Wednesday, October 5, 2022

Last night I went to bed at 10pm, fell asleep quickly, got up once at 2:15, finally waking up at 5:45 and giving/getting up at 6:30.

Today is Teresa’s 64^th birthday. Happy Birthday Teresa.

I reminded Teresa of our 7pm reservation at Rocoto tonight. She asked me if I told them it was her birthday but I hadn’t so she was relieved.

MT called from our porteria, I ordered a Didi car for them and Teresa left at 7:15.

I had just updated my blog when Teresa called at 8:10 and informed me they were done already and asked me to meet them at Los Portenos for breakfast. I quickly shaved, dressed, and left the apt 20 minutes later. I arrived first and had just ordered a small latte when they arrived. This is a Halloween wall they have set up.

The total check came to 78,339 pesos ($17). The ladies had left to return to their respective apts when I gave our waitress 2 50s and 350pesos in change. It took a while, but she returned with 2 20s, a 5, a 2, a 1mil coin and some other small change. I separated on the table what I was owed: 2 20s and 2mil from what belonged to the restaurant: the 5mil bill, 1mil coin, and the change. Eventually the other waitress came over and asked if I needed something. I explained I’m a mathematician and I explained the difference between what I was owed and what I received. She called over my waitress and they had a discussion and I think my waitress gave me change based on another bill. Anyway, I got that corrected, was thanked for my honesty and I left.

Being such a cool morning, to avoid Parva’s ceiling fans, I went to Eduardo Madrid for another latte and read some more from my new book. I’m almost finished with it.

I bought 2 bags of milk on the way back to the apt.

I started watching season 9 of Alive (8.4) on MTV. It’s good but it’s slow because I’m experiencing a lot of buffering.

About 6pm is when a downpour started.

Teresa was very tired and almost backed out of our dinner tonight.

Every few minutes while she was getting dressed I would ask her if I could start ordering a car. I figured it would be more difficult to get one during rush hour especially since it’s raining. Finally, at 6:35 she gave me the go-ahead.

I checked Didi and they were asking for 22mil. I figured I still wouldn’t be able to catch a car so I switched to InDriver. First there was an update I had to install – they changed their name to InDrive. They probably should have made it InRide. I offered 25mil for a ride but no takers. I kept increasing the bid by 500 pesos up to 30mil but still no takers. I went back to Didi and requested a car. Just before their 8-minute countdown elapsed they gave me a car, cancelled it a minute later, and started searching again. Finally they gave me a car for 12mil and to help ensure I would keep it I texted the driver I would pay him 20mil.

I took our large umbrella but by the time we left the apt it had stopped raining.

We arrived at Rocoto just 20 minutes late. We were surprised that our table had birthday balloons on it. I wanted to ask her who she told that we were having her birthday dinner here tonight but by the time I got their wifi password my battery was down to 15% and the translator didn’t work, probably due to interference from their music.

There was a table of 4 behind us, 2 gringos and 2 Colombianas, speaking mainly English. At one point I heard a little shriek from the lady behind me. Appears the waiter, while serving beers, dripped some water on her.

Teresa had her usual salmon with a limonada de coco which she deemed too sweet so she ordered a bottle of water. I had their lomo saltado and a limonada de coco and only found 2 pieces of beef that were too tough to chew. The total bill with tip came to 136,950 ($30).

This time I had no trouble ordering a Didi to return us to the apt.

Today I only had about 2,600 steps.

My leaking doesn’t seem to be improving and may even be getting worse. I haven’t used my TENS 3000 unit in awhile and that may be the cause. I’ll have to start using it more religiously.

 

Fun pix