what the spanish don't celebrate, we have to make up for (st. patricks day weekend)

at dinner with juaq, alone once again because emma is traveling, we are discussing weekend plans. i tell her that this weekend is st. patricks day. and she says "what are you talking about?"

"you know, irish...st. patrick...green, ummm"

she had no idea what st patricks day was! it was devestating. the only places you could find a substantial amount of green were irish pubs!

so we decided that we needed to make up for the lack of spanish celebration. home made dinner (we didnt have enough bowls, so we had to eat the soup out of measuring utensils), followed by irish car bombs. . the dinner was amazing and really made me miss making my own meals and having a kitchen around that doesnt smell like dog and rotting fruit.

so after a movie viewing from tessas computer, i got a taxi and had the most amazing taxi driver who was playing a radio station that was apparently dedicated to american folk music from the 60's and was playing bob dylan and donovan, and it couldnt have been a better ride home.

sangria, ¿para llevar? (san sebastian 3)

day three of our trip to basque country started out pretty much the same way as all the other days did, with a walking tour. this time we went to gernika. and again, i had no idea what our guide was saying (i had given up on trying to listen, and just took a million pictures instead). but we did see a pretty park, and some beautiful churches, and some amazing public art.

we then moved on to bilbao, with some random stops on the side of the highway to see the surfing sights, a church, and so on.

and finally bilbao. we had a nother walking tour. some highlights:

when we were stopped in front of a cathedral "listening" to the guide, this little boy comes walking downt the street driving a remote control car and manages to maneuver it through our group, and in between our legs. i was in love, and kind of wish i was 5 years old.


we walked by jesus opticals, as well as a store that was selling towels, blankets, and bed games. haha, i love spanish signs.

we had free time for lunch and exploring during siesta time (way to plan out the day guys), so a few of us headed to the middle of the city for some bocadillos. we found a little diner looking place with bocadillos, and suddenly it occured...sangria is exactly what this day needs. so emily, the goddess that she is, orders her sandwich and asks the man behind the counter, "es posible para tener sangria para llevar?" (is it possible to have some sangria to go?). he gave us some strange looks, but made it for us anyway in cardboard coca cola cups. we ate in the plaza in the sun, and took naps in the sun. sangria, bocadillos, siesta. we are so spanish. (imagine me sleeping in between emily and jeanna...i only woke up to take the picture)

we ended the day at the guggenheim. they were preparing for a big anniversary celebration exhibition, so only the permanent collection was open to the public, but that was enough considering the amount of time we had. our guide finally spoke in english for this tour, and suddenly he was interesting, and funny, and intriguing. we were all amazed at how much we liked him in english. i was blown away by the museum, and gained some faith in art again. when we had free time at the end, tessa, emily, jeanna and i decided that we needed to walk through each and every Serra sculpture. if i had that kind of money i would DEFINETLY be making huge sculptures that people can walk through and into and mess with their perspective. except you could touch my sculptures, without the museum security guards freaking out. (we touched them anyway secretly, the threat of camera security didn't scare us)

so we get to the airport, and our plane is delayed. we board (on the plane there is basically just our group and maybe 5 other people), sit, sit, sit, sit...and we have no idea why it is taking so long. suddenly, on come this large group of men dressed in suits. and all the spaniards get so excited. and they clap. and the pilot makes an announcement. and us americans still dont know what is going on...until we see the crests on their suits. it is the entire espanyol futbol team. coaches, media crew, players, everyone, on our flight back to barcelona.
suddenly we were not so tired anymore. i tried to get a picture on the sly, but felt kind of sketchy and stopped (this was the best i could do). i would have asked for some autographs, but considering my luck, and the fact that i dont know who is who on the team, i probably would have asked the 4th string player that everyone makes fun of. so i decided against it and stayed in my seat hoping one would come sit by me. no such luck. they all just sat and played video games while the stewardess gave them free water (and ignored the rest of us).

and following the worst turbulence i have ever experienced (in which the pilot came over the intercom clearly freaked out, shaky voice and everything), we arrived home safe and sound.

france, lake tahoe, and pais vasco (san sebastian 2)

and so our guide tore me away from the park, and moved us onto the bus to go to Hondarribia, a little pueblo north of san sebastian. we had a walking tour of the town, where we saw a lot of things that i am sure are very important. but, of course, no body was listening or understanding what he was saying. so all i know is that it was an amazing little town that took a bit of my heart.

