(It’s July 2023 and I’m backdating a post for each month that I have not blogged.)

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June was a bit of a write-off. I worked six weeks in three weeks in May, so I just wanted to chill with my girls and get caught up on my fun reading.

I’m still going to the dentist regularly, Dr. Javier wanting to perfect my bite. One of those visits coincided with a day off so I decided to go to Altabrisa mall across the street and treat myself to a mani-pedi if anyone was available. I can’t remember the last time I did that!

I don’t remember why I picked a food court lunch, but I probably just wanted tacos and those from La Parilla are as delicious as they are beautiful!

cucumber lemonade in the background

I’m still working on sorting out my kitchen and it was time to tackle the freezer. I wanted some plastic containers for my most-used items as bags just get lost and often open. So I searched for a Tupperware rep in my neighbourhood, got a catalogue, and found what I needed, and on sale to boot. It took a few weeks to get my order, but it was worth it.

What a thing of beauty. I can find everything and I “shop” from the deep freeze.

A huge treat most evenings is to go up to my air-conditioned room around 9PM and read a few chapters of a novel. I’m currently working through the C.B. Strike detective series by “Robert Galbraith” (actually JK Rowling). Here I am on page 100ish of 650ish. It’s been about two months since that photo and I’ve finished that book, read the 1000-page next book in the series, and am 200 pages into the book after that. It’s true that the only way to eat an elephant is a bite at a time!

I had a day off with only some PDF work to do and no Pilates, so I went for a long bike ride, then ended up at Ritrovo for brunch and to do my PDF job.

My bike was wobbly and the brakes almost non-working, so after eating I dropped it off at the shop for some much needed maintenance after all the kilometres I put on it! I’m so grateful that I can bike again! The bike shop owner would, at pickup later that day, inform me that my rims were bent, my brakes were completely shot, and my handlebars were unaligned! He was going to ask where I’d been biking and then remembered where we live! LOL The cost of the maintenance was only 100 pesos.

In addition to biking and Pilates, I’ve been doing some virtual The Conqueror walks to keep me motivated. My big project is walking virtually from Lands End, at the very south of England, to John O’Groats in Scotland (am currently between Coventry and Leicester just east of Birmingham), but I’ve done a couple of shorter walks that have earned me surprisingly beautiful and hefty medals. Here’s the one I got for virtually walking from Tulum to Chichén Itzá.

I wish I could say I do a good workout every single day, but even though I don’t I’m happy with my daily average over these past six months!

Here I am at the dentist yet again at the end of the month receiving yet another new retainer! I don’t pay for these and I pretty much only pay for every other visit, so it’s not like I’m being bilked out extra money for my orthodontic treatment! I was amused that my current colour obsessions are pink, purple, and turquoise and he found me a turquoise box to follow the purple one.

Finally, Xtiga is really coming out of her shell and is the only one of the girls to ask for my lap when I’m working, a rare treat, but it does happen sometimes. Here I am teaching her how to type. 😉

(It’s July 2023 and I’m backdating a post for each month that I have not blogged, so scroll down to get the other three posts I did yesterday.)

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The most significant thing to note about this month is that on May 5th, 2023, WHO officially declared the end of the pandemic, exactly 1150 days after the world shut down. For me, it was a year too soon (sorry!), as I’ve got that itch to get going again, but am not in a good place to do so. But it has definitely had me thinking about what my post-pandemic, house payments becoming manageable, high income life is going to look like. I feel like I entered the pandemic still a young woman and emerged middle aged, realising that the adventures and concessions of youth are behind me and that when I venture back into the world, it will be with the expectations of doing so with adult responsibilities and the spectre of retirement and aging ahead of me.

May was an absolutely insane work month, even by the standards of the last couple of years. I earned six weeks of income in three weeks. I was only able to keep up the pace because I stuck to my Pilates routine, made an effort at meal planning, and have a wonderful cleaning fairy who comes twice a week now to do all the daily cleaning, change sheets (such a luxury), and perform other small household tasks like fold and put away laundry. Our society’s standards were built at a time when one person in the household made money for the entire household while someone else kept things running smoothly, so the criticisms I get sometimes that I should be able to do everything alone or that I’m lazy for not being able to do so are as hilarious as they are outrageous. Having that help on the little things helps me stay on top of the big things.

