Melyssa-with-a-Y

September 11 is The National Day of Catalonia, also known as the Diada, a day-long festival. We had the day off, and spent most of it lounging around the apartment. It was pouring rain, so I did laundry and baked cookies. The sun came out in the afternoon, so we decided to go for a walk. We haven't made it down to the waterfront since we moved here. We were clearly not the only ones with that idea! Lots of flags, people in "independence" t-shirts, etc. There was a stage set up at the bottom of La Rambla, and lots of people gathering in various places. But they were very friendly and peaceful - more of a party than a protest.  As we were walking along, we noticed a giant yacht in the harbor, towering over everything. Turns out it's the Maryah ,  #37 on the list of largest yachts in the world. According to one website, its amenities include a dance floor, movie theater, beauty salon, and underwater lights. It has 27 state rooms. The interior photos are stunning . It...

Bucket list - iStock I was going back through old blog posts, and I found a bucket list I called "50 Things to do Before I turn 50." I wrote it in 2010, when I wasn't even 40. I didn't have "move to another country" on my list, but that apparently happened before I managed to go up in a hot air balloon! Didn't do a lot of these in thirteen years, so maybe I'll do better this time. Y'all are gonna have to keep me honest. I've got about 8 years before I turn 60.  Hmmm... I might change a few of these to reflect new realities and new interests.    Here's my original list: 1. Visit the Aquarium (Monterrey, Baltimore, Sydney, Auckland... I love aquariums) 2. Dance in the rain 3. Ride in a hot air balloon 4. Buy a house 5. Visit all 50 states (hmmm, not as likely now) 6. Own a big girl camera 7. Spend a day at a winery 8. Tutor Someone 9. Host a dinner party 10. Go camping 11. Write a book…or...

Well, the big news is, we got our 'empadronamiento' paperwork done, so we can get on the public healthcare (OoOoh, socialized medicine!) and we have given our fingerprints to the police to get our 'foreigner identification cards'. Whee!  We also spent a few hours at IKEA a couple of weeks ago, and  added some more necessary furniture pieces to the apartment. I have a desk and a chair now (in the main bedroom), and a utility cart in the kitchen to make our countertop space more available. We will also need bookcases when our stuff shows up... I'm not used to living in places without bookshelves! The desk and chair turned out to be super useful this week, as the A/C went out at the office last week, and they show no signs of having it fixed so far. So, WFH it is.  IKEA also had mixing bowls, kitchen tongs, and some other necessities. So I've also been cooking more, trying to get used to the kitchen, different pots & pans, knives, etc. Some of that stuff wil...

Well, we're all moved in, and while we wait a few more weeks (months?) for our bed and books to arrive, we've started buying things to make the apartment work better for us. I did go out and get an electric kettle (red, of course!) and have made tea a few times, but it's usually too hot to drink tea. Yesterday we even got a descaling kit for the Nespresso machine... Barcelona has very hard water, we're told.  We have a new favorite store - Leroy Merlin . It's like Bed Bath and Beyond and Home Depot combined (and pared way down). It's less than a half mile from the apartment, but we have to walk through one of the most touristy parts of town to get there. Although really, it's getting back with all of our purchases that's the hard part!  I've been trying to find a spice rack, but I gave up and bought a little wooden box at LM to keep my spices in - it'll do for now.  I've found a few "standard" spices in different grocery stores - on...

Well, we did it. We rented an apartment! We were going crazy in the tiny Vrbo, so we were extra glad to get out of there a day early.  Those of you who were playing along with the "House Hunters International" game: we ended up renting the 3BR version of apartment #4 ( see previous post ). Was that your guess? Here are some photos and a quick video (sorry if you get a little motion sickness, I sped it up by 2x!)  It  took four trips to get everything moved - one by Uber black ($) another in a taxi (that we hiked a few blocks to catch) and two on the metro. We stopped and bought a wheelie grocery cart after the second trip, so I filled that with the non-fridge stuff and it was pretty easy to move - although I wish I'd looked for the metro elevators more closely - too many stairs to bounce up/down!  Once we got everything moved and enjoyed the central air for a while 🫠, we unpacked and started laundry. I washed the new sheets but they're still a little... crunchy. ....

