First mince pies of the season

Although we've been stuffing ourselves with turron and pannetoni, we didn't manage our first mince pies until Saturday, when Juanmi, Kirsty and Emily invited us to their Christmas party in Rivas.
We were late arriving, having had to work until 2.40pm, so there was a fair crowd clustered round the food when we arrived. It was like a meeting of Expats Anonymous, or rather, Anglo-Spaniard Couples Anonymous, for as well as our hosts our friends Fermin and Rebecca were there and everybody else we spoke too seemed to be in mixed Spanglish relationship. Just a run down of the names (Tracy & Ignacio, Manuela & James, Jason & Dolores) makes it pretty clear! I was worried I wasn't going to get a chance to practice my Spanish at all, but luckily we managed to find about the only other linguistically homogeneous couple there, Nani and Jose Ramon, who grew up in our barrio to chat to. It was a lovely afternoon, with plenty of recent or soon-to-be mums for Kate to compare hospitals and midwives with, plus some carols round the piano.

We nipped off earlyish in order to do some shopping in Carre Four on the way home, where we encountered the most impressive Belen (nativity scene) yet. The Spanish go for their Bethlehem scenes the way a certain type of English male goes for model train sets, and this one, with its functioning water wheels and hand-painted miniatures, was really quite something. For childless couples only though, methinks.

bonding and bowling

We had our work Christmas Party last night. Well, there wasn't much that was Christmassy about it, but it was a party, and it's nearly Christmas, so.... Anyway, our boss kindly treated us all to a trip to the bowling alley with beers, food, taxis and suitably ridiculous nicknames all thrown in. Very nice of him.

As Theo "Thunder" Berry I was paired up with Anna "Maverick" McKendrick as we took on Tim and Kate B in the first frame. (Kate S having decided that bowling and pregnancy weren't a good combination, she'd relegated herself to a cheerleading capacity). Sadly, while Anna and I ratcheted up a combined score that would have beaten any of the other 4 teams, Tim and Kate B turned out to be the two best bowlers there, both being the only people to manage three-figured scores.

Still, what's important to remember here is that Anna and I won the following two games comfortably and the beer was all paid for.

Cumpleaños a ti...

It was our venezuelan friend David´s birthday on Friday and so Saturday night saw us heading to his and Nataly´s flat for a fiesta. Jez and I were a little stiff and sore after an afternoon´s cycling around Casa de Campo, and were grateful to park ourselves on the sofa while trying to hide our glasses (as David would fill them up again immediately if he thought the levels were getting low). Belen and Cesar were there, as well as an old friend of David´s (also called David) and his girlfriend Olga. Everyone made a big effort to try our their English with Jez and to humour our attempts at Spanish. Personally I feel I´m nearly there on the language front, understanding most of what is said to me but still struggling to select the right tense and person when responding.

Nataly had, as usual, laid on a delicious spread with plenty of veggie options, and as the booze flowed we pushed on into the early hours, dancing away to some of Cesar´s mix CDs. Clearly David and Nataly don´t like their neighbours very much!

Birthday Weekend

Last weekend was not only my Birthday weekend - I reached the grand old age of 28 - but was also, rather awesomely, 4 days long. Thanks to the fact that we don´t work on Fridays and that Monday 12th was a holiday here in Spain for some reason or another, I had plenty of time to relax and enjoy myself.

Our first guests at our new flat arrived on Friday - my old school friend Dom and his Lithuanian girlfriend Justinia - and we quickly dashed to IKEA to buy a couple more chairs so we´d all have somewhere to sit. There had hitch-hiked and bussed their way to us from Braganza in Portugal where her sister is studying, and it was really nice to host them for a couple of days. A night out together on Friday featured all our favourite haunts - El Gato in Pueblo Nuevo, La Solea Flamenco Bar in La Latina and Choclateria San Gines - punctuated with in-depth political discussions; Dom and I have similar masters degrees (International Development and International Relations respectively) but different views. As Kate and I largely agree with each other in the political sphere our conversations on the subject rarely challenge us to justify our views, whereas Dom and I were still good-naturedly going at it when we dropped them at the airport on Sunday morning!

In between we hosted our first fiesta at our new flat, inviting a few friends over for drinks and tapas on Saturday night - I wanted to avoid the hideous Spanish tradition of the person whose birthday it is having to pay for everything - to warm the flat up. Rather stupidly we completely neglected to take any photos. Kate gave me a series of useful presents; shirts, a juicer and a hand blender - though she rather hilariously decided to start things off with a couple of kilos of oranges which left me rather perplexed, until the next present provided the rationale. A wonderful bottle of Venezuelan Rum from David and Nataly, some very fine wine from Cesar and Belen, a bottle of port from Dom and Justinia and some lovely scented stuff from Jero and Jose has helped make our flat even more homely.

