Gosh but it’s been a buggy week. I survived the Great Locust Invasion of 2006 without losing my garden. I saw a cockroach (this after rattling on on CancunCare’s forum about never seeing them anymore). And I survived some kind of stomach bug, my first stomach bug since moving here over 3 years ago. Fortunately this bug like the cockroach, was a short-lived one, I was only on death’s door for about 3 or 4 hours. I’m fine now though, all the bugs seem to be leaving me alone for the time being.

I had the privilege this week to meet Jerry Jacobs, the famous San Francisco interior decorator and architect. Jerry is nearly done decorating a condo which belongs to one of my clients. The condo is at Bay View Grand, which a beachfront hi-rise complex located on one of the nicest stretches of beach in Cancun.

I must say that the architecture a Bay View Grand is quite good, even without Jerry’s expert finishing. The condo is nicely laid out with lots of views of the sea. And Jerry did a lot to bring the ocean-views deeper into the condo. He used mirrors to reflect the ocean view back at you when you look away from the water. And he bought furniture which echos the colors in water and on the beach.

The place is plush and up-scale while remaining entirely comfortable. You want to snuggle into the over-stuffed furniture and spend countless hours staring out at the perfect Caribbean sea.

One of the things about Bay View Grand which I especially like are the wrap around decks on the corners of the buildings. They are architecturally interesting, but more importantly they insure fantastic views because from them you can see around the corner of the building.

All in all I was impressed both by the building and by Jerry’s eye. He took already good architecture and played up its strengths through creative use of color, space and furniture. He’s a gifted artist and is in full control of his craft. Meeting him and seeing his most recent work was an honor.

I’ll share the web site I’m building for this client when it’s completed.

Two years of weekly private Spanish classes and for what? I’m still not comfortable with the language. And I stumble and blow it every time I try to say anything the slightest bit complex in Spanish. Of course I _know_ a lot of Spanish, I have a lot of vocabulary and I understand a lot of grammar and I know how to conjugate a fair number of verbs in 4 tenses. I even know how to swear in Spanish. It is not enough. I cannot speak.

But now that we have “domestic help” I actually HAVE to speak in Spanish. Especially now that my husband is working 2 jobs and is never here when the maid is. So I’m learning to speak, just let it flow out of my mouth, in a messy tumble of screwed up tenses and mixed up words. So in a way my maid is teaching me Spanish. I don’t think I will mention any of this to my Spanish teacher though…

I’ve been a neglectful blogger, I know that, but really, I’ve been just too busy. Right now in this house we are adjusting to a new busier schedule. Who says living in Mexico means having a relaxed schedule, ha ha ha I say. I haven’t been this busy in years.

First off, my husband is trying his hand at real estate, hoping that it might mean he can someday soon leave his government job. This means he is working his normal gov’t schedule, which is usually (4) 12+ hour days per week (plus being on-call, travel and some night-shifts); then on his days off he’s working his real estate job. He’s currently repping for Residencial La Playa, which is an upscale condo development project being built on the beach in Cancun just north of Puerto Cancun (more on that later). So basically I never see him and when I do he’s tired.

The same day that we heard about the job at Residencial La Playa we also heard from a local acquaintance who wanted to help her muchacha (her house-cleaner/maid) find more work. The maid has been working for this woman for over 7 years, has keys to her house and is very stable. So I immediately set about getting an interview with this maid. But in the process of hiring her I found myself in a “maid-war”, competing with another friend for this maid’s services. Who would win the battle, who would pay more, whose house was less work…it was very tense for a few days.

But in the end my opponent blinked….and this sweet lovely trustworthy muchacha is now taking care of my house for me a couple of days a week. Every time she comes she tackles some new area of the house and scrubs it beyond recognition. My house hasn’t been this clean ever, and she’s not done with her quest for long-forgotten dirt yet.

Now some more serendipity is that the same day that we hired this great muchacha was also the same day my kiddo and I decided to join a local fitness club. Prior to that I was running 3 or 4 days a week in the beautiful Parque Kabah, but it wasn’t enough exercise and my kid didn’t want to go (she needs a/c to work out since she can’t sweat like normal people and easily overheats). So ever since we got with the program and got a maid we’ve been heading to the gym each day.

It’s great to be working out “for reals” again. It’s been over 3 years since I did any weight training and I sure did miss those Elliptical Cross Trainer machines. I already feel a little lighter though I haven’t stepped on a scale. My kid spent the first week crazy-excited to try every machine out. Now she’s settling into things and is finding a rhythm there. And it was fun to train her on the weight resistance machines. I didn’t realize how much I knew about weight training, but I have been doing it off and on since I was 15, so I guess I must know something.

And then on top of all of this new adjustment my work is very busy. I think I may have enough work now to finish the year. In fact there are moments when I’m too busy and my clients are paying for it by being neglected. If what I did required less training I might look for someone to help me with at least coding the projects but I’m too picky about my code for that. And the rest of it I can’t even considering letting someone else take on for me. I wouldn’t mind having a partner who is at or beyond my skill level but I think finding a someone with only part of my skills would just turn me into a micro-manager. And that would stink. So I’ll keep working weekends and stop taking new work and eventually I will catch up. And I think I’ve learned this year how many active clients would be ideal for me. So next year my goal will be to maintain that number of clients only!

Ok, so that’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

I haven’t been blogging lately because my life is one long string of xhtml, css, javascript and a seemingly endless stream of cropped photographs. In short I’m working too much, but that’s good, right? August and September are always big months for web designers, it seems like the clients come down off the summer with new ideas, on about August 15th I always get a lot of new work.

My latest release is for Condo Marketing International. This is a company which helps timeshare owners to rent and resell their timeshare units. If you are looking for a luxurious vacation, but don’t want to pay resort prices, a timeshare rental might be the way to go. The more work I do for this client the more I understand about the timeshare industry and how to find the good deals in it.

Anyway, take a look at this site. It’s got a couple of bugs in old browsers (which no one in their right mind should be using anyway), and it has a minor Mac bug but we’re releasing anyway. The bugs will be tackled later in the week, after I’ve taken care of writing some more endless strings of xhtml and css and javascript for some other clients. Enjoy!