Bueno, pues... It's still very weird to think that we're not here on vacation. My job starts on Tuesday, so I've had a week of adjusting to the time change (finally getting more sleep), figuring out where things are, and getting used to the heat, with very little "to do".  Sadly, in true Fratkin-McCalpin tradition, we brought a heat wave with us. I was hoping that, because we're moving here, the universe would be more forgiving than our usual summer scorcher in Europe, but no... It's about 8 degrees (C, or 10-15 F) above normal and has been all week... And will be for at least another week. Oy.  The tiny little apartment we're staying in (while we look for our longer-term place) has A/C only in the bedroom, and faces northwest, but the afternoon sun is awful. I feel like I'm living in a cave - we keep the wooden shutters closed most of the time. On Thursday we started visiting apartments! The first one was enormous, with giant wood-paneled cabinets...

Phew. Made it to Barcelona, reunited with my sweetie. Hooray! Of course, the Universe decided to poke me a few times along the way, to see if I was paying attention. [Picture: my two ~50lb suitcases and one giant duffel, plus my non-wheeled carry-on. Yes, everything has a luggage tag from SC!]  My plane was leaving at 9:20pm from Dulles. It had been pouring rain on and off all day, so we tried to make a run for it between rainstorms around 4:30pm. Unfortunately, so did everyone else in town, so we sat in traffic for an hour just to get out to the Tyson's area. [The traffic was made worse by the Presidential motorcade, which came out just as we hit 18th & Pennsylvania Ave. I made sure to blow some raspberries in his general direction. I might have also waved a few select fingers...]   It was about the time that we got to Tyson's that I realized that I had left my medication (and the handy little cold-pack travel case I bought for it) in the fridge at the house. ARGH. Mom sa...

Way back in December 1996, after the Clinton-Gore re-election campaign, I got hired (along with a lot of the other campaign staff) to work on the Presidential Inaugural Committee (PIC97). They made me Ops manager for the Events team, so I was responsible for requisitioning office supplies, computers, pagers, etc., for the people who were setting up the parade, the gala event, the balls, etc. We used LotusNotes. It was thrilling. There was a whole separate operation for the "Talent" being invited (i.e. the Hollywood star power), and for the political machinations.  While I was in charge of requesting the computers, I wasn't the one setting them up - that fell to the consultants from AAC. And that's where I met Judy. We hit it off like a house on fire. We worked together -- I pitched in with the computers if I could --  and hung out during those two intense months. Somewhere along the way picked up a third MoT, Valerie, who worked with the PIC management team. [Photo ab...

  Since I can't keep working for the Texas Advanced Computing Center from Barcelona, two weeks ago I had to say farewell to TACC. When I started there in July 2006, there were only ~60 of us, working in the rabbit-warren of offices and cubicles in the Commons building. Now there are almost 200 TACCsters, many of whom have become like family. (And one of whom I married!)  I was hired to do Corporate and Government Relations, moved up to External Relations Manager, and then became Director of Industry Programs in 2010.  Watching TACC grow and succeed has been amazing, as we kept winning grants and supporting research breakthroughs across every scientific domain, in ways that will have impact for years to come. I can't wait to see what they do next! Fortunately, I'm not leaving the industry, so I'll get to watch from the sidelines as they keep ' Powering Discoveries that Change the World .' Working for TACC also gave me the opportunity to participate in voluntee...

After we recovered from our 3-week vacation in New Zealand, we came back to the craziness of OMG WE'RE MOVING TO BARCELONA!!        Yes, it's true. John officially retired from UT Austin on March 31 and already has a job contract from the Barcelona Supercomputing Center. I applied for a job at BSC, but haven't interviewed yet. I'm not too worried. There are SO many steps in this process. While our future employer helped with our visas (thank goodness), we had to go through every single piece of paper in our house and make sure anything identifiable gets shredded. We're not moving back to the US anytime soon, so we're selling our house and almost everything in it. That required us to sort through absolutely everything, so that the Estate Sale people could come in and set up the sale (10-11) -- and they came in 2 weeks before the date, so we had to be out by Friday 4/25! Fortunately, the sale seems to have gone well, and most of the "big stuff" is gone...

Monday 3/17 we were off on yet another train journey (after all, this is the *Rail* and Coach tour) . This time it was an out-and-back through the Taieri Gorge, going through historic tunnels and along steep mountain cliffs. The Dunedin Railway station itself was beautifully tiled and full of stained glass windows. The train ride was nice, we chatted with people and took photos, and even ventured to the outdoor observation area at the back of the train.  There were multiple excursions available that afternoon when we got back to Dunedin, but we really needed an afternoon off. As it turned out, I also needed to replace my heavily-used Hokas, so I found an athletic shoe store in town and wandered off to spend some money. I also made us a dinner reservation at an Italian restaurant in town that came highly recommended by Campbell. Dunedin really resembles its Scottish cousin Edinburgh, and has a few extra touches to make sure that you make the connection. The Cargill monument (see pho...