LUCKY, 2001-2020

 

Our last cat finally passed away today.   Lucky was 19 years when she died.   We called her Lucky because, well, she was.   We were going to the pet store to buy some food for our dog. Well, as luck would have it, as we walked into the store we noticed  a sign stating there was a cat adoption going on today.  So we took a peek.  “I’m just going to look dear,” I said to my wife.  Unfortunately for her, there was a litter of calicos.  I’ve loved calicos ever since college.  A girl that I roomed with had one and it was simply the sweetest cat.   So looking turned to pleading, which ended up in picking out a new cat.  I picked Lucky because she had a great pattern along with the blackest black fur and the whitest white fur.  I mean truly vivid colors.   We packed her up, bought some cat food and toys and off we went.  

We introduced her to the rest of our menagerie; Pip, our beloved Old English Sheepdog and Smokey our amazing cat.   She got on well with the two and comfortably settled into living in a house rather than a barn.  A few years later I was perusing the rescue animals and spotted another cat.   A green-eyed spotted beauty.  Well, after much conniving, I mean convincing, we went to pick up Misty from the East Haven pound.   She was a fantastic cat with an amazing personality.   But, she did not get along with Lucky.  She fought with her, bullied her and generally made life miserable for Lucky.   So Lucky ended up withdrawing from the menagerie and moved into our bedroom, underneath the bed.  And that is where she would while away the day.  No amount of persuasion would get her out.  Ok, no problem.  Then after a few years she suddenly decamped from our bedroom and relocated to the basement.   Since we kept the litter boxes, food and the water dispenser there, she was pretty much in cat heaven.   Yeah, I would find her by the sunny window in the morning, but then she would scurry down to the basement.   

Even after Smokey and Misty passed, she stayed there.  Then one day, a few months ago, lo and behold, Lucky moved back upstairs.  She literally removed herself from her self imposed exile.   My wife moved her bed to the top of the basement steps and positioned the baby gate so she could come and go without the dogs getting at her food.  She started hanging with Daisy and Beau, our two Shiloh Shepherds.   They would lie together, play together, nap together.  She even tolerated when they groomed, pawed and licked her.   She would jump onto the couch and sit with us.  Everything a normal cat would do.   Every morning I would find her by the window sitting in the sun.  She became Lucky again.

 

But she started to lose weight and slowly began to  lose control of her limbs.  They would drag and she had a hard time sitting.   She also stopped grooming herself.  But, she still had an appetite and ate like a horse and was always drinking water.   Still, a good sign.  Yesterday, when my wife and I came home after running errand all three of my brood greeted us at the door.  It was so moving.   Last night we had her on the couch petting her and rubbing her ears.  She was happy sitting between us but seemed unable to climb onto my wife’s lap.   This morning I went downstairs to make coffee and she was no where to be seen.  I looked downstairs into the basement and she was lying there breathing hard.  We took her upstairs, put her in her bed and called the vet.   Twenty minutes later, she took her last breath and was gone.   

So today has been kind of blue.   The house feels emptier.  It is a little out of balance.  The dogs seem sad and downhearted.   They have been sniffing around the house looking for her.  We gave her a warm, safe, secure and loving house and I’m grateful for the time she had with us.    

The Masked Shopper

Today was the first day I ventured out under the new Connecticut state guidelines for going to the grocery store.  This entailed the “suggestion” of wearing a mask in public.  Well, I didn’t want to get “mask shamed” if I showed up without one, so my wife spent the better part of last night sewing a mask from old bandanas.  She found a Youtube video and created a few prototypes.  This author had a macabre sense of humor because the mask that she was touting literally would not stay on my head. Or my wife’s.    Now my wife is pretty clever and knows her way around a sewing machine but this design was next to useless.    I suggested a few elastic straps and voila, a mask that stays on your head.  She also incorporated a layer of cotton batting in between the folds of the mask as well.  Will that extra layer of protection work?  Who knows but it sounds good.  

