here's the rest of the story....

Monday, July 29th: Kind of looked for Radio head tickets, but mainly just ate tapas and went out at night and partied with a bunch of French folks.

Tuesday July 30: the weather in san Sebastian was getting better but slowly and I wanted to see something else, so I schlepped my shit over to the bus station and hopped a bus to Bilbao. I was going to just rent a car and head to the beach but there were no cars in Bilbao, so I finally took a pension and had enough time left to walk down to the Guggenheim museum. Its a truly amazing building built over part of the river and it was still open, so I went in and saw the Kandinsky and his Contemporaries exhibit. There was also a whole other floor of Picassos, Mondrians, van Goghs, and awesome paintings from Paris. Totally great. I went back to my pension in the 7 Calles area of Bilbao and found a cool bar to hang in. I asked one dude with a guitar if he wanted to play and he looked at me ...and no was all he said... but then I started yakking with this other dude who was from Barcelona ... worked at El Matador... and traveling by himself and we hit it off pretty well. By the end of the night I was asking these nice women where I should go to find a nice beach and they gave me directions to La Playa Menacoz. Then there was something about not being able to get my key to work in the Pension door at 3 am...

Wednesday July 31. Got up (oh about 11) and took the Bilbao metro to the closest station to Playa Menacoz. I really have too much shit with me, and so instead of asking for directions and schlepping it to the beach, I just took a cab. I didn't really stock any provisions, so basically I didn't eat for the next 5 days. I hiked up from the tiny parking lot and looked down on a beautiful small bay with no one on it except for one guy hanging around a little cantina. After getting my legs chewed up in some nasty bushes while looking for a flat space, I found a nice little terrace right above the beach to set up my tent. I just sat and chilled for a few hours and then hiked up for some beers and conversation at the cantina. Everyone was pretty nice, but it was fairly windy and I was tired so I went down early.

Thursday Aug 1. Got up to the sound of some small waves and watched a few surfers brave the rocks over on the right. Wasn't hungry. Just went for a swim and went up to say hi to Luco at the cantina. I met Clara who adopted me for the day. We talked and talked, and the day slipped by as we watched the beautiful people head down to the beach and finally back up to drink with us. At about 8, she decided she needed to help me get a job in a restaurant. So we cruised off the beach and walked up the cliffs and over into town where I had a hard time explaining to her that I wasn't actually interested in working in a hotel or restaurant, so I met the owners and with my long scraggly hair and growing beard tried to be sincere. After that was over we went to a bar and drank and smoked and played some pool. I was alone for a minute and walked over to a group of people who seemed really cool and told them that. Then they invited me to go to another town and hit their annual festival. So at one in the morning in I'm some car with people I don't know and going off to some place I have no idea what the name was. But there was quite a scene when we got there. A massive bash that went on till past when I took a cab home (to the beach of course) in the early morning sun. It was amazing that this party stretched for blocks and blocks and I didn't see a single cop ... actually I didn't see a cop the whole time I was in Pais Basque.

Friday 2 August: Beach. Clara brought a friend and the three of us talked the day away. Her friend was a healer of sorts and we talked about alt medicine and Thrive and etc. The weather was getting better every day and so we just hung out at the beach till late in the night. I think I went into town and had a Patata Tortilla... kind of like Queesh.

Saturday 3: Still couldn't bear leaving, but Clara and her friend were gone and I just chilled down by my tent and swam way out and saw the other beach that had 10000 people on it... Some German freaks that discovered this little paradise the previous year came and set up camp for a month, and we were all playing with their kids. I knew I'd be seeing a lot of bars in the future, so I was happy to lay low with Luco and the other dudes running the cantina.

Sunday 4 August. Um, yeah, stayed at the beach Sunday too. It was very nice.

Monday August 5th: got up and the weather had turned and it was time to pack up and go. Got Luco to call me a cab and was at the train station in no time. Had to wail till two in Bilbao, so I ate some Burger King. I pulled into Salamanca round 5 and hunted down a pension. Salamanca has an old city with lots of light colored stone buildings. It's pretty pleasant to stroll thru and look at. A lot of people go there to study English, Spanish or at the university. Talked to nice German girl who was there studying Spanish. Hit an Internet café at night but couldn't get anything done. Found out that the train to Portugal only leaves at 5 am. As I had already booked my pension, I was wondering whether to give up on Portugal all together or just stay here an extra day and try to stay up all night for the train.

