Ok.  I'm stupid broke.  But I just bought myself a Theremin!!!!  It will be at my house in a week and require some soldering to work, but I will be busting out soon enough.

Last night I had one of the first dreams that I have been able to remember in months, and it made me realize that there is probably a damn good reason I haven't been remembering them. 
In one part, my ears were packed full of wax.  I could hear and all, but I had the persistant urge to claw the awful shit out of my ears.  Plus I remember thinking about how totally unpleasant it must look.  
Another part I was driving around Havana, Cuba.  Not sure why, I dont think about Cuba all that much compared to other places.  I was driving and there was a couple making out sweatily and heavily in the back seat.   My biggest fear was the unexposed genetalia gettting us pullede over, and myself consequentially deported.  

thats all.  Weird ears and driving for heavy petters in Cuba.  Perhaps this will make some sort of sense by the end of the day. 

The job hunt has been decievingly good thus far. I just cant figure out why my prospective employers spent the majority of the interviews kissing my ass about how qualified and professional I am, then dont call me back.  I have done a lot of interviews in my day, and I can almost always tell when I got or didnt get the job, but this time around its just hard to read.  In the meantime, I am working construction-lanscaping-electrical- plumbing with my buddy Horus (Evan).  He is still waiting for his child to be born, Im still waiting to see if this world will get another William (if its a boy) or an Alma (if its a girl).

I have officially been put in charge of arranging my homeboy Ash's bachelor party.  I have to figure out where it will be, buy the booze, and pay for strippers.  I wouldnt mind this if anyone had asked me about it (and I wasn't financialy destitute).  Instead, it was just dropped into my lap.  I doubt he knows that both of the Bachelors parties that I have organized have been astounding failures.  In fact, my brother didnt even show up to his.  

I would be getting on a plane to Spain tomorrow, had I decided not to stay here.  No biggie, but it is occupying a space in the back of my head and throbbing incessantly.  Perhaps it will be easier to accept tomorrow.  Then again, I have already cancelled my plane tiocket and quit my job, so its as much of a reality as it will ever be.   I keep catching myself getting all juiced about returning at the end of February.  

But its a sunny day, and I am going on a bike ride.  Life is still damn sweet.  
-Uil 

Date:	2006-09-15 14:43
Subject:	Mejor mientes.
Security:	Public
Mood:	goofy

I have spoken to a few people who have spent a good chunk of time in Spain, and now feel much better.  I met one sick flamenco guitarist who had spent a year roaming around Spain who told me that he wouldnt have lasted six months there were it not for Flamenco driving him to stay.  My former co-worker just wrote me an email to tell me that she will be here for awhile as well.  I met a few flamenco dancers who asked me why the hell I moved back here, and when I presented them with my logic they totally agreed that it is the right thing to do.  

Plus, Im no longer willing to take shit from ANYbody about how moving here is a mistake unless they have spent more than a year and a half alone in another country.  Well, there really is only one person hassling me, but it chafes my ass regardless. 
 
Its also damn hard to be in a bad mood when a friend calls you up just to see if you want some "hot ballsagna".  Busted a mean 'ol chuckle right there.     

Date:	2006-09-14 16:40
Subject:	Headfucked- Should I stay or should I go now?
Security:	Public
Mood:	discontent

I can officially say that I have never felt more schitzophrenic about life.  

After devoting two years of my life to Spain, I have decided to move back to the US, specifically Albuquerque.  Back to the land of cars, awful government, worse food, and limited horizons.  Also the land of opportunity, community, and my family.  

What has prompted this dramatic change of plans was realizing what I should do as a career- Courtroom translation  and interpretation.  I love to do real time translation, the law facinates me, and it pays rather well.  After the plan became clear to me, it became harder and harder to justify spending another year teaching English and partying.  Im ready to do bigger things with my life, and this requires me to finish school and work my tail off.  It is simply time to do it.   Without direction I become stagnant and down rather easily.  The stagnation that prompted me to leave here had been creeping its way into my life in Spain, and nipping it in the bud is the only way for me to keep any sort of head on my shoulders. 

Another reason for the move is that I was living without papers for two years, and you can only reasonably expect to do so for so long before The Man catches on.  

