Before we begin today, an anecdote. As I wrote my last blog post from the terminal in Manchester, I didn’t have the chance to document the chaos that then ensued as upon boarding. I had only mentioned in that post that my flight had been delayed by three hours thanks to an admittedly festive but ultimately irritating bout of snow, but there was more to come.

Well, I spent almost all of those three hours in the airport building happily finishing my blog post before boarding began. The bus ride to the plane then allowed for a look at the state of the airport. There was a decent amount of snow piled all around, but it seemed that things were under control.

I really should not watch plane crash documentaries before flying…

That was until we were all seated on the plane, when the second round of delays began. Our flight was stuck in a queue of flights needing de-icing before takeoff, which in the end led to another 90 minutes stationary on the tarmac.

The plane might have been stood still, but us passengers certainly weren’t! Restless after such a long evening, lots of people started to move around and grab some fresh air at the front door. I was buzzing as I’d a whole empty row to myself, so I kicked back and got my laptop out to finish the Spanish translation of my previous blog post.

We then all made friends on the stranded plane, with a lady in row 1 pulling up a live stream of the England vs. France semifinal. Not interested in football or contributing in any way to the disgrace that has been this year’s World Cup, I wasn’t inclined to get involved, but seeing as it was already on and there was nothing else to do, I eventually watched England get kicked out of the competition.

The plane eventually took off about four hours late. Ryanair valiantly managed to claw half an hour of that back by doing whatever the plane equivalent is of stepping on it, but it still made for a very late landing and a healthy dose of grumpiness born of exhaustion. On the bright side, the flight into Madrid took us right over the centre for some amazing nighttime views.

Now back home, the first order of business was just that, business. I headed back to work in the cold showers that were pouring down Madrid, showers which lasted for the entire week. I’m from Burnley, though, so I’m not fazed by a bit of water. I thus carried on with my plans, the first of which was yet a night at the theatre after my rather thespian week back in the UK.

My clown boots and the leaves made for a rather autumnal scene.

After seeing my first performance there this summer, I was once again in the Sala Verde at the Teatros del Canal, one of Madrid’s main theatres. I spent a good two and a half hours there watching Women’s Football Club, a Spanish-language piece despite its English name.

The show told the story of the world’s first women’s football team from Sheffield, the city where my sister’s based and whose name I’d also ran into just a few weeks before at a market near my house in Madrid. Strange how these things happen!

It was an absolutely amazing performance, with the eleven women who made up the cast giving it their all as they sang, danced, performed, and even played a game of football without even so much as an interval. I was left touched by the story and in stitches by the comedy!

Back home, I’d finally finished decorating my flat for Christmas. It made for a lovely atmosphere to return to after some long days at work as clients as well as us are keen to finish as much as we can before the Christmas holidays begin.

The week then finished with a rush to throw together a carrot cake for a very special occasion. After years of living just down the road from me here in Madrid, Bogar and his partner Javier are leaving the capital for new adventures. To mark the occasion, I baked my signature cake and headed over to their flat for one last hurrah before the big move.

It’s not the prettiest carrot cake I’ve ever made, but it sure did taste good.

It was a bittersweet occasion, as I’m naturally sad that they’re not going to be so close, but I’m equally happy with where they’re off to: Gijón! This city in the north of Spain is like a second home to me, as I’ve visited more times than I can remember with Cami, Kevin, and Sara. I’m still very often found around Asturias, and I’ll now have yet another reason to visit and another bed to sleep in!

With the goodbyes said and the tipsy hugs given, I then had another relaxing weekend with friends. Things started on Saturday, when me and Napo met up for lunch in the city centre. He took me to a Venezuelan restaurant, where I tried a traditional Venezuelan Christmas dinner. It was absolutely delicious but rather filling, so we effectively had to waddle back to the bus stop to grab the bus back to mine.

Everything was washed down with a Venezuelan beer, of course!

Back in my house, we had a nap to begin to digest so much food. This nap wound up getting completely out of hand and we woke up blurry eyed at around 9pm! With nothing else planned though, we popped on a film and cracked open some snacks for the night. I even made some mulled wine which went down a treat and helped us get back off to sleep at around 2am!

The next day, I made English-style pancakes for breakfast, which we proceeded to devour with the traditional toppings of lemon juice and sugar, followed by some more decadent ones with Nutella and cream. You can’t beat it!

Later that day, Sara and Rocío came over for another round of mulled wine. The three of us had a good gossip, some snacks, and a cup of the festive drink at mine before we all headed off our separate ways for something to eat. I wanted to carry on making the most of all the Christmas decorations and scented candles I’d bought, so I stayed right where I was in my living room!

