Foolery

Nerds In Europe Day Seven: Tuesday, June 2, 1992

Another beach day.  This time we went to Fuengirola because it was so pleasant there Monday.  There were soft-cushioned lounges and palapas -- no charge this time. 

Lunch at a beach bar.  I had my usual:  bocadillos de queso y una cervesa (a french roll with white cheese and a beer.  Awesome.  I could live on it.

I got pretty sunburned, so when Mom, Dad and Kenny wanted to go to Mijas (a village up the mountain from us), I opted to stay home, and so did Bocci.  We took long hot showers -- a real luxury after sponge baths.  I got some sun on my legs on the patio, and generally kicked back.

When they got back we drove to Fuengirola to meet Javier.  He was still at work at 9:00 p.m., typical for Spain because they take a 2-3 hour lunch.  He -- in silk clothes -- led us on his motorcycle down the street to a building his family owns, also right across the street from the beach.  The bottom floor is a seafood restaurant they rent out.  Guillermo designed the interior of the restaurant.

Guillermo joined us and we ate on the patio.  We were almost the only customers, plus we were V.I.P.s because we were with the building owners.

The service was excellent, and the food was, too.  Guillermo ordered for all of us -- lots of fried hot appetizers, all typical dishes of southern Spain.  The main course consisted of two whole dorado fish baked in salt.  They totally bury the fish in salt, then when they bring it to the table in a shallow wooden box, the waiter scrapes the salt off, skins the fish, and lifts the meat off the bones.  The salt helps the fish retain its moisture, but the meat doesn’t taste salty at all.  We drizzled a garlic-infused olive oil over the fish.  The dorado alone was about $150.00 for seven people; the whole meal came to about $280.00.
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Javier kept the wine coming.  We must have killed four bottles of white wine.  We all had postre, of course, though I’m not sure how we found the room.  I had arroz con leche (very sweet rice pudding).  

The waiter brought out three bottles of aperitif; one was anise-flavored, one cinnamon, one manzana (apple).  Very good.

The conversation was lively the whole evening.  Javier is very funny and enjoyed joking with Ken a lot.  I was surprised to find out he’s only 25.  Guillermo is a little more quiet but also fun.  He’s also very successful for his age (probably close to 30).  Not only is he an architect, but he’s also an elected city planner, which draws a good salary.  Two young guys at the tops of their games.

After dinner they took us on a tour of the restaurant, then up to the top floor of the building (the Portonovo) to see Guillermo’s apartment.  He designed it himself -- fantastic views of the city out the kitchen windows; views of the harbor out the living room window, and the patio in the back has a panoramic view of the mountains.  But from the patio an iron spiral staircase leads to the roof, where you can get a 360-degree view of all of it.  I was so jealous.  I could live there, I think.

We got the car stuck when we parked; one wheel went into a “hole” that turned out to be the edge of a cliff.  We pushed it out okay (thank heavens for front wheel drive).  I’m glad we were staying at Club Riviera; anyone who saw us pushing the car at 1:30 a.m. thought we were Brits and not Americans.

Nerds In Europe Day Six: Monday, June 1, 1992

The water finally came back on around noon or earlier.  Dad didn’t feel like sightseeing, so he went to the beach, and the four of us went down the coast to Fuengirola (about 20 minutes away).  Ken’s friend Robin had a friend, a former student, who now works in Fuengirola (his family is from here).  Ken knew him too, and had arranged to meet him at his office.

Javier and his older brother Guillermo have an architectural business in a building right across the street from a huge beach.  Javier gave us a tour of Habitat, their three-story business.  Very cool.  Afterwards we went across the street to a beach bar and had a beer.  We made plans to have dinner with Javier Tuesday night.

Next we headed inland to Grenada, to see the Alhambra.  The trip was pleasant but long.  The Alhambra was interesting, but too much of a good thing.  I like the Moorish influence on Spain, and seeing the Alhambra made me realize how pervasive Moorish influence on architecture has been.
 

In the last segment of the tour -- the Alcazaba, I think -- we climbed up a winding stairway to the top of the highest tower, from which we could see miles beyond Grenada.  We counted 52 steps on the way down -- more than four stories in that tower alone.




We got home in time for dinner at Bogart’s, down the hill with the rest of the British places.  We ate on the patio as usual, but it was colder than usual, so I left a little early.  Besides, sitting on the patio makes you fair game for all the guys coming around trying to sell you stuff.  I walked back up the hill by myself.

Television has been interesting here.  The best part is the advertising, especially English.  The ads are usually funny, and pretty creative.  But when they’re corny they’re really corny.

