Everyday is a start of something beautiful.

So today was just another day in paradise and my kids were great today.  Even the kids that have a hard time paying attention: GREAT.  I have decided that holidays aren't just around to give people an excuse to eat in excess and have parties, they are here to give teachers a reason to be excited for lesson planning.  My kids are eating up halloween classes like little american kids eat up nasty candy corn.  We have been singing and dancing and watching movies all week and they actually like it.  The kids that act too cool for school STILL were dancing the cha cha slide and singing the addams family theme song with me. HOLLA!!  It's a bit exhausting for me to always be a flaming ball of energy at school but I have come to the overwhelming conclusion that if I stay busy, the kids stay busy.  If I'm having fun, the kids are having fun.  If I am willing to act like a complete idiot, the kids are willing to act like complete idiots as well.  fan-freakin-tastic.  I have also just talked to an old roommate from Ireland and we have decided to have a reunion in Barcelona in a few weeks and i am soooooooo excited to see him!  I feel like it's been forever!  So, looking at my schedule, I am going to be a VERY busy bee all the way thru the new year.  Every day I leave my house around 7 or 8 depending on the day and come home around 10.  The weekends are the only times I really don't have things scheduled...until now.  This weekend crazy Ali Gibbs is coming for halloween so clearly I wont be getting any sleep for the next 3 days.  Next weekend I'll be visiting the dashing James Harrell III in Budapest, the following week I'm going to Barcelona with Brian, the following weekend is Thanksgiving.  That concludes November and starts crazy December.  The first weekend we'll be going ot Amsterdam and then heading down to Germany to celebrate my birthday, the following weekend I am taking the LSAT and the weekend after tha tis my last weekend in Madrid because the following Wednesday I'll be getting on a plane back to the good ol' USof A.  Holy crap, I'm a bit tugged out just thinking about it but I serisously can't wait for all the crazy escapades to come!  Not to mention all the amazing people I'll be meeting along the way.  After meeting people at random around the world I'm starting to realize that things aren't really random at all.  I think you meet everyone in your life to serve a purpose.  Maybe you don't know exactly what it is at first, but all things come back around.  So, like I said before, everyday is a start of something beautiful and I'm coming to the point now where I literally can't wait to wake up to start a new day.  gaaaahhhhhh I LOVE MY LIFE!!!

It finally happened. CRAZY metro ride

So, remember when I said I had a great weekend and on Monday, after a great day I predicted that this week was going to be nothing short of the bees' knees?? lies.  all poppycock nonsense.  I woke up yesterday with a MASSIVE cold and felt under the weather all day teaching.  I felt sooo bad for the kids, how are they supposed to be excited to learn when their teacher is being a huge crabby patty??  my bad.  So this morning is my waayyy early morning and I woke up feeling less than par and headed for the metro ride to school.  Everything was business as usual on the yellow line for exactly 2 stops.  And then it happened.  I felt a HUGE tug of my hair, whiplash, and then I was on my ass.  What. The. Heck.  After I realized I wasn't dreaming I looked over to see a man with a fist full of my hair siezing on the ground next to me.  I guess on the way down he reached out to try to catch himself and got a monster grip on my blonde locks.  He had an episode for about 3 minutes which seemed like about 4 lifetimes with my hair in a horrible death grip and NOBODY would help.  They all stepped about 2 steps back and watched as this man literally looked like he was dying and all i could do was hold his head so it wouldn't hit the ground and try to keep from freaking the F out.  He finally came to and sat up clearly not knowing where he was.  Someone eventually pulled the E-brake and we were able to get him off the metro and my hair was given back to the proper owner.  I was about 5 minutes late to class and told the teacher I work with all about it.  her response?? "yeah, it was the first time but it wont be the last, the metro is very unpredictable".  2 things with that statement caught my attention.  1-SHE WASN'T SURPRISED BY MY STORY!! like that shit happens every day or something. 2-her first sentence implied that someone will have an episode on the metro and pull me down by my hair again but her second sentence told me that the metro was unpredictable.  A bit of a contradiction, dontcha think???  Either way this morning was mad crazy.  HOWEVER, since it's the week of halloween I shared a bunch of pictures with them as well as songs and movie clips from halloween in the US.  I then taught them the monster mash and "casper" cha cha slide.  For today, I was more popular than the tooth fairy with these kids.  The bad thing?? they REALLY liked the cha cha slide, i have a feeling that today isn't the last time we'll be doing that one.  Clearly shot myself in the foot there.

