La cuenta

Domingo 16 - Sábado 22 Mar 2014  What a start to this week! During the night a windstorm arrived. We had to get up and check it all out with a flashlightt, due to the rattling noise from the roof. We were okay, our property was okay -- turns out the noise was from our rear rain gutter, well affixed in place but the galvanized metal made sounds when buffeted by the gusts. What a surprise! Thought for sure we would lose some roofing from the third story mirador, but all was secure there.

As we were finishing our breakfast of french toast, Ania and Frank stopped by to see if we would like to go to the huge second hand car tianguis (temporary market) which is every sunday not far from here.  This is THE place in the region to buy a used car, and we had passed it many times but had never done a walk-thru. Frank was looking to replace his old pickup. It was rather enjoyable to check out prices and models of the several hundred vehicles being privately sold. Since the thermometer hit near 90 today, we had to water everything twice. Carmelo stopped just as we were leaving in the morning. He still thinks that he can talk us into buying many plants. Carmen is determined that we will buy very few more – just no room to put them. And – we will absolutely not adv                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     ance him any more money for future deliveries. After some arguing about the situation, Carmelo finally believed Carmen. He can always talk Dan into believing his sob stories, not so with Carmen. She can be most hard hearted if necessary. We finished our 1500 piece jigsaw puzzle. It is a beauty!

Carmen controlled herself on sunday and did her cleaning on monday. Ania keeps telling her to leave our doors and windows closed during the sugarcane burning months to keep the air-borne soot down in the house. Carmen is unable to do this. Not only do we like to leave doors ajar for our sweet kitties to wander in and out at their will (though we had a cat door installed, we have not gotten them used to it). Also – we lived in an area previous to this where it was just too cold to let the outside air in except on the very rare hottest days of Pacific Northwest summer, and we are greatly enjoying the ambiance of the outside doings and breezes, what ever the ocasional smells or dust it lets in.

Monday we roasted the pork butt we bought a few days ago. We invited Ania and Frank for the meal, but there is still a large amount of meat left to eat and eat. Yum, yum. Carmen made cinnamon rolls for the first time in four years. She bemoans the fact that she did not put enough butter, brown sugar, and cinnamon in them to make them perfect. It would have been nice if the oven had not darkened the bottoms too. Will practice again soon. After dinner we watched the movie “Footloose” which Dan had recorded a few days ago. Rather a bouncy affair.

Tuesday Dan studied the internet to learn how to cut a glass bottle. Not a perfect job, but now Carmen has a new flower vase made from a distinctively-shaped rompope bottle.  He wants to make a jig to cut some wine bottles we have been saving up.  A great tailed grackle (Quiscalus mexicanus) sat on the fence and chattered to Carmen as laundry was being hung out. We believe it to be the same bird that was on the front porch a few days ago, and then walked up to our back gate when we had it open, working on the roof tile. It might also be the same one that threatened Gardi when we first moved here. We think that's likely. Perhaps it wants to be part of our family?

Carmen took it upon herself to take a cuenta (count) of all the plants we have surrounded ourselves with. Some in planters, some single in a pots, many orchids just tied or hanging from limbs, and many in the ground in our new front garden.

• Upper terraza outside the master bedroom: 103, plus a planter with catnip & other little things.  Most of our cactus collection is here.
• Backyard/patio area:  61, west & north of the house, including hanging orchids & plants in ground, plus ground cover of wandering jew or traveler jew, plus black mondo grass clumps.
• Inside:  8 plus four 4 african violets in an east bedroom window
• Front garden & porch:  124 in ground plus 158 hanging (many orquideas) & in pots, including a longish branch full of  many orchids and several herbs for cooking & teas.

Total:  458+ plants to care for. But still we do not have one of everything (an impossible task in this area of floral glory), and we do have several of a few favorites. Chances are, there were some plants missed in the count, and we are sadly way behind with the goal of ID-ing them all and getting them on a spreadsheet listing. Though all plants are loved, they are not loved equally -- we both definitely have favorites we watch out for.  When we chance to lose one, due to not understanding it's particular care needs,  it just gives us a chance to try again, or perhaps fill that space with something new.

Una orquidea grande

Domingo 09 Mar - Sábado 15 Mar 2014  How we do enjoy listening to the church bells and the singing coming from over from the Capilla de la Sagrada Trinidad across and up the street from us.. While having a spanish lesson with flashcards on our mirador, with Gardi laying at our feet, we saw over a dozen zopilotes (turkey vultures) floating along on the air currents overhead. Lots of butterflies too, and a couple parrots flew by. A truck with policemen drove by. The one standing in the back looked up and waved to us. 