Plus there is going to be a lot of birth, death, and life this year, a lot of it I feel I need to be around for.  Every time there was a birth, death, or life changing event in NM these last two years I had the horrible and impotent feeling of being able to do nothing more than call.  The people in my life need me here, and as much as I would like to deny it, I need them.  

A lot of it is just financial.  Im in debt and go further into debt every year I spend out there.  Im also fed up with being SO damn poor (I only earned about $5000-year in Spain). 

I just hope and pray that Im making the right decision. I think part of the reason this seems like the right thing to do is because I have been starved for affection (platonic and otherwise) for quite awhile.  I tried (a lot...), but the spanish ladies never responded to my mack.  And while I had quite a few friends there, I almost always felt like a tag-along, and rarely, if ever, felt accepted as an equal.  I suppose that's normal when you are a foreigner, but none the less gets old pretty goddamn soon.   None of the people I  know who have lived in foreign countries for more than two years did it alone, they always moved with their spouse, or met their spouse overseas.  I feel as though it is admitting a weakness, but I cant feel right living my life without love in it any longer.  

Right as it seems to move back, I cant stop second guessing myself.   Sometimes I see how the majority of people I know here live and remember why I needed to get the fuck out in the first place.   SImply put, Albuquerque can be one hell of a depressing place to live.  The nightly dreams of Granada, in all its beauty, dont help me feel like Im doing the right thing either.   But Im not sure that the frustration of being there would be any better than the frustration of being here.  

The only thing I know to do when I feel like this is to trust my bloated gut, which is telling me to stay (right now, at least).   I hate these either/or decisions, there is a certain amount of second guessing and regret involved in whichever choice you make.  Goddamn Atlantic ocean.....why does spain have to be so far away?

In case I have made the wrong choice, I feel better knowing that Spain isnt going to go anywhere, and while it isn't the easiest thing in the world to do, moving out there is easier than it seems.  If I want to move back later, I will, and this time with papers written up and some type of plan to move ahead with life.  
      

Im now in Seattle chilling with my dad and brothers.  Its a trip to finally get to know my brothers a little.  
I drove up to Washington with my (superbly badass) sister to drop her off in Walla Walla for school.  I got to hang out with her and her friends for a day and a half, get a little intoxicated at a university (it had been years since I had last done that), and shove a piano a block and a half at 2am.  It was freaking awsome. 

I just figure that I should teel everyone who might not know:  there AINT SHIT in Utah.  Nothing.  It stands out in my memory as a 9 hour beige blurr.  I cant tell weither people become mormons from living in such a shitty environment or if the high percentage of mormons is what makes it have such a shitty vibe.  either way, Utah blows, nuff said.  

On that tangent, Idaho is remarkably dull as well.  At least they have some tall ass pie to boast about (in Bliss).  

Im not exactly sure when Im going to make the drive to NM, but when I do it will probably be alone.  A 20-some hour drive is a daunting prospect for a narcoleptic....so.....Anyone want a ride from the great northwest down to New Mexico?  You dont even have to chip in on gas, I only ask for some company. 

damn, it has been quite awhile since I've updated, and even longer since I've written a post of more than two sentences.  Where to begin?

As always, being back in the good ol' U S of A has been a strange one to adjust to.  The culture shock hasn't been as bad as it was last year, but unlike last summer it took me a good week to get back into speaking english all the time.  I haven't really been doing a damn thing with my time here other than just hanging out, trying to be the mack on the american ladies, doing yardwork, and being slightly too abusive to my liver.  I think I'm taking off for Washington to drop off my midget sister tomorrow, but due to a lack of cash flow things still arent certain.  The uncertainty of the situation is chapping my hide just a bit, as I prefer to have some loose sort of  itenerary when it comes to travelling.

I have officially grown man-boobs since coming home.  Sad Flayva.  I also cut off my (rather pathetic) attempt at a goatee.  I liked it, but the ten-or-so scraggly hairs sticking out of my chin made me look like I was 18.  Perhaps I'll attempt one in my mid thirties.  

