We Travel to Eat

Friends Forever

This is my friend Gail. Way back in the "old days" when I moved to Florida, I rented an apartment from Gail and Tony. Later on I sold their apartment buildings for them and helped Gail find the house she owns now. Still later I found them another investment property which fortunately they sold at a market high before the current crash. Along the way, we became friends forever. It's Gail who we visit when we go to Hollywood. It's also Gail who lent us a car during our entire 2-week visit. It was Gail who lent us an apartment for a month when we found ourselves temporarily homeless when our house sold in Florida before we left for Costa Rica. Gail is also the one who, when she learned of a homeless shelter being built in her neighborhood, took a bunch of stuff over to donate to them. This was while the rest of the neighborhood was up in arms doing that "not in my neighborhood thing." It was Gail who, with no hesitation, said "Of course" when I asked her if she wanted to drive across state to help when Hurricane Charley devastated the other Florida coast. Now she's a regular Red Cross volunteer. She's an amazing woman.

Driving a Car

Driving all the way from Port Charlotte to Plant City yesterday morning and then down to Hollywood last night was not really my idea of fun. On the other hand, since we don’t own a car and I don’t drive in Costa Rica, it’s kind of interesting to be on the road. Our incredible friends Gail and Tony, who live in Hollywood, actually lent us one of their cars to use for our entire 2 week trip! How great is that? What a huge savings not to have to rent a car this trip. Thanks Gail and Tony! Of course we always stay with them at their house when we’re there, too. Gail and I are the absolute best of friends and always have tons to catch up on, even though we talk regularly on Instant Messenger. There’s finally an airline with a flight from San Jose to Ft Lauderdale – Spirit – so for the first time we were able to fly there instead of going through all the crap at the Miami airport, which I hate. Gail picked us up at the airport and we visited with them for a couple days then took off for Port Charlotte. Now we’re back to visit some more before going home.

Speaking of Staying Young!

The amazing Uncle Nello is doing great and says he’s just a little sore where the incision is. He certainly doesn’t need us. So, much as we would love to spend more time with them, we drove this morning up to Plant City to visit Gene’s Aunt Mary. We had called to invite her out to lunch. You know us, everything is about food. Yes, she said, I’d love to see you. But of course when we got there, she had the table set for lunch! Well, she had had a little spare time yesterday, she said, so she decided to fix us lunch instead of bothering to go to a restaurant. And of course her famous jello salad.
Aunt Kay and Aunt Mary are both gorgeous women, still in their 80’s. Aunt Mary golfs, sings in the church choir and does a zillion things around her community to help some of the “older” people who live there. Her next door neighbor Lucille will turn 100 in October. I hear that her family is planning a huge birthday party for her and inviting the entire community, along with a lot of other friends. I wish I could be there for that. So maybe it’s not just Port Charlotte. Maybe it’s Florida. These women age well and slowly!

Something in the Water?

Well, I had been thinking that Aunt Kay and Uncle Nello were unique somehow in their ability to remain forever young. I know that a lot of it has to do with attitude. They both seem to think like very young people, if not teen-agers, most of the time. They take classes, learn new things, go to exercise class, lots of other stuff.
But in the past couple of days here we’ve noticed a lot of “mature” people who are clearly very youthful. One woman in particular was eating lunch at a table near ours. I had noticed her and thought how attractive and refreshed she looked. She was probably in her mid-70’s. And then she stood up. This woman, wearing shorts, had legs that any 19 year old would be jealous of. She was a knock out! So maybe it’s just attitude, living and eating well, getting exercise and being active. On the other hand, maybe there’s something in the water around here. I’ve been trying to drink the recommended 8 glasses a day every day.

Let's Play the Game!

Those are Uncle Nello’s words when we get to the house! Shouldn’t you be resting, we ask? No, they told me not to lie down and to make sure I get up and walk around. So it looks like playing cards is perfect, as long as I stand up and walk around from time to time. So we spend the afternoon playing “the game.” God we’ve missed these crazy relatives of ours! We wish we could spend more time with them. But they’re not going to move to Costa Rica. And we’re not gonna live in Port Charlotte. ‘Course we don’t have to wait for someone to have surgery to go visit. We wish they would visit us once in a while. They came down once but feel that it’s too much strain to do it again. We love spending time with them but it’s expensive to get there. Actually the expense was substantially reduced this trip thanks to the generous loan of a car from a friend (more on this later).

