Saturday, February 1st, 2014

Last night I watched the 2010 movie The Way Back (7.3) “After escaping from a World War II labor camp, a band of soldiers undertake a journey to traverse Siberia, the Gobi Desert and the Himalayas.”

I went to bed at 10:45, had a little trouble getting to sleep, got up at 12:15am and closed the louvers and blinds due to the incessant blaring of a car alarm, got up twice during the night and finally woke/got up at 8:10.

I had my usual breakfast at Pacman for 5,400.

I waited in line (the wrong one again) for 30 minutes at BanColombia to make my medical insurance payment.

I took some money out of the ATM and then had an extra key to the building made for 6mil for when my brother comes to visit.

James Antle showed up about 10:50 for our noon meeting.  He rode his bike from Envigado and even made a detour to the stadium before meeting me at Mall de Laureles.  He is 60 years old and is from Pennsylvania, merely visiting here for 6 months.  He is staying at a “hostel” named The Art House and he told me about a sports bar up the mountain from Envigado named Mahalo.  While we were there I saw Augusto but he obviously saw I was with someone.

James bought me lunch at SanJote – my usual Solomito – and he had pretty much the same thing.  As he was leaving he showed me the old bike he bought for 100mil plus about 60mil in repairs.  He plans to sell or give it back before he goes back to the States in March.

When I got back to the apartment I pleased to find I got 2008 COP to the USD today.  I sent Margarita a check for $648 which is the current USD equivalent of 1,300,000 pesos.  Next month I expect to be in my new apartment upstairs and only paying 900,000 per month allowing me to squirrel away $200 a month.

Later in the afternoon I was at Fresco Pan having an ice cream for 1,600.  Just before 5pm when church started I had a slice of ham & cheese pizza with a cup of coffee.  A few minutes later a car zoomed up the narrow street with speakers blaring setting off a couple car alarms in the process.  Talk about disrepect for the church.

Tonight I’m going to continue the process of changing my addresses to my MBE address in Miami.