December 9th – A quiet day in the park

Today dawned bright and clear in Madrid, but it was cold.  The highs have been in the high 40’s to low 50’s however with the wind it feels quite a bit colder, today for the first time I wore a Pendleton shirt under my rain jacket and I was a little cold most of the day.  However we decided that it would be nice to spend the day in the Retiro, so we hopped on the bus and got out at the corner of the park.  We walked over to the east side of the park, a less traveled area for us, and found a sunny bench to sit in the sun and read.  It is very entertaining to sit and watch all the people who like us are living in apartments that have no access to yard or garden get out and enjoy the park.  Families with 3 generations are all out taking the air; the kids are running and hollering, chasing squirrels, etc., the parents and grandparents walking, chatting, and trying to keep a lid on the exuberance of the kids and dogs.   Have I mentioned that there are wild parrots in the park?  If not, I’ll tell you now that in every city where we have visited, except for Seville, we have seen wild parrots in the parks.   I’ve tried to get pictures but my camera won’t telescope far enough and the parrots won’t hang around for me to get close enough for clear pictures, but they are there. 

After several hours in the park we headed back to our apartment.   We stopped and bought our daily bread then Deb made a yummy dinner of fresh duck breast, potatoes, and zucchini.  She made a sauce of onion, garlic, red wine, and bits of the fantastic fois gras of duck which were sent to us as a gift from Julia and Jose.  We drank a bottle of bubbly, Spanish Cava, along with it and spent a quiet evening watching some Sean Connery movie.   On a sporting note, Leo Messi of Barcelona just broke a goal scoring record that has stood since 1972 (Muller) when he finished up the match with 86 goals for the season, and there are still a few more games left in the football (soccer) season so it could go higher.