I am 10 months pop-free today

Granted, I’m not over the ambrosial fizziness of bubbly beverages so I’m now living with a three-can-a-day addiction to sparkling water—which is the quién-es-más-macho equivalent of saying I’m living with a three-rainbow-a-day addiction to majestic unicorns—but I’ve successfully broken free from the bonds of pop’s unpronounceable-chemicals elixir soup. And for that I toast myself with my first icy cold can of cherry bubly for the day. ¡Salud! I mean ¡Princess Sparklepony Unicorn!

Apparently I’m going through a skulls phase

And a Día de los Muertos Mariachi phase:

Times dos:

And a single-parent-ghost-family phase:

Do not be afraid.

But English is three languages stacked in a trench coat, so who are we to make snarquerie?

I’m trying to decide if it’s wise to work out right before our production-week rehearsals

On the one hand, I’ll instantly look 97 if I miss just one workout. On the other hand, my pre-workout shake—like ALL pre-workout shakes—can make me what we will politely call did-you-know-that-bathroom-in-Spanish-is-baño?-y.

I’m leaving the gym right now for thong rehearsal (yes—we strippers are literally having a rip-away thong rehearsal in the interest of establishing consistency in our stripping moves) so I’m about to find out how things ... come out.

In the mean time: I wore my NYC shirt today because The Full Monty takes place in Buffalo! Which totally made sense when I was getting dressed this morning!

When it's 5:11 am ...

and you’ve been pointlessly wide awake so long that you’re tethered to an outlet because you’ve drained your phone battery in a YouTube clickhole, you stumble on this forgotten gem of Sondheim + Liza + Pet Shop Boys gaysplosionness—which is made mega-extra fabuloso with the addition of Spanish subtitles because SPANISH SUBTITLES and there’s nothing more Sally Durant Plummer than losing your mind looking at a coffee cup as the dawn breaks with SPANISH SUBTITLES.

Aloha!

My intrepid, brilliant, humanitarian-minded niece is as we speak flying to Guatemala with her Spanish class to do community service work and then explore the country from the valleys to the volcanoes. Meanwhile, her white, privileged, North American-insular, US-resident uncle has found himself humbly obligated to do some googling to learn that Guatemala is NOT, in fact, in South America but is five countries north of Panama on the Pacific side of the narrowing continent.

Fun fact: Guatemala is also in the central time zone—though it doesn’t have stupid Daylight Savings Time, so I’m sure my niece and her Spanish class have wicked jet lag. ¡Qué lástima!

I´m purring like a kitian

´cause I saw me some Titian!

(God, that was bad. But I´m caught in a weird mix of cultural overstimulation and jet lag, so I refuse to apologize.)

This morning we toured the unparalleled Museo Nacional del Prado, where I also saw me some amazing Reubens, Raphael, Cranach, Velásquez, El Greco, Bosch (bless the earthly delights of his twisted little imagination) and -- best of all -- my boy Goya. It´s hard to describe how much I love Goya´s work -- especially in person. His Saturn Devouring his Son is as disturbing as I´d hoped, though it´s a lot smaller than I´d pictured it -- and it´s displayed kind of absent-mindedly in a corner of a room filled with larger, less stirring works.

(Note to self: Get the Prado curatorial staff replaced with people who display paintings MY way.) I also love his starkly honest portraits of what must have been the down-the-line ugly Spanish royal family. The next time I´m feeling like I´m having a bad nose day, I´ll just remember the Ichabod Cranes that populate Goya´s royal portraits and I´ll give myself an instant, massive jolt of self-esteem. (Of course, the ugly royal family could overcompensate for its shortcomings with wealth and power and a specatular palace. All I have going for me is a closet full of shoes and a couple lipo scars. But the shoes are FABULOUS, and I´m currently not dead, so I guess I win. At least for now.)

The second item on our tourist agenda today was supposed to be a train ride to the Medieval fortress town of Toledo, but after we´d walked all the way to the train station, we discovered that the Sunday trains to Toledo are rather scarce -- and that we´d already missed the last one. ¡Que lástima!

So we thought we´d do a little shopping instead, but the whole city shuts down on the Sabbath (I think I might have even seen a Catholic church somewhere when we were exploring the city yesterday), so instead we had ourselves a late lunch, and now my traveling companions are enjoying a brief siesta while I blog a bit and then head up to join them.

I have to say, there´s something profoundly satisfying about visiting another country, immersing yourself in its culture and having enough command of its language to find yourself able function there independently. My Spanish has taken me effortlessly through stores and restaurants and maps and street signs and advertising -- and it´s even gotten me a few compliments from the natives! -- though the explanatory documents posted next to the works in the Prado were definitely out of my league. In any case, I feel such a sense of belonging here, and I just know I´ll be back often.

On a more alarming note: The mullet is back in full force here in Europe. The fashionistas are covered in mullet, and it even adorns hoi polloi heads here more often than one would care to acknowledge. And though it´s never really left America -- at least not in the populations that don´t appreciate irony -- it´s doomed to return with a vengeance on more educated heads in the near future. You heard it here first. So don´t say you haven´t been warned.

We leave for Paris tomorrow (Monday) around noon, so we´re enjoying our last few hours in our kick-ass Madrid hotel. Here´s a link to it if you want to check out its high-tech-meets-old-world-charm glory. The brick-arched basement catacombs are perhaps my favorite part of the building (after the orgasmically glorious showers, of course), and I´ve been writing my posts from a free computer down here all week. It´s SUCH a cool space.

Off to my siesta. ¡Hasta luego!