Not much to report really! Jess and I took a much needed rest day to recuperate after 11 days of non-stop go-go-going. We woke up around 9:00am, as usual, but chilled in bed until about 12:00pm when we both reached maximum capacity for time without food. I had several Nature's Valley bars set aside for the morning so we would have food before shopping so we both ate one then headed out. There's a shop literally a block and a half from us, basially the same distance as the one we used in Paris, which is great! We literally didn't plan at all for what we'd do if there weren't food places close to us. I mean, we assumed there would be, but we didn't even consider that there might be. We're quite lucky.
Neither Jess nor I read Portuguese so we just had to guesstimate what everything was from the packaging or the way it looked. Most stuff we could figure out, like fruit and orange juice, but we couldn't figure out what the pastries we bought had in them. We decided we just didn't care and threw them into the cart anyway! I love the carts in Portugal and Paris! They're shaped like slightly larger shopping baskets but the have wheels on the bottom and a second larger handle so you can hold it or use it lke a wagon. It makes sense though, since the stores are so small and a full shopping cart would either not fit or clog up a whole aisle! American stores and shops are all so large, so the bigger carts make sense, but that doesn't mean the little European carts aren't adorable!
With only my Trusty Paris Purse (still sans zipper) to carry everything we carried and held a lot of the food as we paid the 14 euro it cost for literally so much food. I dunno what rent is like in these countries, but in terms of groceries the price is totally right! We carried our food back and made ourselves a ham and cheese sandwich each, glad to have an actual meal for the first time that day. It occurred to me then that the oven was a gas one that I had no idea how to work, prompting Jess to message the AirBnB owner because Google wasn't gonna cut it. While we waited on a response we explored our new abode a little. We got a full place to ourself this time, a whole apartment with all kinds of space! There's a bedroom kitchen, living room, dining room, bathroom, front patio, back windowed patio, and a garden in the back! Totally royal! It's also got a washing machine, so I'll get to do some laundry for the first time since Killarney! Exciting, isn't it!
Jess then took a shower and I tried to figure out the oven but I only succeeded in turning off the heat on Jess, which she definitely didn't appreciate, and leaking some gas into the kitchen. So I'm not a contender for Top Chef, sue me. Post attempts at kitchen-utilization Jess went into the living room and I chilled in the bedroom and we both just vegged out for a bit. Jess thinks she sprained or pulled a toe in Paris and is trying to rest it up, and it was nice to just have our own space for a while. I did some writing on the back porch then watched some Netflix in bed until Jess reemerged from her chill-zone to see about dinner. The AirBnB owner had messaged her back instructions on how to work the stove, informing us that a person would be coming the following day to refill the gas or something like that. Because of whatever the issue was his instructions said to turn the switch for the burner we wanted to about medium, then light a match and hold it to the intended burner while holding the switch in for 30 seconds. I went through about 6 matches attempting it because Jess was too scared to go near it and I couldn't light the match and push the button in at the same time. Eventually I figured out how to use my knee to hold the button and got it working so we could make grilled cheese! I accidentally turned the stove off once and had to relight it, but I was basically an expert at that point!
Grilled cheese was had in the living room where we decided to test the TV. All the channels have Portuguese subtitles that we can't figure out how to turn off but hey, we might learn something! We found a channel showing Young Sheldon and decided to watch. The show is alright, very different from Big Bang Theory and Sheldon isn't unlikable just the least entertaining of the family to watch. After that the channel showed Joe Somebody, some Tim Allen movie Jess and I had never seen but watched as we snacked on some more of the goodies we'd gotten, and discussed plans for the following day. Those plans were to basically do the same thing, but plan for going to either the castle or the archives the day after. The Princess Diaries 2: Royal Engagement, a movie we adore but have also seen several zillion times, came on after Joe Somebody so we passively watched that before meandering off to bed. Like I said, not that much going on, but we really needed a break!
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