Cádiz, and..."Where'd I put my green wig from last year?"

Oh yeah, it fell on a dirty Logroño bar floor and a drunken dude stole it. Damn. I want it back. Beer/Sweat stink and all.

Wow...I've actually got a bit of time to write in this thing right now? The past 3 nights have been spent correcting exams and whatnots...so here goes. I still have 57 report cards to cover this weekend. Fun times ahead, indeed.
So Cádiz was beautiful. Very small overall, but simply magnificent. Mercedes, her boyfriend Juan, Donna and I all had a great time and were able to relax a lot (although some people just cannot walk for more than 10 minutes sometimes...ahem.) Here's the cathedral...which was located super close to our great hostel "Fantoni".






Hmmmm. Seafood is just amazing in Spain, especially in Huelva and along the coasts (d-uh). I never really used to eat seafood in Canada, but I've grown to love it a lot here. Nothing like skinning prawns and scraping out oyster meat! This fine dish cost about 7 euros...about 10 canadian bucks, I believe.







Donna, me and Mercedes in front of the theatre in Cádiz. It was much bigger than the one we have in Huelva. We were pretty lucky with the weather (but heck, this is Spain...there are far more sunny days than anything else) and it was roasting hot on Saturday...I think we had about 26-27 degrees at one point. I'll repeat myself: I shall die in Canada.








Me and Donna acting like a couple of twits in front of a church. I purposely downsized the pic so as not to make you all turn to stone from our medusa-like grimaces.








Tee-hee, how cute. It's a wee lil boat made out of metal...wish I could have somehow twisted it off its pole...then I could have put it on my head and told people I was Poseidon, directing Odysseus to doom and gloom. Yeah, I'm pathetic...I still haven't finished The Odyssey because of my workload, alright?

This was my hostel. I'm a queen. Pfffff, yeah right. I'm not too sure what the heck this was, but it was located close to La Caleta, where there was a nice pathway that led up to a castle (which was unfortunately closed off to locals and tourists...heaven knows why).

I could have sat there all day, it was so nice and relaxing...the sea, the breeze, the waves...we really don't need a lot to be happy in life. I miss nature. I couldn't stop smiling.

I went bonkers when I saw this little Harry Potter carousel in a kiddy park. Not only was the park GORGEOUS, but it had Professor Snape's image in it, too. By far my fave character, he possesses a ruthless and cunning wit, is rarely caught off guard by any comment or insult and often leaves his verbal combatants with little to say.

Oh Alan Rickman, I don't know why I love thee so much. Or perhaps I do?


In other news, there isn't any news. All I've been doing is working my ass off and trying to get everything finished on time. I didn't even think I'd be able to update my blog until next week, but surprise surprise, you all got lucky.

I guess when it rains, it really does pour. Just so much to do.

2 out of my 17 "English Alive" students failed their last exam and I have to give them a make up exam...pffff. WTF. Everybody else got between 80-90% (seriously...we fricking revised everything and I told them exactly what they needed to study) the other 2 should have just studied more. More work for me, and for what?

I've been miss cranky pants for the past few days, considering the mountain of work I'm expected to do for the next few days. The good news is that when this weekend will be over it'll be a bit more smooth sailing up ahead...(I hope). Shane's also coming on Thursday, so that is also considerably lightening my mood.

I swore to myself to go out tomorrow night for St. Patty's Day, regardless of how much work there is to do. I'll just get up early enough in time to go out and meet up with my friends at an Irish Pub (gotta love Irish Pubs that advertise:"The Autentic Irish Sperience"...I shit you not).

Tomorrow is Bono's birthday...I better make sure to call him.

I don't know when I'll have time to post again...perhaps during the week when Shane's in Morocco.

Oh, and I'm still deeply jealous of Eve's The Shins concert happening TOMORROW. Argh (shakes fist). It was all me, baby.

H xoxoxoxox

The Wait...

I need a vacation. Being a teacher in Spain sometimes means becoming deaf and mute. Mostly deaf. Spaniards just CANNOT control their tone of voice...seriously. During the last half hour of my last class today I played a game with one of my 12 year old classes, and (as usual) they were yelling like banshees. DAMMIT. Don't scream in my ear when I am a mere 10 cm away from you, telling me that the other team's point didn't count. I wanted to strip off his skin layer by layer and then chew on it a-la hillbillie style. Where's my spit bucket?

I totally discipline that class, that's just how they are. Even my boss' sister (who's also a teacher) had to deal with their noise last year, so it's not just with me...

My voice has been transformed into steel. I don't lose it because I've strengthened it so much from disciplining. On the other hand, I might already have the hearing capacity of a 92 year old.

My ears actually hurt, they were being so obnoxious during the game. Thank God my other 12 year old class isn't like that.

I'm just tired. Plain tired. I need a vacation. Now. Paris can't come quickly enough...well, at least I'm going to Cadiz this weekend with some friends (hostel's already booked and everything, thanks to yours truly...as usual). I'm such a great trip planner. Seriously. If you ever need a good travel buddy, then I'm that one person in a million that you'll truly cherish spending tied-to-the-hip moments with. I'm a planner, organizer, get-your-shit together kinda person. I'll even find you a hostel where they'll leave you triangular shaped chocolate hearts on the pillows (or Knight Rider stickers, if you're into that sort of thing).

On the plus side, I'm loving my 5 year olds more and more. They're great, and pretty smart too. My 6-7 year olds on the other hand...kinda iffy. It depends on the days, really. Strange, cuz at the beginning of the year it was the contrary. My, my...how some children improve and how others just seem to disintegrate before your eyes, losing curiosity and the will to learn...

I work hard. Did I mention I need a vacation? My ears, at the very least, need one. Maybe I'll package them up nicely and send them off to Cancun where they'll be able to rest on a hammock or something.

My job is gonna prepare me nicely for when I'll be teaching in a real school. I wonder how Canadian kids will be...I don't expect them to be better than the Spaniards. I mean, they can be loud too...we'll see. It really depends on the kids. There ARE lots of kids in my classes that I simply adore, but of course there are some that you just wanna -BLEEP-!

Welcome to the wonderful world of teaching. Get used to it, H-Bomb.

Oh, I had a telephone interview with Wilfrid Laurier U yesterday. It went well enough, I think...considering I had to call AT work because of the time difference and everything. It sucked that I also had to call them...sheeesh. Universities can't afford to pay long-distance calls? Yeah, and Britney loves her kids. (rolls eyes)

It's the only uni out of my 5 chosen ones that needed an interview. Thank God for that. What a hassle...took me so long to get through, too (they were doing interviews all day). I'll know on April 2nd if I did as well as I thought or not.

Besides all of this...hmmm...just been chilling with friends in Punta during the weekends. The weather's been kick ass great. 21 or so degrees here (TO had -21 yesterday, WTF)...I'm so gonna miss this. Most things in Spain are amazing (I'm not gonna say everything due to slight deafness right now)...I look forward to going to Cadiz and seeing another great city. Pictures will follow, my lovelies...don't worry.

Report card season is coming up...this will be a busy month. 22nd, are you there? Hello?

H xoxoxoxoox