Hell’s Half Acre

I have been bouncing between 80 and 77 kilos since early December.  It has been driving me crazy because I *know* how much I eat and it should be low enough to continue losing weight.  So yesterday, fed up yet again, I started tracking my calories.  And um, well, I *thought* I knew what I was eating.  There really is no getting around calories in vs. calories out.  I’m happy I’ve lost the 13 kilos so far, but really need to lose another 10.  Or more maybe.  It galls me somewhat that my goal weight is my sister’s “unhealthy” weight.  Must be those gigantically dense bones I have.

I started jogging again on Sunday and didn’t have to stop for a torn calf muscle!  I”m really happy that it is looking like I’ll be able to start running soon.  Well, relatively soon.  Relative to never.  I am going to start with week 1 (I got injured at week 6) of Couch to 5K and take it really really slowly.  I jogged almost as slowly as I walk, but I was at least jogging without injurying myself.  Right now it is just 10 minutes of jogging but that is so much better than envisioning nothing at all.

The nortes seem to be giving us a break for a little while and today it was warm enough for Ellen to go swimming.  Jamie spied 80F somewhere this morning and I hope it continues in this fashion.  We need some serious heat to kill all the germs that keep infecting us – I think I’ve had a head cold for about a month.

This morning after our daily walk, Jamie and I hung out upstairs in the palapa, home to discarded and abandoned Legos, and watched grackles and buzzing insects swoop all over the yard.  The dogs next door don’t seem to be bothered by the birds but they get mightily pissed when an iguana thinks he can meander through their territory.  The birds were chattering constantly – they must have been having a caucous of some kind – and a strong breeze was keeping us both cool and mosquito free.  It was so nice and peaceful that we dragged chairs, cawfee and oatmeal up there, watching the blowing trees, the terribly busy birds, the errant iguanas and before we knew it the kids were awake and ready for breakfast.  Definitely the best way to start a day.

(the above was written yesterday – today below)

Jamie and I spent the day in Cancun.  I interviewed, dropped his MacBook at the Apple service store and hit Costco for $1600MN of “necessary crap”.  I came out of the interview thinking it went really well but as time went on I realized how badly I bombed so many of the questions.  I spoke almost always in generalizations and gave very few specifics.  And I thought of MUCH BETTER answers after I left.  Sigh.  The traffic coming home was HORRIFIC and we couldn’t believe a 1 hour drive could take 2+ hours.

I got about a million things done today.  Anytime I get more than two things done in one day it feels like minor miracle.  We’ve been trying to get Jesse’s tooth looked at for quite a while.  It only took a full year to get my post put in (yes, a full year) but that really isn’t an issue for me – I had about 5 appointments where the post didn’t fit right yadda yadda – it was always something.  So now, a year later and some 5 years after the root canal I have a poste.  Our dentist is amazing and respectful to the kids and we absolutely love him, but sometimes he makes appointments verbally and we find out later he put something different down in his agenda and then we miss the appointment.  Sometimes he takes forf’ingever to return a call/text/email.  Sometimes I think he’s avoiding us or wanting to break up with us and then he finally returns a call and apologizes profusely and schedules us in.  And then we fall in love with him all over again and remember why we wait for him.  And sometimes WE procrastinate and don’t call and make appointments and before you know it a year has gone by.  So, the last time he saw Jesse he determined he’d need a root canal.  We tried a few days of garlic and went back in, but the infection was still raging so we went to antibiotics and then waited for the dentist to return our calls and/or texts.  And waited.  And finally he scheduled Jesse in and apologized profusely and we saw him today and are in love again.  He started the process of what will probably be a 4 appointment (or more) root canal.  They do them slowly down here but Jesse’s is being done even slower due to pain.

I also finally found the MexPost location today!  Well, we went on a reconasiance trip last night while using the car heater to warm up.  I had tried a month or so ago and the last known location seemed to have closed up.  Our local internet site suggested a new location.  I misremembered the location and sqandered one scouting trip looking for it in the wrong place.  Last night we found it and today while jesse was waiting for his appointment I headed there and MAILED the Christmas thank you cards.  Well, just Papa and Tata and Chris and family’s.  We’ll send more next Wednesday.  it will be interesting to see if they get there.  They are supposed to take 15 days, so keep an eye out!

