these weeks in the odyssey
2.7.00 -- 2.28.00
tarragona, barcelona, montserrat, lloret del mar, figueres, carcassonne, san sebastian, bilbao, tarragona

Great Scottie!

Europe -- an ever-unfolding tapestry of ancient cities, cultural wonders, and culinary delights. The crucible of western culture, home to philosophers, poets, artists, and kings. Birthplace of the Renaissance, incubator of the Enlightenment, and the only place in the world where the solo albums of David Hasselhoff (of "Baywatch" and "Knight Rider" fame) are still selling like hotcakes. With all that going for it, the cherry on top of the whole European banana split has still got to be the giant topiary sculpture of a Scottie dog sitting in front of the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao (heroically pictured at right). I mean, who wants to read Kant or Spinoza when you can check out a giant dog made out of flowers instead? Somewhere, Greyfriars Bobby is smiling contentedly. Heck, so are we.

Now, I don't know about you, but giant topiary Scottie dogs really bring out the magnanimous side of my personality. Flush with benevolence and -- dare I say it? -- the human spirit, I am driven to share Europe's cultural bounty with an eager and impressionable audience. It's actually rather similar to the way Mr. Rogers reacts to a really nice sweater.

Fortunately for me, just such an eager and impressionable audience was already winging its way across the Atlantic and into Spain in the form of my globetrotting nephew, Marcus (pictured at left). The really attentive members of the Office Odyssey audience will no doubt recall Marcus from his earlier North American Office Odyssey engagement which went off to rave reviews back in the relative innocence of 1997. Since we love a good sequel as much as anyone else (I'm pretty sure I'm the only person in the world who has seen all three "Revenge of the Nerds" installments in addition to all three "Karate Kids" -- how Ralph Macchio has avoided an Oscar so far, I don't know), we were eager to see what new excitement Marcus could bring to the Office Odyssey experience.

We didn't have to wait long. Marcus turned up at the international arrivals gate firmly in the tow of two very stern looking airport officials with badges, walkie-talkies, and seriously buttoned down attitude. Uh-oh. It appeared our nephew was under arrest...but for what? We immediately began to picture the worst -- corporate espionage, food fights in business class, impromptu break dance sessions in the plane's aisle, fifteen hour hunger strikes in protest of the lack of World Wrestling Federation programming on international flights -- what could it be? Springing Marcus from the Barcelona lockup really wasn't how we had envisioned beginning this little European adventure. I began mentally composing my phone call to Marcus' mother -- "Umm, yeah, Steph? Yeah, hi. Look, your son is going to be cooling his heels in the Spanish hoosegow for the next couple weeks until he gets a trial date but not to worry -- I hear they do excellent jailhouse tattoos there. Also, we gave him some cigarettes to trade for food, so I'm sure he'll be fine. Okay, talk to you later!"

Not good. Though I'm sure jail time can be very instructive (the license plate making, the road sign painting), it wasn't exactly the kind of "new world" we'd hoped to open up to Marcus. Ever so sternly, the suited squad marched closer and closer to where we were standing until Marcus finally raised his head high enough to make a desultory scan of the good people assembled there to wait for their arriving friends and family. There, he laid his wary eyes on his nervous aunt and uncle, stopping long enough to point us out with an angry shrug before returning to his in-depth examination of his shoe-tops, already in progress. Thus tipped off, the officials peremptorily beckoned us, indicating that we were to join them immediately, lest we run the risk of joining our nephew in the slammer.

Mustering my courage, I put a winning smile on my face and approached, ready to do the unpleasant business of arranging for Marcus' release.

"This your nephew, sir?" Icy. Severe.

"Well, yes, he is, but I'm sure we can take care of whatever he's done between just the two of us. Incidentally, did I mention that I happen to have 10,000 pesetas in my wallet and a winning smile on my face?"

"No need for all that, sir. Just show us some ID, sign on the dotted line, and he's yours. Also, stop smiling. You look like you swallowed a bug."