Tuesday, August 6: I thought maybe I could take a bus there, so I packed up and hauled my load over to the bus station. Got there to find out the only bus left an hour earlier. Got to try to get up earlier! So I took a bus to the train station and sat down to figure out what I wanted to do. As I was sitting there, some dudes were talking about Phish shows and it turned out we'd seen the same Oyster head shows at the Greek. They were in town for Radio Head and they kind of convinced me to try to check it out. So I put my bags in the consigna, bought a ticket to Portugal and headed out the door. As I was walking out, I ran into Darren, my friend from the first night in San Sebastian...Also a big Radio Head fan. I told him I was going to try to get in and he was very psyched. So I walked back to the old town from the station and stopped in a tapas bar to read the newspaper and watch some news. Then I walked the rest of the way into town and wanted to chill and read the rest of the paper at a cafe. I saw a nice one with an eligible woman reading an English Spanish dictionary so I sat down next to her. She got up immediately and walked away, but another lovely woman sat down with her dictionary and I struck up a conversation. That was Julie and she was from Boston and had two days left on a yearlong trip around the world. We talked for two or three hours and had a nice dinner together and of course swapped emails. If I end up back in the states, it'd be nice to hook up with her... Anyway she had to get back to Madrid and I wandered down the road and ran into Darren again and Jay and Sabrina, who I also met in San Sebastian, were there too. We chilled, got some ice cream and headed over to the show. After turning down the 70 Euro ticket, I got one for 40. Sat down with the gang inside this hall that seated about 2000 and took in my first radio head show. I guess I thought they had decent songs, but they took no chances and I wasn't convinced at all that they could really play their instruments. They mix up their set lists every night and seem to be pretty cool people given to the music, but there wasn't one song longer than 5 minutes I don't' think. And the lead singer Tommy sung all the tunes. I was sick of his voice by the end. I mean those guys do pretty well for not being really great.

Wednesday August 7: Anyway, Darren and Sabrina and Jay and I got some drinks after the show and then they dropped me off at the station in their cab. I sat for an hour and then got on my train to Portugal that was filled with sleeping people from Bilbao. I begged my way into my seat and stared off into the night till I fell asleep sitting up. Soon after I woke up and much later I gained consciousness. By the time the train pulled into Lisbon, I had made friends with Salvadore and Guy... from Italy and we headed off into town to find a Pension. They were a little hard to come by so we settled on a small room with only two beds. I decided to go for a walk and met this nice Italian woman reading a guidebook. We walked together for about an hour up and down the hills of the very San Francisco like city and said goodbye and went to our pensions. Then Salvadore and Guy were ready to go out for some dinner and we headed into the Barrio Alto and stopped at the first restaurant. I had the first full meal Id had since France. Chicken and fries and a salad. While eating the two Manuelas, also from Italy, sat down near us, and my boys went to work. They jabbered away in Italian fro about an hour before we all took off together to hit the town. They knew Lisbon fairly well and we found a few cool bars, a reggae bar and then the thriving gay district and stayed out till four. I met some people from Bilbao and I yakked Spanish at them and told them how much I enjoyed their city. At the end, the Manuellas came with us back to our pension and things got pretty silly, but they left and we crashed out...

Thursday August 8th. Woke up at noon and went over to the Pensao of the Manuellas. From there we hiked in five different directions with all our shit to finally find the metro to the boat, across the bay in front of the Portuguese version of the golden gate bridge to a bus to a beach that was full of people. A far cry from Playa Menacoz, but we laid down our towels and the Manuellas decided to be the only ones to go topless on the whole beach, which was ok with me. We swam and played some frisbee in a fierce wind. Pretty chill day. Finally the Maunellas left and S. & G. and I set up our tents in a massive campground full of trailers next to the beach. We went to the little restaurant for the campground and ordered pizza and beer and talked to some Portuguese people for a while. I was kind of bummed that I didn't go to Sintra, but that's life.

Friday August 9th, pretty weird day. Not my best. Marked the beginning of the pretty rough middle period in Spain. Woke up and packed up the tent and headed back into Lisbon with the Italians. We split up as they went to Porto and I was heading down south. I had to take a ferry to the train station and wait for 3 hours. I decided to start drinking I bought a liter of brew. After finishing that, I bought another two to get on the train with. I took my seat and started slurping em down and looking out the window. The dudes in front of me were smoking right on the train and I said it smelled good so they offered some to me and asked me if I wanted to sit with them. We talked for an hour of the trip and I was playing some New Orleans CD's for them, and they weren't impressed. I was headed to a town called Tavira where I heard there was a campground on the beach. They were going there too and told me there was a drum festival on the island. They were really the first people I met in Portugal that spoke English and they were pretty cool, but the trip was long and I started talking to the Germans across the aisle and finally moved over to talk with them. It seemed like every German I met were from Bavaria but not from Munich. These guys were the same and were headed to Morocco. We talked about Bush and global economics before their transfer point came and they got off. Meanwhile, I set about finishing the third liter of beer and ended up slamming it as we got to my transfer point of Faro. I ran around getting my bags together and then ran off the train forgetting my sandwich, water and lighter that I had from the train station. I then proceeded to somehow miss the Tavira station and ended up on the Spanish border. I had to get back on the train in the other direction and try to explain things to the conductor of the other train. He wasn't pleased and my drunkeness must have shown thru as I asked him if he really wanted me to pay money to get back to where I was supposed to be. He looked at me and said Hey Fuck You! I felt like shit and was regretting the alcohol binge. My energy was all messed up. I got to Tavira and got off the train and headed towards the island. I managed to share a cab with some guys to get to the boat to the island. It was getting dark when I got to the island and the campground was sold out, but I was able to take a number to wait in line for a spot. I think I was 120th in line, but I managed to get a site after only 20 numbers. I hiked in to the very crowded campground and found a spot in the middle of a bunch of other tents. After setting up, I went out and perused the strip of bars along a little path that led to the beach. They were all full of Portuguese kids and I was kind of waiting for the scene to drumming start happening. I had some food and was having a hard time getting my energy up to talk to people. So feeling kind of out of place in Portugal, with no massive drum jam happening, I just crashed out.

