Living Room Excitement: Continued

I know you've all been dying to hear about the completion of our new nook and L-shaped couch.

No, that's not true. But it's 11 p.m. and I'm tired and that's the best lead-in sentence I can come up with at this point. So here we are. NOOK. COUCH. GET READY.

The living room is now 90% complete (we can have more than 2 people over to hang out!) and the nook is half complete (we have a place to eat dinner that's not a couch!), so I wanted to share the photographic evidence.

First, is the nook, made by my wonderful dad:

The second seat is still being made, but you get the idea. We also need to paint it, but are not sure on the color choice. I'm thinking black... If you have a better idea, please leave it in the comments ;)

So, yeah. My dad is quite the craftsman! If you think the nook is cool, you should see the wardrobe he built me right after Beauty and the Beast came out.

It didn't have a face and it couldn't talk to me, but it was pretty awesome AND contained a secret hiding spot for whatever I thought was fun to hide when I was 5. Pencils? I don't know. Seriously, he's very talented and makes amazing furniture like it's nothing. Thanks, Dad :)

We also picked up our new couch yesterday and moved it in. I had previously mentioned that it was an L-shaped couch, but I was mistaken. It is actually a...

U-shaped couch! Even better. Here it is:

It's actually a wool couch, which I had never seen before, but we bought it (for a very, very low price) from someone whose home looked very expensive, so I'm assuming it's well-made. As we were moving the couch through the buyer's home, we came very close to knocking over a very expensive-looking bust and sending it to its shattered death on the ground. Thankfully, we narrowly missed it.

We managed to get it all the way back to our place, up the stairs and through the narrow halls of our apartment with minimal swearing. So, I consider that a good moving experience.

The other exciting thing about having this couch is that we now have the living room exactly the way we want it. At least for another few months until I feel like moving the furniture around again.

So, that's it for now. If you come over to our place and only see the kitchen, nook, and living room, it looks pretty good. We'll keep the door to the other rooms closed for now...

Hot yoga. Hot damn.

Recently, my good friend Laura mentioned that she was going to start doing hot yoga, and I - as a person who often gets excited about things before thinking them through fully - was like, "Awesome! I want to do that, too!"

So tonight we went to our first session at the hot yoga studio. I was excited, but also terrified, because I'd heard that you need to chug water ALL DAY in order to not pass out, so today I was pounding glasses of water like it was my job. I was doing two jobs today. It was stressful. Beyond dehydration and passing out, the other thing that made me nervous was the yoga people. They intimidate me. The are freakishly flexible. I'm just not like that. It hurts to sit cross-legged for more than two minutes. When I was younger, I always got super stressed out during the presidential fitness competitions in middle school, because the only thing I couldn't do was the sit-and-reach. Sit-ups, push-ups, running - no problem. Sit on the ground with straight legs and reach two inches past your feet? Yeah right.

So, I'm not sure what drew me to hot yoga. Partly the fact that I knew Laura was going, so I knew I'd have an encouraging workout buddy there, partly because I've been wanting to expand my workouts, and partly was because it's January in Chicago. I'll sign up for anything with the word "hot" in it.

Here's all you need to know about my experience tonight:

105: temperature in the room

90: minutes of hot yoga

26: number of exercises

24: number of exercises I couldn't do properly due to my lack of experience and/or flexibility (maybe a bit of an exaggeration... but not much)

2: amount of times I thought I was going to pass out

1: amount of times I thought I was going to throw up

1: amount of water breaks allowed by the insane instructor (no, we were not allowed to drink at our own discretion. too bad I broke that rule! sorry, dude)

1: successfully completed session!

So intense.

I'd thought that it couldn't possibly be that hard. I work out and am in OK shape right now, but that class was like, "Ummm NO, woman. You are NOT in shape. Keep on working."

Laura's coworker, who is an experienced hot-yoga-er, told her that the goal of the first class is just to make it through. Which we successfully did! Hurray!

