Wherever You Go, Hey! There You Are!

     Six AM Cinema:  I saw a movie the other morning whose premise was based on two strangers driving across country together.  She had just left her husband and jumped into a taxi.  The taxi driver wasn't legitimate and neither was the taxi.  They're in downtown Manhattan and she tells him; "Just Drive".  In addition to catching her husband with another woman, she has just found out that her estranged father is in the hospital in San Diego having barely survived a massive heart attack.  She has a flying phobia so she decides she's just going to let this cabby drive her to California.  At several points during their trip they find themselves penniless and they must resort to ingenious and somewhat desperate solutions.  It reminded me of a time forty years ago when my girlfriend, Diamond Deb, and I were in a similar situation.

     Debbie had a VW camper that I had just rebuilt with bigger pistons and we were dying to try it out.  A housemate of ours had just moved out of Happy Acres and invited us to come see him at his next gig, headlining at "Club Madrigal" which was in a Roadway Inn in Juarez, Mexico.  Steve had been a minor piano player/singer in the side lounges of Las Vegas for several years and this job in Juarez was going to be one of the last in a career that had started out promising and just sort of petered out.  But he assured us that he still had plenty of "pull" at the Roadway Inn and could get us 'comped' room and board.  That was all the excuse we needed to head out on the open road.  

     In the early seventies, the VW camper was the vehicle of choice for hippy types with a yen for travel.  The car was fairly small as campers go but it was frugal.  Simple to operate and repair, it was amazingly self-contained.  A bench over a trunk in back folded out into a bed that slept two.  There was a sink, a closet and a table that folded out from the side door.  We also had an awning that rolled out on the side and we would park our deck chairs under it.  Deb had put curtains up on a piece of twine that encircled the back "living compartment".  Whenever we were tired of driving for the day, we would pull over to the side of the road, close the curtains, get food out of our ice chest and fire up the camp stove.  As the dinner was cooking either I would play my guitar or we'd turn on the radio/cassette player.  I remember John Denver, Bread and Stevie Wonder were some of the featured artists on that trip.  A scented candle and a bit of reefer and we were in Hippy Hog Heaven.

     The transition from front seat drivers/passengers to back seat dwellers always amazed me.  For short periods of time, a confining space is actually quite cozy.  The music and the curtains gave us a sense of isolation from the outside world even when we knew traffic was whizzing by us right outside.  The 'shake-down' run to Mexico went off without a hitch and we arrived in Juarez feeling pretty proud of ourselves and our little cobbled together arrangement.  The plan was to spend a few days in Juarez as Steve's guest at the Roadway Inn and then just travel in Mexico for several weeks, letting the camper take us wherever it wanted to.

     When you cross the U.S. Mexican border, everything changes.  My first trip to Mexico was to drop off a couple of college girlfriends who were going to take the train from Mexicali to Mazatlan for Christmas break.  The one who owned the car was lending it to me so I could go to a wedding in Taos, New Mexico with the proviso that I be back in Mexicali on new year's eve day to pick them up at the train station for the drive back to the Bay Area.  While they were buying their tickets, I waited for them in the rail station's restaurant.  They must have just stopped serving because the place was empty except for me, hundreds of plates of half-eaten food and a pervading cloud of flies.  "Who lives like this?"  I wondered to myself.  I had never seen such squalor and I was shocked to see it in a public establishment attached to something as major as a train station.  In my snobbish American sense of superiority, I shuddered to think of what the rest of the country must be like.  Debbie and I were about to find out.

     On the marquis outside Club Madrigal at the Juarez Roadway Inn, was Steve's name up in lights with the sub-heading "El Borracho Hawiiano". (the drunk Hawaiian).  He had recently been entertaining in nightclubs in Waikiki and fancied himself the white man's Don Ho.  I guess he was promoting the image of the swinging tippler.  Steve was a decent accompanist on piano and he had a wonderfully dramatic bass voice.  He claimed to have done a bunch of macho beer ads in his past, but I was to find a lot of 'holes' in Steve's life narrative in the years that I was in contact with him.  When he was staying at Happy Acres with Deb and myself, we had actually written a few songs together and Steve promised us that he'd feature me in a couple of duets from our ringside table at the club.  Verily that came to pass as each of the four night's (that we were there) closing set included Steve coming down from the stage to our table and the two of us, glowing in the spotlights, would sing "I Don't Care About the Whereabouts of Me" and a couple of others I have since forgotten.

     The closing night of Steve's gig was well represented.  He had been a foreign exchange student in Mexico when he was in high school and spoke passable Spanish.  This, plus the fact that he was a past performer in Vegas made Steve something of a big name around here and his annual Christmas gig was very popular, especially with the padrones who owned ranches there in the high Sonoran desert.  Steve introduced us to one group who invited me to go on a cougar hunt.  Not wishing to offend Steve or his friends, I feigned interest in the invitation and asked them how it worked.  "Well, Miguel, we pile into our pick-up trucks and set up out in the desert.  We put a portable cassette player out on a rock and play a tape that we recorded of a jack rabbit being tortured.  Sometimes the screams of the rabbit brings out a cougar.  If we see one, we drop our bottles of homemade mescal, grab our rifles and start blasting away."  Diamond Deb said we had other plans...

     The final show ended at 4 AM but back then, there was no curfew or closing hour in Juarez, kind of like Las Vegas.  Steve and I hopped into a taxi and went club hopping in the heart of Juarez's entertainment district.  All the club owners knew Steve and he and I sang several boozy renditions of "You Are the Sunshine of my Life" and other standards  of the time in some of the nightclubs and dance halls around town.  We finally headed back to the Roadway Inn at sun-up.  I still have this image of us sitting in the back of a taxi with Steve leaning out the window saying a dios to his huevos rancheros. 

     The next day, Deb and I said our goodbyes to Steve and the town of Juarez and headed out on the open road.  Next stop:  Wherever...  Actually since we were in pretty elevated country and it was December, we decided to head west, over a series of mountain ranges and decamp in Mazatlan, on the coast.  Most of you can probably imagine from personal experience or stories you've heard, that driving in Mexico can be an adventure.  If this sounds euphemistic to you, well, you're right.  At times the Mexican driving experience was downright scary.  The narrow mountain roads with their hairpin turns and sharp drop offs and no guard rails were a particular concern of ours.  It seems like there was a little roadside shrine at each such turn for the unfortunates who had preceded us and not lived to tell the tale.

