LOS ANGELES

Little Betty and I hanging out after the below crying incident. She is clearly laughing about how mean she was to me. Little Satan Baby!

In LA I met Betty for the first time. LITTLE BABY BETTY IS SO ADORABLE!!!!! Granted the first day I was with her, Teeny (my sister) and my Mum went to a taping of The Ellen Show, I volunteered to baby sit Betty. She was sleeping at first and looked so lovely, she then woke up and I put her in the pram for a spot of shopping. well the damn alien was fine until I stopped to look and things and then she CRIED, it seems she just wanted to go for a little walk and all the american goods that were on offer for bargain prices due to the weakness of the dollar were not of interest to the terry towelling pink bonds jumpsuited little satan. I gave up and went back to the hotel. Then it was time for her bottle and she didnt even want it and MORE crying! It seems what she wanted after much crying was to lean her little head on my forearm in a very uncomfortable position for me, while I bounced her around the room and the halls of the hotel. FOR AN HOUR! Then she fell asleep and it wasnt even sleep time! Lazy bastard! But then she was so cute asleep I forgave her for all the pain she had just caused me.....Oh but yes, there was more pain to come. That evening, with a suspected upset tummy from the long flight, she projectile vommited her weight in spew onto me, leaving me with puddles of vommit in the creases of my jeans. THEN, the next day, all comfy on Aunty kristy´s tummy in the Baby Bjorn, Aunty Kristy suddenly feels something wet on her feet. I scream, I THINK BABY BETTY JUST PEED ON MY FEET. As I couldnt see my feet cause the view was being blocked by baby betty bouncing in the baby bjorn, my sister inspects the mysterious liquid. "Um thats not pee its poo" It seems baby bettys upset tummy is still wreaking havoc and american babies have fatter asses that the aussies cause the runny poo escaped out the sides of the ill fitting pampers. As a true trooper mother teeny wipes my feet with a wet wipe, takes the runny poo filled baby (GET HER OFF ME) snaps the baby born on her own body and heads back to the hotel to clean up. Kids are ROTTEN!

Jody (the bride) later joined us and we packed the hire car up to look like national lampoons family vacation. The car was decent sized, my suitcase was small enough to fit in the front seat of the car on the floor, everyone else however had packed as if they were immigrants leaving their countries for good... Teeny packed a GIANT suitcase and then ANOTHER medium sized one... claiming that all of Betty´s 000 sized bonds jumpsuits really do take up alot of room. So we had to make a trip to Kmart which was an adventure in itself, to buy a tarp and things to secure the goods. We had roof racks so we piled Teenys stuff of the top of the car, figuring baby Betty wouldnt care if she lost a few nappies, jumpsuits or her pram, covered it with a tarp and embaressingly drove all the way to Vegas with a bright blue tarp flapping dangerously in the wind. The Vegas mixed CD I had prepared (with great vegas hits such as viva los vegas and a great kenny rogers track) and bought along made us feel cool from the inside of the car but we certainly didnt look cool from the outside.

OK maybe Little betty is cool, both inside and out! So cute!


LA was quite fun, all I can really write about as far as sightseeing is the "tour of the stars homes" limo ride that we took. This was very fun and we of course took vino in the ride to be truly famous looking. The hightlight of the limo right was when we had consumed all of the vino and therefor were busting to pee. Where does a limo stop when its occupants need to go to the toilet? Well of course it stops at the public toilet when George Michael got busted doing dodgy business. Here we are at said toilet... so cool.














Oh and I saw my long lost friend Malko which was AWESOME as the americans would say. New Rule Malko...no wearing watches in gym class! MUA!

