A few times I’ve engaged in those getting to know you email quizzes. Often they are stupid but sometimes I like the questions. Once I got one that asked the reader to list the items sitting next to their bed and I thought that was a pretty good way to learn something real about someone.

So here you go…items currently sitting on my bedside table:

– The Heart is a Lonely Hunter by Carson McCullers. I’m half way through it and it’s a lovely book. This is my current “fun read”.

– God is Not Great by Christopher Hitchens. Everyone should read this, I’m going to have withdrawal symptoms when I finish it. This is my current “hard read”, except it’s not hard to read at all.

– Getting The Love You Want by Harville Hendricks. Hey, it’s cheaper than therapy. This book has been recommended to me so many times that I feel like a moron for not having finished it sooner.

– Compact History of Mexico by various authors. I never seem to finish this one even though I like it. I start it and read 50 pages and then don’t come back to it for another year, hopefully this time I’ll finish it.

– The Secret Gratitude Book. It was a gift and I’m grateful for it. And I’m finding that the meditation of being grateful makes it much easier to be happy.

– The American Heritage English Dictionary. I can’t live without a dictionary next to the bed. This is the best dictionary I have right now, but it’s not good enough. I’m going to buy a better one, one with more words in it, next time I have the chance.

– The New Oxford Annotated Bible. I’m reading the Bible because the Hitchens’ book keeps referencing it. I always find the Bible fascinating, especially because so much of it seems so removed from modern day life, I mean I don’t exactly need advice on how much to pay if my ox gores your ox, or how much to pay if I sleep with your slave…

– A notebook with lined paper so I can write down ideas when they pop into my head in the middle of the night. I usually end up waking up at least once per night and writing some inane thing in there.

– A pencil so I can write in the notebook while lying on my back and not have to fight gravity with an ink pen.

– An Ultra Jewels alarm clock, given to me when I taught one of their employees how to use a complex piece of software. They gave me a bunch of other stuff too, including some lovely perfume and expensive make-up, but none of that is on my bedside table.

– A 3 inch piece of copper wire with 6 beads on it, don’t ask why I have it because I have no idea. I think it was part of a gift-wrap job that my artist-sister did once, either that or my kid made it. Regardless, the cats like it so it won’t be on the bedside table for long.

– A telephone with the ringer switched off. If someone calls while I’m in bed I always wish I could kill them, and I hate talking on the phone in bed, it makes me feel like I’m giving a speech naked. I actually have no idea why I have a phone in the bedroom, it probably has something do to with the idea that there could be an emergency that would make it worth talking on the phone while in bed.

– A small pad of skinny post-it notes. I use these to mark passages in the books I read so I can find them later and read them out loud to my husband who sometimes pretends to listen.

– A ceramic lamp that I painted myself about 15 years ago at one of those paint your own ceramics places. Cancun needs one of those places.

– And finally, my cell phone is sitting there charging.

Scattered thoughts are all you will get from me right now. So sorry. Better luck next time.

+ I read with absolute trepidation Canuck in Cancun’s 5 things post. And sure enough she tagged me, so now I need to come up with no less than 20 bits of wisdom to impart to my kid (poor kid). That will take a few days, so be patient. I swear she owes me a double latte for this.

+ I spent much of last week in the presence of a pathological liar with schizophrenic tendencies and signs of an ongoing psychotic break. Something about that experience destroyed my ability to put up with other people’s bullshit. I’ve been on serious bullshit-avoidance since Saturday afternoon, so watch out if you are a bullshitter.

+ I’m having waking dreams about moving back to Colorado. I find myself walking the dog past piles of basura (garbage) and baches (potholes) and daydreaming of the miles and miles of dog-friendly open space trails in Boulder County. When dog-face and I run in the morning we always run through one small park with grass, and while we are crossing that 20 meters of grass it I have life-long daydreams about romping in hectare-wide meadows with my dog. I’m so sick of the lack of parks and green space here in Cancun.

+ My kid, apparently, according to the ex (but on the hush, so don’t squeal), has an almost maybe boyfriend. She told me about him already, but she described him as “a buddy” and “moodier” than she is. Can you say “parental turmoil”? Can you say “sex education”? Can you say get that damn HPV vaccine? Christ, to be 13 again. Maybe one of my points of wisdom to her will be “don’t date people who are moodier than you are”.