Saturday August 10: woke up in the busy campground and wandered out to the camp store and bought some toothpaste! Oooh boy. Then after brushing my teeth I walked down to the beach and sat down. Tried talking to the Aussie girls, but they weren't interested. Hiked about 2 miles down the beach and went for a swim. I ran all the way back. I figured I might as well try to get some decent exercise in. Then I found the main beach soccer field not being used and started trying to shoot goals with some little kids. I hadn't played soccer since I was 9, so my shots weren't even reaching the goal, let along getting by the keeper. A little while later, some other folks came out and needed me to make the teams even, so, I got into my first game. Mostly I just ran up and down. Once I had a header to make and I just bounced it with out direction. Next time, I'd try for the goal. Once, when the other team had a goal kick, the keeper just dumped it short to one of his guys. I ran up to him and pretty much was able to steal it and get kind of open 5 feet from the goal, but the keeper was on top of me and blocked my shot. I also almost headed one in, but I should have used my foot and it might really have gone in. I was playing Brian McBride. It was fun making fun of Figo and the Portuguese side whenever I could. Just mentioning Landon Donovan's name was enough to make people shudder and laugh. Anyway, after a couple of points, there were other teams that wanted to play, so we played first to score gets to stay on. We scored two more times before finally getting beaten on a cross to the inside. I wandered off back to the tent, grabbed some water and came back out to the beach. I threw a bad frisbee with some people and watched some other people play soccer for another hour. I offered one of the players a drink out of my bottle and I'm not sure if that wasn't where I caught the cold that plagues me today here in DC. Anyway, those guys who I gave my water to were really nice and offered to entertain me at their beach camp if I got bored. I walked back to get a beer and then saw someone throwing a nice frisbee. I went over and threw for about an hour with the freaky dude who was running in the pricker laden dunes with no shoes on. I think he was happy that he didn't have to move far for most of my throws. I went out to the dunes with no shoes and I got a splinter that stayed with me for five days. He had a 180-gram disk that I could throw better forehand because it was too heavy to throw backhand. It said ultimate on it, but he didn't know what ultimate was. Very strange. Ultimate has a long way to go on both sides of the Atlantic. I hung with the freak from Holland and others at the last bar on the boardwalk that were more of the transient tourist type than the young Portuguese type. Someone had a guitar and drums and a few beers went down there before I went back to the tent. I showered and turned around and went back out. But after getting frustrated playing someone's right handed guitar, I felt really out of energy and down right ill, so I went down early again.

Sunday August 11, Got up and tried to pack up before the sun melted me. I trudged over to the ferryboat and got back onto the mainland. Took a cab up to the train station and found that there were no trains to Seville and it would take me four or five hours to get to the border. I walked back into Tavira and found the bus station. They had a bus to Seville in 7 hours. I almost bought the ticket then decided to give hitching a try. I walked about a block from the station where a road led to the autobahn and made an Espana sign out of some postcards. The third car by with Spanish plates stopped and told me to get in. I was in luck. This lovely couple were headed back to Heulva and wanted to tour a little in the mountains before going home. So we drove north along the border between Spain and Portugal until we figured out there wasn't a bridge across the river. We stopped on a bluff way above the river and had a nice picnic and talked a lot. It turned out that Sol had a friend in Barcelona that I could stay with. They were super nice and offered me a lot of their food and took me to the Heulva bus station and bought me a coke there and said adios. From there I took a bus to Seville and another bus across Seville to the other bus station. In Seville, I put my bags in the consigne and just hiked the streets for about two hours. I saw a bit of the twisted maze in the old city and walked inside the Cathedral, which has a crypt for Christopher Columbus and an amazing old organ. Then I got on another bus and went for Cordoba. Pulled in there and had a cab show me a $30 hotel with air conditioning. I took it, went out and saw some amazing flamenco in a little square next to the Alhambra before going back and sleeping.

Monday, August 12. Got up and made another cultural mistake. In Mexico, it seems like there are lavendarias everywhere. I just started wandering around with my dirty laundry (dirty since Pau) and hoped to find one on the street. But I walked about 2 miles and saw a lot of the city but no place to wash my clothes. I was asking people but no one seemed to know. I finally asked back at my hotel and was pointed to one that was closing. No luck. I played a little keyboard in my room and slept a bunch because I was pretty sick and tired and it was hot.

Later I went out and found a weird icy orange juice drink at a cool café and had two of those while watching people wander the tiny streets. In the tapas bar next door, I ate some nice beef stew stuff and chatted with some Mexicans from Guadalajara and then some Aussies and an American who stopped in. They had just been to Grenada and told me I should go there to see the Alhambra. I was taking it easy so I turned down their offer to go with them and party. I just went to sleep and planned to get up early.