Cathy's party

Beep! Beep! Beep! Suddenly the peace and quiet of another long, hot Sunday afternoon in the South of France was shattered by a string of cars and vans honking their way down the drive to Cathy's gite. Even those of us who were expecting them were pretty surprised, especially at how they'd all managed to coordinate their arrival perfectly. Cathy dashed into the kitchen saying "Oh god! what have we got to feed them" but she really shouldn't have worried, as no sooner had the cars parked when people started tumbling out bearing huge tureens of soups, trays of pizza, platters of roast meats and vegetable terrine, giant bowls of salad, breads, cheeses, pates, dips and bottles of wine, along with boxes of cutlery and crockery. Within five minutes a table for 26 adults was laid, a separate one set up for the enfants, while another was covered with drinks and snacks.

It was Kate's mother's - Cathy - 60th Birthday and she'd planned to have a quiet one. Just her, her boyfriend Jean, her two daughters and their families plus her friend Christian (who's 50th birthday was also that day) and his family. A mere 15 people for lunch, on 3 tables set out under the oak. No sweat. Jean however had other ideas and had teamed up with their friend, landlady and feast organizer extraordinaire Margitte to magic up a surprise party and feast for Cathy's french and anglo friends that lasted well into the warm summer night.

It was the perfect culmination to the two glorious weeks Kate and I had spent relaxing at Cathy's in the company of Kate's sister Becky and her four beautiful children (husband Dan joining us the friday before the party). It was a lovely, lazy time, with mornings often spent swimming at the local lake, trying out boats I'd built with the kids out of paper and plastic bottles, long 5 course lunches eaten out side, walking through the woods with their mental Breton spaniel Cocky, games of cards with Jean and their neighbour Norbert, visits to other friends and local markets, plus lots and lots of reading. It really was a shame to leave - if only the rest of our families and friends could be persuaded to move to France (preferably the Lot region) it would be ideal!

A sculpture is a sculpture, marmelade is marmelade...

Obvious, yes? Maybe not - especially if the sculpture is either made of marmelade, or of marmelade. What they hell am I talking about? To find out you'll have to read my review of SJ Esau and The Wave Pictures @ Club Neu! last Saturday
http://www.the-fly.co.uk/words/reviews/live-reviews/4704/the-wave-pictures-&-sj-esau

We had spent the afternoon before hanging out with Mr Esau himself - Sam - as he's an old friend from Bristol and had very kindly played at our wedding; his songs had sound-tracked much of our journey around Europe last year. We showed him Plaza Major and the St Gines Chocolateria (a must!) and then met him later before the gig. Along with his Italian friend Nadia (who now lives in Segovia) we were about the only people at the gig who knew who he was, but he seemed to go down very well!

After the gig, it was our Spanish friend Jaime's birthday party; he's a busy boy and this was actually the first time we had managed to see him since the Pueblo Ingles week last year, so it was great to hang out with him again and meet his lovely wife Teresa. Belen, another Pueblo Ingles friend was there with our lovely Venezuelan friends David and Natalie in tow, so much fun was had in the little underground bar Jaime had booked for the occasion. A very lazy Sunday followed as a result!

Flamenco Fiesta

Last Saturday our flatmate Alex, who has just got back from Mexico, threw a party for some his friends, which - after Kate had got her guitar out and played a few enthusiastically-received songs - turned into an improvised Flamenco show in our kitchen. We filmed a little bit of it:

http//www.youtube.com/watch?v=UmXJnD6K95k

No idea what he's singing about, but it sounded pretty rude and clearly had the crowd in hysterics.

flat fiesta

This weekend was decidedly more active than the last one; after a week of working hard with Kate at training for her new job from 9 til 7 and me supervising classes of manic children, we decided to play a bit harder too. (Though not as hard as our flatmates it has to be said!)


