the dreams of the girl with plates for eyes...

from an e-mail sent to me and m today...

"i had the weirdest dreams... of course bunch of random stuff...

monday night - had a dream that britney spears and i had to run away from people chasing us and to escape and loose them we had to enter into a dance competition - she made me where this brown sequence mini-dress and a gold top over it

tuesday night - angie and amanda were coming to visit me on a thursday so i had to take off of work to show them around, and john mayer was with us to drive us around but he was being such a dickwad...being weird and stuff...

other things happened around paintballing and stuff... just strange."

strange indeed.

Mr. Rude in Madrid...

en el cuarto del hotel...en el Palacio Real de Madrid...

la relajación en el parque...

la comida de paella y bebiendo sangria

la noche última chocolate con churros...

another black (bow)tie affair...

so, i went to the private equity industry's annual awards dinner...filled with wealthy people, wealthier people, and not so wealthy people like myself...basically, investors, bankers, lawyers, and accountants...the firm bought a very very expensive ten person table...we invited five of our clients/prospects to sit with us...champagne, wine wine wine, and the food was decent although the rump of lamb was a unique choice for a main...the turnout was actually very low which is clearly due to the credit crunchola...about 750 showed...the last couple of years, its apparently maxed out at 1,500...but 750 is still a lot of people wearing penguin outfits running around...

during a break in the awards, they had a stand up comedian go up and try to entertain us...he was one of those one-line guys...never actually telling a story, but just linking one-liners for a full 15 minutes...some were funny, but most were cheezy...and as i've found with british humor, most of it was way past the PC line...because the PC line doesn't really exist over here...

another thing they had was this silent auction on the side with about 100 autographed pictures of famous people...actors, celebrities, presidents, politicans, etc etc...some of the pics were awesome, but the starting bids were over 3k GBP...the autographed pics of MLK and JFK AND Jackie-O definitely caught my eye...they had an autographed pic of Obama of course, what caught my eye there was his signature, which seemed more like a symbol (like Prince) rather than a real "honest and sincere" signature...and they had cheap pics (under 200 GBP) of celebrities like certain blonde singers i don't really care to mention here...

anyways...that's it...good night, had lots of drinks, met some new people and caught up with others i haven't seen in a while...finished the night off with this whiskey on the rocks made some random country that my buddy wanted me to try...it was absolute krap...tasted like i was drinking a cigarette...way too smokey of a taste and one glass basically cost as much as a black label in the US...

the Rock Pigeon...what a terror...

wiki says that "The species commonly referred to just as the "pigeon" is the feral Rock Pigeon, common in many cities."

so, there are definitely too many pigeons in dear ol' london...they are everywhere...many buildings put up spikes or pins on their ledges so that pigeons don't loiter...it works, but it makes the building look unappealing, which is definitely not the image that london wants to convey...clean walkways or ugly architectural add-on...tough choice...

anyways, you see the occasional car that mistakenly parked under a large overhanging tree...that was just absolutely obliterated by evil, spiteful, malicious pigeons...

however, my buddy at work has had the worst luck as of late...a couple of weeks ago, he went for a run around his house and a pigeon doo-dooed on his head...direct hit! direct hit!

then, yesterday, it was a bright day, so we decided to grab lunch and just eat it outside along the thames...we passed under a couple of trees to get to these benches and BAM! i was walking a few steps behind him and saw doo-doo land on his shoulder blade...it was a big ol' dump too...

obviously, i'm very cautious now when i spot a bunch of doo-doo on the ground...i immediately get out of the line of fire...never look up...never...

out of material...for now...

i'm a little out of material right now...we had a normal weekend...great weather actually...got a little farmer's tan from golf today...yesterday we went to this dutch festival at trafalgar square...it was fine...a band was playing and some food...it was sunny and we were outside...good enough...i could write more about this stuff, but i don't feel like it...just nothing entertaining enough to write about...or worth memorializing in here...

anyways, i expect a bunch of good material in the coming weeks...next weekend, we are going to madrid...we went to barcelona as part of our honeymoon...so, we may as well explore madrid and see what its about...