Sweet relief! Despite his somewhat depressed demeanor, Marcus wasn't under arrest! Nope -- just a little upset stomach from airline food, in fact! Phew! And those "cops?" They weren't cops at all -- just helpful airline employees! Since Marcus is a minor, his mom had arranged for the airline to provide assistance to him, directing him from arrival gate to connecting flight, to customs, to us. Two signatures later, we were out the door and on our way up to Barcelona and the hotel room we'd rented earlier that day.

This particular hotel room was to be Marcus' introduction to Life In Europe. In addition to being approximately the size of George W. Bush's knowledge of foreign affairs (yes, it was that small), it also had three twin beds laid out abreast one another with nary a space between the three. Just a nice intimate bedroom for Marcus and the aunt and uncle he hadn't seen for over a year. Also, to help Marcus adjust to the Office Odyssey experience, Kristanne and I had done our best to make things more homey for him by hanging our entire collection of laundry out to dry over every available lamp, chair, and television antenna in the place. The place looked more like a tenement rooftop than a hotel room.

Fortunately, Marcus proved to be fairly adaptable when it came to accommodations and didn't complain at all, preferring to remark instead on the prevalence of "tiny-butt cars," as he put it. Oh, how fast they grow up. Since what our hotel room lacked in charm, it also lacked in comfort, places to sit, and character, we decided to grab the subway and head on down to La Rambla for a little exploration and some dinner.

La Rambla is the most famous street in Barcelona, a movable feast for the eyes with all manner of everything going on at once. Sidewalk vendors sell lottery tickets, roosters, guinea pigs, and a whole lot of porno magazines that we spent a lot of time trying to steer Marcus away from with clever lines like, "Hey, Marcus, look at that alien landing craft up in the sky! Oops -- just missed it! Better luck next time!" Meanwhile, the masses of Barcelona's humanity take their evening paseos, strolling comfortably up and down the central pedestrian walkway, providing ample opportunities for people-watching and old-lady dodging (as pedestrians, Spanish old ladies are almost as tough as the babushkas of Prague).

Unfortunately, the area surrounding La Rambla is also justifiably famous as a great place to get your pocket picked or your camera swiped. Of all the petty theft in Spain, statistics show that an astonishingly high percentage of it happens in Barcelona and Madrid, where tourists are plentiful and attention to belongings minimal. We'd already warned Marcus about this, telling him to keep a close eye on people following too closely and to carry his wallet in his front pocket while we were walking around La Rambla. Predictably, the petty thieves of La Rambla were perfectly obliging, one of them managing to trail us for ten or fifteen minutes waiting for his opportunity to make a covert attempt at the pocket of Kristanne's backpack. Fortunately, Kristanne's backpack is from Poland and and is made out of heavy leather with an old-fashioned strap and buckle system that takes me ten minutes of cursing and shaking to get into on a good day. This guy had no chance, particularly when Eagle Eyes Marcus saw what was going on and alerted us to the danger. Grrr. Petty thieves are incredibly annoying. Somewhat shaken but with all our belongings intact, we headed off to dinner and eventually to sleep, ready to take on La Sagrada Familia in the morning. Welcome to Europe, Marcus!

La Sagrada Familia is the unfinished masterpiece of famed Spanish modern architect, Antoni Gaudi. It's a towering affront to anyone who insists on straight lines or traditional appearances. It's also an affront to out of shape Extreme Telecommuters who would dare to climb the 500 odd stairs to the tops of its towers. After a couple hours of marveling (during which we forgot the digital camera -- sorry!), we made tracks back to our rental car to avoid a parking ticket and headed into the mountains west of Barcelona to check out the Benedictine monastery at Montserrat (pictured at right). It was during the drive out to Montserrat that it finally dawned on Marcus that we really didn't have a clue where we were going. I'm sure there's some part of most kids that simply trusts adults to know where they're going. Alas, this really doesn't apply to Extreme Telecommuters. Marcus got a small taste of this phenomenon the night before while we navigated the subway system from our hotel to La Rambla in fits and starts, but now he was getting a full dose as we missed several exits, did some epic backtracking, and eventually meandered our way through backstreets out to the cable car that would take us up to the mountaintop monastery, which, conveniently enough, was closed. Oops. From the backseat, Marcus woke up long enough to exclaim matter of factly, "You don't really know where you're going, do you?" Umm, no. Not really.

