More of the Same

The Rains of Ranchipur took a Fair Wind to Java where it hooked a ride East of Eden on The Road to Bali and finally fell on, you guessed it, good old Boquete giving us thirteen days that included all or parts of a downpour. It is raining as I write this morning, so day fourteen is now in the Monkeymind Book of Records an unofficial compilation of anything that occurs to me. The record for uppours, for instance, remains at zero.

Yesterday's rain, having a sadistic sense of humor, waited until RTGFKAR and I picked and shoveled and rocked the the ruts on our servidumbre just enough to allow me to barely - three attempts were necessary - drive my car to our house. After the afternoon deluge, driving FROM the house may now be problematical if by problematical I mean crazy to attempt. Two days of dryness or one day of uppour will be required to sufficiently firm up the road's mud base for a run the gauntlet ride to what now seems like the far away pavement. Ah well, it can't rain forever, can it?

While working on the servidumbre, RTGFKAR and I had to step aside and allow a four wheeled drive something big pick-up truck to pass easily over the wreckage of a road and I thought wistfully back to the Toyota Tundra we had sold before departing The States. It too would have made the trip up the servidumbre a simple four wheel for fun journey. Our little Kia Sportage, a car that would almost fit in the back of a pick-up, has neither the weight nor the clearance to make the trip anything less than a challenge. On the other hand, I thought wistlessly, the 30 miles per gallon of diesel fuel - thirty to forty cents a gallon cheaper than gas - that I get with the Kia has given me a savings over the life of the car of roughly, more or less, quite a bit and by quite a bit I mean a lot. Factor in that while it is parked here at the house unable to drive and you will note that we are saving even more. (I like to look on the bright side even when I have to make it up.)

The Broncos play the Jets today and I am hoping it will be televised here. The Jets and their quarterback whose name should be pronounced five-ray (Say five like a southerner) but isn't, are media darlings and their games are aired regularly. Cross your fingers for me.

What Rain?

I've lost momentum. Can't write without Mo. Need Mo to keep the Flo. Have to force it for a awhile. Shove through the dead zone. Find the light. Write.

I love the keyboard on our new computer. I hit the spacebar with my index finger when I type and our old laptop keyboard required a pounding to make the space. I was continually going back and separating words. (And you thought you had it rough. See the kind of problems I have to deal with.)

Alrighty then. So, on the twelfth day of Rainmas, it didn't. Well not so far anyway. Of course it's not even eight yet, but hell, it's rain free afuera and that's a novelty. If it remains so, RTGFKAR and I will take pick and shovel to our servidumbre (access road) and try to make it drivable again. We have stacks of trash that need to be removed from the premises before they overwhelm us. ("Boquete trio found smothered in household garbage. Puppies chew their way to safety.")

My car has been parked at B and L's for most of the weather siege. Whenever we needed something from town I would walk there,(to B and L's) drive across the mountain, make the purchase, return, park the car and lug whatever I had up the muddy, rocky, slippery slope of a trail. The other day I brought back a propane tank - our water is heated by propane - that weighs, I don't know, maybe fifty or sixty pounds. I drove it to the trail head where I met RTGFKAR. We took turns walking it up the trail until we reached RTGFKAR's car which was parked at the bottom of the concrete carilles that lead to our house. RTGF drove it from there. We had done the same with bags of groceries the day before. Both times were made more annoying by the ceaseless rain. No matter though, we are rugged guys used to the rigors of our primitive lives. Especially me. I use a strict routine of chain smoking cigars, while downing cocktails to keep me fit and ready for any unexpected hardship.

After the road work there will be football. It is "Rivalry Week" for the NCAA (Naughty Collegiate Amos and Andys)and a few of the games promise to be competitive and entertaining. The Gators vs. Seminoles is always a good one featuring as it does actual alligator/indian tussles in the parking lot beforehand. I'll put my gameface on for that show. My gameface is the one with popcorn and beer being shoved into it at regular intervals.

Right now, though, it is still not raining so I better put on my work shoes. I don't have a workface.

Weather Seige

"Rain rain go away, come again some other day."

I awoke this morning to the sound of rain on the roof. It is a sound I have become accustomed to, or rather to which I have become accustomed.(That's for Bonnie) I donned some sweats and then opened the kennel and gathered our two pups into my arms to carry them out-of-doors. I don't trust them to make the walk through the house without stopping for their morning, ah, evacuations. After each ten pound pup had deposited an amount of poop roughly equivalent to their combined body weight upon the lawn and I had reloaded them with Science Diet rocket launching puppy kibble, we moved back into the house, I to write and they to create havoc for an hour or so before crashing and settling down for the first of their many daily puppy naps. We are at that precise moment now. The naps are going well, the writing not so much.

