Mazatlan

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Handling a Power Outage with Aplomb

There was a planned power outage scheduled from 6AM to 2PM today. My laptop battery can last most of a day if I do a few tweaks to conserve power, so my only concern was internet access since my modem needs power. Of course, if I was home, power wouldn’t be an issue, but I’m not so well equipped in Mexico.

In case TelMex was also down, I made sure last night to buy some data for my phone so I could get internet through Telcel today. I picked their 1GB package good for a week as that would ensure enough bandwidth for the day while not being a huge investment if I ended up not needing it.

The first thing I did today was string an extension cord to the truck from my office window. The power went out at about 6:40, so I plugged my modem into the extension cord, went out to the truck, plugged my inverter into one of the truck’s 12V outlets, and came back in to see if I had internet. I sure did! That was fantastic since it meant that I could keep working from my office instead of having to do so outside with all the mosquitoes! As a reminder, that’s because I only have TelCel internet with a cellular booster, which needs to run off the truck battery as well.

To preserve computer battery life, I left the computer in sleep mode when I wasn’t actually working and instead checked my emails on my phone. This meant that by the time the power came back on at 1:30, I still had 10% computer battery life left (about one hour of run time if I kept it in power saving mode or 30 minutes if I had to work)! If the outage had gone on, I would have used a bit more truck battery capacity to charge my computer, no biggie.

The only thing I would have needed for today to be totally stress-free is small solar trickle charger to keep my truck battery topped up during the day. It’s one of those things I keep forgetting to get because I’m still so used to having everything I own with me at any given time. But I knew that one day of running the modem wouldn’t kill my battery (I mean, I ran my booster for several days when I first arrived), so, really, I wasn’t particularly stressed today.

Those of you who follow me on Facebook know that I did have one power-related emergency today: I forgot while I still had power to grind coffee beans for my second cup of the day. My solution to that was not a joke. I put some beans in a baggie, put a cloth around the baggie, and then put the cloth-wrapped baggie on a smooth rock from my yard. I then used a rounder rock to grind the beans. The cloth kept the rock from going right through the baggie and getting ground beans everywhere. My ‘primitive’ grinder worked perfectly!

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So I Finally Had a Shrimp Burger at Tony’s…

Today was another very full day! I got my work done ahead of the deadline and waited for my client to confirm that he had received it, which he normally does promptly. Half an hour later, I got an email asking where the work was. I had successfully sent it, so I went to downdetector.com and learned that Gmail was having serious issues. So nothing I could do about it other than slip the job into a shared FTP folder on my server, Skype my client to let him know where to find the file, and to wish him luck with his email issues.

The not fun part of the day done, I had a late breakfast and then greeted Janet around 10:30. It was just the two of us again today for riding, but we didn’t go out on our own. Daniel was in a feisty mood, with today’s Spanish lesson being fall of naughty words! That Monday morning hour and a bit is so special and magical. As if riding on a beautiful tropical beach wasn’t enough, we get the linguistic lesson thrown in as a bonus. I really treasure my Monday morning ride.

I got in around 12:30 and put together a few things so I could run a very specific errand in town. First stop on the other side was lunch! I’ve been hearing so much about the shrimp burger at Tony’s in the mercado from several unrelated sources, including Chris and Juan, that it was time to have it even if the last thing I needed after all that holiday food was a burger!

This is what I got for $60:

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I like how they avoid having to wash dishes…

It’s pretty clear from the picture that the burger is all about the bun. There were barely any shrimp (related, I’m sure, to the shrimp fishermen having a hard time this winter), but what was there was perfectly grilled and fresh, so points for that! There was also lettuce, tomato, and crema. I found that it was missing something and I was about halfway through when I realised that all reports of the shrimp burger had it with avocado on top. What was there was delicious. I like how the bread was toasted and there were definitely some spices or seasoning, plus the veggies were very fresh. I’ll have to try again on a day when Tony himself is cooking because while it was good, I was underwhelmed after all the hype.

