[ Completely irrelevant story below, unless you were around that night ]

The other day I wrote about my stay at Madrid for the Jornadas GNOME Hispano, and said we were going to Madrid to have dinner and then go out.

My fears weren't unfounded. I was forced (ok, maybe not forced, say... induced) by hordes of evil Madrileños to drink, as they probably know I succumb quite easily to that drug. First, Grex prepared a dinner in a tapas bar near the Plaza de España.

This dinner basically consisted in eating little and drinking quite a bit. After I (voluntarily) had my first beer, my glass of wine would never be empty, as there was someone around who would quickly refill it as soon as I finished it. Anyway, after a while we went to a pub, where among other things, acs challenged me to a press-ups contest. I managed to win (you suck, acs!) even if I didn't feel my arms. At one point we were out on the street again, and I was missing my wallet. 5 minutes later, it was found in acs' pocket, who was probably more drunk than me (and that has its merit).

Garnacho was kind enough to take me to the hostal, which I would have never found alone, and offered to translate my attempts to communicate with the hostal guy to get my room opened. Nothing to exciting until here, besides I really don't like being drunk. What an image must I have given around Madrid...

Ok, so my train back home was at 9:00AM. At 8:27 or so, Carlos managed to wake me up. "Dude, it's 8:30". I think I managed to be ready in about two minutes, rushed down and hoped that I didn't have to change trains in the tube to get to Atocha. The hangover was quite bad, or probably I was still drunk... at the station, I waited a few minutes for the next train, and kept looking at my mobile phone. "11 minutes, 3 stops. I can make it still".

There were two men with suitcases and luggage in the same wagon, and when we arrived to the Atocha tube station, they stepped out of the train. My spinning head managed to connect two events: "men with luggage stepping out" = "I'm at the Puerta de Atocha RENFE station". I followed them, and after a few seconds. I realised there was no indication of how to get to the railroad station. I ask the men... "Oh, that the next tube station", and at that exact moment the doors in the train close. FUCK!

Next train went by 5 minutes later. 4 minutes to go. I rush out of the tube, carrying heavy bags with me, rush to the railroad station and when I get there, I am told the train has left one minute ago. The rest of the morning involved waiting 2.5h for the next train, suffering a horrible hangover alone, in a stupid station, not being able to read my book or study any Valencian and getting a smoking ticket for the next train. D'oh! At least I saw a nice demonstration of a support group for the Saharaui people, which was nice.

In the train, I managed to find a seat in the non-smoking wagon after an hour. An American couple sitting right next to me demonstrated how sucky you Americans are at spelling. "How do you spell 'recommend'?". The guy thinks for a few seconds... "Two c's, 'reccomend'". Ugh!

I arrived at Valencia at 3PM, and at home at 4, way too late for lunch. After the horrible train trip, I needed a 3 hour long nap.