Saturday, April 5th, 2014

Last night I read Luz’ email and if I want to meet her at 1pm she would like me to meet her at SantaFe CC - but she’s buying.  I told her that would be fine and I gave her my cell phone number and asked for hers.  I’ll go there ahead of time to make sure I get a good Wi-Fi connection on my iPad and get the name of one of the restaurants for us to meet at.  I’ll bet, like all malls as I remember, they have a Frisby and a Mimo’s.

I emailed Margarita that 8am tomorrow would be fine and to ask Jaime to bring his drill because I need to reset one of the supports for the horizontal blinds.

I went to bed at 10:30, fell asleep quickly but woke up at 2am.  I got up twice after that but still managed to get some sleep.

I got a reply from Margarita that she got my email and she told her dad that today at 8am is ok.  No mention of the drill.

Jaime arrived at 8:10 with a young man I’ve seen before and the additional towel bar I requested.  His name is Camilo.  Guess what, the connection for the stovetop doesn’t fit.  The young man removed the stovetop and they are taking it somewhere, most likely to make sure they get a part that fits.  They said they would be back in 20 minutes; we’ll see; it’s now 8:20am.  They were back in 15 minutes.  They installed the stovetop but I noticed he put the plumbers tape on against the threads instead of with the threads.  Then they installed the additional towel bar in the bathroom and the horizontal blinds in the bedroom.  Before Camilo left he asked me when we could play chess together.  (He saw my “wall hanging”.)  I told him to call me and we exchanged phone numbers.  They left at 9:45.

I hustled on down to El Comedor de Chiva where I had my usual breakfast.  Lucas was working today and I asked him if I brought a mug could they serve me my coffee in that and he agreed.  He said the next times he will be working breakfast is next Wednesday and Friday.

Beatriz texted me at 10:10 and I understood she wanted to know what time it would be easy for me to pick up my clothes today.  I replied 1pm today.  Later I translated it as “it is easy to come by today and clothing come hours.”. 

At 11:15 Dario called me and asked if I could meet him at his building at 2pm to play chess and I agreed.

Augusto stopped by and mentioned that the lady I saw him with 3 weeks ago named Marina plays chess.  I told him I don’t remember that meeting and I didn’t see it mentioned in my blog later.  I told him I’m getting a chess table and maybe he would like to come to my apartment and play.

I noticed that Yummy’s restaurant has something called the Ensalada Azteca (Aztec salad) that with a little doctoring up (add cheese, beans and ground beef) could be like the nochos in the US.

I left LM at 12:30, stopped briefly at my apartment and then had my usual pizza at Pizza Americano.  I stopped at the apartment again and picked up my chess set and was at Dario’s building at 2pm.  He told me he wanted to win today – I’ve won 3 in a row – and when he won the coin flip and I ended up AGAIN with the black pieces I said “you won the white pieces, you want to win the game too”?  He put pressure on me and tried to create a king side attack but I held on and started a queen side attack.  At one point I threatened to capture a rook and I guess he didn’t notice as he made an inocuous pawn move, I took his rook for free, and he resigned.  4 in a row!  He did comment “you have been playing very well lately”.  Do I owe that to the Chess Magnet School?  I’d like to think so.

Back at the apartment, I received an email (LAC) from a pretty lady named Teresa from Envigado.  I replied questioning if her photos are recent because she doesn’t look 50 years old.  There are some obvious mistakes in her profile: red hair where in the photos it’s black and she has a 1 year old child?  One concern I have is that she’s the artistic type and I’m usually a better match with the more rational type.  Time will tell!

I got an email from Jose asking for my address because my chess table should be ready to be delivered next week.

I had the Fruit Salad Special at Almibar in LM tonight.  I always order it without cheese and without apples.  It comes with slices of mango, strawberries, bananas, and papaya with 2 scoops of ice cream (peanut and coconut for me) with a little whipped cream and arequipe sauce on top.

Beatriz and I finally agreed I would pick up my laundry Tuesday morning before 9am.

 

T-shirt of the day: Chicago/Alton/St. Louis Railroad.