At work the next week we then had a bittersweet occasion to celebrate. It was Inés’ last day at the company with us before she heads off to Japan for a new adventure in 2023. Me and the rest of the team convened in the office to head out for a goodbye lunch – at a Japanese restaurant, of course – and so that I could give them my traditional team gift of some chocolate. This year it came with some “Oliver” confetti my mum had sent me once, so everyone branded themselves with them!

A vanity selfie because I’m not in the above photo and because I look cute.

My last festive event before the Christmas holidays then took place down in Legazpi, an area just a ten minute walk from my house. Luis, a whole bunch of his friends, and I had arranged to meet up to go ice skating and then had a Chinese hotpot meal for tea. This was a carbon copy of the fun evening we’d spent with Yaewon last year, so it’s well on its way to becoming a little Madrid Christmas tradition!

The Matadero is lit in a rather dramatic fashion at night.

The bunch of 15 of us met up at the ice skating rink for our quick run around on the ice. I was pleased to see that after losing some weight and taking skating lessons this year, I was much better on my feet and had did a good few laps of the rink in a decent time. I was no match for Luis, though, who was zooming off and twirling around like there was no tomorrow!

The image captures the speed, beauty, and grace of our skating session perfectly.

Once we’d had our fill of the ice, we moved over to a cozy bar in the Matadero and had some drinks. I had a bad stomach so went straight for a gin and tonic, protesting that tonic was good for the stomach. This was quite the start, though, so I then stuck to munching on the free crisps (thanks, Spain) and drinking water before we headed to the restaurant.

We then had an absolutely fabulous albeit completely chaotic hotpot meal. Last year with just the three of us it had already been a bit of a logistical nightmare to organise what we were cooking in the broth, so with seven of us around the table you can just imagine the scenes!

I do love a good amount of chaos – why do you think I moved to Spain – and so had great fun struggling to pick up some meatballs and then watching other people fail spectacularly to pluck noodles out of the simmering broth. This combination of a fun format, delicious food, and hilarious company made for the perfect sendoff before heading to the UK for the Christmas period.

We had a lot of fun cooking our own food around the table!

The next day, I balanced work with packing before having some lunch with Nacho, who was visiting from Prague. He brought over a bottle of wine and we ordered some Italian food from one of my favourite places. This meant we could have a lovely catch up as we nibbled on some pizza, which we did up until the moment I’d to head out to the airport for my evening flight over to the motherland.

After some horror stories about the state of Madrid Airport in the run up to Christmas and the border force strikes over in Manchester Airport, I had probably the smoothest journey from Madrid to Manchester ever. The only hiccup came as I lost my AirPods in departures in Madrid, which I went rushing around the terminal looking for before eventually resigning myself to the fact that they were lost and hopping on my flight as they called us to board.

I’d supposed that the “Find My” app on my iPhone was malfunctioning as it said that I had my AirPods on me the whole way back, but I’d unpacked my bag and run through all the pockets on my coat many times over and I still couldn’t locate them. This was until I got home and took my jeans off, upon which they fell to the ground. I’ve no idea where they were within my jeans or how they ended up there, but it was a Christmas miracle to discover that I hadn’t in fact lost these 220€ earphones!

Time will only tell when I publish this blog post, as these days I’ll be relaxing and spending as much time offline and with my family as possible. I wish you all a Merry Christmas and hope you all have chance to enjoy some chill time off, whatever it is you may be celebrating!

As I alluded to a couple of posts back, I’ve just had a rather busy but lovely week. After work last Friday I had a quick chat with Pedro, packed my bags, and then headed up to Madrid Airport to catch my habitual flight back to Manchester.

The main purpose of this weeklong trip we will come to shortly, but the working week was an odd affair in Spain. Thanks to a couple of national holidays I had both Tuesday and Thursday off, meaning I’d have to work on Monday, Wednesday, and then Friday. Quite a strange one!

After getting rather confused and telling my mum that I was arriving at 10:30pm and my dad that I was arriving at 00:30am, I eventually landed bang in between the two times I’d quoted at 11:30pm. We headed home and I got a decent night’s sleep in to kick off the weekend.

It was very nice to be back in the green room that I designed as a teenager.

On Saturday I headed over to Bradford to visit my grandparents, after which we headed back home for a roast dinner with beef and homemade Yorkshire puddings that my mum had confected for the occasion. It was all rather delicious, but the Yorkshires were definitely the star of the show!

The next day I headed into the centre of Burnley for lunch and a catch up with Abi and Danni. We headed to Ellis’, an American-style burger joint located in what once was a pub that we used to go drinking in quite a lot in our student years. It was quite odd to be sat having a civilised meal in a place I’d before associated with tipsy cocktails before hitting the clubs!