I'm going to move into the apartment across the hall when I return to Spain.  Cheaper rent, different landlord, and a sense of my own space make it a wise move.  I had been trying to find a roomie via internet until yesterday, when my friend told me that there were more than enough people he knew who wanted to move in to choose from.  They need someone to move in by the first, and I return the 27th.  I'm leaving it in their hands, and I hope they choose someone cool (i.e. someone who showers, has a job and less than three dogs).   

I started and finished a sudoku this morning, which gave me the urge to run around pumping my fists in the air all Rocky style.  Yeah, I suppose I need to get a hobby.  

The quandry of what the hell I'm doing with my life has become unclear as ever.  I suppose it's because when I came home last year I felt like Albuquerque's prodigal son returning with news of the outside world, and now I simply feel like a drifter.  More and more people have been asking me why I'm returning to Spain, and through trying to justify it I've realized that its almost unjustifyable.  What pulls me back to Spain is a lingering feeling that I still have a few lessons to learn from living there, a rather hard idea to get across since the majority of people dont hop the atlantic just because their gut tells them to.    The other reason I'm returning to Spain is that I simply cant imagine moving back to the states for any long period of time.  Although I was born here it still feels somehow foreign.  

At least this quandry isnt complicated by women pulling on my heartstrings this time around.  This makes thinking of getting on that plane again much, much easier.  That isn't to say that there haven't been ladies in my life lately, just no one I would consider changing residency for.  

My big plans for the day : giving myself a buzzcut, figuring out how the hell I'll do this road trip, looking at maps, perhaps renting a car.  Who knows, maybe another sudoku if I get all crazy. 

Damn, Im here in Mad CIty, tearing it up with Big Gabe and Aline.  It has been a good way to spend my last couple of days in Spain for this year.  

And tomorrow, the trans-altantic maddness begins.

Holy sheep shit!!!!!!

   I will be chillin in Burque this time next week.  All you crazy people out there, prepare your livers and hide your daughters!!!!!!!

Date:	2006-07-03 13:44
Subject:	Up in the Camp
Security:	Public
Mood:	kangaroo

Hey El Jay world.  
   I'm stuck up in the mountains outside of Granada for the next month, after that it's back to the good old western hemisphere.  Too many midgets reading over  my shoulder to be totally honest.......
    Look foreward to updating in some sort of real way soon.
   Till then. 

Date:	2006-06-26 14:24
Subject:	I prefer to write in stone- you dont lose posts.
Security:	Public
Mood:	Mildly miffed at technology

Just spent an hour writing a long ass post, and another half hour trying to send it before giving up.  To summarize what it said- Humor is damn hard to translate.  

I will just use internet cafes from now on.  Yeah, it costs 1€ per hour, but at least I can send emails and post entries.  

Problems with Yahoo as well.  If any of you have written me lately and gotten no response, that's why. 

Date:	2006-06-22 00:50
Subject:	Aromatherapy
Security:	Public
Mood:	good

Just wrote a long entry that got deleted.  The gist was that I got over my week and a half long senseless funk yesterday with the help of the smell of the rain.  Not so much rain, but rotten fertile earth that reminded me of Costa Rica, Seattle, the weird taste in my throat when I travel, and taking hikes in the mountains.  Life isn't always easy, but I'm living my dream and therefore have no reason to bitch.  

I have to wake up at 5am to go to a teaching conference in Mad City tomorrow.  Icky, but opens a lot of opportunities.  Time for Z's

Date:	2006-06-16 02:54
Subject:	Newsflash to the people of Spain
Security:	Public
Mood:	tired

Not all americans are rich.  I am living proof that Americans can be stupidly poor.  Please stop laughing or acting like I'm lying when this fact comes up.  

Not all americans are monolingual (again, I'm living proof).  Last wekend I went to a house party and ran into this guy who I had met before, and for some reason, rubs me the wrong way.  When I first met him he busted out his unintelligible english and I told him to calm down, that I have been living here for almost two years.  At the party last weekend I overheard him ask one of my friends if I spoke spanish at all (despite the fact that at that very moment I was having a conversation about philosophy in spanish).  I just turned around and looked at him without saying a word.  I think that understanding about 95% of what I hear and being able to express about 90% of what I want to say (granted, with errors and a funny accent) counts as being fluent.  I dont have a damn thing to prove to people who cant see beyond my blue eyes.  