Carmen started a 1500 piece jigsaw puzzle. Once she starts a puzzle, she is rather addicted to it. What ever she does not get done in the mornng before looking at the puzzle, just does not get done that day. There could be worst addictions, of course.  Carmen cut Dan's hair and of course Gardi loves having the clippers run over him, just the body of the unit which vibrates strongly. He climbs onto Dan's lap and pats the clippers until he gets his turn of the massage.

Dan has been unable to check our Sandander local bank account online, so we went to the bank to get things straightened out. The bank officer made a phone call and handed the phone to Dan. He had to keep telling the guy on the other end of the line to speak more slowly. It can be most difficult to understand a phone conversation in a foreign language when there is background noise at both ends, at least for our old ears. We left the bank with a newly reset password, being assured that he could now check our account from home. Guess what! No can do!-  Now the token which supplies a new countersign number to type in when we want secured info is not recognized, although it seems to display it's 8 digits when the button is pressed. We must go back to the bank again.

Celia, a block west of us, came up to the house and asked us to come and look at a blossoming plant she had. It is a huge Dendrobium nobile orchid, about 2.5 to 3 feet diameter, just starting to bloom with large flowers of white and purple. With the buds just starting to open, we should have more than 200 flowers, all 2" to 3" in size.  We bought it for $16 US. It is in a wire frame and she had two others, one of which is in a tree crotch. Apparently this particular orchid, native to the Himalayas, is a source of some very effective natural folk medicines.  Celia came back the next day because she had heard the two men from Cosco down again talking about us seeing the land they had for sale. She said we could buy her property, which is a normal width 10m lot down on Calle 9, but its very deep and goes back to the creek. No thank you, tho' we would like to see the area behind her house where she says she has an orchard. Another lady was admiring our out-front garden and asked if she could have a start from a verbena plant.  Carmen believes she is bringing a piece of hers that is a different color.

Carmello stopped by with more flowers for sale. Yes, we bought a few more. This must stop, as Dan told him, as we have really no room left for more plants. He told us he was waiting outside our gate monday for us to return, when the police stopped and told him to move on and fined him MX$300 for loitering. Apparently they thought he was up to no good, and so were they just protecting us? Or was the problem that he did not have a license for selling? Or did he just look like a campesino they could lean on?  He took them to a neighbor to reassure them that he indeed did sell plants to us, and he always waited for our return. Carmelo has been telling us that our Pata de Cabra (Pink Orchid tree) needed drastic action.  So we clipped it way back and put lots of cuttings into a pot. We're hoping to get a healthy plant again. It is certainly ill, with all the branches turning black and all leaves fallen, which apparently is not the norm for his supposedly hardy tree.  We also have a pot in which we planted some seeds from the dried pods, in case the Bauhinia monandra cuttings don't take.

The fellow from Honduras stopped at our door again, asking for mexican coins. We gave him a juicebox. Also the fellow who hurt his leg was here, ditto. A lady selling avocados came by, but the bag she handed us had squishy fruit in it – so, no thank you. A woman in a wheel chair accompanied by five grown children rang our doorbell. They had two small cans for money. Did not understand their story but we gave her some pesos. A lady stopped to speak english to Carmen for awhile. She is a Jehovah Witness and is here for a few months. She was raised in Jamaica, and then spent the next 40 years in the US in Massachusetts, Florida, and North Carolina. Her next move is to western South Carolina. She is living presently with a mexican family about five blocks south of us, and she said that everyone has told her that an english-speaking couple live here. We had a nice chat and she will stop by again.

We had lunch at Ania and Frank's wednesday – a surprise birthday celebration for Tamara who is married to Tim (from California). They live near Coscomatepec, 40 minutes north of here. The cake was a cheese pie with pear topping and final garnish of filbert stuffed candies. As usual, Ania's meal was superb! Seems that their kitty will be popping forth with kittens soon. Can hardly wait to see them. Hope her delivery will be safe. Carmen had a cat that would have died in delivery had she not been there to help her by straightening a kitten that was crossways in the birth canal, so Carmen worries about other small mama cats. Well she has to have something to worry about...!

