Back online

It has been rather up and down since my last blog; I’ll try to fill in before resuming (I hope) on a more regular basis.

In January, Angie & Matthew had a baby, Sam, and making a third grandson; this is a recent photo. Barb wanted to see this new addition and went to Halifax from late January until Feb. 7. Then, while she was away, we had a burglary (about Feb. 2nd). I am certain it was someone who had been watching us and the house. Barb walks the dogs every day about the same time about 9:30 or 10 a. m. for about an hour. However, with Barb away, I was walking the dogs about the same time. On Tuesday, when neither the gardener nor maid come to the house, I took the car to Guadalajara. Sometime, not too long I think, after I left (i.e., just before or at noon), the burglars (there had to be at least 2) climbed up the wall beside the water aquaduct ditch and in. There was only about 30 inches space (see photo) there beside the little bodega (storage shed); all the rest of the wall has virtually impenetrable bougainvillea. My 27 inch iMac plus my old laptop, which were both on my desk, were stolen. The external hard drive for our backups was also taken.I should have taken care of that gap in the bougainvillea and not had both computers and the hard drive on my desk. I was feeling too secure.Fortunately, I had saved most of my personal files on the iPod about a year ago. Thus, I was able eventually to recover the older stuff.

With that lesson, we did some work to add more security. At the side where they entered, we had them install about 20 feet of concertina; that is circular barbed wire and razor wire. Then, along the front wall, we added about 3 feet of wrought iron fence with barbs at the top to the wall (see photos). It was very upsetting and I was certainly kicking myself for being so blaise. I have replaced the iMac and tried to get back to normal.

With the illnesses and the trip to Nova Scotia, Barb has had a hard time getting her energy back. She seemed to be alternating good and bad days. However, this past week has been quite good.

We have had other work done. Pam, a friend of Kate’s of many years standing, last summer bought a house here. However, she decided to renovate virtually the entire house. First, she wanted to replace her gas stove. It is a very nice Bosch but she in putting in a separate stove top and oven. She sold us the stove at a very good price. As our stove was old and not very good, Barb was delighted. Thus, we had Jose Luis’ men install it. Then, subsequently, in fact just last week, she offered us her dish washer at an even better price. The men were back to install the dish washer. It was a very tight fit, but they chipped out the floor and wall a bit to squeeze it in (see below). While they were at it, we had them run a gas line from the stove in the kitchen and out to the BBQ in the patio. Now, we don’t have to worry about filling the little tank periodically as the BBQ is now connected to the big propane tank. It was good timing because it was only 5 or 6 days since the little tank had gone empty just as we were cooking leg of lamb. Fortunately, with the new stove, the oven works well and we were able to finish the lamb in the kitchen. The oven door in the old stove did not close properly so we never were able to use it. Thus, as the song says (taking a bit of liberty), “Everything’s up to date in La Floresta.”

Since we arrived, we have had dressers and bedside tables in the bedrooms that were not well made. There were no sliders on the drawers and they all had a tendency to fall out when you went into them. We finally gave them away to LIA; Anabel, the director, was pleased to get them as the older girls need them for their clothes. They are young and can more easily cope with drawers. We brought so few clothes with us that we didn’t really use the dressers; instead she got a table which you can see above). She did get new bedside tables (below). All of these were very inexpensive. The style is called ‘rustico’ which is what we have in most of the house.

Maintaining my past habits in this blog, I have to talk briefly about the weather. After the cool weather in Nov. and Dec., the weather in 2011 has been warm. In fact since early March, it has been hot. It hit 90º F (32º C) on March 28th. That matched the high temp for the last 2 years (usually late April and May). We have been getting temps in the middle to high 80s (28 - 32º C). There had been no rain since last Sept. 29th (i.e., 200 days with no rain). However, Saturday late afternoon, we had a thunder storm and rain! It only amounted to .7 inches (18 mm.), but it is rain. Usually, there is about 2 inches Oct. - Dec. and another 2 inches or so from Jan. to the end of May. The average for April is .3 inches so we have more than doubled that for this year.