Boots Cats

Fun fact: if you repeat this title again and again rapidly (aloud) you will be beatboxing. Anyway, on to the main body of the entry.
Last night I made a step I haven´t made in my history of pilgrimage-making and bought a bell pepper to eat with my dinner. It was GREAT! What with my half baguette, liter of orange juice, and banana (and cookies) I had a very good meal including the pepper. After dinner I readied myself for bed and then went to the mass, where I finally got to learn the name of one of the many Koreans I´ve been pacing for a while. Since I´m on the subject of church, let me share with you something I´ve been thinking about for a while now and that I actually talked about with an Italian guy for about half an hour as we walked.
As an English major, I´ve read many poems and essays by English and American writers who have gotten fed up with "the church" (interestingly, none of them ever mention Jesus) and look at Christianity as a dead religion no different than the Greek and Roman mythologies. Having come from a vibrant (and American) church I always wondered how they could ever feel that way. Having been to several masses over the last four weeks, I think the reason is this: in an American church, there is little historical quality to the building itself and the priest and parishioners usually seem more at home and comfortable. In these old European churches, however, the services have all been presided over by tired-looking and solemn old men and attended by mostly old women. A troublingly large fraction of the priests seem to just be going through the motions. And it´s even worse with monks because they wear the medieval clothing. All of these factors, I believe, contribute to non-believers´ impression that Christianity is a dead religion. (My Italian friend and I agreed that, of course, it´s NOT because Jesus is alive.)
Anyway, I slept well after mass until about 3:30 when a combination of heat (due to some short-sighted individual closing both windows), bladder pressure, and one guy letting loose infrequent coughs that sounded like gunshots. I got up to take care of the first two problems and then tried desperately to get back to sleep with the (otherwise nice) guy continuing to emit these blasts of air to clear his throat. I cleared my throat loudly to try and and hint at a more polite and quieter method of cleaning the airways, but he only gestured grumpily in my direction as if to say "what do you want me to do?!" (3:30, I´ve decided, is nobody´s best hour.) The next morning I did my best to explain in Spanish a better path, so let´s hope he takes my advice because we´re in the same room again.
Today was a good day, but the last 4 or so kilometers were pretty rough. Considering I did about 18 miles, though, it´s not that surprising. Now I´m in Arzúa, which I only remembered is a bit dumpy after I arrived and passed by 2 miles the quiet little town with an award-winning albergue. Oh well. Still, since it´s bigger I found a grocer store and got another bell pepper to eat with dinner along with some apples and bread and cheese for tonight and tomorrow.
Now you´re probably all wondering what´s with the title other than being a lesson in how to be cool. The reason I put "boots" in there is because, well, I think it´s time I talked about mine. Let me begin by saying that no pair of boots is perfect (especially after almost 1000 miles!). When I first started last time I quickly found that if I was going to survive the Camino I needed to reduce the friction between my Achilles tendon and the upper part of the back of the boot. Fortunately I had a kit with teflon stickers to do just that, and those worked like a charm for about 900 miles. Today, however, I had to finally remove them because they have become so worn that they did more harm than good. Judging by the blisters now oozing on the backs of my feet, I´d say my boots haven´t changed for the better in this area. Two more days to Santiago and then I´ll be wearing flip-flops for the rest of the summer!
Confession time: I only put "cats" in the title for the beatboxing joke. I´m only human. Anyway, I´ll be about 20 km away from Santiago next time you hear from me! God bless!