I came across a wonderful online flower maker. I hope you enjoy it. Here’s a flower I made and below is the link to the site so you can make your own flowers.

Make your own: Ze Frank’s Flower Maker

I got a great real estate listing the other day. It’s a large beach front building lot just south of Cancun in the northern end of the Riviera Maya. It’s in a gated community called Petempich. Even though Petempich is very close to Cancun it feels very remote there. When you are there it’s easy to forget that Cancun is only a few minutes away.

The lot is actually two lots which are adjacent each other. The seller owns another house in the area and cares about Petempich and so wants to insure low density by insisting on selling the two lots together.

Here’s a picture:

Petempich Beach Front Lot

We were fortunate the day we went to take pictures because the weather was PERFECT and the light was perfect and there was not a cloud in the sky. Even though we get more than 200 days a year of sun here, and we have this fabulous tropical weather we still have lots of days where there are enough clouds in the sky to make it hard to take perfect beach photos.

If you want more information about this lot you can see the full listing on the Mexira web site.

I’ve been receiving threats. I’ve been told repeatedly that I need to get with the program and update my blog. So, without so much as a clue what I’m going to say, here you go. Prepare to suffer my random ramblings.

First off, we found a home for 2nd ball of fuzz, the lovely part-Siamese kitty (who we now actively MISS in that heart-lurching miss your right arm kind of way). He went to the friend of a friend (who is now well on the road to being a friend herself). And we are satisfied he will be properly loved and played with and that he will be snipped so he won’t be party to more homeless kitties being created.

And second, it’s probably time to reveal that I’m shifting the focus of my work. Web design is my first love, but the pay is crap. Nobody wants to really pay you for all the effort it takes to do a good job, they don’t even RECOGNIZE what a good job is. People see web design as a commodity, and think that anybody with a copy of Frontpage or Dreamweaver is a web designer. If I were in the States I might be able to get a job where they appreciate that my skills are deep and advanced. But here, working with small businesses, which have smaller budgets it ain’t working. And so I’ve decided to raise my rates, and take fewer web design jobs. That should eliminate some of the riff raff, and a lot of the hassle, and I think I’ll be happier and less busy.

I’ve also decided to put some time into selling real estate here in Cancun and in the Riviera Maya. In fact one of my favorite web design clients has invited my husband and me to work with him in his real estate business. Real estate will undoubtedly kill me, just the way that web design does, or rather, I will work myself to the bone no matter what I do. But with real estate at least there’s more at stake. Instead of busting myself to build a $2000 usd web site I can bust myself to sell a house that will pay a $20,000 usd commission. That seems like a better way to kill myself.

I know I have a lot to learn about real estate in order to be good at selling it. But I’m a thorough person and I will learn the lessons as fast as they come along. And I have always looked at real estate as a hobby, my husband is the same, we go see houses just for fun. So I think that this is a natural step for us. And I’m already happier because it’s getting me out of the house and away from this infernal machine.

And finally, some of you have shared with me that I spooked you a few weeks back with an ominous post about friendship and marriage. And I won’t get into that too much, except to say that my marriage rounded some kind of a corner feels really good, we went through something complicated and right now things feel uncomplicated, which is nice. As for the friendship stuff, maybe the jury is still out on that, if I figure out how to say more I will.

You can read all about the kitten’s new home by visiting Lisa Love’s site.

And you can take a look at the web site of our real estate partner by visiting Mexira.

Two weeks ago tonight we found an orange tabby kitten next to a busy street here in Cancun. At first we couldn’t catch it, it was yowling like no one’s business, and was clearly starving, but it would not come out of the thicket. So we went home and armed ourselves with a nice smelly can of tunafish. When we returned the kitten complied by creeping up to the tuna, warily. We had a few near misses and finally I caught the little guy by the head and picked him up. Fortunately his head was firmly attached.

We brought him home and cleaned him up and determined that he was simply dirty and very hungry. So we fed him and we fed him some more and then we started on the annoy the kitten with too much love campaign. Within 24 hours he was completely attached to humans to the point of falling asleep without notice anywhere on any human. And he understood what to do with his litterbox from the get go. So we set about finding a home for him.

It took a little waiting but yesterday he was welcomed into the home of a gringo doctor who just moved here. I miss him terribly, but he seemed comfortable and the doc is a “cat guy”, so is was all good.

Below is a picture of this little guy:

But wait, there’s more. One week ago,as I was leaving my daughter’s school, and as I was passing the exact spot where we found our dog Sam, I saw a kitten in the road. The car ahead of me swerved way around it, and in so doing forced on-coming traffic to stop. When I got there and saw the kitten I put on my flashers and got out of the car and picked up the little screaming wretch of a cat. The traffic going both ways was still stopped and I got some clapping and some shouts of approval from the waiting drivers when they witnessed my rescue in action.

And so I ended up with another kitten. This one is part Siamese. Also male. Same approximate age as the other guy (about 6 or 8 weeks). And this one is also a total love. This one eats a bit more like a pig than the other one. And this one seems to purr a bit more. This one had a LOT of fleas when I found him, and a tick and he was super stinky. So my first task, after feeding him, was to bathe him, poor guy, he hated that. But then he smelled like roses, or rather Pantene 2 in 1 shampoo from Costco, but hey what’s the difference?

