Good morning my little chickens and waffles, how’s every little thing?
Me? I’m super. Okay yes, technically I did break a bar stool moments before Cristiano Ronaldo scored a sizzling goal to equalize for Madrid during Saturday’s el Clásico against Barcelona, which was dead embarrassing, but I didn’t miss the goal and I didn’t spill my pint so I’m still taking that as a big W.
Also, I got mistaken for being from Spain, which is about the coolest thing that has ever happened to me in the history of…well, ever. Yeah, pretty much ever.
I’d just finished watching the match and was leaving a nearby paletería, coco paleta in hand. Oh, for those of you who don’t have access to paletas (and thus no probable reason to live) a paleta is a popsicle-type thing made of fresh seasonal fruit. Normally you have to wait for the paleta man to come by with his little cart, but as it is unbecoming of a woman of my social (not to mention physical) stature to chase an infinitesimally small and surprisingly easily-spooked Mexican man down the street while waving a wad of cash, I was delighted to find a little shop that sold them, a dollar a pop, from a little freezer.
Anyhoodle, I’m traipsing down the sidewalk in my magic jeans, beautifully-fitted Xabi Alonso jersey and 5″ Diane Von Furstenberg cobalt pony heels (made from real cobalt ponies!) enjoying the first paleta of summer and trying to make 100% certain that second-half pint was out of my system before getting behind the wheel.
I popped into La Merced, because any place that advertises itself as a combination “Groceria, Carneceria y Discoteca” –grocer, butcher and discotheque– is a place I want to see the inside of.
While inside the admittedly disappointing grocer/butcher/disco (is a discoball made out of a haggis dipped in broken mirrors really too much to ask? I submit that it is not) I pretty much got the same response I always get when I walk into a place catering to a mostly Mexican clientele while wearing some sort of Spanish soccer jersey: a mix of confusion, suspicion, appreciation and fascination which I never really understood.
On my way back to the car, still enjoying my coco paleta, I hear a muffled whistle, then a much clearer one.You know, a real, old school wolf whistle of the variety usually reserved for cartoons where Bugs Bunny is dressed in drag.
Yeah yeah, I know I’m getting my humorless feminist card revoked as soon as I hit “publish” but after the second whistle and a call of “Miss! Miss!” I turned around.
If a guy is going to take the trouble to leave his place of business to whistle at me in the middle of a sunny Saturday afternoon, I’m going to turn around to see.
He was precious.
I was easily a foot if not an actual foot and a half taller than he was and when I turned around he hesitated as if he’d just caught a shark with a minnow then asked in Spanish if I knew the score of el Clásico. I answered him –also in Spanish– that it was a 1-1 draw, with Messi putting one past San Iker and then Cristiano Ronaldo answering in the second.
More confusion…
“Are you from America or Spain?”
I answered and he explained that he thought I was from Spain (the Xabi shirt, and the Spanish-from-Spain slang) and was purposefully misunderstanding him just to be a language snob.
Which brings me to my major point:
Pep Guardiola is smokin’ hot.
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