11/26/2017 First of all, I apologize for being MIA. My laptop died soon after my last post and we have been waiting ever since for the new fan. It finally arrived on Wed and Bill installed it a few days later and it works. He also put in a new laptop keyboard but the space bar isn’t working. Damn. Bill just discovered the space bar only works if you hit it right in the middle, either end doesn’t work. Nice..And a lot of the letters don’t work. I sent Amazon a bitchmail telling them it was defective and it would cost me $50.00 to return it and they credited me the money. Bill bought me a keyboard at Technos for 170 L, about $7.00. It’s kind of psychedelic.
I was sick when I returned from my class reunion but once I saw the ENT @ Clinica Esperanza and got the right meds, I was better in two days. I felt great for about a week and then the rains began here. It rained so much and for so long that I became a hermit and didn’t go anywhere unless I absolutely had to. One night I woke in the middle of the night, all stuffed up, figured it was an allergy. After a few nights of that and Benadryl not working I got some Zyrtec, thinking that would do the trick. Nope, didn’t work either. I started on Nyquil before bed and again when I woke at 2 AM unable to breathe. Nyquil works but only for a few hours. I was going through boxes of Kleenex like an alcoholic goes through cheap gin. I dealt with this for 5 weeks, I kept thinking I was getting better, only to feel worse the next day. I ended up going back to the same ENT as the last time. He said it was definitely allergies, probably to mold and mildew. Gee, I live in the jungle, it’s rained for 6 weeks and there is mold on my tshirts and my pocketbook straps. Nothing is sacred here. I bought 2 Damp Rids for the bedroom and in less than 10 days they are filled with water. Dampness is everywhere. Jungle life is not for everyone. The ENT Doc gave me the names of some nasal sprays, I bought 2 of them and some Claritin for about $40.00 and felt better immediately after using the nasal spray. It’s a flipping miracle. I am finally off the Nyquil and sleeping fabulously again.
We were without power for 12 hours one weekend. Our friend had a generator he wanted to sell so we decided to buy it. Bill and Miguel went to pick it up and brought it home to hook it up in the outside bodega. Bill got it all hooked up (by now we were with no power 15 hours, I was going stir crazy, enough that I played Yahtzee alone for a few hours and read a book in a day) and threw the switch. I was sitting on the front porch and the lights came on. Then they went off. I went into the foyer and smelled something electrical burning. I assumed it was just the generator getting started but the smell got stronger. Bill was back in the bodega and Miguel was out front with me. I told him I smelled something and he said lets go look. We came upstairs and the smell was awful, instant headache awful and there was smoke. I knew right away what it was. The surge protector under the island had caught fire.
It also fried our good Belkin surge protector. We don’t know why it did this, it may have been the plug on the generator or something else. It had previously been worked on by an islander and not saying it’s their fault but many times they really don’t know what they are doing but they won’t ever tell you that. We’ve decided against that generator and are going to get one but something smaller. We don’t need one that big, just enough for the fridge, the computers and a few lights.
All of the dogs are healthy, Gringos tail healed perfectly. They were thrilled when the sun came out and they could swim. I get so much enjoyment watching them have fun in the pool.
I have not done very much these past 6 weeks, Carmen and I did some shopping one day. A trip to Mega Paca and then Ace and Eldon’s grocery store. I picked Chuck and Nancy up when they came back to the island and the other day I had lunch with Jeanie and Nancy at Cal’s, he’s finally open! Yummy garlic laden caesar salad, I could eat it every day. Except, my breath, OMG. I could start campfires with it.
I started watching Stranger Things on Netflix a few months ago but kind of forgot about it. I saw all of my friends posting about it so I decided to start over and watch both seasons. I was hooked and totally binge watched it. Shortly after it was over I wanted Eggos, really bad, like craving them. I forgot them when I went to get groceries with Carmen. I asked Bill to get them, he either forgot or thought I was kidding and didn’t get them for me. I finally remembered to get them the next time I went to the store. I stared at the selection and ended up getting the plain ones. When I grabbed the box it felt damp. I knew right then they were going to be crap and they were. Disappointing Eggos, frozen and thawed so many times on their journey to Roatan. There was no softness to it, nor was there a crispness on the outside. It was like eating a cardboard plate with butter and syrup on it. I even tried to thaw them before I toasted them. Cardboard still. How disappointing. I frisbeed them over the bank into the jungle figuring some animal would love them. Next time I’ll try the local brand. UPDATE: I tried the local ones (ShurFine) and they are edible.