I actually feel amazing right now, which is shocking. I think it's all the endorphins I released. So much sweat, so many endorphins. As hard as it was, I am excited to keep working at it. I'm hoping to improve my flexibility and strength, but even if that doesn't happen, I'm at least sweating out half my body weight in every workout, so it feels great.

The next session is later this week, so we'll see how this whole hot yoga situation progresses.

In other news, I know there are a lot of intense things going on in the world, and I feel like I should write about one of them, one of these days. But tonight is not that night. Tonight is just about hot yoga and pretty nail polish colors. Let's all just look at this lovely new nail polish inspired by the upcoming royal wedding. It's so pretty. It's... fit for a queen.

With that, I'm out.

Living Room Excitement

Apparently Dave's first entry got a lot more traffic to the blog than any of mine, so I'd like to thank him for bringing in more interest, but also warn him that if it ever happens again, his privileges are being revoked.

I don't really review music because I'm one of those people who is contributing to the fact that the cast of Glee surpassed the Beatles on the Billboard singles chart. I'd like to think I have good taste in music, but when your idea of a good morning run includes listening to Glee's version of "I Say a Little Prayer for You," on repeat, it's time to just accept who you are. And by "you" I mean "me."

I digress! This post is about awesome new furnishings -

Guess what? I'm SO EXCITED about our new living room, and it's not because of the fact that we have two huge HD TVs in our apartment right now.



I'm excited because, this week, we've added two awesome new additions. The first is this fantastic new globe pictured to the right, compliments of two awesome friends and wedding guests. I am a bit of a map/globe fanatic, so I was extremely excited to come home on Tuesday night and see this baby sitting in the living room.

Also, we've been trying to find either a new, bigger couch or an additional couch for the living room, but since I don't really care to spend $1000 for a new couch, the search hasn't been too fruitful. However, yesterday, I decided to check Craigslist and found a fantastic, very well-priced L-shaped couch that had just been posted. One piece of the couch is a tad bit longer than we'd like, and I'm a little nervous about actually getting it into the apartment, but I think we can do it. We may end up cracking some of the door frame or putting a hole through the wall, but in my opinion, as long as the end result is a beautiful L-shaped couch in the living room, I think it'll have been worth it.

I'm so obsessed with both globes and L-shaped couches - I really can't decide which one I'm more excited about. Let's just say it's been a good week for furnishings.

Once the couch is moved in and the globe is moved to a place of prominence, I'll post pics.

A Special Guest Blogger

This is my (Dave's) first blog entry ever so go easy on me. I originally thought my first blog post would be about being newly married, but another topic came to mind, so I'm writing about that instead. The inspiration came from my friend Phil's band Mosquito Fleet. They are college and post-college age and hail from Indiana Wesleyan University. They released a new EP the other day and while I have listened to it a few times since downloading it, today was the first time I listened to the lyrics and embraced what they had to say. This is kind of a review and kind of a commentary on why these songs hit me so hard today and why you should support these guys.

Noah. The beginning of the song is consistent with some of their older stuff and is a great way to begin the album. While I didn't pay attention to the lyrics the first 5 times I heard it; I did pay attention today and they are beautiful. The song is about the injustice in our sinful world. The lyrics “Is it better to all have drowned? Is it better to all have drowned than to live in this wicked town?” just sat on my soul during the song. This world is screwed up and without God and His plan of salvation there is no hope. I just finished a creative writing class and we had to write on some tough issues such as hunger, AIDS, child prostitution and many other subjects. This class had a greater effect on me than I though, I see a need for Christians to step out and help those in need and while a lot do, I for one do not and am feeling convicted to do so. This song just resonated with the feelings I have been having while in this class and just encouraged me to find a way to serve those in need and hopefully encourage others to help.

Elizabeth (Swings & Cloves). This is the title track of the EP. The version I am writing about is the acoustic bonus track.. This love song has the right amount of cheesiness and deep lyrics. I recently got married, as I mentioned before. Through the process of dating, engagement, premarital counseling and finally marriage I have seen the beauty in God's perfect plan for marriage. In everyone's marriage you take two broken people and form one broken couple. With Jesus at the center of that marriage you begin to understand that nothing has changed and you are still that broken couple but with the perfection of Jesus anchored in the relationship the marriage is good and fruitful to you individually, as a couple, for those around us, for the world and for the Kingdom of God. That is what I took away from the deep part of the song. The cheesy part is great too. The description of swings and cloves and a warm evening with the love of my life creates wonderful imagery in my mind and it makes me smile.