+ Life is emptier without that dead cat. You’d think with 10 cats that we wouldn’t miss one. But I’ve been living and breathing the cat-ness in this house since he left us. His mama misses him, his brother does too. His sister is unreadable. The other cats are irritable. And Ariel (one of my two 17 year old sister cats) is telling me that she’s next. Mortality is not for sissies! God damn.

+ My husband is on vacation again, the second two-week vacation in 6 weeks. Don’t ya love governement jobs, they have such sensible policies. It’s great for him, all that time off, but for me it’s hard to get anything done with Mr. Boredom in the house.

+ Yesterday I got some shit from someone who thinks it’s wrong that the people from the U.S.A. call themselves AMERICAN. His problem, obviously, is that the Americas run from northern Canada to the southern tip of Chile. But he’s young and moody (like some other people we know). And I told him that he couldn’t hold Americans to blame for the fact that our country has a really STUPID name! I mean Mexico is actually the United States of Mexico, and so everyone calls it Mexico (in English at least). What the fuck are you supposed to call people from the U.S.A.? United Statesians? I get the argument, but get over it. If you want to criticize the U.S. for it’s foreign policy or it’s war on “terrorism” or it’s poorly educated rednecks then be my guest. But it ain’t our fault that the country is named after the whole continent! The people to blame for that are dead, like my cat!

I learned a few things today. I learned that we, humans, have apparently used up 2/3 of the world’s resources. I learned that rats chewing through wires are responsible for 18% of the power outages in New York City. And I learned that my dog will actually eat dog food, so long as it’s expensive gourmet dog food. It figures.

As 2007 draws to a close I’m finding myself thinking over all of what I’m grateful for.

First, I’m grateful for my good health. I’m grateful that I didn’t break this arm when I fell. I’m grateful that my endometriosis doesn’t hurt everyday any more. I’m grateful that I rarely get sick or have days when I feel anything worse than tired.

I’m grateful to my husband for being there, and for making sure that I feel loved everyday. And for always putting up with me, even when I’m being an uptight neurotic bitch.

And I’m grateful that my daughter is happy and healthy, and that her dad is taking good care of her.

I’m grateful to all my friends for their loyalty and concern. It means so much to have so many friends who really care and really empathize.

I’m grateful to my mom for everything.

I’m grateful that I live in a place with clean air.

I’m grateful to my cats for teaching me that love is all about having your ears scritched in just the perfect way.

And I’m grateful to my dog for his undying love and for how patient he is with us.

I’m grateful that I finally learned to touch type, it makes it faster to blather on about nothing important in my blog.

I’m grateful that Joyce got kitties because kitties are good for the soul.

I’m grateful that my sister finally has time to knit and make art, even though she’s sick. And I’m grateful that she’s getting better now.

I’m grateful that I don’t have to work for someone else and that I don’t have a mortgage or any debt.

And most of all, I’m grateful to be here, grateful to be able to laugh another day.

I’m not sure what this is. Is it a 4-year-delayed case of homesickness? Or is it a mounting disgust with the shit of living in a 3rd world country that is full of corruption? Or is it the realization that a number of the friends I’ve made here are considerably more self-centered and not nearly as loyal as they make themselves out to be?

Or maybe it’s because my kid isn’t here?

The things I know are these:
– I look at real estate prices in Colorado altogether too often.
– I HATE, beyond words, living in a place where the local press is keeping track of the number of EXECUTIONS this year. So far we are at 29. And these are not normal big city murders, these are mob-related executions where the people get kidnapped and then shot in the face after a dose of torture.
– Just recently someone in the local mob just happened to stop by my house, yeah right. Excuse me if I feel sick, excuse me if I don’t believe that he was just driving by (on my dead end street).
– I already have a plan for how to move these lovely 10 cats to the U.S. (just watch me, I have it all figured out). It may well cost me 10 grand but I will do it.
– Cancun sucks as a place for walking, or running with, your dog. And guess what, Boulder County DOES NOT! They have this thing called Open Space, which is paid for by tax dollars, and is open to my doggie.

But there are these other problems you see. The first being that I don’t know how I’m going to stand winter again, EVER! Then next being that Americans are cold-hearted bastards and I don’t really want to live around them, especially if they have not traveled extensively or have not lived abroad. Then there’s the problem that there are probably (though I have not looked it up yet) laws against having 10 cats in 1 house in Boulder County. (Not to mention that I don’t want carpet in my house with all these gatitos.) Then there’s the fact that I’m so busy here. I’ve got more to do in the next 6 months than I’ve ever faced before!

