Michael: Summer Preview

The warm breeze, sunshine
And dry air foreshadowed the
Coming of summer.

Wednesday, November 25, 2015

Yesterday was just a bright cheerful day all around. The first day without rain in quite a while and, on top of that, it was sunny and warm all day. What a mood lifter that was.

After our morning gym workout, we went to The Roundhouse, a newly re-opened restaurant next to the gym. And yes, it is round with large windows all around; very light and inviting. And they served as close to real pancakes as I’ve had in Panama with butter and syrup. They were about twice as thick as normal U.S. flapjacks, but they’ll suffice until I can get back to a Denny’s.

And it even got better than that when, on our walk to our cottage, we saw the cable repair guy working outside on fixing the net. That may only last until the next storm rolls through and takes something else out again, but we’re  thankful for now.

Kimme and I are both dependent on the net to keep in contact with family and friends, to read and study and for entertainment. There are no bookstores or libraries in Volcan. I’ve been reading books on my tablet from Sribd, so without the net, I’ve been thumbing through some pretty well worn material. And yes, it’s fun just to goof and browse and let your mind wander through the net once in a while.

I suppose I could find things to complain about without looking very hard, but tomorrow’s Thanksgiving, and I feel there’s a lot, both great and small to be thankful for, and I’m sure as hell thankful for yesterday.

Michael: Supernatural

The roadside hawk looks
Like a small eagle but acts
More like a vulture.

Tuesday, November 24, 2015

I am not a believer in the supernatural, but it is an odd coincidence that this morning is the first morning in months we’ve woken up to strong, Santa Ana like winds.

Odd because yesterday I expressed to Kimme the idea that maybe we shouldn’t look around for a place to live and just pin our hopes on being offered the land next to us. She didn’t think that was a wise idea for several reasons.

One being that next door is not a sure bet. Another is that we should see what else is out there, and finally…oooOOOOEEEEEEEeeeeoooooo…or however you indicate eerie music playing in the background, one of the main reasons we were going to look around is because it gets very windy here during January and February, and we’ve heard that just down the hill we could duck our heads out of the ghoulish Volcan winds.

Of course it’s going to take a lot more than the odd occurrence of a little wind to turn me into an occult worshipper, like if Kimme could stand by the internet receiver and make all 4 lights light up, then I might truly be astounded enough to feel there are other forces at play in this world beyond the realm of science. We’ve tried that and no such luck.

But I will make a few phone calls to look at other properties.

Michael: The Search Begins

Scavengers abound;
When life is in abundance
Dark wings will flourish.

Monday, November 23, 2015

We’ve just told a few people we’re looking for land and already we have a few interesting prospects.

One of the persons we told was a our landlord. She talked to her neighbor, a man from Spain, who is selling his house because he doesn’t have residency here in Panama so the National Bank is closing his account. He also has  homes in Chile and Florida, so he’s not hurting for places to live.

His two story house is simple, beautiful and spacious, but a little more than I’d like to pay and I have my heart set on designing my own home.

But the really exciting prospect that our landlord shared with us is that she’s going to talk to the owner of the finca who owns the land next to our cabin and see if he’d be willing to sell us that parcel. Originally, her partner was going to buy it, but he thought the asking price was a little too high. But he was dealing with a man that is much older now and doesn’t take much interest anymore in running the finca. He’s turned that responsibility over to his son, who may be more flexible in his asking price.

That would just about be ideal for us. The land’s only prominent feature is that it has a great view of the volcano, but it’s flat and is a good size for us at about 6,000 square feet. It would be the last house before the open pasture so our only immediate neighbor would be whomever our landlord rents our cabin to. And, of course, our landlord would only be two doors down.

We’re both keeping our fingers crossed that we’ll become our own neighbors for a while.

Michael: Slow Transition

Jack ass curls his lips,
Nods his head repeatedly
And brays his mantra.

Sunday, November 22, 2015

We are slowly transitioning from tourist mode to ex-pat status.

We’ve hit all the big tourists check off spots and to do’s in the highlands many times and finally we’re venturing out to places that you wouldn’t cram into a two week itinerary.

Like the small rural road to Finca La Guardia. It has no big tourists drawing points, but is a beautiful way to spend a couple of hours walking through some ranches and pastures typical of this area.

We also ate at a very small local restaurant off the main drag called Glady’s because we heard they serve pancakes. For under $4 we had two omelets, a tortilla, and something close to a pancake without syrup. No English was spoken and again it’s not a place we would’ve discovered on our own.

Now we’re being inundated with ideas for places to hike to and go spend some time at that we didn’t do in on our short tourist visit last year or so far in our extended stay this year. But we’re settling in and we’ll get there.

Michael: Friday's News

Take to the trails
Where the wild green spaces
Heightens your senses.

Saturday, November 21, 2015

Apparently all it took to weave ourselves through one of the mazes in the process of building a house in Panama was a phone call to the good old U.S. of A.

After talking to Rachelle, the T.S.A. loan officer, on Thursday and telling her live over the phone that I wanted to switch the terms from a 10 year loan to 5 years, it was a done deal. I say apparently because I can see the email confirmation header using my phone as a personal hotspot, but I can’t open any mail until either our net miraculously lights up again or I go to the internet café.