Then I headed down to the tourist area (5th and 14thish) to find the martial arts studio.  I didn’t exactly find it, but I think I found the stairs that lead to it but since there was a locked gate at the bottom of the stairs I couldn’t exactly find out.  I think I started looking into martial arts classes for the kids in May of last year.  Scouting trip done, I know I can only approach the place from 10th and will have a field day looking for parking.

And last, but certainly not least, i found whole wheat flour.  So many times down here you really need to stock up when you find “weird” items.  Whole wheat flour is one of those things that seems to be either feast or famine.  Chedraui, Mega, Wal-Mart, Soriana and San Francisco haven’t had it for a while.  Bodega did have it.  So we’re good to go again with WW flour.

Two posts in two days.  That’s got to be some kind of record!

Resolutions for the week to come.

damn. I forgot them already…

1. Answer 5 emails languishing in the forgotton inbox each day.
2. Rock Tuesday’s interview.
3. Really and truely lose a kilo. Not bounce between numbers.
4. Make a list of items ordered and verify arrival.
5. Speak an hour of Spanish to the gurls.
6. Volunteer once at Angel Notion (this will be easy as they’ve already slotted me for Wednesday am)
7. Talk to the kids about regularly volunteering at AN and schedule an informational tour.
8. Try the drumming class (boys?) at La Cieba next martes o Jueves (5-pm)
9. Try the Arte Huichol class at La Cieba next Friday with the girls (6-8pm)
10. Light a fire under jesse’s ass to see if he really wants to volunteer at the golf classic.

It got so cold tonight that we headed out in the car, cranked up the heat and blissed in the heavenly warmth issuing from the mighty diesel engine.  It was actually quite stinky but I was happy to trade stinky for warm.

I don’t know what has happened to our heat.  We had it a week in early January and a few days last week, but it has just been one norte after another and getting colder and colder.  My neighbor from Durango says the weather is changing.  Not a good thing.  Those of you in really cold climates probably can’t begin to relate, but we are built for warm weather.  We have a grass roof.  We have an outside kitchen, diningroom and sala.  We have no carpets or rugs.  We have no heat other than what the car offers and our hot water heater.  And we only have hot water in the bathroom.  I swear the reason I did so many dishes on our CA visit was to warm up my hands.  Not going to happen here.

On the other hand, we finally, after a year of waiting, have BANANAS growing in our backyard.  It started with one tiny banana plant – it had maybe 2 leaves when we planted it – and we now have 4-5 offshoots and a blooming banana flower.  Birds have taken a sudden liking to our backyard so I think I might bag our bananas to let them grow and keep the birds away from them.  I should probably use some of the leaves to make tamales as it has been rather rainy of late and the leaves should be well hydrated by now.

So, what has been happening?  Really, not much, thus my reticence.  I managed to re-injure my calf muscle the day after I last posted and have been chomping at the bit to run again.  I figured I’d try to start Couch to 5K from the beginning again, but found 4 days ago that I could only run for 3 minutes before my calf muscle made its voice very loud and very unhappy.  So I decided to take another week off.  And it is just killing me.  I have found, to my amazement, that I really enjoy running.  So each and every day I have to convince myself to NOT run and it surprises me each time – that I WANT to do this exercise.  Because it doesn’t seem like exercise to me.  I really do enjoy it.  I know, it kinda freaks me out a little too.  So I’m hoping that next Monday I can start week 1 of Couch to 5K.  And I have visions of hour-long runs in my future.  For some reason that fills me with contentment.  I know.  it’s weird to me too.

Jamie came in UNDER BUDGET in the grocery categoy last month and I’m VERY proud of him.  I hope you all send him congratulations.  The children all send their love and kisses to Maca and hope she is healing fast.

Pike and I are deep into Ancient History and I’m really loving learning alongside him.  I think I finallly figured out that Jesse enjoys listening but doesn’t want anyone to know he is absorbing.  So we facilitate his eavesdropping.  Pike and Sissy will be getting braces evaluations on the 19th.  Our dentist has a specialist who comes once a month from Merida to see his patients.  Both have very overcrowded mouths.  Too many teeth and not nearly enough room, as well as teeth going a little bonkers.  I’m sure there is a more technical term for it, but we’ll go with bonkers.

