Aaaargh!!

Well ladies and gents, it would seem that the rather risky system we had going of 'borrowing' the internet has now backfired on us (as I feared it might at some point); yesterday morning I was getting ready for work and happily streaming Radio 1 over their website, however when I returned from making breakfast I was met with a silent room...it often pauses to reload so I thought maybe that was it, however the whole server appeared to have gone down. I had to go to work so left the flat and planned to have a look at it later. So when I returned I tried to figure out what the problem was. It was now asking me to provide a password for the previously open network that we'd joined...not good news at all....So after trying in vain to access any network I could get my hands on, I gave up and decided that we officially didn't have internet. I said it wasn't working to my housemate when she returned - she said hers hadn't been either and that it had done it before and maybe it would work again in a day or two. This didn't look likely to me but I thought it was worth a try. However today it appears to be saying the same thing, therefore leading me to believe that we actually have to stop being naughty and buy our own... I'll discuss it with her if it's not working at latest by the end of this weekend - I will actually go INSANE without internet - it's my pretty much sole form of contact with you lot in Blighty (Skype, MSN, this thing and Facebook have been absolute life savers in terms of keeping me in touch with you kids (and therefore sane)) so being stuck on my own for several hours a day in the flat with nothing but a few books, my music (which I've pretty much exhausted now) and rubbish Spanish telly for company would drive me absolutely up the wall :( That said, there are a few internet cafés around, as well as WiFi in the library down the road, and in Starbucks etc, so hope is not completely lost, however I don't really fancy trekking it about with my laptop on my back at all hours of the evening. So we shall see. Just thought I'd post this so if you don't hear from me for a while, you know why..! Feel free to keep texting and even write to my address (see below) to keep me mentally above water..! Miss you lot loads and the prospect of a house without internet is really not doing my mood any good right now :( - am at work at the moment, hence how I'm able to post this entry lol.

In other news, actually met Cristina (elusive Spanish girl who I was meant to meet for coffee..let's see, sometime last week I think it is now lol) last night for coffee! She's from Tenerife, it turns out (lucky mare lol) and is wicked - chatted for over 2 hours! About anything that came to our heads really - difference in English and Spanish youth cultures, weather, Halloween celebrations, nightlife, where we live, where we've been in Spain/the UK/USA...all sorts! Was ace :) and she even bought me my hot chocolate! (Yes, the AWESOME one...:p) May be meeting up to do something tomorrow night in the way of going out - though this was when I thought there was still some hope that my internet would work.. :s (Oh yeah, feel free to text, it costs me 25p to reply and am running out of credit but will try to - PLEASE don't ring as it costs me even to receive the call and thus will run out my credit this way as well..! Will try and get on Skype asap. Will probably be able to get on Steph's internet very soon - tried last night but didn't work but sure one of the boys will help me to, it's worked fine before.)

Love you and miss you all tons, not too long til I'm back now though! Can't believe it's November tomorrow already..! Madness..

Keep sending me all your news, emails/facebook messages etc will still be there for me when I can get online :) thankies :)

xxxxxxxxx

Address!!

At long last, here tis! Sorry kids...

Nikki Tomlinson,

C/ Galileu, 40 3° 2ª

08028 BARCELONA

(Spain!)

There you are my lovers, lots of lovely letters now eh?! ;p

Dentist time today.....wish me luck! :s

os quiero todos xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Monday Monday..

A Brief Chronicle of Today's Events:

