Happy Halloween! This was our first trick-or-treater this afternoon. He came as a Viking -- not the NFL type, that might be too freaking horrifying after the way they've been playing lately. He came as the friendly, drunken kind instead. In this photo, our little buddy is either contemplating which piece of candy he should take from the bowl, or he's literally gagging himself at the options. Since we offered five varieties of candy (one being snickers), I am thinking the former.

Oy. Today I was still unbelievably sick, so I had to stay in and just rest and catch up on my Tivo. You would not believe my TV addiction and what all I have recorded since leaving for Spain, but let's just say that I could spend about three days on the sofa and *maybe* I would be caught up. Maybe.But it really does suck to stay in. This is my favorite weekend of the year to go out -- I love seeing all of the costumes, and I hate having our costumes go to waste. Boo.Anyway, back to the photo. This is my man cooking homemade chicken soup for me tonight. And let's just think about how awesome that is. Yeah, I'm a lucky girl.

Look familiar? Yeah, it's another dark shot of the New York coastline on a gloomy, cloudy day. I'm usually OK with that, as some of you know that I prefer dark, cloudy days to bright and sunny ones (I know, I'm weird). But yesterday we were stuck in the airport for a few extra hours due to a late plane (and the air force escorting a plane in from Yemen, I suspect), and man, I just wanted to get home to my pups! We had just over 20 hours of travel, but we made it back. Now three days off before returning to the office. Let's fire up the Tivo, shall we?

Well, here it is. Our final night in Barcelona. I wish I could tell you that we arrived at 3 pm and have been out partying and we're heading back out to celebrate after I log this post. But sadly, we're crawling into bed early. This head cold is really too much to fight, and I have a lot to get done when I return to town, so I don't want to make it any worse. Plus, I'm in such a cold-medicine-induced-haze, I'm not getting much out of the city right now, anyway.So what DID we do if not paint the town red, you ask? We did a little shopping for a few souvenirs, and then finally hit up El Xampanyet for Tapas. Our book had said it was a must-do, and my buddy @formica_dinette (Nicky) had suggested it as well. So we ended the evening with Cava and tapas. The trick to this was, however, we let the waiter choose our food. So, um, we have no idea what all we ate. I *think* it was ham on bread (delish), pickled tomatoes (delish), some sort of egg bake with creamy cheese on toast (pretty solid), salamis (good), raw fish (would not touch), cheese (yum!) and pretzels covered in some sort of pork. I'm not sure it was cooked. It was white. But Jamie loved it (I did not mention I thought it might be raw until he had finished the last bite). It was super fun and a very authentic experience. Overall, I'm not *too* ashamed of how tonight ended, and I bet I will be thanking myself in the morning.And speaking of tomorrow (ahem). Right now we are scheduled to wake up at midnight CST, so we can get to the airport on time. We are also scheduled to arrive in Minneapolis around 6 pm (so that would be roughly 18 hours of travel) and then meet Julie for drinks for her last night in Minneapolis before we head to the Deer Tick concert. So place your bets now on what we get done tomorrow. I will say this, should I accomplish all of that while not being able to breathe through my nose due to this cold, my blog post will be late. Something has to give.See you all back in Minnesota. Where it's snowing. *sob*

Today we hit up La Ciudad de las Artes y las Ciencias (the city of arts and sciences). The architecture blew me away. The aquarium blew me away. Overall, it was just absolutely amazing. These might be my favorite photos of the whole vacation (over here)... either that or I'm just stoned on cold medication. Or both :)Tomorrow we head back to Barcelona for our final night in Spain. Sob.

This morning we said goodbye to Barcelona (for now) and hopped on a train to Valencia, which is about 3 hours south, but still on the Eastern coast. The main difference is that it feels much more like a beach town. It's more laid back, there's much less English, and there are lots of palm trees... and parrots! And it's very modern. Don't get me wrong, there's a big hunk of the town that is historic (which you can see in my daily photo set over here), but the rest of the city is full of contemporary touches, like this here exit to our subway stop.The other difference between Valencia and Barcelona is that we are staying in a PALACE. Well, not *really.* But it feels like it. The, um, WALK IN CLOSET and bathroom of this hotel room are about as large as our entire apartment in Barcelona. And don't even get me started on the amazing bathroom. Just know that I took both a shower AND a bath in the nine hours since we arrived. But don't worry. Somehow I will muster the strength to leave this *feather down bed* and get out to take more photos tomorrow. :)

Tonight we ended our stay in Barcelona by seeing Jonathan Richman at Sala Apolo. What a cool club! Look a those sweet red lights! You can see all of my photos from the day over here. Tomorrow we get up early to catch a train to Valencia, so I should have all sorts of new stuff to shoot then :) Man, this blog is gonna seem so boring when I get back home!

So I thought I would surprise you today with something a little modern. This is Flash Flash! It's a fun greasy-spoon diner that specialized in tortillas (which are Spanish omelets, not soft-taco shells). Anyway, the food was all right, but I sure did love the decor! Apparently it was inspired by Twiggy in the 1970s. I also loved that this was very much a local spot, and almost zero English was spoken. Greasy spoons should always be this authentic.I posted a bunch of other photos today as well, and you can catch them over here. Today was all about historical architecture and the sunrise over the Mediterranean.