Huespedes

Domingo 16 - Sábado 22 Feb 2014  Harmony skyped us Sunday morning.  So good to see and talk to her and her family! The walls & downstairs ceilings inside of our house are painted white. When the sun is bright, it is interesting to watch the shadows play about on the surfaces. We think we are hearing some new bird calls/songs. Are they migrants coming or going thru here? Paying attention to little things like this in life bring us a lot of pleasure.

The outsides of the new porch storage cabinets got their coat of paint. After a touchup of missed spots, we will finally be able to do a good cleaning on the porch! It would really be good to hose it off every day – but that will never happen unless we someday in the far future have a housekeeper other than Carmen. Found some aphids on a rose bush. Not many so they simply got squashed. Hate to spray if not really necessary. Cosme comes by every few weeks asking if we want everything sprayed. We did let him spray for insects when we first moved in.

Monday was a full day.  A drive into Córdoba was first, mainly to pick up eye appointment orders at IMSS -- these were again not ready for us, as we were told the oftamología clinic was currently over-booked. We took the opportunity to stop by the shop where we bought our vacuum cleaner, to get the guarantee stamped and buy some replacement filter bags. Walmart finally had that all important cat litter today and Home Depot had some coated metal shelving Dan can attach to our upper walls, as barriers to keep the cats off the neighbors' roofs. Now for the good stuff:   With the porch cabinets finished, Dan moved an electrical outlet, covered over in the new bodeguita, to one of the front panels of the new cabinet -- much more convenient this way. He also reinstalled a hose reel on the front garden wall.  Dan enjoyed finally moving all the garden items from their crowded storage in the backyard bodega to their new home out front. Now with all the work done, we finally swept the porch floor several times and mopped it twice. My but it does look nice for the moment!

Tuesday morning the day started with much to-do, even before breakfast!  First Carmelo came and we bought six plants and he owes us a bit of advanced money so he said next time he will bring us fresh elotes (corn on the cob) from his little milpa. Unfortunately we do not care much for the white corn grown in this area.  It isn't bad but it's just not the sweet corn one gets NoB. While perusing his plants from the two full bags he carried, our front door bell rang. Dan answered it. Two fellows, hermanos (brothers) of Luís our crew foreman from Coscomatepec, came to tell us about a piece of property for sale up there. No, we do not want to build a cabin/house up there, and take care of another piece of property, though they are sure we do. However they got that idea in their heads is beyond us. Probably since our friends the Shattucks have a couple small cottage type homes with property there, they assume we must also desire to own property north of here, perhaps for a vacation home.  Dan promised to look them up next time we visited Cosco -- no harm in looking, right?  And perhaps we will come across someone just looking for a parcel of land that we can steer in that direction. We had a great day, in the sun/shade at 80ºF+ degrees, gardening. Planting, transplanting, weeding, pruning, watering. Carmen gave many starts away of a purple coleus, a pink & green caladium and some fuchsias. Nice to have starts to give to people passing by. Artemio, our area gardener, stopped to say hi, as did many other folks. Colyn took pictures of our garden. She will be moving to Veracruz next week. We will miss her. Also did some touch up painting. A busy and happy day!  We had huespedes (guests) for lunch wednesday, Ania and Frank.. It was good to see them after their six weeks away in Nayarit!  Only an Italian sausage on a bun (reminiscent of Carmen's life in Wisconsin when the summer party food was bratwurst with sauerkraut on a bun), with a huge lettuce, fruit & veg salad.  We finished up with lime meringue pie for three of us. Ania is not fond of this so she had homemade oatmeal cookies instead.  A couple of games of dominoes, and we were all ready for post-luncheon naps.

IMSS still had no envios (ex-clinic orders) authorizing our eye appointments for us on friday. We're to try again next wednesday or thursday.  We stopped at Metalurve and picked up a small piece of welded galvanized fencing.  On our way home, we took a road that we had not traveled before. Dan kept telling Carmen to look at a map, and Carmen replied that she would do so as soon as she saw some street signs. So very exciting to think that you are lost for awhile! Never needed the map, nor saw any street signs either, as we eventually wound ourselves back into a familiar area.  Carmen moved a few more plants around. Dan still is helping some folks, remotely, with their accounting. He also got the bent steel frame (which had been welded last week by Mauricio) painted and ready for attaching the fencing.  

Saturday was such a lovely day, that we did a walk into town, mostly in the south side in the old fraccionamiento Fortín where the older upscale houses are located. We had originally hoped to buy there, but the houses we saw there were all way too large and expensive. We very much enjoy commenting about the many house styles and landscaping as we pass by. On our walk we stopped at the Suites María Antonieta, where we rented three winters ago when we were house-hunting, and had a chat with Carlos, one of the owners. He showed us their new alberca (swimming pool) and invited us to use it any time we liked. Next we saw and talked to a neighbor five houses south, who was downtown with her husband and little boy. Stopped at the Super Ahorros for apple yogurt, and continued on towards home. A vehicle pulled up beside us and the driver tooted the horn. Carlos, our neighbor two doors down, had stopped to offer us a ride. We took him up on it just to be sociable, though we were out for the exercise. Must start doing regular walks around town soon --so much to see, and winter is now behind us!