Started work at 10am as per; well, ish - had been over to Mum's hotel to drop off a copy of the Barcelona magazine so she could find out what stuff was going on that they might have a look at (see, we offer practical services! :D) but alas, she wasn't up, so I abandoned that mission and strolled (at a leisurely pace, naturally..) across the square to the office. Had a brief chat with Juan the doorman (legend) who was coming down in the lift when I was waiting to go up lol; spent the moments normally taken up trying to disengage brain from Sleep Mode hurriedly racking cortexes for Spanish knowledge in order to decipher his Hispanic mumblings; think he said something about having seen Steph and her seeming a lot happier now her parents were here lol. I agreed and said mine were also here; he nodded and said something about family being 'lo mas importante' (the most important thing). Wise words, Juan. lol. So on I went to the office..another day, another morning spent catching up with Steph for as long as possible on the previous night's happenings, in order to avoid checking an inbox you know won't contain anything useful and opening a few Internet browser windows in a vain attempt to start some 'research' (which actually culminates in scouring the MSN and BBC homepages for any vaguely entertaining articles lol. My search results today? Men's Health articles are actually pretty interesting!...Yes, procrastination levels have reached that point..). Maybe even cracking open the occasional Word document if you were feeling ambitious in that you might actually write some words of your own..! Lol. Sooo yup, one Monday morning successfully whiled away..!

Eventually 1.00 rolls around and Steph and I head over to Starbucks, having decided we'd treat ourselves (and that we couldn't be arsed making lunch :p) so we pick up a (really good!) toasted sandwich and munch on that while having a natter about...nothing in particular as I remember lol, tends to be the way when eating! We then decided, despite only having 5 minutes left of our break, that we would treat ourselves even more to a muffin for Steph and this piece of raspberry and white chocolate cheesecake I'd been eyeing up, which we escorted back into the office to pick at while embarking upon the afternoon's 'work'...

I must have managed to crowbar a bit of productivity in somewhere, as somehow my article on Christmas Traditions in Valencia is now pretty much written (well, insofar as it's over the word limit...lol) so apparently my fingers met keyboard at some point, even if my brain wasn't factored into the equation..! Spent the final hour of the day blasting tunes on my iPod and getting even more distracted, as I recall....then the blessed 4.00 rolls around and we slide out the door to freedom :D

After that I wandered across the street to meet Mum outside the hotel; KT was still in the shower, despite me having said I'd meet them at 4...typical, lol. So I went and monged about in their room for a bit, before we headed off to the Metro on our way to Parc Guell (a.k.a. just about my favourite place in the world...EVER... :D). Numerous escalators mounted in hilly roads ensued....all completely and utterly worth it, as always. I only went yesterday and I was still so glad to be back :) I LOVE it.. honestly, there's something about Gaudi's stuff in general, but this park is just a phenomenon...I was wandering around it yesterday and thinking, man, I wish he could see what he's done for Barcelona, as there were so many kids running around, parents and grandparents sitting on the benches, leaning over like children themselves, admiring in wide-eyed awe the view of the myriad of rooftops stretching out to the sea.... ahhh it's just breathtaking. :) The hill with the cross is now one of my favourite places also. And the acoustics under the courtyard with all the pillars supporting it were absolutely incredible, as they always have been. Nothing like hearing a classical Spanish guitar piece ringing out into the evening air in a place like that. Absolutely stunning :D 

Anyway, I could rave about that place forever, will stop..! Oh actually, we went inside Gaudi's house as well..first time I'd been in it...sooo cool. I love that man! What a legend.

So then we traipsed back down the hill to the Metro, and headed back, planning to get said INCREDIBLE hot chocolate, but by which point everyone (especially KT) was hungry, so we decided hot chocolate will wait til tomorrow and that we'd head straight for tapas. Went to El Bosc (Wood bar - amazing) briefly, but then discovered they only really do sandwiches, by which point KT was practically eating the fake leaves hanging from the ceiling, so we threw one last cursory glance around the place and spooled on. Found a reasonable tapas place (Café Joan - pronounced as in the old lady's name by KT - actually more like Juan lol) and hastily scoffed a few plates of patatas bravas, croquetas and pan con tomate. Yum :) Mum and I had a glass of Sangria each - was particularly good there, actually - which made us rather drowsy, lol - but KT had now decided that she was properly tired, and pretty much just wanted to go back to the hotel and sleep. At 8pm. Lol, now maybe it's just me, but that's a poor effort from a 16 year old, Kate! :p We nevertheless had a meander around Plaza Reial and I showed them the restaurant we hope to go to tomorrow night, Les Quinze Nits (yes, the amazing one I've been on about since I first went there at the end of my first week :D) - and we also spotted the jazz club/bar we'd noticed had some jazz on tonight. So I went and asked about when it was on, whether there were seats, how much tickets were etc, and we marked that down as an option, but first had to drop KT back at the hotel because by this point she was practically bedding down on the flagstones...*sigh* kids! :p