We started off with a flat-warming party on Saturday night, inviting along friends of ours from both Pueblo Ingles and Vaughan Town, plus our flatmates. Apparently it's not really the custom to invite friends round for food - the Spanish tend to just meet in a bar - while starting things at 8pm is definitely not the usual way of things in Madrid, but the food at least was reasonably Spanish. Indeed my first efforts at Spanish-style tortilla and aubergine fritters were gobbled up with pleasing enthusiasm! We'd set up an ice-breaking exercise ("find someone who?" bingo) for a bit of fun and nostalgia (it's something we had played at Pueblo Ingles) and to get people talking, not that we needed to encourage them - they're a sociable bunch! Pete our flatmate got on the DJ decks and spun a little set, which started to make us think it might be nice to go somewhere for a dance. Cesar obligingly phoned a friend and had 10 of us put on the guest list for a trendy club, which we headed out to at 1am - still early by Madrid standards. In fact when Kate and I left at 3am we had to queue to get our coats from the cloakroom - because there were loads of people waiting to hand theirs in!! It was a great night and lovely to see our friends again.

Sunday lunch and curries are two great English traditions, though it's rare that we combine them. Today however, after a lazy morning, we ventured out to the Guru restaurant in central Madrid to meet an old childhood friend of Kate's, Kirsty Frost, her husband Juanmi, parents and aunt and uncle (all friends of Kate's parents). Kirsty has been living in Spain for 10 years now and she and Kate really enjoyed seeing each other again - our social circle here is rapidly expanding. Despite our protestations, we were treated to lunch. Again. If we have to buy back all the meals we've been treated to we're going to be bankrupted rather swiftly. Just as well Kate starts work tomorrow!

Ruffled Feathers, Lack Of Horn

It was when my Matron of Dishonour (Hen) put the sixth case of Cava in the car and we realised we didn't have room for any food that I knew my hen weekend was going to be a serious business. Let's not even mention the barrel of cider, which had already been decanted into another hen's estate car.
There had been a lot of mysterious activity going on with only the smallest hint to me (that there was activity, no clue as to what it actually was) and all I knew for sure was that we were staying in a big house near Barnstaple, vegetarian chilli was the Friday night meal and there would be sixteen of us.
The house was perfect, in a sort of residential home for the elderly sort of way. I think we counted six different floral patterns in the lounge, which had a number of not-quite-matching three-piece suites lining the walls. All that was missing were tartan blankets and tea served in china cups and saucers.
But it was spot on for our purposes - very cheap and clean with lots of space, plenty of bedrooms and some decent-sized areas for communual mischief-making. We had pedalled the usual fib of it being a birthday party knees-up, but to be honest, I don't think they would have minded if we'd come clean about the clucking.
The first night was relatively low key, involving a mere eight people, lots of chat, several generous plates of nosh and some pretty respectable in-roads into the Cava. A highlight was when the hens (including one honorary cock hen) unexpectedly appeared in the kitchen all wearing the chosen uniform for the weekend of black matching Ts printed with a huge pair of red lips and the words "Redd to Wed" on the front. Suddenly I was the front woman of a stadium rock band on tour. It was priceless and hats off to Matron of Dishonour (clothes) who was responsible for the idea and the design.
The other memorable moment that night involved our mole at the simultaneous stag do (Theo's sister) texting me a picture of my intended wearing a bright pink "Mr Perfect" T-shirt and baggy yellow Y-fronts. Outside his trousers.
I was (rightly) chastised for the number of stag/hen textings that went back and forth, but the rest of the roost probably didn't realise the level of my anxiety and the need to be reassured my gorgeous (even in the Y-fronts, although I hope he won't make a habit of them) young man was not only still alive, but also sporting all his hair.