Jamie and I started a new event – we’re dating weekly.  Last Friday we headed into town to catch a free Julio Iglesias concert.  It was a lovely concert and if it ever gets warmer than FREEZING at night again we’ll try it again.  On our warm up drive tonight we noticed a Oaxaca exhibit at a plaza in town and might try to catch that.  I really need to kick myself royally in the behind and get back on the MT bandwagon but I’ve been swamped with homeschooling and planning the materials and, well, to be perfectly honest, avoiding MT.  And that’s all the news that’s fit to print.

The Epic of Gilgamesh is not something to blithely stumble into and start reading various translations of willy-nilly. I’d read some reports of “safe” and “toned down” translations on a homeschool board I frequent, but figured those moms were probably somewhat uptight and that we didn’t really need to sanitize the oldest story in the world. Um, either I found a particularly graphic translation or it can really use some toning down. Since I’m mainly reading this to Pike, who runs a degree or 20 more prudish than the rest of us, I’ll leave the sexualization of Enkidu to others and we’ll enjoy the sanitized “Gilgamesh the Hero” thank you very much.

We are trying the great MexPost experiment to see if the reports are true and they are, in fact, delivering post.  We have never used the Mexican postal service because, well, it either has not existed or simply did not work.  We got quite used to this situation and it has taken some 6 months of reading accounts of MexPost success stories to decide to try it.  I had our mail service in South Dakota send our mail a few days ago and I’m so excited to see if it will actually arrive that I’m already making lists of more books to get.  I also have a contact on my homeschooling board mail me things left at my sister’s – she’ll walk across the TJ border and then send it via Multi-Pak or Estafeta, two delivery services which thrive due, in many ways, lacking on the part of MexPost.  So!  TWO packages!  That MIGHT arrive!  It’s almost better than Christmas!  After making all these momentous decisions (when no business, not the electric company, not the water company, not the government uses MexPost, but instead hand deliver all bills, it is easy to see what a foreign concept it is to use the postal service) I found out that a temporary camper here has been innocently using MexPost to send all his mail and dive computers and wetsuits and whatever it occurs to him to order from the US without a second thought.  And he has never had a problem receiving packages.  Which just goes to show you how beautifully the ignorant are protected.

The past few months I’ve been getting more and more unhappy with the evening and nighttime schedule of the kids’.  We finally had a family meeting a couple weeks ago and addressed the issues I had.  On a typical day the girls are gone all day playing and the boys are gone once they get up.  We rarely get them home from lunch and they only return once their friends are eating dinner and, quite understandably, they are both famished and cranky beyond reason.  Once they shove food in their mouths they are off again to play.  They then come home around 9pm and settle in with a night of DVDs and computer time and lay waste to the kitchen.  Not only am I missing my kids but I am not enjoying the disaster that results from the starving children and I feel like we’re running a hotel and maid service here.  Luckilly, they care enough to listen and we hammered out a solution which should meet everyone’s needs.  We also decided to take a one week break from all DVD and computer use.  I rallied for a month; Jesse countered with 2 weeks and we ended up lasting only a week before caving.

I think everyone in the family was shocked by the results of the week-long experiment.  Everyone realized how much they missed interacting with their family members and how much fun we can have doing “nothing”.  So we had another family meeting and decided if we wanted to continue (yes), how often (we’ll try 3 times a week and see how people feel about that), and other miscellaneous needs like popcorn to eat during Family Drudgery Nights (nights with TV and computer).  So we now have Thursday, Saturday, and another day (Monday?) dubbed as Family Fun Nights.  Last night we listened to Prarie Home Companion (it had gotten to the point that only Jamie and I would listen and the kids would be on their computers or their friends computers) and wrestled and played dominoes and enacted an episode from “Smallville”.  It was a wild and crazy night.  And by 9:30 I was ready to turn on the TV.

My friend in Merida, Ellen, has either coined a cunning term, Obamamos, or heard it somewhere else, but it is absolutely perfect and I LOVE it!

We (obviously) listened to the events today.  We don’t have TV but we can get photos over the internet (no streaming video though) and have satellite radio, so between NPR’s coverage and the photos at cbsnews.com, we missed very little.  But life is strange.  When we listen to the radio I always put on the only station we have reception for (yeah, we’re a bit more than a bit off the grid down here) is from Cozumel, Sol Estereo.  We connected the Sirius to the car radio and headed into town listening to the end of the coverage.  Ellen, confused, asked, “Is Obama in Cozumel?  Can we go see him?”  Maybe you had to be there…

A few days ago (five?) we had an impromptu family meeting and I expressed my dismay that the kids are generally gone from our palapa all day and pretty much of the night before returning for either DVDs or computer time.  We never really have the chance to interact and just *be* together anymore.  I asked them if they’d be willing to go a month without DVDs or computer.  No Way!  But they did agree to 2 weeks.  So we planned for 2 weeks without the computer or DVDs starting the next day.