Not all spanish spèakers lisp, although most people in spain do.   Dont insist that I use a lisp when I talk, it makes me feel like less of a man. 

The president is NOT my fault.  Just as much as Franco (the facist dictator who controlled Spain from 1936-1976, more or less) wasn't your parent's fault.  Stop asking why I voted for him, I didn't.  

Yes, it's fucking hot.  Get over it, or at the bare minimum stop complaining about it.  

The Macarena (as well as the "Bomba" (king Africa) and the "Chocolatero") are and have always been AWFUL.  Please stop singing them, and for the love of all that is sacred, stop dancing them.  

An equivalent for the word "Step" needs to be created so I can describe my stepmom without saying the literal equivalent of "my father's second wife" and later describing that they are still married.  Trying to explian my ex-stepfather is even harder.  I know that divorce was illegal in Spain unless you had the permission of the pope until about 1978, but the times are changing.  Give it another ten years, and all the Spañards will be crying out for the invention of this word as well.   I suggest the sound "pluf".   "Mi pluf-madre" or "Mi pluf-padre" has a ring to it.  

  

   El Bombero Torrero y sus Torreros Enanos are coming to town on Friday.  Thats right,  MIDGET BULLFIGHTING!!!!!    This entails, as far as I can tell, midgets fighting bull calves, mixed with bulljumping and staged stunts.   A friend of mine described them as "The Harlem Globetrotters of bullfighting".  
 
   Unfortunately, I will be teaching during the entire event.  While I'm tempted, I dont think seeing a midget bullfight is a valid enough reason to cancel class.   

Date:	2006-06-14 18:53
Subject:	Fashion advice from dragon riding women.
Security:	Public
Mood:	exhausted

      This morning, after dealing with mass beurocratic BS, I went down to see the Cabalgata (parade) Del Corpus Cristi, which was a trip.  Its the one pagan procession out of the hundred or so catholic processions held every year.  It is one of the most interesting, most colorful, and strangest public celebrations in Spain for me, mainly because of how absurd it is.  First, people wearing giant paper maché heads walk down the street hitting children over the head with bags filled with air.  One thing I forgot about the big heads (cabalzuelos) is that they all portray some racial or cultural stereotype (a bullfighter, a bucktoothed asian wearing a conical hat, a muslim with a big turban, an italian with a thin moustache and a beret, etc), which one would think would be prohibited, or at least toned down, in today's politically correct world.  
      Then the big event came through-- a manequin riding a dragon, wearing this year's fashion in gitana (gypsie) dress.   When I saw it last year I wondered if people actually took their fashion cues from a manequin on a dragon, but sure enough, shortly after corpus cristi I saw a ton of women wearing the frilly, bright orange dress that I had seen on top of a dragon  a few days earlier.   For any of you fashion-concious readers, this year's dress is lime green, and the manequin wore olive branches in her hair to complement it.  I forgot to brong my camera to this internet hut, but pictures will be posted soon.
     The other thing that makes this particular Cabalgata special for me is that it's during the day and mostly for the kids, making it the *only* public gathering I have seen here where people aren't astoundingly drunk.  While drinking in public is fun and all, it's nice to see that people dont need the social lubricant at every single social gathering...... 
     Then again, the World  Cup game between Spain and Ukraine started about two and a half hours after the parade, and most people started in on drinking at the kickoff.  Spain whooped them 4-0, which, combined with the corpus cristi festivities,  means the party will continue well into tomorrow evening.  Thank god tomorrow is a public holiday here.  Spain always gives a day off for the hangover.  
     I have one hour of class to teach tonight, but shortly after the maddness will begin.  I'm not sure how long I'll last tonight though,  more insomnia last night mixed with getting up really early this morning has left me zombie-like, and it's only 7:20.  Oh well, I'm sure to find some sort of riddles tonight before my body demands sleep. 

Date:	2006-06-12 16:12
Subject:	Menos Mala Leche- Mas Bull Jumping!!!!
Security:	Public
Mood:	menos mal
Music:	Tonedeaf children singing "The wheels on the bus..."

