Nine Speeken zee Doitch (layover in Frankfurt)

I'm writing you from Frankfurt Germany where I am in transit to New Delhi. It has been a whirlwind of a trip thus far and all the family except mom and I is passed out throughout the leather chairs in the Lufthansa business lounge. Ive spent the morning walking up and down the terminal, scouring the duty free shops for a zit cream that isn't tested on animals and is in the right price range. Its the only sort of manageable mindless activity that will keep me occupied and awake for now. I'm on zero hours of sleep yet the anticipation of the journey to India has me suspended high in the sky on the exiting energy of adventures to come.

Mom and I left New York on Thursday evening. I could barely sleep the night before, inspired by an awesome full band rehearsal on Wednesday where we went over almost all the songs for the album. I was surprised and encouraged by how quickly the songs are coming together and pleased that the musicians whom I admire and respect, seem to seriously dig the music. We went over arrangements for Olive Greed (Veruca), The peace song, Crash and Burn, Duele Menos, Momma Momma, Goodbye, Suspicious Package, Tequilanated, A Broken heart is such shame, and America. All together we played 11 songs in a few hours! It was so exciting to hear the songs that I wrote and co-wrote with KK come alive with a full band of experienced and amazing musicians. Everyone laughed when I pointed this out in a little impromptu song called "Everyone in my band in more famouse than me", and its true and i couldnt be more delightful to be humbled and inspired to keep being challenged in situations where I feel outleagued, out-rocked and out of this freakin' world!!!

The rehearsal was followed by a fabulous homemade farewell dinner with my the band and other good Friends down at the Treehouse (the affectionate pet name for our loft. We call our house the tree house because of all my plants everywhere, and not to mention the big tree in the living room:) We dined on creamy asparagus risotto and spicy vegetable pasta-less minestrone soup. For dessert there was bitter chocolate and strawberries, wine and laughter, goodbyes and promises to get make music and memories soon, soon, soon.

Anyways, theres so much more to write but now our 5 hour layover in Goolasholandia is almost over. Ill have to write more later, from the almost 8 hour flight to India. I still havent even told you about our 36 hours in Madrid! What an adventure and culture shock that was. We arived at the Ritz Carleton around 3 in the afternoon to meet the family and then it was off to ultra modern Reina Sophia Museum in the colonial center of town. Im not sure if you could realy call any part of Madrid "the colonial center" because its all beautiful and impressive. The architecture is so impressive everywhere you go and huge arches stand in the center of all major intersections, elegantly framing the huge boulevards as if in a painting planned perfectly. My eyes were happy and my heart delighted by the sights and sounds of the city of Madrid.

We went to see Picasso's anti-war epic masterpiece "Guernica" and all the Dali's, Miro's as well as some delightfully random peaces famed Dada master Man Ray's Spain inspired collection. After that we went to the square where there was live music and people singing and a guy playing the saxophone and people feeding pigeons. It was 10PM but it felt like 5 in the afternoon. The sun didn't show and signs of wanting to rest and lucky for us, neither did we. We got back to the hotel 11PM, just in time to get ready for our dinner at 12AM at the famouse family owned Lucio's in the other old section of Madrid's city center. Old is a relative term here though so I can't tell the difference really. Its all beautiful, quaint and spectacularly Spanish to me.