El McDonaldario's

Spanish French fries are better than French ones!

I miss my cats. I miss my coffee pot. I just discovered, after almost a week, that the big, round, yellow thing outside our apartment I thought was for recycling is actually a mailbox.

Travel is supposed to be broadening, despite the fact that life seems pretty much the same everywhere, with some exceptions of course like Haiti where many people live in paper boxes and have no food. But here in Barcelona, life goes on just like in America but without the constant mention of Obamacare, admittedly an upgrade. People shop and drink and eat and work, and do a lot of running around. One obvious difference is that smoking is still very popular here: Everyone seems to do it, young and old alike, right out in the open, unashamed and with abandon.

Another difference is mundane, to say the least, but worthy of mention. Yesterday, in an act of desperation, we lunched at McDonald's, where we learned that they offer two kinds of fries here: one for the Americans--the long, skinny ones we are used to--and another for the locals--fatter, and much tastier. As a result, French fries will now forever remind me of Spanish fries.