and then suddenly i understood perfectly what he was saying, lunch time! he told us that we could take a boat to france for lunch if we wanted, and even though he claimed that everything is twice the price once you cross the border, you just can't pass up this sort of opportunity. so we boarded the boat to france (as pictured), and made our way to an afternoon of france. the boat ride was short, and manned by just one guy who seemed quite overwhelmed when our group of 30 americans showed up. the combination of sun and france was not good. when we arrived emily was so excited i thought she might pee her pants.

we had our minds set on some french cheese, a baguette, and some champagne (not cava this time!), and found this guy on the street selling some amazing looking cheese. he was amazing, and apparently knew every language as he was not only speaking french, but also english, spanish, and catalan. every time someone knew was speaking with him it seemed he was speaking a new language (and just to boast, he spoke to us in spanish and NOT in english!). He let us taste some of the cheese, and it was impossible not to buy it. we asked him where we could buy some bread. unfortunately it was siesta time, so nothing was open (according to him), but we can buy this loaf of bread he bought this morning...he only ate a few pieces since he bought it. and wine, where could we get wine? nowhere? oh, you don't have any of that do you? oh.






so we settled on some good french bread and amazing french cheese and ate in the sun and it was lovely. and when we had finished off the bread, we headed back to spain, and back to san sebastian for the rest of the afternoon of free, unguided time, where we re-walked the walking tour from the day before, this time in the sun. it is amazing how different a town can look from way to the next. i barely recognized san sebastian in the sunshine.

my favorite place was this place by the sea with these amazing metal statues worked into the rocks. there were also ladders that led down to rocks closer to the sea, that i should have climbed down in the name of art and photography and general adventure, but tessa talked me and emily out of it. i still regret it.

we continued with some shopping. tessa saw this dress and decided it would be perfect for my wedding. but seeing as it didnt even fit the maniquin they had it on, i don't know how much i luck i would have with it. and then, in order to make that dress fit even better, we went to find some churros con chocolate.

when the rest of the girls went up to the counter to get the churros i held the table. i was sitting next to a couple of little boys wearing firefighter hats (which are yellow here) and i talked with their dad, who was from brazil, and the place was filled with other little kids with firefighter hats (because apparently there had just been some sort of firefighters fair), but our conversation was interrupted by the appearance of churros con chocolate. they were gone in minutes.

we decided to walk back to the hotel, to work off the churros, since we were only returning in order to eat the amazing 3 course meals they were feeding us. on our walk, we happened by a carousel and ended up spending the best euro of my entire time in spain. which was followed by a surprise fireworks show (literally), some of the most amazing, as well as most creepy street performances i have ever seen, and a beach sunset.

dinner time, and then off to the bars. we were not about to miss the barca madrid game, and headed off to find a bar with a big screen and estrella to watch the game and yell loudly at the screen like the old men in the bar by my apartment do, even though they clearly dont pay attention to the game. we settled at the second bar we went to, and emily and i decided to get another beer. i decided to ask the bartender for the beer that was his favorite, he gave it to us, and said it was a czech beer. so we drink it, and half way through, realize that on the label on the back of the bottle it says "label of budweiser". apparently the bartender has bad taste in exports. we were then hit on, attempted to be danced on, and sweated on by these guys from san sebastian. but all they knew about the US was lake tahoe, because one of them had visited lake tahoe, and all they could say or ask us was "Has ido a Lake Tahoe?" (have you been to lake tahoe?). they were quite dissapointed when i said no, but would forget in a few minutes and ask again. it was a vicious cycle of dissapointment.

where the bumper cars sang to me (san sebastian)

school organzied weekend travels may seem somewhat disadvantageous. you can't do what you want, when you want, where you want. and basically, you are at school so its pretty much automatically not as cool. but i am going to admit right now, i am a nerd. not only did i sit at the front of the bus and joke with the chaperones, but i loved this sponsored trip to the basque country. let me explain why.

they organize everything. you pay them one lump sum, and suddenly flights, tours, itinerary, hotel, and food are all dealt with. plus, we ended up doing things that i NEVER would have spent the money on if it had been up to me. our hotel was amazing, and the meals that were included with the trip were four course meals. literally. when we got to our tables there were already warm rolls! and every day we were lead by a tour guide.