Sooo Madre and I headed back down to the Jazz bar...4€ for a wicked set by a 7 piece band - 2 vocalists, Spanish guitarist, bassist, drummer, trumpet player and cellist. Awesome :D No seats so everyone was just sat on the flagstones like kids in a school assembly..! Was so cute :) loved it. Perfect wind down to a Monday evening :) Headed off at 11ish because of Metro shutting at 12 on weeknights; grabbed a falafel durum on the way back from a passing shop front (my new night-time snacking vice lol), yum :D Wandered back to Metro and had a surprisingly quick trip back home. Got in, nestled in PJs, lit some incense and here I am! Pretty wicked Monday if you ask me :D

Steph has the day off tomorrow, so I'm anticipating a particularly boring day in the office lol...though if I do get really stuck, I suppose I could actually edit this article and write the other one lol...that would mean actual work though.... :p Meeting the mischiefs for said amazing hot chocolate at lunch though, which shall be my sustenance throughout the morning! :D yaayyy!

Had better head to bed now, has been a long day and will no doubt be another one tomorrow...! Bring it owwnnn..

Love you all so much kids, wish you were here with me. This place is amazing... xxxxxxxxxxx

Lo que me mola de BARCELONA!

What Rocks about BARCELONA: 

- My gorgeous flat with bills included for €330 (about £260) a month, with bills included and roof terrace!

- The awesome tapas served on every corner

- The way everyone says 'Hola' to you even having just stepped in a lift with you/walked past you in a changing room/seen your face for the first time..!

- The way there's always something random happening - a protest in the street, a festival in the square with fireworks - the Catalans are always up for some random fun and are so expressive

- The young people's awesome style and love for piercings! 

- The cheap and efficient transport, especially the Metro - I know people complain but yeah, it may be sweaty and often busy, but it's soo handy and quick, and so cheap compared to Blighty!

- The cute little shops and bars

- The Ramblas and shops, especially the markets!!

- The gorgeous architecture, no building is the same

- The crazy nightlife - there's always something happening, everyone's up for a great night and places don't shut til around 6.30am! :D

That'll do for now, some friends are down for the weekend so we're gonna cook and get our rave on then head on over to their hostel to get the night started! Mum and KT are coming over tomorrow night so can't wait for that :) Will update properly soon, can't believe how fast time is going..! Love you all tons xxxxxx

Enferma! :( bum

Woahh ok so I officially haven't written in a fortnight! I'm normally quite good at these things..oh dear..

So anyway, not sure I can update a whole 2 weeks with much detail, but I'll try and recall bits..! 

Weeks probably consisted mostly of work, interspersed with Starbucks lunchtime coffee breaks and bashing the gym afterwards....loving my gym! Weekends mainly include a massive lie-in on Saturday, then going out on Saturday night and having crazy nights til 7.30am...then sleeping away the majority of Sunday as well, and perhaps going to the cinema on Sunday night (weekend before last we went to see Tropic Thunder in Spanish! - pretty predictable stuff, but was good for a laugh and also interesting to see how they translated it in Spanish!) Then this weekend just gone I did my first solo international trip (!) to Manchester :D! Had to find the bus station which I'd never been to, but was indeed only about a 10-15 minute walk from work, in a straight line..! Then caught a bus to Girona airport which took just over an hour, again very easy :) arrived at airport around 3.30 for my flight which was at 6, so read and chatted to some Scottish people for a bit, went through security (only took a minute as I'd already checked in online) and found a nice terrace café where I got a snack and sunbathed for an hour!! Perfect :) 

Manchester, as predicted, was awesome :) was so great to see everyone again! Had a night out and a couple of trips to the cinema, as well as an amazing 3 course meal Quinny cooked me :) was such a great visit! People must think I'm crazy being in Spain and pining for Manchester! You just can't beat a bit of Blighty..