Tuesday August 13. Got up early and walked to the train station to get a ticket to Grenada. It was going to leave at 4, so I went back to do the wash and finally see the big Alhambra thing with the double arched ceiling. I checked out and got my train down south and talked to some paki's and Americans on the way. In Grenada, I stashed everything but a shirt into the consigne and went to find a pension and something to do. The pension was easy to find but something to do was harder. I ended up walking all the way to the Alhambra and back. Probably 4 miles ... and I felt like I was lost most of the way. By the time I got back to my pension it was one am and I was dead.

Wednesday, August 14. Woke up around 10 and made my way to the Alhambra by 11 or so. There I found a 4 hour-long line to get in. I waited, tried to sneak ahead, failed, waited and then finally was told that it was sold out. There was no way I could get in. I just started walking down the big hill and into town wondering if I'd try to stay another day and get up real early to get in or what. I decided to go to Barcelona and get my act together so I could live in Spain and come back whenever I wanted. I went to the train station and found there were no tickets for Barcelona. So I booked a ticket to Madrid and was on my way. I talked to a Spanish woman who was going to college near here in Maryland... and got in to Madrid around 10pm. I read in my lonely planet that the Plaza Santa Anna was pretty hip, so I took the metro two stops and hiked the lively streets looking for a pension. I found a nice one but they said I could only stay one day. I showered and went out and saw some nice freaky jazz at one club and yakked Spanish with some other dudes for an hour at a bar. I really felt good to be in the big city and with less provincial people. Despite having these massive coughing attacks every hour, I think I even felt good enough to hang out in a disco for an hour before finally crashing out.

Thursday, August 15. Decided I liked Madrid enough to stay another day and so I got up to change pensions. In the plaza, I met this woman who had seen me looking for a pension the night before. She asked me if I found one and told her that I had but was looking for another one. She offered to show me around, so I let her take me back to this place that only charged me 22 euros and she even waited for me while I checked in. Then we went and I got some coffee in the plaza Santa Anna and talked for a while. She introduced me to some friends who walked by and eventually to her sister. We talked a lot and I found out she was from Equatorial Guinea and was working as a hair stylist of sorts and was looking for places to stay, etc. I told her I was looking for work and she helped me translate my resume into Spanish for an hour before we figured out Google was better at it than we were. We ended up spending pretty much the whole day together. We walked up towards the Prado at one point and through a really crowded park. Yeah, this is a holiday day, so the huge park had lots going on. There was one guy doing a little puppet theater. There was a guy trying to help the king be romantic with the queen. The little guy coached, "repeat after me... Reina, mira me en mis ojos. Reina, te quiero mucho. And afterwards he should kiss her. The little guy would kiss the king and the king would get all mad. Finally though the queen came back and with a little difficulty, the king pulled it off. It was very silly. We watched guitarists and Andean musicians and then walked back to the plaza to eat a little and then wait for her sister's friend who was going to take us swimming somewhere. After going to get my swimming stuff, something happened and they decided to go with out me to look at a place to live. So I said good-bye but was supposed to call them later. I walked away and sat down on the bench sad that Estefania was gone, but I was joined by a guy with a guitar who played a bunch of really cool Spanish influenced music and let me play an awkward Ripple. Then I went off into the night looking for this street festival, but I had forgotten the exact location and instead just saw the Plaza Mayor and the Grand Via before going back to Santa Anna. There I wandered around doing nothing until it was too late to try Estefania. Then I sulked climbed into bed. Estefania had wanted to go to some discos and I wasn't too thrilled about the idea, so I guess that was my excuse for not calling her.

Friday August 16th. Got up and out of my super heated pension and went into the train station. The dude said there were no tickets to Barcelona for a few days so I decided to spend one more day then go to Bilbao to meet the cool people I met in Lisbon and see the big city festival. I then went and spent about two hours online looking for work and sending off my new Spanish resume and then went and checked out the Prado. The Prado can be pretty dull the most modern art is at least 200 years old. But the El Greco's were really stunning to me with their wide brush strokes and feel. There was a exhibit of nude paintings that was very non controversial today... Then as I was getting back to Santa Anna, I met Estefania again!

We became pretty inseparable for a while then. I took her and her sister Yolanda out to dinner at a Chinese restaurant and met Yolanda's boyfriend who was a riot. We stayed out late and went to an r&b joint and grooved for a while before she wanted to take a shower and change clothes. She didn't really have a place to stay, so we went back to my pension and cleaned up and then didn't go back out. I struggled to keep my hands off of her and she struggled to choose between being comfortable in the bed or boiling in her clothes.

Saturday August 17th. My train to Bilbao was at 3 or something and after getting up at noon, we had to figure out how to get me there and everything. With Estefania's help, I finally decided I really didn't want to go to Bilbao and then figured out that Estefania had an unused bus ticket that I could use to get to Barcelona on Monday. We had to schlep my stuff all over Madrid to get it all straight though. Estefania was very great about helping me carry my piano! It made her pretty happy that I didn't go. I was happy too. We got tired of looking for a new pension, so I sent her ahead and she found a place where we could stay together. She came up with the idea that she could make good money helping backpackers find pensions. Hopefully she's getting started on that now. I think we went out and bought her a pair of white pants she really liked and got food at the Museo de Jamon to take back to our hotel. Then we watched TV, and drank our vodka and sweat and took showers and slept very close.

