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I could eat a good minestrone soup as my main meal night after night.

Still in La Crosse for one more night.

Took Mom out for lunch at a local Italian restaurant. I just got a bowl of Minestrone soup since we will be meeting one of my BFFs at the favorite tapas place before heading to the 60th birthday party celebration for the class of 1983. I don't think there will be a huge turnout.

Have fun in Barcelona Liz! Hope the SIL is well enough to go home soon!

DD, you are navigating retirement wonderfully! Keep it up!

Question: Did your SIL buy any travel medical insurance for this trip? I'm currently looking at some policies that will either be something we buy with each trip, or some that you pay an annual fee and it covers you for multiple trips. Two years ago I face planted on some stone steps in Mexico and as I was going down I thought no insurance! Luckily I did not break teeth or nose, and only had a fat lip from the fall. I will buy some kind of policy from now on when we travel internationally. We'll especially need one in Brazil for 6 weeks.

Peps, did you buy medical insurance for your trip?

The heat broke last night with rain, and its still raining off and on right now and I feel sluggish. I stayed up until 1am to finish a book, which is one of my favorite things to do. I love reading a book cover to cover in one day. It is a satisfying indulgence. It could explain why I'm tired though, that and the rain. I will go work out in a bit and see if that perks me up. Maybe its a nap kind of afternoon.

No set plans today, but there is always plenty to do, since I have MANY deferred organizational projects. I did a small one yesterday, purging the mug and singleton wine glasses. Unless there were 4 of each, and I liked them, they are now gone. Tomorrow evening we have tickets to see Cabaret, one of my favorite musicals. Monday morning a friend and her 90 some years old Mom are going to meet us for coffee. Her Mom grew up in the area where the coffee shop is, and we want to hear her stories about the old neighborhood. Then Friday, we visit DS and his girlfriend to see their new apartment in Madison. I like having plans, with open spaces for what strikes my fancy at the moment.

We are in Barcelona. Already we noticed that more people in hotels and restaurants speak English. But we also noticed more people walking down the street sounding like Americans.

The train was relatively pleasant once one figured out where to go in the station. Thank goodness a younger guy helped get our very heavy suitcases up on the racks. To DD's point about taking public transportation, we have taken Ubers and taxis a lot especially with SIL and at the end of the day they haven't been terribly expensive.

We arrived here around 4 then took a walk past the Cathedral of Barcelona and a little bit into the Gothic area. I will try and post pics on FB if they came out okay (haven't checked yet). We had a relatively normal dinner of potatoes bravas as an appetizer (well not normal but can be good - this was just ok) and roasted chicken. Back to the hotel where we crashed. The last night at the wedding caught up to us.

This morning I will call SIL and see how she is. Then we have tickets for the Hop on, Hop off bus to get the lay of the land. Not getting an early start though as it is already 9:30.

Have a superlative Saturday and Diane S, don't forget a picture with Peps!

I bet the tapas there is different from the tapas at bars here. For the most part at a bar they are charcuterie boards with a limited selection: Iberian ham (cured ham - a little like prosciutto only sliced thicker), manchego cheese (tastes a bit like Parmesan), and thick sliced toasted bread. Okay but not super inspiring. The other common tapas are croquettes (some good, some just okay) and potatoes bravas (potatoes with a spicy sauce - again some really good, some just okay). Even when the food is reviewed positively it hasn't always excites us. Another thing they have at some places is a Russian salad, which is weird but sometimes good. It is like a potato salad and a tuna salad mixed together. The best one of those we had at a high end restaurant where it was scallops vs tuna. That restaurant also had great fried octopus.