With the cable car closed, we needed to gather our bearings. Now, I don't know about you, but nothing helps me gather my bearings more than food. Since everyone was feeling the pangs, we made a short grocery store stop and piled out of the car in a small village's picturesque town square for an impromptu picnic lunch. After we all pitched in to make some epic Dagwoodian sandwiches (c'mon, "Dagwood?" From "Blondie?" Remember his sandwiches?), a cognitive spark hit us full-on, nearly setting what is left of my hair on fire (cognitive sparks can be dangerous things in the wrong setting) -- that sign pointing to "Montserrat" on the highway probably meant we could just drive right on up there without the assistance of the cable car. Like the astrophysicist I very nearly was (I failed "Space Camp" back in third grade, or I would've been a shoo-in), I pointed the car in the indicated direction and we were shortly at the top of the mountain, drinking in the mountain air and reveling in the gorgeous vistas.

The monastery itself was gorgeous, complemented nicely by a small but well-chosen art museum with pieces by Picasso, Degas, Monet, Dali, Caravaggio, and Renoir. After deciding whether we liked the free samples of goat's cheese or sheep's cheese better at a nearby roadside stand (goat's was the winner), we hopped back into the car and headed for the Costa Brava and points north.

Our intention was to stay in one of the small villages that dot the Spanish Mediterranean on the Costa Brava, giving Marcus a taste of life on the coast. We should have known better. We should have known way better, especially after our last run-in with an out of season coastal village back in the deserted burg of Peniscola. Most towns appeared to be shut tight for the winter season, the innumerable hotels darkened and boarded up. The beach was still gorgeous, though, so we spent a little time there, taking in some of the ocean breezes. Sleeping on the beach, however, did not seem like so viable an option, especially since the ocean breezes were rapidly turning somewhat brisk. So, we began pounding the pavement, searching vainly for the one hotel that might be open on the Costa Brava. Eventually, we came to Lloret del Mar, a half-pleasant, half-cheesy resort destination for northern European vacationers. Again, most of the hotels were closed, but a few did appear to be braving the off season. Unfortunately, they also appeared to be plagued with something far more surreal than a mere lack of customers.

French people. Old ones, too, all done up in plaid pants, pastel shirts, and rope sandals. What few hotels were open were also packed to bursting with tour busses full of French package tourists, reveling in senior citizen get togethers in out of season Spanish hotels. You've never heard such a clamor in your life -- thousands of old French people playing canasta, shuffleboard, and rousing games of "Where's The Bathroom, Sonny?" I felt like I was on a cruise ship. Still, at least one such establishment did have a room for the night. Suspiciously, however, this establishment was also called the "Hotel Don Juan." Just what I need -- a hotel full of randy French senior citizens looking to get it on.

Still, since our other options were looking like either the beach or the car, we decided to risk the Hotel Don Juan, immediately locking the door once we got to our room for fear of hormonal French oldsters drunk on the Don Juan's charms knocking it right off its hinges. Yikes.

Actually, Marcus was pretty excited about the Don Juan since it featured one of the first things about Europe to really pump him up -- video games! An entire arcade full of video games! Faster than you can say, "My Streetfighter II skills have begun to atrophy from disuse," Marcus was down in the arcade with a fistful of pesetas and a maniacal glint in his eyes. We stayed out of his way for the first hour or so, but eventually challenged him to some rousing interactive Indy Car Racing, where you can race against other players on linked machines. Though I still maintain that the game was clearly fixed, I seemed to come in last every time, with Kristanne and Marcus trading off the top spot in between making disparaging remarks about my "ultra-lamitude, dude." I've got to stop playing video games with fourteen year olds. And my wife.

The next day dawned with us looking to make some tracks across the Pyrenees and on into France. On the way, though, we stopped in the town of Figueres to check out the Salvador Dali museum. Most people have probably heard of Salvador Dali since he is one of the few "fine artists" to sort of transcend the genre and become the equivalent of a modern pop star. The curly mustache, the self-promotion, the melting clocks -- all of it made him a media star while he was alive. Naturally, the art establishment kinda hates him for this, tending to view his work with a decided air of condescension, the way a jazz musician might look down his nose at someone like, say, Kenny G. Actually, maybe that's not a very good example -- unlike Kenny G, Dali did have creativity and talent. Kenny G, on the other hand, has a lot of hair.