     Luck was with Diamond Deb and I, and we made it safely to the relative warmth of Mazatlan on the Sea of Cortez.  (I prefer the term Gulf of California, considering what a monster Cortez was to the locals...).  Our travels also took us further down the coast to a little town called San Blas (sand fleas) and, eventually, Puerto Vallarta.  Our brief stay in "P.V." included Christmas Eve dinner at a Chinese restaurant.  One day while we were lolling around on the local resort beach, we watched a squall come roiling in from out to sea.  The raft we'd been sunning ourselves on began to rock with the incoming swells and we dove in for the short swim back to shore.  The waves were producing a sweet little shorebreak that was right up my alley as a bodysurfer and I got in some great rides in that storm surf.  When I came out of the water, (the rain hadn't arrived yet) the people on the shore gave me a standing ovation for my wave riding prowess.  Thank you, thank you very much, people of Puerta Vallarta!...  Up on the cliff above the beach we could look down on the town as the storm came ashore.  You could see that lights wink out as each section of the city got wet.  I was reminded of a lament I'd heard said by Mexicans about their country.  "Poor Mexico!  So close to the United States; so far from God...".  

     As I look at my map of Mexico now, I marvel at the distances we traveled on that camping trip forty years ago.  We spent more than two weeks and drove over four thousand miles.  It was inevitable that we were going to pick up "Monezuma's revenge" aka "The Aztec Two-step".  With that amount of close proximity to the local populace, avoiding tap water was next to impossible.  As we drove North to Tijuana, an uncomfortable rumbling set up shop in my nether regions.  The first night back in the U.S., we parked in the vast empty parking lot of a Macy's store in Long Beach.  The rain was howling down and we were howling in our own misery.  Having the tourista meant having to brave the elements about every ten minutes for "evacuation".  Incredibly, at one point during the  night's tempest, we heard a knock on the camper's door.  Some poor homeless soul was begging us for shelter.  We told him things were pretty cramped and we had to make frequent exits but he was free to lie under the bus if he cared to.

     The next day was sunny and we'd make it home that evening so we could begin healing from our sundered stomachs.  Highway 5 had just recently been built and it was the most direct route from LA to SF.  Unfortunately, it had not yet filled out with lots of service stations and fast food franchises.  If you saw a gas station, you had better stop and top off the tank as insurance.  Somewhere north of Los Angeles, just past the grapevine we started running low on fuel.  We also hadn't eaten and the next stop was a large 76 service station and restaurant.  Before gassing up the camper we went into the diner for a hearty breakfast that we hoped would stay down as we drove through the central valley.  As we sat down, Deb and I discovered to our horror that we were out of money.  Somehow the funds had quietly dribbled away without either of us noticing.  That was the situation that the movie I referred to earlier reminded me of.

     "What are we gonna do for food?  My 76 Gas Card will fill up the tank but we can't drive all the way home on empty stomachs!" wailed Diamond Deb.  "You've got your checkbook in your purse, right?  Once we've eaten, they'll have to take a check.  Either that or make us wash dishes.  I'll wash, you dry..." I replied.  Having been in the restaurant business for some years prior, I had had to deal with similar situations, and several times we, the help, had to chase down fleeing patrons who were also financially embarrassed.  Debbie gulped and muttered a shaky "OK" and we proceeded to order a large portion of the menu some of which we would hide in Deb's purse.  When it came time to pay, we went up to the cashier and made a charade of looking for our money.  The hostess's friendly grin soon turned into a malicious scowl.  "What!?  You mean to tell me you can't pay for your meal!  You've gotta have something in there!"  And with that she grabbed Deb's wallet and started leafing through the slots where she kept her store cards.  Suddenly that sunny smile came back on the face of our cashier as she triumphantly held up the 76 Gas Card.  "You don't need any money! Your gas card pays for the pump as well as the food!"

     What a relief that was.  Now we knew that we could cruise home not having to worry about being penniless out on the road.  Right about then, my bowels growled in appreciation.

     Vaya con Dios!  Mickey da Mayor of Happy Acres

     

     

My English Lass: Sherine

     Some years ago when I was seeing some of the Old World with my friend John, (Johnny Surf to his fans---of which there are many) we found ourselves getting into a van at 4 A.M. in Jerusalem.  It was our departure day from the old city and we decided to go out in style by taking an early morning trip down the road that straddles the green line separating Israel from the West Bank.  We were going to hike up Masada at sunrise.  As some of you know, Masada was the last hold out of Jews defying Roman occupation.  

     It was a nice vigorous hike and it was glorious with the sun rising out of the desert.  At the top, our guide told us that the roughly nine hundred Jews who were holding out there had a huge underground cistern full of fresh water.  We walked down a steep set of stairs that had been cut in the rock and found ourselves marveling at this huge room that it had been hewn from.  It was about the size of an olympic swimming pool and at least forty feet high.  The Romans were toiling below, building an immense wooden scaffold so they could put a battering ram on it to break down the gate, thus allowing them to conquer the last of the Israelite hold-outs.  

     The Roman legions were on strict water rations of a cup a day.  Every afternoon, when the sun was at its hottest and the Romans were at their thirstiest, the Masada residence would flush a large quantity of water down the side of the cliff to taunt the thirsty Romans.  The night before the Romans finally broke through, nine of the Masadans were chosen to stab the rest to death.  Then one of the nine would stab the other eight then take his own life just as the Romans were entering.  Apparently one woman survived and told the Romans what had happened and that's how it became part of the amazing history of Israel and the Jews.

In the upper left, you can see the Jordan River as it flows into the Dead Sea behind the citadel of Masada.

      After our Masada excursion, John and I headed down to the Dead Sea for a swim, taking great care not to get our heads wet.  I touched a finger to my lips.  It was so salty it burned.  I can only imagine what it would feel like in your eyes.  You don't really "swim" as much as bob around on the surface like a duck.  After our "bob", we went across the road to wait for the bus to Eilat.  While we were waiting, a busload of school kids got off for their Dead Sea excursion.  One group of spirited "sabra-ettes" heard John and I conversing in our American accented English.  They looked at other and giggled and amazingly, broke into Frankie Lyman's doo-wop hit from the 50's:  "Why Do Fools Fall in Love".  As they were doing the doo-wop chorus, we started singing the lead.  The girls got very giggly and danced their way in front of us.  John, who was our sound/recording man on this trip (I was camera/visuals), pulled out his Sony Portable Recorder and he recorded our little performance.  The girls loved all of it; especially the playback.  As they were dancing around to the recording, some of the boys from their class walked over, looking a bit jealous, and started pulling on arms to get the doo-wop girls back into the group for their dead sea swim.  We waved them goodbye.  "Bye, you lovelies, keep on singing and dancing!..."