Cosme was here again wanting to spray our plants. Carmen has bought spray and takes care of them herself. He tried hard to find some insects. There are always a few, but some of his “insect” finds were in fact soot. He is the person who sold us our first orchids, all tiny. He seemed perturbed when he saw that we have purchased more and larger ones from others. Celia came by to see that we had carefully put the huge one, we bought from her, in a proper location. She thought it should get more sun or be hung in our bugambilia tree, where of course it would get no sun. Dan pointed out that we put it in thesame orientation on a south wall comparable to where she had it. The piece of vanilla orchid from breakage a year ago, which we had potted in moist medium, is finally sending up it's new growth

We went to IMSS clinic again friday to get two appointment slips for Dan. This is the at least the eighth time that we went for the envio to the opthamologist. Finally it was ready, along with the one for urologist. We then went to the IMSS hospital to pick up an appointment slip for Carmen's next eye exam. Come back next friday, we were told. We walked two blocks east of there to a commercial meat market, where we purchased a pork roast, tilapia, ground beef and arrachera beef, all at excellent prices. There was a special on the tv news about seafood going up in price, since demand is so high this time of year during Lent. The wholesalers have imported shrimp from central america because they could not supply the heavy market this year.

We have been looking for magnesium sulfate to fertilize out plants with. To this point, no luck. Tim and Tamara, who are farmers, told us the only place that carries it is FYPA (Fertilizantes y Productos Agroquimicos) a local firm with branches all over Mexico.  Driving home from Córdoba, we saw their sign along the bulevar and stopped to inquire. This was only their main office, and we had to wait outside until we could be buzzed up into their suite of offices. Behind the closed gate and entry to this company was a most beautiful set of office buildings. Would never guess it from the street front -- gorgeous landscaping inside the compound also. Once upstairs, we learned they only sell it in giant quantities. Would take us a few more lifetimes to use a ton of it at two tablespoons per gallon of water, but it also was available in 50kg bags under another label. They did give us a list of their agrochemical stores where the product was actually available. We'll check that out sometime when we're in east Córdoba--chances are a clerk at the store will know someone who buys from them and repackages for retail consumption. 

To finish this week off, we took down our exension ladder from it's high storage spot and Dan got up onto the parking entry roof to re-cement (caulk with adhesive, actually) an end barrel tile that he was afraid might fall off. A job he had not looked forward to.

Then there was the unfortunate besucona (gecko) Gardi invited in to visit.  Either slow, old or particularly unwary, it let Gardi catch it three times. First time he carried it into the house and we at first thought it was a small snake. Did our feet ever come up off the floor fast! Carmen caught it and put it back outside.  Inside, Gardi was inside wondering where the big part went to. The tail, which was still squirming all over the place, he finally ate. Yum. Well maybe they are yummy, we will probably never try one. Now Gardi cat went back outside and almost immediately came back inside with the still lively gecko. Again Carmen put it back outside. This time further from the house in some heavier bushes. It took about ten minutes before we saw Gardi again bringing it inside and we quickly picked him up, along with the wiggling gecko in his mouth, and put them back outside with the door firmly closed behind them.

Cosas del horno

Domingo 02 Mar - Sábado 08 Mar 2014   Why is it that Carmen gets into a cleaning mood on sundays? Plus she weeded the front flower garden, while Dan did much watering. Also there was an unusual two layer birthday cake made. Both layers were our banana muffin recipe, plus grated carrots. The bottom layer became spicy with cinnamon and cloves, plus dates and pecans. All put together with a huge quantity of glaseado real (royal frosting). While making the frosting, Carmen did not put her glasses on 'til everything was whipping in the bowl. Oops, it looks much too wet! On with the glasses. Too much boiling water, so the whole recipe had to be doubled. Thankfully the frosting is not a really rich thing, lacking the butter most icings contain. It does not freeze well, so it was all spread on and around the cake.  The horno (oven) was busy with things all afternoon, as rolls and cookies followed the cake.

Monday was Ania's birthday and she and Frank came for a 5pm dinner of tilapia filets and chicken thighs smothered in a west African peanut sauce accompanied with a brown rice combined with cubes of yam and also fresh ejotes (string beans), left long. Carmen carefully put stems of fresh mint where she was filling the plates, to be sure she would not forget to garnish the plates. Yep – at the end of the meal she remembered the mint! She did remember to put the salads on this time. And the homemade dinner rolls both plain and some cinnamon sugar sticks, both of the same dough. When the first slice of pastel (cake) was cut from the end, the whole of it was frosting! That is how thick the frosting was! Careful though Carmen was in de-pitting the dates, Ania got a pit in her piece -- something special for the birthday girl. Carmen had also baked Ania some oatmeal cookies, all packaged up to take home, as she likes them so much. After dinner we played rummy cube. Each of the four of us won one set and Dan won the total by points. The perfect game when everyone wins.

Some needed rain arrived over night. Tuesday at our monthly doctors appointment, Dr Rendon's nurse, Luz, said that she could read english, she just could not understand it when spoken, just like Carmen and spanish. An appointment was made for Carmen's last mammogram, which would be at the hospital in the afternoon the next day. Gracious, she has reached that age already? Since she also had a wednesday morning eye exam, this seemed quite convenient.