Figueres was Dali's home town, so he chose it as the site for his museum/slash/mausoleum. He designed the whole thing, right down to where he would eventually be buried and, boy, is it ever a trip. From the building itself, all covered with sculptures of loaves of bread, to the giant mural in front of his grave (pictured at left), all the way to the indescribably strange installment of an old Cadillac with two mannequins and a rain machine inside, a fat naked lady as a hood ornament, and a rowboat with a parasol on top (pictured below, with two quizzical would-be art lovers in front), the Dali Museum is definitely a real headscratcher.

Still, love him or hate him, there's a lot of interesting work at the Dali Museum. Unfortunately, there are also a lot screaming schoolchildren at the Dali Museum. To make matters worse, the museum itself is laid out as a four-floored cylinder surrounding the open air installation of the aforementioned Crazy Cadillac (not its real name). Much of the artwork hangs in the narrow hallways running around the cylinder on each floor, instead of in galleries (though there are some of those, too). Because of this, to see the artwork, you find yourself constantly swimming upstream against a rising tide of panicky schoolchildren driven all higgledy-piggledy by the unqualified weirdness of Dali's vision (or, if you prefer, mania). The narrow hallways make this doubly difficult, forcing you to lead with your elbows so as to protect your body from the mewling masses. Naturally, Kristanne was more than happy to take the lead for us, though, clearing a nice path through the swarms of madding kids. "Punk," I heard her mutter as one kid took a nasty hip-check down the staircase. "He got what he deserved."

You can really only take so much surrealist art before you need to move on. Actually, if you're Marcus, you can't really take any of it. You just say, "art sucks," and get ready to go to France. So, on to France it was! Home of the baguette, the cafe au lait, and, well, French people! Figueres was (and probably still is) very close to France, so we rolled over the border relatively quickly, though somewhat daunted by the French border commandos sporting nasty looking automatic weapons. These guys are here to make sure you know the dangers of making fun of French people's accents during your stay. Just don't do it, if you know what's good for you.

After a brief stop at an internet kiosk in Perpignan to check my work email, we drove on to Carcassonne, an incredibly well-preserved medieval village. Those are the city walls pictured at left. Actually, since I'm going for more of a traditional travel writing feel this week, let me just say that those are "the magnificent fortifications, so utterly and indescribably Gallic in character, resplendent in the twilight gloaming."

Hmm. I'm not so sure I like this new feel. It makes me sort of lightheaded.

Since neither Kristanne nor I speak a lick of French (and if Marcus does, he wasn't saying), we were just the tiniest bit anxious about this part of our journey. We've all heard the tales about the French being uncommonly stuffy about foreigners not speaking their language, even openly ridiculing those foolhardy enough to try. Fortunately, being openly ridiculed is pretty much old hat to me after 11 months over here in Europe. By now, I've been mocked in Malaga, scorned in Slovenia, and jeered in Geneva, usually for my less than stellar attempts at speaking the language, but sometimes also for my taste in clothes. So, without tooting my horn too much, let's just say that I felt uniquely qualified to try to speak French to the French.

My first opportunity came as soon as we arrived in Carcassonne -- we needed a hotel. After a quick check of the phrasebook and some even quicker deep-breathing exercises, we approached the reception desk, where I managed to get through "Bonjour" before completely panicking and pointing at Kristanne. Miraculously, the anticipated outburst of taunts and razzing failed to materialize. With a friendly smile and an understanding demeanor, she handheld us through some basic questions before bringing out the owner of the hotel and his wife who, wonder of wonders, had recently spent a year living in my home state of Washington! In addition to attending Central Washington University in Ellensburg on an exchange program, they had also lived in Seattle, worked in the wine industry in Yakima, and spent a lot of time touring all around the northwest. Importantly, they also spoke fluent English. We talked for twenty minutes before realizing we'd left an increasingly bored (and at the time, asleep) nephew in the car.

