The bad news is, it’s like 105 degrees out there.  Whadda ya gonna do.  That seemed like a very long weekend, most likely because of the holiday thrown in the mix last week.  We had a good Fourth, speaking of the holiday.  We headed out to Mom’s and had a festive ‘que dinner, at least as much as we could with the intermittent rain.  Dave and Larry brought lots of fireworks so we had a nice barrage of firepower too.  The kids shot off most of the stuff, although I just couldn’t help throwing just a few firecrackers.

Friday I had lots of plans, but, go figure, went to the Brooksider instead.  We didn’t go inside though, just unsociably sat outside on the deck and enjoyed the evening.  If you haven’t been to the good ol’ Brooksider recently, they’ve made considerable upgrades to the deck.  No reason to go in and get all smoky when they spent all that time and money fixing it up outside, I figure.  After hanging out down there for a while, we went across the street to the grocery store and picked up some dinner; Pork chops and potatoes to be exact.  The rest of the evening was spent hanging out our own back deck, grilling up some grub.   Came out pretty well…  I’ve been on a “fresh herb” kick lately and I think I need to be a little more judicious in my seasoning.  Just doesn’t quite have the PUNCH of dried herbs it seems.  Have to start snipping the plants a bit more liberally.

Saturday we got up and decided to go on a moderately long motorcycle ride.  Kind of test the feasibility of taking a longer trip, I suppose.  I had actually never ridden on the interstate, so that was an adventure in itself.  We ended up in lovely Kearney, MO, for no particular reason other than it seemed like a nice distance.  We hung out there for a while, cruised through the Jesse James farm and had a drink at Sonic, then headed over to Smithville and back home via 169.  The whole trip was just about 100 miles, and we fared pretty well.  Everything but my arms that is… I burned the crapola out of my upper arms where the wind blew my sleeves up and exposed my farmer’s tan.  Ouch.  Would we make it 250 miles or 300 miles in one day?  Well, that question wasn’t fully answered I don’t think.  We were ready to get off the bike when we got home, I’ll just say that.  After our heads quit vibrating, we made a tasty lamb chop dinner and spent the rest of the evening reading.

Sunday I had the bright idea to go lay out at the pool, to try and even out the sunburn I got the day before.  As I read that last line, I realize the sheer folly of my reasoning.  I guess my mission was accomplished;  My entire front side is now glowing a nice shade of radioactive red.  What was I THINKING??!!  Sheesh.  Anyway, we hung out there for a few hours and then spent a little face-time down at the Brooksider again.  After that John and Susan W. came over for dinner, so we fired up the grill again.  We broke out the rotisserie and did a pork loin, with more fresh herbs of course.  I hope that stuff grows back quick because I’ve been clipping it like crazy.  After that we watched Entourage, and then I went and slept in a tub full of aloe vera lotion.

I got nothing.  I almost started construction on an ark but got caught up in the Andy Griffith marathon.  Seriously, I have done absolutely nothing since Donette left town last Thursday for a “girl’s weekend” in Hot Springs, taking the car with her.  The dogs and I just sort of sat on the couch and sulked, staring out the window at the rain.  We were so stir-crazy by Sunday that we did go on a pretty long walk (in the rain, naturally) but other than that the entire weekend was spent playing on the computer or watching TV.  My sole accomplishment was getting Fedora Core 7 up and running in VMWare.  Wanna hear about that?  Didn’t think so.

