Manchas' pretty manicure. This is an old picture and for awhile we matched but now she's gone back to hot pink and I've turned to blue.

The pup and I are just having a quiet girl's-night in. Me with my book and her destroying the dried flesh of some poor fool animal that's been killed and salted and rolled up into a bone shape for the sake of puppies everywhere. I had a really great vegetarian dog treat thing going on with her, but then the grocery store ran out of stock or something and she's converted to blood, guts, and horseshoes.

Speaking of which, happy belated St. Patrick's Day. I wore a green shirt on accident, but it's not really celebrated here, anyway. My primary acknowledgement of the day was to go on Facebook and silently criticize all the P-day posters. Like, oh my god, this beer's green. I've never seen that before in my life.

Last year I met some guys from Ireland at a Cuban bar in Madrid (pinche globalization!). I realized it was my first time meeting a genuine Irish person and not just some person sloshing a Guiness and acting cheeky. (--> I don't know exactly what this word means, but it seems to have Irish connotations). Anyway I thought that they were lying and I got a little annoyed with them. "Your accent's horrible, you don't even sound Irish." Huff and scorn. They were though, and I learned a lesson:

I'm a douchebag.

I moved on from it and now only criticize Irish impersonators on anonymous online social networks. I don't know why I have a problem with this.

. . .

Anyway, that was before. Time has passed and it's 4 in the morning. I've been awake against my will since 1215am, so I'm doing the next best thing to sleep - sipping Diet Coke and playing online solitaire. My interview for Greece is in three and a half hours, so I'm glad I'll be well-rested and alive. As I write Manchas is making particularly cute faces next to me, probably in an attempt to make up for the puddle of wizz she left outside the bathroom door. I can't clean it up because the mop's out back. Normally in these occasions I'd wake Mono up to go get it for me, but he's at the base and there are bugs out there that I'm not prepared to deal with. In any case the place is already a mess, with three of Mono's shoes scattered on the floor. I leave them there after I smash bugs beneath them, and then Mono throws the bastards away when he gets home. It's a system.

I have a one week vacation for some Saudi holiday I don't know about but I'm sure it would be in good taste to look into. Put that on the to-do. Our last day of work I subbed for a class and one of the students told me he has five wives. I'm really not sure if this was true and I had a wild-eyed look in my eyes (I could see it in the video screen) for a moment while I pondered whether to laugh at his joke or simply nod politely. Evidently I thought the spooked horse expression was an appropriate balance of both.

In elementary school I remember a book series about horses called the Saddle Club. If you bought a book, inside you'd get a little card that said you were a member. There were also lots of other horse books not in the series, and horses were always an option on folder covers and notebook designs and whatnot. I always thought there was something very weird about that particular subject as an obsession among girls my age (9?). Why horses? Why now, when you have so much going for you, are you choosing to identify yourself as a "horse girl"? You do realize you live in the suburbs, right? I think I thought horse girls were out of touch with reality. This is New Brighton, woman, horses are of another era! I might have also been sad that the horse girls didn't let me into their club since I didn't have a card from the book.

Life is a very sad thing.