And then we found that all our Spanish language instruction is on the computer.  And Pike wanted to ask a neighbor currently in Canada to bring him Legos.  And our daily Writer’s Almanac comes via email.  And I needed to figure out how to care for and rehab my calf injury.  So we decided that it would be ok to use the computer for research and email.  Then Jesse decided that since he never reads email (his choice) he’d use that time for Facebook.  And then the other night when I was showing Pike some logic games I’d found for him, the other 3 so enjoyed the games that we soon found all 4 sitting on their computers playing the games.

But it was still an excellent experiment because it really showed us how much family time we’d been missing.  We all spent Saturday night listening to Prarie Home together.  The boys are no longer staying up until 3am or later and enjoy getting up earlier in the day.  Ellen and Pike are playing chess as I type this up.  We’ve started reading so much more (one thing I really wanted to concentrate on) and enjoying our time together.  So it was a wonderful experiment and showed us how much we’ve been missing out.  We now just need to figure out how to find an happy medium with computer time and movie time.

You know, I started a post in my head last night, as I was falling asleep, and it was witty and funny and you really shoudda have been there.

Gawds, I really wish you had been because I’ve got NOTHING here.  Still no word from the employment place and I need a real kick in the ass to get back on the hamster wheel of transcription.  I am LOVING the ancient history track we’re taking this year and especially Susan Bauer’s Ancient History spine.  It isn’t your everyday dry texbook – I really don’t think it is anything like a textbook.  We’re still very slowly finishing up Indian and Chinese culture and I’m hoping that by the time we make it through the Egyptian time period we’ll be done with China. I need to make a confession to my unschooling friends.  I finally decided to make the jump and no longer consider myself an unschooler.  I am requiring schoolwork from the kids and you can see just how far I’ve fallen in the homeschooling blog.  I’m not sure how I feel about this.  I’m disappointed in myself because it is truly a failing of mine, but at the same time I’m relieved because homeschooling is so much EASIER than unschooling.

I finally broke out of my weight plateau yesterday and hit 77 kilos.  Today I’m back up to 78, but at least I managed to get out of that 78-80 rut.  I think I got in a junk rut and have really tried to get back to the healthy diet I had before Christmas and TDay.  My leg feels back to normal and I’m hoping to start running again tomorrow.  I think I’ll drop back to week 5 of C25K and I really need to start the strengthening exercises.

I started a facebook account after my BFF (dayum, am I up on the lingo or WHAT???) setup my 14yo on facebook.  I really resisted because I have a blog and really, who needs more online presence, but I wanted to see what it was about.  I figured it was just stupid blog stuff but more interactive.  And I got completely and utterly hooked.  I’m in contact with my very first boyfriend’s sister (oh, and him also) and finding people I’d met and connected with and then lost in the wilds of the internet long ago.  I’m not sure how long I’ll keep the facebook account, because Jesus H Christ, that is a LOT of personal information out there, but I guess you’re supposed to control that with friend access?  I really need to learn more about it before I use it even more than I am.  Which is WAY too much.  Hey Jonna, bet you can’t resist…it is a time suck from which you will never recover.

I have been trying to move all my stuff from my T30 to my T43 (and got all email over there) only to find that the T43 has started having internet connection issues.  I think I finally nailed it down to Net 3.0 but I’m not sure.  So that’s too much fun figuring out.

We’re blindly pretending we didn’t buy a house in Merida because we simply do not have the money to put into it and live vicariously through Jonna and Mimi and pretend their house is ours.  Because we want the exact same dealio.    But I SO want to be there and not here.  Except I want our beach at our Merida house.  Gawds, but I’m demanding, eh?

We’ve been bizzy little beavers the last couple days – actually *I* have been a bizzy little beaver – and we’re starting to get back into a groove again.  One thing the boys identified that they wanted changed was more of a structure to life.  After eons of spontaneous life I’m actually beginning to enjoy structure.  I never imagined I’d like any imposed structure but I’m actually enjoying it.