Our bus showed up and in about an hour and a half we got off in Eilat, a little village at the very southern tip of Israel where it meets the Red Sea.  On the bus with us were many young Israeli soldiers; mostly female.  They all had assault rifles slung over one shoulder and banana-shaped bullet cartridges slung over the other shoulder. They all looked like they wanted to be anywhere else but here.  Unfortunately they had no choice as there is a mandatory draft of two years for all Israeli's youth who are not at death's door or Hassidic Jews.

     John and I rented a little A-frame cabin in a campground across the road from the sea.  It was a little trapezoidal unit with just enough room for two cots and a single chest of drawers.  After washing the day's considerable salty grime from our bodies, we had dinner and drinks at a fishy little seaside restaurant across the road and since we had risen at 3:30 that morning, we called it a night.  The next morning, we put on our beach wear and repaired to a nice little beach club/cabana right on the water.  There were beach chairs and umbrellas, a little seaside bar/restaurant and a small gazebo where you could rent snorkle equipment.  After breakfast, we wandered around town a bit.  I look at the images of Eilat today and marvel at how it has grown in twenty-one years.  Back then, it seemed like a dusty little low-rent beach resort.  This is the southern most spot in Israel.  Jordan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia, all staunch adversaries of Israel, come to a confluence here, which must be a little unsettling for the locals.  No wonder there were so many gun toting "sabras" on the bus yesterday.  In Eilat, you are literally surrounded by your enemies...  

Eilat was a sleepy little back-water low-end beach resort back then, but you can see how enticing the Red Sea is.

     We returned to the beach cabana and settled into a couple of beach chairs on the sand, with cold beers in hand.  All around us were other vacationers in various modes of beach-wear. Judging by the conversations, it appeared that we had crashed a German hofbrau.  We had run into quite a few Germans on holiday in our travels and I marveled to myself, "How can Germany be the most productive of the Euro-market countries when it seems like, wherever Johnny Surf and I go, a large portion of its population is on holiday, sitting on clothing-optional beaches drinking beer?"  

     The people lounging around us were, for the most part, large blond and boisterous.  The men wore skimpy speedos and the women were topless.  There was a young woman to my right who was not topless and who didn't appear to be part of the hofbrau crowd.  She wasn't a knockout but she had a nice smiling face, curly light brown hair and a very nice figure.  She smiled at me and I smiled back.  "Hi!  Do you speak English?"  She laughed and gestured toward the clothing-challenged crowd, "No, I'm not with the Germans.  I'm from England and I'm here on holiday with the guy I share a house with."

     We exchanged names and I introduced "Sherine Robinson to Johnny Surf.  During our conversation (I had moved over next to her) I learned that she was traveling with a doctor whose house she lived in.  He was not her boyfriend, she emphasized, but she strongly suspected that he would like to be.  She was originally from Durban, Natale, South Africa.  She had been a sprinter on her high school track team and a gymnast as well.  She was a good enough runner that she competed in the state championship.  She certainly looked athletic with a great pair of legs.  

     As a former snorkeler and SCUBA diver from Hawaii, I had heard about the wonders of the Red Sea.  The reefs and fishes and the clarity of the water make it a top diving experience.  I asked Sherine if she'd like to join me in a little snorkeling.  "Brilliant!  I'd love too!"  We rented snorkels, fins and masks from the little rental kiosk and waded in.  The water was refreshingly cool (it was mid-march) but not cold (we were surrounded by desert; the Negev and the Saudi Arabian Peninsula on the left; the Sinai Desert Peninsula to our right.).  Before I put my head underwater I looked around at the landscape.  I saw desert everywhere and several young Arabs in white robes, riding camels.   I put my goggles on and went under.  I was immediately transported back to Hawaii.  All the reefs and reef fish I had marveled at in my diving experiences in Hawaii growing up, were all around us.

     The juxtaposition of deserts and Arabs riding camels above water, and the Hawaiian reef tableau below was an amazing experience.  "Sherine", I exclaimed, after we had popped our heads back up, "this is just like being back in Hawaii.  I recognize all these fish!  What the Red Sea locals call "Moorish Idols", we call Kikihi back home.  That school of red fish we saw are generally known as Soldier Fish but in Hawaii, they are Menpachi and quite tasty, to boot.  That other fish you pointed out underwater?  In the books, its name is Wedge-tailed Squirrel fish but in Hawaii---get this---it's called "Humuhumunukunukuapua'a!"  After she stopped laughing I told her how the "humuhumu" as it's usually abbreviated, was the official state fish.  The Hawaiian translation means "fish with a face that looks like a pig".  Sherine squealed with delight, "That's too brilliant for words!  I'm so glad I have my own personal fishing guide!"

                  The Moorish Idol, aka, Kihikihi in Hawaiian 

The little fish with the big name and Hawaii's state fish:  The fish with the face of a pig:  HUMUHUMUNUKUNUKUAPUA'A!  It took an old girl friend of mine about a year to pronounce it properly.  It's a good way to see how long someone's been in              Hawaii.

      After we got out of the water, we toweled off, grabbed some cold beers and flopped down in our beach chairs.  The more we talked, the more I liked her.  I had not been with a woman in some years and I was easily charmed.  By this time it was late afternoon and a chill was setting in.  "I notice you have goose bumps, Sherine, would you like to wear my velour shirt?  It's very warm."  Sherine replied, "Oh brilliant!  That would be lovely if you don't mind."  Shifting into suave chivalrous mode I said of course not.  I took it off and handed it to her.  I must admit it looked quite fetching on her.  "Oh it is warm!  It smells good, so umm, masculine, I guess." she remarked.  I tried to remember the last time I'd showered, remembering that I had gotten up at 3:30 the morning before.  "Well, about the smell, I apologize." I replied,  "That shirt climbed up the Masada plateau yesterday at sunrise and then it visited the Dead Sea."  She said it smelled "yummy" to her and we spent the rest of a fading afternoon getting to know each other.  

