Allie in the South of Spain

Because Jose and I are (fingers crossed) going to be (hopefully) getting our apartment soon, we have been doing a lot of research as to which television company to use, not that there is much difference in the channels they offer. Basically Spanish tv consists of 20 channels (unless you get a special package) that 50% of the time show the news (both global and local, as in someone's cat stuck in a tree local), 25% of the time is a show called Salvame which comes in both regular and deluxe versions and chronicles the happenings of the rich and famous by a group of trashy commentators, another 15% of the time there is soccer and 10% of the time (after 100am) there is porn. Okay, that might be a slight exaggeration because they do have various series and movies but you get the idea. In fact, I was getting fairly tired of there not being much I wanted to watch until I saw a commercial that salvaged my image of Spanish television. It was like the light at the end of the tunnel: "La

Last night Jose, two friends and I went to Sevilla proper to see part of the ´Vuelta a España´. Translation: Spain´s version of the Tour de France (which obviously because it is French iz di best ting in di world). I was curious yet fairly apathetic about the whole race when we first arrived. Imagine, hoards of people waiting at the finish line of a race that must take place at 1000pm because during the day it is too hot. Being only a short leg of the race which runs throughout Spain, each team made a turn around the city, ending in about 15 minutes. While trying not to get killed by bicyclists or run over by the cars following them, we watched the participants finish the race (and when I was bored with that, some change in their bus). What surprised me was how Jose and his friends knew so many of the riders´names while cheering them on. I only know of Lance Armstrong and that´s only because he has one testi (Livestrong), dated Sheryl Crow and has won a bazillion times. Apparently, in

There are two, maybe three main motivations for me creating this blog. First, my family has asked me to do so which basically means they want easier access to creeping on my life in a foreign country. Plus they can verify that I am still alive. Second, it´s much easier than writing a bazillion e-mails to keep people updated. Third, Kate has created her blog for Italy (please see Kate love Italia) and in the spirit of Kate, Allie, Barcelona (of last summer´s trip through Italy and Spain), I figured I would keep the tradition alive. I have been here in Sevilla (or rather Mairena del Alcor, the town where Jose´s parents live) since August 2nd. (We are still waiting for our apartment to be ready). Since then I have not accomplished a whole lot because honestly it´s too damn hot to do anything in my opinion. We spent our first few days in Malaga with Jose´s aunt, uncle and cousins. Then we made our way here, wrestling our four suitcases (three of which may or may not have been mine) plus