Saturday, October 10th, 2015

We got up at 7am and left the finca by 8:15.  The killer dogs came out followed by one bewildered puppy.  Luckily, the German shepherd, which I assume is the puppy’s mother, is still chained to her dog house.

We only had to wait a couple minutes for a bus to Caldas.

They are putting up guardrails on the new bridge.

In Caldas we walked a couple blocks to the nursery.  While Teresa was there I walked down the block to the ATM machine next to the Consumo grocery store.  When it was my turn I was informed that the maximum withdrawal I could make was 400mil.  I guess it’s been a while since they refilled it.  I requested the 400mil and they gave me 40 10mil bills.  It takes up a lot of space in my fanny pack but I can always use the small bills.  I ducked into Consumo where I found a bag of chips to go with the salsa Elda had brought but the few people in line had too many groceries to be checked, there wasn’t another checker, and I knew Teresa was in a hurry to meet up with Giraldo, so I left without it.

Back at the nursery Teresa was finished, whatever she was discussing with an employee there, and we walked a few blocks to what I would call a kitchen/bathroom supply store called Materiales & Ceramicas Mademor (sp?).  They displayed toilets, faucets, and tile and I also saw a stack of drywall.  After some deliberation we bought 196mil of something which I believe were tiles.

A truck arrived and they put our few items into the back of this big truck.  We got in the cab and the driver went a few blocks to another location where we picked up a few pieces of wood.  The driver then took us through downtown where the town square had a lot of kiosks set up.  I asked Teresa if today is a holiday and she replied “no, but Monday is, and there will be a lot of people in town this weekend”.

Traffic was heavy leaving the downtown area and I thought the driver was taking a detour when he started heading up a sideroad.  We drove through what looked like a poor area: a narrow dirt road with no longer used railroad tracks in the center, dilapidated houses, clothes hanging on lines out front, dogs in the street, etc.  We stopped in front of a building, went inside and then I saw something that made everything much clearer.  There was a stainless steel countertop about 12’ long and then a 90 degree turn with another 4’ length.  A hole was cut in the long piece which I understand is for the stove and there is a sink built into the small section.  Teresa’s going to be going from almost no counter space to a lot.  Good for her.

As they put it in the back of the truck I saw black clouds coming and soon it started raining lightly.  We had outrun the rain by the time we got to the sidehill up to the finca.  The truck got up the hill without any trouble although it moved quite slowly.  At the top he turned the truck around and backed it down the hill towards the finca.  The killer dogs barked a lot but didn’t come out to the path; too many people and too big truck for them.

We were back at the finca by 11:15 and Giraldo and the driver and another man (from the back of the truck?) carried the stainless steel counter and the other things into the finca.  We gave the driver 1 million pesos and he gave us a receipt for 1,300mil.  I got the name and number of the truck driver just in case we should need him someday.  Giraldo got to work fastening the counter and put up the backsplash.

Teresa called to a man named Don Miguel out by one of the other fincas.  He showed up a minute later and she gave him a glass of juice and a few cookies.  I think he might be cutting the garden for us now that Don Carlos isn’t here any longer.

A thunderstorm came through from about 2:25 to 3pm.  I took a nap from 3:15 to 4:30 and the rain had stopped by the time I got up.

Giraldo was putting up the backsplash and I was eating some shelled peanuts when suddenly I broke out into “Take me out to the ballgame”.  They got a kick out of that.

Giraldo left at 7:15.  He’s not quite finished so he will be returning again tomorrow.  As far as the kitchen goes, small changes yesterday, big changes today:

I followed the Chicago Cubs vs St. Louis Cardinals game #2 online and the Cubs won 6-3 so the series is tied 1-1.

In Chess Magnet School I was promoted to Earl.

Teresa called Giraldo and asked him to bring a large bottle of Coca Cola tomorrow and to recharge our cell phone with 20mil which he did.

I emailed Alan that I’m going to be in Envigado on Tuesday and maybe we could finally meet.

I watched the last episode (season 1) of Fargo from midnight to 1am.  Actually, I’ve only seen episodes 2, 6, 9, and 10.  I’ll probably be able to catch the others later.

I took my sleeping pills at 1am and went to bed.

T-shirt of the day: Sorry, we’re cool.