My Drunken Haze. Day 9 (Jaen, Madrid)

This morning started out fairly normal. I got up, and had a Jaen breakfast, which consists of toasted bread, olive oil, a tomato sort of jam, with jamon and cheese. Tasty tasty. Also, I had some of that ColaCao stuff I showed you yesterday. I had sort of fibbed, as it wasn't actually ME who had it, it was JuanJe. Also, I said you add sugar to it, but you really don't have to. It's quite sweet just on its own. I apologize for my fibbing, but it had to be done.

Once I got off the metro stop which was supposed to be right at my hostel, I stood there for about half an hour, completely lost. I used the wifi at a starbucks to look up the address, only to find it was literally right next door. There was no sign, no nothing, and I had to wander about inside until I finally found it. I perhaps booked the most ghetto hostel in Madrid. You have to wear wristbands. Like a roller skating rink. They are quite similar when you think about it. They both smell like sweat and there is a high chance of your stuff getting stolen.

Once settled, me and all my valuables hit the town. I toured the Royal Palace, Apothecary, and the Armory.

 RAWR! I eat your mail!

They were freaking phenomenal, but I was sad because you cannot take any photos inside. I decided to remedy this by taking notes for you. Here is what the fancy crests and designs looked like with the armor. I call them scaredy-eyes cat and skinny-legs lion, respectively:

These are near exact replicas.

The armor was very cool to see also. It has an incredible amount of gilding/decoration/fanciness. 3 things about the armor:

1. The armor is tiny. And not the child-size armor which was even tinier, but the armor would not even fit me.

2. They have ample space for their bellies.
3. They have some weird thing that sticks out from the chest which makes it look like they got stabbed. This only seemed to be on important people's armor. They called it a "riste" I think, but I could find no explanation. My conclusion is this: either it is to look like they already got stabbed in the chest, so soldiers will leave him alone, OR, it is a step for someone to get up into a tree or some high place. I should be a historian.
4. Some of the... codpieces? Are they called that in armor? Well, their special business area armor was actually formed into the shape of an erection. I guess some of the soldiers REALLY like war. Or armor.
5. This was more than 3 facts.

So by the time I finished and headed back to my hostel, I had a horrible migraine. I thought I was going to have to crawl into a small dark hole for the rest of the day, coming out only to finish/turn in my work and pee. I didn't take any medicine, because I hate medicine, and I still had a small hope a nap would help, and I could venture out afterwards in search of some tapas and fanta.

I was so wrong. I woke up in a blind haze of pain and discomfort. I had to finish my work, so I forced myself to sit up and get out my netbook. After some period of time, the pain got to be too much. I couldn't take it. I whipped out my excedrin and popped a couple down. I figured I still was going to be up for a while, and I wouldn't even be able to sleep anyway in that amount of pain. Any medication for me usually takes about 2 hours to kick in, so I got back to work to wait and see if it would have an effect.

It did. And almost immediately. But instead of the pain relief, I got the bad side effects that sometimes hit me instead of the good ones. I broke out in a cold sweat, shakes, and overwhelming nausea. I realized that I hadn't actually eaten anything since my Jaen breakfast, save for a couple pieces of fruit.

At that point, the combination of said effects, along with the heat radiating into my legs from my netbook in my already sauna of a room made me snap.

In a flurry of motion, I had my shoes on, my valuables in my purse, and I made my escape into the outside world. I staggered out into the street, happy to breathe some air that wasn't hotter than my own breath. I think I was searching for some food to stop the excedrin from eating away at my stomach. I had left my map in the hostel, because it was in a heavy book, and I couldn't handle my bag being heavy at that moment. Plus thinking any thoughts beyond the current moment was nearly impossible. So in a combination of confusion and false confidence, I headed out into the city of Madrid.

After taking some turns down a small street, I came across an internet/fotocopy shop, and went excitedly inside. I needed to print off my airplane boarding pass, and was hoping they had a printer, which they did. It only cost me 20 cents. This is really boring, but I'm telling you anyway. Then I ventured back out. As I was walking down the street, I spotted a small child. He was staring right at me, playing with a large remote control car. Feeling like a champ, I used my fluent spanish of "Hola" as I passed by him. He continued to lock eyes with me, and promptly threw his car straight at me. Thank goodness he has puny little arms, and I was walking like a drunk, because it sailed right past me into the REAL car parked on the street. Take that, nino. That'll teach you to hate my spanish.

I think I circled around, and wandered through a park until I found an ice cream stand. You know in cartoon,  when they're in the desert, and all of a sudden there's like a water fountain mirage or something, and angelic music is playing in the background? That's what this was like, only I'm pretty sure that it was real.

Magnum bar clutched in hand, I'm not positive what happened next. I ended up in the subway, apparently talking to myself. I only realized this when I looked over to see some guy staring at the crazy person that was me. So I took the metro to Sol, a huge plaza, and there were tons of people out. It had gotten dark, so I knew it was at least 10 o'clock, so I was impressed at the number of people out for the evening.

I walked down the busy street, stopping to see some musicians play. Some were playing an instrument I didn't recognize, and I took a picture to prove it was not a hallucination.

Then I got to a string quartet and I stared at the cello. Everything sounded so beautiful. I started crying in the street. Don't even ask me why. I was also confused.

I landed in front of a hotel restaurant, apparently staring at it, because a waiter came up to me looking confused. I just said "1". and he seated me. I thought he was very nice. I now am wondering if I looked like a starved puppy or something, because they brought me 2 kinds of table bread. First, a couple slices of artisan type bread with some sort of yummy cheese on it, and the other a rustic roll.

I ordered some Galician stew, which was not like anything I'd had before, but in a good way. It looks yucky, but it was not. It was not.

I finished, and asked for the check. Then someone came to bus my table and asked me if I wanted any coffee or after dinner licquor. I politely said no. Then the first guy came back and said something really fast in spanish. I caught "free on the house" and "hierba". I was like, oh maybe it's an herbal something, like a tea, or like the herby lemonade I had the other day. He seemed like his feelings were hurt if I didn't say yes, so I said yes. He did bring me 2 kinds of bread, after all.

He brought out a bright yellow liquid in some weird bottle and poured me a glass, saying something about it being good for digestion. I should have known better. But my brain was still that of a hyper emotional 5 year old at that point. So I began drinking it, and it tasted good. It was very sweet. Then I put it down, and breathed out- yup. It was totally liquor. Just what I needed. I wandered off in a bit of a buzz, back to the plaza full of people.

I found myself smack in the middle of a demonstration. Spain has been protesting for the past month, sleeping and such in the main plazas, such as this one. The police were driving through the crowds, flares were going off, and people were yelling in bullhorns. Calamity! I stood there wide-eyed for a while, and took some pictures and videos. It was awesome. Then, mildly worried that I wouldn't be able to get home, or that I might get arrested for being drunk at a huge protest, I made my way back into the station.

I did make it back to my hostel, safe and sound. I finished my work, which I had planned to do where I found food, but had instead stared off into Underland. All is well. Now, I think I will pass out.