SAN FRANCISCO

From New York we caught a plane across to San Francisco with a brief stopover in Chicago airport where we unfortunately did not see Oprah WInfrey (bummer). after arriving in San Fransisco you instantly get the feeling you are by the water, its just got that coastal beach vibe about it. Its just so damn pretty! The architecture, the blue skies, and those streets! Damn they are steep! Everything you imagine and more. We saw some closed ones whose slopes were too dangerous for cars, but methinks you may fall backwards while walking up one...so steep. Mum, who was yelling "taxi" like a true New Yorker at any given second, had a few tantrums at the bottom or top of many of these steep streets. She didnt have a heart attack though and am sure one day (?) will thank me for making her walk the famous Lombard street. Was fantastic to have some great asian meals as they are in very very short supply in seville, we got local in chinatown and had a fabulous chinese meal with a bossy over the top waiter who pretty much forced us to order what he wanted us to.... then the next day got glam and went to a posher chinese restaurant in the Ferry Market building which was just simply divine...I LOVE FOOD!

From San Francisco we hired a car, Mum bought her Tom Tom GPS which HELLO is a travellers DREAM, what an amazing little gadget! It made everything so easy! How many cities have I been lost in! Heaps! Most notably trying to get out of Lisbon to go south and ending up in Benfica which is neither Lisbon nor south. Also missing the turn off for Verona, in Italy not once but 3 times in a row, each time having to try and turn around and come back on the highway and passing that damn Vincenza town the whole damn time... a 1 1/2 trip turned into 4 hours. But not those sorts of troubles with Tom Tom! I love him!

Tom Tom cant solve all problems though. We left San Fran at approx 8:30am... the plan was to cruise on down Highway 1 (USA version of the Great Ocean Road) enjoy the scenery, stop for lunch, see the seals, and arrive in Santa Barbara in the early evening. WELL. We started off well, I bought the best of the Beach Boys to get us in the californian mood, the sun was shining, the views were amazing, lots of cool places to stop and take pics. We stopped at a place to have lunch with amazing views. Twas during this lunch that we saw in the distance, a plume of smoke that kinda looked like a tornado. So we continue our journey, only to be later stopped (about 2.30pm) by higway patrol who said in his most bestest american accent. "Sorry mam, there is an accident and a fire, you have to go back to where you came from" "WE CAME FROM SAN FRANCISCO" I SCREAMED! Highway 1 is one highway, and for a very large part of it, it has no exits as it has coast on one side and lush forest on the other... There was no choice, we had to drive all the way back to the point where you can get the inland 101 highway.... the BORING inland 101! Nooooooo! We even missed the seals! We arrived in Santa Barbara so late there was no time to see anything and we were up at the crack of dawn to head straight to LA airport to pick up my sister teeny and my little niece Baby Betty.

NEW YORK

Being that I havent blogged for ages, I thought it about damn time I blogged about my USA trip and Jodys wedding... so long ago but so much damn fun and looking back on the pics I just want her to get married again.

I visited such great cities they have to be blogged about seperately....

We´ll start in New York...
The plan was to meet Mum in New York. Is there anything more glamorous than meeting someone in New York? Well of course in theory its glamorous but in reality after a 12 hour flight where I got drunk for the first time (love Lufthansa! They passed by after dinner asking if I wanted "Cognac or Baileys" as my after dinner beverage. Of course I accepted a Cognac as Baileys is for wimps, and they presented me with a giant glass of the throat burning and instant sleep inducing Cognac. Nice one.) We co-ordinated flight times perfectly and she arrived a couple of hours before me at JFK airport. We had an exciting reunion, hugs, kisses, but no tears, which was unusual for Mum cause she normally cries at everything, I soon found out why. She said while she was waiting she ordered a coffee so she was alert for my arrival after such a long flight from Sydney, they served her a coffee that contained so much liquid that she could have washed her car with it. She drank it of course and was so very high on the caffeine she was unable to muster even a tear for her long lost daughter.

I always try to stay in the cheapest hotels, and my mum is used to this after doing a bit of travel with me in europe, this hotel was by far one of the worst I had ever stayed it...strangely Marcos recommended it to me, and he loved it! I don´t think he stayed on the same floor as us cause ours was rough, Mums bed had a blood stain on it! I said it was brown and could have just as easily of been poo but that was no consolation. Lucky hers was a double bed and she vowed to sleep on the "clean" side, she is a good sport. We liked the crazy characters that we passed in the hall, one was a loud black prostitute (well maybe she wasnt a prostitute but who wears red lipstick, big hair, heels and tight black capris at 8am?) a sweet looking russian prostitute (well maybe she wasnt a prostitute but who wears a night dress and heels through the hallways of a dodgy hostel and leaves her door slightly ajar to see only a bed surrounded by 50 tealight candles?) and a man who looked homeless but he wasn´t homeless obviously cause he lived at the hostel. They were our savoury neighbours for the duration of our stay. I told Mum to toughen up, the New York experience calls for a level of danger!