Not wanting to break tradition, I ordered a bright and fruity cocktail as I waited for Abi and Danni to arrive. Yes, the tables had turned, and I was the one who showed up on time for once! Once they arrived, we ordered some food and enjoyed some lovely burgers and sides.

The next day I was back at work from the cozy warmth of our back room. Once I’d finished at about 5pm, I changed into something a bit nicer than my dressing gown and Amber came to whisk me off for a few hours together. We headed up to a local gastropub and had a catch up over a lovely evening meal.

Amber looking cheeky and festive before all the shenanigans began…

Of course it wouldn’t be a meet-up between me and Amber without some drama. This came when I first ordered a vermouth, something that they weren’t sure if they had in. I ended up having to explain how to make a martini, which I then didn’t enjoy as I was complaining about the olives. They just weren’t the same as the ones from Mercadona!

I also caused further confusion when I asked for some olive oil for my starter and then requested that the two flavours of ice cream I ordered for dessert didn’t touch each other on the plate. They wound up bringing me them in two separate glasses and it looked like I’d ordered two desserts: what a nightmare!

We had a great laugh, and I left a nice tip for all the confusion I’d caused. I forgot which friend it was that made the observation, but it is true that I very rarely order something straight off the menu. Nightmare, so I am.

The next day I was back working from home, after which we’d another evening activity organised. My mum, dad, and I prepped the car and then drove over to Todmorden, where we visited the Gordon Rigg garden centre to buy our Christmas tree. I also wanted to have a snoop around their festive displays, in particularly the room where they always set up their huge selection of decorative Christmas lighting. It’s something I’ve always loved doing since I was a child: it’s not Christmas without a snoop around Gordon Rigg’s!

The business of choosing a Christmas tree – which can often be a drawn-out affair as me and my mum search for the perfect height, girth, and fullness of branches – took a matter of seconds this year. Heading into the outdoor area where the trees are displayed, my dad grabbed one that he liked the look of. This caused the tree next to it to fall right on top of me, and I jokingly remarked that instead of me choosing the tree this time, it had chosen me. We then had a good look at the fallen tree, decided that it was actually rather nice, and reserved it to take home later.

It couldn’t have been easier!

The next day I was up and out early in the morning, as me and my mum headed back over to Todmorden. This time we headed to the train station, where we picked Ellie up ready for our day together as a family. Outside of the Christmas period, the four of us very rarely have the opportunity to meet up all together.

The reason for our meeting was a rather special one and the reason for my visit in the first place: we were off to see The Lion King: The Musical! Me and Ellie had bought my mum and dad tickets to see it for last year’s Christmas, so it’d been almost a year of waiting, but the big day was finally here.

We headed off to Manchester around midday, heading first to the Christmas markets and then for a spot of present shopping. We had a good wander around Affleck’s Palace, an awesome old mill full of kooky independent shops that my dad has taken me and my sister to visit many times over the years.

Sometimes I think Manchester is ugly, but it has its charm.

With many floors of all sorts of second-hand wares and weird and wonderful things to see, I wound up losing the three of them. Once I’d seen all I wanted to and made a few purchases I knew exactly where to find them though: up in the top-floor restaurant munching on some of their legendary chip butties!

The views from Affleck’s Palace were nice in the afternoon sun.

From Affleck’s, we walked further into the Northern Quarter, Manchester’s cool independent district and my favourite part of this great city. We payed a trip to Fred Aldous, a stationary and arts supply shop that’s been going for years and where my dad wanted to recreate an old photo of me and Ellie.

We saw some funky coloured posts in the Northern Quarter.

We’d eventually to head back towards the centre of Manchester and to San Carlo’s, a fancy Italian restaurant that mum had booked us all in to have a meal together. She was calling it an early tea, but I saw it more as a late lunch. Either way, it was a lovely meal of a lovely prawn starter and then some fresh pasta.

Dad and Ellie opted for some desserts, but I was more than happy to grab some Cadbury Orange Chocolate Buttons as a sweet snack on my way to the theatre. That I did as we were arriving at the Palace Theatre, where we eventually took our seats and waited for the show to begin!

Mum and Ellie had seen the show before and so had advised us that the opening with the “Circle of Life” was an emotional rollercoaster. I still wasn’t prepared for how impactful it was, though. It really set the tone for the rest of the piece, which was a fabulous spectacle of puppetry, singing, and dancing!

With the show over we headed home in the bitter cold of the Manchester evening. It had been a lovely day in Manchester as a family and well worth the logistical nightmare of getting us all together. I’d come in from Spain and Ellie had taken a complex train journey up north from the middle of nowhere in the south of England where she’s currently working on her PhD placement.

