Sunny Day

Today has been a particularly sunny day. So much so that I had to find shade in order to see my screen. For those that don't know, on Sundays my only internet option is to sit outside the Library in the park and use the wireless. Normally it is overcast and I can see well enough... but today is bright. It's like 60... only downside is that it's also windy. I can't wait for summer.

Yesterday we went with the school to Sevilla... where we spent the morning going on tours of stuff I have already seen. I understand much more spanish this time around though, so I actually understood the stories about the things we saw. Among other things, I saw Christopher Colombus' tomb, the building that was once in charge of the entire New World (adminstrative building for the colonies under Spanish control), and a Palace where several important moments in history happened (Christopher Colombus and Magellan were given permission to set sail, Franco assumed power at the end of the Spanish Civil War, King Ferdinand died... etc. Also learned that the dollar symbol ($) originated from the royal seal used by King Carlos V... two pillars representing the Pillars of Heracles, and a squiggly line representing the wind of the Atlantic.

The highlight of the day for me was spending about 3 hours lounging on the banks of the River Guadalquivir under a full sun and 75 degree temps. Was actually warm enough that I bought some ice cream. Kathy and I just took in the sun and talked... was a relaxing afternoon. Think everyone else divided their time between the Cruzcampo Brewery and shopping. Cruzcampo is like the Spanish Budweiser... and the Brewery apparently gives out all you can drink beer and ham on the tour.

While here I have found that I really have no desire whatsoever to go out to bars or clubs. It's strange, because that stuff is supposed to be fun... but I find that all I want to talk about is Magic, programming, DotA, grammar, and finance... you know, nerdy things that don't usually play well at bars full of American college kids. I kinda feel like I'm in High School again, insofar as I prefer to be antisocial and do nerdy things. Oh well, that is probably a good thing as far as productivity is concerned.

Other cool news is that a project named ActiveMerchant has sprung up in the Rails community to automate handling payment gateways. I'll obviously have to read up more on it when I get that far, but at least it should speed up the PayPal integration.

Anyway, it's getting cloudy and cold now, so I'm going back to my apartment. Adios!