So I get to the store, don my gloves and put my mask on.  Great.  Two months ago if I showed up looking like that at the store, I would have been promptly arrested and charged with attempted robbery, today I’m greeted with open arms. Well, not real open arms, more of the virtual kind.   My, have times changed.   To keep the flow of traffic going and encourage social distancing the aisles are now one way, with HUGE arrows on the floor directing the flow of traffic and signs everywhere telling you to keep at least six feet between you and the next person.  Pretty easy to follow right?  Wrong!  Remember I’m going at six in the morning during old people hours and for some reason, the old people are not quite grasping this concept.  More than likely it is because of the masks.  Whereas the mask that my wife made looked pretty good on the surface, there were a few design flaws that I detected.  

1. I could barely breath.  So maybe the other old masked people were oxygen starved and couldn’t figure out the signs or directions.  and
2. I couldn’t see.  The mask I was wearing was fogging up my glasses. Most of the other people in my age bracket were wearing glasses and perhaps they were blinded as well.

So here we are, gasping for breath and unable to see, careening around the store trying to find food.  It really was a sight to behold, providing that you could see.   I had a list but because of my current state of limited vision and low oxygen, I’m pretty much  stumbling from aisle to aisle just throwing stuff into my cart.  Okay, there is a can of something, it resembles corn, it could be tomato paste, I’ll sort it out when I get home.  This bag feels like coffee, maybe it’s dried pinto beans, so into the cart.   This could be yogurt or perhaps it’s cottage cheese.  Into the cart.  

I was cruising down one aisle and stopped dead in the middle of the aisle was a guy on a scooter.  He had a boot on his leg so I felt some pity, but that soon turned to anger and then rage when he picked something off the shelf and examined it for a minute or two then moved two feet forward picked something else off the shelf and took his sweet time contemplating that purchase.  And again, and again.  WTF, we were instructed that if we  touch it, it’s ours!  Finally we get to the end of the aisle and he turns right.  I gleefully turn left and continue.  Maybe his broken ankle has caused him diminished capacity or maybe, he is just a jerk.  I think this is peanut butter, but maybe it’s mayonnaise. Sugar? Flour? Into the cart, I’ll figure it out when I get home.  

Finally I’m done so it’s off to the check out.  Aisle 9 is the designated aisle for waiting for a register to open.  I cruise down the aisle with some lady whose is now tailgating me.  I stop in the middle of the aisle to brake check her and she almost rear ends me.  I turn around and scowl at her, but since the mask covered my face and my glasses were fogged up I’m not sure she got the message.  Thankfully she somehow figured out my displeasure and retreats to a safe distance.  The cashier motions me over, I check out, she tells me how many gas points I have, which doesn’t do me any good because gas could be free and I still have no where to go and nothing to do when I get there.  

I leave the store, rip off the mask, and take the first full gulp of air that I’ve had in 45 minutes.  Ah!   My oxygen starved brain begins to function. My eye sight returns. I look at some of the items that I bought and wonder why the hell did I buy a bag of pinto beans?  I finish loading the car and make my getaway. 

 Home! I think I’m in the clear, but my wife saw something on the news about decontaminating the food so I unload everything onto the counter and she starts wiping things down with homemade cleaners with such vigor that if I didn’t know better I would have thought that she was a former employee of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.  I’m so stressed I throw my clothes in the hamper, put my sweats on and crawl back into bed.  Grocery shopping has never been so stressful.  

Corona Shopping Hours At Stop And Shop

My wife and I decided to venture out into the great abyss this morning.  It was a tough decision.   We had to leave the comfort and security of our  home to go to “the over 60 only” time bloc at  Stop and Shop.  It wasn’t a decision we made  lightly.  But since we were  running low on  a few necessities we made the move.  Wake up, throw some clothes on and out the door.  I figured that it would be a quick in and out and then we would scurry home to our lair.  Wrong!  We pull into the parking lot and the place is packed.  It’s like the early bird special at the 99 House.  Every person over 60 from a 20 mile radius is jockeying for position in the parking lot.  It’s dark and rainy this morning.  Some of these elderly people have trouble parking their car correctly on a dry sunny day.   Oi vey. My blood pressure is starting to rise and I haven’t even left the car.  My wife finds a space far away from everyone because she needs to social distance her new car from some jerk who doesn’t know how to open a car door without smashing their door into her car.  

