There will only be a few pictures because there's almost nothing to tell. I apologize in advance for the quality – my parents' old camera still shoots pretty poorly. I would've bought myself a “DSLR replacement” Panasonic Lumix G1, which I like for absolutely no reason, but no money is budgeted for it this year.
I made burritos out of ready-made ingredients. It's not rocket science. You take Santa Maria tortillas (available in any supermarket), put in any filling (I did it according to the recipe on the site), pour Santa Maria taco sauce over it, and pop it into the oven. You could probably do it in a pan too, pan-fried flatbreads taste better in my opinion, even though they're less healthy. In my opinion, it came out a bit dry – next time I'll use meat with some fat. It also turned out not spicy at all, because the taco sauce was mild, and there was no guacamole whatsoever. The only thing that saved the day was some stashed Tabasco sauce, even though it was also mild.
Macho Valera polished off a bottle of rum all by himself. As usual, he entertained us for three with his jokes. And when he wasn't entertaining us, we watched all sorts of New Year's crap. The Russian channels were showing some Comedy Club and stuff like that, while the highly spiritual Latvian ones had either dancing or an Intars Busulis concert. For those who, like me, do not follow the mighty Latvian pop scene, I offer a music video for one of his popular songs – Races.
Intars's concert left an impression that was more favorable than not. You can hear and see that he's originally a jazz musician. As for the dancing, that was funny too. The thing is, rk13 used to be seriously into it back in the day, so when he saw the participants, he'd exclaim things like: “Oh, remember when Violka and I drank vodka back then?” (not addressing me). And I, in turn, reacted with: “You know the talking heads from the TV!”.
Here are, for instance, the winners of the “Dancing with the Stars” competition, Viola Abramova and Raivis Vidzis. (I hope the analogies between the competition and Russian projects are clear). Raivis seems to be a bodybuilder or a powerlifter, so they look pretty funny together. Unfortunately, I couldn't find a decent video of their dance, let alone the exact one we watched. Here's one filmed from afar by an amateur.
There's also this in the news broadcast: Viola and Raivis up close
This was in the bag with the groceries. What it is, where it came from, and why it has such a funny inscription – is shrouded in mystery.
It looks impressive, and is essentially quite amazing. It rotates, taking whatever you want is tolerated.
And I'm already leaving.
Before leaving, I had some tea at the railway terminal in a tea-and-coffee shop-cafe called “Divi turki”. I didn't like the tea, they brewed it way too strong, it got bitter and tart, and you can only drink that kind with sugar or sweets. I had to break off a piece of a chocolate bar I bought at Stockmann, and it got a bit better.