Never-Before-Seen Heart-Pounding Action!

Boy oh boy - Where to begin. The ever-changing and constantly fresh excitement of tropical adventure kept us racing along all day on a tsunami of eye-opening cross-cultural hijinks. Here's the quick run-down - Hold onto your hats...!

Got up. Kind of late.

Did some shopping.

Drove around some, missed an exit, got kind of turned around.

Couldn't go to the beach anyway, because it rained.

Had pizza and watched a movie.

Went to bed.

We're turning in the car tomorrow, after a final day in which we would have done OK without it. It was nice for getting to the mall, but we couldn't think of anything to do there, so we didn't go. We did some shopping at a better-stocked supermarket than our local one for food-based treats to bring back for family and friends, which was made much more convenient by the car, but that's the only way it made our lives better today. I kind of can't wait to get rid of it - undamaged, clean, full of gas. If we had older kids, or were just here on our own, we probably could have done a lot more, but as it stands, we're out of ideas for the car, and out of energy, frankly. This past week has been great, but we're pretty bushed. The first two weeks were far more relaxing, and we're looking forward to having another one like that.

Observations:

Blockbuster's and Pueblo, the Puerto Rican supermarket chain, are linked - the family who founded Pueblo brought in Blockbuster as a tag-along business, and you won't find one outside of a Pueblo. That's where I got our movie tonight - I bought "Cars", which we'd been meaning to buy anyway. The Spanish sound can be selected to play one of two ways: "Espanol", or "Espanol mexicano". I can see a very interesting Spanish Club activity coming - Compare and contrast the two. I assume there won't be any real swearing, though that would probably be half the fun.

A guy I assumed to be homeless - of the party-ready sort, an aging hipster with black clothes and a dog, still trying to ride the wave of partying in the party town where he probably got marooned years ago - was in the park this morning about 8:00, washing himself in the little faucet set up so people can clean the sand off their feet before they leave the beach. I was there, doing my exercises with the EBCRD, another couple of people walking their dogs, somebody doing yoga. And a cop on a motorcycle pulled in and parked (flagrantly illegally) on the sidewalk, got off and walked around as he talked to someone on his cell phone. After he finished his call, he kind of sauntered about, checking things out, and as he walked past the homeless guy, he made a gesture toward his dog and said something sideways. The homeless guy nodded and hurried up, gathering up his shirt and his dog. The cop sauntered back to his motorcycle.

I have to say, there's something wrong with hassling this guy and his dog - On a leash! - while all up and down the street, there were drivers parking along the sidewalk in ways that made it completely impossible for people to walk there, let alone anybody in a wheelchair. Or hurtling through red lights with a cursory glance in either direction to make sure they'd not hit anyone. Or changing lanes at 90 miles an hour out on the interstate with no signal, and two feet of clearance between their vehicle and the next one. When we went to the big supermarket today, every single handicapped parking spot was parked in, and I saw no stickers or tags or anything on any of the cars that said the driver was handicapped. No fear on the part of anyone, it seems, of actually being ticketed.

But the cop feels his most pressing duty then is to make sure the homeless guy knows he has his eye on him. "And your little dog, too!" Maybe I don't know the whole story, but the impression he gave off, with his mannerisms and his choice of targets, was pretty clear. What a feckless bully.

Someone in a pickup truck stopped next to Janneke and Tess, with her six braids and her sunglasses, as they were walking to Pueblo this morning, and rolled down his window. He was in his 40s, and his wife was in the passenger seat, two kids in the back. Looking at Tess, he said:

"Que linda que linda que linda!"

Twice.

Ah, rest! No car to worry about! Quinn asked at bed time if we were going to go to a different beach, or to "our beach". He's eager to get back to the old rhythms too.

No pictures - though I would have gotten one of the family playing dominoes, if the battery hadn't been dead. Oh, the humanity!