Here’s a picture of this newest kitten:

I’ve been really enjoying the kitten energy in the house. Kittens are all about play and sudden intense naps (on your head) and discovering toys where they really aren’t (my computer mouse is a toy, as is the button that fell off my new jeans, as is the bottle of blue nail polish that lives on my desk, it goes on). And kittens are about love, unconditional love, and purring and demanding to be petted and DEMANDING to be fed. And they are certainly about pooping up a grand poop storm. I swear they poop more than the big cats, which makes sense because they eat WAY more than the adult cats do.

Here’s another picture of mega-pooper number 2:

And so here I am again with another kitten that needs a home. In a day or two I’ll send out some emails and nag all my friends to take him. But for right now I’m just enjoying the little guy and am calling him Fuzzbucket, for no reason at all except that it pops into my head when I see him.

Well, I don’t hate it that much. Ok, here goes, TELMEX SUCKS!

For anyone who doesn’t know, Telmex is the local telephone company, it’s effectively a monopoly at this point. I have a land-line with them and get my over-priced and under-fed internet service from them too. I’m not going to get into all the reasons why they suck, because I don’t feel like complaining THAT much, or rather, I’m just too tired to bother making a list. I’ll just complain about one issue for now.

In April we never got our Telmex bill. But being good citizens we paid the bill on-time anyway. Finally, when the May bill was a couple of days from being due, a bill showed up. I must say I looked only at the amount due, and never realized that this was the long lost April bill. I figured, because it was timed right, that it was the May bill because I’m that kind of a logical person, and it MADE SENSE to me (and didn’t involve any thinking, which is also critical).

The bill was due over the weekend. To pay the bill when it’s due or late you must go to the Telmex office. If you pay it early I think you can pay in a few other places. But I always pay it the day it’s due, and so I go to the office. If you go to the office you have a choice of standing in a line to pay a person, waiting in a line of cars to pay a drive-up teller or paying a reverse ATM machine that sucks in money and spits out receipts.

But on weekends your only choice is the reverse ATM machine. The others are closed. However this weekend the reverse ATM machine was “fuera de servicio”, out of service, and so even though we TRIED to pay the bill on-time we could not.

So this morning I go down there to pay the bill, which is now late. I go down with the April bill in hand, still thinking that it’s really the May bill. And when I get there the machine is still out of service. So I decide, like the idiot I am, to go inside and pay in person.

Mistake. There was one teller working, one very chatty teller, one teller who found something wrong, something to explain in long drawn out sentences (with hand gestures and lots of typing) to EVERY SINGLE PERSON that she waited on. And there were 30 people ahead of me.

Seeing as the bill was late I thought I should stick it out in that line. And so I stood there with all the other people, not getting anything done, just 30 people idly wasting a half hour of their day standing around waiting. What a useless thing. All those people who could be producing something, or learning something, or spending time with loved ones, all of them just standing there in the freezing-ass air conditioning at 8:30 in the morning while one teller gesticulates all over the lucky soul at the front of the line.

And finally, after waiting 32 minutes, I reach the front of the line. And the ONE TELLER points out that I have the April bill, which is not as big as the May bill. But I didn’t have an extra centavo on me, I just had the amount on the (wrong) bill. (You see, I’d just come from my morning run, and didn’t have my wallet with me; I’d stuck the phone bill money in the phone bill envelope and had left that in the car while I ran, figuring no thief in their right mind would break into my car and steal my Telmex bill!) So I give the teller what I have and tell her I will come back later with the 14 pesos (about $1.20 usd) I still owe. And then I leave, not at all relieved, thinking how stupid I am to do business with these people who can’t hire more tellers or make sure I get my freaking bills!

About an hour later the phone rings. And it’s a recording from Telmex telling me that since my bill is not paid in full that they want to disconnect me…blah, blah, blah. Idiots. If they would send the bill, I would pay the bill, simple. If they don’t send the bill I’ll screw up, simple. I’m good at screwing up, but you know what? Even if I screw up, it’s still their fault because they have bad policies and bad employees and their stupid air conditioning is too cold, and they waste everyone’s time making us wait in lines so they can yell at us and want more money for their limp-along service.

I guess I should hustle on down there with my $14 pesos, but I must say I’m just not very motivated to wait in another line to hand over that tiny amount of money. Can’t I just toss it out the window as I drive by at 40 miles an hour? Telmex is not worth the wear and tear on my brakes if I have to to stop! I swear to God that I loathe that company.

I have not been my usual quick-typing oft-blogging self lately. This is due in part to several things. One being the fact that hubby and I are still rental-condo-hunting, it takes hours and days and lots of thinking power. But we may have finally cornered the right condo in the right building in the right neighborhood at the right price with the right rental income potential. And the owner may even be capable of reaching and abiding by a sale agreement. We shall see.

Another factor is that my social life and my marriage both have been a bit taxing. I may blog about this stuff a little later, when I get some perspective. Suffice to say my loyalties to certain of my close people are being greatly taxed. In relationships and friendships there are sometimes lines that get crossed; but at some point I stop forgiving, and I don’t start again, and I walk away and don’t look back. I’m simply afraid that one of those times may be upon me. Again, we shall see.

And the final and main factor is that I’ve been (what? can it be true?) getting my WORK DONE! A couple of projects are still suffering a lack of attention. But I’m proud to say several others are in good shape, nice code and nice clients and nice work, when all is said and done. So that is very satisfying.