Thursday, June 30, 2005

It's just more exciting when there is a picture to look at.

So here it is.















Isn't that a great picture? It could be in a travel brochure for VCI. Good job, Rhonda.

Wednesday, June 29, 2005

This is not a weather report.

I am not going to get up every morning and go Oh look, the sun's out! because it's the rainy season right now, dang it, and it's gonna rain.

Worked last night, got home around 2am, slept until 9:15am and woke in a panic thinking I missed the Cristal guy. I saw him last night while Liz and Cash were picking up her cats and her car from Laura and I. The car (of course) wasn't starting so Cash did all kinds of things I never would have done involving the accelerator and eventually it started, big black smoke spewing from the exhaust and all. Brought back fond memories of the Ford casting plant off Hwy 71 in Cleveland... need a moment... okay, back to the blog. Yeah so the Cristal guy was surprisingly late pulling around the street, and actually making a delivery to Los Picos #3 next door, I mean it was 7:15 and his times are usually 9-9:30am and 3-3:30pm daily... so you can imagine my surprise (yep, this is all I got). Anyway I yelled for him, and he (from like half a block away) gave me the "Oh my gosh I am exhausted, it's so late, I have to go home, this was my last delivery, have you LOOKED at your watch?" look, and so I yelled back, "Okay, pero, maƱana!".

There are two water guys: the Electropura guy and the Cristal guy. The Electropura guy (there are actually like 10 of them in my neighborhood alone) is the guy that rides around on one of those rickshaw looking tricycles with the ginormous basket that holds like I don't know 8 bottles of water (the big ones, 20 liters) and all the empties, every 15 minutes or so, yelling "Agua! Agua Electropura! Agua!" the whole time in a very distinct voice. There may be 10 or 20 of them all doing the same thing but I swear they all have the same voice. Then the Cristal guy, as I said before, has 2 times a day that he comes around, and he drives a little truck and honks and sometimes yells but not as much as the Electropura guy (this a.m. he was out honking and look it was like 10:30, man, get a schedule and stick with it! but at least he knew I was needing my Cristal). I never EVER hear the Cristal guy. He comes around the back of the building so if I am not listening (and remember, not sticking to his schedule) then I miss him.

I buy both waters, though - Electropura for cooking and coffee and stuff like that because seriously the guy is ALWAYS around (in the time it has taken to type this there has been 2 different Electropura guys come by) - that 20L bottle lasts for weeks. But to me, Electropura water tastes like ass and I won't drink it. So I used to go to the Oxxo almost daily and buy those littler bottles, the 1 gallon size (3.785L) but they run like $14 MN and the big bottle from the Cristal guy is $17 plus I tip him the $3 to make my total expenditure $20MN. Doesn't last as long as I drink alot of water, but totally worth it because Cristal is the bomb (it's times like this that I wish I still talked to Brady Coffey, he would just be laughing his ass off about this big water discussion). I fill up empty gallon sized bottles (I know, bacteria, blah blah blah, if it's not that it'll be a Tri-Met bus) and put them in the fridge. When I run out of Cristal I sort of panic because a) I just don't have enough to panic about these days and b) its a pain in the butt looking for the Cristal guy.

All right then. It's sunny (ish) and I am off to Joe and Janet's pool to continue the quest of being tan before Kim gets here (what? Oh this is just my natural color...).

You know, you guys can make comments if you want to... you don't have to but, you know, if you felt the urge....

Tuesday, June 28, 2005

Like a hot rock

I would like to thank the fine folks at Cablemas for allowing this blog to continue. It's ironic, really: I would have dropped this thing and never gone back to it again due to the fact that I have attempted a post two days in a row and lost them BOTH. Totally discouraging. I don't save them mid way, I don't start them on Word and then paste them here, should I be doing that?

Saturday's attempt was a really good one, funny, smart (and getting funnier and smarter as the number of re-telling increases), and suddenly my cable just went out. Thank you Cablemas. It does that - just goes out. Suddenly, no internet. Nothing. TV cable, sure, but no internet. The computer says its connected, the modem is a solid steady light, but sure enough, no internet. After messing with it a couple times, the "online" light on the modem starts blinking and its official. Anyway, all was lost, I was pissed, and went to bed.

