Every Breaking Wave...

  Taken yesterday sitting in a pedicab at the first checkpoint into Nicaragua at the aptly named Penas Blancas. We've been trying all week to make our 90 days border run to renew our visas. We've done this particular goat rodeo before. Just not since Covid. If only all our residency paperwork was in and accepted as 'in progress' by the government instead of kicked out of the system and forced to start over with all new copies of every nit picky document. We were just in progress when Covid hit. The government threw out the applications of everyone applying when the pandemic hit, which means start anew for us. Usually we go during the week, trying to go in the morning so we could escape to the plethora of restaurants in Liberia that do not exist in the Tamarindo area. Usually you walk up, pay your exit tax of $8 or $9 dollars (depending on the exchange rate that day), walk into the CR immigration building to turn in your exit tax papers and they stamp your passport with

  Playa Grande this morning. With asthma while it's helpful to live within 7 miles of the beach,  actually going to the beach with the fresh salty air seems to help. I didn't walk as much as usual, but I did enjoy the ocean breezes. The waves were insane with lots of rip tides visible. Last night my asthma started trying to morph into lung crud. Better today. When we first moved to Costa Rica almost exactly four years ago we were getting near the end of our four months there when we met someone on the bus to San Marcos. A retired lady with a name straight off of "Game of Thrones" and a haughty attitude. Another American, retired there from teaching creative writing at the university level. I could tell that Jim was pissing her off on this short ride. She wasn't doing herself any favors with me either. Why? Because she spent the entire 45 minutes bragging about being a great writer with a zillion books. I went back to our plastic paneled room and looked her up by h

  Yeah, I'm there again. Still asthmatic, but now it's settling in my lungs in such a way as I feel like I'm developing bronchitis or worse. High fever, sweating, coughing and honking way too much. Tomorrow to the doctor I go~ Pretty sure I don't look as nice and nicely put together as Chappelle's Crack Guy. Jim is getting the full court press official evangelical Love Bombing at the church. He attended the same one we've been going to for years just so he could fully restock the tee shirts and make sure it's all organized. Miss Bossy claim twittering on up stroking his male ego about how 'needed' he is. Kristin came out and did the exact same thing! Now our email box is filled with paeans to Jim's helpful tee shirt selling and doing other things. I can see what they are up to, and I don't much like it. But I know even if they tempt Jim into staying a few more weeks it's just going to be more of the same, and he'll figure it out. Righ

  The rolling, roiling, goat rodeo, one legged man at an ass kicking contest that is church. This is going to be long, and explains why I've been mostly gone. It's been quite the horrible week. My snark-o-meter has been turned to 11. You've been warned. It's also going to be a long one, this tale has sprung boarded me into a huge discovery about someone too. First read this , followed by this . Yes, the Big Fuzzy Emotional Rescue Poodle happened. I have had several not so friendly conversations with that board member that keeps chasing me outside and insisting I sit just beyond the doors to watch when I am in desperate need of injectable benadryl and a boatload of Combivent and other drugs at home, asap. She told me immediately after the second happening that the board had decided I was to keep sitting at the tee shirt table with Jim, and they'd put Emotional Comfort Poodle on the balcony next to the other side of the room, and his owner would sit inside the buildin

  Pork, the stray that moved in and adopted us, taking a long hard nap on my fresh sheets. She arrived with her friend we called Beans, as in Pork and Beans, but Beans comes around rarely now. Not Pork, Pork is permanent. Yesterday Jim gave his good friend Derwood a ride to the Liberia airport.  I didn't offer to go with them. I knew Jim wanted to take the opportunity to talk with Derwood alone. Last year when the pandemic started until Sept Derwood was at our house every single freaking day. Jim thought he'd made a close friend here. It's hard to make close friends here because of the very transient nature of the place. It fits the description that Stephen King used in "Stand By Me" about friendships. It's more true here that friends move in and out of our lives here like busboys at a restaurant. My best friend here got abused by her husband and went back to the States.  It happens. When Derwood disappeared in Sept we were both puzzled by this. Every single d

  Right now I need all the chocolate in all those cocoa bean pods processed in my hot little hands pronto! No sleep because no breath plus asthma drugs. It's easing some, and I had a small window of time today without wheezing, but my eyes look like I'm smuggling these cocoa beans between the bottom and top lids. No bueno. Stayed home largely in the bedroom under the air conditioning and I read and crocheted a lot. If I ever again utter the words "Hey I love that very intricate afghan and I'm going to make it" I want one of you to stick my head in the paint can shaking machine down at the Sherwin Williams store, either here in Costa Rica, or home in the States and flip that sucker to high. Right now I'm making the Phoenix pattern and I'm losing my mind. Had to rip out the last six rows last night because I'd some how made an error six rows back screwing up the entire thing.  Because I am somewhat sidelined I'm now the official keeper of the Iphone