American in Spain

A notable change in the weather has taken place this past week. The days of sleeping with the windows open and wearing sandals about town is coming to a close. It’s time to break out the sweaters and long trousers. There’s something about the beginning of autumn that makes me want to go outside and throw an American football around. It surprises me every year, since it’s not one of my top five favorite sports, I’ve never worn a football helmet, and I don’t have a favorite team, but there’s some deep bit of Americanism in me that I can neither control nor explain. Curious, that.
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This summer, I purchased a tiny computer, called a Fitbit, that I wear on my person that tracks my movements when I am both awake and asleep. Then, when I spend a few minutes in my office, with the device still clipped to my clothing, the information about my previous days’ movements are uploaded wirelessly to the internet and a report prepared for me, detailing how much I tossed and turned in my sleep each night and how much exercise I got. The Fitbit is a very advanced pedometer, counting steps and general movements and accelerations, but the integration with The Cloud is what makes the device special.
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If you live in Spain, there is one question upon which you absolutely must have an opinion: Are you a Barcelona or Real Madrid fan? You can be a fan of your local team – Go Racing Santander! – but you still have to pick a side between the two rival fútbol supergiants.

Most Spaniards have some emotional connection to one of the two cities, or sometimes team loyalty is passed down from generation to generation, but for a foreigner like me, I’ve got nothing to go on, so I’ve had to think about which side to choose. By just about every measure, I come firmly down on the side of…
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My two year old now had the mental capacity to reason through simple causal statements like “Mommy is sleeping, because it’s night time, so we need to be quiet,” but the logical side of her brain isn’t yet powerful enough to override the emotional side enough to accept, “It’s night time, so you need to lie down in your crib, be quiet, and have the light off and no one else in the room with you.” She does, however, accept small bargains where good behavior results in her getting something that she wants. Lately I’ve been using this to my advantage.
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For a long time, I have been unable to understand the point of political and social demonstrations and parades and such. I have at least two posts to this effect. What does Congress care if a bunch of rainbow-flag-waving hippies are out on the National Mall? That’s not going to change anyone’s mind!

With the combination of a number of successful political demonstrations – the most successful being that of Egypt – in the first quarter of 2011 and a video lecture I saw on YouTube, I finally had an epiphany about why demonstrations matter, and how they can be effective.
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The Spanish news and gossip media has been aflutter lately with stories about the British royal family. It’s reminded me about a really bizarre phenomenon when it comes to names of members of the royal family. For some reason they are translated into their Spanish equivalent. For instance, the current monarch of England is called Reina Isabel. She and her husband, Principe Felipe have a son, Principe Carlos, who is next in line to the throne. Carlos has two sons, Principe Guillermo and Principe Enrique. That sounds so weird. In no other circumstance are names translated like this.
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Today I wanted to share two of my favorite brainteasers. It’s just by chance that they are so similar, both tricking you into thinking something is missing. Every few years, I forget the trick to the first one – because I’m smart like that – and it stumps me again. The latter puzzle is more of an optical illusion than anything else. Like all good optical illusions, understanding how it works doesn’t ruin your ability to see it.
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My blogrollmate, Simon, shared this article with me today, by a US citizen who has lived in Europe for a decade, about the superiority of American domestic appliances. I must say that, after having spent a decade myself living in four houses and a dormitory in Europe, I agree completely.

Allow me to address my experiences with a variety of appliances.
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It was like flipping a switch. My cute loving toddler turned into a hateful monster.

Nora had a cold last week, so I got her some cough medicine at the local farmácia. It cleared up her cough, but also gave her an upset stomach, diarrhea and vomiting, which made for a terribly long weekend, during which she insisted on watching this video of herself about a thousand times, each time tearing up when her onscreen doppelgänger got upset.

Somewhere among the “Oh, poor thing, she’s so sick,” whining, twenty-four days before her second birthday, a special, dreaded, kind of behavior arose: The Tantrum.
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Nora’s Spanish has taken some leaps and bounds in the past couple weeks, yet her spoken English is lagging behind, and I can’t help but blame myself for it. In the mornings, when I care for her for 3-5 hours depending on when she gets up, I speak only English to her, except when we are around Spaniards in the grocery store. She, however, chooses to speak Spanish to me. There are some exceptions. When she asks for a cookie, she says “Doh-chi!“, and when she wants to get down off of something (e.g. chair, sofa, stroller), she typically says, “Down!”, although she has recently taken to saying “Al suelo!” (to the floor).
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