I walk into the store, snap on a pair of surgical gloves  as if I’m going to waltz into the operating room and perform open heart surgery, grab a cart and tentatively enter the store.  I’m immediately greeted by a guy passing out packs of  12 rolls of toilet paper. Sure, let me have one please.  The guy offers me two but I decline.  Unlike the asshole dude in front of me that took six packs.  Six packs?   Seventy-two rolls of toilet paper?  Their must be a lot of assholes in that family!  We split up the list.  Fruit, veggies, tea yogurt, and bread for me.  My wife handles the deli counter.   I try to social distance myself by trying to avoid people which proves to be absolutely impossible given the fact that the aisles are narrow and if someone dares to stop and ponder their purchase they create a choke point preventing people from passing.  Sigh!   

Their organic produce section is sparse on a good day and this is definitely  not a good day.  I do score some berries, but fail with the lettuce.  Oh well, conventional romaine will have to do.   The tea aisle is barren so I can take my time.  Some English Breakfast and green tea.  Perfect.  I am trying to navigate through the store and remain a safe distance from everyone but this proves to be fruitless.  People stop in the middle of the aisle to check their lists,  stop to chat, or just have a senior moment!   Really?  Keep your freakin’ distance.  What is it with these people?  I detour down the greeting card aisle and gaze at the Get Well Soon section.  Oh oh, not a whole lot of those cards left.  Now it’s off to the bread section.  Rows of empty shelves greet me.  I find the last two loaves of seeded rye bread.  I place one into my cart and contemplate getting the other one.  That’s until some lady sidles up to me and starts pawing the other loaf.  I quickly social distance my ass towards the yogurt.  None of my favorite goat yogurt is left so I maneuver my way towards to deli counter.  It’s like an obstacle course.  People stopping, chatting, or just standing staring off into space.  I finally find my wife waiting patiently at the deli counter.  They finally call our number we get our Swiss cheese and sliced chicken and hightail it to the registers.

And here the fun begins.  People banging their carts against one another while standing asshole to elbow.  No social distancing here.  I’m on the lookout for anyone who is coughing, sneezing, or wiping their noses.  Thankfully all is quiet.  We quickly check out and my wife realizes she lost her quadruple point gas coupon.  Oh well, too bad, but we really don’t need a whole lot of gas because there is pretty much no where to go.  Except for Stop and Shop. I snap off my gloves, load the car and we light out of there.  Back to our lair to start our day of social isolation.  

Uncomfortably Numb. I Cracked A Crown And I Care.

I fell in love with popcorn when I was a child.  In spite of  being culinary challenged, my mother did make a mean bowl of popcorn.  I loved to badger her to make a bowl. My favorite trick was to wait until she was on the phone and mime out what  I wanted.   Between the phone in one hand, a cigarette in the other and talking to her friend with the phone wedged between her head and shoulder, whatever gesture she made I would naturally interpret as a go-ahead.  “But when you pointed the cigarette at me and exhaled smoke, I thought that meant yes.” More often than not she agreed. Boom!  I would race around the kitchen,  pulling out the large soup pot, small saucepan, butter, oil and the bag of popcorn.    Under her strict supervision, I would pour  3 TBLs of  oil into the pot. When the oil started to shimmer, I would toss in a test kernel (my favorite part), wait until it pops…, toss in the rest of the popcorn, cover, shake, and when the popping stops, dump it into a bowl, add some melted butter and salt and you have yourself a party.  And the best part, the very best part, were the un-popped kernels.  They had one job; to pop.  Not complicated, it’s actually your name.  John Wheelwright makes wheels, William Taylor makes clothes, popcorn is corn that is supposed to  explode.  But sadly, for some reason, known only to them, they failed in their mission.  Well, lucky for the un-popped kernels,  there are people, who love them.  I’ve loved anything crispy or crunchy ever since I was a kid so, unpopped kernels, lollipops, and fireballs were the best.

My mother and I would fight over them.  First off the partially cooked ones were always first to go. Then we would actually divide up the remaining un-popped ones.  My mother, being a mother,  would always give me the larger portion.  But,  if I wasn’t looking or paying attention she would try and sneak a few back.  It was her thing. She used to do these commando raids, actually crawling on the floor at night, to steal my father’s M&M’s which were locked in his night table, and then belly crawl back to her side of the bed.  So, from a tender age, I had a mother who was an original member of Seal Team 6 and a lover of un-popped popcorn kernels. 