Hurriedly, we returned to the parking lot to see what had become of Marcus. We found him wandering around the parking lot in a daze, muttering to himself what sounded suspiciously like, "Who am I? Why am I here?" Marcus is something of a slow riser. Well, either that or a fervent admirer of the little-remembered vice presidential candidacy of Admiral James Stockdale. (Come on now! Admiral James Stockdale? Ross Perot's running mate? He said that very line in a televised debate several presidential elections ago! Sheesh.)

After a pleasant walk through the richly evocative streets of Carcassonne (there's that Traditional Travel Writer guy again), we finally settled into a pleasant bistro for a full-on French meal. Like the language, French food can be sort of intimidating for the unwashed (which is to say, me). Once you get past the whole French bread, French dressing, and French fries thing (only one of which is actually French -- you can probably guess which one), you're looking at a whole lot of mashed up goose livers, stuffed pigeons, and tiny canary-like birds, baked and eaten whole (ortolan, now illegal). Reputedly, this is all supposed to be very delicious, but we still decided it might be in our interest to avoid giving Marcus any of the gruesome details before we actually tried them. Marcus, for his part, decided that he was just going to stick with the "chicken, chicken, and more chicken" theme that had served him so well thus far on the trip (in French, "poulet, poulet, and more poulet"). Alas, in France, things are often not what they seem. You see, to save a few francs, we all ordered of the prix fixe menu, where you get an entire meal for a single price. Included in this deal for Marcus was a salad that came with....aspic. Yup, clear, quivering gelatin, served up in slices on an otherwise normal looking green salad. Though this was somewhat more palatable than my introduction to aspic in Poland (where they serve you a cylinder of it the size of a milk glass with fish heads bobbing around in it), it still seemed to have a disquieting effect on our young nephew. Ever the willing soldier, though, he managed a few bites before pronouncing, "aspic sucks." Unlike his earlier comments on art, this time we couldn't really say that we disagreed.

The rest of the meal, however, was triumphant, a joyous medley of earthy flavors from our chef's bounteous larder. Will someone please shoot the Traditional Travel Writer guy? Thanks.

After a pleasant night's rest, it was back into the car and onto the highway to head west towards San Sebastian on Spain's Atlantic Coast. En route (we were in France, so I feel okay about saying "En route" instead of "On the way..."), we made a stop in France's Cave Country. Actually, they don't call it that, but I figured I'd take the liberty since there do appear to be a large number of big caves in the Foix area, many of them sporting plentiful prehistoric cave paintings. Our more careful readers will no doubt recall that Kristanne and I had previously visited a cave near Ronda down in Spain's Spelunking Sites (again, not it's real name), and marvelled at the cave paintings therein. We were so pumped up about the experience, in fact, that we decided it was just what Marcus would love to see. From his low grunts and refusal to say, "caves suck," we're guessing we were probably right! The particular cave we visited was called Niaux, a mammoth cavern near Foix. You walk in some half a kilometer, taking in the relatively ancient graffiti (some of it carbon dated back to the 1600s), dodging puddles, and clambering through tiny passages, until you get to the really ancient graffiti -- cave paintings some 14,000 years old. Though we were the only non French speakers on the tour (there were twenty of us, all told), the guide was incredibly nice about coming back and giving us a condensed version of what he'd just said to the rest of the group in French. For example, he spent some 15 minutes going over one painting in agonizing detail, using a laser pointer to remark on certain details the group might have missed. Then, when he'd finished, he came back to us and said, "It's a bison. Now, let's move on."

Eventually, however, a few exploratory blows from Kristanne's Michelin Guide brought Jean-Claude (possibly his real name) around to seeing things our way. We reveled in complete descriptions and the vision of his shaky knees the rest of the way.

After an amazing couple hours in the cave, we finally emerged back into the daylight, ready for nothing so much as to get back in the car and drive four hours to San Sebastian. Luckily for us, that's just what we did!

San Sebastian enjoys a gorgeous physical location, situated pleasantly on a conch-shaped bay between two mountains. However, we didn't stop there to enjoy the scenery. Oh no. We stopped there because it put us in striking distance of one of the main reasons for taking this trip -- the new Guggenheim Museum of Modern Art in Bilbao (pictured at left, below, and at the top of the page -- we really liked this building).