ok, so the weekend begins.
we meet at the airport at some unreasonably early hour and after a plane, bus, walk, bus, we get to this little village called Getaria. It was raining (as it continued to do for the rest of the day) and although it was only 10 AM it felt like it was time for dinner. There was no time for walking around. Food was needed right away. Thankfully we managed to find an amazing bakery, and somehow managed to communicate to them that we wanted toasted bread with jam. and the jam was homemade!! it was so good.

we continue with another long bus ride, and finally arrive in san sebastian just in time for lunch, where we are served a ridiculous amount of food and i get way too excited and eat as much as possible. literally. i have never eaten so much i thought i was going to be sick, apparently there is a first for everything. and it was so amazing, i didn't even regret eating it all.

after some digestion slash napping time, the group of us met our tour guide for the weekend, and headed out for a walking tour of san sebastion. set the scene:
cold wind
cold rain and mist
cloudy skies
no umbrella
mesh shoes and jean jacket (way to pack appropriately for the weather claire)

regardless of the most horrid weather possible for a walking tour, our guide managed to stretch it into a 4 hour extravaganza, speaking spanish nonetheless. so not even were we not paying attention to him because we were distracted by our uncomfortably wet everything, but we couldn't even pretend like we were listening to be polite. needless to say we we began to get quite ridiculous around the second hour. needless to say, emily and i began reminiscing about zoolander, and decided that blue steel would be the new theme of the weekend. this is cathedral blue steel (notice the soaked hair and wind burned face), unfortunately my cheek muscles were too cold to pucker appropriately, but i promise they got much better by the end of the weekend.

when the tour guide (who was quite good at overlooking the fact that we paid no attention to him the entire walking tour) finally said we could leave to get some dinner, all we wanted was to be warm. i was still ridiculously full from lunch, so we went to a tapas place. in basque country they call tapas pinxos. supposedly they are different, but i can't tell what it is. and we all got like 2 tapas and something warm to drink and sat as far away from the door as possible.

and the next morning there was sun. beautiful, glorious sun. and so consequently we were all suddenly full of energy. it probably didn't help that the first place we went was a theme park on a hill overlooking the city. Of course, none of the rides were open for the day yet because it was off season, and we were told that the real reason anyone goes there is for the amazing view. But the sight of bumper cars, and even better, bumper boats, and the smell of park food made me very nostalgic for some good rides. i mean, it was no holiday world (thats for you cricket), but it would have to do. i tried to convince everyone that we should stay there until the park opened, but i dont think the tour guide appreciated my ideas.

rockstar sightings

i got back from portugal, and who was here in barcelona to make my life even more amazing? eliza my contact improve love! eliza is studying in london for the semester, and was in barcelona for the weekend before heading to Morroco for her spring break. I missed most of her weekend, but fortunately got to see her on Monday. she had a pretty cool friend with her (brie). it began with some ultimateyl confusing facebook messages, but eventually we met up at la catedral (after waiting an hour with my friend tessa cuase eliza forgot about the time difference, haha) and went to lunch. It was a beautiful lunch in Juicy Jones (can juicy jones ever not be amazing? i think not), and then tessa went on her way as eliza, brie, and i strolled down to parc de la ciutadella where we had a romantic row in the pond. eliza was a professional at rowing, so brie and i got to chill in the back of the boat. at one point we decided it would be a good idea to row underneath the bridge, but didn't realize that it only came up about a foot above the water until we were practically underneath. it was pretty ridiculous, like a mini roller coaster, and we had to go underneath it several times before finally leaving the pond. we frolliced in the park, and i showed off my knowledge of barcelona, got some fancy chocolate, and then i walked them home to their hostel. it was basically a perfect afternoon.

important things i learned in lisbon

bananas and water are two staples of traveling. (we went to the grocery store every morning, and usually once at night and got bananas and water) cheap and good

portugal loves their sausages. but at least its not huge big legs hanging in the window

apparently portuguese street performers train their dogs to collect the money. i was super impressed.




i kind of fell in love with this underwear, and wish i was a boy so i could wear it.





we ran into this random, very trashed, public park while wandering around. i wanted to keep it forever.