A highlight in May was returning to the Van Gogh exhibit as my Pilates partner got free tickets to the full VIP experience. This included my first experience with virtual reality, which was incredible. I was sat on a stool and felt like I was moving through a fully realised three-dimensional world. I would love something like that for my home gym. Can you imagine a simulation like that combined with a treadmill? There aren’t really any places to go for long walks in nature around Mérida, plus the heat and sun can be dangerous, so the virtual option sounds great.

After Van Gogh, we had giant beers and dinner at La Negrita cantina. I had to bow out after the music started as it was much too loud and I need to protect my hearing.

May is when I decided to change direction regarding finishing the kitchen. The case is ongoing so I don’t think it’s a good idea to talk too much about it right now, but let’s just say that I did a lot of sleuthing in these first few months of 2023 and built an iron-clad case for myself, including locating parties who tried to disappear and as well as witnesses. I was hoping to actually finish work in the kitchen in June, but it’s still at a standstill in July. I did spend some time in May organising the fridge and freezer, decluttering, making usable the under counter space where the garrafones used to lived, but, frankly, the kitchen is a bit of a nightmare for lack of meaningful storage space and I really hope to get this nonsense sorted out by the end of the year.

Found a picture of the final touch of the bathroom update! This tile was the closest match we could find. If you saw the other patches in that room, you’d be as satisified as I am! Don’t mind the dirty sink — we hadn’t cleaned up yet. I thought a black sink would be a nightmare to keep looking nice, but between a wipedown every time I use it, which I do with a white sink as well, and my cleaning fairy, it always looks great. 🙂

My gardener/maintenance guy is now coming twice a month when he can, which is fantastic as he spends one day on maintenance and cleaning and the other on gardening. Now that the property is finally cleaned up from all the kitchen mess, having him here twice a month really makes a difference. I was looking for him one day and found him literally in one of my cedars, which inspired a joke by a friend that I had to turn into a meme!

(It’s July 2023 and I’m backdating a post for each month that I have not blogged, so scroll down to get the other two posts I did tonight.)

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Honestly, there was nearly nothing of note in April. Work this year has been firmly 200% busy or 0% busy. I’m grateful for the steady income, but have to say that I’m looking forward to refinancing the house to lower my monthly payments so I can start working more humane hours!

I went through the pictures I took from April and it’s all cooking, cats, and memes complaining about the heat, which has been the worst this year since the start of recorded history, absolutely relentless. We didn’t get a winter this past year, four to six months of low to no humidity, so it’s been pretty intolerable.

I did have a leak in the bathroom upstairs, so I had to replace the year-old sink cabinet. Let’s just say that while that contractor did a lot of good work for me, I’m starting to see problems with the plumbing and electrical work his contractors did for me and so I think I’ve moved on to my new guy.

My new guy suggested that he just make me a bare concrete counter since I still had a ton of material left over from the kitchen reno (which, a full year on, is not over, so you can look forward to an update about that!). I loved the idea of having a counter spanning the width of the room, so I told him to go ahead.

The job didn’t actually get finished until late May, a full month later, but the space was usable in the first few days of May. I was just missing those two tiles and it took a while to find ones that would kind of match. The black sink was a complete surprise. My contractor buys materials and then I reimburse him. He saw it, thought it would look good (he clearly likes black, based on the kitchen), and figured he could get a refund if I hated it. If he had told me he found a black sink, it would have been a definite no. But I could not imagine one with a matte finish like this and I love it! The new space, including the faucet, is an absolute dream and I’m delighted with the upgrade. The old sink cabinet did not go to waste, nor did the rest of the construction materials. My cleaning fairy wanted it all, so I paid the $500 for a flete to come haul it all away for her.

Another water-related upgrade happened in April, one that was a long time coming — a reverse osmosis filtering system so that I could drink my tap water and stop relying on garrafones! I’d seen the ads for Bebbia on Facebook for ages. They are a subdivision of Rotoplas, the folks who make tinacos. I asked around and found lots of people who have used Bebbia for years and are happy with the service, so I signed up. All you pay is a monthly fee and the equipment, installation, and maintenance are included. I currently pay about $250 per month and that’ll go up to $350, barely more than I was paying for garrafones without any of the hassle!

I met all the installation criteria, so it was a very quick and clean installation. I was a bit nervous about making a hole in my new sink, but it was worth it!

I’m a little frustrated there’s no cover on the filter system itself. I can’t see it behind everything I have in front of it, but I bet it’s dusty back there. Oh, well, it’s their problem!

