Divebomb notations

[petronia]

Back from Barcelona. The joke is Continental does pretty good service recovery, it was all recovery and no service. (Ironically I only flew Continental because I had a $1K certificate... which they gave me as service recovery.) Literally did not make a single connecting flight either way; was in Lisbon for three unplanned hours and Bangor, Maine for one. Luckily I am interested in shiz like aerial flyovers of unfamiliar geography. Lisbon was v. attractive and has been marked down for a proper future visit.

Also: in the continuing saga of my stolen purse, my old passport got flagged when someone tried to enter the US with it illegally, so it was all very Jason Bourne at customs for five minutes there. Mostly I feel sad for whomever it was: unlikely it was eg. a CIA-trained assassin, rather than someone just trying for a better life.

Also-also: I left a very few postcards with the hotel front desk. The last time I tried this, in Rio, they were never sent (or at least none arrived), but the staff was so stellar this round that I'm cautiously optimistic. Srsly, if you're in the 120EUR range for a double/queen in the centre of what my TimeOut app coyly called "Gayxample", I recommend - as opposed to the old city's picturesque, non-taxi-viable, mugging-friendly alleys that looked dodgy even in broad daylight. This is a real consideration when you know you're getting back to the hotel at 4-5AM for three days in a row. ANYWAY THE POINT OF THIS WAS, I meant to complete more cards on the plane and send them out from Montreal, since Canadian mail is more efficient than Spanish anyway, right? but I just learnt that Canada Post is going on strike starting June 2. = =+ So you may not be getting these any time soon, is what I'm saying. (No, there was no card signup post. I consider some of you ppl regular correspondents, is all.)

Other than that, Barcelona was deliciously awesome, Primavera was stellar, and I was on top of my inbox by noon, via sheer superhuman desperation. Some stuff which will probably show up in various formats here and on Tumblr:

* a Barcelona food resource post for bookmarking purposes
* music post - scored some Spanish indie CDs at the Miro Foundation of all places, there was a temp exhibit
* Primavera: the city filled up with Britishers XD not drunk enough for Of Montreal or PIL, too drunk for Flaming Lips (yes I know this seems like it would be hard to achieve; a sorry story there involving malfunctioning technology), Grinderman and Neubauten on different nights, barrier position at Belle and Sebastian and Pulp back-to-back, PJ Harvey (enjoyed this set immensely for an artist whose body of work I don't know at all), James Blake, Jamie XX, Lindstrom, Odd Future... LOL
* went to the beach in Sitges, the Dali Museum in Figueres, and the Cathedral in Girona which was built over a Roman temple
* read 2/3 of Origin of Species - good stuff, comfort reading in fact, clear thinking and proper science - want to talk about this and The Knife's opera (which got it right! so I felt I had the musical version first) and Picasso who also kept pigeons and painted them, and cathedral-building - it's not one fellow with a brainstorm upon viewing some finches, but the distillation of a 20-year, 30-year conversation: a roll call of hundreds of naturalists and geologists and livestock breeders and odd men who spent months putting bits of coloured wax in beehives - although I have a sinking suspicion that were I to ask what Gaudi (and wondrous naturalist he was) thought of the theory of evolution I would not like the answer
* watched on plane: The Hurt Locker and 1.5 Bourne movies
* my Dunnett notes are so extraneously ridic I think I'll post the NYT-style abstract instead

Comments

[rondaview.livejournal.com]

Glad to have you back! Now it's my turn to ask for an address. PM or email me at rondaview@gmail.com please? :D Maui in a week wooooo

(although I'm as yet undecided as to whether I should take Lymond #5 with me on my break. it's that, or a brick ton of Jane Austen. ???)

[uminohikari.livejournal.com]

You enjoyed Origin of Species?? I read it one summer and absolutely hated it. It's so.. verbose.

[petronia.livejournal.com]

Oh yes! I mean, I enjoy the topic - actually just find the stuff about pigeon breeding and slave-making ants fascinating - there are parts I know a lot about and parts I barely know anything about, aspects touched on where science has obv. progressed beyond (it's actually hard to wrap one's present-day perspective around the fact that Darwin drew up this entire thing with no access to the concept of Mendelian inheritance) and others where I have no idea where current thinking is, if it has advanced at all. It's meticulously thought out, and he means to make his argument against detractors, but if you've followed the process you can get through the repetitiveness quite quickly. I think after reading Dunnett I just didn't find the language a particular barrier. XD; Also I just find it weirdly touching? The amount of sheer work that went into it, by Darwin and all these other scientists, professional and amateur - counting seeds, watching insects, dissecting mollusks. But then, OK, I actually found The Knife's Darwin opera (v. abstract stuff) to be moving to the point of tears, and I am literally the only one I know who had that reaction to it. XD;

[kuroraka.livejournal.com]

That Primavera lineup looked almost perfect for me (Grinderman, Neubauten and PJ Harvey...wow!), i wish i could have made it and i wish i didn't hate large crowds...

Did you catch any of the "BARCA WON THE CHAMPIONS LEAGUE!!!" madness?XD

[uminohikari.livejournal.com]

It's fascinating, but I had to sit there and summarize every sentence before I actually understood what he was talking about.

I saw some Dunnett books at the bookstore, and thought of you! But I ended up going with Diana Wynne Jones instead >>

[petronia.livejournal.com]

The crowds were actually not bad! I thought it was going to be a lot worse. I think what it is, is the programming intentionally goes to the level below "mega-band headliner that everyone streams into the main area to see", and stops. The 2AM centre stage bands on each night were: Flaming Lips, Pulp, and Animal Collective. XD; So the crowd always stays fairly spread out over a large area... I've been monitoring the Primavera lineup for a few years and it's been consistent quality. I mean, I picked it over Sonar weekend, that's saying something for me. XDD

I was in the food area and there was some celebratory singing among the food cart staff, who had their radios on, and then Mogwai said something about it onstage. XD And of course there were a lot of ppl wearing Barça shirts in the metro beforehand, including a whole bunch of Asian tourists - like, this team apparently has a lot of Asian fans? LOL I guess I don't always expect Livejournal to reflect real life. The day afterward it was quiet, which was kind of weird, because when Montreal wins an important hockey match ppl riot in the streets = = and if the Italian, Brazilian, Greek etc. communities win at national soccer they drive around with flags out the back windows honking. But in Barcelona everyone just wears soccer shirts (especially the little kids, every boy 12-and-under was in a soccer shirt) and looks happy.

[kuroraka.livejournal.com]

That sounds like a very nice concept. Most of the (big) festivals over here do the 'mega-band headliner' thing which is why i prefer the smaller ones.

I guess Barca has fans everywhere since they play pretty attractive soccer and have the (arguably) best player of the world in their team. Maybe people were busy <a href="http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/05/27/police-clash-with-protesters-in-barcelona/<i>with the protests</i>?

[petronia.livejournal.com]

That happened just in time for Jarvis Cocker to have someone to dedicate "Common People" to, yeah. XD;

(Jokes aside it's awful that the police went in like that, I was there on the previous Sunday and it was completely peaceful. There were little kids playing ball for cripes' sake. There were students camping out in the square in Girona as well, and many other cities.)