My current tale of woe starts   at the end of the summer.  I happily spent a summer eating oysters, clams and  mussels in Maine and Cape Cod.  All summer long.  Yum!  I come home, go to my favorite pizza place, order my favorite pizza pie, white clam if you are wondering, first bite and CRACK!  Of course I chip a tooth on a stray bit of clamshell in a pizza joint 50 miles inland.  Go figure right?  So Ole’ Snaggletooth goes to the dentist, who puts  a veneer on my chipped tooth.   In passing I mention that my left molar is sometimes sensitive.  A few x-rays later, and drum roll please, a new crown is the diagnosis.  a fews days earlier I had innocently mentioned to my lovely wife that I should snack on popcorn because it is semi-healthy, and lovely wife goes out and buys  some microwave popcorn and I was hungry and well you know the rest.  

Novocaine.  Lots of it.  I mean lots.  The entire left side of my head is numb. Tongue? Can’t feel it.  Lips? Can only feel the right side.  Cheek?  Can’t feel them either.   But happily for me I can still; 

1. Hear.  As in hear the screaming of the Dremel tool whirring at 10K RPM inside my mouth and reverberating in my skull along with the death rattle sound the suction straw is making as it sucks away all of the debris and,
2. See. As in see the mist of finely ground tooth gently rising from my mouth as my dentist happily grinds away at the offending molar. Mercifully, it is over in just a few hours and I am now the happy owner of a temporary crown.  Temporary as in there  is more of this ordeal that I will have to endure, but lucky for me, I have three weeks to wait until the permanent one is done.  In the meantime chew on the right side and for obvious reasons avoid popcorn.  

I have often complimented my dentist on his technique.  I told him once he had the hands of a watchmaker, he quickly told me  his  father was one.  Great moment.   Anyway, on the way to my car I promptly cancel my gym plans.  The thought of bouncing on the treadmill, mouth numb, blithely gnawing away at my cheeks doesn’t interest me in the slightest.  No thank you. So back home and lie down. A refreshing nap turns into a freakin’ nightmare when the novocaine wears off, OUCH!  Everything hurts.   And while all of this is going on, my mouthguard, which I thought I put in a safe place, was found by one of my dogs who, chewed it up, and now I have another trip back to dentist, who did warn me in no uncertain terms to, you guessed it, keep the mouth guard away from pets.  

So, knowing me, I will swear off popcorn for about, oh,  a day or two and then back to my tricks.  Although, I will concede to not eating any more of  the unpopped. As I was listening to his instructions of what to do if the temporary crown comes off, which it won’t, but if it does, put it in a plastic bag, provided you didn’t swallow it, and let’s hope it won’t happen because he’s going on vacation, but if it does…  Anyway, within those instructions, root canal was mentioned twice not once but twice and trust me, once was enough.  So where in the world are my fireballs?  

It's Freezing Outside, At Least In New England

New Year’s Day in New England and it is bitterly cold and very windy.   The peel your face off if you are not careful, mind numbing type of cold.  The you could be wearing ten layers of clothing and still be cold kind of cold.    So I decide to stay in and do some e-shopping.  Cold weather for me means L. L. Bean.  Good stuff and they stand by their product.  I type in their address and off we go.  First stop: gloves.  I am notorious for ripping, tearing, losing, somehow ending up with two right hand gloves type of glove owner.  Needless to say, I use my pockets a lot.  But we are in the middle of a  cold spell with no end in sight and it is  tough driving a car with your hands in your pockets, so off I go looking for a new pair of gloves.  The men’s Carrabassett gloves look awesome in brown and gray, are incredibly warm, but their $89.95 price tag forces me to move on.  The GTX PrimaLoft has great reviews, but it’s got all these straps with pulls and things dangling from it, looks pretty complicated, big and puffy, and I really want them for going out and besides, I like leather gloves.  So the hunt continues.  Finally, deerskin gloves, cue angels, ahhhh! Light, warm, my size and on sale.  Boom! I’m in.  Drop it into the cart and hmmmmm.  It’s still pretty cold out and the weather guy just said we will be getting an “impactful” snow storm later on this week.  Well, that’s a blizzard where I come from, so lets go look at sweaters.  