Operation Totally Successful!

It was long day. I don’t know how Aunt Kay held up, but I was a wreck. You know, that hospital thing. They put you in a waiting room and proceed to get your loved one ready for surgery in some other mysterious area of the hospital. Hours later you’re worrying about why you haven’t heard anything since someone told you 3 hours ago that he was going into surgery. It was supposed to take only an hour and a half. When you finally find somebody who will help, you learn that he is still in pre-op, waiting for the surgeon. So after hours of waiting, we find him still in pre-op. I think he’s now been nearly 24 hours without food or water and how ridiculous that is. He says he’s doing just fine. Been napping on and off and listening to the activity around him. We try to get an update on the expected time of his surgery, but no one seems to know. After a while someone comes over and informs us that the surgeon has had to tend to an emergency at the other hospital and will probably be tied up for 3 or 4 hours. Apparently that was old news because 20 minutes later someone else comes in and says that the doctor is on his way. There are too many people in his little cubicle, so we all decide to leave and return to the surgical waiting room. These people can’t even communicate and organize well enough to get their stories straight to tell you whether he’s still in pre-op, still in surgery, in recovery, on his way into surgery or some other option. And yet you have to trust them to have their systems working well enough to work together to cut open someone’s body!
Of course after we leave pre-op we have no way of knowing if the surgeon really shows up, if he is now in surgery, or what. After a few more hours, we decide that it’s “tea” time (North American style) and I get sent out to procure the wine and cheese. By the time I get back, Aunt Kay has been told that he is out of surgery, in post-op and that everything went well. We will be able to see him in a while. We have time for our wine and cheese in the waiting room first.
Uncle Nello looks great! You’d never know he just had surgery! You’d certainly never know that he’s over 80 (considerably over 80 actually!).
While we wait in the hall outside his 2-bed room to be able to see him, a nurse walks up to us and starts asking Gene questions about the patient’s normal medications. The only trouble is that she’s asking about the other patient in the room. Comforting, huh? Don’t ever go into a hospital without somewhere there at all times to look after your needs. That’s what they do in Spain. A family member is there at all times. Uncle Nello will not like me saying anything negative about his hospital or the staff because he believes that his surgeon and everyone else associated with him are perfect. I’m certain that his surgeon is great. He did a great job on Uncle Nello. But the organization (or lack thereof) in hospitals terrifies me. Not just this hospital. All hospitals. From what I’ve seen, they are all confused.
But right now we are all just totally relieved that everything went well and that we can take him home in the morning. In spite of my fears for the system, medical science is a wondrous thing.

Aunt Kay's Art

Aunt Kay is getting ready for her next art show. She now has a gallery wall in her house. She also has a cozy little studio off the lanai. That’s the lanai which had to be replaced after Hurricane Charley. Recovering from Charley was a long two year process, but the house is now beautiful. Aunt Kay loves her brand new kitchen. The new flooring is nice, too. It’s practically a new house, thanks to Charley. May there never be another hurricane year like 2004. She was teaching art classes but got derailed after Hurricane Charlie and hasn’t found the time and inspiration to start again. Hurricane Charley (and the 3 that followed within a month) changed a lot of people’s lives. But she still takes art classes and displays her art regularly in various venues. Her art is fabulous. Watercolors that are so beautiful. Dewdrops so real you think someone dropped water on it. Roses so soft you want to reach out and touch. After years of incredible still lifes, she is now doing abstracts – fabulous abstracts. What a woman!

I Don't Know What I'm Going to Do When I Get Old

This is one of Uncle Nello’s favorite sayings. At 93, he doesn’t appear to be planning on getting old any time soon. He’s scheduled for spinal surgery tomorrow. Last week he went out and bought a table saw so that he can get to work on some of his projects after the surgery, once he doesn’t have to endure this pain anymore. He’s been feeling a little better the last few days, so we’ve been able to spend some good time visiting and playing “the game,” the card game with no name which he and Aunt Kay taught us years ago and which we have now taught to all our friends.

