(how awesome is this sculpture in the lobby of Madrid’s Atocha Train Station? An awake baby head was on the other side.)

Still out in Spain….getting more used to the time zone (6 hours ahead of NYC) and pace (late mornings, afternoon naps, 10pm dinners)…but had a bad run-in with a shiesty gypsy who somehow managed to bump me so slightly and slip my blackberry out of my purse in about 3 seconds. The crazy thing is that I’m almost positive I know exactly which gypsies did it, they were parked on the same corner by the Reina Sofia Museum the next day too. This time, I gave them the ice grill and they left us alone…but obviously, my blackberry is long gone : (

On the plus side…not having my BB has been really liberating. For one, it’s forced me to look at the sights around me, without constantly relaying them to an audience back home. (And, being unreachable also means that I couldn’t keep checking for emails or calls that weren’t coming. Which was the emotional break I definitely needed on a personal level.)

Today we took the bullet train** from Madrid to Toledo, the old capitol city of Spain. Toledo was home to Christians, Moors (Muslim) and Jews, and you definitely see the influences of all 3 in the architecture, etc.

(Me and Jules in Toledo, in matching Barbour jackets…rockin’ our James Herriott “All Creatures Great and Small” steez, lol.)

More from Toledo, and then foodie-heaven with crispy baby pig at Botin….after the jump

(more…)

(Plaza Santa Ana: this is around midnight. On the right corner, a group of men are drinking open bottles of wine and smoking. On the left there is a playground, that was packed with kids and parents. All around the perimeter…tapas bars.)

Info: I was telling Mikey n Legend about how I’m exploring the tapas x bar scene is here in Madrid. And Mikey (always thinking) said I should post some pics to break up the monotony of rappity rapping, and rapper talkity talking.

(lots of people eating, beautiful old-world decoration….dinnertime starts at 9pm, and people are in the streets ’til 4-5am. Maybe that’s why Madridians take a break in the middle of the day. Stores shut down from around 2pm-5pm.)

(In life, where goes ham, I follow: inside and on that bar is a leg of Iberian ham. Jamon Iberico. The bartender is slicing it like tissue. I will eat alot of that this week.)

holy crap….a gathering of the best street vendors is my dream come true….the hours of waiting on line, not so much.

Everyone here knows how serious I am about my hand-pulled noodles, and taco trucks, and Korean fried chicken…but seeing DP and Rafi at the Vendy Awards (which you have to pay to go to!) make me realize….I will not be going there. My suggestion: just check out the list of the 2009 vendor contenders and visit them on their actual route. The Biryani Cart is awesome, and I think The Dessert Truck deserves a nom too. Next for me is to try the Jamaican Dutchy truck and the Taiwanese Cravings truck!

Related: Vend Diagram, Immaculate Infat x Miss Info,

From MTV’s Mixtape Daily:
“He’s smart,” Ross said about Eminem not addressing him and avoiding a rhyme battle. “That’s what I’m waiting for. That’ll be a gift — a great Christmas present for me. But y’all know what I think. I think everybody knows. It’s all ‘hood, man. Shout-out to Mariah Carey, she needs to reach out to me. We could eradicate some things.”

Rawse loves the word “gift.”
His schtick is past its sell-by date, me thinks.

I need that ODB beige tee….Shout to the Internets Celebrities, Dallas and Rafi, welcome back!

(olive oil poached octopus…with potatoes. meh…)

Whoo Hoo! Last week, I went on my first “foodie dinner” with Andrew and Chris from the foodblog ImmaculateInfatuation and singer/beautyexpert Heather Park ….ImmaculateInfat posts new NYC-area reviews daily and they hit all the ballyhooed hotspots…which is perfect for folks like me who treat every meal like its my last (I pre-research everything, its pathetic) but what’s key is that Andrew and Chris go past hype to the bottom line: should I eat here?

Plus, their reviews make me laugh out loud.

Personally, I lean towards tiny, ethnic haunts. I’ll eat anything served out the side of a truck. Also, I have a fear of franchises and laminated menus that have more than 8 pages….so the boys suggested Macao Trading Co., in Tribeca, which, like its namesake, Macau a/k/a the Las Vegas of Asia, is a blend of Chinese and Portuguese influences….

Chris writes:

“First of all, Macao is a huge scene … everyone in the house is either on an early in the game date, or starting off their night before they hit Pink Elephant. Second, the place is essentially a theme restaurant. There must have been a yard sale after the last Indiana Jones movie and the owners of Macao cleaned out every prop that Planet Hollywood didn’t already scoop up. I honestly wouldn’t have been surprised to see a monkey in a shriner’s hat come out and bus the table….”

Click here to read the slam by slam of our meal...

NOTE: the ImmaculateInfatuation boys noticed that there were lots of tables with 1 guy and 3 or more girls…..Me and Heather noticed that some of these combos looked like they were mail-ordered.

I’m jus’ sayin’.

Sure Seth Rogen is no Daniel Craig…but most women will agree, he’s easily more  jumpoff viable than 3/4s of “Entourage”’s entourage. (and personally, 4/4 because Vince’s dependency makes him very unattractive…Ducati shopping spree’s notwithstanding)

So, if this above clip from “Entourage” this past Sunday seemed random (as does so many of this fallen show’s feeble gags lately) and loaded…its because apparently, creator Doug Ellin sacrificed plot for personal beef…

Rogen reacted to “Entourage”’s discussion of his “oddly fascinating” ugliness by saying to E!:
“Yeah, those guys are assholes. I actually ran into Matt…Kevin Dillon in a Starbucks. And he’s like ‘You know, I’ve got to kind of apologize because apparently the guy who created our show doesn’t like you so much.’ “

“And I said, ‘Well, I have reason to believe because I think Doug Ellin is a moron from all I can understand, so it makes sense he doesn’t like me.’

“…I’ve kind of said some disparaging things about the show. Although in our defense, ["Entourage" producer] Mark Wahlberg called us misogynistic in an interview, so I think they kind of started that. … It’s on. Luckily, I never have and never plan on watching ‘Entourage.’”**

So…Marky Mark called Seth and his Judd Apatow “Knocked Up” crew sexist? Oo, shots fired. Then again, Seth could also have a case of sour grapes.

**for the record, I don’t believe that last line, lol.

after the internets exploded when South Park lampooned Kanye West last night (you got the play by play from your girl Inf here and on twitter, lol), the world waited with baited breath to see if it would spark an epic tantrum from Mr. West…or a benevolent high-five. Well…it was neither…instead, we got a sort of introspective confession on Ye’s blog.

well played.

Full Episode of South Park “FishSticks” featuring Kanye West! (thank you so much to Ny5Haze for helping me get this right, lol…)

UPDATE: If you’re having any problems watching the video, you can also stream it on SouthParkStudio : )

“Kanye Loves Fishsticks!”

It’ll all make sense (hilarious sense) once you watch the entire episode, but tonite’s South Park featured the boys making up a joke about…um…fishsticks. Which ended up driving Kanye West to bestiality, getting a joke-stealing comedian in trouble, and so much more.

Even that synopsis made no sense…oh well. The important thing is that Kanye’s mullet was in full effect and so was Kanye’s Paris Fab Five…..in full Taz Arnold leopard legging glory.

*double dog dead*

(more…)

Yesenia from HipHopStan sent over this video taken from TMZ of Chris and Rihanna landing via private plane back in Los Angeles after a weekend of reconciliation and jetskiing in Miami.
I’ll be in LA for a few days, maybe I’ll bump into the re-happy couple at the Korean taco truck.