Wednesday, December 1, 2021

Recovery Day #159!

Last night I went to bed at 10pm and fell asleep quickly, got up once at 5am, did my Kegel exercises, finally waking/ getting up at 7:15am. My arm is only slightly sore, I think I’ll be able to sleep on it tonight.

I left the apt at 8:30 and took a Didi to Immigration. The driver’s name was Anderson and he lives nearby in Belen. I offered him the opportunity to wait a few minutes so he could take me back to Envigado after I pickup my new cedula but he was meeting a friend in a few minutes. The whole process of entering, waiting, receiving, signing for the new cedula took about 10 minutes. Outside, a taxi had just stopped to buy a snack from a vendor so I caught him before he left. He took me through Itagui, past Mayorista, and we took the new bridge to Avenida Las Vegas next to California Buffet.

I stopped in our neighborhood Exito and bought a jar of decaf coffee before returning to the apt.

Lenny and I left about 9:30 and walked to the mall. On the way I introduced him to Herman at his orange juice stand. Lenny exchanged some dollars $3000 for pesos. (I told him next time he should just use an ATM.) We then had coffee in Santa Leña. Being Italian, he likes expressos. We called the gals and found we will be skipping lunch but leaving for Los Patios Hostel at 1:15 so we each had another coffee with an almond croissant. We returned to the apt by taxi.

We left the apt by Didi at 1:30 and still arrived in time at Los Patios hostel. We were driven to Communa 13 where we met our tour guide, an inhabitant, Moses David. He took us up the hill explaining it’s history on the way. With my slight hearing loss + my tinnitus + his accent + the background noise, I had a difficult time hearing everything so I bought an English version of the book that explains it’s history. We had a rainstorm at one point but luckily it only lasted for 5-10 minutes. We visited a couple “art museums”, saw some break dancing, and took the outdoor escalators. 

Teresa was hungry so he took us to a family restaurant where they had fish but I, who wasn’t hungry, had a basket of patacones with a coconut lemonade. (Every time someone who paid their left a tip they beat a nearby drum.) We left just before dark and we walked straight down these back stairs, past his apt, and he connected us with our return trip driver who was a master of using Waze to navigate side streets and avoid congested traffic. At the hostel Teresa asked about Hija Mia and I believe they will be joining Glenn and I next Sunday. We walked down to Calle 10A (it’s actually Calle 11) where we quickly caught a taxi back to Envigado. Traffic was backed up before we even got to EAFIT university. I was kind of hanging out the window when at one point a woman in the car next to us said, “gracias” and I reflexively said, “mucho gusto” only realizing seconds later that she was being sarcastic because we didn’t let her enter our lane. Everyone, especially our driver, had a good laugh over that one. We finally returned to the apt by 7:45.

The 3 “lost” chess games I was concerned with, I have one loss against Chiefs523, one draw, and in the 3^rd game I’m down 2 pawns but I think I might be able to hold the position for another draw. I’m also deep in the middlegame of the next game against Chiefs523 and he made novel moves on his 17^th & 18^th moves but I think I found good replies.

Laura and Lenny left at 8:30 to check-in to their hotel.

 

The New York Times’ 7-day average of new daily infections and deaths has the US with 80,684 ð 83,120  ð 86,565new cases and 884 ð 893 ð 947 new deaths.

Per Medellin Guru, as of yesterday, Colombia has a total of 1,975 ð 2,296 ð 2,173 new cases with 36 ð 55 ð 58 new deaths. Medellin has 329 ð 493 ð 286 new cases from November 30^th to December 1^st. Envigado has 18 ð 10 ð 19 new cases from November 30^th to December 1^st.

 

T-shirt of the day

One for the history books.