The next day I had another day off, so me and mum headed down to Crowwood, the local gym and leisure centre that she’s a member of. She’d got a pass for me to join her for the morning, so I headed into the pool and swam lengths for half an hour. I may have missed my lessons this week, but I was determined to do at least a bit of swimming!

From there, I headed out for lunch with Karen, the creative director of Burnley Youth Theatre, the place I used to work and where I took my first steps in the design world. We had a lovely catch up after all these years, and I then accompanied her to the theatre itself to spend the rest of the afternoon and evening.

In a stroke of sheer luck, I’d chosen to go on the day of the VIP preview of the Christmas show, which meant that lots of ex staff members had come back for the day to see the biggest event of the Burnley Youth Theatre annual calendar. I had a great time catching up with everyone and the Christmas show was an absolute hoot!

If you’re in or around Burnley, I’d definitely recommend going to see the Wizard of Oz. The show has been specially rewritten and reinterpreted for and by young people, and I guarantee you’ve never has so much fun whilst navigating the Emerald City. You can get tickets here!

Friday soon came around and I was back to work again, but this time I finished at 2pm UK time and my crazy afternoon was just about to begin. I packed my bag, headed out the house, and began my long journey over to Leeds. This begun with a walk though the countryside which surrounds my house and up to a bus stop in the middle of nowhere. It was a pleasant if cool walk, and I wound up meeting some rather friendly sheep along the way!

I eventually made it to the bus stop and made the journey over to Todmorden, where I then changed to a train and made the last leg of the journey over to Leeds. There, I met up with Danni for tea and to head to the Leeds Playhouse. I’d yet another piece of musical theatre to see, you see, this time being Charlie and the Chocolate Factory!

It was –3°C when I arrived in Todmorden and I was not happy.

This Roald Dahl classic is one of my all-time favourite stories, so I was very excited to finally get the chance see it live on stage. Needless to say that it didn’t disappoint one bit, with a great cast and some fabulous visual effects telling the funky albeit somewhat dark story of Willy Wonka and the five children.

Once the show had ended, I accompanied Danni to the train station and grabbed myself a taxi up to Em and Lincoln’s place. I arrived there quite late, so we had a quick catch up before we were all wilting and very ready for bed. It was great to catch them even just for a few hours after their wedding just a couple of months ago.

The next day we woke up, took their dog Lando out for a walk, and then headed down into the centre of Horsforth for breakfast. We had an absolutely lovely meal. I tried a rather fancy hot chocolate and some equally fancy poached eggs, but it was all over way too soon as I’d to bid them farewell amongst the news that Manchester Airport had closed both of its runways due to the sudden heavy snowfall.

These poached eggs with bacon and black pudding were glorious.

This brings me to the here and now. I’m currently sat in my usual sport in Terminal 3 of the airport, waiting patiently for my delayed flight to be assigned a gate. I’ve kept a cool head about it all, though – I’m just happy that it hasn’t been straight up cancelled after all the chaos this morning courtesy of the unpredictable British winter weather!

I’m sure I’ll be publishing this now back in my cozy flat in Madrid, but for now I leave you with the dulcet sounds of some screaming children that have done nothing but drag themselves across the floor and throw themselves headfirst into the windows. I really should have brought my noise-cancelling headphones over with me…

So today’s post is somewhat of a break from my usual scheduling. My idea is to bring myself up-to-date before I wind up busy over Christmas, as well as making the most of an opportunity to share some photos I got back which I found quite pretty.

Much like the photos I shared around my neighbourhood, these snaps come courtesy of a roll of film I had developed after my trip around the US. I can’t say I ever remember taking my film camera down to Murcia on one of my various trips down to see my auntie and uncle, but they were a nice surprise amongst the many others.

The first couple of photos come from one of my auntie’s favourite spots for a coffee and some food along the Mar Menor. La Encarnación has a gorgeous interior courtyard covered in plants, so clearly one day I made the most and took some snaps of the table in the afternoon sun.

The third and final photo comes from Cartagena, a coastal city near where my auntie and uncle have their apartment. I have no idea when this was taken or what we were doing, I just recognise the port and the land in the distance.

The other mystery lies in what the two black lines across the photo are. I initially began to invent all sorts of crazy theories, but just as I’ve edited these photos I’ve realised (reluctantly) that it’s probably just the camera strap that’s swung in front of the lens at a rather inopportune moment.

I don’t know what they are but they give the shot a real sense of action.

There’s not much more to comment about these photos. As I say, I’m not sure from which of my many visits down they come from, but you can have a snoop at my many trips to Murcia on my travel page!

