This post could have so many different titles

Such as¨"Gelat and Shopping, what more could I ask for?"
" I´m pretty sure I´m now a part of the Spanish Mafia"
" Vacation´s over, time to move into the real world"
Pretty much any title would work. I haven´t written in awhile so I have a lot of ground to cover. Joan usually helps me remember everything, but he´s not feeling well today so he´s already in bed. I´ll go back to as far as I can remember.....Sunday before new years I guess will work.

Joan and I drove to Barcelona to meet his friend Xevi. Xevi´s father is still out of town so we stayed in his flat again last weekend. It´s so nice to be right in the city. Sunday night Joan and I went to the Hard Rock Cafe. Everyone gets onto me about this but after so much Spanish cuisine it´s nice to have something different. We get there, an hour and a half wait. I try and get Joan to slip the host some €uros but he insists he would be something like Chandler on Friends and just make an ass of himself so we wait. Three Mai-Tai´s later we get our seat and I have the most amazing dinner. It´s nice to have American food now and then, I took it for granted for sure. After that we got a couple drinks and relaxed around the city. Xevi was out seeing American Gangster with some friends and since Joan and I had already seen it, we had to wait around for him to get back to his flat (we forgot to get keys from him). Around midnight we are bored, didnt want any food, didnt want any drinks, shops were closed, no clubs we felt like going too-so we made our way back to Xevi´s neighborhood. We sat and waited for at least 40 minutes until Xevi got back and immediatly passed out. It was a good night. Needless to say, my week go immensely better.

Monday we went shopping at El Corte Ingles a gigantic department store to get some last minute items for New Years. I had to get black tights and a red thong. It is good luck to wear red on new years and since my dress was a metallic silver-black combo that was my only option. To make things even better, we went for some Gelat at this great ice cream place. I had something called a "Sweet Gofre". It is a small belgian waffle, but a bit sweeter, with chocolate and carmel syrup and chocolate ice cream on top with sweet whipped cream and thinly sliced almonds. It was without a doubt the best dessert I´ve had in a long time.

Later that afternoon, Joan and Xevi figured it would be a wise choice to take a siesta before the nights festivities. I didn´t know we would be out until 7:30 the next morning.....

We left Xevi´s around 8:45 p.m. It was me, Joan, Xevi and German. The most hilarious guys I have ever met. We had to take the metro because finding a cab is impossible on New Years. My feet are already hurting. Granted, I was wearing the highest heeled shoes ever but they were so gorgeous and they matched my dress perfectly. Anyway, we took the metro across town to the Barcelona Casino. It isn´t much fun standing in a crowded metro dressed up with a bunch of other people dressed up ready to go out as well. It is even less fun with creepy guys staring at you. We left the metro and there was a guy there, maybe 19 or younger even watching everyone....I had a bad vibe from him immediatly. Not more that 2 minutes later as we were crossing the street do we hear a loud scream and there is that same creepy boy running from four Italian girls. He stole one´s purse. The poor thing was crying hysterically. The girls gloves were in her purse and fell out as the bastard took off and so German went and got them from another man who picked them up. Can you imagine? What a horrible way to start the new year. I´m so glad I didn´t take a purse. Joan was the perfect gentleman and said, "I´m sorry you had to see that honey" while German said, "Don´t worry babe, you got three body guards here"

We arrived at the casino and met with David and Allison and his family. David is Joan´s other friend that I met in Florida. David´s girlfriend Allison, is from Philly but studied in Florida and met David. It was so nice to see her again, it had been two years since I had seen either of them.

We go into the casino and they ask for our passports. Joan left them home. Home in Lloret, an hour away. Shit. Luckily, we got in with a few strings pulled in our favor. We are led into the VIP section of the restaraunt, and there are only about 8 tables inside. The room is decorated with black gold and white. We take our seats and dinner begins. 10 courses and 3 bottles of Champagne and Wine later, it is 30 minutes until New Years! Allison and I have talked the entire time, we are going through a very similar situation so we got along famously. The waiters passed around gift boxes for each of us, everyone in the room got a watch. I am not one for watches really but mine was a beauty. Black crocodile band with diamonds and very funky numbers on the face, very cool. We also had gold bags under our seat filled with a party hat, confetti, noise makers, masks and streamers. Immediatly everyone started celebrating even though we had 10 minutes to go. The waiters passed around bags of 12 grapes for us to eat at midnight. These grapes had seeds so Allison and I took them out, it was a mess and the guys made fun of us but we thought for sure we could eat them faster that way. 12 seconds after midnight, I had five grapes left, Xevi had given up half way through, David couldn´t go fast enough either, Allison had most of hers still in her mouth and had spit them into her napkin and Joan was the only one who had eaten all 12. I still don´t think he chewed.

It was the best New Years I´ve had in a long while. Everyone was so happy and I seriously haven´t laughed so much at a dinner before. A band started up and we danced and talked until three or so. We went to the actual casino and watched David´s father throw down a $100 chip at random and win. I could never do that.

After we went to this club, Up and Down. It was 45 €uros a person but well worth it. I love Spanish music and danced all night. My heels were off by this time for sure. We all parted ways and it was only Xevi, Joan and I heading back to the flat. My feet were in such pain. I didn´t dare take my shoes off on the streets so I suffered through while we walked and walked and walked until we finally found a metro. We still had 10 stops or something before we reached Xevi´s flat. That is so far! I would have had to walk that entire way had we not found that metro. My feet only stopped hurting today, and it´s officially Friday. We got back at 7:30 and completely collapsed. I don´t think we woke up until 1 or so on Tuesday and all we got accomplished was a trip to Burger King and some sight seeing. It was truly a great time.

So much more has happened between then and now but that will have to wait for another post. I´ll post pictures tomorrow as well. You just have to see the heels on the shoes I wore.

Tomorrow is a busy day though, two interviews and we´re finally looking at the flat we will be living in!

I hope all of you had a splendid New Years, Happy 2008!

Best Wishes & Be Nice