Midlife Milk-crisis

I think I am currently faking a mid-life crisis, which at my age is rather scarey because despite my peevish teenage insistance that I would not live long, I would rather like to.

Poor Dani has a lot to contend with.

We woke, or rather, I woke this afternoon at about 3pm to the beautiful sound of moving furniture upstairs. I am convinced that the witches bought football-boots intentionally just to clomp around in, whilst one of them flicks incessantly through the TV channels, just to spite us. Occasionally we hear them, Darth-Vader-like, climbing the stairs. Poor auld Dani woke up to me staring at him with what he calls "THAT look", which as far as I can figure out is when I desperately want to tell him how messed up my head is right now but I don´t.

Of course, since I wouldn´t tell him what was wrong and nothinged my way out of it, he just went back to sleep, but kept waking to find me staring at him. I would probably be freaked out by my own behaviour but it doesn´t seem to faze him at all. He even laughed and called me a weirdo the third time he caught me at it. How nice - one less thing to worry about. Anyhow, eventually I booted him out of bed with a combination of sneezes, pokes and kisses, and yes, I even resorted to a cup of Cola Cao. I called our friend Darren and arranged to meet him down in the Milk bar in half an hour.

The Milk Bar is a new bar owned by an Irish couple just off Via Laietana, which is situated in an area of Barcelona called Barri Gotic, the medieval quarter of the city. Many buildings here are from the 12th century and the streets are mostly pedestrianised and flanked with tall stone buildings that keep the cool in during the heat of the day. Lots of the city´s clothes markets are located here, along with a fair amount of the new designer shops that seem to be infesting the place of late. There are oodles of mad boho cafes and bars, and every so often you turn a corner to find a lovely little terrace on which you can sit and have a beer or cava.

A beautifully decorated place, the Milk bar is probably the type of place I would avoid in Dublin due to it´s cool crowd, but the atmosphere here is really relaxed. The bar is low-lit emerald green, the seats are brown and red soft 60s style stools and sofas, and one wall is covered with a lovely white and blue patterned wallpaper, with parrots and flowers, old-style. There is a mosaic on the floor reminicent of Arabian tiles in bright colours. The toilets are scrupiously clean and you could spend hours reading the comic book collage that covers the walls. The staff chat with everyone, and best of all the cocktails are delicious and reasonably priced (3.50 during Happy Hour), and the food is delicious. Definately worth the visit.

We sat drinking our Mojitos and White Russians and Daquiris until Dani had to go off to work in that kip in Port Olympico. Then I proceeded to whinge a bit about what the hell am I doing type things until I had to go to work. Darren invited us to his place this weekend to play some music, and maybe even do some recording (in the long run). I can´t wait. I think a large part of my problem at the moment has to do with my work-sleep-work lifestyle, and that I am partly projecting this onto Dani, who has been nothing but sweet about my behaviour of late.

But now, with 4 hours to go of the night-shift at work, I will cease my rambling, and resume my reading of the papers. Dani gets a laugh out of my daily news reports, which cover anything from sports through to the caffeine percentages of various drinks I don´t want before bedtime. I must remember to buy some more milk, or Leche De Toro, as Dani would have it. Being an avid milk-connoiseur, he insists that the milk here is from bulls because the taste is so bad...