it's a BEAUTIFUL day in the Barrio :D:D:D

Drink. It. Up, y'all!  It's officially fall and it feels soooo good!!  The leaves are turning, the buckeyes are falling and the temperature is finally bearable and I am loving every minute of it!  Not like I haven't been completely in love with my time here yet, but I do believe it just got a bit better.  Also, as a complete side note: when you look on my facebook and it says "my life couldn't get any better, i'm completely in love"  I am clearly talking about Spain, people!!  You all know me, and my incapability of actually being in love with someone outside the Flynn clan.  DOOIIIII!!  so sick of explaining to people that one to y'all... AAANNNYYYYwho...it's Halloween week at school and it's FANTASTIC!! i love halloween and I am soo lucky that my kids love it just as much.  We worked all day today on all things halloween and it really makes me want to go back to costume parties in Mrs. DiGrossi's 4th grade class.  I, however, am in charge and I will say, it's not as good but it's pretty flippin close :)  There really isn't a whole lot to talk about today, I surprising didn't get into too many shennanigans.  Woke up, went to work, had a fab day at school (like always!!) went to my private lesson I teach at Dunkin Donuts (YEESSS, i picked the location...jealous??) and then learned just a bit more in my spanish class this evening.  It is now 11pm, I still have a bit of planning to do and it looks like i'll be  hitting the sheets before Midnight. GAAHHH what a great Monday, people!  This is going to be a great week, I can already feel it. :)

Just livin. L-I-V-I-N.

6 bottles of wine, bottle of vodka, 40 of beer, and mixers.

So, this picture represents exactly what happens when Michael and I are in charge of going to the grocery store :)  What can I say??  I finally found someone who appreciates a good time just as much as I do and I couldn't be more pleased with my roomies.  I feel soo spoiled here and I must say: I am so fine with that.  I have amazing roommates, I'm meeting amazing people and everything just keeps falling into place.  Perrrrrrfect.  I think everyone that reads this can agree that I am happiest when I get what I want and lately I've been getting basically everything that I want.  Just a recap of the past week:  Started off great with a solid tumble down the metro stair at 7 AM monday morning.  AWESOME.  I saw the train there and started to step off the first step, completely stepped out of my shoe and BOOM BOOM BOOM.  Down I went.  I lost both my shoes BUT I didn't drop my computer so i'm going to call it a success.  After I collected, my shoes, dignity, and other belongings I caught the next train and had a great day at school.  Spanish class was great and we got drinks after again which has become a great little addition to the week.  It forces me to speak spanish and I get a little bit of relaxation after a crazy day.  Tuesday's classes were awesome and I presented my final project in one of the classes.  This is the official mark that I am one class down in my masters program, 7 to go!!  aaahhh time is flying.  it's soo insane to realize that I am already almost 2 months deep.  I feel like i just got here! way weird.  Wednesday is my longest day of the week, however it is also the fasted day of the week and classes were great, running very smooth.  I am seriously soo lucky that my students like me and the things I was doing with them.  I think all you people out there reading this that knew me in my high school days can verify that I wasn't the most desireable student and I am so lucky that my students don't try to pull half the shit I did when I was their age :)  Friday was great and I think after some talk, I may be doing this again for another year??  After classes I went back to another teacher's house and she helped me decide on a master's thesis project and cooked me dinner. yuuummmm I love spanish food.  love.  LOVE.  After that I rushed home, threw my soccer clothes on and met my team for a friday night game in our league.  You know I don't like tooting my own horn but...TOOT TOOT baby, I'm the only girl on my team and I was the only person that scored, helping us win 1-0. hooolllleeerrrrrrr!!!  Saturday was a little crazy and my roommate has a friend that is in the Army and is stationed in Germany and was here for the weekend so we met him and another guy from the Army out at another friends house.  We all went out together, things escalated quickly and we stumbled drunkenly into our door at about 5 AM.  Not a bad night out amigos, not a bad night at all.  I slept in/stayed in bed until about 4 this afternoon and then met a few people in Retiro for a quickly Sunday Funday beer in the park.  I know I keep telling everyone at home, but I really can't believe how great my life is with my work, friends, and crazy adventures.  I wish all of you could be here experiencing everything with me but I guess updating this as often as possible is as close as I can get to sharing everything with you.  i PROMISE to try to get with the program and blog more often!  promise :)  Love all you guys sooo much, can't wait to see everyone in December!  it'll be here well before you know it...

