead where he'd worn a hat in the sun. This also amused me.

5. This would never happen in German
As some of you know, my wonderful (ahem) work colleague, lets call her frauline, is German. Just lately I cannot seem to be able to get throughout the day without hearing the immortal phrase “This would never happen in Germany” .
You too can use this phrase:

· When someone doesn't answer the phone quickly enough.

· When something isn't delivered on time..

· When a shop is closed for siesta.

· or just anytime really..

Just sigh exasperatedly and declare to whoever is listening: “In Germany this would never happen.”

Lately I have taken to finishing frauline's sentences for her. As soon as I hear the sigh, I know the dreaded words are about to follow …

Just a few days ago frauline told me that she had signed up to a website where she was sure to make a few bob…

www.rentagerman.de

Frauline is convinced that this website is for real. I have told her that no-one in their right minds would want to rent a German. Let me know your thoughts. Real or not?

6. Other

Weather is hot!

Well done if you've read this far. You are truly bored at work..

Hasta la proxima.. I’ll try not to make the next one so long.