Okay, so its been awhile..

I'm sorry to all (5) of my faithful followers! haha I know I'm not the best at keeping this thing up to date but heres a quick review of the past few weeks..

Visit to Salamanca: Amazing:-) Lindsay, Erin, & I took advantage of the 3-day weekend and caught the bus to Sal for a couple of days. We visited all of our favorite places.. during the day we saw the Plaza Mayor, Casa de las Conchas, our old university building, and the Catedral area. And at night did a bar crawl of all the best spots: Irish Rover (for JMU shots!), Jackos (The Michael Jackson theme bar), Gatsby and Hacienda, La Chupiteria, and had to finish up with a Sandwich Mixto from Leonardos. On Sunday I was able to visit Escoli, my host family madre from when I studied abroad.. and she was still there being her crazy teeth-covered-with-lipstick self :-) Two of our new friends tagged along too and stayed in a hostal IN the Plaza Mayor so we got some pretty cool photos from their balcony.

La Catedral

MTV's European Music Awards Concerts: Last weekend we luckily decided to check out the concerts at the Plaza de la Independencia. Its maybe 15 minutes walking from my apartment and right by Retiro Park where I love to run. On Saturday night there were some famous Spanish artists, including one called Alaska. I can only describe her as the Spanish version of Cher, and she performed with a chain saw in hand. weird. But anyway, everyone in the crowd knew all the words to her songs and when I asked about her on Monday in school one of my 1st graders piped up "Si! Me gusta Alaska, el con todo los travestis!" (Which means, basically, Yes! I love that band, the one with all the trannies!!). These kids are ridiculous. The rest of the concert was cool too and at one of the intermissions the Jackass guys decided to "Zorb" across the crowd in a huge plastic sphere. On Sunday we battled an insane crowd but finally caught a glimpse of Jared Leto in 30 Seconds to Mars, right before Kanye made his big surprise appearance! Katy Perry and Linkin Park were up next but the many thousands of people in the street were overwhelming so we left before too long.

Alaska--eek!

Mi Vida Cotidiana (My Daily Life):  Well I'm finally settling into a somewhat regular schedule with school, work, and everything else. I'm trying to get back into running but since the clocks changed its a bit too dark to brave the park. Instead I'm working out a new route down Calle Ortega y Gasset and Calle Serrano, which just so happens to be the "Golden Mile," or fanciest shopping street in Madrid. Today I discovered Jimmy Choo and Prada among others so the window shopping is great for keeping my mind off the workout. The only problem is running here is what Lindsay describes as "frogger," since you are constantly hopping back and forth across the sidewalk trying to avoid the other pedestrians.


Teaching is going pretty well so no complaints there.. and I just finished my first two master's classes so its nice to have that behind me. Okayy I think thats enough for now!

 ¡Hasta Luego!