The Grand Prix at Monaco was on all weekend, and the French Open has been on, too.  Other than that the choices are pretty slim, unless you count Dad and Ken’s favorite, “Tutti-Frutti.”  It’s a soft-porn game show or something from Germany.  There’s also “Love at First Sight,” England’s version of “Love Connection.”  It’s so bad you have to watch it out of disbelief.

Nerds In Europe Day Five: Sunday, May 31, 1992

Another chilly morning.  The weather has been surprising; it’s really not warm enough to swim or eat outside, but it’s not too bad, so we try anyway.  Not that any of us are swimming; we’re not.  The Mediterranean is very cold here, probably because we’re so close to the Atlantic.  Besides, I’m not sure that the town’s sewage doesn’t come right down the hill into the sea.  I’ll stick to Hawaii and our pool, thanks.

No water yet, but it’s been promised for about half an hour in the afternoon.  About noon we went down to the entrance to Marbella (a big gaudy white arch over the highway with MARBELLA carved out of the plaster) and went to Banana Beach.  It was pretty quiet when we arrived.  We staked out some chaise longues and got some rays (350 pasetas apiece for the chairs.  At 98.75 exchange rate it’s about $3.50 American).

Dad and Ken got plenty of boobs for their money, although they were mostly middle-aged milktoast British boobs on holiday.  Lots of little kids who said things like, “Duddy” and “Mum” and “khan we ‘ave a go at the wottah, Duddy?”  Big loudmouth jerks sunning themselves in their jeans and motorcycle boots.

“I’M GOING SWIMMING!”  -- big obnoxious, loud thug upon seeing a lovely young topless thing head for the water

The beach bar was right behind us, and they fired up a huge stereo and warmed up a rock band, so we left.  Pretty much a Ft. Lauderdale atmosphere with families.  Lots of Spaniards on holiday and locals out on a Sunday.  Good sun, good beer, but just a little too Coney Island for us.

“I’ll bet there’s 57 tits up there.”

We headed back home to use the little water we were allowed, cleaned up, and went to the pub downstairs.

English child:  “Duddy, Duddy, that mean man has taken my chair.  Duddy, I don’t like it here.  I want to go home, Duddy.”

One of the bartenders suggested the Royal Beach Restaurant just a few blocks down the highway, so we tried it.  You could tell it was almost entirely open air in the summer, but because the ocean wind was so chilly they had all the glass siding up.

Dad:  “What do I want to eat, Lynne?”

We finally got our paella.  Dad and Bocci and I ordered it together, and they brought it out in a large iron skillet.  Instead of mixing it all together, they laid the seafood on top, so it pretty much stared up at you while you ate.  All shrimp are served whole -- even the vein is left in, eyes bulging out, etc.  But they’re great.  I’m not as crazy about the mussels, though.

Back home to bed, very late as usual.  The hours are easy to adjust to here:  we get up about 8:30, sometimes later, and dawdle until about 11:30.  Lunch is usually around 2:30 or 3:00, happy hour at 8:00, dinner at 9:30 or 10:00, and bed at about 1:00 a.m.  The sun seems to be about an hour or more behind our time, because it doesn’t get completely dark until about 10:00.  I could live this way.

Nerds In Europe Day Four: Saturday, May 30, 1992

I was the lucky one -- I got a shower.  I was so careful to be frugal with the hot water that I even endured a mostly-cold shower.  So I couldn’t understand it when our water supply dwindled to a drip by 11:30 a.m.  We found out later it wasn’t my fault -- a water main for most of the coastal towns broke, and nobody informed the condo managers.  All their reserve supply, which could have been rationed, was used up.

“Oh, by the way, did I mention this lamp is broken?”

So we piled into our tight little car and took a late-afternoon trip to Ronda.  The drive was pleasant but probably nerve-wracking for Ken, who drove.  The road wound around the cliffs of the high coastal range, heading inland.

Ronda is a small town built on top of cliffs and bisected by an extremely deep and very narrow gorge.  The town drainage falls into the stream at the bottom, which is visibly polluted and smells even from a long way above it.
 

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The town was quaint and very European, with cobblestone streets and marble and tiles everywhere.  Ronda also boasts Spain’s oldest bull ring, which we toured and clowned around in.  Its museum was interesting, and included more bullfighting memorabilia than I thought existed.