Next stops were the two Parisinas (fabric stores) near the Mercado. One has more fabric, the other has more notions. I was looking for fabric for head scarves. I was a bit disappointed by the selection of fabric at hand, not finding any stretchy cotton, only polyester, but I came out with enough satisfactory material for eight scarves for just $120 between the two stores. I’ll have three in solid colours and five with patterns.

I was carrying a rather heavy bag with a scarf pattern; sample scarf; and two dresses, one of which I was hoping I could add to my order (hemming and straps) and the other being the model, so I didn’t do any other shopping and instead headed straight for the seamstress. It’s not my fault that my favourite nieve de garrafa vendor was on that route… 🙂 I haven’t been there much this year and I was still recognised! The owner told his helper to give me two scoops of prune and one each of my two other choices even before I had ordered! So that was four scoops for the price of three. They are small! Four scoops is less than a standard scoop of ice cream, and not nearly as rich since there’s no cream in them. I sat on a bench in the Plazuela Machado for a break to eat my treat.

From there, it was a few blocks to the Costura Express on Carnaval. The lady I had spoken to last week wasn’t there, but her sister was. Between my Spanish and her limited English, we figured out what I wanted and she even called her sister to confirm my order and find out if she could do the dress, too. Yes, for $80, which puts that dress at the same price I would have paid if I had bought it finished. Perfect! I really understood their conversation, including where she bargained the dress price down for me since I had the fabric for the straps. I will get to pick up my order on Saturday! I’m so excited since I’ve been wearing the same three scarves for ages. The new scarves will be $70 each, plus $15 each for the fabric, for a total of $85 each, 5USD at the current exchange rate. I paid 30USD each for my current scarves! It will be nice to have that dress finished, too. I’ve worn it strapless around Isla, but it’s way too casual to wear into Maz.

I then headed back to the mercado to pick up some fruits and veggies, stopping at a few vendors until I got most of what I wanted. I was ready to drop by this point, but still stopped in at the Ley on Melchor Ocampo, which has been totally revamped! I got some more fruits and veggies (half each of a cabbage and pineapple) and meat.

Thankfully, my friend Sue was on the lancha coming home, so we were able to walk a good part of the way home together, giving me something besides my exhaustion and heavy bags to focus on! 🙂 I got in, had a break, then made a ginormous veggie and beef stir fry for dinner. I really like how the beef is sold in such thin strips here since it marinates in no time. I just threw it in a bowl for about 20 minutes with a minced clove of garlic, the juice of two (tiny) limes, soy sauce, and sushi vinegar and it came out so tender and flavourful!

No map of my day, sorry, since Google Maps aren’t cooperating. It was about a 5KM excursion.

Now, time to unwind so I can get to bed on time and be up and at ’em for 5:30. It is going to be a tough day tomorrow because there will be no power on the whole Isla after a transformer blew up in the Colonia yesterday (a guy who lives two doors from where that happened told me all about that on the lancha coming home). Needless to say, I’m worried about work. Hopefully, TelCel will work well enough for me to get through my day. I am also going to try plugging my modem into my inverter to see if my TelMex connection could work that way (the only reason it would be down, I’m told, is for lack of power, so…). My truck battery has a full charge, so I’ll have enough power, even if I have to charge my laptop for a bit. There’s no sense fretting about this until power actually goes down tomorrow. I’ve been told the outage will officially be 6AM to 2PM (my entire shift!), but that, in fact, it shouldn’t take more than three to four hours. We shall see!

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What a Week!

Let’s see if I can recap the last week… I ended up taking a lot more work than I had planned for the week because it was from a good client I’ve been saying no to a lot lately and then I had a bunch of social engagements!