I may actually have to retract to some of my bad-mouthing from last week, believe it or not.  As Donette pointed out, American Airlines was only responsible for 1 of our 2 luggage mishaps, not both.  Dang it.  And as for the coffee guy??  Well, when I went to coffee last Monday, I was very dismayed to find my favorite shop was closed for business.  This was very disconcerting, as I’ve developed something of a nice, familiar routine there.  Every now and then I give them some money, and then I just walk in and pour a cup of coffee, sit down and read my paper.  After some number of weeks, the girl will catch me on my way out and say “You’ve used up your tab” and I give her some more money.  It’s a very effective system, and one I’m quite fond of.  But, alas, it looked like I was going to have to find coffee elsewhere.  So Tuesday, I stopped in at the shop around the corner.  There were a few other coffee refugees I recognized from the other shop so I figured it was safe.  I passed the girl my cup and said “coffee,” and what happens???  She starts peppering me with questions, just like the guy in Spain!!  “Do you need room for cream?  Would you like a light or dark brew?  Iced or hot?”  She seemed a bit taken aback when I burst into tears, but I am in no shape for that level of interaction at 7:00 in the morning.  So, perhaps the word “coffee” is not quite the internationally recognized, catch-all phrase I thought.  Word on the street is that my usual shop is back open this week.  I can only hope, because I am tired of making my own every morning and it’s apparent that I’m not quite ready to move on to another location.

It was a relatively quiet weekend for the Kenagys.  As a matter of fact, we did nothing at all.  I think we’re still trying to catch up on everything from the long vacation, and besides that I was on-call.  Saturday we walked the dogs down to the Brooksider and hung out on the deck for a while, which they seemed to enjoy.  In the category of “it’s a small world,” the people sitting at the table next to us recognized us from Seville!  We’d spoken with them briefly there, (they commented on Chris’ Royals shirt) and it turns out they live right down the street.  Wacky.  Sunday brought a similarly quiet day;  Other than a motorcycle ride out through Overland Park we didn’t do a whole lot.  Maybe things will pick back up next weekend.  Or maybe not.

The 18 day vacation is officially over;  I know this because I am back at work, I am wearing socks, and my credit card was declined when I tried to buy a sausage biscuit this morning.  I was ready to be back though, I guess, if for no reason other than it’s nice to be able to understand people again.  It was getting a little tiresome listening to all that nonsensical jibber-jabber from everyone around me, and that includes our short stay in New York.

I guess I’ll cobble together a short vacation summary, although believe it or not I have better things to do.  After our Sweden & Denmark trip, we moved on to Spain, which I briefly touched on earlier.  We met up with the Martins in Madrid, then drove on to Toledo.  That was a long day of walking around looking at “points of interest.”  Not to minimize the things we saw, because there were several rather awe-inspiring sights, but I’m not good at descriptions anyway so I’ll just leave it at that.  After Toledo, we drove on to Cordoba.   This city had lots of potential, but we spent the better part of our time there driving around aimlessly looking for a safe place to park.  We’d gotten a parking ticket in Toledo and were a little gun-shy, I guess.  We finally found a place we determined safe to leave the car for the night, but by that time everything was closed.  The next day we got up, moved the car again, and did a very little bit of sight-seeing, including a Mosque that was built in the year 780.  Pretty impressive stuff, but all we really did was look at our watches to make sure our meter time wasn’t up.  From there, we moved on to Sevilla, a.k.a. Seville.  Luckily the hotel we picked there actually had parking available, albeit at a cost.  (I guess it wasn’t luck;  we made sure of it when we called.)  We did quite a bit of walking around in this city too, but mixed in a fair amount of “activities.”  I’d say Sevilla was probably my favorite of the “Spain” portion of our trip.  Our activities here included going to a bullfight and watching a Flamenco performance.

After our Spain trip, we drove on to Salema, Portugal, for some relaxation.  All that walking around in Spain had worn a little thin on everybody, I think.  This was a great portion of the trip, if not too exciting.  We pretty much laid on the beach for three days, had some great food, and just took it easy.  I really liked this little town;  Laid back, interesting, good food, and CHEAP, which was a refreshing change.

