Why oh why oh why oh why did I answer my phone at 8am on my day off? The behaviour of an idiot. It's like I've never been a welfare officer - the first rule of being a welfare officer is do not answer the phone, the second rule of being a welfare officer is do not answer especially when you are in bed, before 10am on your day off, especially when you haven't had a lie in for two weeks. Well that all went out the window. 8 am Friday, phone rings. It's Elsa telling me that Amandine and I need to go in to Uni to see a conference on teaching maths in the classroom, never mind that it's my day off, that I don't teach maths, that it will be in English, a language Amandine doesn't speak. We get showered and dressed, and wait for a lift in to Uni. It's not until about 10 till 9 that we realise there's a large chance that our lift has already left. It has. We gave up, rather early to be honest, but walking through the heat to squeeze on a bus and be bumped around for a while, is more than I'm prepared to do for a conference on teaching maths.
My birthday was lovely.7.37 woke up to a message from London, into work and spanish class, getting taken to cake shop, huge strawberry cheese cake, lunch, maestos and friends, and people I can't remember the name of, photos, photos, returning home, sweaty and tired, get dragged excitedly upstairs, given a bunch of flowers almost as tall as I am, Paddington bear, slightly teary, message from London, into barrio antiguo, Tomoyo, Becky, Amandine, Amy, Tony, little restuarant, with books, candles, Italian food, sol and lime and salt, chat and laughter (Tomoyo says Japanese men are feisimo - how do you spell that?, but we should all get a Japanese man because they don't talk back, quietly work very very hard and have big hearts. She is currently travelling as far as I can tell, to gawp at all the attractive men, before she goes back to her feo japanese novio, her words not mine!), bar art, lamps and chairs and sofas and not enough room on the balcony, men who look like dads with moustaches playing music, the keyboard with more than a hint of Blackpool or Phoenix Nights, sang Happy Birthday to me, tequila longer than my index finger, hurried panicked search for keys that someone else had and bundled into taxis, attempts not to be charged foreigner prices - Tomoyo goes as far as massaging the taxi driver's shoulders, repeating '60...60..', we still travel the long way round, through the dark dark streets to home. And getting up at 7.40 the next morning. The tequila causing a big enough dent in my immune system to let a nasty cold be finally victorious.