Tuesday started with my landlady’s mother and the handyman coming over to work on my lack of hot water and water pressure issues. She said that they guy who did the plumbing for the house completely messed it up and they really need to start over. They lifted up the tinaco (rooftop water tank) and that helped a bit with the pressure issue. But hot water will continue to be hit or miss until they can upgrade me from the crappy ancient water heater to an on-demand one that will be installed in my shower. While they were there, I asked if they could lift up my clothesline since it had gotten slack and my sheets were almost touching the ground. Not a problem and they put it up almost too high, knowing that after a few loads, it’ll get slack again and come back down a bit. So many of my friends here with Mexican landlords complain about how slow things are to get done, but I have no problems and am thoroughly spoiled!

Shortly after they left, Wandering Mike arrived. I settled him into his suite and then went back to typing because we were going out to dinner at Miguel’s with Contessa and Colin at Miguel’s around 6PM. I didn’t know what I wanted, so I opted for both a chorreada and a shrimp burrito, and I tried their limonada for the first time. It was, of course, a good meal. We’re lucky to have Miguel’s!

Wednesday started off badly. I was really over scheduled with work and the internet kept going down in the first hour of my day (6AM to 7AM). I couldn’t even get data on my phone to send and receive emails, and even if I could have, I had too much transcription to do to spend the day sitting in my truck waiting on emails! Thankfully, the issue resolved itself and I was able to work the rest of the day without any more problems. I had two Skype calls, one to a client and one to my mother. It’s nice that the internet here is good enough that I can video Skype!

Part of the reason that work was so overwhelming that day was that I was meeting a bunch of friends on the beach for a late lunch, including L&N, whom I hadn’t seen since I arrived. I got there around 2:00 and was back home by 4:00. It was a coconut shrimp and coco (chilled green coconut with the top lopped off so you can drink the water inside) kind of day! I don’t really like the restaurant we met at, El Velero, but this was the best meal I ever had there.

I paid for my lunch with having to type until past 9PM. I did something like a 13-hour actual day of work (plus the break). I can’t believe that used to be a normal work day for me.

Thursday started off fun. I didn’t have a proofing shift, so I went to town with Mike to get a cake at Panamá’s for Christmas dinner. We took a pulmonía from the embarcadero (a real treat!), got the cake, and came right back. It was just over an hour door-to-door to run the errand. I then had to do a small job and then I got to work preparing an appetizer for happy hour at Contessa’s (guacamole).

Mike and I headed over to the RV park around 4:00 and met up with Chris and Juan. Happy hour is meant to be just that, but it always runs late and there’s enough food for it to be a meal!

I got a late start on Friday and headed down to the City Deli to pick up some crema (sour cream) for one of the dishes I was making for dinner as well as beer.

Most of the day involved cooking. I put together scalloped potatoes in Contessa’s crockpot liner and then brought it over to her place to cook all day. Then, I came back and got a ham cooking for the meat eaters at dinner. Even though it was a small ham, it was way too much and I have a pile of leftovers to fill the freezer with, and this is after giving away as much as I could!

Dinner was great, with everyone bringing a dish or two. We all ate our fill and there was tons left! We sat around till about 9:00 gabbing and having drinks and coffee.

Saturday was pretty much a write-off. I was up shockingly late, nearly 11!!! I was just exhausted and stayed in. I wouldn’t have gone out at all, but Contessa organized a blogger convention thing for 5:00. So I headed out around 4:30 for a long walk around the Isla and then met up with the gang at Lety’s restaurant on the beach. Service was slow and the other blogger joining us was super late showing up, so we would have been better off going to dinner in town. But I had a wonderful meal even if some of the others didn’t feel that way. Their shrimp quesadillas never disappoint and, this time, they came with a side of really good guacamole! I also treated myself to a piña colada!

Sunday was chilly. I was working yet again, so I only took a break midafternoon for a beach walk. There was an impromptu happy hour in the late afternoon and then Mike and I went to Miguel’s for dinner, where I had their steak platter (orden de carne asada) for the first time. Very good and surprisingly inexpensive!

Which brings us to today. Mike left early to catch the Baja Ferry and I finished up a small job this morning. I’ll be heading out to ride soon and then I’m going into town.

