Tuesday, April 30th, 2013

If all goes well tomorrow some of my retirement money should be in my checking account!

This morning Reina and Dylan left at 7am to see someone about his military service.  I will be fixing my own breakfast.  And they might be gone all day so Reina left me some lentil soup for lunch.

I wanted to fix myself French toast for breakfast but we had neglected to purchase bread yesterday.  I checked my USAA account and I can see 2 of my pensions have shown up but I probably will have to wait a day or 2 to access it.  So that means I only have $9.34 available or about 16,000 pesos.  I decided I would try to withdraw 10mil of that to buy a loaf of bread.

By 8:45 I had finished my coffee and left for Viva.  I used the Vivienda ATM machine and the least amount it showed I could withdraw was 20mil.  So, figuring it would be rejected anyway, I chose the 20mil and darned if it didn’t go ahead and allow the withdrawal.  Now is that because of the 2 pensions that are waiting in my account?  (I’m still trying to figure out how all this works.)  I then bought a loaf of bread for 3,030 pesos and a large box of Frosted Flakes that was on sale for 11,193 pesos.  I figure with all the milk we bought I can at least have breakfast at home for a few days.

I got home at 9:08 which means that in 23 minutes, I walked to Viva, took money out of the ATM, went upstairs to Exito, located & purchased the bread & cereal, and walked back to the apartment.

When I got back I was surprised to see Dylan and Reina back already.  She explained if they pay 1,200,000 pesos ($667) he can get papers that will keep him out of the army.  Well, she’s not getting it from me!  I’ll pay her what I owe her and she can decide what she wants to use her money for.

I made French toast and gave Reina a piece; she said she liked it, but I think she gave what was left after she took her first bite to Dylan.

Reina tells me that Saturday, May 3^rd is a big holiday – Dia De la Sta Cruz and a lot of the stores will be closed.  I don’t see this listed as a holiday in my book on Colombia.  But if you change Sta to Santa then this translates to Day of the Holy Cross.  

10am Reina left with Dylan’s computer.  She’s taking it downtown to see if it can be repaired – hopefully for not a lot of money.  

I checked my USAA account online and it processed the ATM withdrawal as if the 2 pensions were in my account available for withdrawal.  If my Social Security payment is on time – tomorrow – I’m confident I can pay Reina what I owe here and get her out of here.

Again the ants are gone!  Actually they weren’t here yesterday either.  We’ll see if that’s finally the end of them.

11am and the garbage truck finally came through but I didn’t notice the pretty street sweeper this morning.

Lunch is becoming routine – soup (lentil), rice with a sausage, a few potato chips and milk.

3:20 I hear thunder out west.  3:40 Thunder slightly south with light rain.  4:00 heavy thunder and saw lightning for the first time and actually caught some of it on video on my iPad.  (I didn’t catch the loudest thunder however!)

4:30 Reina returned and said the Inverter, whatever that is, needs to be repaired and it will cost 100mil.

Dinner was a simple one: lentil soup, a fried egg with rice, a few potato chips, and a 
glass of milk.