What a pleasure to return to our favorite plaza in Sanlucar!

On Friday evening, the families were out in the plaza, having beer and tapas or ice cream.  It was way too early for dinner. We watched the kids chase the pigeons, and the teenagers cruising.

I had forgotten some of the many things that delight me here.  My nose gets a lot of interesting activity because the Spanish like cologne.  People pass by and I get a whiff of something lovely.  The jasmine sends out fragrance in the evenings.  The lemon trees in our house’s yard are blossoming.  Also, there’s the smell of fermenting or spilled manzanilla (like port, but special to this area) when we walk by a warehouse.  And the garbage.  And the sewage plant.  And the scent of detergent from the clothes dryers.

A trip to the Mercadona supermarket provided several minutes of entertainment as we watched the orange juice machine at work.  It cuts, squeezes and dispenses fresh orange juice into the bottles displayed at left.  Smells great.

It’s a whole different adventure coming back to a place and town that are familiar.  Except for the house where we are living.  The same lovely couple who loaned us their home last time moved into a larger place down the street.  It’s a really big house, but more about that next time.

Dodger

by Terry Pratchett

Harper Collins, 2012

Michael L. Prinz Award Honor Book

Dodger, by Terry Pratchett, offers a delightful romp through 19^th century London. The reader encounters many famous personages as s/he follows Dodger in and out of the sewers and streets of the city. We meet Charlie Dickens, Sir Robert Peel, Sweeney Todd, and even Queen Victoria.

I guess I’m very late in discovering Pratchett. He has written tons of books in his Discworld series. I don’t know if I’m ready to plunge into such a huge collection. But Dodger was really fun to read, clever and humorous, and the language was superb.