WHEW. I’m all social engagemented out and don’t plan to do anything for New Years! But it was a fun week and it was nice to spend time with everyone.

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A Very Special Ride

It was just Janet and me to ride today and Daniel decided to let us go out on our own!!! He must have told me, “¡No caiga y no te mates!” about ten times to me before we went out. That means, don’t fall and don’t kill yourself! LOL!!! Janet didn’t get that warning since she had her own horse for twenty years!

We had a lovely time riding along the beach, just chatting and taking a break from our Monday Spanish lessons. 🙂 It was a pretty cool (by Maz standards) and overcast day. The horses were feeling lazy since Daniel wasn’t there and so we only got in two short canters.

When we got in, Daniel had us dismount, then changed his mind and asked us to take the horses to a place on the beach where he ties them up. So we got back on, happy our ride wasn’t quite over.

Then, Janet came back to my place to get her things. I needed to go to town, so I asked her to wait while I changed so I could take the (expensive) lancha over with her. On the way, we ran into Sue, who is waiting for internet installation, hence why she didn’t go out with  us. I got a tour of her newly renovated one-bedroom suite. It’s really lovely, with impeccable decor.

I was going to grab a bus right at the embarcadero, but Janet suggested she show me where her seamstress is since I’d asked about her. The lady spoke good English and I had her examine one of my headscarves to see if she could make me some if I provide her with a pattern (which I have) and fabric. Yes, and for only $70 each! I am going to raid Parisina next week and hopefully get enough fabric for ten scarves!

Then, Janet offered me a tour of her house! She lives in Playa Sur, a suburban neighbourhood. The house she and Grant are renting is huge and rather close to what I’m hoping to find in Mérida, with white walls and lots of dark wood, as well as an interesting floor plan. I was impressed.

(Their dog remembered me!)

It was almost 2:00 by this point and I really needed to get going since I was going all the way up to Rico’s for coffee and then on to Soriana to get holiday meal things. Conveniently enough, the bus I needed was coming up Miguel Alemán as I reached it and I successfully waved it down! That saved me quite a bit of walking because I expected to have to walk to the Mercado to grab it!

It was a long bus ride, but since I got on so early in the route, I had a window seat. I timed my getting off chime almost perfectly and got off just three or four businesses before Rico’s.

Thankfully, they had Veracruz this time! As she was ringing me up, the cashier complimented me on my piercing (which was lovely of her!) and asked me where I got it done. Not in Maz, sorry! 😀

Then, it was time to make a decision. Even though I hadn’t really eaten yet today, I didn’t really have much of an appetite so I thought of getting back on a bus to go to Soriana. But it was so cool and overcast that it seemed a waste not to get some exercise out of this weather, so off I went, promising myself an ice cream if I did so!

Well, I passed Ta’Loco and decided that I was peckish enough for a couple of tacos. I fell into the plate of cucumbers with salsas and found my missing appetite! The meal was exactly what I needed, not too heavy, healthy, and super cheap, only $37 with the tip!

I still had room for that ice cream, of course, so I went to Thrifty’s and decided to try their amaretto ice cream, which had cherries, nuts, some sort of cakey bits, and, of course, almond flavour. Dang!

By the time I made it to Soriana, I was pretty tuckered out and hoped that I’d find what I needed there, otherwise I would have had to double back to Mega. I went to the deli counter first and looked at the hams, finding one for a full $200 less than at Mega. We’ll see how it tastes! I also bought cloves and dark beer to cook it with, but struck out on molasses. The beer was funny. I wanted just a single bottle or can and ended up picking up this imported beer bottle from Germany with a label written in German only! I can very barely sort of fake my way through reading German and the absurdity of wishing there was a Spanish translation was not lost on me!

I then picked up a few more odds and ends that I needed and was beyond ready to call it a day. Of course, this meant that taxis were severely lacking. I must have waited fifteen minutes for one, and, yes, I crossed the Soriana parking lot to flag one down on Rafael Buelna!

