Thursday March 29, 2012

Thursday Mar 29/12 update

Bella left to meet Michael Berger at the lawyer’s office to get the final deed for the house and then to go get the utilities, water and power in to our names, and get automatic payments arranged through the bank.

I struggled from another bad night to get outside and look to the sky which was threatening in every quadrant.  After starting east along the other side of the river, directly into a dark cloud, I thought better of that move and doubled back.  Ignoring a slight charley-horse, I then proceeded to head south towards El Valle and a patch of blue sky.

As I was trying to get my camera going to catch a hummingbird my phone went off, but I missed the call.  I also missed the hummingbird as a result. The phone rang again.  It was Bella asking if I was still at home because she wanted the numbers off the meters.  Nope, sorry, I’m not at home.

I was about to catch the bus to the top of the mountain when the phone rang a third time and it was Bella again informing me that the lawyers had put everything in my name (we are all male chauvinists here) and that meant I had to come and join them, so there went my jaunt for the day.

I thought I was being clever by slipping past home and getting the meter readings before catching a bus right away to meet them at the Empressa Electrical building.  Who would have guessed they wanted the serial number of the meter, not the reading??  It turns out it wasn’t that important as they already had all those details.

Things go much smoother now that we have our Cedula residency papers for this kind of stuff.

Once we did the electrical, it was a cab ride downtown to the Etapa office for the water.  Then another cab ride to the bank.  It is a good thing we have Michael to interpret for us to make things go very smoothly.

The bottom line is that we are now officially, officially, officially owners of our castle.  YaHoo!!

We stopped at Papa John’s for a quick nooner pizza before heading home again.

I made a very quick side trip to the Rotary Market to get a small carved wooden knick-knack box with a lock to keep our grocery money in.  The box was a whole $5.

Once home, I was disappointed I had never got one photograph today so I figured I would check out the flowering trees in front and I might get lucky and catch a hummer.

As I was looking along our block I was struck by the different varieties of trees just in our block alone, so I decided to take a shot of each one and see if there is a horticulturalist out there who wants to take a guess at the types of trees/plants they are….  Anyone??   Oh,… and I got lucky and saw this little green hummer too.

Enjoy the pics.    That was today’s excitement.  Hugs to all.

120329 Hummer on the left

120329 Hummer at the bottom

120329 Hummer in the middle

120329 Tree on our street #1

120329 Tree on our street #2

120329 Tree on our street #3

120329 Tree on our street #4

120329 Tree on our street #5

120329 Tree on our street #6 - Guava

120329 Tree on our street #7 - Hibiscus

120329 Tree on our street #7a - Hibiscus

120329 Tree on our street #7b - Hibiscus

120329 Tree on our street #8 (Baby Bottle Brush?)

120329 Tree on our street #9

120329 Stationary Hummer

120329 Tree on our street #10

Wednesday March 28, 2012

Wednesday Mar 28/12 update

As I walked to my rendezvous last night I noticed the Tomebamba was running very high since I could not see my “measuring rock” at all so I took a photo with a flash.  I hope it does not get much higher or there could be flooding problems across the river.

Last night I met with the young economist, Juan Bernardo Matute Pacheco, and we traded stories and helped each other with our different languages.  He is a very bright and pleasant young fellow.  He was forced to re-take an English class because he had written the Spanish translation of two English words in his textbook.  That sure sounded pretty harsh.   Our next meeting is actually going to begin with 8am Mass on Sunday at Immaculate Conception, then we will walk around El Centro and practice our (poor) language skills.

Really sad news was received from our good cousin Maurice Jalbert.  His wife, Marilyn, has lost her fight with cancer on the 26^th.  We sincerely hope a cure is found soon.

More sad news arrived that our expected first visitor has been felled by pneumonia and is not able to make the trip.  Get well quickly Mavis and book those flights again.  We tried to get the Pope to stop by, since he is in the area, but his plans were already set in stone, sorry.

I stayed in all day fighting with the internet, which crashed about 4 times, trying to still find a better way to access some North American programming.  I did find some interesting sites but I don’t think I can watch too many live shows, events or sports.

Bella was busy binding her new cookbook which has already given her many new insights.

Enjoy the pics.    That was today’s excitement.  Hugs to all.

