Hola Amigos,
Another stay-at-home week, at least for me. Ben went on a successful shopping trip to La Paz one day, and Ryan has been there visiting friends since Saturday, returning via bus sometime today (he heard Ben is fixing his famous smoked pulled pork for dinner tonight!) Ben invited our daughter Rebecca over for dinner tonight, too, and she thought is sounded wonderful (since she's in a place where they don't have pork to eat!) Ben is busily concocting his spice rub mix while I'm writing this. I am staying out of the way!!! Actually, he needed my help to sprinkle on the spices since his hands were all mustardy, and he needed to turn it to get the spices on both sides.
Rub all over with mustard.... sprinkle with the spice blend, and put on the smoker for an all day slow, smoky fire. Yummy! Ready to go on the fire!
We were pleasantly surprised the other day when our friend, a contractor, showed up and said he was ready to start our next home-improvement project! Yippee! We are extending our brick patio from the clothesline area all the way to the veranda on the front. Rick and his worker Alfredo managed to get the forms poured all the way from the existing patio on the south to the north side of the house in 3 days. Now, Rick is going on vacation to Florida for two weeks, and will be back to finish up the project on December 3rd. We even managed to keep the dogs out of the fresh concrete for each pour, although Sam tried once. Fortunately, the concrete was fresh enough that Rick could smooth it out. The wide concrete areas are where our gargoyles spew out water on rainy days, and the bricks are so porous, we decided that the concrete would last longer.
Notice the banana bunch next to the sidewalk? Isn't that convenient when they get ripe, you won't even have to get your feet dirty when you pick one!
The drain line project also got finished this week, thanks to some hard work by Ryan. That rock in the ditch was BIG, and flat on the bottom, and hard to maneuver! With persistent shoveling and work with a pick and pry bar, he finally got it out, and rolled it (or maybe he hurled it?) over the bank! Phew!
Final joint hooked up and good to go! Hooray! This was probably a really good mosquito breeding ground!
You know that things down here deteriorate quickly in the heat. This time, it was the drain hose to our washing machine. It was at least helping us keep the laundry room floor mopped, but not at our convenience! Ben took it all apart, and managed to find a hose that would fit from the local hardware store. He hooked it up, and it worked great. It's a little stiffer than the original, but hey! It works!! Did I ever tell you how nice it is to have a husband who can fix stuff like this? I am truly blessed! Oh...see the curtain in the window there in the laundry? I shortened a curtain I had kept since we moved from Eugene in 1984 (can you believe it?) and it looks great there. It is to shade our 2nd fridge from the afternoon sunshine. (Gotta keep the drinks cold!)
My friends Pat and Cheryl invited me to lunch last week at Bayview. When we got there, we noticed a crowd on the beach in front, so we went down to see what all the hoopla was about. As we got closer, we saw multiple camera people (big, TV type cameras), kids with signs, people with special T-shirts, and the local Turtle guy Noay (sp?) with a mature turtle, ready to go to the water. She was outfitted with an antenna on her back! Telcel, a Mexican cellular service, is sponsoring this effort to track the turtle and post it on the internet. They're building a website and if I ever find out more about it, I'll let you know! You may even spot me on the beach taking pictures of the turtle!! Go Turtle!
Some more photos are in our 2014 November Picasa album.
I'll leave you with an arroyo sunset.
Hasta la proxima semana,
Tus amigos de Baja
Harriet, Ben, Ryan, Sam & Zoey
Another stay-at-home week, at least for me. Ben went on a successful shopping trip to La Paz one day, and Ryan has been there visiting friends since Saturday, returning via bus sometime today (he heard Ben is fixing his famous smoked pulled pork for dinner tonight!) Ben invited our daughter Rebecca over for dinner tonight, too, and she thought is sounded wonderful (since she's in a place where they don't have pork to eat!) Ben is busily concocting his spice rub mix while I'm writing this. I am staying out of the way!!! Actually, he needed my help to sprinkle on the spices since his hands were all mustardy, and he needed to turn it to get the spices on both sides.
Rub all over with mustard.... sprinkle with the spice blend, and put on the smoker for an all day slow, smoky fire. Yummy! Ready to go on the fire!
We were pleasantly surprised the other day when our friend, a contractor, showed up and said he was ready to start our next home-improvement project! Yippee! We are extending our brick patio from the clothesline area all the way to the veranda on the front. Rick and his worker Alfredo managed to get the forms poured all the way from the existing patio on the south to the north side of the house in 3 days. Now, Rick is going on vacation to Florida for two weeks, and will be back to finish up the project on December 3rd. We even managed to keep the dogs out of the fresh concrete for each pour, although Sam tried once. Fortunately, the concrete was fresh enough that Rick could smooth it out. The wide concrete areas are where our gargoyles spew out water on rainy days, and the bricks are so porous, we decided that the concrete would last longer.
Notice the banana bunch next to the sidewalk? Isn't that convenient when they get ripe, you won't even have to get your feet dirty when you pick one!
The drain line project also got finished this week, thanks to some hard work by Ryan. That rock in the ditch was BIG, and flat on the bottom, and hard to maneuver! With persistent shoveling and work with a pick and pry bar, he finally got it out, and rolled it (or maybe he hurled it?) over the bank! Phew!
Final joint hooked up and good to go! Hooray! This was probably a really good mosquito breeding ground!
You know that things down here deteriorate quickly in the heat. This time, it was the drain hose to our washing machine. It was at least helping us keep the laundry room floor mopped, but not at our convenience! Ben took it all apart, and managed to find a hose that would fit from the local hardware store. He hooked it up, and it worked great. It's a little stiffer than the original, but hey! It works!! Did I ever tell you how nice it is to have a husband who can fix stuff like this? I am truly blessed! Oh...see the curtain in the window there in the laundry? I shortened a curtain I had kept since we moved from Eugene in 1984 (can you believe it?) and it looks great there. It is to shade our 2nd fridge from the afternoon sunshine. (Gotta keep the drinks cold!)
My friends Pat and Cheryl invited me to lunch last week at Bayview. When we got there, we noticed a crowd on the beach in front, so we went down to see what all the hoopla was about. As we got closer, we saw multiple camera people (big, TV type cameras), kids with signs, people with special T-shirts, and the local Turtle guy Noay (sp?) with a mature turtle, ready to go to the water. She was outfitted with an antenna on her back! Telcel, a Mexican cellular service, is sponsoring this effort to track the turtle and post it on the internet. They're building a website and if I ever find out more about it, I'll let you know! You may even spot me on the beach taking pictures of the turtle!! Go Turtle!
Some more photos are in our 2014 November Picasa album.
I'll leave you with an arroyo sunset.
Hasta la proxima semana,
Tus amigos de Baja
Harriet, Ben, Ryan, Sam & Zoey
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