The Haps

I’ve been playing this new game quite a bit since I got here called Carcassonne. It’s this map building game in which you draw pieces out of a bag, one at a time, and then place them on a growing map. You can build cities and roads, and once you have two ends to the road or enclose a city you can score points based on the length of the road or size of the city. You have to have placed the most pieces to score points. Anyways, it turns out I’m pretty good at this game. I won the first time I played and have now won seven out of eight times. Dustin is even actually trying now, and I’m still knocking him around. Good times.

So, this weekend, I went out for a walk on my own to try to get to know the city better. I brought a map and some water, and had planned out a way to try to get to the Mediterranean. I won’t bore you with too many details. Suffice to say I set off walking the wrong way down the street I had determined would take me in the general direction of the water (south). So I was basically walking to France. In any case, it was a nice walk and that was really the point. And I did get a better feel for the neighborhood. Especially once I oriented myself enough to figure out I wasn’t actually on the map anymore...but I digress. The point is, on my walk I discovered a big athletic complex, with an Olympic sized track, basketball courts, and various other cool things. I went back today to try to figure out how to get onto the jogging track and discovered it’s actually a gym. Instead of trying to figure out how to join, I thought it made more sense to just run laps around the outside of the entire complex. I decided to consider it 1/3 of a mile (even thought it’s probably more like a ½ mile) and ran six laps. It was great to get a good jog in. AND I didn’t get lost once. I walked straight to it, and straight back (along a different route no less).

I’m basically trying to settle into a good routine around here. We’re not going out all the time; a big part of that is trying to save money since there is very little inflow at the moment, but it’s also that I want to get to know Barcelona in a different way than that. I was in Europe in 2001, and even though I loved it I got really tired because we were running around so much, trying to fit in everything. Well, I also got tired because I was with my dad and brother and we started drinking at 10am every day. Regardless, I decided then that, when I came back here, I wanted to do it this way. To actually move into a city and get to know it as more of a resident than a traveler. To find all the equivalent things here that I love in Seattle; all the great little secret restaurants, the grocery stores where you can get the best stuff, how to use the mass transit system effectively...not to say that I also don’t want to know where to go to dance and drink, of course. But it’s a small aspect of a much larger goal.

I've started the process of looking for my own place; D and I are going to check out a nice spot tomorrow, about a mile away from here. It's pretty expensive but it looks really nice, and I've always been willing to spend a bit more for the right place. Besides, I guess it's a Manhattan-style free-for-all when it comes to housing here; you basically have to show up at the appointment with a big wad of cash in your pocket and be ready to throw it down at that moment, or else the person breathing down your neck will. We'll see...

Gonna go watch the big futbol match tonight, Barca vs. Chelsea. A huge match-up, even w/out Peter Cech (who got his head broke in a recent match). We’re going to go out to a bar w/ a couple of Dustin’s friends, I’m excited to check it out.

Ciao.