never before and never since, I promise

So, I was tempted for a split-second to participate in that National De-Lurking thingamajob, and harangue all y'all to peek out from the cover of anonymity. Then, I realized that would be kind of stupid in my case, for a multitude of reasons:

• I, myself, try to maintain anonymity, so it would be a little hypocritical for me to harass anyone.
  
• I'm lucky that anyone anywhere reads this meaningless and often cryptic drivel, so I should just be grateful that anyone ever does comment.
  
• Following up to above, my heart does leap up excitedly whenever anyone new comments, or mentions they've been lurking for a while. It leaps because I am always shocked anyone is trying to follow along. But it also leaps because it means something I've written has touched enough of a nerve to compel you to comment. So, just calling you out seems a little, well, unearned.

Count on me to overanalyze even the simplest, most innocuous thing, but anyway, there you have it.

In the spirit of getting you to comment, though, I have two really random questions to throw out to the internets. Let me have it:

Question: (for maximum effect, it helps to think of me trying to imitate Dwight from The Office saying 'Question' in his stilted manner)
Has anyone done a Spanish immersion program in a foreign country? Any suggestions? Is 3 to 4 weeks enough if you already know some basic Spanish? Guatemala? Costa Rica? South America? I'm going to pick maisnon's brain on this when she returns from India, but I thought I'd see if I could gather up additional data without having to do any actual research myself. See, my motivation is usually laziness.

Question:
Is Cleveland a sh*t-hole? I'm not trying to be clever, I legitimately want to know. Does it have redeeming qualities? What are they? Would it be a death sentence to live there? Just curious.

If anyone has any comments on either of those questions, I shall be eternally grateful. Last time I threw out this sort of pondering, I got an excellent recommendation for how to get from Houston to Austin from Thalassa, so I figure lightning could strike twice.

Last night, I was talking to my cousin K, and I realized it is not easy to avoid sounding like a complete jerk when really good things are happening for you. I want to say that I can't believe how lucky I am, and I can't believe how many amazing little good fortunes have befell me of late, and how all my dilemmas are the best kind of dilemmas. But it's hard to say all of that out loud without sounding like a total a$$hole. I mean, I come off sounding like the kind of person I normally want to punch in the face. And I know it won't always be like this. I have been telling myself it won't always be like this, not because I am trying to George Costanza myself and ward off the evil eye. I'm trying to remember that it wasn't always like this and it won't always be like this, because I want to be aware of this moment. I want to be present, be in the present, so that I can appreciate how precious and how brief a moment in time this is. Because once you have that, if you can know it, if you can capture it, then you have it forever. Then you have it through the dark times, a little amulet to see you through. But only if you don't take it for granted while it is happening.