April 23- Thursday - Don Benito, Espana

We woke up, and walked to a cafe for breakfast in Valladolid. bread, ham, cheese, coffee, juice for all for about 44 euro. We passed a giant book fair going on that stretched for almost an entire block. Behind it were giant moon bounces, booths and games. It was a holiday for everyone. Lots of cute little kids and old men slowly strolling together through the town. Lots of old people out and about here. They're not put away as in America. I think I would like to grow old in Valladolid.

Man, so our promoter for this show is pretty awesome. She had so much energy, was incredibly friendly, and, for lack of more sophisticated language, just soo cool. She told Nicole and I about her travels around the world, learning different languages, and living as a surfer girl in Mexico. Oh, and she gained major points for playing Al Green followed by Dirty Projectors from her itunes as the house music in the bar. It's been really strange but comforting to hear music that we're all into in the U.S. in such unfamiliar places on the other side of the Earth. Anyway, you'll never hear about the show if I continue at this rate. We had dinner on the patio of a restaurant annnd were served another multi-course meal. People in Spain truly know how to do dinner! Man! We sat outside for a couple of hours, our surprised expressions increasing with each new course. Let it be known that I tried shrimp and raw salmon for the first time. This is a big deal for me. I've been captain of the no raw sea food club for oh, over a decade. I'll say that I wasn't pleased; no me gusta. But again, this has nothing to do with the story.

The point is that we were stuffed full of goodness and red wine, and then played a really great show. The crowd was loud and drinking at first, but we managed to shut them up. They were into it. ..Really into it. This crowd in Don Benito was the first to voluntarily clap along (and whistle annnd chreer) to the clapping part of settler. The energy was great, and probably partially because we were trapped on the stage and had no where to go after our last song, they clapped us into an encore and played one more song.

Then Nicole and I had a dance party upstairs in secret.

After a couple more free drinks and some chit chats with people at the show, we packed up our things, and walked 10 minutes to our fancy hostal/hotel for the night. Good. Times.