The pumped up version with the whole band is great too, I still prefer the acoustic version because it is a love song and I am a romantic at heart.

Everything's Different. I think the guys count to 4 in at least 1 song per album. The song is almost 9 minutes long which is a little long for me but the guys use the time to showcase their talent and at the end it seems like a 5 minute song which is not a shot at them, but a compliment. Everyone that has grown up and moved on in life will resonate with this song. As a freshman in college you think you are going to graduate and change the world. Then you graduate and get a job in Corporate America and realize “Everything's Different.” I myself just started college but when I was 18, I thought I was going to change the face of sales forever. It isn't to say that the different outcome of your life is a bad thing; in many cases it is a great thing - following God's will rather than my own. The guys in the band are at this age and I'm sure this is very real for a lot of them so I am glad they wrote a song about it and used it as a chance to show off some of their “Indie” stuff.

Come Thou Fount of Ev'ry Blessing. One of my favorite hymns and I am really glad the guys chose to put this on their album. I always enjoy a rocked-out version of hymns. The guys went through the hymn with their own take on it musically and when all of the verses are all completed they repeat “Here's my heart Lord” and then “Prone to Wander” to make a wonderful round 12 times (I think the term is “round” this is what I remember from 2^nd grade music theory AKA chorus). As I listened to those words wash over me I was overwhelmed with what the Gospel has done for those that believe in Jesus. This song is great and the guys really captured the essence of being lost and wandering away from God and our inability to live without His grace. Then to see the Grace of God wash our sins away and give our lives to Christ. The guys didn't have to do much here, the lyrics have been wonderful since they were written in 1757. I did really appreciate the musical take they had on it and this is my favorite song on the album followed closely by “Noah.”

I have been looking for a topic to write on and this album struck a cord in my heart today so Mosquito Fleet gets the honors of my first blog post. If you have not yet downloaded their EP Swings & Cloves you can get it tonight for FREE but you only have until MIDNIGHT because that is when the “name your own price” sale ends. Sorry I wasn't able to give you more time to get this for free but I wasn't inspired until today. Look on the bright side, you can buy it tomorrow to help these guys in their trans-formative time in life.

Here are their links:

http://mosquitofleet.bandcamp.com/

http://www.facebook.com/mosquitofleet

http://www.myspace.com/wearemosquitofleet

Golden Globes "live" blog

So, last night, I sat on the couch typing up my "live" blog of the Golden Globes for over 3 hours. When I was done, something weird happened to the computer, and half of my post disappeared. At that point, after spending my entire afternoon (football) and evening (GG's) in front of two screens, I was like, screw it! I give up. But today I feel like posting the remnants, so here they are...

The show starts with Ricky Gervais doing his opening monologue, with a glass of either beer or apple juice on the podium. I'm guessing it's beer...

I love that Ricky just shamelessly mentioned that the only reason The Tourist was nominated was so Angelina Jolie and Johnny Depp would show up to the show. Did anyone even see that?

Boardwalk Empire shout-out! So, I stopped watching the show halfway through the first season... It was really good though, and I'll be cheering for it.

To celebrate the year of her birth, Scarlett Johansson dressed to to honor the year 1983. Yikes. That dress is wild.

Best Supporting Actor in a movie: Christian Bale. He basically just said, "Hey thanks to my costar for being so boring and drab, so that everyone noticed how awesome I was." Not a fan of him. Cut your hair and get off stage.

Julie Bowen - love the dress. Looking at her still makes me feel sad about LOST being over. I know - I have a problem.