We had lunch at a small cafe in a very old building.  The art was, as Kenny described it, “appalling,” but the food was pretty good.  Mom and Bocci ordered gazpacho, which to everyone’s amusement came blended in a tall glass.  They drank it like a V8.  I thought Dad was going to choke on his laughter.

It looked like rain, so we headed for home.  The views of the Mediterranean and the chalk-white villas were stunning.  Some of the villas were clumped together in tight knots of urbanization on the side of a hill.  We’re not used to that type of lifestyle, because we’re so territorial, and because we have too many earthquakes.

“We’ve seen Africa!  Now we won’t have to go there.”

We did a large shopping at a grocery store in Marbella, then back to the condo.  Still no water, but it had apparently been on for a while, because we had enough water to flush the toilets once.

Again we decided to eat with the Brits, this time halfway down the hill at the “Brahms and Lizst” pub.  Kenny said that was Cockney for something-and-pissed (drunk).  The food was pretty disgusting, but the waiter was nice and the beer was great.

Dad, to Ken:  “Why do you like beer?  Your mother and your father or your sister or your brother don’t like beer.”
Ken:  “Why do you want to learn to read?  Your mother and father, sister or brother can’t read -- why do you have to?”

We had a constant flow of African men selling crappy tourist stuff -- nothing interesting, always too expensive, always the same.  Dad, of course, encouraged them.  He tried to get me to buy something -- anything -- but I wouldn’t even look.

Dad:  “My new Rolex better be working.  It cost me almost $45.00.”
Ken:  At least your watch is right twice a day.”
Dad:  “I should have gotten the one with diamonds; it was only $5.00 more.”

Home again to go to bed grubby.  The water was promised by Monday morning, but this is Spain.  Nobody’s betting any money.

Nerds In Europe Day Three: Friday, May 29, 1992

Leaving Los Yébenes by noon or so, we drove south through hours of rolling terrain with nothing but olive orchards.  It finally began to clear up, with periods of intermittent rain.





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Mom:  “This looks like southern Oregon, except with more olive trees.”
Dad:  “It looks a LOT like Spain to me.”

We arrived in Málaga in the early evening and headed up the coast to Mijas Costa.  Our condo was in the Calahonda district.  It specializes in British tourists, so everything is in English (or at least secondarily in English).

Our first meal was, of course, Chinese.  First, however, we went to happy hour at an English pub in our complex.  We drank a lot of beer, then walked the 1/2 mile or more down hill to dinner.  It was actually very good.  The walk back up the hill was necessary.

Nerds In Europe Day Two: Thursday, May 28, 1992

More attrocious flight attendants, but the food was good.  We drank like fish because the alcohol was free.  Seat by the bathroom under an air duct, and the movie broke.  Is this a Chinese prison camp?  Can I come back?

 
 

Madrid was totally clouded over and cold.  We piled into a little Citroën and drove through the city.  Somehow we got stuck on a three-lane one-way street that converged to one lane.  Worse than an L.A. freeway at rush hour.  But the city was attractive and it was worth it.

“THERE’S a woman without a mirror.”

We left Madrid after much difficulty and drove to Toledo, a beautiful old city on a hill.  We toured the cathedral there -- amazing.  The streets didn’t seem to make much sense -- very narrow, not at right angles, etc.  But picturesque.



Dad:  “¿Donde esta las vacas?”

Lunch was an experience.  Foolishly we wanted to eat at an out-of-the-way place, so we found a very local place upstairs, down a long, narrow alley.  Ordering was humiliating -- it took almost ten minutes.

“Mi Español es pequeño [I speak a small Spanish].”

We stayed at a forgettable little hotel on a hill above Los Yébenes.  It was clean and functional, but in the morning our “fried” eggs were almost completely raw.  We did catch up on some needed sleep.

“Can you turn our eggs over, or haven’t you got the technology?”

Nerds In Europe Day One: Wednesday, May 27, 1992

Dad:  “Kenny tricked us.  He told us he was taking us to Modesto.”

We got up much too early after going to bed much too late.  After picking up Kenny in Davis we braved commuter traffic through San Francisco and were underway by 11:00.

Remind me never to fly American again -- the food sucked, the attendants were Leona Helmsley wannabes, and they allow screaming toddlers on board.

Sitting in an icy Dallas airport drinking as much as we can seems to help.  Our flight has been delayed -- no big surprise.  Apparently they’re striking at the Madrid airport so we’ll see if we can even go.

Nerds In Europe: 1992 Trip Prologue

What do you do with a timeshare week which is about to expire?  If you’re my parents, and it’s 1992, you try to get a week in Baltimore.