Sunday August 18th. It does get blurry. We didn't do much Sunday. We stayed in late and then went to go find Yolanda. She is a singer and had some performance to get to. We went to the train station and found her friend then they took off and we went to eat at this buffet. I wasn't hungry and it was hot and the day was kind of hard, but we went and took a nap and it was looking better. We tried to go find the place where Yolanda was singing, but we had the directions all wrong, so we just ended up at the Museo De Jambon again. It was very nice to have someone to share my day with. Reina, mira me en mis ojos. Reina, te quiero mucho.

Monday August 19th. The bus was going to leave around midnight, so we had the day to spend before I was leaving. We got up late and then wandered over to the Locutorium to check email and to see if there was anyone who could put me up in Barcelona. All my connections were running dry. There was Sol's friend from Huelva, but he wasn't in Barcelona. He was in Heulva. Hugh's friend from New Orleans... had left and the apartment was sitting empty. Tom's friends from LA... called and got a not very nice reception from the woman who answered the phone and wasn't enthused enough to try there again. The nice Canadian I had met in York... still in Hong Kong. I got no responses from all the emails I sent looking for work and so somewhere during the day, I made Estefania happy again by saying that I wasn't going to leave. I remember being very happy myself that I could make this decision to stay, but then I felt really strange. It took me twenty minutes but then I told Estefania that I felt defeated and really was close to crying. I had been looking forward to getting to Barcelona for 10 months and now I might not ever even get there. My whole dream of finding work there and living there was slipping away and I hadn't even gone to see what it was like. On one hand, I was letting myself be delayed by Estefania, who although we were close, I didn't think was going to become a permanent part of my life, and on the other hand, there was nothing to do about it. There was no contacts, no interviews, no one replying to emails, no one even in their offices in Barcelona this week. It was dead. Estefania talked me down on the stairs of the pension and then we switched pensions again and found ourselves at the Casanova. How appropriate.

Tuesday, August 20th. Another quiet day in Madrid. We got more food from the Museo and spent most of the day lying about. Yolanda was inviting us to go out of town for the weekend, but I needed to be in London on Monday, not Madrid, so I could tell it probably wasn't going to happen. I tried to think of ways to take Estefania with me to Barcelona, but it just didn't seem wise. I guess I could have tried to rent a car and then send her back on the train, but it seemed complicated and expensive. She said she wanted to go to Milan, but her plan was to fly. Otherwise, we could have gone at least part of the way together. Anyway, after looking online to see if we could locate the father of her child and to set her up with a yahoo account, we went out late night with Yolanda and went to a couple of bars and discos and danced and had a good time.

Wednesday, August 21. We got up around 11 and Estefania had some errands to run. I decided to go check the scene with the trains. Next thing I knew, I had a train for 4pm. I went back to the pension and told the owner we were going to leave. I waited for Estefania and told her the news. She was very bummed but was big enough to understand. For a while. Then she started to cry and ask why I wasn't staying for a few more days. I didn't know what to say to console her. Just that she was a strong, smart and clever woman who was going to find work, find a place to live, find enough money to send home to Equatorial Guinea take care of her baby and mom. I told her she could call me whenever she wanted and that I'd call her. I felt like I was abandoning her and she predicted I'd have bad luck in Barcelona. She of course accompanied me to my train and carried my piano the whole way. The train ride was slow and boring and I got into Barcelona at 11. I blew off the people who were offering pensions at the station and headed by Metro to La Rambla, a wide pedestrian street in the middle of the very lively Gothic Barrio. After an hour of wandering around, I was exhausted and couldn't find a place to stay. Finally a woman gave me the address of a hostal that usually had beds that I could get to by cab. So I gave up on the Rambla and got into a cab. The driver didn't know the place but we found it in about 20 minutes. Right on the beach, it wasn't too bad. I put my stuff in my room, got two beers from the store in the hostal and went out on the beach to watch the moon. After finding some money and food, I wandered down to the beach again and started singing songs with a group of nice people. My body ached for Estefania, but there was nothing to do. People asked me what I was doing alone and I could only think of the nice times in Madrid.