     She lived in a little town east of London in an area known as East Anglia in the village of Fritton, not far from the southern coast of the English channel.  She was a nurse and that was how she came to know Dr. Costley and to be renting a little cottage on his property. She liked to play squash and was an enthusiastic equestrian.  I gave her a brief bio of myself ( knowing me I probably went on way too long, but she was either actually interested or too polite to interrupt me.)  The sun was sinking low and I screwed up my courage and asked her, "Sherine, is there any chance I could steal you away from your doctor for a dinner date with me tonight?"  "Brilliant!" she enthused, "I'd love to.  Why don't you meet me at my hotel.  We'll have drinks and decide where to go."  The more we talked, the smarter she made me feel.  Everything I suggested was "brilliant!"  When I finally got to England two months later I found out that everyone and everything  was "brilliant!"

     After we parted ways, I snooped around some and scouted out a nice romantic Italian restaurant on the water across from her hotel.  I went back to our little trapezoid cabin, got cleaned up and met Sherine at her hotel.  She admitted that the doctor was not thrilled to find out that she had made other plans for the evening but she put her foot down and said she was having dinner with this "Brilliant!" American she'd met on the beach that day.  The doctor was sixty-three and Sherine was "in her mid-thirties" and had no interest in romance with her older landlord.  I was liking this frisky gal more and more.  

      We finished our wine and got up from the table.  She gave me a big smile with a sparkle in her eyes and put her arm inside of mine.  "Oh Mike, I'm so glad you asked me to dinner!  Brilliant!"  We crossed the road and got a nice cozy table near the sea.  We talked, ate pasta, laughed, and drank wine until we were the only ones in the place.  Taking a hint from the bored looking waiter lurking nearby, I paid the tab and suggested we take a walk along the beach.  Outside there was an almost full moon and the Milky Way was blazing in the desert night sky.  It was chilly out and I put my arm around Sherine and she snuggled into me with a little sigh.  I was getting giddy with feelings of romance.  I turned to her and after gazing into each other's eyes I gently leaned in for a kiss that was returned with passion.  In an instant we were making out and  groping each other like young lovers.

     The last romantic embrace I had had was with my ex-fiance about four years prior.  Suddenly a wellspring of passion, romance, love and desire poured over me like a whole-body orgasm.  In a voice, husky with urgency I said to Sherine, "Do you want to come back to my place?  John flew back to Tel Aviv for a date.  We could get to know each other in a more intimate way if you want... like I want."  Her moan of desire turned to a groan of dismay, "Oh Mike, I'd like nothing better but if I don't go back to the room tonight with the doc, he'll be really cross with me.  As a doctor at my hospital and my landlord, I can't afford to make him angry.  Oh, I wish I could stay with you tonight, I really do!  This has been like one of the most romantic nights of my life!"  With a sigh, I responded.  "I understand, Sherine.  I'll be missing you terribly in my little cabana tonight.  I want to see you for breakfast at the beach club tomorrow morning.  Is that OK?"  "Oh definitely!" she enthused, "I'll be thinking of nothing but you till I see you tomorrow."  After a few more passionate embraces we reluctantly parted ways.  That night I dreamed of her.

       Early the next morning, I went into town to secure my plane ticket back to Tel Aviv that afternoon.  Then I hastened to my rendezvous with Sherine, my sweet Baboo...  at the beach club.  When I got there she was waiting.  When she saw me, she jumped up and threw herself into my arms for kisses that left off from the night before.  The magic and chemistry were still there for both of us.  We ate a languid breakfast while Eric Clapton provided musical accompaniment for "our blues".  "Sherine, darling...may I call you darling?" I asked, "We've got time for one more swim and then I have to pack and get to the airport.  With what I've experienced so far, I know that Israeli security is gonna pillage through all my stuff.  They seem to think I'm some sort of CIA spy or something.  Meanwhile my traveling companion, whose last name is "Rosenberg", sails through customs and security with barely a nod and a friendly go-ahead wave."

     "Mike, and yes, I love that you called me darling!  I understand.  I wish we had more time together but I understand that you have to catch a connecting flight back to Athens for your next trip to Egypt.  You said you'd be finishing up your trip in England, right?  Will I see you then?"  "You bet, sweetheart, do you mind if I call you sweetheart?" I replied, "Wild horses couldn't keep me away from you.  Here...  Write your name, address and phone number in my little travel address book so I can find you when I get to England.  It should be in early May if all goes according to plan.  Then we can take up, at least for a little while, where we left off last night.  I've done nothing but think of you ever since then."  With a little wistful sigh she looked up at me, "Oh yes, sweetheart; you can call me sweetheart.  What I really want, is for you to call me as soon as you get to England.  I'll be waiting for you.  Already I can't stand the thought of not seeing you till then."

     We waded out into the cool Red Sea for a last swim together.  We fervently began to kiss.  Under water our hands quickly slipped inside each other's bathing suits for a little more torment and titillation.  Much to soon I was toweling off and heading back to the little trapezoid cabin to pack.  Sherine rode the bus with me to the airport so we'd have our last moments together.  We sat on the back bench of the bus and held hands.  We may have been gazing deeply into each other's eyes also...  While Sherine sat in the departure lounge, I disappeared into the security area, a small room separated by a partially drawn curtain.  I could see my Sweet Baboo looking anxiously at me while a grim-faced security guy started tearing through my rucksack.  He asked the usual inane questions about my being given anything to take on the plane, etc. etc.

      Meanwhile his hands were methodically pulling apart everything I had packed.  He picked up my camera and made me open it.  Then he made me take out the battery.  I was pretty sure that would kill the pictures in the roll of film and later, to my great frustration, I would find out that I was right.  No pictures of Sherine and I frolicking in the Red Sea.  He went through each page of my travel books, page by page.  The time was ticking away and I could see by Sherine's worried looks that the other passengers were beginning to board the plane.  As I was finally cleared, I frantically threw all my jumble of belongings back into my pack, gave a hasty kiss and a hug to a now teary eyed Sherine.  I flew out the departure gate to see the plane literally taxiing down the runway with the back stairs still down and the flight attendant waving to me.  Like those scenes in the movies where the reluctant lover barely makes the plane or the train, I jogged up to the moving plane, threw my bag to the flight attendant and jumped aboard the bottom step.  I vowed that, as God is my witness, I would be with Sherine again.  Little did I know on that chaotic and heart-wrenching day how difficult that was going to be.

My English sweetheart from the little, and I mean little, town of   Fritton, East Anglia, England.