I don't really know what to say. Pictures, video or still, are clearly better mediums to describe the flood that has decimated parts of our beautiful town. You can find some of those at boqueteweather.org by clicking on the word "quick." I could make light of the whole affair by cranking out a humorous account of our inconveniences, but with reports of property destruction and deaths still coming in, I don't feel up to that task even if I do see the irony of having no water from our faucets in the midst of a flood.

Today's rain is light, so far, and I'm hoping it remains so. A partial rainbow, arco iris in Spanish, poked through the clouds an hour or so ago but it quickly disappeared into the soupy thick sky. Lluvia, pronounced you-vee-ah, rain, has visited us for ten consecutive days. I'm thinking that's enough.

In addition to the usual blessings I'm thankful for - family, friends and televised football - I now have a new one to add to the list here on Thanksgiving Day. I'm thankful we didn't fall in love with riverside property. Our house is safe here on the mountainside and the rain has our lawn looking great. Great that is, if you don't mind the piled puppy poop.

Happy Turkey Day to everyone.

Terremoto

Terremoto is not the the name of Japan's visiting Prime Minister as some might think. It's the Spanish word for earthquake. Last night at 1:10 a.m. Terremoto did come-a-calling and frankly I would rather have had Japan's P.M. The quake lasted long enough for me to say "holy shit" six or seven times, but I quit after the third one to hear what Woowoo Charly had to say. She was seconding my opinion. The intensity of the temblors (tremors)was double that of any we had experienced heretofore or even heretofive. It was noisy, unsettling, disquieting, unnerving and four other adjectives with the general meaning of Yikes! When it was over I meandered over to RTGFKAR's side of the house to see how he had fared and he too was in a bewildered state. I did point out to him that "on the bright side" our new home was still standing. It wouldn't have surprised me to have found windows out or roof tiles missing or cracks in the walls. I mean how can you shake an entire building hard enough to make your bed dance on the floor for half a minute and not have some sort of visible damage? I made a cursory check of the interior this morning and found nothing amiss or amister and will venture to the exterior when the monsoon wind and rain that were the earthquake's sidekick let off a touch.

An aside: I wrote a nice earthquake bit in what I called my "Costa Rica Papers" when we lived there and experienced our first serious shake and quake. I lost those writings and the subsequent "Panama Papers" when my computer's hard drive took a dive and never recovered. If any of youze good people should have a copy, por favor, send it my way.

Animals, I have read, often sense the onset of natural disasters before we puny humans do. Dogs, cats, bats and rats have been known to exhibit odd behavior prior to hurricanes, earthquakes, cyclones and the like. Our pups though are apparently missing that early warning gene. They made no sound to wake us beforehand and, at the conclusion of the terremoto, they merely shuffled around in their kennel a second or two and then promptly returned to sleep. I guess when you are a nine week old dog everything is cool with you except the word no.

Later today we are off to lovely and talented Daveed to get said pups their vaccinations - we will see how they feel about that - and another bout for me with Doctor Skinbegone and his trusty companion freezeface. I always enjoy returning from these sessions looking like a wereleopard in mid metamorphosis; especially when I have to appear in public before the spots drop off. Friday night I have to read at our writer's club and I will likely be in full moon bloom by then. Ah well, it's still better than a stick in the eye.

Or an earthquake.

Blogging Time

Blogging aimlessly is the Monkeymind's forte. No point beyond amusement is really needed. That's my amusement I'm talking about. I'll try to share, but there's no guarantee. I could have a central theme, a focus, even an issue I suppose, but then I would have to actually know something in more depth and that, perish the thought, would require research, study and the most perisible of all my resources, time. I spend my time (like all good Enneagram Sevens)in an orderly progression of things I like to do. (When not interrupted by the "have to's", that is.) Among those, obviously, is blogging. Although my writing away from the blog consumes far more time, I still enjoy letting the Monkeymind loose to see from which limb it decides to swing; what turn of gray matter, brain cell, or external stimulation will appear to capture my attention and find its way into words. Today, until now while reading over this first part, I had nothing, which is usually the case. But aha! Eureka! I have found a theme in the phrase "spend my time."