On the first day we met up with an old friend Lidia, supposedly just for lunch, but of course when the kids from Blacktown come out to play, lunch turns into 3 cocktails at a bar afterwards and stumbling through the streets of New York trying on hats in random shops. My first cosmopolitans for the trip so it needed to happen. That evening Mum and I had tickets for the broadway show called "Jersey Boys" we had both bought special outfits and accessories for our Broadway theatre experience but of course after a bottle of wine and 3 cocktails during the day there was no time for glamour and we needed to fill in a bit of time before the show.
We came across this bar, the russian vodka bar that advertised an "attitude adjustment hour". I told Mum that she had a serious attitude problem and that the russians needed to adjust it. She agreed that she had a very bad attitude too so we went to try and adjust it with some more cosmopolitans.




We were starting to see a common theme in america, everything was giant. Mum ordered an ice tea and it was twice the size of her head, she drank about 1/8th of the thing! Too giant! We stopped at a deli for sandwiches, the sandwiches had about 80 slices of meat on them! Mine came with a side of chips, they were the size of my head! (americans must measure everything with their head, fuck rulers!) We couldnt stop laughing at the sheer absurdity of it!

I loved all the New York accents, like on TV but in real life! We went to a gospel church in Harlem where the pastor did not disappoint with his "Praise the Lord" deep loud, african american sounding voice. One guy was fighting with his girlfriend on the street, she was walking ahead defiantly and he was tagging behind, baggy pants and all shouting, "Fuck you biiitch, you want some other nigga, plenty otha niggas out there for ya" It was just so exciting! One glamorously dressed couple near central park stopped to give us directions and then came out with an accent like Nanny Fine! Straight from Queens! So cool!

Campeones, Campeones, o eh o eh o eh!!!

Last weekend we went to see Jack Johnson in Barcelona. I have been to Barcelona twice already and really like it, but it was Marcos´s first time there. Very bad spanish boy! Its nice going to a big spanish city but I wouldnt change living in Sevilla for anything. Sevilla is far too lovable. We went with spanish friends Isabel & Domingo who are also fans of Jack Johnson. Isabel has family and a few friends in Barcelona so on the Friday night after we arrived we all met for a big dinner in the Raval district of Barcelona. This is known to be a bit of a dodgy district and it was funny seeing so many dodgy types and prostitutes hanging about, we dont get much of that in sevilla. We had a big dinner and I tried for the first time...wait for it.... kidneys! Pork kidneys that is not human kidneys, I am no canibal. One of the shared dishes we ordered was a plate of mixed meat an out came some of the old kidneys, I didnt know what they were at first but to be honest they were the first thing on the plate that caught my eye cause they looked so tasty. Most of the spanish turned their noses up on the kidneys in disgust (although they would quite happily eat the cheek or other gross parts!) but I was feeling brave and gave it a go. It was ncie! I couldnt quite get out of my head what really it was but it had the texture of the tough bit of a mushroom so I just kept thinking about that.
Saturday night was Jack Johnson and he rocked! Well maybe he is too mellow to say he actually rocked but I though he was great. I couldnt believe how many people were there considering most spanish people dont know who he is, granted there were a damn lot of guiris (foreigners) and specifically a damn lot of aussies! I actually saw a few blue bonds truckdriver singlets! Noice.

