I just looked at my credit card bills and what did I see? New tires, which I broke in on my trip to Merida, they are rock solid up to 115 mph so I guess they were worth it. And my hotel bill for Merida…and more hotel bills for my upcoming Florida trip (stay posted, it’s next week). And, oh yes, PEARL JAM TICKETS, they cost gobs, but hell Eddie Vedder will be sweating all over us (we’ll be up front), that’s got to be worth money right? And a plane ticket to get to Portland to see my friend who is graciously accompanying me to get sweated on by Mr. Holy Sweat himself. And then there are some clothes I bought, to replace the rags I’m normally seen in. And then there’s some web hosting and a voip phone bill and a booze (and grocery) run to Costco and…some nerdy books about designing web sites…

Well, hell the real problem is this. I’M NOT CHARGING ENOUGH! I refuse to feel like I’m spending too much. I’m not. The problem is that I figure out how long it’s going to take to do that thing my client wants and I DON’T DOUBLE IT! I always figure things will go perfectly and it really will only take that long. I never take into account that clients never email you back when you need them to. And I never take into account that I always try to write nice neat valid “girl code” which takes longer to write than messy invalid “boy code”. And I never take into account that things don’t go according to plan.

I just raised my rates quite a bit 3 months ago. But now I’m seriously considering doubling them. If I can’t get smart enough to double my time estimates then maybe I need to double my hourly rate…

So how come it seems like my blog is either me bitching about something or me glowing and waxing poetic about something? Isn’t there something in the middle there?

And how come the harder I work the more behind I feel like I get? And how come the more clients I get the less money seems to be coming in?

And how come the older I get the more complex life becomes? I’m getting so I can’t handle this exponential building up of paths not taken thing!

And how come when I go off the pill and stop eating chocolate every single day I GAIN weight? I thought it was supposed to go the other way.

And how come I can’t decide what I really want? Or where WHERE I really want it? Living outside the US means I’ve been changed in ways I can’t ever undo. I get so sick of Mexico sometimes and yet I’m afraid that I could never be happy living in the US again.

And how come I can spend, literally, 12 hours in row on my computer and not feel like I got anything done?

And how come I can feel on top of the world one day and the next day I get a massive headache and everything seems to suck?

And how come I try so hard to be an honest upstanding citizen of the world and it just doesn’t get me anywhere?

I’m just back from another quick trip to Merida, Yucatan. This time I stayed in a hotel worth staying in. It’s called Hotel Medio Mundo. It is located on Calle 55 in the historic downtown area of Merida.

Hotel Medio Mundo – upstairs near the front terrace

When we checked in we were greeted with tall cold glasses of jamaica (hibiscus iced tea). The beds were quite comfortable, and our room also had a hammock in it which was big enough for two people. The hotel has very nice tiles, nice lighting and there are plants everywhere. There’s a large fountain in the atrium the sound of which you can hear from your room. There’s also a refreshing pool in the back patio area.

Pagoda and flowers on the back patio

One morning we opted to eat breakfast at the hotel and it included yogurt, breads, coffee, juice, cheese, sandwich meat and fresh (very fresh) mixed fruits including mango from the mango tree which hangs over the patio:

Beware of Falling Mangoes

Not Yet Fallen Mangoes

My only complaint about Hotel Medio Mundo is that the service was a little inconsistent. The first time we used the pool someone came right away with big thick beach towels for us to use. Not understanding that we should keep them with us we used to the towels and then left them by the pool when we went back to our room. Then the next time we used the pool no one showed up with towels, I think the assumption was that we had already been given towels to use. But that was a very minor point, and when we did get the second set of beach towels we held onto them.

My daughter liked the hotel so much that I had trouble getting her to leave and explore the wonderful city of Merida. I did manage to drag her to most of the important historical sites in the city, but she kept up a constant plea to return to the hotel so she could read in the hammock or play in the pool… Next time I take her to Merida I need to be sure to stay in a fleabag hotel that stinks, that way I’ll get her out into the city!