120327 Can't see my measuring boulder....

120327 My language buddy, Juan

120327 Night shot of a tree

Tuesday March 27, 2012

Tuesday Mar 27/12 update
Insomnia is a crazy creature to handle.  To bed at 1, awake at 3, up at 5, back to bed at 7:30…..
Bella was off to weaving to get a rug backed with latex, then to the book/movie exchange, then to get some copies made, then to SuperMaxi for some groceries.  We were lent a copy of “Cooking In The Andes”, made by a group of church ladies in Quito, which is in both Spanish and English, so Bella will really enjoy trying their recipes and using more of the local vegetables.
I was up very early putting the finishing touches on our street address sign.  I though I was being so clever, thinking things out so carefully, but having enormous problems with silicone continuously bubbling up and then with the initial anchors I had put in the wall.  I finally kept tamping down the silicone so it shows very little but hopefully will at least seal the top of the numbers and keep most of the moisture out.  I then also installed some spacers on the back to allow some breathing area and allow a little flexibility.  Once I put in some new, decent anchors the installation was a breeze.  The sign isn’t exactly as I had initially envisioned, but for about $3.08 I am not about to complain about the results, it should do the intended job.
Trying to download the recap from Dancing With The Stars is always challenging, as it takes about 4 times the 1 hour and 25 minutes to download the silly thing.  Even then, the quality of the runback leaves a lot to be desired.  We really have to find a good way to watch the actual shows live, whether on the computer or on TV.
Poor Martina Navratilova is certain to be the first casualty.  On one site the vote was 60%.  Isn’t that Welsh bombshell Kathryn exciting to watch?   And the women will continue to drool over Mr Levi….. go figure…
My sister gave me heck for not showing my delightfully crooked photos, so here you are Yvette….
Tonight I am meeting with a young 25-year-old young fellow named Juan who has an Economics degree.  We are going to be trading conversational English for Spanish.  He had an ad on GringoTree and I responded that I would like to give a try.  I initially thought that Bella was going to join in but apparently I will be doing this solo.
Enjoy the pics.    That was today’s excitement.  Hugs to all.

120327 New address sign $3.08 and a lot of work

120327 Crooked 1

120327 Crooked 2

120327 Crooked 3

120327 House is pretty much complete now

120327 House with street address sign in place

Sunday-Monday March 25-26, 2012

Sunday Mar 25/12 update
We have now news that our stepdad Lucien is on the decline and having trouble communicating.  Mom and Leonie visited him again Friday and he was only partly lucid at that time.  This is so sad and it must be hardest on his three children who are maintaining a constant vigil. 
Well the right buses weren’t showing up and the lightning show was becoming more persuasive so I never made it to any soccer game last night.  The subsequent rain storm would have chased most fans home before ½ time anyway.   I finished off the Rambo series of movies while Bella was happily Skyping with family and friends.
Sunday was another lazy day of rest.  It was a beautiful day until about 2:45 when we got a rain and hail storm for an hour and a half.  The rain quit for a short while then it continued to sprinkle as we went to the Monay Mall for KFC.  We stopped at Coral and picked up 3 more picture frames and also a clock, temperature, humidity combination for $6.85.  Again, between the time we went, and the time we returned, the river rose about a foot. 
That was today’s excitement.  Hugs to all.
PS. Don’t forget the informative blog cuencaresidency.blogspot.com that is updated regularly.


Monday March 26/12 update
Today Bella sent me to the nearest Coopera to get some cash for the week then she was headed to Coral for a few things.  I intended to walk a direct route to that Graiman store by the airport again but actually found a huge ceramic store just up the hill east of Coral.  It cost me a whole $1 to get a yellow tile that will look good on the house once I mount our house numbers on it.
I am learning to take my time and think things through but things don’t always go the way we want.  I have always been envious of those folks that can run a bead of silicone in seconds and have it perfect.  Not me….
It will take me another day to get that sign sorted out.
I also did up four more photographs for our stairway.  They all insist on hanging at a slant, mind you it is all the same slant, so I am leaving them like that to see if we will get accustomed to it or not.   So far it offends my sense of level horizon.
We waited for a bus for ½ hour tonight, actually one of 2 buses would have worked but we have no luck at all after 6pm.  We finally hailed a cab and made it to the Sucre Theatre just off Parque Calderon to hear an American bluegrass band called the Ajusco Mountain Boys.    The crowd was 80% expat English-speakers, yet the band spoke only in Spanish, but performed in English.  Here is their rendition of Rocky Top Tennessee.
http://youtu.be/QX-87G2DVkQ   That was the liveliest they got….  It seemed like all the songs sounded the same, and they didn’t do something fun like “Men Of Constant Sorrow”, I think it is called.  That should have been in their repertoire.   And they basically just stood there and played and sang.  The bass fiddle got rotated only once…  They really didn’t do much to get the crowd’s attention.  It was a night out, and it was free, and we did get to see a lot of Canadians we hadn’t seen in a while.
Enjoy the pics.    That was today’s excitement.  Hugs to all.

120326 Our local church, St Teresa de Jesus

120326 Part of the Sucre Theatre