Another email header from Felipe of the Volcan Hiking Club is telling me there’s land for sale, but with a small house on it. Probably out of our range and we want to build fresh anyway. But we’ll see him today and hopefully get more information.

From yet another email header I can see that Matt at houseplans.com is wondering if I’m still interested in them creating blueprints for me. Yes, Matt I am. As soon as I can open up the email about the loan, I’ll get back to you.

Live and in person, on our way to the Friday Market we saw that a company called Iron City Park is just about ready to crank up an old fashioned amusement park. I don’t know what they call the rides in Spanish but there’s a roller coaster, tilt a world, merry mixer, scrambler, giant buccaneer swing, and a merry go round. I didn’t have my phone with me so I’ll have to go back to take pictures.

But there’s no way in hell you get me on any of those rides, not even the merry go round. It’s not that I don’t mind a good thrill now and then, but Iron City Park looks like it may have been operating in the states when I was a kid. I’ll just live off my memories, thank you.

At the market I ran into James the builder who advised me to talk to Marcos the attorney about our home building plans. I, Michael the runner, will do that soon enough.

But today, after our morning jaunt with the hiking club, it’s off to the internet café to see what’s behind some of these intriguing email headers.

Michael: The Accidental Racer

Feathery leaves crown
The ten foot tall slender stalk
Like a pharaoh’s fan.

Friday, November 20, 2015

For about 10 kilometers yesterday I was a professional bike racer.

It’s been one of my fantasies since Greg Lemond’s days to break away from the pack and lead a glorious solo charge up Alpe de Huez to victory. Although yesterday I was clearly neither in the Tour de France or in the front of the pack, it was pretty exhilarating to be part of the frenzy of a professional bike race.

Yesterday’s race was the Vuelta de Chiriqui. From a blog post I knew it would be coming through town soon, but from my web searches and questioning of ex-pat riders, I couldn’t figure out exactly when. And I had no idea I’d meet up with the race when I started off on my ride in the morning.

But on my return home, as I was approaching the main road to Volcan from Cuesta de Piedra, I  saw two riders and traffic crawling up the road which only happens if there’s an event or an accident. And when I hit the corner and turned right heading up hill and people were outside cheering, I pretty much figured the race was on.
The two riders in front of me were moving away at a pretty decent clip, and since I couldn’t see any rider approaching from behind, I figured it couldn’t hurt to stay on the road and ride toward home. I must have veered onto the tail end of the race, but if I thought I would interfere at all I would’ve dismounted and become a spectator.

As it turned out there were a few riders behind me as I was passed by number 44 a few miles outside of town and #55 within a mile of Volcan. After #55 passed me the road flattens out and I was able to keep pace with him from a safe distance behind.

In Volcan there is a T intersection where if you turn right it heads up a mild grade to the small hamlet of Cero Punta. That’s the direction the race was headed. I was going to continue straight toward home. As we approached the intersection a race volunteer was waving his arm and yelling “derecha, derecha”, but I waved vigorously indicating that I wasn’t part of the race and continued straight toward home.

But for about an hour it was a thrill passing cars, receiving cheers and shouts of encouragements from the adults and children watching outside of their homes, and riding at a decent enough clip to be momentarily mistaken for a bike racer. 

It has me dreaming again and seriously considering entering Master’s bike races in a few years when I turn 60.

Michael: Plusses and Minuses

A wash of gray skies
Shrouded the day in a damp
And dreary malaise.

Thursday, November 19, 2015

I’ll start with the minuses.

We had no sun. We have no net. We didn’t go on our usual invigorating trail run. We didn’t receive the deep tissue maulings we had hoped for. I made dinner. We watched another Columbo. It was one we had never seen before because it was a Mrs. Columbo that was included as a bonus episode on the season 5 DVD. I have been avoiding watching any other Mrs. Columbo’s  after seeing two other bonus episodes, but I was feeling desperate. However, outside of the same name, Columbo and Mrs. Columbo share very little in common. I don’t even think that’s Columbo’s dog. I’m not sure how the Mrs. Columbo series ended, but it would’ve been appropriate for Columbo to kill his wife and get away with it for disgracing the family name.

On the plus side.

We did get out for a jog. On that jog I stopped at the bike store and discovered that they sell Honey Stinger gels for a reasonable $1.50. Honey Stinger will be used at my A race next year, so now I know I’ll be able to train with what will be available at the race. On another stop on our jog, we went into the Air Box Express office that just opened in Volcan. They said switching our account from David to Volcan would be easy. That means we can pick up any packages or mail we have sent from the states right here, instead of making a day’s excursion to do it in David. I feel more shoes coming my way soon. After that we had a very nice breakfast at Mary’s. Without the net as a distraction, I had time to re-work my schedule and have now freed up my afternoons. The massage was warm and soothing. My red lentil soup wasn’t so bad and is very healthy. Puppy, our neighbor’s dog that we really like, joined us on a short after dinner walk. I didn’t have to do dishes. And it didn’t rain last night and looks like it may be clear enough today to get out on a dry morning bike ride.

Who knows, maybe Zeus will bless us again with a lucky lightening strike and fix the net.