We’ve been having weekly family meetings and last week Pike decided he wanted another week off of any academics and Jesse has never wanted any academics so that was easy.  Today we all figured out a schedule that we want to try for academics and the kids continued working on thank you cards (we are anticipating an exciting experiment in mailing letters from Mexico!) and I continued organizing.  Since we live outside, all kitchen stuff is exposed to the elements and gets dust and dirt and nocturnal animal exposure.  I cleaned out all the cabinets and re-organized stuff.  Today I started tackling the refrigerators.  They are supposed to be cleaned weekly by Jesse but sometimes that doesn’t happen and he really doesn’t *clean* – just kind of glances around for obvious rot.  Since we now have THREE refrigerators and really only one that works, it is a large job.  Today I got the trailer fridge cleaned and organized and tomorrow I’ll work on the others while I sit and obsess about whether or not I have a phone call coming my way.

My leg gets better and better and i expect I’ll be back at full ability in a couple days.  I’ve probably lost speed but I’m hoping I’ll be able to put a full effort into the walks in a day or two.

I was finally able to pin the kids down to their KIVA recipients and they really wanted two of them, so they decided (suggested by me) to all put $5 from their Christmas haul into the pot and select two recipients.  Nicaragua is the first recipient and Peru is the second.  I’m really excited to see what happens – I had asked the boys to pick 5 recipients and of Pike’s five, four had been funded by the time we got around to lending.

And the biggest news is that my mareo, my dizziness, my dysequilibrium, whatever you want to call it, seems to have gone the way of the old year.  It has been a good week without any weirdness and I’m hoping it lasts.

Its been a quiet week here on the edge of the jungle, but we’ve got a lot cooking on the backstove.  I have progressed from shuffling to hobbling and now just have a slight limp.  I started doing rehab exercises and today began strengthening exercises.  Yesterday I got so sick of my moaning and groaning about not being able to exercise (except swim) that I hobbled out for a walk.  I may have only gotten 2.5 miles in and was going so slow that I was voted “Restaurant of the Year” by the local mozzies, but it was so incredibly nice to get out and exercise at something that really doesn’t feel like imposed exercise.  I really don’t enjoy swimming because my mouth is constantly full of salty water and my shoulder is really sore.  Can’t do much Yoga due to the leg and shoulder so really, I’m just left to moan and groan.  Today I bumped myself up to strengthening exercises and I have no pain and very little limp.  I’m planning on taking another easy walk today and hope to continue moving forward with rehab.  I don’t know when I’ll be running again, but just walking is good for me.

The kids have been playing non-stop but today I hope to encourage Thank You notes and deciding on our KIVA recipient.  I went over the KIVA site with the girls but haven’t had a chance yet with the boys.  I talked to the boys yesterday about the idea of setting a goal or goals for the year (I really don’t do resolutions) but neither thought it was a good idea – no, I take that back – Pike decided his goal was to save all his allowance all year.  I’m planning on continuing the weightloss and exercising and I should probably figure out something else.

We had a lovely New Years; we had cheese, hot oil and chocolate fondues at their house with arrachera, shrimp, chicken, beef chunks, veggies, tempura batter, bread and fruits (for the chocolate).  I put together some fruits that I figured they hadn’t tried before (candied squash and star fruit) and they enjoyed those and everyone loved the arrachera.  After dinner we played a Guitar video game competetion thing and Uno.  Then to the restaurant to watch the dancers and hoped for a repeat of last year’s Cozumel fireworks (that we could see across the channel) but it was too cloudy and actually rained quite hard that night.  Everyone had a really lovely time.

I have an iron in the fire of employment but don’t know how secretive I should be or want to be about it.  Whether or not it goes through I’ll also be looking into a related (if hired) line of work that I hope to eventually get into.  The hiring process for the 2nd career is rather lengthy with written and oral exams and a 7-week training class.  I’m purposely being vague.  My resume should arrive today (checking Estafeta’s site, I see it is at the destination city but not yet delivered) and I’m not sure when/if I will hear from them.  I’m hoping for next week and will be on pins and needles waiting.  I have no idea how many other applicants are involved nor what my chances might be.  Once I hear one way or the other I can be more candid.  Maybe. 

Well, I think I’ve iced my leg long enough to try and exercise now, so I’m off to get some sun and hopefully some exercise.  Hope you had a lovely New Year!