Sunday after going to the beach, I decide not to let it get me down, type a new post, titled "Cablemas Sucks" and typed away again at the injustice of my failing. Then in an effort to lighten the mood, I decide to throw in a picture. After it uploads, I go to view it, and ALL THE TEXT IS GONE. AND, I might add, unrecoverable (I tried). Pissed! I can only surmise that karma got the better of me and because I insulted Cablemas, they somehow had a hand in this.

Monday I couldn't do it. Tuesday morning I couldn't do it. Until I saw the guy on the ladder.

It's been raining almost non-stop since Sunday night so I have been hanging out here, wallowing in a pool of my own filth. Going outside is just asking for trouble due to the number of mosquitos out in force from all this rain. Large pools of rainwater are everywhere because of this. It isn't raining right now (sun actually is peeking through).

I sat down to open my mail and all that and out my window I see a ladder.
















The ladder is not wood (I wish I had a digital camera!) (and I am not going to say it is aluminum because to be fair I don't know), and it is leaning against something. At closer inspection I see that it is leaning against the power lines. After a little while, a Cablemas guy climbs up the ladder and starts messing with some of the cable lines (I immediately turn on the TV and pull up the internet just to make sure he isn't fiddling with MY cable). He is on there on this not wooden ladder, leaning against a bunch of electricity wires, on wet pavement. Maybe this is safe, I don't know. I can't imagine it would be. Mostly because I have just never seen anything like this before.

I was inspired to write about it. Cross your fingers, let's hope it sticks.

Friday, June 24, 2005

Checking something out

Dork that I am.















This is where the magic happens.

So it appears it is very easy to upload pictures to this thing (I'm not very computer savvy. I smoked some dope in high school and college, so I lacked the foresight everyone else had regarding the computer age. I was much more social.).

Let's try some more (I am killing time before the Fedx guy comes - it appears my debit card is sitting somewhere in Cancun RIGHT NOW, and I have the sort of luck where if I go to the Soriana, like I need to do, because I need groceries - read: chocolate - he will show up just as I am pulling out of the driveway, so I am sitting here waiting for him to come - he apparently has til 9pm but this is Mexico, you just don't set your watch to anything).














This is my street. "They call it paradise, I don't know why..."

And this is my building. Isn't this fun?














It's kind of not that much fun though because I have to keep moving the pictures around. Plus during all this magic-making my debit card came (yayayayayayayayay!) and so now I am off to the Soriana ~ and access to my cash ~ how liberating (funny thing though is that in the 3 weeks since I have not had a debit card and access to my cash, I have not been hurting at all and actually still have some left over moolah. Budgetting... what a concept. Could it be that I have just been spending the money to fill some sort of void in my life? I guess I will find this out when the balance hits a little closer to zee-roh...).

Ciao!

Thursday, June 23, 2005

Sun Sun Sun

I woke up this morning and there was sun in my bedroom for the first time since last Friday. Woo woo. If this holds out (and I think it might) I am hopping in that car and getting my butt down to Marbella to get some sun! I am so freaking pale it is criminal, I look like I have spent the whole winter in Iowa...

I also just spent like 25 MORE minutes trying to figure out how to post a picture in my profile, but I did it. Double woo woo. Still just as not enthusiastic.

My debit card made it to Beaverton last night so Rhonda is going to Fedx it to me today which means I will either see it tomorrow afternoon or sometime on Monday, it's anybody's guess, I am not dealing with normal stuff here, I am just happy that I get to access my checking account again! Yay! Don't tell anyone, but I still have like $850 MN, I just flip out when I think I am going broke. I need to buy some phone cards. And some pop. Remind me to go to the Oxxo when I get back from the beach.

Yay - the beach!

Tuesday, June 21, 2005

7 minutes to type

Gotta go soon to "work".

I read some blogs and get so irritated and then suddenly while viewing my profile today I found that I had misspelled TWO WORDS. I am so embarrassed. Now what will the smart kids think of me....

I am working tonight at Over 30 covering the karaoke for Janet - it's her day off, but I am not sure she really wants a day off. I mean, she just doesn't seem as stressed as she was before her vacations. I, on the other hand, can't think of anything more I would rather do than go stand in a palapa on the lagoon and sweat my a** off while drunk vacationers sing "Summer Nights" and "Hit Me With Your Best Shot". I have an ear infection so I am cranky.