Thursday August 22. Got up as early as I could and took a bus back to the Rambla. I quickly found an Internet cafe and went in to get caught up and think about work. I went back to the infojobs.net site that I had been using in Madrid and was able to apply for 10 more jobs, saying please write me today so that we can meet before I go. After that I went over to the train station and bought a ticket for Paris for Saturday night. Then I wandered up past the Gaudi buildings and dropped a resume off at El Pais, the main Spanish language newspaper. Of course there was no one there to talk to. Everyone was on vacations. So from there I walked a long way to see the Joan Miro square near the bull-fighting stadium and then up to the Joan Miro museum itself. The museum was really great with sculpture and painting from every period of his life. For all the sick and twisted stuff that most artists put out, I love the simple beauty of Miro. After wandering the museum, I stole aboard a city-tour bus and got back down to the Rambla. There weren't any responses from my applications, so I wandered looking for a bar or something. Finally I just decided to take the bus back to the beach. I soon found myself talking to some German guys, Phillip and Andres. We were having a good time buying beers off of the Paki dudes who were selling them after the bars on the beach had closed. It must have been around 1 when the Moroccan guys came and started talking with us. I stood up and the one with the white pants and white shirt bumped up against me. I sat down again and Phillip told me to check for my wallet. It was gone. Oh shit.... let's see, I already wrote this up:

I was out on the beach in front of my hostal talking to two German dudes when these three guys who I think were Moroccan start talking to us. One of them starts bumping my leg. I wasn't sure what was going on, so it took me a minute to check for my wallet and by then it and the dude who had been bumping my leg were gone. The Germans and I spread out thru the Barconaletta barrio and followed his trail, but lost him. We reconvened at the scene of the crime and decided to look on the beach where we saw him again. So we went up to him and asked him what wassup and he said he didn't have my wallet. We followed him and one of the other guys who was there around until he got pissed and broke a bottle. I didn't want a fight or anything, I just wanted the cops, and so I backed off. Then he and his buddy split up and ran. I followed the guy who I knew was messing with me, but my sandals were flying off and I lost him quickly in the weird grid of streets. So I kept running and got to the main street where I waited for less than a minute before some cops drove by and I hailed them and explained what happened. They let me get in the car and we went looking. A minute later, we saw other cops busting the dude who still had the broken bottle. I don't know how those other cops knew what was going on, but I assume someone in the barrio had called them or something. I'm pretty amazed they found him. But of course he had had time to stash the wallet, so the rest of the story is academic... headed to the cop station and had a report filled out and I assume the dude is still in jail. Got home to my hostel at 6.

Anyway, I'm fine and still have my passport, ticket to Paris on Saturday, ticket to London, ticket to dc & no, and most all of my travelers cheques. I lost $120 and d.l. and credit cards... Credit cards. I'm having problems closing my accounts. Help!!! Someone make some calls for me! Lets see the number for wells Fargo is 1-800-642-4720 and it was a gold MasterCard under my name. The USAA Platinum Visa, I think can be cancelled by calling 1-800-531-2265. I guess I'll be trying to make these calls myself. My usaa number is 3891988. I used both cards legitimately yesterday the usaa to pay my car insurance online and the wells Fargo to buy my ticket to Paris. Any charges after those are bogus.

There was a report filed: ministerio del interior, direccion general de la policia. no:13459

in Barcelona at 03:55 am. 23 august, 2002. I think two cops are identified: no:72059 and 82147. anywho... Barb or Nari or Dan, make some calls for me!!! Thanks.

Time to push the eject button.

Friday August 23. Got up late and changed a traveler's check then went to check email and tell my story to the world on the Rambla. I then paid for a city-tour bus and checked out the Sacred Family church that Gaudi was working on and went up to Park Guell to wander the twisted landscape created by Gaudi. I was in a pretty lousy mood and missed the weight of my wallet in my shorts. After finishing the tour bus thing, I checked my empty email again, watched some skate punks do their thing in front of the contemporary art museum and then headed back to the beach. I got to play a little frisbee and then sat down with a beer and ran in to Phillip and Andres again. Next to the three of us were a couple Americans and Scots. A Gambian joined us and there were some French people too. The American dudes and I started singing Dead tunes. That was pretty nice. I hadn't done that in weeks. It was all good fun and then we went to eat paella and wandered late night to find a reggae disco the Gambian knew about. The disco was very cool and we hung out there till 4am. Finally I took a cab back to the beach and slept well into the morning.

Saturday, August 24. Basically got up at noon and after breakfast on the beach, I went to the train station with all my stuff and waited four hours for my train. The first commuter train was crowded and long. At the border, I realized the dude didn't give me real seat reservations, so I had to switch places on the train three times during the night. It was not pleasant.

Sunday August 25. Arrived at Austerlitz around 8 am and figured it was too early to call anyone. I took the metro up to Gare du Nord and put my bags in a locker. Then I walked and made a reservation for my ticket to London (that I had bought with Tom back in early July) for Monday night. Then I walked over to Pat and Jemimah's killer apartment near the Hotel de Ville. They greeted me with tea and stories of the honeymoon in Italy and trips to the US and Sweden. I went out last minute souvenir shopping and came back and had a little lunch.

Then Badu called and invited me over to the Senegalese dudes house for Sunday chillin. I said bye to Pat and Jemimah and took the metro to meet Badu. I was out of place in this French-speaking world and had to guess at what they were saying about the training habits of the Senegalese national team. The food was this massive Senegalese rice bowl that we all ate out of with big spoons filled with fish and assorted vegetables like I had never seen. The Cassava was really amazing and there were garlic like vegetables and broccoli and other things that all tasted very good. The crowd was lively and it was quite an experience. Another great day in Paris. Badu, Amaya and I took buses to just outside Paris and I fell asleep soon after arriving.