Marcos speaks english really well, we dont speak much in spanish which is really bad for me but we´ve always spoken in english so its hard to break the habit. Of course he often makes small mistakes, I can always understand him and dont even notice it enough to correct him. He also often says sentences that because they are translated literally from spanish to english, I understand him cause I know what it would be in spanish and it doesnt sound so weird to me...however of course, sometimes he does make language faux pa´s, mostly in public, like for example a common swear word is "me cago en la madre que te pario" which means "I shit on the mother that gave birth to you" in spanish its used alot, you can even say it joking, maybe even when someone puts down a good card in Uno, between friends...but in english is pretty damn harsh...Marcos has tried to say "I shit on your mother" in english and I have to demand he simply not say it cause he just may get shot. Well on the way back from the concert I questioned Marcos about some change he had to give Domingo for some beers, Marcos exclaimed in a loud voice "Yeah, I put my hand in my ass and I found coins!" There were a couple of english speakers in front of us who laughed at this and he knew he had said something wrong but couldnt work out what! He meant to say he put his hand in his back pocket and found the coins... I would never correct this cause I know what he means but yes maybe I should do a bit more correcting so he doesnt get publicly laughed at and people dont think he puts coins up his ass.

We arrived back on Sunday afternoon, ready for the final of the Euro Cup between Spain & Germany. Marcos was nervous all weekend, and couldnt stop counting down the hours till the game. The previous 2 games, against Italy (spains nemesis) and Russia we watched at our friends Maria & Miguels house. For these games we started a custom of wearing all red (I didnt have anything red so wore a dress of maria´s) and drinking the national beverage of the country. For Italy we had Italian Pinot Griggio white wine & vodka for russia. For this final match no-one wanted to jinx so we all wore the same clothes, shoes and drank german beer, we had to watch it at Maria & Miguels place as changing locations would have been bad luck. Isabel came this time to watch the final and Marcos said if Spain starts playing shit he will have to kick her out of the house as she may be a jinx! Bastard!

I dont like sport at all but a final is exciting I must say, and only cause spain was playing. It was fun when spain scored the first and only winning goal (spain won 1-0) and everyone went mental. There were some tense moments but spain dominated the game and it was a good win. Here is Marcos, Domingo and Miguel after the first goal was scored.





Here we are in the final minute of the game getting ready for the win.











Here we are after the whistle blows. Marcos and Domingo running to the window to scream and everyone bips their horns in the streets and you can hear the cheers from all the surrounding bars/apartments.





Miguel opens a bottle of champers and we all decide to head to Puerta de Jerez a square with a fountain in the centre of seville where everyone seems to go after a big win. (Although Spain hadnt won anything in 44 years, but they go there when the Seville team win something)





We walked towards the square, and we see that the spanish flag is out in full force and everyone is dressed in red & yellow.
The square was packed with people, jumping up and down, singing, chanting, "Si Si Si La copa ya esta aqui" and "campeones, campeones o eh o eh o eh". It was madness and oh so much fun!

Summer Pool Party

Its freakin hot here! After a slow start to the hot weather we´ve had 2 weeks of 38 deg weather...and the forcast is that temperatures will rise due to a saharan wind comin on in! I mean really...saharan wind!? I remember my canadian friends once telling me about the "arctic wind" that freezes the shit out of them if it comes their way, and now we have a saharan wind... hold on to your sunscreen people we may get fried. It reminds me of that scene in Terminator where the people spontaneously combust at the park. I hope that doesnt happen here. So yes yes, pretty damn hot, horario de verano (summer working hours) havent started yet (8-3 workday) and I am astounded every day as to why the hell sevilla doesnt have any more damn public pools. In OZ, we are surrounded by the sea, heaps of people we know have swimming pools and most suburbs have public swimming pools. Seville has public swimming pools but they are indoor and generally only for exercise. You cant swim in the river (throw in a bit of chlorine I say, who needs the fish, we need WATER!). You can drive 1 hour to the beach but every other person in seville has that same idea so the traffic to/from the beach on any weekend is outrageous. I am on a quest to find a hotel that will let me use their swimming pool... I am on the case with a few of the americans and with a few low cut tops and extra clevage we hope we can convince some fool to let us laze by the pool. (Seville is empty in summer, why not!?)
One of the rarely seen americanitas Deidre, but she calls herself Isa cause the spanish cant cope with Deidre! (she just had a baby and lives in the country so we dont get to see her much) decided to be kind to all us sufferers and have a pool party last weekend! Heaven! The pool party was held in Sanlucar la Mayor a village 19km outside seville.