Best Supporting Actress: Katey Segal for Sons of Anarchy. Dave is screaming loudly at this point, as he is obsessed with that show. I know nothing about it, but I support her win, because, again, she's a LOST alum. (speaking of, how was LOST not nominated for anything?? this award show = officially not credible)

And now for the nominees of Best Miniseries or TV Movie. A Tom Hanks-produced series about a war was nominated in this category and DIDN'T win? Bold move, Hollywood Foreign Press. Bold move.

"Please welcome Ashton Kutcher's dad, Bruce Willis!" - Ricky Gervais. And that's why they pay him the big bucks.

Best Supporting Actor in a TV series: Chris Colfer for Glee. GLEE!! That show went downhill quickly, but he's great in it, so I support this win. During his speech, they cut to Lea Michele crying. What a diva - she can't even let her costar have his own moment.

Annnnnnnd the most exciting part of the broadcast so far - a promo for Parks & Rec, which is back this week!

Alice In Wonderland is nominated for Best Movie? Wasn't that on a bunch of "worst of the year" lists?

Eva Longoria looks great. Looks like she successfully removed all of those "9" tattoos.

Best Actor in a Drama: Steve Buscemi! I called it! I like this win. He honestly sounds like a genuine, nice guy.

Best Drama Series: Boardwalk Empire! Dang - now I really wish I had kept up with this season.

J. Lo is rocking some weird Miss America-wedding dress thing, but I love it:

Best Song: Ugh, who cares. When the nominees include two songs from Burlesque and one sung by Gwyneth Paltrow, can you really be proud of winning?

Best Original Score: Trent Reznor and Atticus Somebody for The Social Network. I haven't seen the movie yet (it's been on my "to watch" list for a while...), but just based on the awesome trailer with the Radiohead song sung by a choir, I have no doubt that the rest of the music in the movie was perfect.

And now - they have two teens announcing the nominees for Best Animated Film. If Toy Story 3 doesn't win, I'm turning this show off. And they do! While accepting the award, the producer looks at Bieber and True Grit Girl, the presenters, and says, "Were you two even born when the first Toy Story came out?" Bieber - yes. True Grit Girl - no. Wow. I feel old.

Best Actress in a Movie goes to Annette Benning. I wanted Emma Stone to win, but only so I could see the full-length view of her gorgeous dress:

Well done, Emma. My only concern is the blonde hair. Remember the last up-and-coming redhead who dyed her hair blonde? The Lohan. You don't want to go that route, Emma. Dye it back and don't go the way of the Lohan.

Next up: Al Pacino wins for something. The only thing that I took away from his speech is that he's 70 years old and still calling the woman he's with his "girlfriend." There's gotta be a better term, at that point in your life, right?

Claire Danes wins for Temple Grandin. I'm loving the hot pink dress:

And, unfortunately, that's where my post cut off. I wrote a lot more. What happened to it? I'll never know.

The only other thing I wrote about after this, that I can remember at this time, is that Natalie Portman gave an extremely awkward acceptance speech, which I attributed to pregnancy hormones. If you want to see a hilarious video of her laughing, please go here: http://www.bestweekever.tv/2011-01-17/lets-watch-natalie-portman-laugh-a-couple-of-times-in-a-row/

That's all. Next time, hopefully I won't accidentally delete my work. Or I just maybe will decide not to spend the entire day in front of the TV.

My Decorating Dilemma

Lately I've been getting really into decorating blogs, which really interest me yet also depress me, because I don't think I have the necessary time/money/ambition/creativity needed to become one of those people whose home looks like this: http://www.designspongeonline.com/2011/01/sneak-peek-lara-collins.html

Ughhhhhh. I'm borderline lusting over that home. Just tell me that home was custom-designed by some over-priced decorator. I don't want to find out if the people who live there have full-time jobs and they just kind of "throw things together" on the weekends to make the house look nice. If they scour flea markets and mix their own paints or whatever, I don't want to know. It will only make me feel bad.

If I say I'm "nesting," does that just mean I'm justifying obsessing over material goods? Is nesting a legit thing? Is "nesting" a term that some materialistic person came up with to make themselves feel better for caring too much about their home? Who knows. I don't care. I don't want to know right now. Feel free to leave a comment if you think I need to be convicted about this.