So I arrived back yesterday morning after a very early start; had been granted the morning off work because of flight times, which was good. Went back and basically spent the afternoon with Steph, chatting and catching up. As the day wore on, I noticed I was constantly having to blow my nose..not a good sign..and by the time we'd gone home from work I had pretty much decided I'd hit full blown cold :( Went out for tapas for tea as I had no food in from the weekend - went to Bracafé, definitely one of our new favourites! Very smiley chatty waiter and great tapas - I had a salad for 2,50€ which was very generous and amazing! Tuna, egg, olives, the lot! So that was really nice. By the time I'd got home though, I felt very rough, and decided that today wasn't looking likely in terms of work. So I allowed myself a nice long sleep today to try and recharge (12 hours, nice!) and have vegged out watching Spanish tv/reading on the roof to relax myself. Being ill is pretty rubbish, but it has given me the opportunity to recuperate, so it's ok in some ways.. 

Have just found out our friend Karen from our course at Manchester is coming to visit on Friday!! She was out here for a couple of months over summer, before I arrived, and is now in Perpignan in the south of France to work on her French time abroad, so can easily catch the train over :) will be great to see her! Really starting to feel the strain of not knowing many people out here - obviously the place is fantastic but when you have no one to see the sights with, it gets a bit wearing. I joined a group on facebook last night run by a guy from Barcelona, who's been put in charge of raising awareness about events in Barca among all the American students who are here this half of the year, so may sneak along to one of them and meet some people! Also let me know if you start booking flights kids! You can get some really cheap deals if you snap them up early :)!

Hope to speak to you all soon, am often on Skype in the evenings if you fancy a chat, would be lovely to hear from you :) 

Love you all loads! xxxxxxxx

chilled out :)

Weyyy! Wow, time is going really fast, I can't believe I posted that last entry last Thursday and now it's Monday! Crazy!

Today was soo boring at work, but huzzah, another Monday over with! I'm officially moved into my flat now :D and I love it! Was sunbathing on the terrace yesterday :) 25 degrees and sunny, perfect!! Over the weekend we had a pretty chilled Friday night because we were so knackered..watched a film with Alex and Montse (Steph's flatmates) and just vegged out in front of the tv. Had a fantastic lie in which I was much in need of! Saturday night we went out and had a very random night, getting offered discounted entry and drinks in bars and taking whichever offers we could find, drinking sangria and ridiculously generous helpings of spirits while talking in English/Spanish/French to anyone who said hi...another night of stumbling in at 6.30am...fun times! So that wrote off Sunday for another week hehe. Got up at about 2.45 (after my first night in a bed for 2 weeks!) and promptly moved myself up to the terrace to catch some rays :D then went for tapas with Steph to satiate our hangover-hunger pangs (this thing called a bomba is our favourite at the moment - it's basically a big round meat croquette with brava sauce on it - amazing!!) and chilled out some more/did some exercise to try and use some of the energy I'd saved up in my awesome sleep..then went to Steph's and made her special chicken/soy sauce/paella rice/veg combination (awesome) and watched Black Books :) 