And I’m facing all that work while being homesick to the point of not always functioning. Yesterday I just stayed in bed all day, despite the work that needs to be done, and I spent the day reading a novel that takes place in Boulder, Colorado. Pathetic, I know, it just makes me MORE homesick. But at least I’ve now taken my first day off since whenever that was in August.

I’m finally getting around to posting a few photos from my trip to Colorado. It was so lovely to be there. The lack of potholes. The buried power lines. The nice friends who clamored to get me to hang with them (actually my friends do that here too).

And the city of Boulder is so pretty, especially now, before winter. Mountains and art in public spaces (with no graffiti) and bike paths and no garbage…I find myself sighing loudly when I think about it.

These are my brother-in-law’s lovely duckies

And here are some pix from the famous Pearl Street Mall which is a pedestrian mall in Boulder. There are street performers and lots of great shops and restaurants there.

Pearl Street Mall in Boulder, CO

More Pearl Street Mall

I must admit I’ve been scoping out real estate in Boulder County. But it’s too early for us to get serious about back moving there. We’ve much too much going on here for the next two years. Now wouldn’t it be lovely to live in both places…I wonder if we can swing that.

Or at 28.1.

Yes, I did have a birthday this week. And am now over 40. And the lead up to it was much more intense emotionally than anything since. So I guess I’m over it now. Actually I kinda sorta secretly think this decade might be the best yet…

We had a lovely small gathering of close friends at a new local restaurant called Iki RestoBar here in downtown Cancun. It seems to be Thai-inspired food with a lounge feel. The decor is lovely and everyone in our party enjoyed their food. But the best part was the company, thanks for coming everyone!!

And I also want to thank all the people who wrote and called and posted (and even BLOGGED) with birthday wishes, it was overwhelming, especially when you consider how very BAD I am at remembering other people’s birthdays. I’m not worthy, so don’t do that again.

A bit ago I followed a link from my dear friend Anita’s My Magic Roundabout blog and found this Life Expectancy Calculator, and I’m happy to say that the thing says that my real age is 28.1 and that I can expect to live to 86.9.

It gives me lots of credit for being happily married (mostly), for getting good sleep (mostly), for always wearing a seat belt and for all those years of being a slave to exercise.

Funny, I don’t FEEL 28.1 (or even 28.2) and don’t want to. And I don’t think I look it either, although I did get whistled at today by some creepy-looking construction workers. Ick.

Well, not too frozen yet I guess. I talked to my kid today and she reports that school is “fun”, and that she’s happy to be able to get good pizza again. There’s a small chain of pizza places in Colorado called Beau Jo’s and their pizza pretty much puts any pie in Mexico to shame. In fact I’m getting hungry just thinking about it. Anyway her class stopped for pizza in Idaho Springs on the way down from the mountains today, and she was quite happy about that. It’s the small things in life, right?

My 40th birthday is coming up next week. And it seems big to me, definitely bigger than turning 30 was. I didn’t think I would be this tired when I turned 40. I didn’t think that life would have thrown this much at me by now. I know I’m blessed with a pretty easy life on many levels. I’m healthy, my family members are healthy, I have money in the bank and no debt, I wear flip-flops to work… But still, this life stuff can be serious.

When I was a kid I didn’t believe I would live past 20. I had no sense of the future, of life over 20. I figured that lack of vision meant I wouldn’t live beyond 20. It didn’t mean that. It probably just had to do with being young and scared and unprepared for life as an adult.

Now I’ve lived twice as long as I expected to. And I’m still completely unprepared for being an adult. But somehow that’s ok with me. In fact, the older I get, the less it seems to matter how prepared I am, or how good I am at things. And the more it seems to matter that I just simply try to enjoy life.

So here’s to enjoying life. And to catching up on sleep too (yes mom, I know mom).

My daughter left to go live with her dad in the States yesterday. I’ve had a headache ever since. We have a low pressure system sitting on top of us and I can feel it weighing me down. And I’m still in shock over my daughter’s departure, which is also weighing me down.

On the bright side, with her away, I will have a lot more much-needed time for myself and my work. But she’s my best friend on many levels. And she left a big hole in my little universe when she got on that plane.

I can’t call her today because she’s off already, with her new school, on an overnight field trip. They are studying straw-bale construction methods and went to look at some examples of straw-bale buildings. And they are camping tonight, in Colorado high-country, in October. Talk about cold. Better her than me. So anyway I’ll bother her when they come down from the mountains tomorrow. I hope her first “day” of school was good.