Alongside a fun but long day out in Santander just last week, I’ve also been up to the odd thing here in Madrid despite the cold weather which, as all my friends agree, leaves us wanting to do little more than relax in the warmth of our houses. 

Up first on the agenda was a rather important task: rest. This year and after the rather brain-numbing pandemic period I’ve been very keen to do as much as possible, but I’ve realised I need to plan myself some time to rest. This can be cooking, wandering around my neighbourhood, or just collapsing onto the sofa with a glass of wine to watch some telly. Last week, it took the form of a little cycle around the city!

I pass by this lovely archway on my way home from the office.

Later that same evening, I returned to the Puerta de Toledo where the photo above was taken in order to attend another painting class. I’d been just a month before with Sara, but this time I was accompanied by Luis. He’d heard me talk of the concept of painting whilst drinking and snacking and was all for giving it a shot!

It wound up being somewhat of a private class as the other people who’d signed up were a no-show. We made the most of it all though and once again I was pretty pleased with my koi fish painting!

Again, not bad, but maybe I should have stuck to orange dots.

The next day I had another plan for an afternoon with friends. After my weekly shop at my favourite place in Spain, the Mercadona at the Mercado de Santa María de la Cabeza (quite a long name for a market), I headed down to the Museo del Ferrocarril (The Railway Museum) to meet up with Bogar, Javier, Hugo, and Sergejs.

We’d arranged to meet there to visit the Mercado de Motores, a pop-up artisan and food market held amongst the old trains once a month. As the place is just five minutes walk from my house, I’d been meaning to go for years, but I’d never got round to it. About right for me!

The market was absolutely lovely, so I did kick myself for not having visited sooner. No sooner had I begun to browse the first stall than I got chatting to the owners and wound up buying some handmade chocolate treats. This story then played out again and again at many other stalls. I wound up grabbing lots of cured meat, some cheese and a sauce called mojo from Tenerife, some postcards, and the odd Christmas gift.

Just being inside the Museo del Ferrocarril was also fascinating, with plenty of old rolling stock on show inside the lovely old train station. I was shocked when I came across an impressive green and yellow behemoth only to look up and be confronted with the word “Yorkshire”. Who’d have thought that’d I’d run into a train made in Sheffield here in Madrid?

Seeing one of my home counties in Madrid was a nice surprise.

With my purchases done, the five of us headed to the outdoor area and grabbed a table for a quick drink. After a glass of vermouth, Bogar and I were feeling peckish, and so we treated ourselves to some sinfully delicious food. I grabbed a tray of huevos revueltos con torreznos (egg and chips with fresh pork scratchings) and Bogar went for some patatas con mojo (potatoes in that sauce from Tenerife I mentioned earlier).

We shared these two dishes between us and they were both absolutely divine. I was shocked at how good the spuds in sauce were – they might even have rivalled the ones that Cami took me for the first time I was actually in Tenerife!

After another drink, we all parted ways and I wound up heading down to a shopping centre in order to continue my Christmas shopping. It turned out to be a bit of a useless trip, as although I did buy some stuff, it was all for me!

The next day I allowed myself another day of rest at home, but the weather turned out to be quite nice and so I managed to rope my colleague María into going for a bike ride around the city with me. We began in Retiro, Madrid’s main park, before heading down the huge Gran Vía to see the Christmas lights. It was a lovely afternoon out which was ended as all Sunday afternoons should: with a beer.

Cibeles always looks lovely at this time of year.

Back home, I allowed myself another cheeky drink as it was once again time for me to call the Cake Club girls: Megan, Loredana, and Heidi. We spent another long evening gossiping and having a good laugh over video call from our respective countries of Spain, the USA, Austria, and Norway.

The working week then began in earnest, but it was to be a special one thanks to the staff Christmas do we had coming up and thanks to some rather spectacular sunsets along the way. One day I left work to be confronted by this amazing view, with the setting sun creating a perfect gradient across the sky.

It’s been a while since a sunset has left me genuinely lost for words.

Then came the event of the week in the form of the Christmas dinner we hold every year at work. It’s been on hold for the last couple of years thanks to the pandemic, but we were all back and ready for a lovely night of food and tipsy shenanigans this Thursday!

I got dolled up for the occasion and we all met in the city centre at a Basque restaurant. We enjoyed a series of starters from croquettes to chorizo, and I then ordered some fresh cod for my main. This was all helped down with a couple of shots of patxaran, a sweet fruity liquor that can be quite dangerous!

I didn’t stay out too late however, as I was tired from a long day and had plenty to do the next day! More on that next time, though…