Returns

Right, so I’m back from a very good time in Madrid. It’s a much smaller city than I had expected and was easy to get around. The weather was a bit mixed at the beginning of the week, but by the end of the week it was lovely. I’ll post some photos at some point but haven’t got round to loading them on to my computer yet.

The slight black marks on the holiday were that on the flight on the way out, a small child in the row in front was very sick, which included vomiting on my rucksack. Lovely! G’s bag was also stolen, which fortunately had no money or valuables in it, but did have our guide book and phrase book etc in it, so we bought a new phrase book and then just winged it for what we would do for the rest of the week. The guide book was from the library so I shall have to go and throw myself on their mercy and hope that they don’t cancel my membership (I suspect for a sum of money they can be bought off…).

Madrid is a nice city and we had a somewhat lazy week mooching about, eating food, reading books and seeing the sights. The last few days we were there, we sat in the park each day and I would read to G from the book I was reading – Moon Palace by Paul Auster – which was so pleasant. I would read for maybe 30 minutes to an hour while we sat there in the sunshine and we would chat about the book as we walked around Madrid. I have said it before, but Paul Auster is such a fantastic author (I might say some more about him in the next few days) and G is also now a convert. Hooray! I also found a few Spanish books that I would like to read (in English) and will add them on to my phenomenally long list of books to read.

Anyway, a good place to visit (despite a few problems). Photos will follow at some point. It’s back to work now and G is away for the next couple of nights at a conference. Only three days of work and then I am on leave again. Hooray.