     More on this evolving romance next time.  Mickey da Mayor of Happy Acres   

My Big Travel Adventure Begins: First two days in Spain

     Twenty years ago a friend and former house mate of mine named Glenn Veale sent me and my current housemate a cassette letter invitation to visit him in his home town of Johannesburg, South Africa.  My friend and current housemate at the time was a fellow named John Rosenberg a very talented professional piano player.  It was our mutual friend from Jo-berg who had introduced John and I and that was how he became my house mate after his marriage broke up.  I had a comfortable amount of treasure in my piggy bank and I was eager to blow some of it on a travel adventure.  For several evenings, lubricated by several glasses of wine we started exploring the possibilities of going to visit our friend Glenn who had described in enticing detail his four bedroom house on two acres of landscaped lusciousness including swimming pool and tennis court.

Here's travel partner, Johnny Surf, sitting in at the piano at a trattoria where enjoyed complimentary dinner and drinks.  John played and I sang selections from my portfolio of Sinatra classics.  Luckily I knew all the words to "Three Coins in the Fountain" as were within walking distance of the famous "Fontana de Trevi" of which Frankie sings...

Here's our buddy Glenn on the right, who put the bug in our ear that started this whole travel adventure going.  That's me, Mickey da Mayor on the left in a silly rainbow colored painter's hat.

Glenn was residing there with his girlfriend and assured us that there was plenty of space.  He was eager to show us his home town and country.  At the time there was a travel agent living in the cottage that my brother and I had recently built on our little homestead.  She was a “newby” in the business but very smart and very motivated.  “Sure, guys, I can book you any flights you want.  I can you do a round-the-world trip with open return date and departure sight!”  It turns out that, because at that time, South Africa was still under apartheid government, most airlines were not flying there.  That somehow scotched the round-the-world idea.

Instead, we decided that a separate back and forth to South Africa from Heathrow was the way to go.  We booked an overnight flight from SF to London, leaving on 2/18/93.  We boned up on our coming trip by buying three Rick Steeves’ travel books: “Europe Through the Back Door”, “Europe 101” and “Mona Winks”.  The first book tells you how to travel “correctly” by avoiding air conditioned buses and large guided tours given by bored guides who feed you a bunch of malarkey.  The second book is a primer in modern European history.   The third book provides tours of all the great history and art museums.  It includes detailed floor plans of all the must-see museums so you could easily make your way to the important pictures and statues to admire and why they are admirable.  (Steeves majored in European art history in college).  In his first book he recommends the cool places to see in each country in Europe.  Basically, what to see, why and how to see it, where to go, where to stay, where and what to eat and drink and how to mingle with the local ‘hoi polloi’.

The night before our transatlantic flight proved to be a harbinger of things to come.  John had, of course, waited till the last minute to pack.  Somehow, we managed to make our flight and spent the duration of our ‘red-eye‘ flight drinking mimosas and flirting  with two Spanish ladies who were conveniently seated next to us.

We arrived without incident at Heathrow airport in the afternoon with an hour or so to kill before our next flight to Madrid.  Since it was mid-February, we decided to do the low countries (Spain, Southern France, Italy, Greece, Israel and Egypt) first, saving ‘upper‘ Europe for the later, hopefully warmer, months.  John, having lugged his bags off the carousel to our our Spanish departure gate, suddenly realized what a colossal mistake he’d made in packing so much stuff.

  

When traveling Europe through the back door, Steeves recommends traveling light.  He even shows you what and how to pack and what to pack it in.  If you pack exactly what he recommends it will all fit snugly in a Rick Steeves designed ruck sack.  It’s brilliant, simple and rugged.  Made of durable canvas and double stitched, it has handles and straps that allow it to be carried vertically or horizontally by hand, or on the back like a backpack, leaving the hands free.  It fits snugly in overhead compartments in airplanes, buses and trains.  It has multiple pouches for such things as passports, travel schedules, your travel diary and, of course, his books.  Regarding his books, he recommends ripping out the sections pertaining to the places you’ve already been to to conserve space (and no doubt hopes you’ll leave those sections in a place where other intrepid travelers might find them and perhaps buy the entire books).

John and I, in our enthusiasm to travel in true back door fashion, had purchased his ruck sacks for our trip; mine in grey and his in burgundy.  I followed Steeves’ packing advice virtually to the letter and all I was carrying for the next three months was this single, marvelous, conveyance.  John, on the other hand, in addition to his overstuffed ruck sack, had several other bags which he now found to be a major nuisance and a likely impediment to our coming travel adventures.  “Mike, I think I made some packing mistakes.  I need to repack and send my overflow back home.  I’m going to the airport post office to take care of this problem.  Wait right here and I’ll be back in time for the flight to Madrid.”

I’ll bet you can guess where this is going.  As I sat there waiting and watching the time till our departure loom ever closer,  I realized that John not only had both our Eurail-passes and most of our traveler’s checks, he also had the tickets for our soon-to-be-boarding flight to Madrid.  I don’t remember time ever passing that quickly before.  At the last possible minute John comes running up to the gate with just his ruck sack.  Yea John!  Maybe this mad-cap adventure will work out after all.  How silly of me.

We arrived in Madrid without further adventure and proceeded to our little Rick-Steeves-recommended pensione and unpacked.  The ground floor of this establishment was a tappas bar which we (perhaps I should say whee!) immediately retired to.  By this time it was probably around ten or eleven o’clock in the evening but I was so excited to finally be in Europe that the time of night seemed irrelevant.

I had originally planned my great European adventure for the summer after my graduation from University.  My parents had offered to send me the cash equivalent of their trip from Hawaii (my home) for the graduation ceremony if I’d rather have that than their presence.  I realized that that money could finance a frugal backpack based trip to the old world, the land of my WASP ancestors.  There was also the fact that one of the many wonderful things about going to University in California was that I’d be 2200 miles from home and up and away on my life as my own man.  There was also the minor issue of a class I had to repeat that Summer before I would truly graduate and be able to receive my diploma.  Instead, if I attended graduation, I would be handed an empty diploma case which would be awkward to explain to the parents.  I decided to take the cash.