 First up, Cardigans.  While I love the theory of the cardigan, in actual practice, at least for me,  it falls rather short.  I try them on and  think, “I look pretty cool.” Open, buttoned, sleeves up/sleeves down, nice.  However, when I try one on in the store  when my wife is present, she heckles me unmercifully.   “Looks good for a man in his nineties,”  “Do you want to be buried in that thing?”  “You look homeless.” That kind of stuff.  Needless to say I don’t own any cardigans. Next.  

Ah, the fisherman sweater.  I love them. Big, bulky, warm and good looking.  It must be  good looking because that is what I was wearing when I met my wife.  At least that is what it was according to my wife.  That was over thirty years ago. She also remembers the color and pattern of the accompanying shirt I wore.  I couldn’t tell you what I wore yesterday with a gun to my head.  Glad I didn’t wear a cardigan when I met her.  But here is the problem, the big, bulky warm and good looking fisherman sweater only comes in that off white, creamy color.  Which shouldn’t be a problem except for the fact that every time I have gotten a sweater in that color one of two things are going to happen.  I will either get a coffee stain or a tomato sauce stain on the sweater. Guaranteed. And just wait one second.  Fishing is a dirty, sweaty smelly, way to make a living.  Why the hell did they pick off white for the color of their sweaters which screams stay clean when we all know that is next to impossible?   

 I could be wearing an apron over a bib inside a level A hazmat suit, survive a breakout of ebola  and yet  sure as the sun will come up tomorrow I will somehow get a stain on my cream colored sweaters.  Never fails.  Last year I tempted fate, foolishly thinking that I perhaps grew out of that phase.  I bought a few moderately priced cream colored sweaters.  Sadly, they too succumbed to coffee stains.  What’s worse though is wearing a cream colored sweater and  not knowing it has a stain on it.  I would be halfway to work, look down and sure enough old coffee stain.  Shit!  Go to work with a coffee stain and suffer humiliation or go home and change.  Go home, change and call in late.  That damn highway, always accidents.  Yep.  Truth is out.  

V-necks? Nope.  Never liked them.  Ever.  Next. 

There it is; the Double L Cotton Sweater but, of course, they don’t have my size.  Big sigh.  I’m beginning to feel discouraged. It’s not getting any warmer and I can’t find a sweater.   I’m ready to cut my losses with just the gloves and go look for a sweater on the REI site, when I take one more look and there it is.  The Classic Raggwool sweater.  Charcoal grey. Perfect for hiding coffee or spaghetti sauce stains. Crew neck. One hundred percent lambswool.  All the bells and whistles.  Free shipping.  American Express and it’s on its way.  I check the email and confirmation and, oh shit, I didn’t take the discount.  A nice chat with customer service fixes my stupidity,  and it looks like the gloves and sweater will be here Friday; just in time for the impactful snow event that the weather people are talking up.  But, I’ll be warm in my new duds.   Sipping coffee and eating lasagna.  Happy New Year and thanks for reading this.  

Where is U? Peruvian Teachers Strike Again!

Visiting Machu Picchu was a moving and emotional experience. I was overwhelmed by its majesty.   You can look at thousands of pictures and none, I mean none, will do it justice.  I won’t even try. You have to see it yourself. Not only  was  it a spiritual moment for me, but every Peruvian I met said the same thing. It’s a spiritual moment. And they all brought their hands to their hearts when taking about it. Everyone.  

So having toured and explored this amazing place for about five hours, it was time to head back to town.  A moderate wait for the bus and an uneventful ride down the mountain.  My son and I walk into town and proceed to Toto’s House Restaurant for some coffee and empanadas.  We have a few hours to kill and this place is perfectly situated for people watching.  Perfect.  An Incan quartet of pan flutes and guitars are playing for coins and selling CD’s.   Better than perfect.  We hang out here watching the comings and goings, listening to live music, talking and laughing.  That nice ache settles and another beer just might do the trick.  The beer is exceptionally good down there by the way.  