If there wasnt so much spanish tiling covering the outside of her house I would have been able to pretend I was at an aussie BBQ. We drank and ate all day and played with the cutie little newborn Roberto, or Bobby his american AKA.... look at this cute little fattie boombah!












Here is Sarah looking very Marbella lazing in the pool with a very not marbella botellin of Cruzcampo.... the spanish stubby of choice.



We were very careful mixing such safe drinking in the sun combinations such as beer, pimms and lemonade, champagne and rasberry juice.

For dessert, the americans introduced me to an american summer camping tradition of S´Mores, they claim to be called this cause you always want some more.... so first you toast marshmallows in the fire. (I felt like I was in an american movie doing this....fun!) you try not to burn it, mine was black in about 3 seconds I put right in the fire no one told me there was a strategy...damn americans! You wait till the marshmallow is to your liking (black) and then you pair it with a slab of chocolate between some graham biscuits to make a chocoalte and marshmallow sandwich... it is tasty but kinda disgusting at the same time.

Im at work now and my workmates just came in and said that the street thermometres are saying its 44 deg! Jesus Cristo! I might have to start wearing a turban! Ok I dont know if turbans fight the heat but all the middle eastern dessert dwellers are always wearing them so it may help....

Santa Luzia, Portugal.

I know, I know, I´ve been here a million times. I just love it, the Santa Luzia apartment isnt ours but we pretend it is. The spanish gang havent stayed at the apartment before so we took them there, had a lovely weekend doing what we do best there, eating, drinking and relaxing. I made a New York themed dinner on the Saturday night, the spanish girls had never had a Cosmopolitan before, The horror! After drinking about 100 of them they may well never have another...Viva Portugal!

London. A Damn good weekend!

I havent been blogging cause I like to blog in chronological order and the wedding/USA trip blog is half written and the wedding/USA trip photos are half sorted and Ive been busy (for spain) at work and havent been able to get my shiz together.
So Ive decided to forget about the wedding/USA trip blog until I get all that sorted and just continue posting about other things easier to write a shorter blog about with not so many pics to chose from.

So here brings me to now. well, maybe not now, mid May, 1 1/2 weeks after I got back from the USA I went to visit Mick in London for the weekend to see his new apartment and give him my very important approval of this big purchase. As you can see from the pics its a great little place and perfect for Mick.


What a damn good weekend I had! Marcos and I lived in London a few years back, I was never very keen on loving there, Spain was always calling me back, but as a place to visit, especially with a good friend to catch up with, London is a fucking great place to go! Comparably, Sevilla is like a village and its great to visit the big smoke, restaurants, shopping, theatre, cocktails!

I always crave asian food when I am away from Sevilla and London did not disappoint. After a spot of shopping on Saturday morning we went to a fabulous dumpling restaurant and ordered this tower of dumplings. Yum.



During lunch Mick got a call from his friend Glen asking if we wanted his tickets to go see Madonna at a big outdoor concert...Um HELL YES! Mick and bought us tickets to go to the theatre that afternoon, we went to the theatre saw an interesting play about a drunkard crazy mother and her fucked up children which was interesting to say the least, there was even some nudity when the son lost it and stripped off, shook his ass to the audience and there was some interesting ball shaking visuals through his legs. Nice.

We left the theatre, nipped over to pick up said tickets and made it to see Madonna, the last act at the concert at 9pm. Mick and I have an ongoing argument about madonna, I cant stand her preaching, complete with images of starving children in Africa, whilst dressed in Jean Paul Gaultier and thrusting her hips, not to mention her guitar playing. But her music is catchy and she certainly does put on a good show so we had a damn good time and I vowed to keep my opinions to myself for the moment.

Sunday was breakfast in the sun (I really miss going out for breakfast! Spain doesnt have a big going out for breakfast culture...) and shopping at Spitafields markets with the lovely Jane.

Here is Mick with some slimy oysters.







Early evening we met up with Lady P and the lovely Stephanie and it was really great to catch up with these gals who are so much fun. We had Thai, yum yum yum at Busaba an old favourite.