With that settled I was free to not attend the graduation festivities.  Though I’d be missing out on one of those seminal events in one’s life, my alternative plan seemed a good enough consolation.  My recently acquired girlfriend was coming over to do her laundry and we would have the house to ourselves.  I lived with four other seniors off campus, all of whom would be going to the graduation ceremonies, all dressed up in their caps and gowns and accompanied by their proud parents.  The plan was to wait till everybody left the house, put the laundry in the washing machine and then give ourselves up to lascivious cavort.  To add to our cavorting pleasure, said girlfriend found two large capsules of organic mescaline in her husband’s shirt pocket.  (Did I mention that she was married?  More on that later...).  In the spirit of cavort, we immediately swallowed the drugs, lit some candles, put on Van Morrisen, took our clothes off and waited for the mescaline to kick in.

Soon, a delightful psychedelic haze overtook us and the cavorting switched into high gear.  We spent the rest of the afternoon languidly pursuing the arts of lovemaking.  That is until we heard the graduation party returning to the house, including the proud parents.  We laid low in my bedroom trying to be as quiet as two psychedelicized mice pissing in cotton.  (One of my latin teachers at boarding school, when he wanted to be alone to nurse his hangover would sometimes dismiss us early with the admonishment to be as quiet as mice pissing in cotton.)  After what seemed like an eternity, the proud parents left and we could make our getaway.  We put on our clothes, removed her laundry from the drier and I drove her back to her house.  She assured me that her husband would be working during the time of our idyl and besides, they had an open marriage.

  

We arrived at her house only to find that the husband was home and the marriage was, apparently, only open at one end---hers.  In addition, when the cuckolded husband discovered that his drugs were not only missing but had been consumed by her and her illicit lover, he went, understandably ‘postal’, which was ironic since he worked for the post office...

With some of my graduation money I purchased a round trip ticket to jolly old England and set off to say goodbye to my brother who was ‘doing time‘ in the Navy.  He lived several hours away in Stockton and I was desperately hoping that my very delicate and problematic English sports car would make the voyage there and back.  Alas, it was not to be.  The engine seized up in the 100 plus degree heat in Stockton and I had to use my travel money to fix my car.  That was the end of my highly anticipated great adventure in Europe.  I promised myself that I would get there someday.  Twenty three years later that someday had finally arrived.

BRING ON THE FLAMENCO

John and I seated ourselves at the tappas bar and waited for the lovely blond senorita to serve us.  “Queremos un botella de vino rojas, por favor”.  I said in my best phrase book Spanish.  The bar wench smiled at us and said: “You don’t have to try and speak Spanish with me, I’m from Connecticut...”.  That would make further communication a lot easier.  Having studied and loved and played Flamenco guitar music in high school, my desperate desire for the evening’s entertainment was to find a real Flamenco show to attend that was in the best Europe-through-the-back-door tradition.

  

Our lovely American bar keep knew of just such a place and she gave us directions to give to a cab driver.  The show would start around 1AM.  I AM?  We soon learned that nothing of any entertainment value started before 1 AM.  Dinner was usually somewhere between 11 PM and midnight.  So John and I whiled away the ensuing hours eating wonderful tappas and drinking botellas de vino rojas, tinto and blancas.  At the appointed hour we hailed a cab and gave our cabby the directions.  He turned and looked at us as if to say: surely mi amigos, you have made some mistake.  The directions we had given him would put us in the middle of a seedy semi-industrial section of Madrid, hardly suitable for tourists.  Trusting our American bar maid, we insisted that the Flamenco show was to be held there at 115 Los Carricol (I don’t really remember the actual address but I think that was the street name...).  We knocked on a large unmarked grey door.  The door opened and were told that yes, there was a Flamenco show there that night and it would start in about an hour.  Please repair to the tappas bar around the corner and come back in about 45 minutes.  It turns out that this Flamenco show was equivalent to one our ‘raves‘ back in the states, where a secret and usually somewhat seedy location is utilized to produce a sort of spontaneous underground music event that only certain chosen people would be invited to.  Rick Steeves would be proud of us.

Accordingly, we repaired to the bar around the corner and ordered up some more vino.  This place was what I could only assume was a typical working class bar for this portion of Madrid.  Everyone there, mostly middle and older aged men, was standing while they drank their wine and smoked their cigarettes.  Hanging above the length of the bar were cured whole sides of ham, or ‘jamon’.  These jamons were sliced thin and served like prosciutto usually on a thick crusty sour-dough type bread.  Looking down, I noticed, with some squeamishness, that the floor was being used as a sort of spittoon.  Wine, spittle and cigarette butts littered the floor.  Looking up felt like being in a charnel house; looking down felt like standing in a spittoon.  Welcome to Madrid...I must say, I kind of liked it.

Eventually the time came to go back to our Spanish Flamenco rave cave.  We stepped through the large industrial door, paid our entry fee and sat down at a little worn wooden table halfway to the stage.  While waiting for our botella of vino to arrive, I eagerly glanced around to drink in all the lovely Spanish faces.  The people (by that I mean women) that I looked at all had the most wonderful features.  Mostly pale but darkly complected, they had wonderful noses and piercing eyes.  One beauty who I was admiring had vivid blue eyes, flawless olive skin and a nose whose profile was the quarter arc of a circle.  It was love at first sight.  It occurred to me that these were the original people from whom all things latin and hispanic flowed.  With the exception of Brazil, every country south of the American border owed their existence to this one country. These were the pure bloods, the thoroughbreds of all the hispanic peoples.  By comparison typical Americans now seemed to me to be nothing more than mutts.  I wasn’t sure if it was inbreeding or crossbreeding that was to blame.  All I know was that I was thrilled with the noble faces I saw around me, bathed in candle light, beaming with anticipation of the coming show.

Soon the guitarists and the dancers took the stage and the music and dancing commenced.  I was instantly transported back to my boarding school dorm room.  Les Hixon, teacher and former Flamenco guitar student of the great Montoya, was teaching my roommate and me the mysteries of this wonderful Gypsy music.  For several years we immersed ourselves in Flamenco guitar music and tried our best to master the playing of it on our Spanish guitars.  We had to learn the rasqueado, the piccato, the vibrato and the three-fingered tremolo in order to play decent Flamenco.  We soon leapt past the well known and well worn Malaguena to the Soleares and other Flamenco folk styles.

Flamenco is similar to jazz in that a particular tune is never played exactly the same way twice.  In fact the tunes are nothing more than platforms from which the guitarist launches himself.  Using a basic chord structure unique to each song, the guitarist stylizes his playing to suit his, and his dancers’, mood.  I was reminded of some of the Flamenco greats we had learned about and listened to almost 30 years ago.  Sabicas, Angel Romero, Paco di Lucia and Manitas de Plata (hands of silver).