where the grafitti is stenciled on

so i have probably mentioned that my roommate emma is gone basically every weekend. and there are a lot of people in the program here that are travling constantly. but i have no such plans. there are a couple of problems with everyone being gone while i am still here. perhaps the most important is that my meals alone with juaq are super awkward. we basically end up watching spanish who wants to be a millionaire and eating as quickly as possible.

so, when josh asked me if i wanted to go to lisbon, portugal for a weekend with him and kevin i was all for it. not because i really wanted to go to portugal. quite honestly, i didnt know a single thing about lisbon other than the fact that it was in portugal. what i did know was that going meant one weekend without awkward dinners of mushy vegetables and eggs. we booked our tickets a week before the flight, and went without knowing a single thing about the city.

but, really, not knowing was the best thing that could have happened.

we got to the airport having no idea how to get to our hostel. In fact, josh had even forgotten to write down the address, so all we knew was the name of the hostel and that it was supposedly in the main square downtown, accross from a theater. thankfully, the airport information man was extremely nice and figured everything out for us, and got us on a bus that dropped us off directly in front of our hostel!

we had a three bed romm in the hostel, with our own bathroom. other than the bathroom door having some trouble closing, it was a pretty nice set up.

after claiming beds, checking out the view from our window, and so on, we went on to get some dinner. the guy at the front desk gave us a map and showed us where mcdonalds and hard rock cafe were. but we gave him a mean look, so then he showed us where a restaurant with good grilled chicken was. apparently portugal is known for their grilled meats. we left, and the boys led the way to the restaurant. and even though the guy at the desk gave us super clear directions, the boys decided following the map was better, and got us lost. finally we decided to just stop at a random restaurant, and it was the right one!

we all ordered grilled chicken, and while we were waiting they put out some bread and cheese and this little ceramic container that seemed to have olive oil in it for brushing onto the bread. mm, olive oil bread. i soaked my bread with it, took a big excited bite...it wasnt olive oil. it hurt. my mouth was burning, and we hadnt even gotten water yet. we decided that it was mustard seed oil, and i got a new roll. i then proceeded to eat the biggest plate of meat i have ever seen, and ordering a mystery dessert (which turned out to be pineapple and whipped cream)

after dinner we tried to go to barria alta, where we had heard all the good night life was, but got lost again. instead of barria alta we ended up just walking up this huge hill on a super sketchy road with lots of strip clubs. I have never seen such a lack of pedestrian women on the streets. i convinced the boys that we were going back downtown, and ended up going to a small bar near our hostel and spent the night listening to top eighty hits from the 90's. (i have learned that all of the iberian peninsula listens to bad american music, and especially enjoy the eighties and nineties)

even the cafe we went to the next morning for breakfast (after eating an entire bag of pan con tomate tostas-aka, best pizza chips ever) was playing VH1 i love the eighties. ridiculous.

we woke up the next morning, and still have very little idea of what there was to see in the city. so we walked. we walked up random hills, down little alleyways. we ran into a castle (caste of sao jorge). apperently the castle foundations were built in the second century BC, or something crazy like that. but we didnt go inside becuase it was really expensive. at one point we recognized how awesome the graffiti was all over the city and had a photo shoot. seriously, the graffiti was amazing. other than the cool freehand stuff there was also a ton of clearly stenciled designs all over the place. the graffiti artists are super prepared.

we also tried to walk to this place in lisbon called belem, which is where another old castle and architecture and some war memorials...aka, tourist central. but then we realized half way there that we had been walking for over an hour, and it was still so far away. so we went to cafe and chilled. after a cheap dinner of sandwiches, and some rest time in the hostel, we decided to try to get back up to barria alta. but first we had to visit the beautiful bartended from the bar we had been to last night. this time there were live musicians singing bad music from the nineties. it was awesome. haha. but josh, being super lame, was falling asleep in his chair. so we had to get him moving and went on our way up the hill.

