Packed

Like I did last year, I'm taking two weeks to pretend I live the life of a retired American in Madrid. Everything is ready to go: the bathroom DIY work is mostly done and cleaned up; the loaner cat has been delivered (however unwillingly) to his vacation caregivers, and I managed to limit everything that I'm bringing to 10kg in they-fit-under-the-seat carry-on bags. The only thing that's not ready is my brain. I haven't been practicing my Spanish regularly in the past few months and I fear I will be caught quite unprepared on Monday morning in my first class. But last year the teachers were quite nice and I shall simply have to study very hard.

August travels

It has been a month of weekend trips for me. While I only took off a single day from work, I managed to cram in three terrific trips. As mentioned earlier, I visited my parents and Ohio friends at the start of the month. My father, lover of old motorcycles and old cars (and old tractors, old phonographs, old waffle irons...) drove me to the airport in style. I told him that wearing a scarf made me feel like a 1940's movie star.

Each summer I go to the beach once with my friend E and her kids. Her husband despises the beach, so this arrangement lets us both get some sun-and-sand time while splitting the driving. Every year we marvel at how the kids get older, the car trip gets easier, and the waves less scary. (#3 is directly related to #1, of course.) This year I also took two beach day trips on my own, which let me perfect my beach lunch (tomato and mozzarella salad, with German rye bread) and test a new beach with a reduced entrance fee.

Last weekend, my friend C invited me to visit her parents' weekend cottage in rural Virginia. The cottage looks out on a three-mile wide river near the point where it enters Chesapeake Bay, so there were lots of beautiful views and wading in salt water (while keep a careful eye out for jellyfish because I am a wimp). I hadn't  previously met any of the other people there, but they were all kindred spirits because we are in the same financial planning community. Some of them hang out on a forum, so it was cool to meet people that I previously only vaguely knew of virtually. Drinking gin-and-tonics with interesting, fun people while looking out over the water is pretty much the perfect thing to do.

Vitamins

I'm not saying the garden is winning, but it might be a photo finish. This is the time of year when I'm acutely aware of how easy it is to pop a seed in the ground in April and not consider the consequences in August. On the other hand, I am eating like a queen right now, and I hope I will appreciate all this frozen and dried produce come January.

And see those beautiful figs? That's more than I've ever harvested in a year, and there are more on the tree. My long-term plan of buying a house so I could plant fruit and asparagus has really paid off.

Weekend in the country

In the English novels I read, the gentry are always spending a weekend at Lord So-and-So's country house. There will be hunts, drinks on the terrace, perhaps some whist.

I participated in the modern-day equivalent this weekend. I had decided to avoid my parents' annual pig roast and visit early, and since they have a huge house I invited all my local friends. Three couples, two kids, and my aunt were there, and most stayed the whole weekend. We filled every bed and used the RV as a guest suite.

It felt quite luxurious to offer all my friends a free place to stay and delicious meals. (Thanks for making that possible, Mom and Dad!). It's also a luxury to sit on the back porch, drinking beer, celebrating all my friends' lives (babies and tenure and grants received), and without ever having to consider what I should be repairing right now. The only downside, compared to the country weekends I read about, was that the maid was not reliable and not once did the butler show his face. Apparently it's hard to get good help in Homerville.