and for the next two weekends after that my rents will be coming...good ol' batoots and patring...the first weekend we will be taking them around london and neighboring towns...and the second weekend, we will be taking them to paris...so, we should have LOTS of stories with them around...hopefully good stories about when we aren't escorting them around...when they are left to wander while we are at work...oh boy...i'm going to say that again...oh boy...

a red letter day...

in the life of Gustardo...
so...the entire time Gus was in the U.S., we left him in his crate...because every time we turned around, he would be chewing something...whether it be our couch...our carpets...our throw blankets...the evidence is now stored in a Franklin Park warehouse...he was a puppy then...

now, mr. gus is going to turn three in a few months...granted, he is still a nut(less)bag at times...but has definitely matured and calmed down a lot...

while over here, we keeped him in the crate for the first few months...then we started letting him loose in the little patio atrium dining area-ish thing that we have...tiled floors...nothing really there to destroy...and he had a little 8 foot square area to at least stretch his legs...

well, over the last month or so, we started letting him loose for a couple of hours at a time while we were out for dinner or a run or something...free to roam the entire flat...absolutely unsupervised...most of the time, he just sleeps anyway...in his favorite spot which is pictured above...

so, TODAY, we let him loose the ENTIRE workday (actually really "I" because i didn't tell m i let him loose because I knew she would say no...and if something DID happen, then I would get home from work before her anyway and would be able to survey the damage caused)...

But nothing happened...the flat was perfectly the way i left it...he greeted me at the door and i subsequently ran around to see if anything was out of place...and i went to the bed and felt the huge indentation pictured above and it was still warm...so, the picture above was basically the hole he makes for himself everyday...his favorite spot to sleep...

Congrats gus...you are a trusted teenager now...first time truly home alone...don't do anything that we will regret...trust is earned...and can easily be lost with a bite out of something expensive!

the segwayyyyyyyyy experience...

so, we visited Leeds Castle today (pics to come in another blog)...on Easter monday...as it was a nice bank holiday for us...we went with a couple of m's friends who rented a nice merc...anyways, they offered this short segway tour of the grounds...a little bit more than half an hour at a good price...it was just the tour guide and the four of us...it was the first time for all of us to ride a segway...it was a really cool experience actually...that thing is pretty neat in that it just moves based on your weight shift and the direction your body turns...no need for buttons or dials or pedals or anything...just stand there, hold on to the handle bars, and turn and shift your weight...and it just goes...

anyways, obviously, little miss princess was obviously the slowest one out of all of us and was always lagging way behind...here is a pic of us waiting for her and how far back she was...and here is a hilarious picture of her being chased by a dog...the dog just ran after her as we passed by this farm...if you have ever watched the movie Paul Blart: Mall Cop or at least seen some of the trailers...then you would understand why this is so funny...

Mr. Rude in Zermatt...

so, we forgot mr. rude at home...so, we tried to improvise...but its just not quite the same...

so...long weekend eh???

so, we get good friday and easter monday off...bank holidays...nice...

since we don't get thanksgiving off, this makes up for it...

thank you england.

what is two times thirty...

its batoots' age today...hey hey hey...happy birthday! for about one month only, he is mathematically twice my age...i am nerd hear me roar...

this pic was from a bears game we went to in December 2007 against the pack...by far one of the coldest bears game on record...something like negative 35 windchill...we wore about 6 layers of clothes each and we were still freezing...it didn't help that we were basically a couple of rows from falling from the top of the upper deck as you can see...

if golf courses only had 17 holes...

so, for some reason i always blow up on one or two holes a round...this time, i shot an 88 for 17 holes...which was decent considering i'm still tinkering with my swing...but on that one hole, i shot a 9...eeeeeekss...so...97...anyways, can't beat golf on a sunny sunday afternoon...

crazy jumping horses...

so, this afternoon, the Grand National was just run...which is England's most prestigious horse race...apparently, worldwide, its one of the most popular races in the world with 600 million viewers each year...but being a typical american, i had never heard about it let alone ever tuned into BBC on race day to view it...

it was great race to watch and absolutely crazy...let's compare England's most prestigious horse race with the U.S.'s most prestigious horse race - the Kentucky Derby...

number of horses:
Grand National - 40; Kentucky Derby - 20

distance:
Grand National - 4.5 miles; Kentucky Derby - 1.25 miles

fences/jumps:
Grand National - 30; Kentucky Derby - 0

They say that the Grand National is "arguably the toughest test of horse and jockey in the world" and based on the above stats, i'm pretty sure nobody will argue...the horse has to not only run for 4.5 miles with a huge crowd of other horses, it also has to jump 30 fences which are all much taller than the horse itself...