I am going to ask that Janet if she she really wants me to work for her anymore. $250MN for this, it's not like I don't need it (do I have to keep bringing up the debit card situation?) but I almost think they just feel sorry for me. Hey, man, I wasn't looking for a job to begin with.

Are these things supposed to be all about rambling? Good thing nobody knows this is here, what a disappointment it would be!

All that took 5 minutes with a couple o' re-reads...

Monday, June 20, 2005

Time on my hands

So the fashion show is over with. Now what? I have nothing really more to do, and will grow bored quickly. The weather has been lousy the last two days so no beach, and I know I can go to the beach whenever I want (Marbella, where Nancy has apartments), but I would LOVE to go while I have Liz's car... I am rambling.
I have a friend visiting in early July, did I mention that? We will go to Playa del Carmen for a couple of days and do some other fun stuff, should be a good time to entertain someone here that is here for me, for the first time since I moved here. Then nothing until the end of October, when another friend comes down for a week.
Tomorrow is the longest day of the year and the sun sets here at like 7:45 or some dang thing, totally early, I was looking at the traffic cams from ODOT a bit ago and it was full daylight still on the 217 at Walker Road. Makes me miss it bad. But going back... more of the same, I guess.
I suppose I should start looking for a job. Joy. Timeshare I guess, it's all I want to do here, unless Joe and Janet find something for me. We'll see. They don't want me to move back, but they don't know me very well. I am bored and I need a boy to play with.
Going to bed, this is going no where.

Sunday, June 19, 2005

Sunday blah

Of course it is crappy out, it rained and thundered and lighteninged all night last night and there were crazy noises coming from that stupid glass door that leads to the balcony off my bedroom. I so do not look behind the blinds. After the whole cockroach incident I think I am better off ignoring stuff in the middle of the night. There is masking tape covering the big gap between the window and the floor that the bugs were coming in through, but I just assume that when it is raining the rain is unsticking the tape and all manner of beasts are breaking in. I also assume that there are bugs and bats and rodents and spiders all just hanging around out there, waiting for an opportunity to come into my apartment.

Cloudy today, a day I meant to go to the beach, but hopefully I will be able to go tomorrow. I was thinking about getting a job but now maybe I will wait til Kim comes to visit me in July. Nothing on TV, I have an ear infection brewing, it's only 82 outside but it sure feels like 95 in here. I really don't have much to report, I better just sign off.

Saturday, June 18, 2005

Fashion Show

I am so relieved and finished and happy this thing is over. I am in a women's club here in Cancun and our major fundraiser this year was a fashion show - the charity is an AIDs group, really worthwhile. I was Raffle-Girl - in charge of the prizes and stuff that were raffled off. We had some awesome prizes, seriously, great hotel stays, plane tickets, jewelry, tons of dinners and stuff. Anyway after eating, sleeping and breathing this thing with the president of our club, who let's just say has control issues, today was the day. This morning actually. I barely got to see any of it (due to my duties as Raffle-Girl) but anyway it was a success and we are done with it and I just am happy I don't have to wonder if the friggin phone is going to ring regarding this thing. Yay. Although now I don't have a lot to do in the day but lay out (bummer). Since I have no tan I think I will enjoy that for the next week anyway. That's all I have for now. I am exhausted and I think I have an ear infection. Gonna go lie down in the hamaca. It's cloudy and I bet it storms tonight.

Did I mention I still don't have my debit card (I lost it TWO WEEKS AGO in a cab and still have not received it from the BofA via my friend in Oregon), running low on cash, bought $400MN worth of raffle tickets and won NOTHING?? It so figures.

Friday, June 17, 2005

Starting out...

This could save me alot of time on emails. I read a few people's blogs on the net in my spare time, and just this morning came up with the brilliant idea of doing one of my own. Duh. I started out in December doing a diary on Word just so I could remember some of the stuff that I have gone through and done here since my move but that ended like in late December. Wouldn't it make more sense to just post here and then when someone from, like, 1993 pops up and says, Hey! What's been going on?! I could just respond with this url? Sort of impersonal, the email equivelant of waving off the person, but it sure would be easier than typing and retyping... plus too with my fabulous internet provider here in Cancun, half the time it's so slow that the email times out during send and I lose the whole message anyway, which just pisses me off, because then I have to re-write (and re-think) and it's never as creative and funny as it was the first time around and clearly the reader can sense my bitterness. Okay. This was just a starter post so I can personalize this thing. On to it.