Well, it’s been a pretty crazy year here at the world headquarters of all things chorizo.
For one thing, the world headquarters has moved!
Yes, I started out the year in el romántico barrio de Puente de Vallecas and now I find myself, finishing it up, in el romántico barrio de Tetuán.
It’s quite an improvement, in several ways.
The year in review: Mr Chrizo style
Meanwhile, my chronically-employed alter ego, the hard working Mr Daniel, has been up to his usual stunts this year: releasing books and online courses like there’s no tomorrow.
I wrote an article about his insanity and neuroses in The glamorous life of a semi-professional blogger, which surprisingly turned out quite well.
Long story short, don’t become a semi-professional blogger and expect to be the next Tim Ferriss overnight.
This shit takes some work.
Also, check out 6 reasons why you should give me money.
Psh! I can think of at least twenty reasons why you should give him (me) money. But time is limited, so there are only six on the list.
He was even interviewed on the Magnetic Memory Method Podcast, by the brilliant Anthony Metivier. (Of course, he couldn’t resist talking about chorizo and blood sausage on iTunes, of all places!)
And if all that wasn’t enough, he got in a celebrity deathmatch with Venus O’Hara (the second-hottest redhead in Spain and author of Inglés para pervertidos – the book that finally taught me how to say “rim job” in Spanish, as if I cared.
In other online news, Mr Daniel is now nominally the publisher over at ¡Vaya Madrid! which is a cool project he hopes not to run into the ground. He’s written a few articles over there, for example Gastro-this and hipster-that: lost in the new Madrid, an article about Almudena Cemetery, and of course, a list post: 5 reasons why you should date a foreigner.
If “content” like that isn’t “evergreen,” he doesn’t know what is.
[Update: Vaya Madrid is down and I’m moving the articles over here. Some links might not work yet. Check back soon for more.]
So (abandoning the notion of speaking about oneself in the third person) it’s been an exciting year around Madrid.
Madrid’s ebola scare and other news from Spain
There was an ebola scare, which led to two articles: As Ebola Virus Spreads, Madrid Prepares for the Zombie Apocalypse and its sequel, in which I follow up with news and reader comments.
Of course, I called that whole thing wrong. It turns out that poor nurse recovered! And they’ve officially declared that the ebola outbreak is over.
Sorry, ebola!
Still, it was fun to imagine Mayor Botella handing out shotguns as a last-ditch measure to save the city.
It’s been a big year around Spain, too. We lost a King and got a new King (blah) and Emilio Botín, the owner of Banco Santander, died.
See: RIP Uncle Emilio.
Some annoying party girls left the country and wrote long, pouty articles about it which were (for some reason) way more “viral” than anything I’ve written.
And the national team was eliminated in the first round of the World Cup–but not before I got around to writing Is the Spanish government hypnotizing you? Click on that one, if only to see the photo of Cristiano Ronaldo’s package.
And, a propos of absolutely nothing, we have How to go whoring in Madrid, and Translating DOS-Speak: What your Director of Studies is really saying and Big Publishing, Kiss Your Ass Goodbye (Part 2).
Last but not least, this has been my tenth year in Spain. Ten years is a long time… And I wrote a compilation post about it. (I couldn’t resist the temptation of linking to a compilation post in the middle of another compilation post… HA!)
Anyway, yes, living abroad messes with your head.
And I’m living proof!
I’m not really sure how I managed to do all this and still hold down a couple of jobs in the meantime. I must be some sort of masochist. Or the next Faulkner.
Wait, no. Probably just a masochist.
Well, till next time, here I am. Contemplating the end of another year, and the beginning of another ‘nother year–and trying to figure out how I can get all this into a novel…
Yours,
Mr Chorizo.
P.S. I linked to almost every article I wrote in 2014 in this compilation. But I didn’t link to Obscene Conversations with ESL students. Or wait… Did I?
P.P.S. Nah, forget about it. One P.S. is enough.
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