Check out Hotel Medio Mundo.

I know I’m too busy and I do neglect my friends but I’ve noticed since moving to Cancun that I’m better than I used to be about nurturing friendships. Is it Mexico? Is it something in the Crystal water? Is it a by-product of eating salsa 3 times a day?

I suspect that it’s a combination of things. One may be that I’m a “displaced person”, or an ex-pat, or whatever you call it. I think that us ex-pats like to stick together.

And another may be that when I moved here I didn’t focus on making friends, I focused on how to earn a living (still working on that) and on renovating my house (still working on that too). It was only after I got lonely that I started reaching out and trying to meet folks. I think that made me appreciate the people I’ve become friends with more than I might have if I’d met them more easily or sooner.

But I also think it might have something to do with Mexico itself. There’s something about Mexican time and the weather and way the air always smells a little sweet (even in the city), there’s something in the culture here that lets us all feel it’s ok to take a little extra time to talk on the phone or to linger over café con leche, or to hang out at a party.

A couple of friends of mine are about to open a restaurant and bar here in Cancun. Janet and “Karaoke Joe” Cerutti are set to open “My Place” in the heart of the Cancun’s hotel zone. They are hoping to open this coming weekend.

We were lucky enough to get a sneak peek of My Place on Friday night when Joe and Janet opened for a private party. We had a great time and found the atmosphere to be laid back yet exciting. I imagine that once everything is up finished we will want to hang out there as much as possible. Here are a couple of pictures:

My Place: Looking toward the front entrance

My Place: Looking toward the mural in the back area

My husband and I have been following the progress of My Place since the beginning. Back in the late fall Joe and Janet gave us a tour of the building before they had done much work. There was a lot of work to do but Joe and Janet had pretty well thought out plans for the space. The space has many levels and many distinct areas. And they have used this to their advantage and have given each space a distinct feel by using different furniture and lights.

I apologize if I sound like an advertisement. But I have always wanted to open a restaurant myself and I am really interested in the whole process they are going through in getting this place off the ground. I can’t wait to spend an evening there after they are really open!

I don’t even know why I’m writing this post, someone should put tape over my mouth and my tape all my fingers together. Well, here goes…now I really hate Mexico (fuck the nice weather).

People come here to Cancun from all over Mexico. They also come here from other places. And lots of the people who come here from other places are wanted in those other places. Or they’ve done something which makes it difficult to live in that other place. They come to Mexico because no one will bother them here. Mexico will extradite you if you are wanted for murder, or for being a pedophile but not for shit like ponzi schemes or owing someone lots of money or for cheating on your taxes…

So, in short, this place is full of sleazebags.

Before I moved here my good friend Suzanne told me that Cancun means “snakepit” in Mayan. She’s right, it does. And it is one.

At first I thought Cancun just had a bad rep because of the whole Spring Break thing. We’ve got more than our share of discos and 24 hour parties here. And when I got here I discovered a place where people go to bed at 10 o’clock every night and where there are more private schools per capita than anywhere I’ve ever lived.

But pretty soon I found that lots of people here are involved in various underground, illegal, unethical and immoral activities. At first it seemed like just an isolated thing, just a few people I’d come across. But now it seems like it’s everywhere. It seems like every single person I know is connected in some way to someone who is involved in something big, something they could go to prison for.

I had a horrible experience today which opened my eyes to the fact that I can’t trust people here. I said the wrong thing to the wrong person in the wrong moment and someone I care about got fired over it. And he didn’t just get fired he also got screwed out of a (big) bunch of money.

And when I sit and think about it I realize that any power I might have to rectify this situation is muted by the fact that the shitheads involved in this are connected to people who will do anything to preserve their crooked way of life. And since they already operate outside the law, and since they will already go to prison if they are caught then what’s to stop them from shutting me up!

I hate Mexico!

I know I said I hate Mexico. But I don’t always hate Mexico. Like I don’t hate it when the Portland contingent tells me about the sheets of cold rain coming down there. And I don’t hate it when I realize that I’m sitting here working (yeah right) in bare feet with a tank top on and all the windows open. It’s 80 degrees with a light breeze and there are these small puffy clouds out there and the sky is blue, as usual.

