happy friday

In this rapidly passing year, which for more reasons than one I am referring to as the "year of the blur", I have finally managed to cross one item off of my "to do" list. Yesterday I had my first official Spanish lesson with Miguel. From our previous chats, he had very accurately gauged my level and consequently paired me up with another of his advanced students, B., a retired Englishman (who also speaks French and Italian). For 90 minutes, B. and I managed to keep up a conversation that ranged from art history to the EU charter status to the 6-euro "mantenimiento" fee Telefonica charges (in addition to the 39-euro base fee) for ADSL to places we had traveled in the US. Miguel would raise a new subject when we would begin to run out of steam and would gently correct a missed verb conjugation or assist if we ran into a situation where we just didn't have the vocab. The time passed quickly, but I confess, my brain was "frito" after its 90-minute workout. I had a brief chat with B. after the class and was glad to see he had a similar attitude to the learning process, ie, he doesn't get too worked up about making mistakes because he too realizes that they are inevitable. Additionally, he made a good point, which was that the more experienced speaker still makes errors, but just more advanced, technical ones. So I believe the weekly lessons are going to work out really well. And it is a treat to listen to Miguel speak Spanish. He is originally from Peru, so he doesn't speak the whacky village dialect that will always vex me. Sigh. It has been a long week. Mostly good, some bad, but very full, I guess is the best way to describe it. So I am looking forward to the weekend, if for no reason but for the quiet break from the construction next door. It been 6 weeks; the workers estimate they have 6 to 8 weeks to go. :-( Am doing well with the no smoking thing. The manic phase that dominated last week has passed, and I can now go several hours without thinking about a cigarette, which seems like a major achievement. Hope you have a nice weekend. Hasta pronto, mylifeinspain