Finally it’s getting close to 4 PM and we have a train to catch. I had the hotel hold the bags and send them to the train station.  There they are, and now I’m schlepping around my suitcase and backpacks. They let us through the gates and the station is PACKED!  Oh and did I mention utter chaos?  That too.   Remember those striking teachers?  Yep.  The striking teachers are at it again. This time disrupting the rail service.  They put logs and rocks as well as parked trucks on the rails.  People are everywhere and more and more are coming through the gates.  There is nowhere to sit, people are camping in the gardens, under trees, all over benches and occupying every square inch of this place.  You have to plan your moves if a seat looks like it’s going to become available.   I pounced on a bench when a young lady stood up to stretch and she offered me a seat.  Ah. Bless you child!

So here we have hundreds and hundreds of people, all speaking different languages, mind you, sitting asshole to elbow, trying to;

 a) Listen to any news over the “loudspeaker” which it is an oxymoron because it was neither loud nor audible, even in English.  It was as if you were speaking through  a tired old speaker with a hole in it trying to talk over hundreds and hundreds of unhappy people while holding your hand over your mouth. And you were underwater as well.

                                                                                                            And

b) Get some sort of answer from the overworked, exhausted, and just as much in the dark as we were, train attendants.   Those poor employees had no clue as to what was going on either.   They did not know when the trains where coming in. They were not getting any information from the Ministry of Transportation.  They were exhausted as we were.  We spoke to one attendant who had been there for 18 hours and had another four hour round trip ahead of her before she could go home.  

Now all of the food is gone because the mob is not only big but hungry as well.  We had a few leftover energy bars and lots of water.   But now those are long gone and the trains are not rolling in.   They are 6 hours behind schedule.  Yep.  Six long hours.  Wait! Hold it! And here comes a train.  The entire  station erupts in jubilation. But there are a lot train security and they are checking the tickets and times carefully.  Not our train.   Later on we met a bunch of kids from Ireland who missed that train  by minutes.  Those poor kids were devastated.  Soon we befriend a group consisting of an elderly couple from Australia, along with two teenage girls from Venice and Saskatchwan, who have coalesced into a traveling unit because of this shared misery, led by Bruce, a very tall man in a bright red jacket and big white straw hat.  And they were in the same carriage that we were in. 

People are starting to go from a spirited, we are all in this together festive mood, to edgy, then, angry, onto loud and finally everyone for themselves.  People are clapping and chanting.  Someone start shouting informacion! Informacion!  Others quickly join in.  My son and I along with our new traveling partners are able to find a quieter place in the station and wait there. We take the philosophical approach; nothing much we can do, out of our hands, oh well.  

Finally our train rolls into the station.  The carriages  are marked M, N, O, P, Q,R,S,T, V, W, X, Y, Z, L.   Oh, and we were all in carriage U.  Yep, carriage U.  The one that’s not there.  That carriage U.  They are checking your ticket and passport to the manifest and if your aren’t scheduled for that train and carriage, you are not getting on it.  Period. I’m going from attendant to attendant, dragging my suitcase and backpacks screaming Donde esta U?  Donde esta U?  Where is U?  Where is U?  They didn’t know where U was either.  They mostly spoke into their walkie-talkies and then said something to me in Spanish that I didn’t understand and walked away.  Great.  I keep an eye on Bruce in the bright red jacket and big white straw head to see if he has made any headway.  

They start closing the doors and I see my new mate Bruce standing by the last carriage.  L.  It dawns on us.  L is the new U. My son and I race to  Carriage L.  Bruce and his wife are boarding, I hear Bruce scream to the attendant those are my daughters.  More like grand-daughters Bruce’s wife snickered later.  The two young ladies from Venice and Saskatchewan get on the train.  I show my ticket to the attendant and saying, “U is L, L is U!” She gives us a weary smile and  lets us onto the carriage.  She doesn't even bother checking our passports. The doors close.  

We leave the station.  No actually we don’t, for some inexplicable reason, we wait for about a half an hour, and then leave the station.  We start chatting it up with our new traveling partners, swapping stories, and spend a pleasant train ride back to Ollantaytambo.  