Not his real name, Manitas was a local legend in his home village near Seville in Southern Spain, the heart of Flamenco music.  As an illiterate Gypsy he was fiercely ignorant of the outside world since all that mattered was his music and the culture of his people.  The great Picasso had come to hear him play once and was so inspired by his soulful and passionate playing that he painted a picture on the back of Manitas’ guitar.  Word of his towering talent spread as far as New York where some aspiring music producer wanted to record him.  He flew to Seville and journeyed to the little village where Manitas resided.

      Upon hearing of the offer, Manitas said sure, he’d be happy to play in this man’s recording studio as long as he didn’t have to get on an airplane or a boat.  The music producer had his recording gear sent from New York and asked if Manitas knew of anyplace locally that would be suitable to record.  Manitas’ reccommended setting up in a small local stone church nearby which just happened to have stunning acoustics.  Manitas was often accompanied by an old half blind compadre who sang these old Gypsy folk laments.  The Gypsies (who now preferred to be called Roma) have much to lament about having been persecuted for most of their history.  There are many Flamenco patrons who maintain that only a Gypsy can truly bring out the passion and pathos of this music.  The recording that was made that day is well known among Flamenco guitar enthusiasts as a masterpiece.

       As the fierce music with its own wonderfully singular tempos washed over me, I gave myself up to my emotions.  All that wonderful music came back to me from my boarding school dorm room and the tears flowed without restraint or embarrassment.  I’m sure Rick Steeves and Manitas de Plata would have been proud.  When the show was over we retired to our cozy little room in the pensione with just enough room for two beds and night stands.  “Goodnight John, or rather “buenos noches”, what a wonderful evening.  I hope I didn’t embarrass you too much with my crying.  I can’t wait to see what day two has in store!”  With that I drifted off to sleep, next to my friend and travel companion for the next three months.

I know that I had drifted off to sleep because at some time later that night I had a dream.  I dreamt that I was in a huge and very reverberant cathedral.  Somewhere near by, someone was operating a chain saw and the noise was deafening.  I awoke to find that the chain saw was John’s snoring.  With each noisy breath the walls of our room seemed to contract and expand.  John had forewarned me that he was training himself to sleep on his back in order to be more “open to the universe”, and he may snore a little in that position.  If it were to happen, I was to just wake him up, tell him he was snoring and to please roll over on his side.  I did so to muddled results.  Thus ended the first day of our great American travel adventure.

ENTER THE BAD CONTESSA 

The next day we wandered around Madrid soaking up the sights and sounds.  We visited the Prado museum and Mr. Steeves faithfully lead us around via his art museum book.  That evening we took a bus to the little walled town of Toledo.  It was February 22 the day before ash wednesday.  This had no significance to us until we began talking to a lovely young senorita who was also going to Toledo.  It turns out that that night was “carnival”, their equivalent to our Mardi Gras.  Intrigued, we asked her to tell us what would transpire that evening.  “Oh everyone gets dressed up in silly costumes and pulls pranks on other people.  There’s lots of drinking, eating, dancing and music.  Various marching bands follow each other around town playing.”

As we approached Toledo, from an overpass we looked down on rows of musicians walking along, dressed in costumes and blasting away on their instruments.  Our senorita explained that each marching band is a social group just like the “krewes” of Mardi Gras.  They decide on a theme, create similar costumes based on that theme and create dance steps that they perform between songs.  They’re all ages of both sexes.  People from all over come to watch as each group tries to outdo the others.  They were all lined up like a big conga line marching, playing and dancing as they headed for the walled city.  We said goodbye to our lovely companion; checked in to our pensione in the neighborhood just below the town proper; dropped our bags and headed for the fabled walled city.  This place is a serious fortress town.  It’s partially circled by the Rio Tago.  You could imagine El Cid riding out of this fortress through the huge wooden doors guarding the city, on his way to do battle with the Moors.

As we pass through the gate into the city they are masses of people pressed together laughing, drinking, hollering to each other and singing.  We can hear drums in the distance.  It’s like some big joyful bacchanalian celebration.  We flow with the moving throng of people down a narrow alley.  I think of British soccer matches where all the fans are pressed up against each other.  I hope no one panics and starts a stampede...  The alley opens up into a little square and people have a chance to spread out a little.  There are all kinds of food and wine booths in the square.  Hmmm, shall I go with the barbecued blood sausage or the pickled pimento pepper?  What would our travel guru Rick Steeves advise?  The “Back Door” philosophy says buy one of both.
  

A young woman starts weaving her way toward us.  “Hi, you’re Americans aren’t you?  Good.  I want to practice my English with you.  Listen I’m out of money.  Could you perhaps buy me one of those pepper rojas?  If you do I’ll be your guide and show you around Toledo.  You picked a great night to visit.”  Well, if this isn’t a perfect “Back Door” moment I don’t know what is.  We proffer up a few pesetas for a pepper.  Her English is surprisingly good.  It turns out that, in her youth, she spent a summer in Fresno, of all places.  We tell her that we hail from a little village just north of San Francisco.
  

“Oh San Francisco!  I only got to go there once but it was so wonderful.  It reminded me of a lovely European city.  Certainly more than Fresno did.”  Our companion was probably in her mid thirties.  Her husky voice suggested many late nights of smoke and drink; perhaps other vices as well.  As we wander together through the throngs of merry makers I notice that she, unlike everyone else, is not in costume.  I ask why.  “Well, it’s kind of a long story.  My grandfather was Franco’s second in command.  When Franco vanquished the loyalists my grandfather was rewarded with the keys to the city of Toledo.  So he was kind of the lord of Toledo.  That made all of us a kind of royalty around here.  We own many properties in the area and we have a huge estate across the river.  Some of the family still live there but I live in an apartment here in town.  We don’t dress up so the common people can come up to us and make fun or insult us.  By tradition we must smile and take their insults with a good humor.  Because they are in costume we’re not supposed to know who they are.  But I usually know.

  
The large castle in the back left of the picture is where we saw the pairs of rings hanging high up on the back wall.  Later on in this narrative "the bad contessa" tells us what their original purpose was for.

My brothers, back in the early seventies, opened the first, and still most successful, discotheque in town.  When Franco was in power there were people lined up around the block to get into our disco.  After his death, our influence here waned a bit and now the  lines waiting to get in only stretch halfway around the block.  Everyone here knows us and gives us respect.  But because of our stupid macho culture here, my brothers get to run the nightclub.  It’s nice because it’s a huge money machine and it has made all of us wealthy, but I don’t get to participate in the business because I’m a woman.”

