Thursday, July 26, 2012

Departure day is drawing closer and that makes it all the more difficult to be here and there at the same time.  The anxiety, however, is somewhat diminished by knowing that we will be back in Valencia on October 2^nd in our new place where everything is ready for its occupants.  All we have to do is open the door and continue our adventure.

Juliet left early Tuesday morning and we had breakfast with her.  From Valencia she went to Madrid on the AVE and had an afternoon flight to the Canary Islands.  I assume that he errant suitcase was waiting for her at the airport in the Canaries.  We puttered around a bit after Juliet left and after a quick visit to the Central Market Susan whipped up a salad and we had a quiet lunch at home.   We kept activity to a minimum in the afternoon.

Pepe came by at 8:00 to take a look at our new place and to have a little bite.  It turns out that he remembered being in this apartment before, but it was not in its present condition.  It belonged to an architect friend of his father and what is now the living room and dining room was the architect’s office.  While we were chatting on the sofa Pepe’s phone rang and it was none other than Juan Tamariz, Spain’s most famous magician.  He was calling to find out when Pepe was going to come to Cadiz for a visit.  Cadiz seems to be the place in the summer where magicians gather at Juan’s house to talk magic.  Another magic mission caused Pepe to leave at 9:30.  He had a scheduled videoconference with Michael Ammar, one of America’s top magicians.  Michael has developed a ten-lesson course and it is possible that it may end up as a Magic Agora offering.

Yesterday Susan went off to her Pilates class and later we made our way to La Fórcola for lunch.  We split a salad and a pizza and we were hard pressed to finish the pizza.  After lunch we made our way to Nespresso to restock our coffee supply and then we headed over to the ONO office to see if they could help Susan get Internet access when she was away from a Wi-Fi site.  Raquel, who has helped us with all our issues, has arranged for a tech to call us and walk us through the necessary settings.  After that it was back home to rest up for last night’s experience.

Pepe had told us that there was a very promising event at Jimmy Glass last night.  Nicole Henry and her quartet were in concert for one night only.  We had made our reservations earlier in the day and when we approached the venue there was already a long line of people waiting to get in.  As it turned out, Pepe was first in line and he saved us two seats right next to the bandstand.  We were literally inches away from the piano player.  I bought a beer and a Gin and Tonic at the bar and we settled in for what turns out to be two and a half hours of exceptional jazz.

Nicole Henry is one incredible singer and her musicians are top notch.  The group is currently based in Miami and they were finishing up their five-city tour of Spain in Valencia.  Lucky us. Her repertoire included a number of standards, blues and a touch of gospel.  The crowd truly enjoyed her sparkling performance.  Here is a link so that you can check her out.  Her music is available on iTunes. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VFzFDv7DYs

It was one o’clock when we got home and it was close to two by the time we got to bed.  Today Vilma and her boyfriend are coming over and this evening I have a meeting with the veteranos.  Susan will meet up with Ofelia while I am at my meeting.