The next morning we checked the damage. A few minor hangovers and one nudging into more serious territory. We agreed the several bottles of sparkling water had been a wise investment and we would call for reinforcements for the coming night. Which, I had little doubt, would be more rip-roaring.
It all began fairly innocently. A leisurely walk by the estuary, a pub lunch (inconsistant, was the general view of the food, although it was a nice enough place with friendly staff and right by the water). Afternoon tea and biscuits when we got back (no china cups and saucers, I think we stuck with mugs) then the gradual arrival of more hens..first our mole from the stag do, then two of my sisters (complete with the requested extra fizzy water), then another sister and a car-load from Bristol. I volunteered to remain sober to make the trip to Barnstaple station to pick up the one remaining hen, who had travelled all the way down from Teesside.
My absence gave them the perfect opportunity to transform the old people's home aspect of the house into a veritable homage to The Phallous.
When I got back, pausing only to grab a restorative pint of cider, I was bundled into a wonderfully voluminous second-hand wedding dress, given a pair of flashing nipples to wear underneath (one of which refused to work unless someone stuck a finger directly onto it...cheap thrills), then showered with presents for use in my new life. They ranged from the genuinely useful (excellent travel toilet-bag, phrase-books, paper knickers etc.), to the possibly useful (vibrating dolphin cock-ring) to the completely ridiculous (banana-flavoured cock drops, anyone??)
But the best was yet to come. When I walked into the dining room the whole place was decorated with buttock-shaped balloons (which were supposed to be heart shapes, but looked like arses, breasts or testicles depending on the angle they were viewed from), bunting and long, pink balloons fashioned into an outrageous assortment of hats and table decorations by the creative (and filthy-minded) hens. I was shot with a nob-style confetti gun (most impressive - some of the confetti even had the individual pubic hairs drawn on) and after a most excellent curry and dal main course, presented with a cake in the shape of an enormous penis. It was a magnificent confection. And rather shockingly, made to a Delia Smith recipe. I opted for the bifocation method of cutting it up and can affirm it tasted better than most examples of the real thing (or so my other hens assured me, I am much too refined to be able to comment).
After that Dolly Parton's Mule Skinner Blues went on the stereo, the Cava (and medicinal fizzy water) flowed and we partied until every last drop of bubbly was finished. Quite how one hen managed to break her wrist during tail-feather shaking that went on, nobody knows. Even she didn't realise what had happened until later the next afternoon - the anaesthetising qualities of the sparkling wine and the couple of ibuprofen I'd insisted she take before retiring may had something to do with it.
Still, a broken wrist is a small price to pay for missing the nadir of the stag do (broken-wrist hen had been given the option to join the stags, but had turned it down) - the dreaded strippergram. I had a plaintive phone call from Theo later on, who sounded not a little traumatised by the ordeal at the hands (and other body parts) of the two Paignton strippers (paint-strippers). Hats off to the doe-stags who took those responsible for ordering them well and truly to task. Thankfully, all the male members surrounding me during the cluck fest were artificial (well, apart from one, but his remained safely in his trousers), for which I am truly grateful.
But it was a great weekend, mainly because it was so fantastic to party with friends and family (boy, those babymamas can really let their hair down when they get the chance...) and I was so thoroughly spoiled by them all.
Now, I'm looking forward to future partying with Theo beside me. Or in other positions. We're still trying to work out how best to employ my new dolphin cock-ring.
Thanks hens, truly you are wonderful cluckers.

Feathers And Antlers - by Kate

Hen dos. Stag parties.
Let us consider the edifying spectacle of a single-sex group (or is that a group sex of singles...?) in matching togas or tiaras, shrieking in super-stretch limos and swaggering (then staggering) from bar to bar, hellbent on humiliation and inebriation. When watching examples of the singleton's last hoorah, my reaction is usually a mixture of indulgent amusement and horror. Accompanied by wincing.
Despite the numerous wedding invites on my CV, I've only been to a few hen-dos. And actually, they were all varying degrees of fun. Mainly because none of them involved wearing L-plates, male strippers, indeterminate pub-crawls or the introduction of random items into bodily orifices.
In most cases, a (reasonably) civilised meal was a main focal point. At a couple, we went to health spas for some girly pampering; at another, we rented a stone cottage and did some walking; at another, we had an all-day, all-night house party. What they all had in common were lots of women out for a good time and fizzy wine. Which can be a lethal combination, admittedly.
So when thinking about my own hen do, I was determined it would be simple, cheap, fun and largely hygienic. So my Matron of Dishonour (Hen) was asked to look for a self-catering place with stroll options during the day (to a local coffee-shop, perhaps, and/or a beach), for communally-cooked meals and a chance to party in private. Cheapness and a south west location were also preferred.
Amazingly, she found a place in North Devon that ticked all the boxes and could sleep up to 18 for around seven pounds per hen per night. That's some roost.
The one thing worrying me is that my MoD (Hen) - I also have an MoD (Clothing) and a Matron of Honour (Bridesmaid Whipper-In) - despite being a much loved friend, is also the woman who shaved a perfect stripe down the chest of one of our male friends who'd unwisely passed out at a party while she was there. Let's just say it adds a certain frisson to the proceedings. Blue hair dye, or even worse, mousy brown hair dye have been casually mentioned in my hearing. I'm telling myself it'll be fine. It'll all be fine.
In fact, it's Theo I'm more worried about. His alcohol tolerance is alarmingly low. He is also somewhat hirsute and I fear for his eyebrows/hair/beard/chest-hair. I have asked his best men (one of whom is a woman and therefore probably more dangerous) to be gentle with him and to please return him undamaged. I just suspect their interpretation of "undamaged" may be different to mine. Oh well. By having the stag and hen dos so early, we've at least allowed two months for things to grow back again. Most things, anyway.