I can’t speak for Molly, but my end-of- and post-Barcelona time has found me saddled with decidedly bad luck.  Aer Lingus lost my backpack, for example.  Which I handled like a pro, thinking, “Hell!  I’m almost home!  Meh!  These things just happen!”  True enough.  And anyway, the nice Irish-accented Aer Lingus lady told me they’d FedEx it and I’d have it in 1-2 days.  “Sorry, these things just happen sometimes,” she said.  “Yes!  These things happen!” I cheerfully agreed, happy to just be away from French teenagers.  But you know what DOESN’T just happen?  Your bag of pretty souvenir scarves you bought for grandma and mom and your sisters DISAPPEARING from your backpack so that when you finally get it from the FedEx man you throw a HUGE fit and your father for the first time learns about the true versatility of the f-word, which as we both discovered, can be used as a noun, adjective, adverb, interjection, gerund, and even an entire subordinate clause.  So we did learn something from this whole debacle.

The other big happening of the week: while eating breakfast in our hostel one morning, we got up to leave, only to realize that my messenger bag was GONE.  We’re still not sure how this happened…we were sitting there, we were awake, surrounded by people, Molly’s usual hangover had dispersed unusually early…but there it was.  Robbery.  After two months of watching our shit like a couple of nervous rural Midwesterners abroad.  So we went to the police station and filled out the requisite forms and so on, and then Molly left me alone in the hostel room so that I could have privacy for a small, pillow-throwing, cussing-filled temper tantrum.

OK, so now that I think about it, that was really our sole “bad luck” per se in Barcelona…unless you count Molly’s bad luck in finding a pair of truly irresistible yet relatively expensive pair of boots that caused her to uncontrollably throw her credit cards at the sales clerk.  Despite a few face slaps, “Pull yourself together, woman!” moments, acknowledgements of lack of suitcase space, and reminders of the Euro exchange rate, the forces of commerce prevailed, and Molly walked away bleary and blissful, teetering in her impractical yet gorgeous slouchy grey suede boots with impractical yet stylish heels, smoking a post-spending cigarette and glorifying in the fact that this purchase would necessitate Danielle writing a 50-comma sentence on the blog. 

Bad luck all around, I say.

Anyhow, due to my loss of bag, debit card, and a bit of cash, it was decided that (a) I needed a new bag, preferably a cute, inexpensive, bright-yellow shiny vinyl one that nicely balances professionalism with whimsy, which lo and behold I FOUND, thankyouverymuch (I suddenly realize that this blog just went way Sex and the City…stopping NOW)…and (b) it was time to stop doing tourist things (i.e. museums, cathedrals, and things that in general cost money and also, incidentally, tend to bore the pants off of Danielle, who by now was fragile and faithless in humanity…not to mention that require us to wander at Molly’s maddening gawking-tourist walking pace) (sorry, Molly) and start doing free, relaxing things.

Hence, numerous visits to the beach.

The normal laws of the universe do not apply on Barcelona beaches.  For one, every woman — regardless of age, attractiveness, build, and <cough> the pull of gravity — is totally comfortable wandering around without a swimsuit top. 

Not horribly shocking, perhaps, but the men didn’t seem to notice or care.  Woman wandering topless down La Rambla?  Riots ensue.  Woman’s towel slips in the hostel bathroom?  Endless jabbering, whispering, pointing for days.  HUNDREDS of breasts, just out there swaying in the breeze, humming contentedly to themselves as they soak up the sun?

Nothing.

But upon closer inspection, the men usually had better things to do than gawk.  For example, roughly half the men at the beaches were vendors of some sort, wandering about screaming, “Coca Light?  Coca?  Coca Light?  Coca?  Cerveza?  Coca?” and getting in the way of your sun rays.  Some also sold pieces of coconut.  These vendors inexplicably wandered around yelling, “Da-doo-da-doo-da-doo-DA-DOO-DA-DOO!”  (And though I haven’t looked it up, I don’t think “da-doo” is the Spanish word for “coconut.”)

The other half of the male beach-goers were British 18-to-20-year-old men on what Molly called “The 2008 Losing Your Virginity Tour of Europe.”  These young men spent most of their time talking in Cockney accents about what a ”smashing” and “brilliant” night they had last night with “that bloomin’ bloody blinkin’ big-titted girl from the club.”  “Oh, really, Cecil?  THAT strumpet?  How simply delightful!”  “Indeed.  Oh, drat, there is sand in my marmalade.”  “Oh, your bloody crumpet is ruined!”  “Quite!”  In between gloating over girls, they flagged down the vendors and quietly engaged in transactions that involved rolls of Euros, large amounts of marijuana, and very little Coca Light.

Consequence-free nudity and drugs.  God bless you, Barcelona.

Incidentally, this same college-age Brit male crowd made up a striking proportion of our hostelmate population as well.  And it was at the hostels that Molly and I really started to feel our age.  We were the old girls lurking in the courtyard, sipping a beer (singular) while reading New Yorkers and Newsweeks sent to us by our families, who then snuggled in at 10:30, talking about how tired our feet were from the EXHAUSTING walk to all those museums and cathedrals.  Everyone else in the hostel rolled in around 4:00 AM, each one on their 15th beer of the night, scantily clad, awash in sequins and lycra and eye makeup (fairly often regardless of gender, God bless ‘em), usually with several MORE 18-to-20-year-old British men in tow.

Of course, I exaggerate, because 4:00 AM is when Barcelonans call the sitter and put the kids to bed.  My morning runs (around 6:00 AM) were both agility and endurance exercises, as I was forced to nimbly dodge the packs of stumbling-drunk fools on La Rambla.  It was rather nice, actually, not being the only person out and about early in the morning (running down dark unfamiliar urban streets alone = panic attack), though I occasionally attracted douche-baggy packs of drunk clubber men in shiny silk shirts who thought it would be fun to run with me.  Fortunately, beer is kind of hard on the ol’ motor skills, and with enough evasiveness and strategic darting, I was able to run several of them into lampposts to get them off my tail. 

Anyhow.  I am now back in Iowa, where it is warm and sunny and flat.  I have finally had the time to pause and reflect upon my adventure, and I have come to one chief insight: Europeans have no effing clue how to make a hay bale.  Between Greece’s wire-bound monsters, Italy’s wet and moldy beasts, and Spain’s positively soaking wet, 5-ton bastards, I learned to appreciate how Iowans do this until-now-seemingly-simple task.  I realized this the other day, as I unloaded several racks of hay bales for my dad and contentedly juggled the nice, dry, under-75-pound, rectangular bales before casually tossing them off the rack.

And I’m getting PAID for it.

God bless America.  It’s good to be back.

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Alright, this blog is about tapped out.  But stay tuned for <sniffle> THE FINAL POST.  Oh man.  I think I need to lie down.