say it with me

I spent much of last week in Barcelona and while my coworkers are rejoicing over the “sunlight” in Munich and lack of snow, I am thinking wistfully of 20+ temperatures and beaches.  Of course, it was embarrassingly easy to locate the other tourists wandering the city – we were the only ones without heavy black wool jackets and long pants.  And sitting outside.

I am an extremely light packer – being small and having small clothing/shoes does help, but I also bring very few things in general.  My bag going to the airport weighed 6 kilos, which was about the same size as most carry on purses.  Or 8-year-old backpacks these days.  However, on the flight back, a mere 5 days later, I had a whopping 14 kilos.  Where did those 8 extra kilos come from?  I have one word for you, my friends: chorizo.  Okay, a few more words: “specialty canned seafood” and “marcona almonds”.  Not to mention an embarrassing large assortment from Cacao Sampaka.  Some of the most delicious chocolate I’ve had and inexpensive enough to make me wonder why one really needs Paris and Michel Cluizel.  But while that may seem like a lot, I was making fideos last night and realized I did not buy NEARLY enough chorizo.  6 kilos of baggage allowance gone to waste.

The German is being badass at work and was invited to join a select leadership program his company has for its top people.  Which is great except for one thing – they call themselves “high potential carriers”.  Can you imagine phoning home and saying “Guess what?  I’m a high potential carrier!  No, not for STDs…”  Of course, he sees nothing wrong with this name.  Clearly there are no Americans in their HR department.  If I was going to apply for a job there, this would be my first example of value-added.