Tengo el mundo en mi clase de espanyol

Getting settled back into the fast pace of Madrid living is way easier than I thought and I still can’t believe how great things are here.  The only problem is that everything is going by so quickly!! I feel like I am just living someone else’s crazy dream and I’m just waiting for them to wake up and burst my spanish bubble.  But, in the mean time, I plan on enjoying this crazy time I call life.  I went for it and finally bought my ticket to Budapest and will be there for the first long weekend in November.  Seriously, I can’t wait to get some QT with my James :)  I’m seriously so excited for this weekend that I can barely stand it!  The only thing getting me by is knowing that time is flying and it will get here before I know it!!  I also was just informed that my crazy DFW (down for whatever) lax friend from college will be in Madrid with me for the weekend of Halloween.  AAAAAHHHHH!!!!!!!  Before I know it we’ll be celebrating American Thanksgiving and then I’ll be sailing thru the skies on a plane home to be reconnected with my heart <3 in Ohio.  I feel like I should be writing a book on how amazing things are going right now but I wouldn’t be doing life justice because I wouldn’t be able to squeeze all my amazing memories into just one book!  Life is good ladies and fellas, life is reeeaaaallll good.  I’m slowly learning my way thru the spanish language and my classes are going pretty well.  I am the only girl in the class but it’s great because I have 5 guys in there with me from all over the world.  There guys are from Poland, England, South Korea, Italy, and a crazy Dutch guy from the Netherlands.  I say crazy because I mean he is soo freaking funny.  He has a house in Holland that he drives to every once in a while and we have already decided that I’ll be in attendance for the next road trip!  hahaha, he seriously has no idea what he is getting himself into but I’m sure we’ll have a good time.  On top of that our teacher is a Spanish guy (obviously!) so we represent 7 countries and you should hear our conversations we have with each other during our after class beers that we all get together in Sol.  If I could just work and go to Spanish classes I would have it so made over here.  I am not a huge fan of my masters classes only because they are about 1.5 hours away and they are 4.5 hours long so it’s about a 7.5 hour ordeal every Tuesday and Thursday after work that I have to go thru.  Such a long day!! But, who knows...maybe next year I’ll be over here just teaching and taking more spanish :)  Spanish is such a beautiful language and I’m getting to the point where I can understand most of it when I read it and when others talk to me but it is soooo frustrating that I can’t carry on conversations yet!  I’ve been here for about 5 weeks now, that should be enough time to become fluent, right?!?!  Clearly I got my dad’s patience...

Buckle up readers, this is going to be a long one...

Click to make it bigger :)

