Marge visits.

Not Homer's wife. A friend of Laura's from the community college back in Walla Walla retired this year and is on a several-week trip to Europe. She's visiting Sevilla this week and staying with us. I took the bus out to the airport this morning to meet her and escort her back to our flat.

She took a bit of time to rest. Laura went to class and I went to the gym. We met Laura after class and went out for tapas. Along the way, we ran into another small procession:

We also were able to peek inside a church and see the dismantling of a couple of pasos:

We shared a few tapas on the Alameda:

and headed home.

On our main street, we saw a crew hauling another partially dismantled paso out to storage for another year:

Imperativo

We've been doing the imperative form in Spanish, so I spent some time today reading and practicing. My Spanish class doesn't use a textbook. We we cover a topic, I usually go home and scrape together my own resources on the Internet, or from a Spanish textbook pdf I found on-line. Of course, after all that preparation, we didn't do imperative today, but rather all the other ways to express obligation like: tener + que, hay+que, necesitar, es necesito, debes etc.

***

It was cold and rainy today. I moved my office out of the guest room and back into the space off of the kitchen in preparation for a sequence of guests starting tomorrow and extending into the middle of May. I also did a load of laundry which is currently on the drying rack in the living room (rain) and vacuumed a bit.

***

After class, I went to the gym. On the way home, I took this picture of a building I pass frequently on our street, but whose tile work is particularly photo worthy:

***

One of the Italian students in my class recommended the Italian restaurant Al Solito Posto here in Sevilla on the Alameda. Maybe we'll try it with our house guests.

Gas

Laura and I noticed a posting in foyer this morning:

Apparently it's normal to have inspections of all gas appliances and connections in all flats. As this notice indicates, our inspection will be between 10am and 1pm on April 26.

***

This thank you note/postcard I sent to the Simon family this morning is the first time I ever mailed something that didn't either go to or come from the United States:

***

The tear down of the common part of the procession routes continues apace in Plaza de San Francisco:

Gotta get all this stuff out of the way before feria starts in 2 weeks.

***

At Rachel's recommendation, I've been reading Shortest Way Home by Pete Buttigieg (boot-a-judge), the mayor of South Bend, IN. He's also a democratic presidential candidate. It's been an ok read so far, but today he got into the value of AI, data, and machine learning in running a city. His understanding of the strengths and limitations of these new techniques is impressive. His ability to articulate those ideas to a lay audience--even better. I'm thinking of using some excerpts of this section in my machine learning class. Also, I'd vote for him, if he made it that far. Of course, I'd vote for a warm sack of shit if Donald Trump was the alternative, so I guess that's not saying much. Buttigieg certainly epitomizes what I'd like to see in a President, mayor, or any public servant.

Monday

The day after Easter and things are returning to normal. This morning I watched the replay of the Mariners losing to the Angels. I re-read my paper. I did a lot of Spanish to get ready for the resumption of my Spanish class today. We hit the grocery store. I did a load of laundry. I went to class. There was one new person from Italy in class. A good group. We reviewed the imperative verb form. I went to the gym. Laura went to Costco. I worked on statistics.

***

Lacking photos of anything else today, here's a random photo of our main street:

It was warm and breezy today. I think the wind is blowing in some rain for tomorrow and the next day.

Happy Easter!

Things were pretty quiet here in Sevilla today. I think with all of the energy poured into the semana santa activities leading up to Easter, there's not much left in the gas tanks of the average resident today. Streets are pretty empty:

There's a little more litter on the streets as the city workers have had a couple of days off:

I like my new gym. I can let myself in anytime, even Easter:

I talked to a few people on the phone today: Rachel, Betty, Jo-Anne and Emily. I did a load of laundry. Tomorrow it's back to Spanish class and math.