happy friday

Somehow almost half of January has flown by already. Am not complaining though; this just means Mr. James will be home all the sooner. :-) It was a quiet week here in the village. The daytime weather has been glorious: sunny, light breeze, and about 64 F. At night, the skies are still clear, but the temperature takes a nosedive. I curl up under the blankets with the dogs, the hot water bottle, and sometimes even the cat to ward off the chill. The sun is beginning to rise noticeably earlier. This morning, there was a peak of light streaming through the skylight at 8:15, just after I had wakened. As much as I know that it is perfectly acceptable for me to sleep in a little later during the winter, I fight it, which I blame on my father. He is one of those sorts who believes one has wasted the better part of the day if one chooses to sleep past 7 am. My brother suffers the guilt as well, often rising early on his day off from work because there's an image permanently running through his head of my father, coming through the backdoor on a Saturday morning after having run an errand or two and upon seeing his children planted on sofas watching cartoons, yelling, "Still in your pajamas, at this hour?!" No particularly exciting plans for this weekend. I am going to crank out some work, clean the house, and perhaps finally finish unpacking the last suitcase from my trip. Sunday evening I have been invited to D. and U.'s for dinner and telly watching. I hope to convince D. to turn off the FA Cup matches for a little while so that I can catch some of the NFL playoffs, which he can tune in on his monstrous satellite dish. Mr. James continues to have a great experience in Pakistan. The work is going well, and his boss is very happy with the progress on his work sites. He continues to make new friends and was even invited to a wedding last weekend. On the subject of weddings, we have been invited to the wedding of his former boss back in Munich, which is taking place in early May. I am fairly certain we will attend. Neither of us has been back to Munich in years, and we very much would like to see our friends D. and S. and Klaus P., as well as Munich itself. Munich is a great city for foodie types. There is the amazing farmer's market, plus many food halls that carry specialties from all over. One could spend an entire week there just exploring these places. The gifts continue to come from Antonio and Iluminada....yesterday they brought me a large sack of lemons from their harvest. I don't know if there is anything Antonio doesn't grow. Have a nice weekend, everyone. hasta manana, mylifeinspain