The oftamologa (opthamologist) was two hours late arriving to her office. Possibly a staff meeting ran late (as we have seen happen before)? She, the doctor, perhaps was not happy that Carmen did not speak spanish, or was she just having a bad day? She was certainly professional, and had no trouble reading the eye care history Carmen had brought from the states, but she was just not warm like most everyone else we meet. This is the first experience we have had with anyone here who was not totally pleasant. Carmen wanted her eye pressure checked, but as one might guess, this facility lacked the equipment for this, and we'll later get an envio for another appointment elsewhere.  The uncomfortable time with the doctor and this last hassle caused Carmen to start thinking of moving back to the US. There Dan would not go to the medical appointments to talk for Carmen. While mentally listing all the positives and negatives of living in the two countries, that was one of  the few pluses for the US. If only Carmen's head would give in and learn to communicate in spanish. We now had a three hour wait until our next appointment.  We considered walking around town and perhaps having a lunch at a reastuarant, but we decided it was too much so we drove home instead..

One most embarrassing thing happened while waiting for the eye doctor. There were a dozen folks waiting. All the sudden, a lovely looking medical assistant stepped right in front of Carmen, bent down to where her face was smack in front of Carmen's. Now what! She proceeds to tell Carmen that she looks like a princess. Her daughter wants to looks like a Disney princess, and Carmen looks just like one, as she lightly touches Carmen's face and hair. Well – that woke up the dozing waiting folks and put smiles on their faces! The lady never knew that Carmen could barely understand her – though enough to know what was going on! Nor did Carmen think to tell her that she had wished for the beautiful darker complexion that the medical assistant had, when she was growing up.

We drove back to the hospital for the 2pm mammogram . First we went upstairs to the lab to clarify something – did not help. We still do not understand. Next we went downstairs for the mammogram and found ourselves 45 minutes early, and fifteen minutes before they closed for lunch break. Nevertheless, we handed in the exam order form, and low and behold, Carmen was immediately taken. Much too much pressure used, though Dan did not have to come in and interpret. After all, these tests must be the same all over the world.  We drove further east to the Soriana store to buy our favorite oatmeal. Don't know why, but theirs tastes more oatmealy. We also amongst other items bought a bag of their spicy tortilla chips. That evening Carmen asked Dan to check in the car for the chips, since she realized that they had not been unpacked. No chips any place, not even on the receipt. We know that we both handled the bag and put it in the cart. Hope who ever got them, enjoyed them, since we obviously put them in the wrong cart.

Across the street one afternoon we saw five huge turkey vultures. The dead cat is now gone. Never saw a turkey vulture that close before. They certainly do look much the same size and shape as wild turkeys. It is good to have something to clean up the decaying flesh. Lots of butterflies fluttering thru our flowers – to Smij's delight. Gardi pays less attention to them. The geckos and grasshoppers are more his thing.   Woolen socks were put away, which of course brought another cold front thru. Seems anything below 60ºs nights or 72º days is a bit fresco (chilly) to us now. But the orchids (and the cacti) seem to love the cool mornings and moderate days, and are beginning to bloom now. So far only tiny flowers. Still hoping that we have an orchid that will produce large flowers.

Another warm morning came along. We took advantage of it and dined on our breakfast of huevos escalfados (poached eggs) on toast out front on our porch at our table for two. No different than eating outside at a restaurant we tell ourselves, as folks walk by, saying Buenos Días, while we are sipping our fresh squeezed orange juice and local coffee.

Barreras de gatos

Domingo 23 Feb- Sábado 01 Mar 2014 

Oh what a beautiful morning, Oh what a beautiful day...  Our house sparrows have returned and are building a nest in the nw corner of our roof again. We love their cheery songs. Our fresh flowers purchased at the front gate this week are large cream-colored roses with dark red petal edges and interiors. Off in the distance north, looking past our bugambilias and over the banana fields, we can see the top of a tree covered with bright yellow flowers!  Fortín truly is a city de las flores!  We're doing our bit here, but it does entail regular daily watering of our three flower areas -- front yard/porch, backyard and terraza.  Water doesn't stay long in pots, especially as the soil mix that all our plants seem to require is fast-draining.