Anyway.

Every weekend or weeknight, when I'm not working and have a chance to pursue hobbies, I'm torn between wanting to clean, organize, create, and make spaces beautiful... and sitting on the couch watching Auction Kings. (What do you think we're doing tonight?)

"Oh, I love that vase that woman just bought for $20." Too bad I'm just going to spend my night watching other people bargain-hunt for awesome items instead of organizing my own home, while at the end of the night, I'll go back to my bedroom where most of my clothing is in laundry baskets because we haven't purchased a normal dresser yet.

Maybe I'm too ambitious right now - I want the entire apartment to look awesome right away, with very little effort and very little money. I've found some cool ideas for making/re-furbishing interesting pieces, but do those individual items look good in the midst of a room decorated with IKEA furniture, or does your whole house have to look like Anthropologie before adding quirky, interesting pieces to the mix? Like, I'm really enjoying this light and these cool glittery birds, but if I put them in the middle of our normal-ish, hodge-podgey living room, would people come over and be like, why the hell is there a sequin bird on top of the fax machine? Is that lightbulb-in-wood something you made for an elementary school science fair?

Anyway, those animals are cool and I want them. Too bad they're from West Elm, so, do I care more about paying my phone bill or having a glittery squirrel in the living room?

I don't know. It's a tough call. I've been looking at a lot of decorating blogs tonight, and am not really in the right frame of mind to answer that question rationally.

So, that's where I am right now with the whole home-decorating thing. Does anyone else feel this way? Is anyone good at decorating on a budget? Who can help me? Is it weird that I like that lightbulb thing?

Alright, let's move on. It's 9:40 p.m. and I'm still watching Auction Kings... so, let's talk about decorating that's feasibly going to happen in the near future: fixing up the nook. Oh, the nook. If you've been in the apartment, you know how inadequate the "dining area" was for anything other than possibly falling off the wobbly stools and trying to hang on to the table-top that wasn't big enough for people to actually eat off of. Fortunately, my dad made us some booth chairs and an awesome new table-top, so now we'll actually have a place to eat (and a nice place, at that). It's really cool, but unfortunately we can't find the camera cord right now, so a more extensive post with pictures will have to wait until later.

And now it's time to wrap turn off Discovery and get ready for yet another week!

Tomorrow night: A birthday present from my parents - Pistons/Bulls game! Look for Dave and I on WGN.

Trivial Pursuits

One of the most exciting parts of my life is playing pub trivia.

Not an exaggeration.

I like to pride myself on knowing obscure facts. Unfortunately, most jobs out there reward you for knowing and being able to act upon useful facts, so my skill in identifying Britney Spears songs on the first note are not exactly helpful from 9-5 each day.

I've been reading At Home by Bill Bryson, and no, for anyway who saw me reading this book in November, I'm not done yet. Almost. I've been busy. Let's not even talk about how long it takes me to get through books I DON'T enjoy.

Anyway, it's great, and a couple of nights ago, the chapter I was reading discussed John D. Rockefeller and his early life and pursuits.

So, last night at trivia, one of the questions asked what business he worked in, and the multiple choice answers were: steel, oil, and two other things. I don't remember what they were. For the purposes of this story, it doesn't matter.

I immediately said, "Steel! It's steel. I definitely just read about this a few days ago. It's definitely steel." I could see the words on the page.... "Rockefeller... money... steel..." I don't have a photographic memory, so I'm not sure where this "vision" came from, but it was there. You'd think after 24 years I'd realize I don't have a photographic memory, and second-guess myself, but no. I was so stupidly confident that I told everyone I'd buy shots if I was wrong. Needless to say, Dave wasn't present. Did I mention we share a bank account now?

So, yeah. Fast forward 2 minutes... "And the answer is... OIL!"

WHAT.

I give up. I can't even answer a multiple choice question correctly, after I had just read the answer 2 days earlier. This was frustrating for me. Maybe I'm getting too much of my self-worth from being able to answer trivia questions correctly. Probably. Whatever. (I'm good enough, I'm smart enough, and doggone it - it doesn't matter how many presidents with the name James I can think of in 90 seconds)

I thought maybe he was invovled in oil and steel, but no. He's not. About 90% of his wikipedia entry is about oil. Goo. Literal goo.