Designed by modern American architect Frank Gehry, the Bilbao Guggenheim has already been acclaimed as one of the most striking buildings of the 20th century. It's amazingly visually arresting, billowing up from the banks of the river Nervion in waves of titanium and glass. The insides of the building are stunning, too, huge galleries winding around exposed beams, crazily wound one another, and an inner atrium zooming to stunning heights.

Of course, since this is a museum, there's also some art in there somewhere. At least I think there is -- the building tends to overshadow the collection, even though it's incredible in its own right. We spent some four hours touring the galleries, lingering in crannies and marvelling in wide open spaces.

Best of all, though, was the featured collection. Now, don't get me wrong -- I love modern art as much as the next guy (so long as the next guy isn't like, Andy Warhol, or something), but give me a huge collection of the most influential motorcycles of all time, and I'm pretty much in heaven. Yep, the "Art of the Motorcycle" travelling collection was currently playing to a packed audience in the Guggenheim Bilbao! Friends had already seen this show in the NYC Guggenheim and told me it was not to be missed, especially since it features the very motorcycle I own (a '76 BMW R90S for those of you scoring at home, or even if you're just reading alone). To preserve my endurance, we saved the motorcycles for last, going through all the relatively uncrowded galleries before descending into the long exhibit hall where the motorcycles were displayed amongst throngs of admiring Spaniards.

The show was fantastic, a real treat for someone who loves motorcycles. Marcus seemed to enjoy it, too, picking out the superfast Suzuki Hayabusa (190 mph top speed straight from the factory) as his favorite. Four hours of the Guggenheim were enough for all of us, though, so after a nice picnic lunch in a picturesque square in downtown Bilbao, we packed up the car again and hit the road. Originally, we were going to drive further out the Atlantic coast towards Santiago de Compostela and see some things out that direction (like the Picos de Europa). However, we were all starting to feel a little bit road-weary, so we pointed the car back towards Tarragona and made the six hour trek all the way back home, arriving back in T-town sometime around 10:00 PM. Spain is a big country!

After a couple days seeing the sights in Tarragona (there are more than you might think), thoroughly kicking Marcus' butt in the the video game "Quake" down at our local internet cafe, and playing a whole lot of gin rummy, it was time for the M-man to head home. Unfortunately for us, he was heading home on a 9:15 AM flight from Barcelona. Since we'd already returned our rental car, this left us dependent on the miracle of public transportation to get him to the gate on time. Being the ever-prepared Extreme Telecommuters that we sometimes resemble, we'd already checked the timetable for trains up to Barcelona the day before. Now, we just needed to get down to the station and grab the 5:52 AM train up to the big town. No problem, right?

Wrong. First of all, catching the 5:52 means that you have to get up at 5:00, which is almost exactly as much fun as watching "Biz Asia" on CNN (which is to say, not at all). Still, we managed to make it up and out of the house, arriving at the train station in plenty of time to catch our train. This is when we met...the beast.

Rail strike. The Spanish railworkers union had chosen today to go on strike. Actually, if we were more attentive readers we would probably have realized this since most public transportation unions in Europe are amazingly polite about when they go on strike, taking great pains to tell you exactly which routes will be cancelled when, and for how long while they're out airing their grievances. Unfortunately, we hadn't been reading the local newspaper, so we had no idea that the 5:52 had been cancelled for today (and today only), set to resume service tomorrow. The ticket agent was very helpful, telling us that the next train for Barcelona was scheduled to depart at 6:42. Ouch. This was definitely cutting into our schedule since we still had to make the connection in Barcelona from the main train station on out to the airport. Things were looking tight.

As I frantically called rental car agencies to see if they were open (when there's nothing you can do to change a situation, it's good to kill time with fruitless panicking), Marcus and Kristanne took up a sleepy residence on a handy bench in the Tarragona train station (pictured at left). Eventually the train arrived and put us back on the tracks to Barcelona. Could we make it?