The cool thing about time is that it is distributed in a very democratic fashion. Everyone has the same amount given to them everyday. It can't be saved, hoarded, stockpiled, and it comes with the proviso that you must use it or lose it. The best way to use it is to spend it. (The concept of "borrowed time" comes falsely from people who are believed to have lived past the point of "time's up." When your time is truly up you can't borrow more.) Some people spend their time in large denominations. These are called hours. If you do something that takes hours it best be something that you enjoy. People, por ejemplo, who work at jobs they don't like are just throwing big bills into the wind. Larger time denominations like days, weeks, months, years are rarely spent on one thing so they are cashed in for smaller units. I prefer to spend my time in blocks of minutes. Like a fat wallet full of ones, minutes make you feel like you have a lot. I can spend 45 minutes writing a blog, 120 minutes on a short story, 35 minutes practicing guitar, 75 minutes reading a book, 60 walking the dogs and so forth. By day's end I will have used up my allotment in a very diverse manner. This is much like spending money on a shopping trip for small items rather than on one expensive large one. Occassionally though, Tuesdays most often, I like to spend an enormous chunk of time on one thing. Four, five, six even seven big hour bills can be dropped in the same place, namely, the golf course. I had planned to do that, in fact, this very day but alas, there is rain in the offing. (I had to get "offing" in again; it's such a cool word.) So, as a consequence, therefore and wouldn't you know, it's back to the time mall for me. Right now I think I'll go spend eleven minutes eating cereal and watching Sportcenter. After that, well, there's a pile of puppy poop I've been ignoring. And you? How are you going to spend your day?

New Kids On The Block !

Subscribing to a theory that I just made up which says, "If the hole in your heart is too big to be filled with a new dog, by all means get two", we did exactly that. Monkeymind readers meet Raphael and Mathilda, less formally known as Raffi and Matti.

We were in David yesterday to look for bar stools, a reasonably priced lawnmower and to have another hunk of this hunks handsome face, looking more and more phantom of the opera-ish every day, carved off and discarded by my friendly - he's always happy to see me - neighborhood dermatologist. We got two of the three, the wily, elusive lawnmower still avoiding capture.

A week ago on yet another jaunt to less than legendary David we had stopped and put our name on a Melo The Pet Store list for a call should they happen to acquire either golden retriever, cocker spaniel or, the longshot, corgi puppies. Woowoo Charly suggested that we should go back to Melo and tell them we would also be interested in any mixed breeds if we liked the look of them. We walked in the store and lo there was a sleepy blonde cocker in a kennel. Alrighty then, let's have a look. A clerk there says they have another in the back that they were just then bathing. I wander over to take a look. As I pick up this little, wet, drippy, black ball o love, the phone in my pocket rings. It's Melo's store manager. He's calling me to tell me they have the dogs. I walk around the corner and there we are talking to each other, face to face, with phones to our ears. We both laugh. In that slender interim Charly has bonded with the dogs and says to me I better go get RTGFKAR who is waiting in the car. A half hour later we are driving home with the pups you see pictured here.

No we haven't put Gus out of our minds and probably never will completely, but the business of looking after two frisky new pups who play until they drop, nap and then play some more and whose goal in doing so is to get into everything possible, tends to keep our gloomier thoughts at bay. It feels good to have furfaces back in the house.

Sex and Golf

Saturday night while waiting for the Texas Techies Okie State football game to come on I tuned to a show entitled "Wild Sex, Femme Fatale" because, c'mon, wouldn't you? There was much to be learned from this show, but not exactly what I was hoping for. It was about bugs. I am a little concerned about the bias of television censors toward insects and against people. Insects are allowed to perform all sorts of kinky sexual acts, including tearing off and eating their partners heads post coitus, while people are barely permitted a skin to skin caress. It's just not fair and I don't know what to make of it. Why, I ask you, the double standard? As I watched a televised gigantically overweight female spider impose herself on an unsuspecting, but not unwilling male an actual spider wandered out from under a nearby wardrobe. It stopped to look up at the screen and was clearly appalled but fascinated by what was being shown. After a couple of seconds though, its fascination turned to concern and it scurried back to the wardrobe to cover its children's eyes. Spiders have standards too and although I don't know exactly what they are I'll bet they stop short of letting the little ones watch that head chomping thing.

The rain has been letting off a bit the last few days and by a bit I mean it no longer falls with the density of a barrel full of Gatorade being dumped on a winning coach's head. There is hope that golf will be in the nearby offing. (Hmmm, does anyone say, besides me that is, "in the offing" anymore? And if not, why not? I like the way it sounds even if I am not exactly sure what it means apart from, maybe, soon.) I miss the sound of a mis-swung club striking a ball un-squarely and seeing said ball fly to parts unknown. This sound and this vision are still with me after weeks of not playing because when one has done a thing a thousand times, the memory of same is indelibly planted on one's monkey mind. You know, like, saying the wrong thing at the wrong time. The sound of a well swung club, on the other hand, striking a ball solidly is a sound I only vaguely remember from having heard it on television awhile ago. Televised golf swings are usually amplified and they sound something like swoosh plock. This sound, strangely enough, is the exact sound a female spider makes as it leaps forward and bites off its lover's head. The next time you hear it, don't be disturbed. Just think golf.