Here’s some of the change I got at Soriana. At the top, a $10 coin, as I’m used to seeing them. Below, a brand new shiny $10 coin. I like how they mellow in their old age!

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For Ed, here is a map of my day:

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There was activity at the house as I pulled in with my taxi since Wandering Mike is coming to stay in the little suite for the week and my landlady’s mother was getting it ready. This means no loud parties over Navidad, yay! I can’t imagine wanting to stay in that suite super long term like the nut did last year, but it’s awesome for a week or so since you get a kitchen in addition to the bedroom and bathroom for much less than the price of a hotel room.

I took the opportunity to politely complain about my lack of hot water situation. I didn’t really notice that the water heater wasn’t working well when it was super hot out, but now that it’s chilly in the evenings, I do. My landlady is going to have a ‘suicide head’ (I think that’s what the Gringos here call them), an electrical on demand water heater, installed shortly. I hate to make a fuss and I understand that wanting hot running water is a Gringo thing, but a hot shower is the ultimate residential luxury to me. I could have dirt floors and no glass in the windows, but if I have unlimited hot water, I’m happy!

After hearing Sue and other renters complain about how slowly things get done at their places, I’m once again grateful to be here in my ugly bunker of a house. My landlady is great about getting stuff done. Even though I said that I don’t need this problem fixed this week, it very likely will be!

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Stares

Back in 2002, I moved to a small insular community in the Gatineau Hills. A few weeks after taking possession of the basement apartment I’d live in for a year, I went to the casse-croûte down the hill a couple of blocks from my place to grab some dinner. The place was jam packed and when I came in, all heads turned to the door, hostile eyes boring into me. I sat down and ordered a meal, hearing chatter about me from all corners of the restaurant. It was rude and unpleasant talk, full of assumptions. This was not the small town life I had hoped to find. Needless to say, the experience has stayed with me!

I was reminded of it tonight, only this time, the ending is a lot happier!

I ran into Patti the other day and she rebuked me for not having come for a meal at her place in a while. The only reason is that I favour takeout when I grab a meal on Isla (unless I’m doing a vacationy meal on the beach) and her meals are dine-in only. But I promised that I would stop in this weekend. Going for brunch didn’t pan out, so that meant dinner there tonight.

When I came in, I was surprised to find her dining room packed to the rafters! Now, it’s a small room, so we’re only talking about six or seven people. They all turned and stared at me like they had never seen a Canadian before. The looks weren’t hostile, nor were they curious. They were surprised.

Thankfully, Patti came out of the kitchen very quickly and told me to grab the last empty chair. I plonked myself in it and asked for enchiladas. The other diners took one last look at me and turned back to their meals and their chatter, which had nothing to do with me. I settled in to wait for my food and watch a very interesting documentary on National Geographic about Air France flight 447. Even with the lack of subtitles and the chatter around me, I was able to understand more than enough to follow the riveting narrative.

My meal came out quickly and was delicious, no surprise there! I took my time and even finished the entire cup of caldo since there was quite a bit of crema and the two mixed together are just plain delicious. Cost of the meal, including a tip for her daughter, was just $50 (4CAD or 3USD).

Sometimes folks talk to me when I go to Patti’s, but not tonight; they were wrapped up in their own discussions. That suited me just fine. I wasn’t in much of a chatty mood and was happy to just watch TV and eat my food.

Patti is starting to jazz up her restaurant a bit. She has really cleaned up her entrance and added lights to make the place more evident at night. The dining room is as it always has been, just a bare concrete room with plastic tables, but she added a ton of Christmas decorations in the last couple of weeks, making the place quite cozy. It’s not five-star dining, but it’s not meant to be. I know I can count on her to serve me an inexpensive and delicious home-cooked meal, and sometimes, that’s all I want. I feel like the guardian of one of Isla’s best-kept secrets and am not sure I want Patti’s regulars getting used to seeing Gringos! 🙂