This past Friday I wanted to pressure wash. It’s one of my favorite things to do. Bill brought the pressure washer up on the concrete pool deck and I got to work. I love the way it cleans everything. The mold and mildew from all of the rain had turned the deck brown and green. The pressure washer returned it to its normal color. It’s just the coolest thing, until you hit your two little toes with it. It took the skin right off, nail polish too. It sort of bled but not a lot. I decided to finish where I was washing, then go dry it and stop the bleeding. I wiped the dirt out of it and went back out and pressure washed some more. Bill was not thrilled that I was doing it in flip flops to begin with nor did he see any intelligence in the fact that after I hurt myself I continued to use it in flip flops. At that point there was no way I could put a shoe on anyhow, my foot was too sore. 2500 PSI can do a number on your skin. I had no idea. I didn’t really clean it out, just rinsed it off in the shower before we went out to eat. I did smear some triple antibiotic cream on it.
That was the night we finally got our $hit together and made it out to dinner with the mid-island gang. Thank you Yvonne for not giving up on us. We all met at Cal’s, along with some friends I met a while ago after a FB friendship. There were 12 of us, it was a gorgeous night and the food was superb, as always. Nice to have a mix of people from our part of the island and a few from a bit further away.
The next day my foot was throbbing so I googled pressure washer injuries and read that if the pressure washer was over 100 PSI (mine was 2500 PSI) to seek medical help. At that point, I thought maybe some hydrogen peroxide would be a good idea. That stung like crazy. I then put some antibiotic creme and a bandage on it to keep it clean and started taking cephalexin in case it got infected. Then I talked to a friend who said to soak it in warm water, dry and bandage it, which I did. And another friend who is a nurse said to stop the ceph and only take it if it starts to look infected. I kept it covered for a week and it is fine, still very sore and bruised but not oozing any longer. My biggest issue was the dogs stepping on it, which happened two times before I learned to pick my foot up and stand on one leg while letting them in or out.
Bill always likes to have Thanksgiving at home so this year I invited Sam and Chelsie Arch and Daniel Johnson and his woman, Steph. Chelsie and Steph went to college together in the states and Sam and Daniel are cousins. I love these 4 so much. Sam’s family has the iguana farm and Daniel has the sloth and monkey hangout. I cooked a big turkey with filling, mashed potatoes and gravy and a variety of other stuff along with desserts. Unfortunately Sam has the flu and couldn’t make it which was really a bummer, he was missed. We had a good meal and stuffed ourselves. I didn’t even have room for dessert.
Bill and Marcos were at our friend Susan’s house doing some work and caught two more baby iguanas. They took them down to Arch’s Iguana farm. We have rescued a lot of them this year. There was a big one in the tree, the dogs spotted it. I came in to get my camera but idiot Highway and his barking scared it away.
On Saturday we had other friends over for pizza. Kevin and Claire live close to us and have one of our pups, Tank. We had dinner at their house last so it was our turn. I think we could sit and chat with these two for days on end, especially if there is wine! I had a headache this morning, I rarely drink more than a glass of wine at a time and I had 2 last night. Woke with a pounding headache this morning.
Remember the sign my friends’ husband made for me that said Warning Mermaids? Well, he made this awesome sign for me too. I’m going to hang them inside because I like them so much and don’t want them to get ruined by the weather. Thank you Gary!!
Today is a pivotal day for the country of Honduras and for the island. It’s election day. The President of Honduras is a very evil corrupt man. It is against the constitution for him to be running again but he changed the rules so he could. I pray he does not win. The island of Roatan is divided into 2 parts, each with their own mayor. We live in Santos Guardiola and our Mayor is a good man. He really tries his best to help the island, he has done work on schools, roads, many things to help the communities that make up SG. The other end of the island is run by a megalomaniac. He has wasted so much money traveling with his bunch of sheep to various places in the world looking for alternate energy sources. Our power company is owned and run by an extremely wealthy Texan. The idiot mayor from the west end has done everything in his power to harass the power company, instead of being smart and working with them. The mayor lost the election in his party so he has moved to a different party and is running again. He has done nothing for the schools, the roads on his end of the island are deplorable, the garbage is not picked up, the crime is bad and he is doing everything in his measly amount of power to ruin the island for tourism. He can not be re-elected. If the current president wins and the ridiculous excuse for a mayor is re-elected, we will really need to evaluate some things.
I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving, except for missing the boys and our families, ours was great.
Mermaid on a Raft 