My dear mum did some church research for me and sent me a list of churches that might suit me better than the kind I found last time I blogged on this and so today I went to Amistad Cristiana. I went there for two reasons - one, it’s fairly close to my house - a twenty five minute walk away (I could have gone by metro but who wants to be underground on a lovely sunny morning) - and two, the main one, it was the only church on the list to have a website… and you know, I couldn’t go to a church if it wasn’t connected, or whatever. Seriously though, I did find it strange that it was the only one of the five she sent me details of, one of the others turned up zero google results, and the others just appeared in lists of addresses, without even so much as times of services. I still will probably try and find time investigate one or two of them though.

So then, how was it?

Well, fascinating, because it was exactly the same as every other evangelical church ever… which I find amazing.
Lots of people, of the right age group.
They meet in a bar (a bar I’ve been to in the past to see bands).
They started late, and spent at least 15 minutes before the service fiddling with the data projector, which still wasn’t right by the time they started.
The service was lead by a generic worship group - all hot young men on rhythm, lead, bass, drums, keys and one obligatory kooky instrument (in this case a saxophone).
And they had the requisite ridiculous number of notices, and everybody who said something started by saying there was a lot to get through so they’d be quick, and then proceeded to give their notice in the most verbose form imaginable.

And, well, time for a rant.
Most of you probably know, because I’ve banged on about it often enough, that it’s something of a bugbear of mine the weird language you encounter in the church which, to my mind, frankly sounds insane. It’s not something exclusive to the church of course but a feature of all groups of people - try and understand what’s being talked about if you’re plonked into a group of sociologists, geeks, teenagers, whatever - that which you’re not. But, for a group that, perhaps, no sé, would like to be inclusive, welcome outsiders, you think we’d try a little harder to not sound completely off our trolleys.
I think that actually a lot of people don’t realise what a Christian service sounds like to someone not au fait with the rites and phrasings but, if you’d really like to know how weird church is - learn another language in a secular context and then go to a service…

Anyhow, singing ‘How great Thou art’ in Spanish was fun.

And then, in fact, after the forty five minutes of notices, the message was given by an Australian woman - in English, with simultaneous translation - and it’s always a diversion two understand two versions of the same thing.

And then everybody packed off sharpish because they had to be out the building.

Spam of the day:

Our tree stands a statuesque 9 feet. We have tall ceilings, we thought. What we failed to consider, however, is that a tree’ s width is proportionate to its height. This you realize as soon as you cut the string that girded the once sleek fir…

Well, so much for staying in.
I ended up going out last night with my lesbian friends, which proved a fun way to spend the evening. I live pretty near Chueca, which is the gay quarter of Madrid, and it’s always a fun place to go out in, flirt with the transvestites, or whatever floats your boat. And it’s been a while since I went out out there, though I stayed in a hostel there for a week while flat hunting.
We ended up at a lesbian club with particularly rude staff and (of course) ridiculously priced drinks. But that’s the way of things.
It’s nice to be out again in a country that has sensible opening hours. It’s also nice being able to walk home.
Then today I met up for a coffee with a friend I haven’t seen in a ridiculous while and we wandered the city, which seems mostly to be what we do do when we meet up. I’m a wanderer so that’s all good.
Then I made some noodles.
Then I typed this.

I could go out but this time I think I definitely will stay in. I need to act my age from time to time.

So then, back to work. It’s kind of weird after three and a half months bumming round the world. It’s also still weird that you have to kiss your boss.

Everybody commented on my hair, I think they probably just remember the red it was the last day of last year, I thought in general I’d managed to present a fairly respectable experience.

I don’t have any of the same kids that I had last year, which in some ways is a shame, I’d have liked to continue the relationships I established last year, but at the same time it’ll be fun to teach a new batch (and a nightmare to learn all their names).

I am, once again, surrounded by female American colleagues, we have already had fights about how you spell behavior and they don’t know how to complete this sentence:

“_________you got any brothers and sisters?”

So there you go. Otherwise, I have been being cultural. And right now I am trying to decide about whether to go to a concert of experimental music tonight… I should because it’s a good opportunity, but I’m not really in the mood to be honest… so I think I might stay in.

A short story called Moon.

There is a boy in front of me on the coach, a father with a baby in a car seat facing rearwards in the seat next to him and across the isle sits his heroin-blond wife (partner, whatever) and another child, a son, who is standing on his seat. The boy has a hole in his earlobe the size of a twenty-pence-piece held open by a black doughnut and his phone rings. It is ridiculously loud for the close confines of the coach, but he doesn’t seem embarrassed. The backlight of the screen as he holds it to his ear and repeats all those tired travelling phone phrases - “I’m on the coach, leaving Birmingham, give you a bell when we get to Studly, 20 minutes late at the mo” - shines through the 20p hole and casts a circle of light on his neck catching the fine hairs in glow.

And outside, in the night, I can see the moon is full.

The coach more or less lapses into silence but for an ancient couple of ladies on the front seats, one of whom is saying, in lifetime-smoker badly-tuned-radio crackle “…been married 68 years now which makes her daughter 69/70… so that’s how it is.” 68 years. So that would be 1940. It’s an easy sum but I don’t do maths anymore. The war. Now she’s saying something about gasworks, the son is being silly and the mum telling him so and behind me is sitting a girl who must be Spanish, of the lighter sort, the radio is really sounding out sitting on the dock of the bay and I’ve seen her earlier, wandering around the coach station. I think she’s pretty hot actually but she reminds me of a friend, a friend I’ve just spent the weekend with and we’ve fallen out. Truthfully though, I don’t know why. “Mummy’s ready for bed now.” I really should have sat behind her so I might catch glimpses between the seats not of holed ears but of something more tantalising, seeds of fantasies - though I’ve never been in lust with this friend of mine, the one it seems who’s changed her thoughts about me. It’s difficult to hear actually but I’m sure the old lady has belched and said something about “essence of Eggs Benedict”.

