After two less than desirable days in Madread, Team Z made their escape to the coastal Mediterranean resort city of Gandia, Spain. Gandia, glad to see ya! We were met with an absolutely perfect spring day. Warm air, the legendary blue of the Mediterranean, and a great venue. Though, upon arriving at the venue, we were met with a vision of how hard the party rocks in Gandia. At six o’clock in the evening, when we walked in, the staff were using large pushbrooms to sweep up huge piles of shattered glass that covered the entire floor of the venue! All-in-all, a promising sign for a raucous evening!
The afternoon was spent on the beach, drinking beers at a wireless Internet cafe, and enjoying Cuban cigars. The show was a success, with a full house of vibrant Spaniards rocking it hard, and buying t-shirts, CDs and DVD’s. We were hosted for the night by the wonderful, beautiful, gracious bartender, Marina. An Argentinian in Spain, she provided us with a comfortable place to sleep, good company, and a light breakfast to send us on our way in the morning. Or, rather, provided all of us with a comfortable place to rest with the exception of Kyle!
Kyle, perhaps tuned up a little heavily from the show, or perhaps just intoxicated with the floral aroma of beautiful, coastal Gandia, decided to make an early morning excursion. Our evening only ended at 6am, but Kyle insisted on staying up an extra hour to walk down to the beach and spend the morning swimming and napping on the sand. First he passed out for an hour on the cold, stone floor, leaning on the bedroom door where Terry had crashed. In less than an hour he was kicked, and verbally abused into consciousness by Terry who was agitated into a frenzy by Kyle’s unconscionable snoring. Taking the hint, and sensing sunlight peeking through the shutters, Kyle hopped up, took a shower and heading out the door for his refreshing morning adventure.
Kyle arrived at the beach at 7:30am only to find the beach being dragged by a series of large tractors that smooth out the sand each morning. Fighting sleep deprivation, Kyle slipped in and out of consciousness, bundled up like a drifter in a dirty sweatshirt with a large hiking backpack on a bench awaiting the completion of the smoothing process. Eventually he found a perch on the sand, but to little avail, as he was repeatedly forced to move out of the way of the smoothing tractors as he seemed to repeatedly doze off in their path! When the smoothing process was complete, and the sun began to peak out from the clouds, it seemed to Kyle that a rich, bohemian beach slumber would come sweet and sandy. Just as his sleep deprived, hungover eyelids began to drop the wind kicked up something wicked and cold and began whipping Kyle into a shivering fetal ball, sand filling every crevice, crack and opening in his belongings. Reluctantly he picked up his belongings and dragged them across the beach to shelter.
What followed was an uncomfortable encounter at a local grocery store with an indignant clerk who was not pleased with Kyle’s “bitter, tired, homeless” style of dress and demeanor when he went on a trek to buy “anti-snore nasal strips.” After an hour of aimless wandering he returned to the beach for a second go only to be met by a continuing, vicious sirocco, and then, to his delight, a chilling spatter of rain. Kyle walked back, in the rain to Marina’s apartment where the rest of us were bundled up tight as bugs in rugs. After dumping his bag and blanket in the van he decided to kill some time by doing some work at the Internet cafe.
Upon completing his tasks at the Internet cafe, Kyle paid for his hour of online use, and then headed over to make a brief pitstop at the cafe servicio’s (a.k.a. el bano, bathroom, shitter). The reason for his visit was the undeniable, unexpected express delivery of goods from the “mud truck.” Curiously enough, the bathroom was located at the far end of an enormous room that was completely empty! Like the Scarecrow approaching the mighty vision of the all-knowing Oz, Kyle made haste to the facilities. Just as he neared satisfaction he was stopped dead in his tracks by the roaring voice of an alarmed Spaniard. The Spaniard was chattering up a storm, trying very hard to illustrate to Kyle the severity of some kind of situation in the “Oz closet.” Even with his decent understanding of Spanish Kyle was unable to comprehend what the man was trying to warn him of. Finally the man said, “No comprendo? What are you drunk?” In English! Kyle alerted him that he was not drunk, but rather a foolish American with a really big problem brewing. It turned out the big problem was nothing more than a very wet floor, and the man sent Kyle on his way, Rusted Root style, to do his business.
With pantalones shucked, and the mud truck about to deliver it’s mastodonic load, it occurred to Kyle almost as a vision, without actually having to look around, but with complete certainty that this Oz closet does not have any toilet paper! And right he was. No paper products of any kind. All that was left was a large terrycloth hand towel and the prospect of simply pulling up and hitting the pavement! Upon sizing up the severity of what had just occurred, stealing the hand towel and ditching it in the back room, caked with mud, seemed like a good option until Kyle realized that, if you remember, the back room was completely empty! Nothing could be ditched or hidden or stuffed in or behind anything! Thus the pull-up/brick-hit commenced.
Kyle duck-walked it down the street and then proceeded to climb the six flights of stairs up to the apartment where the rest of us were still deliciously asleep. Thus concluded the morning of Kyle’s Law: What you never could expect would happen, will happen.
Those pictures are fantastic!
hmmm…