HOW TO GRIN AND BEER IT -- OR WINE; or, CRUZCAMPO IS ONLY GOOD FOR BAD PUNS

the beer in spain would be awful. we knew that. unfortunately, knowing wasn't much of the battle when it came to experiencing and accepting the reality of the situation. and the reality of the situation is that spain only seems to have one beer, a "premium lager" of the quality that you'd expect from a beer with that written on the label. the labels sometimes say cruzcampo, but they sometimes also say alhambra or estrella del sur. dia even sells bottles of its own brand for significantly cheaper than the rest, and you might as well get your liters of that if you're buying beer at dia, because all of the brands taste the same: not great. there's probably just the one big beer factory somewhere that makes bottles and bottles of all of spain's premium lager and then ships them to the different labeling factories. there's a place on feria that has a few taps of somethings german, but if glasses (glasses!) of cruzcampo are one euro fifty, who knows what a place would charge for a pint of premium lager imported from two countries away. anyway, you can get a glass of house wine for a euro ten. it isn't much against the heat, but it does some kind of job. maybe not the best for enjoying the thursday garbage picnic at midday, but there's a dia right near the picnickers, only then you still have to do the chilling yourself.

those glasses of house wine have heard more than their share of sighs. it's not even their fault. and of course the old country is completely out of mind when we're walking back to stick those warm bottles in the freezer. the old country was nothing but strife. this new world of unemployment has everything more exciting to offer in the way of bohemian vogue. but if someone wants to send a bottle of super dog, i wouldn't consider it a backward step to drink it. we're moving to calle becquer. you can have the address as soon as i have it exact.