Sunday it heated up, and reached 79ºF in the shade. We washed and vacuumed the car, after parking on the street in the shade on the north side of the house. Dan struggled with putting up the "barrera de gatos"(cat barrier), a section of fencing we fabricated which will keep our cats from getting off the wall on our west or down into the neighbors lot. Our afternoon meal of salmon and fried freshly-dug red potatoes was taken onto the front porch at our little table there. While dining, there looked to be an eagle soaring in the sky. Well, it would hardly have been soaring on the road. Carmen was reading in our hammock there earlier. (No not on the road either, on the porch.)  A couple stopped at our gate, selling small bags of vegetables. We bought avocados. Dan asked Carmen if she wanted some habas (fava beans) and she thought he said peas and the pods were large so she thought the peas would be too old. Had she but heard correctly, we would have fresh fava beans.

Dan finished putting up more barreras, enamel-coated shelf pieces we got at Home Depot, which he installed along the south wall, to prevent Gardi from touring the neighborhood roof tops. The next day, Gardi, finally allowed access to the second floor terraza, learned of his new restrictions on roaming, and clearly complained to us about the situation. On this level we have a clown nose plant. It presently has a “red nose.”  Actually this plant here is called Huevos de Obispo (Bishop's Testicles). So he, so far, has only one ball, it seems. Blooms have appeared for this years fruiting.  Wednesday we had a scrumptious meal with Ania and Frank. Unfortunately, we had to then rush home since Dan was expecting a skype call – which never happened! We could have stayed there longer!

Carmelo said he would bring our corn on the cob wednesday, but he did not show up. We have an unknown plant growing out front. It's dicot leaves are huge. It actually has the look of a tree. Our night blooming cereus cactus has started putting on growth. We woke thursday morning with a light rain. Finally! Did the plants ever need it. Watering is just not the same.

Friday Dan had an early 8am appointment for an ultrasound of his bladder at our IMSS family clinic. He took his liter-and-a half of water to be imbibed after he arrived. Drinking more than a few sips at a time is hard for Dan, but he managed to get it down pretty rapidly. The technician kept calling others to the lab. Finally Dan was in so much pain from his bladder holding all that water, that he told the nurse. Dan was taken next, and oh what a relief! On our way home we did a quick stop at Walmart. We bought a roasted chicken. It is absolutely succulent!

Saturday at 7am, we turned on the Fortín radio station, to listen to the two hours of oldies in english we've appreciated each weekend. The programming appears to have been changed and we did not care for the selections, so we got up. Put a laundry in the washing machine since the day looked beautiful. Had a Mexican breakfast of tortillas covered with refried beans, cheese and fried egg, lightly smothered in salsa. Fresh local coffee and fresh-squeezed orange juice. A good start to our day.

The good start came to a crashing halt when Carmen was out front, checking her plants for insects, as she does every morning. She first found all the foliage on her year old nasturtium had been eaten overnight, and what little was left was dead. Next, and by far worse, she glanced outside our front gate and there laid the beautiful friendly little white/gray cat. Apparently hit by a car and stiff as could be. Considering Carmen's love for cats – this was a bad blow. She carried it across the street to the banana field and laid it near the road in hopes that the owners would at least see it and not expect it to ever come home again. Why do animals seem to die in front of our abode? The third death of the morn was a beautiful butterfly just in front of our door. We realize they do not live long – but nevertheless it's sad that such beauty is so efimero.  It was black with orange on the front wings and the back wings were black with dozens of small relective white spots. Very pretty. Maybe this was meant to be a blessing to us – just to admire it's beauty.

We walked into town to pay our electric bill but recalled too late that the office is closed saturdays. Our bill for two months, downloaded from the CFE website, reported our daily usage was 5.45 kwh, so our power here is costing us about MX$7.60 or US$0.58 per day.  We walked on to the Farmacia Similares, where there has been a 25% discount on the 1^st and 15^th of each month, but apparently the discount scheme has changed : now it's every monday. No purchase there, we'll come back next week.  Next stop was the grocery store. We needed powdered sugar to frost a cake for Ania's birthday. The store had a pallet of granulated sugar of different grades, but no powdered sugar.  Oh well, we needed the exercise anyway.

Our day did improve. Ricardo, our fresh flower man (we finally thought to ask him his name) had gorgeous roses. Carmen bought three, all different colors: dark red, yellow, and peach. Also a bunch of six dark red large carnations plus one white. Flowers always make for a happier day. On tv this evening we watched the gran desfile (big parade), comprised of about 5000 participants, on floats and marching along in various costumes, taking place for Carnaval week in Veracruz city. Both sides of Avenida Camacho were jammed with spectators until late at night. The onlookers seemed to be all ages, but it seems to us like standing in a crowd for hours is more comfortably avoided.  Curmudgeons though we seem to be in this regard, watching on tv was all we needed to enjoy the spectacle.