By this time in the evening, Dave showed up, and upon telling him that I had irresponsibly bet drinks on my answer, he was like, "uhhh yeah. not happening." Sorry, team. Thank you, husband.

Until next Thursday...

Barcelona. Recapped.

Annnnnd I'm back.

Every time I renew my commitment to blogging, I promise that I will write every single day, and then other things get in the way, like 1. working 2. completely cleaning and reorganizing the apartment (2 rooms down, 3 to go...) and 3. falling asleep at 8 p.m. Yes, that's right - I'm a child. I've fallen asleep at or before 8 p.m. two times in the past 4 days. I think I have mono? I think I'm a hypochondriac.

Anyway, the first order of business on this blog was to recap our LOVELY honeymoon to Barcelona, so that's the task for tonight. It's already 8:06, so let's see if I can make it long enough to hammer this out.

Our trip began on Friday, December 17. O'hare to Heathrow airspace to a tarmac in Dublin to a hotel in Dublin, back to the Dublin airport then all the way to Barcelona. It was a long trip. At least, that's what I thought until we watched BBC news on and off during the trip, and saw that people were stuck in London until 2013. So, I guess the slight detour to Dublin wasn't too bad, in comparison. The most exciting thing about Dublin was staying in a hotel right next door to the national... Gaelic Football Stadium. Here was our exchange with the concierge at the hotel:

Us: What is that huge stadium outside for?

Concierege: It's where our team plays our national sport.

Us: Soccer? I mean, futbol?

Concierge: Gaelic Football.

Us: What?

Concierge: Look it up.

Us: Awesome. Will do. Oh hey! We're on our honeymoon! Can we get an upgrade?

Score. BTW, I just watched some youtube videos of Gaelic football, and I'm pretty sure my elementary school gym teacher made that up... But seriously, it looks really cool, and I'm not sure why it hasn't spread further than Ireland.

Anyway, a mere 12 hours later, we were in Barcelona. At our 5-star hotel that we clearly didn't belong in. How did we get a 5-star hotel for a decent price? Travelocity. I don't ask questions - I just accept the awesome fares. That hotel could NOT have made money on us.

Here's how crazy the hotel was - there was a doorman, which maybe isn't that weird, but what IS weird is that he would give the revolving door a little "head-start" for us. Like, I'm already going to push the door the rest of the way, because I have functional arms and I'm motivated to either enter or exit the hotel. But yeah, sure, give the door a little push for me.

Although it was a little uncomfortable, I did appreciate the star service.

Here are some of the highlights of the trip, after the doorman helped push the door open so we could leave and explore the streets of Barcelona -

Monday -

- Parc de Montjuic - beautiful. Easily my favorite place we went.

- Barcelona 1992!! We saw the Olympic stadium, the Olympic pools, and the basketball arena where the Dream Team was forever immortalized (in the eyes of 8-year-old boys like Dave was, at least). I have a bit of an Olympic obsession, so obviously I loved seeing all of this stuff. I saw people running by the stadium, and was immediately jealous of them. How much more motivated would I be to crank up the workouts if I were running by the stadium where GOLD MEDALS WERE WON? I would just play Eye of the Tiger on repeat on my ipod and run all over the place. OK, I'll move on - this is already the longest section of this post. See? I'm crazy.

- We took the subway. Keep in mind - Neither of us had ever been to Barcelona, nor do we speak Spanish, and their subway system was STILL easier than the el. I mean, it was so easy. What is Chicago doing wrong? I don't understand.

- Favorite quote of the day, after Dave went to the bathroom at the Olympic stadium: "Have YOU ever pooped in an Olympic stadium??"

Tuesday -

-As with all other days, this day started out with a croissant and cafe con leche. From what we could tell, the accepted coffee to sugar ratio is about 1:1.

