Category Archives: work

getting back on my feet

25 Wednesday Aug 2010

Posted by in cancer, change, friends, work

≈ 24 Comments

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I’d had such high hopes after last summer about returning to work and getting back on my feet. You may recall that thanks to Manolo and Agustín I was able to spend much of last August in Málaga and Zahara de los Atunes recuperating from the effects of four months on chemo, so by September-October I felt quite ready to get back to work. I thought I’d be able to line up enough English classes to live on while I worked on my other various projects – the big plan was to diversify so that if/when I got sick again there would be at least some work that I could do from home in my pyjamas. Plus I was ready for a change after teaching for almost 20 years, and it also seemed wise to not have all my money making eggs in one basket anymore … boy, was I ever right about that last one. Because it turned out that the teaching market had really bottomed out and I was unable to find enough to live on, especially as I was also helping Nog get teaching work too. And then this summer I lost the apartment next door and the small monthly income from that. So, it’s been a very long and difficult year, but it looks like things are finally coming together…

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bodega day

18 Wednesday Aug 2010

Posted by in Malaga, spain, wine, work

≈ 9 Comments

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Had a great time yesterday. Went out to the bodega late morning and I got a bit of work done there while Victoria took care of some business. Then we went through photos together, made a video, talked about her upcoming work & travel schedule and, after a quick lunch at a small bar around the corner, came back to the bodega to work a bit more. Later on two wine distributors showed up for their tour of the vineyards, so off we went. Got back to the bodega a couple of hours later, hung out some more doing this and that until Victoria drove me back into town. Finally got home around 10.30, tired but very pleased with all we got done. After a nice shower I put on comfy clothes, made a snack, and sat on the sofa watching a DVD (and my favourite port view). It felt good.


This is a view of the vineyards (Granada is just behind that big moutain on the right). There’ll be more pics and info about the harvest and wine pressing later on… I’ve got so much new material to work with that it’ll take awhile to sort it all out. And I’ll have another meeting with Victoria in town one morning this week to review a few things. Did I say how much I love this job?

Back on holiday today.  🙂

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málaga, mi amor…

15 Sunday Aug 2010

Posted by in fiestas, holidays, Malaga, sevilla, spain, travel, trips, wine, work

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Going to Málaga sometimes feel like I’m carrying on a love affair with another city. What if Sevilla finds out? I’d really hate to have to choose between them. Honestly, nobody was more surprised than me when Málaga stole a piece of my heart last summer. Up until then I had never considered living anywhere else but in my beloved Sevilla, but I suddenly found myself checking out areas of town that felt like “home” in the same way that my street in Sevilla does. I came to the conclusion that I couldn’t decide between beachfront or city centre, so just as well that this isn’t a decision I’ll have to make anytime soon, especially if I can keep having occasional visits like this week coming up…

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saturday at the market

18 Sunday Jul 2010

Posted by in food & drink, sevilla, spain, tapas, work

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I’ve been busy working on my revamped azahar-sevilla main page, which will soon (I hope) become a comprehensive and useful Seville info page. Hence I have moved the Sevilla blog over here, and by doing so have also started posting more day-to-day stuff there. Anyhow, most of the work I’ve been doing is still “behind the scenes” and unpublished, and includes a lot of first-hand research visiting places with my trusty camera. So yesterday morning Nog & I took a walk over to the Feria Market, which I hadn’t been to in years, and we had a very nice time. It’s actually Seville’s oldest market and although it was tempting to get some very inexpensive fish we decided to stick to vegetables as we still had lots of errands to run and didn’t think the fish would survive long in the 45º HEAT.

And of course there were tapas involved…

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