4) What do you consider to be your greatest personal achievement? Wow. Another tough one. I’m not sure I’ve really accomplished very much at all – it seems so much is a work in progress. And my life has been so incredibly easy or my memory so incredibly flojo that I don’t remember any struggle. I’ve had moments, but honestly, I don’t really think I’ve ever achieved anything great. I suppose this is a wake-up call to get to work!

5) Describe the happiest moment of your life. This is so hokey and I keep trying to come up with something better, but each time I read this sentence I keep imagining the same scene. Having Jesse handed to me immediately after giving birth to him. The others were all homebirths and so much more lovely and serene and you’d think they’d have been a better memory. Becoming a mother for the first time, regardless of the environment, keeps popping up as an incredibly happy moment for me. The second most happy would probably be any moment I’m headed down the road to an unknown destination.

Bonus: If you could change one public policy or law in Mexico what would you change? I would like to see some kind of change implemented in the way that children are signed up for school. Parents needing to take entire days off and deal with the enormous red tape to enroll their kids makes it very difficult for kids to get this most basic stepping stone. While we homeschool, we do it from a position of privilege.

Rivergirl sent me these questions and it was a pleasure answering them.  If you’d like to do the same,
1. Leave me a comment saying, “Interview me.”
2. I will respond by emailing you five questions. I get to pick the questions.
3. You will update your blog with the answers to the questions.
4. You will include this explanation and an offer to interview someone
else in the same post.
5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them
five questions.

My leg is getting better – I’m still hobbling but now I’m finally able to hobble so I’m thinking it was only a Grade 1 tear.  I’m trying to keep active by swimming (sea – ROUGH!) and doing exercises that don’t involve my leg.    Still icing and elevating it and hoping for a good recovery.

I have managed to tear my poor abused Achilles away from my soleus yesterday during an absolutely lovely jog. I was about 40 minutes into my workout and quite warmed up, blissing on the turquoise seas and ready response of my body to the demands I was making. For some reason I am really enjoying jogging. Unfortunately, my calf muscle decided to take a little trip on its own and try and detach from the Achilles.  Luckily there were snowbirds ripping up and down the dirt road on their golf carts and one gave me a ride back home.  I’m doing R.I.C.E. and yesterday kept it elevated all day.  It is looking like a couple months of rehab though so I think I’ll need to start swimming if I’m going to keep losing weight (which is laughable after all the junk I’ve been eating).  I was doing ok at 78 (kilos) until a couple days ago and have refused to get on a scale since the chocolate and candy arrived.  I’m guessing I’m back up to 80 after the last couple days but really don’t want to know.  Denial has always worked amazingly well for me.

In the meanwhile, RiverGirl sent me some interview questions and I’ll bore you with those instead of whining about my inability to jog or bitch about the kids.

1) If you could go back in time (including before you were born) and do one thing, what would you do? I really don’t think I have any regrets in my life – everything that has happened has shaped me to be the person I am today and even the ugly stuff has had an impact that I probably wouldn’t want taken away. I also subscribe somewhat to the chaos theory that removing an item from the past would result in present chaos. So I’m not sure I’d change anything. As for doing, it seems the possibilities are endless. I think I’d probably go back to before my time. I’d love to see the Greeks, Atlantis, the Aztecs, the Native Americans, all in their time. But without me really being there – just observing. I’d love to observe. And then, maybe I’d like to be the canoe for Lewis and Clark. Or maybe I’d change the bullets in Dan White’s gun with blanks. But that damn chaos theory…

2) What one experience would you like to provide to your kids that they have not yet had? Whoa. That’s a good one. Frivolously I’d say, sailing around the world but I think it would be more important to actually make an positive impact on someone’s life. My kids seem to have life handed to them on a silver platter and want for nothing. I’d like to have them know how easy they have life – simply by being white and from the US – and how limitless their opportunities are and have them really really understand how lucky they are and how the rest of the world goes through life. Then I’d like to see them do something about their privilege and make some small (or large) impact on someone else’s life.

3) What is the best thing about living so close to the ocean? The cooling breezes of summer. Summer is so much more bearable when a breeze crops up and you’re not hemmed in by buildings.

4) What do you consider to be your greatest personal achievement?

5) Describe the happiest moment of your life.

Bonus: If you could change one public policy or law in Mexico what
would you change?

Aren’t those GREAT questions?

Oh, were you expecting answers? Ok, I’ve done 1-3 so far.