I just realized that I have (basically) a two-day workweek this week, and my mood got better. Also, some coffee, cigarettes, and a good few kilometer walk helped a lot.

Not only that, I saw a flier for a bull-jumping show next Friday. I dont know what the word for it is in spanish or english, but it is cool as hell. These guys do crazy ass flips over charging bulls, or just stand there with their hands in their pockets, suck in their gut and turn slightly, and avoid getting gored by mere centimeters. It has all of the "Jesus H, these guys have some balls!" action of bullfighting, minus the senseless blood and death. My only real problem with the bullfights is that the matadórs have an unfair advantage, and even if the bull wrecks one of their shit, the bull still gets killed. Bull-jumping (I have now named it, since it appears as though no one else has), if anything gives an unfair advantage to the bull. They dont even use capes or clowns to distract them. I dont know how these guys can walk around without a wheelbarrow with balls that big.

I feel like half of my LJ enteries are just bitching about my teeth, so I'll make it breif.  

I just realized that I have FOUR teeth less than I had four months ago, two of which are replaced by a false ones.  
I feel pretty damn good, and I aint in pain.  I just hope I dont puff up like a pufferfish, like I did the last time, like my dentist told me I probably  would.
BUT..... I think that after I recouperate from this my teeth will be basically OK.   Finally. 

EDIT:::::::::::::: monday, june 12th.  No puff action!!!!!!

Balls. I'm at work. Not that I have a class or anything, I just have to write the final exams. But since I cant find the inspiration to do it I'm givving my El Jay a little love. I can write the final tomorrow anyway.

For those of you who know me well, you know I am a wee bit narcoleptic. I will never forget the time I took a bus in SanFran with my sister, and fell asleep with my head on one of the metal grips on the back of the seat, my forehead bouncing and making a metalic "clink" every time we went over a bump. Or when my brother took me to a typical day of class at UNM and I only stayed awake for a grand total of about ten minutes between all of his classes. BUT NOW, for the first time ever, I am having trouble going to sleep, usually tossing and turning until sunrise. Sleep only seems to come easily about three hours before I wake up. There is a bunch of shit causing this- the heat, stress, being broke and wondering how in the hell I will ever accomplish my dreams, the built-up frustration of sleeping alone for so long, the damn van full of hippies parked outside of my house drumming and singing into the wee hours, my roomie's dog crying. Still, I used to be able to go to sleep in a hurricane. If it's not one thing, its another (what I really mean is "Ni Juan ni Juanillo").

Tonight is the Grand Premiere of "El Nido Del Abejarucco II", the sequel to the original documentary about all of the crazy mofos that live on my block.  I'm weirdly exited and nervous about seeing it and hearing what all of my friends said about me.  

And now for this week's images.....

I was in the middle of giving myself a buzzcut and decided to take a picture of myself all Prodigy style.  Just to remind everyone how LAME Prodigy is.  I however, make this haircut look good.   
 

Last weekend I found a "Smartcar" which must have had a stupid driver.  it was stuck in  a narrow-ass street in the Albayzin, narrow enough that I could touch both walls at the same time.   There was a plaza right behind the car, and all of the streets were far too narrow for it to even get there.  The mystery of how it got there evaded me only a few minutes, till I realized that it must have gone down a block of stairs to get to the plaza,  from where there was no escape.  Not sure if it was a stolen joyride or someone that lives in the neighborhood who was just sick of walking up a hill to get home every night.  Either way, pretty surreal. 


What else?   6/06/06 came and went, nothing happened.  Take that, Jehova's Witnesses!   But it did make me think- Perhaps the real apocalypse happened when Jesus was six years old.  Maybe just a little apocalypse, who knows.  Not to rant, but I think all of the doomsday prophet BS  is nothing but self-indulgent mystical nonsense which people believe in order to make there blink of an existance on this earth seem more important than it really is (and while I'm at it, so is astrology, past-life regressions, fixation on angels, and a bunch of other new age crap).  Witnessing Judgement day, either being saved or destroyed by god's wrath, wouldn't that be a trip?   Too many people need to stop fantisizing that their own death will be something glamourous.  It isn't like that.  Just look at Elvis.  
   
