Leccion de Espanol

El hecho mejor planes de ratones y hombres frecuentament va malo. Or something like that. That "oft gang agley" part is tough to translate.

There were only three of us at yesterday's class. Alan and I, of course, and a twenty something young woman who was nice, but not SI swimsuit material. El nombre de nuestro profesor is Bladimir, a name that doesn't exactly resound Latino. Upon arrival I was given an info packet that contained a nice map of Boquete and several pages of text about the course. One of the points made in the text was that fluency in conversation was the principal goal and that grammar was of far less importance. We then spent two hours mostly diddlying around with, I might have known... grammar. Two hours was also all the time allotted as the school has had a sudden influx of students and there aren't enough teachers and classrooms to handle a four hour block.

Still, my only real complaint is that so far the curriculum is too easy. I don't mind grammar. I like language rules and structure. La problema is that I am far ahead of what is being taught. I want (and need) more vocabulary and situational conversations. I want to be pushed and challenged in class. Otherwise I'll just get lazy, sit back and show off how smart I already am. Not a good thing to do at eight fifty an hour. So... we'll see how it goes today. (Vamos a ver hoy o este dia.)

Alrighty then! (Which has no translation that I know of. Hay caramba! may be close.)

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Roy and Dale were beating the stuffing out of Trigger when...

Not that, the other ranch blogger breath...I was happy to learn that the Sonaffa Beach Diet continues to be successful as I have lost another pound. The weight is just flying off me in fractions of ounces! At the rate I am going I should achieve my target weight by my mid March birthday... in the year 2012. If the Mayans are correct, I'll be looking good going out. And I am unhappy to learn that Venezuela, from whence our television programming originates has determined that Spanish League and UEFA soccer are now pay-per view events. Yeah yeah, I know, who cares? Well, I do and four other gringos as well. It's important to remember, well, okay, not really important, but maybe worth noting, okay it's not that either, BUT, I've learned half my second language from Spanish speaking sports announcers. "Se va, se va, se va, se fue! Digolete no no, no no, no no! Cuadrangular. It's going, going, going, gone! Let me tell you, no no, no no, no no! Homerun! Now that's useful stuff.