and i must admit, i wasnt sure it would happen. i thought we were surely going to get lost in the red light district again, and be followed by creepy men again down the hill, and walk by drug deals on the street. and we kind of did get lost. and kevin and i looked at josh and told him "we are in exactly the same place as we were yesterday!". but we kept walking, and saw some other people walking further up the hill, so we kept going. and the streets were silent. so not party central. up the hill, more and more. turn the corner....biggest block party in the world. block after block the streets were crowded with people drinking and eating these amazing looking toasted sandwiches. and people with their guitars and accordians playing together. it was amazing. the boys each got a sandwich and stood on the side of the street talking politics, while i talked to some locals. (we also saw some other people from our program in barcelona, but they were annoying so i am going to skip that part of the night)

around 3AM, i am talking to this group of portuguese guys about sports (haha, oh boy), and they are about to go to a party somewhere else, and ask if i want to go. i do not, so i tell them that i have to stay with my friends, and point to the political debate. they say, oh thats fine, just tell your friends they are coming. so i go over to josh and kevin, and we realize we dont know how to be polite in this situation, so we runaway. literally, we ran through the crowd, down the hill, until we knew they couldnt see us anymore. and returned to our hostel, a locked hostel! there was supposed to be someone at the desk to buzz us in at all hours of the morning, but nobody was letting us in. another group of girls from the hostel even showed up and wanted in too. i seriously thought we were going to be spending the night on this bench. but eventually the group of us was loud enough, apparently, and the person at the desk woke up and let us in. a hostel bed has never felt so wonderful.

the next day we figured out the bus system to get us to belem, and spent the day laying in the sun by the water next to beautiful towers and castles.

when i stop caring about pickpockets

so my roommate likes to leave me alone for long periods of time with our senora, or juaq as we like to call her. juaq is not so bad, but i don't have a strong desire for many long deep conversations with her. so weekends when emma is gone, and my friends are all in other countries, i spend a lot of time wandering around the city, no idea where i'm going and getting lost. considering my directional talents this isn't so hard. and so the other weekend i was feeling sorry for myself, gelato in hand as a feel better gift to myself, walking around barri gotic. little windy streets with a complete lack of signs. and i realized a couple of things.

if pickpockets can get into my double zipper, twenty pocket, close to my body at all times purse and manage to get to the bottom of the pit to where my money and anything else valuable would be, good for them.

street performers are beautiful. i wish i could be a street performer and inspire spontaneous gathering of circular crowds. i especially like the ones that perform in crazy niches and tiny streets instead of a big plaza. and the old men that play in suits and ties. they are great too.

i think gelato unites the entire world. nobody would refuse a gelato date.

street markets are the best sorts of surprises. i would turn a corner, and there would be a little tent with cheeses and honey and chocolate and antiques and artists and jewelry and funny old men selling everything to you. i think i could just sit in the middle of a street market for an entire weekend.

no matter how much girls complain about all the spanish men making cat calls or kissing noises towards them, and no matter how much i would like to take the women's rights position, and no matter how much i don't want to admit it...i am flattered everytime the men on the street make their rude ridiculous comments. it will never get old. and even if they do it to every woman that walks by, i am just going to pretend that it is really all for me. and that i am just that hot.

the scent of strawberry lipgloss will always remind me of carnaval

sometimes there are holidays that nobody really likes. flag day, for example. not to say that flag day is not a good and valient or worthy celebration of our flag and whatever. but seriously, nobody really celebrates it or even knows actually what the point of it is. and it's even worse than president's day. at least we got that day off of school through highschool. i even got lincoln's birthday off in illinois. and casimir pulaski day! i got that off in grade school, and i don't even know who casimir pulaski is. those are all way better holidays than flag day, which is in the middle of the summer and nobody pays attention to it.

ok, so thinking of flag day, i would like to say that carnaval is pretty much the exact opposite of that. its basically impossible to not like carnaval. ok, so maybe you don't like dressing up, you don't have to! other than that there is nothing to not like, and even that is a stretch. i mean, i love dressing up as well as holidays where everyone else get dressed up in ridiculous things. its like the whole world is 4 again. who doesn't want to try out being four again?

recap of the night: emma and i get out of class on tuesday at 7pm, go to corte ingles for some quick groceries, and then have to go back to the apartment so that we can drop off our school stuff, and so that i can pick up my mom bag. trail mix, veggies, clementines, emergency toilet paper, tide stick, water, gum, money, camera, phone, pen, hand sanitizer, chapstick, swiss army knife. i was set. return to plaza catalunya by 8 to meet jeanna and catch the train to sitges. we were literally running the entire time. i was sweating by the time we got on the train. but we had to catch the eight oclock train because the parade in sitges started at 8:30, and we were not about to miss it.

on the train there was a group of people dressed up in costumes drinking boxed wine straight from the box and rolling slash smoking joints without even trying to hide it. watching a rabbit smoke is definetly an interesting experience. we knew which was our stop when they were getting off.

