Catching Up

Last night I caught up with Conrad and Gillea over dinner at La Retirada, a place in Palermo where Gillea recommended the risotto. We split it, and while it was delicious, it doesn't compare to the risotto quinoa from Bio. I'm obsessed with that place. Anyway, last night we split two bottles of Los Alamos Malbec, a green salad, and a provoleta trio. I think Gillea is back to being a vegetarian. Conrad ate the chicken. Our total rang up to $222 pesos. Not a bad deal for a fancy place with drinks included. I'm glad to have Conrad and Gillea around; they know all the good places to eat. I felt like I talked the entire time, as evidenced by my slower-than-normal eating, but I hadn't seen Gillea in like a month and there was so much to catch up on. They're both headed to Cordoba for a wedding this weekend, so they can't make it to my birthday brunch at Olsen. But so far the RSVP list is at 9 people, and Olsen only takes reservations for up to 10. (We'll see who really shows up...) But it was fun to see what Gillea is up to with work and grad school plans. And how Conrad is doing with his roommate from Holland, is it? Now that the American crew is dwindling it's nice to catch up once in a while. I'm working the Expat Connection Happy Hour on Wednesday night for Con and Martin. The ex-pats are rude but they usually tip well. Sometime I wonder why those people left their countries. They only seem to complain. But I have no major complaints, I get by. Slept in and woke up with a massive Charlie Horse (I researched it, and since I've embraced my recent yogurt obsession I don't think it's a lack of calcium in my diet. Perhaps magnesium. Or dehydration. Or strenuous exercise, ha!) so I used that as an excuse not to run. I didn't get to yesterday either because of the movie shooting, and I think it made me cranky. And delirious. At one point I was staring into the fog machine trying to see how it worked and Alan, an extra from California who played Jenny's boyfriend was like, "Uh, are you okay? I'm pretty sure everyone is just running on fumes at this point." Yep, exhaustion and coffee and alfajores.

We made an alfajor run between takes. One of the dudes (Davin from Alaska) is studying business at La Universidad de Buenos Aires and is revamping the packaging for an alfajor brand as part of his studied. He goes out and polls mothers about alfajores. Which ones are better, why they feed them to their kids. "Well, they're so good for you. I mean, the dulce de leche -- that's got calcium. And there's triga, wheat, that's good for you. And they're so filling. I would ever feed my kid like an apple for a snack. That would never fill them up." Hmmm... alfajores are usually drenched in chocolate and they're made with processed flour and sugar. But they do fill you up, I will say that.

So I think today I am going to attempt to get my money in San Telmo. But before that I'm gonna grab lunch with Annemarie and Damian at Pura Vida in Microcentro. (I also want to try a coffee shop that Laurel told me about while we were sipping fake coffee during the shoot.) There are a ton of them downtown around Plaza San Martin. To get anywhere off of the D Line, you have to stop off at Catedral, so I figure why not grab lunch downtown? I'd been meaning to try this juice bar when it was in Recoleta, but I never found it. Jenny opted to go see Indiana Jones instead because the place looked "too healthy." I wonder if she thinks it's cute to act like a little kid? Yesterday craft services tried to serve us a chicken leg over rice. Well, with four vegetarians, that didn't cut it. "We can give you rice and puree de papas," the server told us. No no, we need real food. Finally Kurt let us sneak in to the actors' room to have our fill of salad fixings. The most vegetables I've had in a while. Delicious. Jenny grumbled that she would've rather had the rice and mashed potatoes. Some people just don't know how to be happy with what they've been given.