Feeling Low

I try to remain upbeat and cheerful and there are moments when I actually feel that way. Waking to find Obama a winner on Wednesday was one of those and waking this morning to read of the Broncos comeback victory is certainly another. These were small spikes of joy in what has become a very flat and featureless world. I miss my dog. Oh sure I do what I have to do to keep moving forward. I still shave, shower, dress and go about the day as if nothing has changed but there is a numbness that hangs on me like a shroud and each day is not a thing to be savored but rather a thing to be endured. Each day passed, I tell myself, puts me closer to being whole again. But I can't feel the progress. I can't feel the weight on my heart lifting. There is just so much pain and it baffles me. I have lost other dogs, hell I have lost people, though the latter not unexpectedly, and I have not suffered like this. I must have really loved this little guy. More, I guess, than I realized at the time. He was a vital part of my every day. I relied on him for more than companionship, I relied on him for something deeper, something harder to define. Unconditional love for sure, affection, loyalty, joy, a lot of things jumbled in there and maybe that is just it. I relied on him to bring a multi-dimensional reality to my world and now he is gone and all that along with him. Oh man, this just sucks.

Sorry if I have bummed you all out. I suppose I just needed to get this said.

Blowout

Don't you just love blowouts. You sit back stress free watching your team pile up the points and you realize the world is a good place, a friendly place, a place of grace under the sun.

Yesterday's election was a blowout almost as much fun as the Bronco's opening day win over Al The Devil Davis' Oakland Raiders. Good triumphed over evil by a large margin and hope was renewed in the breasts of the faithful. A caution must be issued here as Obama suggested in his speech last night. The road ahead is long and filled with potholes. We all know what has happened to the Broncos since that long ago blowout. But those concerns for the future are for another moment. This moment, this present moment, must be savored. My mathematical skills have never been top drawer as I have often noted, but even with that in mind, I figure I can't be too far off when I divide votes for McCain by the number of U.S. states. It comes out to six, maybe even seven people in each state voted for the old guy and his goofy sidekick. I figure they just got confused and pulled the wrong lever. I mean what else could it have been? All the remaining millions voted for Obama. If the election was a sporting event it would be what's referred to as a "laugher", a one sided spanking of the opposition.

That's it. That's all I have to say for today. That and of course, "It's good to be the king".

Sensing Something

It's quiet as an empty church at our house this morning. I can hear the odd bird chirping and a distant rooster doing its thing, but really the only noise of note is the clacking of my computer keys. Well, that and the ohmmmm of the universe echoing in my empty head where thoughts ought to be.

I'm sipping periodically on my third half mug of coffee - if I pour more than a half it just gets cold - and I am staring with wonder at a peculiarly blue sky. What can this mean? Is October truly over? Can sunshine, golf and happy days be here again? Are the Beatles reuniting?

A goodly - as opposed to badly - chunk of time has passed while I read over and over again the two short paragraphs above trying to think of what next to say and this sentence is the best I can do. Lame, if you ask me.

Maybe I'll try a writerly technique like describing my sensory impressions. Yeah, that's it. Now what were they again? Okay, I'm smelling, I'm smelling, I'm smelling and I'm getting...nothing. I do feel air going through my nose though. That's always a good thing. I see over the top rim of my reading glasses a still shiny morning with clear skies but I have already told you that. I hear, and this is a sound that just now began, the voice of Barack Obama coming dimly from the great room's TV. Woowoo Charly has arisen and found the remote, a clear sign that this is Sunday. Weekdays she beelines to the patio with coffee and book. And lastly, except for the next thing, I'm tasting the final bitter dregs of my cold black brew.

Now for the important part. My sixth sense tells me I'm hungry and that I will soon be making pancakes which is not a euphemism for something else. I will be actually making pancakes. After that, my sixth sense tells me, I will be practicing guitar, reading a book and taking a nap. All at one time would be nice but my sixth sense tells me to get a life. These things will be done sequentially as I wait for the political pundits to leave our TV screen and be replaced by men who draw a much larger audience, football players. My sixth sense gets a bit hazy at that point but it is suggesting that the Denver game which has once again been advertised as being shown will - once again - not be. This could be a bummer unless my sixth sense is wrong which is often the case. Right now, for instance, I sense a huge evil presence rising from the floor behind my chair. It is cloaked in shadow and dark and resembles nothing human in size or shape. As it nears I sense vicious, murderous intent so you see my sixth sense is often wron----------------------