sitges is a town on the beach outside of barcelona that is known for it´s large LGBT population and famous (or infamous) for its weekend of nonstop carnaval celebrations.

i learned this all when we arrived in sitges and meet jeanna´s spaniard boy bruno and his friend oriel (i have no idea how to spell his name). and proceed to the parade. tuesday was the last night of carnaval, and so the celebration had already been going on for four days and nights. it was a city of confetti. the streets were multi colored and filled with cross dressers, masks, wigs, eyeshadow, and girls pretending that underwear is a costume. we made our way towards the parade, but the boys were already talking about food. what kind of spaniards are these? dinner at 8:30?! how can they be hungry so early? and how do they not want to see the parade?

and so they inform us that the parade goes until 1 in the morning. seriously. they weren´t even joking. so we went to find a mexican restaurant so i could get the nachos that i have been craving basically since i arrived. on our way there emma discovered a new use for my swiss army knife (mom bag use number 1). but we had some trouble, and had to get some help from the spaniards. and so we then found the restaurant, ate some nachos (but they weren´t as good as laura´s, so it wasn't quite perfect, but practically) and had discussions with the spaniards about slang and learned some new vocab. somehow josh managed to stumble across the restaurant and was miraculously able to meet us as had been discussed earlier. needless to say, we had to get a second round of nachos. then, en un ataque de la risa, jeanna spilled sangria all over her jeans. celebrate the tide stick. (mom bag use number 2).

after dinner the night mostly consisted of lots of random moments and ridiculous stories. but here is a general outline of events. watch the parade by the beach, go to the beach, dance on the beach, walk around, oriel and bruno leave, find a cafe to chill, catch the 5AM train back to barcelona.

ok, and now for some random moments and contemplations.

1)when we were at the parade i couldn´t see so josh decided to give me a surprise piggy back ride. it was quite scary, but i got some good pictures.

2)at the parade i tried to get kisses on the cheeks from the dancers in front of the floats, but josh definetly got more kisses than me. and bruno would have gotten even more if he hadn´t disappeared for extreme amounts of time.

3)all of the bars and cafes were open at all moments of the day. even when we left at 5 in the morning everything was open, and there were crowds outside of every bar dancing in the streets.

4) at the parade we met some girls dressed as bowling pins, and the guy that was dressed as a bowling ball tried to bowl the americans over (aka, us)

5)we met a cross-dresser on the beach and emma had a conversation in spanish about his fake breasts. what are they made out of, how are they attached to the outfit, do you want to feel them? they are very realistic. he had very nice makeup. i was impressed. when he left he gave us all dos besos. he was wearing strawberry flavored lip gloss, so my face was sticky and smelled like strawberry smackers the rest of the night.

6) there was an amazing amount of peeing into the ocean happening. seriously a line of men standing at the waves. and then josh decided to take his shoes off and step ino the water. it was an interesting choice.

7) we played soccer with a group of guys for a bit, and then this new girl come and showed us all up. what a show off. when we left one guy, dressed like marilyn monroe, tried to explain that in spain they don´t do dos besos, pero solamente un beso.

8) we ate all of the snacks that were in my bag, including a pretzel i didnt even know was there, on the beach after dancing in about 3 minutes. it was impressive (mom bag number 3)

9) this guy was really jealous of our photo shoot in the street, and just had to be in a photo

10) we went into a burgerking (my first fast food experience in spain) but had to leave quickly because the floor was covered in unidentifiable substances.

11) jeanna got a red card

12) josh picked up a random girl on the street. she kept complaining about how everyone in the streets was staring at her and making comments. what you can´t see in the picture is that she was wearing lacy black lingerie as her costume.

13) by the end of the night there was so much confetti on the ground that it looked like it had snowed.



14)on the train home josh stole the only open seat (what a gentleman) and fell asleep. emma and jeanna fell asleep on the floor next to him. but alex and i met po the telletubby. po informed us that he was going to be the next US president and wondered if we would vote for him.




15)we got to barcelona just in time for the metro to open for the morning. needless to say, people were very tired, josh had lost his hat, and my mom bag was nearly empty having eaten the food, used the toilet paper, finished off the hand sanitizer, chewed the gum, and lost the pen.





home to the apartment on balmes, my bed, and sleeping through spanish class.