The water tastes great. I’ve been washing my produce and rinsing rice with tap water for years as it would be too much garrafon water to do so, so I appreciate unlimited drinking water at the tap now. The unit has its own pump, so filling a water jug or ice cube tray is so quick and convenient now. I also regained a ton of space under the counters. My first maintenance is due in October, so we’ll see how “after sale” service is.

(It’s July 2023 and I’m backdating a post for each month that I have not blogged, so scroll down to get more new content. This is the second of three posts for tonight.)

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March was a busy work month, so this one’s mostly full of cat pictures. But the first thing I’ll note is that mid-month, I had the roof done properly with a seven-year coating. Writing this after a big afternoon thunderstorm in the rainy season makes me really glad I did!

As for my girls, they really started to get integrated in March. Xtiga is still working on it at time of writing in July, content to spend most of her time in her room, but she sometimes likes to come say hi and join me on the couch for a movie. Dodger is a fully fledged member of the household now and she and Alma get along great. They both like to come up to my bedroom door in the morning and sing the song of their people while Xtiga waits patiently for her treats. They’re wonderful company and I’m so happy they are here.

Mexican standoff. I swear this is where they came to some sort of an understanding because now they are inseparable.

Xtiga, like Alma, loves climbing the bookcase in the guest room. I don’t see Alma in there much now. It seems that she and Xtiga have delineated their territories very clearly while Dodger and Alma share spaces. Dodger is of course allowed in the guest room to hang out as the two sisters are still quite close.

Xtiga is my only proper “lap cat.”

In March, I picked up my knitting needles and started to make hats and scarves for charity. Unfortunately, I’m suffering from carpal tunnel syndrome, so I have to be careful how much repetitive work I do, especially with all my time at the computer. So while I’ve had a steady production, it’s not as voluminous as I’d hoped for.

End of March, I had quite a treat, a chance to go to the travelling Van Gogh exhibition. I somehow missed out on the VIP 3D experience, but, spoiler, I had a chance go again in May. 🙂 We all know how much I love Van Gogh’s works!

As another birthday present to myself, I asked my handy guy to install a rooftop pump for my water system to give me pressure in the house. I haven’t really appreciate it much in the shower, to my surprise, but it’s been routine-changing in the kitchen to always have a strong steady stream of water rather than a trickle, plus it makes the hot water come immediately rather than after a few minutes. It also makes a load of laundry take nearly half the time! This was a great addition to the house, even if it’s one more thing in the finicky water system to maintain. Spoiler, it stopped working in June, after just three months, but I suspected it was gunked up with sarro (limescale) and was right. My handyman came over the day after I reported the issue and he had it resolved in five minutes. So I expect more problems in September!

(Five months without blogging has got to be a record for me. It’s now the start of July and I’m going to do a highlights post for each of those months to bring everyone up to speed and then get to work finishing those last 20-something posts. I’ll backdate each of these posts to the last day of their respective months.)

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In February, I found my “spots,” Tropico 56 and the rooftop bar, both at the Remate (at the bottom of the Paseo, near Santa Ana). I discovered these gems with my Pilates partner and we’ve since been several times, eating at Tropico and then heading to the rooftop for a nightcap.

Ceviche and mezcal cocktails at Tropico 56.

Tacos and more mezcal cocktails.

Yet more mezcal cocktails at the Remate rooftop.

Remate bar seen from in front of Café Impala.

I took a whole Tuesday off to go to Progreso with my friend. We got a table at Eladio’s and drank all day. The free botanas kept coming, starting off with boring chips and salsa and escalating to some of the best tacos I’ve had here. It was Carnaval, so nearly impossible to get to and from Progreso by bus, so we split an Uber there and a regular taxi back, which was very affordable for us. I believe the Uber was $300 with tip, so $150 each, and the taxi was $650, so $325 each (all prices in pesos, of course, because I live in Mexico!).

Everyone was dressed up as it was Carnaval. I recognised this popular TV character even if I don’t remember his name!

We couldn’t believe this bill considering we had been there for eight hours. All the food was included!

Something truly magical happened at the end of February. The author of one of my favourite books, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, John Berendt, was staying Mérida and Juanita, owner of the English bookstore Between the Lines arranged an exclusive reading and book signing on a first come, first served basis. It was such a delight to meet Mr. Berendt, hear him read some of his books, and, of course, get answers to questions. MITGOGAE served as my tour guide of Savannah and to that he said “That’s what every author wants to hear.” A class act. 🙂