Lunch with the Grandkids

Megan is 5. Austin is 3. They are absolutely adorable. And they have amazing amounts of energy. We met them for “lunch” at Jaxson’s – Hollywood’s famous ice cream parlor. We let them bring along their Daddy – my elder son Mark. He’s kinda cute, too!

Home Again-But Not for Long

After 3 months in traveling in Guatemala, we’re back in our wonderful home in Costa Rica. What a welcome home. Our friends Emma and Jon and Dale met us at the airport – a real homecoming! Not only that, but they had made sure that our house was stocked with the essentials – coffee and wine! Of course we had assumed we were coming home to 3 months worth of accumulated dust and God only knows what else. Que sorpresa! (What a surprise!) The ever helpful Emma, in her spare time, had brought her maid over and cleaned our entire house! I say in her spare time because she is in the middle of supervising the construction of their new home. We’re here for about a week – long enough to see some of our friends, brag about the trip, do our laundry and repack the backpacks. Then we’re off for Florida! Gene’s wonderful Uncle Nello is having spinal surgery. We doubt that he needs us, but this is all the excuse we need to go up to visit Uncle Nello and Aunt Kay, play some cards, see our great friends Gail and Tony and also, hopefully, see the Florida grandkids!

Guatemala Here We Come!

This is it! Tomorrow's the day. We're off for a 3 month adventure in Guatemala and I think this blog is way too long, so I've started a new one just for the trip. You can find us at Tall n Edgy in Guatemala. We plan to spend the first month or so in the colonial city of Antigua, seeing the sites, enjoying the town, and studying Spanish. After that we'll probably head up to Tikal to see the most awesome Mayan ruins in the world. We're thinking of spending some time in Copan, Honduras, too, because the ruins there are said to be amazing, the town sounds great, and we've heard of a wonderful woman who teaches Spanish on her veranda and lets out rooms to her students. After that we expect we'll head back to the Western Highlands and roam around the Mayan villages and see what we can see. We'll probably continue our Spanish studies there also, unless we get really burned out! Anyhow, look for us over on the new blog. We'll try to update the blog with stories of our travels from time to time. And we'll be hoping to hear from our friends and family when we check into the internet cafes, too. If you don't see anything new posted over there, you'll know we're either traveling in remote locations where internet is not readily available, or we're just having too damn much fun to bother! Hasta Luego!

Afternoon in Grecia

We took a day trip with our friends Emma and Jon today. Grecia's claim to fame seems to be its red metal church, which was shipped from Belgium in pieces in the 1890's. They also claim to be the cleanest town in Central America. We had some good bocas in a plain and comfortable bar/restaurant, enjoyed the attractive parque central, which actually has grass instead of concrete, had ice cream and came home. The museum was closed. Funny thing is that before we moved to Costa Rica, Gene had it in his mind that we would end up in Grecia (this just from reading about it). I always thought of it as a pleasant little town. After spending an afternoon there, I've decided it's too big and too busy. I still like Santo Domingo de Heredia - or perhaps Barva. But it's a pretty place.

Friends on the Caribbean

We're just back from a fun few days over on the Caribbean - the area we first fell in love with in Costa Rica. Pretty nice these days - we have friends who actually live over there to visit. Judy and Bob are in the process of adding on a huge patio to their adorable little house. But don't take my word for it. Check out Judy's blog.
We also discovered a really fun new restaurant where they have an outdoor kitchen just like what I want but I'm not going to bother to tell you about it because as soon as we discovered it, we learned that the place has been sold. So next month the fabulous Swiss trained chef from Cameroon, along with her husband and three children, will be in Switzerland - and the fabulous meal that she served us will be but a memory!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Wishing all of my friends and family an especially Romantic Day!

I got a Valentine Card! (Yes, we do have such things in Costa Rica!)

Late Night Breakfast at Denny's!