And for the last two weeks we’ve been having a butterfly invasion. When I run in the Parque Kabah I see tons of them. And here at home they seem especially attracted to my bugambilias (we have 5 of them, all spilling over with flowers). We’ve also been getting a lot of tiny hummingbirds visiting our garden in the past couple of weeks.

Or maybe I’m just happy because I’m going to see Pearl Jam…Christ you’d think I was 16.

Well I did it. I bought tickets to the final night of Pearl Jam’s U.S. tour this summer. Now I just have to get my butt from Cancun to George, Washington on July 22. I was planning to visit a close friend in Portland OR(igami) in late July anyway, before I learned the dates of Pearl Jam’s tour. Now I get to drag her up to the show with me…

When I moved to Cancun I didn’t know anyone here. My husband’s brother’s ex-wife’s brother supposedly lives here, but we were too lazy (or confused) to actually call him when we arrived here.

Even though we CHOSE to move here it still sucked at first. I spent the first year trying not to break down every time something went wrong. And something went wrong every 5 minutes.

I’ve always considered myself a pretty flexible person, I have my uptight moments, but I embrace new experiences and love travel. So how come I hated Cancun so much?

Well, it’s simple really. It sucked. The real estate agent we rented our house from sucked (and lied and lied and lied) and ripped us off too. And even though we paid all our bills on time the electric company cut our power twice, once for two weeks. Ditto with the water company who cut the water for 3 months to punish us for the previous tenant’s lack of payment. We couldn’t get a phone line run into the house because the previous renter had an outstanding bill of $1200 usd. We couldn’t get cable because the neighborhood was too new and wasn’t wired for it yet. We didn’t have internet access and couldn’t get it. The only nearby internet cafe had spyware ridden slapped together garbage machines that were slower than shit and crashed every 5 minutes. And not only that the owner of that internet cafe, a middle aged, portly gentleman, was in love with my husband and that made it pretty strange to hang out there.

Not too mention that when you get away from the hotel zone a lot of Cancun is UGLY! There’s garbage that no one picks up. The streets make no sense. There are half finished and aesthetically compromised buildings all over. The storm drains don’t! The streets are full of potholes. And the local government is perpetually broke.

People here are so paranoid about money, and are often so desperate, that if you don’t pay in cash you don’t exist! And even if you do pay them that doesn’t actually have a lot of bearing on whether they will show up and provide whatever service you hired them for…

Mexico sucks!

But somewhere along the way I started making friends with other ex-pats. My friends have lived through this shit too. They’ve all had to adjust to the inefficiencies here, the “Mexican time” and the corruption and the financial paranoia and the lack of good peanut butter and the neighbors who think it’s ok to have outdoor (amplified) karaoke parties that start at 1 a.m. on a Tuesday and all the overprice garbage they sell in the stores here. My friends get it.

And somehow that is almost enough. Having people around who can relate to how this place tortures you almost makes you think you can survive in this mess…

…until of course your friends start leaving and moving to Portland, OREGON (I’m not shouting, REALLY) where there are STARBUCKS and health food stores and street signs that are LOGICAL and a post office that doesn’t lose EVERYTHING you give it and where there’s tamari and wasabi and there are yard sales and sale racks in the clothing stores….

Well, at least the weather is nice here (the City of Roses can kiss my ass).

For the first time in over ten years years the greatest band in the world, Pearl Jam, will play Saturday Night Live. Pearl Jam’s official site has announced that Pearl Jam will play SNL on April 15, the same night that Lindsay Lohan hosts the show.

Also The Sky I Scrape, which is a PJ fan site, is reporting that Pearl Jam will play the Late Show with David Letterman on May 4th.

Yours truly is trying to figure how to justify flying to the states just to see Pearl Jam this summer. Well, not trying too hard. No justification is necessary. Although I should be sure to meet with a client or two so I can write it off…