- The CCCB (Centre de Cultura Contemporània) - a cool museum/art space that was, like most other museums in Barcelona, hidden in a maze of back alleyways. We kept thinking we were going to get mugged, and then, BAM! a beautiful museum with world-famous art inside. This place was pretty cool - there was a neat exhibit on labyrinths (although not ONE mention of The Shining, which I found to be quite a glaring hole, but whatever) and a recycled art exhibit. At one point, we wandered into one room of the recycled art exhibit, and I said to Dave, "OK look. I love looking at art, and I try to understand modern art and be open to the emotions it can evoke in other people, but this crap LITERALLY looks like it was made by children. This wall looks like a bulletin board in an elementary school." And then Dave read the sign on the wall and was like, "Lauren, it WAS made by children." Oops. At least I'm an accurate critic?

- The afternoon ended with paella, which was actually not very good. But then I realized, we may have just picked a bad place. It may have been like someone coming to Chicago for pizza, and going to Sbarro and saying, "Gross. I don't get all the fuss about Chicago pizza." So yeah, I think that's what happened there...

- Also, the Picasso museum. AWESOME.

Wednesday -

- Another day of cafe con leche. Only this day, there apparently was some sort of "Christmas lotto" that was a huge deal all across Spain, so during our breakfast, the TV in the cafe was tuned to the Christmas lotto coverage. Kind of looked like CSPAN coverage of Congress, but instead of a politician speaking, there were school children drawing lotto numbers. This is what it was like, for 30 minutes:

Little School Girl: (picks a numbered bead out of a huge ball and sings the number)

Little School Boy: sings "millionaire" in Spanish

At each restaurant we visited that day, we tried to get someone to explain this Christmas lotto to us, but everyone gave us a different answer. Why was the little boy singing "millionaire" so many freaking times? Do ALL of those people called win a million euros? We'll never know.

- We also had great pizza that day. I even wrote down what kind I had, so I could repeat the recipe at home. Thin crust, olive oil, basil, salami, pepperoni, capers, peppercini, mozzarella. DELICIOUS. Make it. Thank me later.

Thursday -

- Back to Montjuic. Seriously, we loved it.

- Museums and castles.

- Tram car.

- Dream Team shoes.

Friday -

- Oh, Friday. We rented this thing: http://www.gocartours.es/. Dave let out his inner little boy, and I let out my inner tightly-wound anti-risk-taker. As if I even needed to mention it, Dave did all the driving that day. Would I like to drive what is essentially a go-cart around a busy, foreign city with totally unfamiliar traffic laws, street signs you can't read unless you have binoculars, and roundabouts (or as I liked to refer to them, deathtraps)? I'll take that question and raise you a "was I PMS-ing that day?" So, yeah. I let Dave drive.

- After freaking out because I couldn't navigate properly (shocker. It took me a good two years to figure out how to drive from Wheaton to Portage without directions), we ended up on the freeway - and thankfully, very quickly got off. That was a rough part of the day, but thankfully, it got much better, and included:

- The FC Barcelona stadium. I know almost nothing about the team, except that their best player is apparently the best in the world. Didn't see him hanging around the gift shop, unfortunately.

- Sagrada Familia. AMAZING. Unbelievable. I'd never seen anything like it.

- Casa Mila. Again, Amazing. Gaudi, again.

- The night was capped off by our first Christmas Eve dinner together, at a delicious tapas place. We went there because it was the first open restaurant we could find, but it ended up being amazing. The best gin & tonic I've ever had (how is that possible with a drink that includes 3 ingredients, one of them being a garnish?), squid, beef tenderloin, duck, and a ham, cheese & truffle sandwich. And, the best part, the dessert - chocolate mousse with a bit of sea salt and olive oil. Mmmm I wish I could just erase it from my memory, it was so good. We ended up spending quite a bit on that dinner, which we kind of felt bad about, and then we realized that we hadn't given each other Christmas gifts. So we were like, OK, that's your gift! Hope you remember that squid for a LONG time.

OK, this is super long. Dave can't believe I've been writing this for so long. I'm done. Hope you enjoyed this, and that you now want go to Barcelona (or go back).