¡Hola a todos!

New resolution: blog more often. I'm sorry family and friends.

However, I do have more photos! I added more from my 21st birthday because my friend Stephen just put some up on facebook and well, I only ended up with about 5 on my own camera. In addition to those, I put up some pictures of my amazing new apartment and the Carnival parade.

Since I wrote last, I have ironed out my schedule: I will be taking Literatura Hispanoamerica II, Etnología de América, Poesía, Narrativa y Teatro del Siglo XX, Dialectologia and Cine Español. But I won't go on about classes, after all, most of you would rather hear about other things.

Last weekend was the first weekend of Carnival and we decided to stay in Madrid rather than go somewhere, like Cadiz, where the giant Spanish party is. I met up with a couple friends Friday night to see the opening ceremony. We made our way there via the emaculately clean Metro, but arrived at a plaza littered with confetti, full of families and an empty stage. We did catch the end of a ridiculous performance by a mime/acting troupe dressed in costumes to represent different countries, doing a strange series of movements that appeared to be an attempt to encourage the olympics committee to select Madrid for the 2016 games. Watch out Chicago... you've got a fierce competitor.

Saturday we went to the parade. (see photos... they speak for themselves) While the crazy floats were exciting, it was strange to not have the MHS Marching Band cadence ringing in my ears.

In addition to classes and festivals, I saw a number of Oscar films over the last several days. Slumdog Millionaire (absolutely deserving of all 8 of their awards) Doubt (Meryl Streep is a bad ass) and The Reader (Finally, Winslet is recognized for her amazing talent). I started Milk last night at about 930 and got about 45 minutes in, but realized that if I was going to wake up to watch the Oscars live at 2 a.m. I had to pause it. I will be finishing it, but regardless, Sean Penn was also the obvious winner. Anyway, I did wake up at 2 a.m. to watch the show live, and have to say the best part was the performance for Best Original Song, when John Legend and A R Rahman mixed their two very distinct songs into a tight duet.

Beyond Carnivaling and Oscar loving, I'm just settling into a routine. Jenni, Robbie, Benjamin and I are headed to Salamanca this weekend for the second weekend of Carnival. Expect more photos!

Until next time...