As I say, today was pretty damn boring, however when work was over we finally escaped into the glorious sunshine and went on a TopShop hunt! We found it :D! though the clothes here are ridiculously expensive compared with England, so I think I'll be saving that particular spree for when I'm back on English soil hehe. I went round the shops nevertheless for a few 'essentials'...hehe...got some candles for the roof and my room :) and some shower gel (extortionate here..!), a lunchbox hehe, and probably my prize purchase, my new slippers! they are soo cute and I was muchly in need of them; my feet have been getting very cold on the laminate flooring! I then got back and ran up to the terrace, hoping to catch the sun before it went down, but alas, it had already hidden behind another block of flats :( so I sat and read for about half an hour before deciding that I was actually too cold to be sat outside in a vest top and shorts 4 floors up...went to the shop and stocked up on our spectacularly cheap vino - €1.99, did I mention?! and awesome! - as well as some things to experiment for tea...chicken pasta salad which didn't turn out half bad! Also, I stuck the telly on as I was eating, and they had Dr Who on - yes, with Billie Piper - in Catalan!! I was greatly amused :p since then i've just been vegging out in my room really; I lit some incense that I bought from a nice man at the bottom of the Rambla last week and now my room smells all warm and welcoming and cosy :) been reading my Spanish book from the library, which is actually by Will Self, and is a bit bizarre from what I can make out..! Oh well hehe. So tomorrow is another day, but hopefully I'll catch the sun tomorrow! Gym membership starts on Wednesday :) looking forward to it, it's very swanky! 

Love you all loads, get those flights booked yeah?! Come and catch the warm weather!! 

xxxxxxxxxxxxx

Here comes that Friday feeling...!

Ello there!

Has been a really good day! Very sleepy start as went to bed late last night, but spent whole day at work proof-reading magazine (looks like it's going to print tomorrow!!), which was good, nice to kill some time doing something not very taxing! Also took my iPod in which was a very good move, definitely passes the time more comfortably than not-so-impressive Spanish radio! And had pizza for lunch from the Italian fast food place (I know..!) round the corner :) Then Steph and I decided we needed (yes, needed) to go shopping - Steph is in dire need of some new shoes because she currently only has flip flops and keeps stubbing her toe! - so we let ourselves go a little bit hehe :) all the autumn things in the shops are soooo tempting! I went to H&M and picked up, err, several things for doing exercise in...decided it was for a good cause so it was ok!...as well as a jacket (which I did need, honest :) ), a hat in my favourite colour (there's so much of it around this season!! I'm absolutely loving it!! Though it does mean saving is going out the window a bit..) and various other bits and bobs, hehe. There's also this gorgeous winter woolly cardigan in Bershka that I've got in my sights, so maybe I shall get that tomorrow.... :p tee hee. The shopping is too good here! We walked down the Passeig de Gracia last night -  I never knew what they have down there!! We got off the metro and I saw Prada, Louis Vuitton, Chanel, Gucci...!!?! May have to have a gander but there's no way I can let myself loose with the debit card in there..! Also walked past Casa Battlo (one of my favourite Gaudi buildings :D) so I got a photo of that hehe. Went to see fireworks in Placa Espanya last night, they went on for about an hour!! Was one of the best firework displays I've ever seen, if for nothing else but length! And the Montjuic fountains at night....it was awesome :) but anyway, back to today...

...oh yeah! We wandered round the markets at the bottom of La Rambla for a bit (the things there are sooo nice...another place I could spend unearthly amounts of money!) before Steph had to head off to her course, so we went to the Metro and parted ways. I went back to her flat and was faced with her flatmate Alex, who I've heard many tales about but haven't met yet...so we did our introductions and had a chat about Barcelona, Facebook, music etc hehe, and had a cheeky beer. I then had a reeeally good catch up with Ru on Skype - think we nattered for about 2 hours! - which was really cool :) she seems to be doing really well which is awesome! Were trying to find out how we could visit each other but planes from Barcelona to Sweden seem few and far between :s Also had an email from uni saying our grants are due to come in within a week!! So hooray, I won't be so skint!!! :D That definitely cheered me up :) also spoke to short stuff which obviously also put a smile on my face :) We're going to see Pendulum in December!! Yaaaay :D then Steph got home and we made tea which was yummy, and had a nice natter which was all goooood :) now I think it's pyjama time and I reckon we're gonna stick Black Books on, the day just gets better! Not to mention we had our sunshine back today! I was gonna go and bask on my terrace but have stayed at Steph's again so think I may be moving in tomorrow, lol. Reet'o kids, I shall be off to mong out for a wHile :) hope you're all doing good, take care my luvvers, buckets of ginger love to you all :) xxxxxxxxxxxx