Friday, March 15, 2013

This weekend the population of Valencia will triple as both tourists and Spaniards flock to the city to celebrate Fallas!  The best way to get around the city for the next few days will either be via metro or on foot.  Any form of transportation that requires a four-wheel vehicle will be next to impossible.  Heaven only know which streets are closed to traffic because of all the tents that have been set up.  The casals fallers are permitted to be in full swing until 4:00 AM.  Tonight will be the first night that the tent in front of our building will be in full operation.

The backup of my iMac on Carbonite has finally finished.  It was a lengthy process, but, at the same time, there was almost 100GB of information that needed to be uploaded.  The computer was on all that time and the black screen phenomenon did not rear its ugly head during all that time.  I am back to using the iMac and I am keeping my fingers crossed that the faulty Time Capsule – that has since been replaced – was the cause of the problem.  The good news is that all my files both on this computer and my MacBook Pro have been backed up.

Susan appears to be coming down with a cold so we purposefully limited our activities yesterday.  We went to Carosel for lunch and that was our only outing of the day.  At Carosel we got to sample what will be the menu for Fallas.  The table de entrantes featured gazpacho, a salad with lettuces, tomatoes, corn, sprouts and goat cheese, bacalao gratinado and a small coca with a slice of tomato at its base and topped with slices of morcilla and longaniza.  Our main course was a paella valenciana that was impossible to finish.  Dessert was a combination of chocolate ganache topped with a raspberry foam.  We did have coffee, but we turned down the offer of a chupito.  By the time we got home it was 5:30.  I worked on the computer and practiced some magic while Susan read and played a game or two on the computer.  Since it was relatively quiet last night we went to bed fairly early lest it be impossible to sleep undisturbed for the next few nights.