We asked her what her name was.  She said just call me Linda del valle.  Linda of the valley.  Her proper name was too long to remember.  I asked her how far back her family went in this area.  Her answer:  “All the way back”.  But around town people just call her “Valley”.

She fills up her time with travel and she is also a columnist for the local paper where she covers the social scene, of which she is a part.  She admits that she sometimes takes out her frustrations about being excluded from the family businesses by being a bit snarky and lampooning the whole social scene.  For this reason some people resent her and others are wary of her and her power to pillory them.

  

I asked her about her travels.  It turns out that her latest journey was quite an interesting one.  She and her boyfriend had decided to embrace the philosophy of “la dolce far niente” (the sweetness of doing nothing).  They took a trip in the boyfriend’s BMW to the southern tip of Spain and took a car ferry to Morrocco.  The plan was to drive to Marrakesh and score some primo hashish, the drug of choice in Toledo.  For some reason the boyfriend got cold feet and after a big row with Valley he got back in the car and took the ferry  back to Spain, leaving the contessa stranded, on her own, in Marrakesh.  Undaunted our “bad contessa” decides to go through with the plan.  She manages to meet up with her hash connection and makes her buy.  Unfortunately the hash she bought came in hundreds of little foil packets the size of large gum balls.  

Realizing that she will not be able to smuggle the hash back to Spain on the ferry in this condition, she hatches a plan.  She gets a seedy little room near the ferry terminal that night and laboriously cuts open all the hash balls with a razor.  In the process she manages to cut her fingers several times.  Undaunted, she takes all the bloodied hash balls and mashes them into packets about the size of a dollar bill, each one about an inch thick.  She wraps each one in tin foil and lays them out inside the legs of one of her panty hose.  She ties the panty hose around her waist, under her blouse and somehow, miraculously gets home, safe and sound with her stash.  Linda del Valle, Morroccan hash smuggler:  Bad Contessa!  

After she tells us this story, “Valley” pulls out of the pocket of her jeans a plug of cocoa brown hashish the size of a horse suppository.  I think we’re having a “back door” adventure.  She suggests that we go to her apartment and get high.  We wind our way down the narrow, ancient alleyways and pass through the door of an old three story building.  Although the outside looks somewhat decrepit, inside her penthouse, which comprises the entire floor, everything is beautiful modern Spanish decor.  We recline on a luxurious pile of Moroccan pillows while “Valley” rolls up a mighty spliff of tobacco and crumbled hash.  We drink some wine, talk of California life versus her life in Toledo, and get high.

I ask her about a strange sight we saw earlier of hundreds of pairs of iron rings hanging high on the back wall of the town’s big castle.  “Oh that...yeah back in the days of the Inquisition that’s where they hung people they thought were heretics.”  I don’t remember reading about that in the travel guide.   Nothing like a little local knowledge.  Linda wants to get back out there where the action is and continue her “noblesse oblige” to the townspeople.  As we wander around this jolly carnival madness, everywhere we go people call out to our senorita.  Playful insults are shouted out back and forth.  As the town social columnist, she knows who everybody is.  “They can’t fool me; I know them too well; besides they wear the same costumes pretty much every year.  But because it’s carnival, it is our tradition here in Toledo, going back hundreds of years not to take offense at anything that is said on this night.

A young boy of about twelve comes running up to us and squares off in front of Linda.  He is wearing an oversize army jacket.  He looks at Linda and starts giggling.  Linda turns to us, smiles and says with a bit of mischief in her voice, “I know what’s coming next; watch”.  With that, the boy opens up his jacket and a giant cloth phallus drops down from his chest to his crotch where a ribbon holds it in an “erect” position.  John and I stare at this outrageous display while Linda laughs and gives him an affectionate pinch on the cheek.  Our young miscreant howls with joy at his little act of defiance.  He packs his “unit” back into his jacket and goes racing away to find his next “flasher” victim.  “Hey Rick Steeves, are we having back door fun yet?"

By this time as we straggle back to Linda’s apartment it’s early morning.  In a couple of hours we will be taking our first Eurail trip to Barcelona.  Linda tells us that she has a special going away treat for us to launch our next travel adventure.  She unlocks a beautiful lacquered box and pulls out another gum ball of a different sort.  The box also contains a piece of foil shaped like a straw and another piece of foil about six inches square with a crease in the middle.  John looks up at Linda and says, “So, you like to chase the dragon, eh?”

Now I had heard the expression before in a Steeley Dan song but I didn’t know what it meant.  John as a professional musician knew all about it.  The ball was “brown tar heroin”, less refined than the usual white powder form; this heroin was roughly the consistency of a tootsie roll.  Linda smeared a generous chunk of this stuff down the center of the crease in the foil.  As Linda was preparing our next adventure, John explained what was going to happen.  

“You put the straw to your mouth while the other person holds a lighter under the foil.  The flame from the lighter heats up the smear of the heroin tar and it starts to slowly run down the crease in the foil and smoke comes up.  You inhale the trail of smoking heroin as it runs down the crease.  That is called chasing the dragon!”  I questioned John about the wisdom of indulging in this unseemly bit of folly, especially before having to go to the train station and figure out our first Eurail trip.  John assured me that as the experienced traveler that he was, and one who had obviously chased the dragon before, we would be fine.  He promised to get us on the train to Barcelona at the appointed time.  With that, I threw caution to the wind and we three, “partners in crime”, proceeded to chase the dragon.

We all collapsed back on the bed of pillows in a state of hazy revery.  Sometime later we managed to straighten up enough to get on our way.  Ms. Valley accompanied us back to our pensione where we hurriedly packed and the three of us walked over to the train station.  “I really had fun with you guys tonight.  It was great getting to hang out with a couple of California “caballeros”.  It sounds like you have a great trip planned.  Here’s my address, drop me a postcard some time.  Vaya con Dios!”  And with that we said our goodbyes to our Bad Contessa, Linda of the Valley.

As we took our seats on the train after a crazy sleepless night “doing Carnival” in Toledo I thought to myself, “Wow, we have just had two wonderfully adventurous days and nights on our trip.  Two down...eighty-eight to go!  Little did I know what lay in store for us that night in Barcelona!  More on that later. 

Mickey da Mayor of Happy Acres