After our beach break, we spent a day driving back to Madrid, where we were flying out the next day.  We managed to hit the “driving day” perfectly, because it poured rain all day so there wasn’t really much else we could have done anyway.  The drive was relatively uneventful, highlighted by a randomly chosen lunch break in the city of Estremoz.   This was the only place we ran into where not only was the menu not in English, but the waiter spoke only Portuguese.  Through a rather lengthy process of elimination, we managed to exclude the “appetizer,” “dessert,” and “drink” portions of the menu, and pointed at what we hoped were good selections.  Either through luck, good fortune, or some selective changes by the waiter, everybody ended up with quite delicious lunches.  We made it all the way to Madrid that night, but didn’t do much, just went out to dinner.

The next day was our flight out, so we didn’t have time for any touristing.  I did make the mistake of going out for morning coffee though.  I dropped in a nearby cafe, and had the pleasure of dealing with some clown who at least pretended to not understand the word “coffee.”  It was at this point I was absolutely sure I was done with Spain, at least for this trip.  I consider (and rightly so) the word “coffee” to be nearly as universal a word as “OK” or “no.”  It’s not like I was trying to communicate a thin-crust pizza with no green peppers and extra sausage; “COFFEE.”  I had literally stood up from my stool and was opening my mouth for what was sure to be a most regrettable utterance when he finally threw up his hands in mock frustration, turned around and poured a friggin’ cup of coffee.  To his credit, it was a very GOOD cup of coffee.

From Spain, we took an almost-pleasant flight back to the good ol’ USA, New York City to be exact.  This portion of the trip was highlighted by a trip to the Yankees/Mets game.  Although we left in the fifth inning during the 40-minute rain delay, it was a great time all the same.  Suffice to say the level of play was just generally above what I usually get to see.  Plus, we sat in the bleachers, which was an adventure in itself.  I don’t know if this holds true for every game or only Mets games, but the number of uniformed police in the bleacher section was rather comical.  I wouldn’t call it overkill though;  They kept plenty busy.  A rather confrontational pairing of baseball fans, we surmised.  Overall, I would say New York greatly exceeded my admittedly low expectations;  May even go back some day.

So, now we are back home safe and sound… Without luggage AGAIN.  I will spare you my anti-American-Airlines tirade, since you may well be tired of reading this anyway.  Plus, Donette seems to think I have some type of agenda against them so I don’t want to be chastised again.  I think quite the opposite though; They have some kind of agenda against ME!!  I have lots of good material from just this trip, including late departures, lost luggage, (TWICE) and the worst ticket counter in the history of air travel, but I won’t go on a tirade because I’m the bigger person here.  In summary, I’ll rank the destinations, just from my narrow point of view:

1.  Sweden & Denmark:  4 out of 5 stars.  We’d already been there so this was a repeat trip;  We sort of knew what to expect.  The whole wedding experience and the “personal tour guides” aspect added greatly to this part.

2.  Spain:  2.5 out of 5 stars.  The food was hit and miss, the car travel tedious, and the residents a rather surly lot.  The sights were great though, and it did have it’s high points… Maybe it was just a matter of the high expectations I had.

3.  Portugal:  4.5 out of 5 stars.  The food was good, the prices the most reasonable of our trip, and we had a good balance of “activities” and “leisure.”  I’d probably go 5 stars if the ocean had been 10 degrees warmer.

4.  New York City:  4 out of 5 stars.  This brief part was a pleasant surprise.  I expected a good baseball game sandwiched between many hours of misery, but I had a grand time.

This is a short vacation status update, before we hop in the Fiat and hit the road again.  We are currently in Sevilla, Spain, where we’ve spent the last two days.  We started off in Madrid, then hit Toledo and Cordoba before ending up here.  Thank goodness for the Garmin.  We’ve logged many miles on my poor tootsies… The car ride today actually sounds inviting.  Yesterday was particularly event-filled:  We left the hotel around 11:00 and spent the day walking around looking at several historic buildings, with requisite breaks for tapas and drinks.  Then, around 7:00 we went and took in the bullfights,  and after THAT a Flamenco show.  Whew.  We stayed out way past my bedtime, which has been the case every evening I suppose.

Today we are most likely heading to Portugal, the Fiat and the GPS willing.  I am ready for some beach time.