Ladies and gentlemen, i am sooo sorry to have dropped the ball so badly.  It turns out when you are teaching all day, taking spanish classes every Monday and Wednesday night, taking masters classes every Tuesday and Thursday night and planning for everything in between...you get a little busy!  BUT I am back from being MIA and I have some stories to share with you all :)  So teaching has been every bit as exhausting as I have mentioned in the past and fortunately just as enjoyable as well.  My kids are soo amazing and I love every minute with them.  They are such fast learners and I seriously can't believe how well they are adapting to classes in english with me.  Some kids are making huge efforts to be able to talk to me in english and I feel completely blessed to have the opportunity to work with them.  There have been some awkward situations along the way but I guess that is just how I roll, know what I'm sayin??  Like about a week ago I called a woman that I am friends with here and when she picked up I guess she thought it was her boyfriend (she is about 70) and picked up and greeted me with a very erotic "Hello sex kitten, prrr prrrr".  Well I went ahead and laughed about this with my father for quite a while and he left me a voicemail on my computer making fun of the situation.  When you leave a voicemail on my computer it goes directly to my itunes so I can play it later.  Well not thinking any thing of it I was teaching a lesson and was showing my kids a clip of a lacrosse game off my itunes so we could talk about it and after the clip was over my dad's voice mail comes on and thru the surround sound speakers in the class of my private catholic school was my dad's voice saying "hello sex kitten, prrrr prrrrrr".  Awesome.  Laughter ensued and they were all trying to figure out why I had lied to them about not having a boyfriend.  To try to fix the problem I said "no no guys, that wasn't my boyfriend...that was my dad."  Whoops, hello awkward, nice to see you again.  Or in my class with my 12 and 13 year olds they are learning how to describe people and the teacher for them told me how excited they were to share an activity with me.  I stood in front of the class and one boy raised his hand, stood up, and said to me "Brenna, you have very big breasts."  "Thanks, Javi" I said, "Sit down please."  The next boy raised his hand, stood up, and said "Brenna, you have nice shapely legs." "Wow, Nacho, thanks for noticing.  Um, I feel uncomfortable, I'm going to sit down now.  I suggest you do the same." was all I could manage to say.  After about 20 minutes of the kids describing me I realized that they were given the sheet from above and were told to describe me.  After I sat down the teacher that gave this to the students and told them it was a little innappropriate his response was "But Brenna, the kids love you.  You are very sexy, they were very excited to describe you."  Let me be the first to tell you that the spanish have no idea what is and what isn't appropriate and clearly I am in no position to tell them otherwise.  After a complete day of feeling judged and slightly violated I spent the next few hours in class, came home, made dinner and worked out a lesson plan for the rest of the week that didn't involve words like "breasts" and "shapely legs" and I have to tell you, I am pretty sure they can describe most people without embarassing them now.  A job well done, Flynn.  After another long and crazy week, this past weekend Christina and I ventured to the Netherlands for a quick vacation.  When I say quick I mean it flew by.  We met some nice people on the plane and a guy from Madrid that was going to the same place we were so we took the train from Eindhoven to Amsterdam with him and parted ways, making sure we had plans to meet back up and fly home together since we were on the sam flight back.  We met up with a friend of mine and his teammate in Amsterdam and took a quick tour of the city.  Of course this included the red light district.  I must confess that I was a little uncomfortable with all the gadgets and women on display.  Call me old fashioned, but not only did those contraptions on display make me uncomfortable, but I was unaware that sex included so many objects that needed to be plugged in and woman that stand in front of a window for everyone to see when they walked by.  V to the omit.  I didn't mind leaving that place.  After a huge dinner of dutch pancakes my friend took us back to his place in Leeuwarden and we stayed with him for the next two nights.  It was so amazing and we didn't even accomplish that much.  It's weird that I had to travel to another country just to relax a bit and get some quiet time in but it worked and I loved every minute of it.  Obviously there was some craziness and we didn't leave Holland without a few crazy times full of booze, preverted comments, and nudity but I can assure you that none of this nonesense involved me and I was actually a very responsible, law abiding citizen during our stay.  After a whirlwind of a visit, my friend drove us back into Amsterdam, we took the train to Eindhoven where we met up with our buddy from the plane and waited with him for our flight.  We arrived in Madrid in one peice and ready for a good nap so we followed our friend to the metro where we found out he lived about 5 minutes from us, parted ways with dos besos (2 kisses) and called it a day.  When we came home we climbed into bed and napped the rest of the day.  Since it is a national Holiday here in Spain we had off school and classes on Monday and today so I am finally back to the grind of making lesson plans for the week, finishing up my homework and hopefully going to bed early so I can start the chump world of working yet again early tomorrow morning.