Input: AC 100-240V -, 50-60 Hz, 1.5A

I am scared of electricity. I managed to shock myself (pretty badly) when I first tried to plug in my adapter. Something about placing mine hand over some poorly-placed metal parts...

Whenever I place anything into an outlet here, the outlet sparks. This is freaky. Not to mention the fact that the voltage is different here and I'm terrified of starting a fire or melting everything.

Funny story, this.

We were advised not to bring our computers, but as I was travelling on, I brought mine. A few others did as well. We definitely made the right decision, and everyone else realises this and uses our computers. I'm quite fine with this. Cristina, for instance, is paying me in Q-Tips, as I managed to forget to bring a bunch, and those little swabs are valuable. I don't mind so much, except when either my computer or my charger randomly disappears.

Theresa was using my charger last night--she asked--and I went to sleep not worrying about it. This morning, she asked me if, perchance, my computer wasn't holding a charge. I told her (with the old Girl Talk blasting in my left ear from my shuffle...) that, to the best of my knowledge, my computer was, in fact, holding a charge. Sometimes, it got confused about whether it was charged and the time remaining to charge, but I attributed that to all the programmes running.

She seemed perplexed, and then began to describe a small problem.

After our trip this morning, we were back at the residences examining me charger. To the best of my knowledge, the cord right next to the magnetic part that plugs into my computer had, well, melted.

Hm.

It was most definitely not charging. After some frantic internet searching (Apple, yoru products are both beautiful and intuitive, but your website is the most convoluted and difficult to navigate page that I have tried to use since ACES, and why the hell don't you have e-mail customer support!?) we managed to find Apple retailers in the area and made a plan to search them after lecture. The cord cost $79, but unfortunately and for some unknown reason, 89€. Theresa offered to pay and I didn't even refuse and wait for a second offer to accept.

We searched a few stores to no avail, although I was able to explain what I needed. One kind man gave us directions to a store that would have it, and I actually understood them and got us there. We found the adapter and bought it, and I felt like I had a late birthday present.

It's so cool! The best part is that it's the European version, but the way that it is designed to interchange a long power cord or a short, straight-to-outlet plug, I can interchange both my two European plugs and my two American ones, saving me the trouble of buying the $80 international adapter kit thingy.

I stuck it into the plug by my bed, and within 10 minutes it wasn't charging anymore (the light just turned off, which means that the plug wasn't connected to any power source...?). Luckily, it works in another plug in the room, which means that I'm now scared of the plug by my head. Also, I managed to read the inside of the plug by my head, which said that it was 250V, and the adapter runs on 100-240, but the straight-to-outlet part says 250, and I bought them here, anyways! Stupid electricity. Heaven forbid anything be standardised internationally.

We determined that the probable cause of the meltdown was the fact that she covered the computer in pillows and didn't like the distracting sound of the fan, so when that kicked on to cool the hot circuit-board, she pushed the computer farther into the pillows, overheating something or other and melting the electricity...? Who knows. I do know, however, that I have wicked cool European plugs for my Mac right now, which makes me wayyy cooler than most US Mac users.

'and here in Spain I am a Spaniard'

Bienvenidos a España, y un viaje del bus del cuatro horas. One awesome thing is that I'm finally in a country that uses the metric system, so my stubborn quirky way of understanding distance, speed, temperature, and even hours (all post times are my local time, whatever it is on any given day, but all posts change together)  is now normal. It's 23 out, and we're sies horas ahead of EST. All this said, the following comment should make sense: I swear that we were going 60, 70 tops the whole time when the speed limit was 120.

The flight over wasn't as long as I expected, and I had my first food improvisation practice complete with non-vegan excursions. We had a chat about identity crisis, but my organic hemp day pack is a nice surrogate for veganism for now. We landed, hopped on the bus, and then drove to Zaragoza, settled (the nice man at the front desk, when reading my passport to hand it back to me, said in Spanish something like, 'Your name is very difficult to pronounce, so, Maria!'), ate, debriefed, and acknowledged our collective tiredness and broke for the rest of the evening. I see sleeping, swimming, and unpacking--not necessarily in that order. Right now, though, the tinto de verano from lunch is making everyone's siesta lovely, I'm sure.

Blunders:

--Walking into an open window when all that I was trying to do was carry my 13 kg backpack duffle and 6 kg day pack up stairs.

--Accidentally shocking myself by somehow mysteriously holding my adapter that has too-wide pins in the socket.

--Thinking that the soap was, in fact, chocolate, but thank goodness I didn't eat it. Who puts chocolate in the bathroom, anyways?

*BUT I totally organised the set-up of my wireless connexion in broken Español.

Seeing the Expo will prove to be very interesting, as will the rest of these studies. The countryside on the way here was just as much a story of the poor people living along the autovia as was anything else. The random tracts of green grew to surprise me, and the little red flowers and bunches of purple flowers delighted me. I wished to walk barefoot in a summer dress and straw hat, picking flowers, and then lie in the hayfield under a scraggly tree eating fruit from Aragon until my eyes closed.