Yes, I know how funny that is.  But if you remember back to 1992, the Baltimore Orioles had just completed their new ballpark, Oriole Park at Camden Yards.  Mom and Dad decided it would be fun to go catch a couple of games there, and see D.C. and the surrounding area.

No dice.  There were no timeshares available there within their time frame.  Broadening their search, they were frustrated to learn that there was NOTHING available in the U.S. in any area they wanted to visit (and I assert here that if Baltimore was number one of their list, they weren’t being overly picky.  Sorry Baltimore; no offense).

They had pretty much given up the idea of using their vacation week, when my Uncle Ken suggested Europe.  HA!  I thought.  Why would there be ANYTHING available in Europe in late spring if BALTIMORE was booked up?

So naïve.   Of me.

They found a lovely condo on the sunny south coast of Spain, near Mijas Costa and Marbella.  It was the perfect place to use as a launching pad for day trips to the Alhambra, the Mezquita, and so on.

So they invited Uncle Ken, and they very generously brought my brother Bocci and me along at their expense.  I tried to make myself useful by brushing up on my Spanish and learning French.  I practiced in the car every day for three weeks while commuting, listening to tapes and chanting “bon jour, mademoiselle!” over and over and over.  I learned a lot, and as is typical for me I nailed the pronunciation, but retained very few verbs.

While going through some old boxes in my parents’ storage room the other day I found my trip diary from that 1992 trip, which I’d about given up as lost.  What follows are my daily entries for the first half of our trip, which took place in Spain.  I was able to write each evening and so faithfully recorded each day’s activities.  Once we hit the road for France, however, we were in the rental car all day, and writing was way too difficult.  I recorded our experiences in France by writing down only the goofy quotes that are inevitable in a cramped car full of American smart alecks driving from patisserie to patisserie and butchering the language wherever we went.

Uncredited photos were stolen from Wikipedia.com.  All pulled quotes are courtesy of my family: parents Dave and Lynne, uncle Ken, and brother Bocci.  My brother Mantel Man was also in Spain that week, but it was with the U.S. Navy, and they didn’t let him come with us.  A good thing, too -- we put 4000 miles on the rented 4-door Citroën hatchback, and there wasn’t one inch of available space for Mantel Man (who was known as Ensign Butthead in those days).

A final note:  in the spring of 1992 Spain was furiously preparing for not one but TWO international events: the World’s Fair in Seville, and the summer Olympics in Barcelona.  We avoided both places like the plague.

1400 Miles with a Broken Window and No Radio -- Pt. 2

(This is part two)

The next day at the beach was postcard perfect. It was quite warm, and Uncle Bocci dug a big sand pit for three three youngest kids (my Sparky and his two boys). They were so engrossed that they rarely looked up. (Later, by necessity, this pit became a latrine and was filled in.)

The big people among us -- "adults" seems such a loaded word -- did our best to keep the California wine industry healthy. Because Uncle Bocci is a chef, WE ATE WELL. (Always do!) A friend asked if we had s’mores. Well, no, but we did have rosemary potatoes, barbecued fresh Alaskan salmon, Croatian fig preserves with creme fraiche on toasted baguettes, blueberry buckle, and linguica. Not all at the same meal.

The only dark cloud came the day the rest of the family arrived, when Bocci’s youngest child -- I’ll call him T-Dog, because Bocci does -- fell down the stairs and landed on Sparky. He cried. Sparky cried. Sparky got a bump on her head. T-Dog broke his arm. Bocci and Mrs. Bocci (T.C. for my purposes) threw him into the car and drove until they saw a human, whom they flagged down to ask for directions to the Petaluma hospital. As luck would have it, the guy was a local fireman, and he led them to the fire station, where they splinted T-Dog’s arm, packed it in ice, and gave directions to the hospital. Even the local law enforcement were accomodating, letting Bocci off the hook with a warning for speeding. Thank you, Dillon Beach – you’re good people.

Chas and I stayed with the four other kids and waited for the rest of the family to straggle in. T-Dog was a little sleepy when they returned at dinner time, but otherwise not slowed down too much. His parents, however, were quite ready for the glasses of wine that awaited them.

It was the first time all four siblings and Mom & Dad were together. Only my sister's elder son wasn't there (we missed you R-Man ; next time, okay?). We all had a great time together, catching up and eating like it was going out of style.

Just before we headed for home Wednesday afternoon, we all spontaneously jumped into three cars and drove 15 minutes inland to Bloomfield, where Dad's best friend Buck has his dairy. It’s been years since I was there. Dad leaned over to me and said, "This may be the top producing herd [average pounds of milk per cow] in the state of California, you realize." That's something, especially on a 45-acre ranch, and a family operation, not a corporate farm.

