Friday, June 25, 2021

Last night I went to bed at 10:45 and fell asleep quickly, got up once at 3am, finally waking/getting up at 6:15.

I left the apt at 7:30 in 68 degrees and walked to Parque Envigado. At Todo Drogas I found the eye drops Dr. Montoya prescribed, a bottle of Centrum Advance (in lieu of GNC’s Mega Men Prostate & Virility), and 2 packages of Zopiclona (Teresa occasionally mooches mine), for 95,200 pesos.

I had my usual breakfast at Carbon de Leña for 9,500 pesos, dropped off some leftover eyedrops for recycling at a pharmacy and walked to Viva Envigado. I arrived at Av Villas at 8:55 to find it doesn’t open until 9:30. Bancolombia opens at 9am and I got in a longish line. When they opened a few minutes later I quickly paid for the Caldas finca tax, my health insurance, Teresa’s gym fee, and my June chess lessons.

I waited 15-minutes in line for Av Villas to open where I paid for the apt rental.

Downstairs I had a café con leche in Todo Fresa until about 10:45. I bought a few things in Exito and returned to the apt by taxi.

The CSE hospital is in Prado not far from 61Prado Guest House where we’ve had some great lunches in the past.

We left the apt at noon for my 2pm appointment with the anesthesiologist.  Our taxi driver took the highway then cut through the bad neighborhood around Minorista. We drove right past the hotel so I knew we would be close to it. At the hospital Teresa asked security if they had a cafeteria and the guard directed us to a restaurant on the corner. As soon as Teresa stepped inside she decided for some reason she didn’t want to eat there. I led her a block away to the hotel where she had salmon and I had a beef wrap. It’s a shame they enlarged the hotel then the pandemic hit. We only saw one other couple at another table while we were there.

(Photo from main dining room looking towards the "kitchen".)

Teresa noted the sky was getting dark and we’d rather be in the clinic if it rains instead of this hotel so we left post haste. We were seated at the clinic by 1:30.

I received a text from Alcala confirming my July payment but they also mentioned something about an outstanding balance. Teresa called them then told me the rent went up.

Me: When? Teresa: January.

Me: Why did they wait 6 months to tell me? Teresa: no answer.

Anyway, tomorrow I have to put an additional 411,696 pesos in their account and starting October 30^th I have to increase the payments by 30,166 pesos.

We were finally called into a consultation room at 2:50. The doctor (intern?) asked a number of questions and didn’t like the fact I’ve been taking Omega 3 capsules. It sounded like we may have to reschedule my surgery for 2 weeks. He called my urologist who cleared me for the surgery. He had me weigh myself and I was 80 kilos same as before the pandemic. (They say muscle weighs more than fat so there.) I am scheduled for surgery at 10am and am supposed to arrive at the hospital by 8am. We went across the street to another office where I paid 8,000,000 pesos ($2120) for the surgical room, instruments, private room, etc.

We caught a taxi outside the hospital but the driver said he didn’t know how to get to El Tesoro mall. He dropped us off at the Prado metro station and after asking a couple other drivers we found one to take us to the mall. The driver said there were protests going on at Avenida Oriental (Avenida Poblado downtown) so he took the highway to Calle 10 and we went uphill from there.

At my urologist’s office I paid 8,000,000 pesos in cash for the doctors’ fee.

Teresa looked in Zara but I guess nothing changed from yesterday so we went to J&C Delicias for supper. She wondered if they had any good movies playing so we stopped in Cinemark. The only movie possible was Fast & Furious 273 (or some similar number) so we declined. I stuck around long enough for an attendant to assist me with downloading the correct app. At the taxi stand we could finally see we’d had some rain while we were inside. Again traffic was slow and we returned to the apt 45 minutes later.

I completed registration for the Cinemark app and it says, “No theatres are found near you”. (Well, one of piece of information they wanted was zipcode but they only allowed 5-digits and here they are 6 digits so…)

At 9pm the Desafio program ended and I heard opera playing by the porteria. At 9:15 I started hearing thunder and at 9:30 I noticed it was raining.

 

The New York Times’ 7-day average of new daily infections and deaths has the US with 11,310 ð 11,672 ð 11,985 new cases and 304 ð 314 ð 311 new deaths.

Per Medellin Guru, as of yesterday Colombia has a total of 4,027,016 ð 4,060,013 ð 4,092,746 cases with 101,947 ð 102,636 ð 103,321 deaths.  Medellin has 341,100 ð 343,153 ð 345,129 cases, an increase of 2,053 cases from June 24^th to 25^th. Envigado has a total of 26,645 cases, an increase of 94 from June 24^th to 25^th. (The increases aren’t correct but I don’t feel like doing the math.)

 

T-shirt of the day

Buy less, choose wisely.