Month: November 2019

In two more months, it will have been two years that my feather in law, Juan, came to live with Ivan and me. It hardly seems like it has been that long- so much has happened in those two years, most of which I am happy to never have to repeat. But many good things have happened as well.

This is how my father in law, Juan, looked 5 months before he came to us. I am not to going to go into the details about his living conditions prior to his arrival at our home, but suffice it to say, he was being heavily medicated, and had been for 3 years prior to this.

This is Juan last month. I am pretty sure you do not think him to be 91 years old, but he is. I, personally, think he does not look much different than he did in his 70’s, which was the last time we saw him.

Well, he is two years, (almost), drug free, taking only B/P meds., an Aspirin, because of his pacemaker, and a statin for his high cholesterol. He eats anything, and everything, we put in front of him, walks almost everyday, reads the newspaper daily, and goes to bed about 11:00 pm. every night, after watching the evening news, or whatever sports happens to be on the tv.

The three of us will be moving to the apartment soon, and that will change his routine a little bit. However, we plan to walk, everyday, with him, around the parks, and maybe to the store and back. It should be a fairly easy transition, I hope, to the new surroundings. I will let you know.

So much of our time, when we leave the house, is to stand in one line, or another, and wait.

We go to the grocery store, and wait in the checkout line. We go to the building downtown, to get my residency, and we wait. We go to get Ivan’s drivers license, and we wait. We go to Toks, for a cup of coffee, and we wait.

From the first time we went to the government building, and we waited for 2 hours there, I decided I was never going to be bothered by having to wait again. There is no point in getting upset by it because it is the way things are here. No one is ever in a hurry. So, in defense of my fragile mental health, I just started bringing things I can do with me.

One of those things is writing another post about having to wait for my blog.

It has made all of the difference in the world in my mental state.

I am trying to watch a show from Amazon Prime on my tablet, but the internet keeps stopping. I will try again later. Until then, I will tell you another tale.

Ivan said the furniture was delivered yesterday, the new couch, and the matching chair; the loveseat has not been delivered yet. I cannot wait to see them, however. Hopefully we will go later today so I can take a photo of them for you. But here is what they looked like when we bought them.

They will need cushions, obviously, which will probably be leather. Then we will buy bright throw pillows for color. Little by little, things are coming together to make our new home a reality.

I must tell you, though, that we walked for about 2 hours, going store to store, looking for “our” furniture. (If you did not read about the furniture buy, that is ok. I am always up for a little replay). We walked down the Main Street in San Pedro Tultepéc, just outside Toluca, all of which is about an hour to the Northwest of México City.

Ivan, Enrique, and I met up with Luis, (you remember Luis, our contractor), in San Pedro, and we walked the street, (it is one, long street, about 2 km), looking on both sides, for the furniture we knew, (read hoped), was waiting for us. I will say, that it did not take us very long to find the living room furniture, in the above photo, but dining room chairs, in the photo below, took us the better part of an hour. Plus, we had to stop for some soup (sopa) and tacos. It was close to the lunch hour.

But eight of these chairs were delivered two weeks ago, after having been spruced up. Originally, when we looked at them, you can see that the spaces between the spines have no stain, or top coat. Also, the bottoms of the legs are dinged, and needed to be refinished. Well, all of that was done, to all eight of the chairs, and now, they are in the spare bedroom, waiting for the new table that Martín is making. We cannot wait to see his handy work- he is so talented. The table he is making is similar to the photo below.

The biggest difference will be that it will probably be solid oak pieces, and the legs will be oak as well. (I told Ivan that somewhere in our home there has to be some wrought iron. Somewhere, or else).

Until I can get a photo of the latest changes in the condo, that is all for this post.

Last night, and tonight, as well, (the 31st, and the 1st) there has been a steady stream of children, each one cuter than the next, ringing the doorbell, and thrusting out their bags, bins, or bowls, hoping for the inevitable Día de Muertos candies. Unfortunately, I did not get many photos of them, as I was too busy writing a couple of other posts. Here are a few that I did get.

One thing I have noticed is that, at this house anyway, and, at the major stores, Sam’s Club included, there was not a single piece of chocolate candy to be found. Not one.

I told our family here that I had never seen, or been a part of, a Halloween celebration that did not include about five pounds of chocolate candies, and all that that entails. They were amazed that it was so.

Actually, now that I am really thinking about this, there is not a lot of chocolate anywhere down here. There is the occasional chocolate frosting on a donut, or a bit of chocolate as in the hot chocolate drink, but as a rule, there really is not much chocolate to be found.

Interesting, to be sure.

Cooler weather is finally here, prompting us to go to Soriana, and buy all of the fixin’s for chili. We cannot wait.

This is about the best chili recipe we have found, and one that does not require much tweaking. The few changes we made were 1) we used Abuelita chocolate, because we like its flavor better than cocoa powder, 2) we used 1kg of ground beef, and 1/2kg of ground pork, and 3) we burned, then skinned, and deseeded the chilies poblanos. We much prefer the “flavor profile” of the burnt peppers to the poblano when it is fresh. (I have wanted to use that phrase for some time now. Here was my chance, so I took it 😉

We made a vat full of the stuff, as you can see, and cannot wait to try a bowl, with some crackers, and cheese. (I cannot, for my life, find a store down here that sells cheddar cheese. What is up with that, I ask you?!?)

You can find the full recipe, along with a corresponding video on foodwishes.com or the same address on Youtube. Enjoy! We are!

Chili update: well, you will be happy to know the chili was a success. Everyone had at least one bowl, and a few had seconds. Always a compliment to the cook when someone has a second helping. There is even enough for a small bowl tomorrow, and that should taste even better, after the flavors have had time to meld. Yay!

We went to the dentist yesterday, the 25th., for Ivan’s first follow up appointment, and what she saw surprised her.

He is doing beautifully, better than she expected. He has been doing exactly what she told him to do, and is a very compliant patient.

Not sure what happens next but nothing will happen until the beginning of November as she is taking a week off for a well deserved vacation. Ivan said we should text her and offer to carry her luggage. That was so sweet.

He is still drinking a banana shake for breakfast, and soup for lunch and dinner, so all is as it should be. Thank you, everyone, for the concern.