“mum. mum. mum. mum.”
“that’s where Debbie lives, Aunt Sandy, you hasn’t got any real aunties… there’s too of you.”
I should probably concoct a leaky bladder, so I can keep on walking to the loo at the back of the coach, and try and meet the Spaniard’s eyes each time, not that I suppose a leaky bladder is particularly sexy, and on second thoughts she might be a bit young for me, though don’t tell that to the kid I went home with Friday who I’m pretty sure was below my lower limit. At least she wasn’t living with her parents but in a flat with a bicycle in the hall that stank of Rottweiler, the hall not the bike - though I didn’t sniff the bike - too busy unzipping her boots, black books, but then who sniffs bikes?
I could try some Spanish on her even, I speak a bit, enough to order a sangria anyway, but then she could be Portuguese now I think about it, and that would just be embarrassing. The friend who it appears thinks I wronged her is Spanish though, and they do look strikingly similar.

The only other people on the coach are right at the back.
“I can’t get over - I mean, I can get over but I can’t get back.”
“You can’t get back?”
“Nah.”
“But you must…”
“I’ll try. Red car. Blue Car. Silver Car. Yellow car. Black car…”
They are silent and Japanese, or, well, I can’t tell, as we’ve established - Koreans? I’m terrible at this and always wonder if that makes me a racist, though I don’t worry about having problems with Spanish/Portuguese - except when it comes to choosing a language to speak to a hot girl in. Not that I will speak to her. I should have sat behind her. I shouldn’t have said sorry by text, I should have called her. I shouldn’t have said sorry at all seeing as how I don’t know what the whole thing’s about. Still no reply.
The driver turns off lights.

Eleven people on a coach.
The driver.
The radio says once, twice, three times a lady.
Two old ladies, silent again.
A couple, one of them with holes in his ears, and their two children.
The red toilet-occupied light is on, though we’re all still here.
Me.
“I love this song.”
“I think her nappy needs doing.”
The hot girl, nationality in question.
And the other two at the back, origin also disputed.
In the night time.

My friend, a different one, who is a Scorpio too, genuinely believes things go a bit crazy at the full moon. And I kind of believe she’s right. And I’m wasting this one in a coach. And I can’t even see the hot one. I wonder if the moon affects her too.
“Quiero una sangria.”

Wikipedia Article of the day:

List of films that most frequently use the word “fuck”

Seriously is that really necessary, I think the film that tops the list, a documentray about the word, is cheating somewhat.

What then is going on in snailsnail’s world? Well nothing momentous, I assure you. I don’t start work until wednesday, so besides getting to know my new neighbourhood a bit and hanging out with my flatmates somewhat I went out on Friday with mis madrileñas when, though I had a good time, even managed to keep track of a percentage of the conversations, and caught up with a bunch of folk, I learned that I’m definitly getting old - for I could not tolerate the ridiculously packed clubs that were very much like sardine tins. Time to start sitting on the porch with a pipe clamped between my teeth of an evening I think. The majority of my time has actually been spent working on something - of which you’re seeing bits posted here, and which I hope will bear fruition within the next couple of weeks.

Wikipedia article of the day:

British Cuisine

Best bit:

Vilified as “unimaginative and heavy”, British cuisine has traditionally been limited in its international recognition to the full breakfast and the Christmas dinner.

Also of note:

I particularly like the timeline of when stuff was introduced, from which we learn that: Kipper came to us from Denmark or Norway in the 9th century, that Turkey arrived in 1524 and sliced bread in 1930.

A bit of what’s happened.

I went back to the UK, saw a lot of lovely people, though not everyone by a long shot, was shocked by the ridiculous price of beer, spent far too much money I didn’t have, came back.

Met up with dear old friend Elisa, it is weird that we will be living in the same place again for the same time since 2005 - and weirder still that it is Madrid - she left and I arrived. Looking forward to some shenanigans. Moved in properly to the flat.

Well now the flat…
It’s a bit pokey for a start, and I don’t have a window - which is already getting on my nerves, and we are all guys, I’d prefer a bit of a balance, and there are no Spanish speakers.
This last one is particularly galling - at the moment there are two French guys, an Italian, and myself. Scheduled to move in soon is another French guy, and we’re still waiting for someone else. At the moment I am the most fluent Spanish speaker here, which means I’m going to get roped in to dealing with all the flat stuff, and frankly that’s not really my bag. We’ll wait and see until we have a full complement, but at the moment it seems they’re shaping up to elect me captain of the ship - not a role I’m comfortable with, particularly as I’ll be sitting between a particularly insane landlord and a bunch of erasmus students. Yesterday I had a bit of a hissy fit at the landlord down the phone on the subject of gas. I won’t go into the whole situation, but sufficed to say we’ve run out of gas in the flat (it’s bottled - we have 4 big empty bottles), so cold showers and sandwiches, and it’s his fault, basically. Hopefully we’re getting some gas delivered today. Hopefully.

So then, also, random link of the day:

You can watch ships on the internet… I wonder if there’s an air traffic control one… probably is, not sure I can be bothered to google it.

Wikipeida article of the day:

German-style board games

Who knew the German’s had their own class of board game. My favourite piece is:

“[German style games'] rulebooks are typically four to twelve pages long and playing times are on the order of 30 to 120 minutes. These games appeal to a wide range of ages, though generally not to young children.”