After spending the afternoon playing cards with Emma & Jon, and talking about some of our old favorite food haunts, Gene suddenly remembered that he hadn't had chicken fried steak in at least five years! And yes, we really do have a Denny's! This was our first time there and it was weird. It looks exactly like the ones in the US, with the prices to match - and maybe more! But Gene got his fix of chicken fried steak. Late night breakfast was fun, with free coffee refills and all! Of course Jon's $3 coca cola made up for the coffee refills!

Sunday Afternoon

Sunday brunch at Maiz Tico. Really good "tipico" food. Really fun band. Really great friends. It doesn't get any better than this.

An Afternoon with Old & New Friends

One of the luxuries included in our retired in Costa Rica lifestyle is having the time to visit with friends. We had been wanting to get back to the Spanish restaurant that we recently "discovered." So we called a few friends who agreed that spending Friday afternoon consuming tapas and paellas and sangria would be a great idea. Then Jim (of Jim & Flora in the mountains) decided we should post a message on Costa Rica Living in case anyone else wanted to join us. What a great idea. Loyd (Zendude) showed up. We hadn't seen him in ages. He says one thing he loves about living in Costa Rica is that he can go dancing almost every night of the week. He's buying a house back in Texas and planning to spend part of his time back there in order to help out his Mom. The trouble with traveling, he says, is that he always needs an extra suitcase for all of his footwear for various types of dancing! What a guy! Jim's post also got noticed by Charlotte and David, which was a real bonus. We had been meaning to call and make arrangements to meet these new imports from Texas ever since David had posted a message on CRL which had got us involved with volunteering at the orphanage. Then we had heard that they had spent last month on the Caribbean, where they had met our friends Judy and Bob (who deserted all of us in the central valley last year and decided to live in a tropical jungle beach area.) So now instead of hearing about this new immigrant couple from the sidelines, we have acquired them as new friends. Our buddies Emma and Jon had given us (Gene and me and our good friend Dale) a ride to the restaurant, so we drove to their house after the lunch, with Charlotte & David following. After some more conversation and another glass of wine at their house (OK, some of us had Emma's delicious fruit drink!), Charlotte & David dropped us off at our house so they'll know how to get here next Friday when we do a follow up afternoon at our house. As usual we got so busy having fun that we forgot to take photos 'til the end. So here you have Gene & me and then Flora and Jim, followed by Loyd and then Dale. Some people claim that we never stop partying around here! I wouldn't go so far as to say that, but we certainly have a good time!

Where Are We From?

It's always interesting to note where everyone is from when a group of our friends get together. At today's lunch, everyone in attendance lives in Costa Rica. There were 4 people from Texas (I tried to add myself but they all said that 10 years residence there did not a Texan make!), 1 originally from Washington state, 1 from Maine, 1 from Michigan, 1 from New Zealand, 1 from Boliva and 1 from Costa Rica. It's interesting that there is always some confusion over the question of "Where are you from?" Although many people answer this by saying where they were born, others refer to where they grew up or where they've spent most of their lives. My friend Emma says she's from Bolivia, although I happen to know that she has spent most of her adult life in Virginia. I think her husband Jon usually says he's from Virginia, where he spent most of his adult years, although he grew up in Washington state. I'm still trying to figure out how to answer this question. It's true I was born in Maine, but since my family moved to New Hampshire before I was a year old, it seems kind of weird to claim it as my "home." New Hampshire makes a little more sense since I grew up there, but I haven't lived there since I was 17 and that doesn't feel like home, either. At times I seem to be a New Englander and at others, not. Some people here seem to think I should say I'm from Florida because that's where we lived immediately before moving to Costa Rica, but I never felt a part of Florida. I'd like to claim Seattle, just because it's one of my 2 favorite cities in the United States, but I didn't really live there long enough to earn it (1 year) or San Juan Island, off the coast of Washington State, where I lived for 4 years. In my adult life, I've also lived in Japan, the Philippines, Mississippi, Texas. "Home is where you hang your hat," they used to say before we all started going bare-headed. I certainly feel like this is my home, but when I try to get away with saying I am "from" Costa Rica, I am always told that I have to be "from" somewhere in the United States. Now if I could just figure out where.

Flowers for my Birthday

Gene & Dale both arrived with an arm load of flowers. The combination made a huge bouquet!