It was going to be close. When the train finally arrived in Barcelona, we all sprinted from the car and on over to the Slowest Escalator in the Modern World. This baby was moving at something like 2 feet per anxious Extreme Telecommuter sigh, inching up to the top floor. Usually the people who aren't walking up the escalator move to the right so that folks moving fast can just zoom on by on the left. Not this time. Finally, we are on the top floor, sprinting out to the taxi stand (we didn't have time to take the railway spur out to the airport), and into the nearest waiting cab. The driver, sensing our urgency (mainly because I kept saying things like, "We're urgent!"), asked us when our flight left. It was 8:30 AM. 45 minutes to departure. Don't they recommend being at the airport 2 hours early for an international flight? Why, yes. They do.

The taxi driver let out a low whistle, said something like, "Mama mia," and hit the gas. This guy was great -- the entire drive he kept it floored, all the while engaging in conversation with me about where we were from, where we'd been, had we been to his hometown, did we know the way to San Jose, that kind of thing. It was actually great -- he really seemed to enjoy helping me out with my Spanish, spending large portions of the drive rolling a single "rr" for like, 5 minutes at a time, looking at me afterwards as if to say, "Now, you try!," whereupon I would splutter like a baby in a bathtub for 2 seconds and give up. "No, no, no, no, no! Rrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr. Like that!" Fortunately, this guy was as good at driving his cab as he was at rolling his r's, screeching to a halt in front of the terminal at 8:45, a full half hour before Marcus' scheduled departure.

Back to full sprint mode and up to the counter, where a waiting official directed us to the nearest agent who, after "tsk, tsk, tsking" us once (this was, after all, British Airlines), reassured us that Marcus would indeed make his flight just fine. Phew!

For his part, Marcus took this news in stride asking us, "Sheesh, what was the big hurry? We're here a half hour early." Before we could answer this, the same burly faux policemen from Marcus' earlier arrival showed up, grabbed Marcus by the arms, and made to escort him to the appropriate gate and his waiting airplane (we'd arranged for the same Minor Delivery Service as Marcus' mom had earlier). We barely had time to snap that exhausted picture you see there at right before he was off, bound for the States and, no doubt, a nice long nap! So long, Marcus! Thanks for visiting the Office Odyssey!

Not quite believing that we'd actually made it on time, Kristanne and I eventually realized that we, too, could now go home to Tarragona. Since time was no longer an issue, we decided to save some money and take the railway spur back to the main Barcelona station before heading south down the coast. Dog tired, we limped the half mile out to where the train comes, only to find...oh, no. No. Not that. Yep -- the rail strike had completely shut down the spur between the main Barcelona station and the airport. Kristanne could no longer face the pain, choosing instead to bow her head on the railroad ticket counter and have a nice, long cry. As for me, I vowed to begin reading the local newspaper regularly so as to find out when the dang strikes are happening. But first, I'm going to take a nap right here in this corner next to the garbage can. You don't mind, do you? Thanks.

Another cab drive and fifteen more minutes of rolled r's later, we were finally on a train back to Tarragona and our waiting naps, already in progress.

And so ends another installment of the Office Odyssey! As if all the excitement of Extreme Nephew Marcus' visit wasn't enough, next week's episode should feature a slambang, action-packed, smashmouth visit from Extreme Brother Russ, coming all the way from Seattle. You know, people, we've been over here for almost a year -- you've had some time to plan your visit. What's up with all the latecomers piling onto the Office Odyssey bandwagon here in the waning months? Sheesh -- get organized, willya! Due to our unprecedented popularity, we're afraid we're going to have to limit visitors to one per week for the next month. Make your reservations early, and we'll see you next time on the Odyssey!

Last Week's Front Page Picture

As for that picture at left, that is once again the stunning new Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, rising from the banks of the river Nervion in all of its titanium-clad glory. Awe-inspiring and mammoth, the Bilbao Guggenheim drops your jaw and demands your attention. Then, when it's done doing that, it wipes your nose, spanks your bottom, and gives you a big, fat, titanium-clad hug before sending you to bed without any supper. Actually, the Bilbao Guggenheim seems to suffer from a mild bipolar disorder, now that I think about it.