(Post 149 of 263)

Right about this very minutes marks the four-year anniversary of Bonita arriving and my house becoming a home.

As a reminder, this was the skinny, very ill, and terrified Bonita who arrived:

And this is healthy and happy Bonita this morning captured when we were playing:

Bonita has milestones almost daily. Just the other day, she did a really “dog thing” that I’ve never had to worry about her doing — she snatched some food out of my hand! She’s gone from a dog whom I could have a hamburger next to while sitting on the couch to her stealing my pan dulce as we’re watching a movie!

Other “dog things” she now does include digging up the yard, barking at trespassers, getting up on furniture she knows she’s not supposed to climb on, and begging for treats.

Bonita loves cheese (and she has expensive tastes, favouring smokey provolone), digging, supervising and “helping” my gardener, playing tag, giving me tongue baths, her blankie, being rubbed behind the ears, and any treat in the shape of a stick.

Bonita does not like loud noises and sudden movements, strange men (but it’s easy for good men to win her favour, as the renovation and painting crews learned), any fruits and vegetables, mommy leaving the property for insomuch as 10 minutes, and being cold (you should see her grab her blankie before bed on cold nights!).

Evolución, the refuge from which I adopted Bonita, has always kept tabs on her. They do such good work. I just saw a post that two of their dogs are headed to Canada. If you want to support a worthwhile cause, please consider donating to them through this PayPal link: https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/EVOANIMAL All the money goes to feeding and taking care of the dogs and paying staff salaries. I sent them $2,000 pesos (about $100USD) today and that is enough to feed 12 dogs for a full month, so, really, even a token donation can go far here.

I love this old girl so much and am rather glad the pandemic came and forced me to spend these golden years here with her.

(Post 148 of 263)

Last October, I opened a bank account with BBVA after losing all faith in ever having reliable service from HSBC. I was told that in about six months, I could apply for a credit card to finally start building a credit history here and that in a further six months, with some credit history behind me, we could look into getting the house mortgage refinanced in my name. So I made a reminder to check back in in April.

Last week, my account manager called to say that he’d had a look at my file and I was locally preapproved for a credit card! If I wanted to come into the office before March 1st, we could do all the paperwork to get the application sent off for head office approval because for a foreigner/resident, local approval wasn’t enough. I told him I’d be in this week.

Yesterday, he called again to check in! I knew that I’d be able to go this afternoon, so we made an appointment.

What felt like a couple dozen signatures and two hours later, I had my card!

I’ve had some technological hiccups and issues with BBVA, but knowing that there are actual humans who keep their promises working there is making me feel more secure than I did at HSBC.

My initial credit limit was surprisingly high, a full quarter of my average monthly income and about a third of the income BBVA sees.

Some of the benefits I now have with a credit card:

• I’m building a credit history to eventually get other loan products
• I can earn points on all my purchases to be spent on future purchases
• I can take advantage of “months without interest” promotions

The big caveat with Mexican credit cards is that, well, they’re not credit cards, at least not in the way Canadians and Americans (and possibly Europeans) think of them. They have insanely high interest rates. Mine is over 90% (!). Mexican credit cards are meant to be used like a charge card, think Amex, where you have to pay off your balance in full every month. They also work a bit like a line of credit in that you can finance purchases using the aforementioned “months without interest” promotions. Once the purchase is paid off, you still have access to that original credit amount, unlike if you’d had a personal loan. They can be a very powerful tool if used properly and I get frustrated when expats just scream about what a “rip-off” Mexican cards are without taking the time to educate themselves.

I’m very happy with this new development and hope that the mortgage plans will happen because that could decrease my current monthly payments while speeding up the timeline to the house being transferred in my name. And, who knows, maybe a car loan is in my future?

(Post 147 of 263.)

(Post 146 of 263.)

(Post 145 of 263. Thanks again to those who participated in the Fundrazr. As I mentioned in the post announcing Bast’s passing from COVID, I thank everyone for your generous donations to the original Fundrazr campaign, which resulted in sponsored 263 posts. I will continue to honour the commitment to write those 263 posts, but I will not commit to more. The link above is to a new campaign to help Bast’s family.)

I was really blessed this holiday season with some very generous gifts from a few of my clients. I was able to clear both my Amazon US and Amazon MX wishlists of things I would never have otherwise bought for myself, and I still had enough left over for a Home Depot run this morning. I’m tired of not having tools and relying on workers for everything. I’m done mourning the workshop I left behind in Canada and ready to start anew here. Most pressing was getting over my fear of concrete walls so that I could learn to hang pictures properly!

My budget today was fairly generous, $7,500, and I put everything on my list in my cart except a saw as I don’t have a project yet that will help me decide if a jigsaw or mitre saw is more pressing. I added a few extras.

I was a bit stunned that my total came to $7,800 after I added in the extended warranty for my tools. I would have been right at budget without it.

I’ve been wanting mats like these to put outside the kitchen door to the service corridor and the laundry room door for AGES. Those are low spots where water collects and the sun doesn’t hit, so they take a while to dry. I tend to be barefoot all the time and it’ll be nice to not step into gross puddles after rainfall!

Here is my entire haul, minus the mats. Good thing I like orange and lime green — must be because I was born in the ‘70s!

First project was to use my new sander on two of the three doors of the master suite — that of the bathroom and closet, then apply a first coat of paint. Very messy and surprisingly a lot of effort. I’m so glad that this project is finally started. The paint is very plasticky and takes ages to dry in this climate, so I’ll do the second coat on Wednesday (Monday today). I am so glad I went with the dark grey to match the blinds and the headboard.

I then took out my new hybrid hammer/‘normal’ drill to hang a couple of pictures. Lots of folks told me a regular drill with a masonry bit would serve me just fine, but my mother, the expert in my life on all things tools, told me that unless the price was significantly different, I should consider a hybrid model. Turns out this unit was super affordable, only about $1,000, and it was also the only one to consider as it was the only corded model.

This past summer, my contractor made me buy a jumbo pack of picturing-hanging screws to use in the future. They come with the plastic anchor you need to screw into concrete. So I had their diametre, three-sixteenths, to guide me in buying a masonry bit. I was surprised by how hard it was to find a masonry bit — you’d think that would be the most popular option!

The drill and bit pierced my wall like it was butter. The anchor fit perfectly into the hole (with some gentle taps from my new hammer) and the screw was easy to screw in using one of my new screw drivers.

My laughing horse has a new home by the entrance:

And my flamingo moved to the stairwell as it is the first thing you see coming into the house and provides a transition from the exterior pink to the inside green.

I have to repair the frame on my calla lilies and then I’ll be rehanging that one above the sofa. I then have a few more pieces that need new homes… and huge expanses of walls that need new art!

By the way, the new green is… perfect. My entire house feels like MY home now. 🙂