I'm now going to go home and nap.  Perhaps, now that it's the time I shouldn't be sleeping it will come easily.  I hope so.  If not, I'm going to be an incoherent mess my the time I finish my last class at 11pm. 
 

It has been awile since I've updated. here's the news.

- Beurocracy and red tape suck fat sweaty goat balls. Dealing with one country's government is a pain in the ass. Dealing with two is a full ass amputation (assectomy?).

- I've had a lot more classes added to my schedule. Cool in some ways.

- It's my last month in Granada before going to work at the summer camp, and then back to my sweet desert home. I am withdrawing from green chile and sunsets so bad my blood itches. This month will be full of going away parties, some "smell ya later"s, and more than a few "goodbye"s. fun, but a little sad.

- More dental nightmares, but getting a problematic wisdom tooth pulled next Friday. I will be puffy in the short term, but will be in less pain in the long term.

- Been having really weird dreams, but I blame the tar fumes (my street is being re-paved).

- I have taken to writing in list format (for example, this), which I find a tad annoying. But it's not like I have some sort of loyalty to the fully formed paragraph or anything.

- I have decided to look into getting certified in translating. Very do-able, not too expensive, and rather lucerative. Might be a pipe dream, but worth investigating anyway.

Date:	2006-05-26 13:18
Subject:	Ramblings.....
Security:	Public
Mood:	unshut-upable

I find it somewhat sick that going to the dentist has become part of my Friday routine, as I have had a dental appointment every friday for the last two months. Hewever the end is in sight, only three more appointments. This isn't so much because everything is OK (I still have a couple of teeth that need some work), it's mainly because I only have one more month in Granada before I go to teach at the summer camp in the Sierra Nevadas, about a half hours drive out of the city. It will be nice to have some sort of change of pace and all, but I'm not all that stoked about being locked in a hotel with 80 hyperactive spanish kids for a month again. It also looks like I will have to do a hell of a lot more work up there this year since there are NO other english teachers left in Granada. Seriously, my boss and I have been combing the city for anyone else to work up there with me and coming up dry. Tons of german and french teachers, but no english or american teachers. If the 80 students get divided between me and my boss I might just have to....I dont know.....do something really nasty and out of character for me.

Alice in Chains is playing a concert tonight. I would love to go, but 25€ is too damn expensive. I would pay it if Layne Staley had come back to life and was still singing with the band, but as is I ain't going.

This weekend my homegirl from back in the day, Amalia, is passing through town. I haven't seen her in about ten years and it will be a trip to catch up with her. She also lived in Granada for a year awhile back and has a lot of friends she wants to visit. I wont be the least bit suprised if we have friends in common in this crazy city.

I'm contemplating weither I should give myself a buzzcut or let the rats nest that's currently covering my dome grow. Any opinions?

My right nipple has been burning for a couple of days and I cant figure out why. It did that when I was thirteen, but the body does all kinds of crazy shit in that phase. No biggie, but it sure is pissing me off.

I have to teach my class at the Biohazardous waste disposal plant in a couple of hours. The asked me to teach them the specific vocabulary they will need to use, but after looking awhile I cant narrow down the words they need to learn to less than ten pages. They offer about fifteen types of waste disposal internationaly, making the key words range from "dog shit" to "pressurized neutralization of bacteria", not to mention the vocabulary related to the potential environmental effects of their service. Damn. Seriously, I would much prefer to continue working on telling jokes and cussing in english as we did last week. I think I will just ask them for a typical email they need to send to their partners or clientele (in spanish) and translate the relevant parts over then next week.

I have offically determined that I need to move out of my apartment. Too much stress, too many arguments, and too many bills divided unfairly. Plus, the wonderful community we have had this year will disolve next fall when everyone moves away to be exchange students. But since I will be out of town for three months this summer and will return two days before the semester begins again, i dont have much time to figure it out. I think I can deal with my situation till next october, then get an apartment in the historic district with a couple of my homies, which would be ideal. Updates will be posted.

'Nuff slacking and rambling. Time to eat, get wacked out on caffiene, and teach.