So, for the 2009 race i just saw, 40 horses started and ONLY 17 finished, which is apparently typical. The majority of those that dropped out literally dropped...with absolutely disastrous falls at the fences...with the jockeys abandoning into a fetal position trying not to get trampled on by any horses running behind...its mass mayhem at every jump...in 163 runnings of the race, there have been 57 horse fatalities and one jockey death. Apparently, animal rights activists have been protesting this race forever, but they will never have any luck as this is part of english tradition which is also forever...163 runnings and counting...

i was in a lottery krap shoot thing at work where we just picked a horse's name out of a hat, and that was our horse for the race...with a little prize money if our horse won of course...my horse was at 100-1 odds...which clearly was no good...basically meaning that nobody expected it to even finish...but funny enough, my horse actually finished amongst the 17 horses...it came in 14th...obviously no money to be won with that, but it still finished! And the irony in all that is that the winning horse in the whole thing this year was a fellow 100-1 odds horse...apparently, in the storied history of the race, its the longest shot horse to have ever won...

definitely a crazy fun race to watch...we'll all watch in next year when i'm back in the States...okay?

stop and smell the roses...

so, i've finally done it...i've witnessed spring...

ever since i started working, i've been putting in a lot of hours...my first three years, i had audit/tax busy season, and just worked all the time and hardly ever saw the light of day...then when i joined M&A, i worked even more and traveled a helluva lot...

for the last few springs, i remember getting this deja vu feeling...i'd come back from a business trip...from o'hare i'd take the blue line to the california stop...and start the two block walk home...in those two blocks, i would look up and think "where did all these leaves come from? what happened? I haven't been away for that long?"...then i would realize that i just never slowed down enough to bother...granted, the springs in chicago are short...it seems to go from winter directly into summer, but there is that short window...and it would always pass without me noticing...

so, being here for our first and likely only spring in london, its really very sweet...since i seriously work a lot less here, i get the chance to take gus for nice walks after work...and it feels like every tree lining the streets here is blooming with some sort of color...its pretty amazing...very picturesque...gus seems to like it...i think...

Twenty Gs...

So...the twenty Gs visited London...caused a lot of hoopla, but not really...so much anticipation with all the protests and anti-everything rhetoric...but it has all seemed to go well...

m and i work right in The City (one square mile)...which is the financial heart of london...anyways, that's where the main protests occurred...right by the bank of england...but we work on the outskirts of the square mile, so we were still a brisk 10 minute walk away from where everything was happening...anyways, since m works for a bank, they were all told to wear casual the entire week...basically, to not look like a banker...my firm, like most non-banks that reside in the city, somewhat followed "suit" and just dressed down for the two g20 days...

the main jist of dressing down was more for the transit to work...where you could be potentially targeted by a protester in the commute in (e.g., they would throw paint on you or something)...otherwise, at work, you were pretty safe because security was stepped up everywhere...what this all really led to was a bunch of bankers on public transit pretending to be casual...but still looking like bankers...so, you'd see douchebags wearing their polo shirts with khaki pants and of course those dreaded loafers with no socks...uhm...mr. protester...ding ding ding...banker banker banker!

of course you had people still wearing suits...because they didn't want to give in to protesters...these guys are the old skoolers...who've never worn casual to work in their lives...and who talked tough and would say they would give any protester hell if they messed with 'em...probably an open handed slap to the face...ooooooooo...hurt me!

ok...but it all went well...the twenty g's seemed to all enjoy playing with each other...and they all played nice...as for the protesters...yeah, there was the typical violence of a supposed peaceful protest...the pushing...the disregard for public property...the loud chanting of nonsense...the lighting of bonfires...the voodoo of bankers dolls...but nothing crazy...nothing out of the ordinary occurred...

snoozefest.