Monday August 26th. Woke up and started watching movies. It was my first day in an apartment doing nothing in well over a month. It was cold out and I just wasted my last day on the continent relaxing and watching three movies (luckily they were in English...). At the end, I started to get worried because like Barcelona, the people I had hoped to stay with in London were unavailable. So when the train pulled in to Waterloo at 11pm, I was pretty hosed. I walked around looking for a place to stay, but there wasn't anything. Finally I asked a cab driver to take me to a hotel and he took me to a place that cost me over $200. Damn. That was not what I needed.

Tuesday August 27th. Checked out at noon and walked the Thames towards Parliament and the Eye of London. Got in the train station, picked up a bag I had left there, ate some McDonalds and called Sue. She said to meet her in Sutton at 3:30, so I got there a little early and had a pint of Guinness over the newspaper. She came and picked me up and we had a nice dinner and played with the three kids. Finn was out playing tennis all night and I was crashed by the time he got home.

Wednesday August 28th. Got up before 8 and had Sue drop me at the Wimbledon tube station. I schlepped over to Heathrow and got my 11:40 plane to Dulles. I read and watched some bad movies. Sprout and Lily picked me up at the airport. Pete and I went out to see TR.

Thursday August 29 thru Monday September 2.

It's nice to be back, kind of... Lily Mondale just started 5th grade today and I'm stuck in DC till I can find my way out of here. It's a bit tough with no credit cards. But Pete and Sprout are wonderful hosts. We spent the weekend out at Cool Aid XVII, a very mellow camp out and party scene on the Gunpowder River north of Baltimore. I went up Saturday with a death trip friend, John Amberg since Pete, Lily and Sprout had enough stuff to fill their little Honda. Saturday the weather was pretty nice and people went tubing down the river and swimming in the pond. I just wandered around bumping into old ultimate and death trip friends left and right. Bill Crawford came in from SF and there were people from New Orleans there as well. Unfortunately the nice woman from Boston who I invited didn't make it...

After the sun went down, Tad led us on a parade with his trombone over to where the giant bonfire was. We all sang old tunes and threw Frisbees over the fire until they inevitably met their demise. It was really nice to see a good side of living in America after being happily very far from it all summer long. So it started misting and it misted for like three hours. Just enough to not get you really wet. But later it poured, and in the morning, lots of Cool Aiders were checking out. But most knew the best was yet to come. Around 2, Tad's parents showed up with two more elder Mondale friends. Alex and Leo Mondale made it too. We all gathered around the stage for the big commitment ceremony. There were 6 brides maids and 6 grooms' men. Sparkles was the best man and Cara from New Orleans stood up for Adele. James Andrews and David Marsh started the ceremony with some sweet jazz as everyone marched in. I was taking panorama photos with my camera... someday I'll get these all on line. James and David backed this woman who sang some incredible gospel song that had us all in tears. Adele and Tad exchanged vows and then Bill laid the broom out for them to jump. They hopped over the broom, and then to everyone's surprise, ran up to the pond with everyone chasing them, and jumped in. Yee haw. I don't think I'll ever see two weddings in a row that were so different. Pat's with the stately elegance of old England and Tad's with a broom and a jump in the lake. Anyway, it was really special and wonderful and I better stop wasting Pete's 10 hours a month.

Tuesday, September 3 thru Monday, September 7

Did someone say travel? Whoa, what a week it's been. After the stellar wedding, I was thrust out of the house by Sprout early Tuesday morning with just the clothes I was wearing. I headed into Adams Morgan and found this wonderful coffee shop with lots of couches. I sat and read the paper, talked to people and then went to get my first burrito in three months. It was a disappointment. Avoid Burrito Brothers... anyway, I decided to take a walk to remind me of the good ol days of the week before where I was walking 8 hours every day... and made it down to the mall and back. Then I sat around until 9 when I met Tad and crew at a pool hall. I was going to head back to Vienna, but Tad said that I could sleep on the porch of their B&B and go with them in the morning to sail the Chesapeake. So I camped out in Adams Morgan and we got up at 6 to get to the dock at Deale by 7. Things went well. Tom, who I had met ages ago, showed up to go with us and we met Tad's brother Leo who I had never really met before right on time at his boat. So off we went into a stiff breeze across the bay. We were getting close to 7 knots for most of the way and were within sight of St. Michaels by 1. But we didn't get there till two because we ran aground and had to drop the sails and turn the motor on and shove it in reverse to get out. It was nice to relive my old days on the eastern shore.