Throughout this ordeal we kept in touch with David, The Best Tour Guide Ever, trading information about the travel delays and making sure we were all up to date.   The train pulls into Ollantaytambo at around 12:15 AM.   Beyond exhausted, we step off the train to be greeted by David, The Best Tour Guide Ever.  He grabs our bags and hauls them to his car.  We settle in and now we have to go into town and try and find a hotel.  Easy enough right?  Not when the only road leading into and out of the railroad station is blocked by a van that is stalled in the middle of the road with a dead battery which  is resulting in cars, vans, and busses all making a huge traffic jam.  David TBTGE, jumps out of the car, rounds up a few other people and pushes the stalled car out of the road.  

We finally clear the traffic jam and head into a very quiet Ollantaytambo.  David TBTGE, starts going up and down the streets pounding on doors of hotels and finally finds us two rooms at the Hostal Sumac Chaka on Calle Medio.  It was clean, it had a bed, it had a bathroom, it had hot water. It was inexpensive and vacant.  Boom, we pay the not so happy manager who was, prior to our, arrival fast asleep and are shown our rooms. I wash up and I am asleep in minutes.

One of the best days ever.  

Yet Another Tent On The Beach Story

I love watching people put tents up on a wind swept beach.  It never gets old and the laughs are simply non-stop.  My latest sighting was on Footbridge Beach in Ogunquit, Maine.  A beautiful but breezy beach that my wife and I love.  We stay at the Gazebo Inn.  An absolutely amazing bed and breakfast.  My gold standard for hotels.   Anyway back to the beach.  Their breakfasts’ are off the charts.  Sorry.  The beach.   So a family strolls onto the beach carrying everything you can imagine.  They were very,  well let’s just say they could have stood to lose a few pounds and   maybe hit the gym every now and then.  The point being that they, in no way shape or form, had anything to do with the great outdoors.  And now of course, they are the proud owners of a brand new tent.  Sealed in the box.  Never opened.  The husband, who eventually proved himself to be extremely inept at tent assembly, was going to attempt to set up this tent on a windy beach.  Add to this his lovely wife who carried an adorable newborn in a sling across her shoulders.  And a beautiful young daughter of around 7 or 8.  

Dad attempts to open the box but is unfortunately thwarted by the steel band-like twenty layers of cellophane tape keeping it sealed.  No knife of course, so they start to tear the box to shreds finally get the tent out. Out billows yards and yards of mutli-colored nylon fabric and three, count them, three ridiculously long, jointed, elastic poles.  The daughter pitches in only to have dad poke her in the stomach with the poles.  “Thanks dad.”   The wife is reassembling the torn box and pointing to the pictures telling the husband what it should look like.  I don’t know what it looked like on the box, but what this guy was doing with the real thing didn’t resemble anything that I have ever seen.  

Ten minutes go by and those poles and yards of fabric still don’t resemble anything that could remotely be considered shelter.  This guy lives in a house, for most of the year.  What does he know about tents?  Finally something that appears to be a tent is up flapping in the breeze.  I haven’t seen the box but I’m pretty sure that the picture on it and that tent had little resemblance to  each other.  In fact, the two of the three tent poles were waving back and forth in the stiff wind looking like huge bug antennae.  I don’t know if it was my imagination but I thought my cell service suddenly got better.  

The husband must have compared the picture on the box to what he was sitting under and concluded that nope, doesn’t resemble the box. So out he pops, tears the tent down and starts anew.  The wife and newborn pick up the tent and begin to put it together; taking directions from the husband who is now looking at the torn box picture. After a few minutes they trade places and the wife begins to point at the picture and shout instructions to the husband.  The daughter wisely stays out of range of the tent poles.  Don’t forget the wind is blowing at a fair clip.  

Finally the tent is up. And NO it’s not.  Down goes the tent.  The husband now sits amid all of these poles and nylon and  pulls out his phone.  Then he starts to open all of the zippers on the tent to see if something is hidden under the flaps.  Finding nothing of value he abandons the zippers and starts in with the tent poles again.  Third time’s the charm and up goes the tent.  Finally figured out the little black tabs attached the tent to the pole.  

Eureka! The tent is up and my cell service is excellent.