We trouped all the kidlets and spouses (who had never been there) through Uncle Buck's milking parlor and calf barn. It all came back to me like it was yesterday, not only because his dairy really hasn't changed (visibly changed) much in 40 years, but also because I grew up the same way. Same smells, same calves desperate to suck your fingers right off your hand in their blind efforts to suckle.

We were even lucky enough to see a calf being born, which I would watch over and over if only I could. Great for the little ones. That's an image that words just can't explain.

It was like returning to my childhood, with all the familiar sounds and smells. Hard to explain why that matters, especially when you consider that I live on the ranch of my childhood, but a working dairy is like a living thing, and it gets under your skin.

Three hours to home through vineyards, urban sprawl, rice fields, and, finally, pastures. Smedley slept peacefully, Sparky sang at the top of her lungs for two straight hours, and the sun sank into the hazy atmosphere of heat and forest fire smoke, just above the coastal range.

So, long story short, we had a great time, and even returned with clean laundry -- how do you get better than that?

1400 Miles with a Broken Window and No Radio -- Pt. 1

. . . but we had air conditioning.

What a week. Week-and-a-half, actually. It’s taken me a whole extra week to write this, and I’m still not sure it’s not too long AND too short. We’ve now logged another successful summer trip to San Clemente to visit Chas’s family, and this year we combined it with a side trip with my family.

Jumped into the car Wednesday night – was it as long ago as the 19th? Yikes – and drove to Kingsburg, our sleeping place that cuts the nine-hour trip in half. (I made that sound way too easy, because the three days before had been a mad crush of laundry, packing, planning, lists. You know how stressful pre-vacation days are. Add to that the mad scramble at work, trying to get everything put to bed before leaving so that I could enjoy myself.)  Our first morning out the driver's side power window broke (a fact which we forgot at nearly every toll booth on the trip).  Oh, and the speakers are hooked up wrong so we had a portable radio for traffic info if we needed it.  How's this road trip looking NOW?

This summer’s trip was all about heat. California was stuck in a heat-wave of something like twenty days, with record temperatures up and down the state. We smugly thought that by going to the beach we’d escape all that, as we usually do. We didn’t. It was HOT in San Clemente. Chas’s mom sent me an e-mail the other day to tell me that it had been 108 in town the last day we were there. Now, even if that number is wrong by 10 degrees, 98 degrees with coastal humidity would be no picnic. But at home they were suffering in 110, 114, 116 temps, so we were still better off.

The girls had a blast playing with their cousins. I just realized this minute that there was no egg hunt at Gramma’s house this time (a tradition that started a couple of years ago and which we heartily enjoy in December and July). It was too hot to hunt eggs and we were all too busy coming and going this time – well, there’s always Easter, I guess, though that seems awfully predictable. The four young ones (from 1½ to 7 in age) sought water, whether in the inflatable pool on the patio, in Grampa Bob’s fountain, or down the hill at the beach. Ah, the beach. The adults among us carried plastic cups of Grown-Up Lemonade (known elsewhere as Margaritas), which at least ensured our fluid intake under the hot southern California sun. Oh, the things we tell ourselves.

I love San Clemente, and it’s so easy to imagine living there. The weather, the ocean, the bougainvillea everywhere. The downtown is still vibrant, though the old corner pharmacy where I bought hair gel on my first visit is now a super-trendy clothing store. Every third storefront is a realty office, and everything in between is food, clothing or candles. But at least San Clemente still HAS a downtown, and one without boarded-up windows – that’s more than a lot of cities can claim. Then I wake up and remember that it costs a bloody fortune to live there, and the snarl of freeways is just up the hill a block. I’ll stick to my rural roots, I guess.

The kids were in heaven and didn’t want to leave. But, after three days, leave we did, braving the teeming L.A. freeways on a steamy summer Sunday. We chugged up the slope to the Grapevine as the thermometer surged past 100. The mercury camped out at 109 the whole trip up the central valley – except, of course when it jumped up to 115 near Fresno. Thank GOD for air conditioning.

Instead of going home we cut across the Altamont Pass to the San Francisco Bay Area, then north to Marin County. My brother Bocci and his family had rented a beach house at Dillon Beach west of Petaluma, and we joined them there, arriving in time for dinner that night. It was so nice to see fog, nicer to need sweatshirts and jeans. And it was nicest of all to spend time with their family.