So after chowing down on stuffed flounder and blue crabs and cherrystone clams, we grabbed another case of beer and headed back, but the strong wind we sailed into wasn't there to push us home. The weather sure was sunny and beautiful, but we weren't getting much over 4 knots all the way back. Finally around 7 we decided to let the motor help push us in. Then Leo imagined something was wrong with the motor and killed it. Then we sailed at around 2 knots till the sun went down and it got dark. We called for help because we knew we wouldn't make it back to the dock with no wind and no motor. But the towboat was busy and finally we convinced Leo that the problem was more due to the beer than the motor. So he turned it back on and ran us aground again about 1/4 mile from the harbor. Then proceeded to motor us further and further into the muck till we were able to convince him that we weren't going anywhere. So when the nice big boat came along and started helping us, Leo was still thinking to continue in the direction we were going. Finally the other boat couldn't get close enough to get our rope and I jumped in (to the crab infested dark mucky water with big hungry sharks...) and finally proved to him that there was no water in front of the boat and in fact if we went back to the channel marker, there was plenty. So we finally got to shore around 11 and then the adventure began. Tad was driving us back to Adams Morgan where I dreamed of taking a metro back to Vienna for a shower and clean clothes... when somehow we all fell asleep in the car and we ran off the road and hit this tree before stopping in the middle of the grassy median. Luckily no one was hurt, but we sure were awake in a hurry. The rental Lincoln Town car was in pretty sad shape and well, we left it there and took a cab back to Adams Morgan where I slept on the porch again.

The police came knocking around 3, but Tad took care of everything and all was well by the time I woke up at 8. Then I had a whole nother day of sitting around the coffee shop and wandering around Dupont Circle and waiting for the happy hour to come. I met Sparkles first and then Tad's parents came and all sorts of people from the wedding came and we had a nice few hours before going to dinner somewhere and then finally everyone agreed that I wouldn't be allowed to go to the party later unless I showered and changed clothes. So after a quick stop for a change, we went to a neat party at the house of a friend who had come down to Jazz Fest this year. We jammed and looked at wedding photos.... mine were the best! And finally Pete showed up to take me home.

The weekend was comparatively tame. We had another post wedding picnic in Rock Creek Park and yesterday we had Champagne brunch over at sparkles and tore down all the walls in his basement to make a killer jam room, which we used all day long. Monday, I went into town to meet Sylvia and talk about her Flowsonline.org project. Monday night, Sylvia, Sparkles, Peter, Amburg, Spewie, Maria and Fritz all came out to meet me at Loreal's mexican restaurant for a bye bye Bagus dinner. I was hoping my brother Andy, who was in town for some meetings, was going to show up, but he didn't get my email in time. After dinner we went over to Sparkles' place again and watched MNF. My gods I can't believe tomorrow I'll sleep in my own bed for the first time in 3 months...

Tuesday, September 10 - Friday, September 13. After a pretty uneventful trip to New Orleans, Tad picked me up and we went to the St Charles Tavern for some crabs with Jimi, Peter Thomas, Tommy, Adele, Charlotte, etc. We chowed tons of amazing crabs and I went home and was getting ready to sleep when Kera came by and took me out for a quick drink with some friends. When I got home, I slept before unpacking. I really had a hard time getting movtivated all week and slept a lot and watched TV and slowly went about putting things away. Finally, on Friday, I got my shit together to go after the cockroach infestation in my apartment. It was extremely nasty. I had left something to rot while I was in Europe and the bugs were having a field day. I threw all the remaining food away and moved all my dishes and papers into the other room. Then I conducted a direct assault with some serious poison and went out to dinner with Tad while I waited the required four hours before going back in. Actually I think I waited 7 hours. Finally I went back and scrubbed every surface in the apartment and got to bed at 3. That's early for New Orleans, though.

Saturday I chilled til Tad invited me to go see Trombone Shorty at the House of Blues. This became, completely insane. Tad had comp tickets to the HOB because we gave Trombone Shorty a ride to the gig. We walked around the Quarter before going in to the show and randomly ran into two groups of people we knew from New Orleans... one of the groups was saying, "Speak of the Devil" as we walked up because they had been talking about Tad. Then we went into the HOB and after 20 minutes I start staring at this tall gangly blond haired dude and I told Tad, 'I know this dude'. I walk over and Mike looks at me and gives me a big hug. Next thing I know I see Curran and Whalen and Zokan there too. Really outta hand. After staying out dancing and partying with these guys and their entourage till 7 am on Saturday and finding out Mike for some reason had an extra ticket, I got the ticket, got a bus home and got up at 11 to get to the game. In all the times I've watched a packer game in the past dozen years, never as it with any of these dudes who I actually played football with. As I told my story about Nelson, it made me realize how important old friends can be. The Superdome was completely Green. So many cheeseheads came down. Really the St. Monica group was about 15 people including wives and some other folks. The game was pretty tragic. The pack threw it away early and then fumbled away their comeback attempts. After the game we just sat and yakked for hours. Curran is in Boulder and is a psych professor there... married but no kids. Zokan lives out in Idaho and works with the forest service. Kelly is in Austin and is divorcing and trying to keep the three kids. Whalen of course plays softball up in Milwaukee and is staying at my place tonight.

It's pretty far out that everyone came together for this game. It was a mass convergence from all over. I guess I came from the furthest away! Now I'm starting to plan this trip out to play the ajeet pal benefit over Thanksgiving, and have friends to stay with all thru the West. Gads, what can I say it was so nice to see these people I've known for 30 years after just travelling thru Europe and not knowing anyone for the last month. Even the Pack getting squashed didn't seem to matter.

Monday was a waste, but I think I'm finally alive here on Tuesday.