Category Archives: tapas

twitter lunch

10 Friday Jul 2009

Posted by in food & drink, friends, internet, restaurants, sevilla, tapas, twitter

≈ 4 Comments

anna & pedro

The other day I met the lovely Anna on Twitter via a mutual acquaintance and, after tweeting back and forth a bit, I asked if she would like to meet up for a cold beer one day. And yesterday was the day. The plan was to meet for a pre-lunch beer and so I suggested Zaragoza 64 because they serve excellent Galician beer there, far superior to the pale and tasteless Cruz Campo, which is the bog standard lager sold in bars here. I’m not much of a beer drinker but I really like the taste of Galicia Estrella.

At the last minute Anna also invited her very charming Twitter friend Pedro to join us and – you guessed it – we ended up having lunch. A wonderful time was had by all. Very pleasant company, lots of laughs, including the very satisfying discovery that we are all “strong and bossy” types, which led to a few good anecdotes about those who feel the need to label decisive people “bossy”. We are also all a bit gadget crazy (who me?) and I couldn’t help but smile when Pedro took out his iPhone to send a few tweets. And also all expats – from Italy, Venezuela & Canada.

So, it was my first ever twitter lunch – hopefully the first of many.

(food pics below…)

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food porn

06 Monday Jul 2009

Posted by in cancer, food & drink, health & happiness, photos, restaurants, sevilla, spain, tapas

≈ 15 Comments

romero prawn nests

I don’t know how many calories these babies have and I don’t care.

After doing some Saturday morning errands and a bit of grocery shopping the other day, Nog & I stopped in for a tapa at one of our favourite bars, Bodeguita Romero. Everyone there knows about the cancer so, as I hadn’t been there in a few months, a full health update was required by the bar staff and Pedro Romero, the owner. After that was taken care of we tried something new on the menu – these really fabulous prawns wrapped in crispy fried potato threads. Then Pedro gave us a free sample of another new tapa they are trying out (see below). Little brie-filled pastries, kind of like spring rolls. The one on the left has spinach and the other one leeks. Also very nice.

All of this reminded me that I have been neglecting my Sevilla Tapas site, which still needs a lot of work done on it. So that is going to be one of my projects this week. In between yoga and breathing and walking and healing…

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summer holidays

01 Wednesday Jul 2009

Posted by in cancer, change, chemo, fitness, friends, health & happiness, holidays, home, hope, life stuff, naps, tapas, yoga

≈ 18 Comments

SummerSun

I proclaim today as the beginning of my summer holidays!

Back when I mentioned my need to take some Time Out there were still several matters to attend to and get organised before I felt I could really relax and focus on taking some quality healing time. So most of June was spent “taking care of business” and getting through some pretty rough chemo. To wit, I have also decided that I’m done with the infusions and won’t be taking the sixth one. If they let me I’ll still do the sixth round of chemo mid-July, but only taking the dreaded Xeloda, which has a slightly less toxic effect on me. After the last infusion I got a very clear message from my body that it was DONE with that shit and really couldn’t take any more. And since my last PET scan was clear, I think I can take my body’s advice on that.

So for the next two months it’s going to be all about healing, yoga, long walks, healthy diet, cats, friends and – most importantly – taking time to breathe. I also have a few projects to work on, but just poco á poco when I feel up to it. And Nog & I want to get casa az de-cluttered and set up so we can both work here in comfort come September.

What will you be doing this summer?

celebration

14 Sunday Jun 2009

Posted by in cancer, change, food & drink, friends, health & happiness, home, hope, life stuff, love, philosophy, photos, tapas

≈ 4 Comments

becerrita(click on pic to enlarge)

On this week’s A Day at the Hospital post I told you that something wonderful had happened and that Nog and I went out to celebrate. Later I told you the reason for celebrating, but I never told you what we did. By the time we left the hospital that day it was almost 2 o’clock and, since I knew I had some extra cash, I decided it was high time I treated Nog to a tapa snack as he has been treating me since I got sick and haven’t been able to work.

And so we took the bus over to Becerrita and had a lovely tapa lunch. Calamares, lamb in honey sauce, potato croquettes and pork tenderloin with wild mushrooms. Then a nice walk home while I thought about the email I was going to send “Bob” that evening.

To be honest, every day has been a celebration since I was given the amazingly fabulous gift of a month to heal. It’s really changed my life and I am suddenly appreciating all the “little things” so much more. I guess I’d been feeling kind of hopeless and at the end of my rope, and so being given this chance to do things the way I feel I need to in order to get better ended up starting a whole series of positive changes. Still taking baby steps, but doing a little every day.

Having hope again is a wonderful thing.