Saturday, January 18, 2025

Friday, January 17, 2025

Last night I went to bed at 10, got up once during the night, finally waking/getting up at 5:30.

A comment I found this morning from Expat (lightly edited): “Your credit card may not exclude you. Some do, some don’t. There can be other problems. Many expats try to hang on to the illusion they are US residents, for example by having forwarding addresses in the US. So, your driving license comes up for renewal in your old state and you can apply for it online so you renew it. But if you aren’t a resident in the state (say using someone else’s address) how legal is that renewal? Now, generally when things are going well, nothing bad happens. You turn up at the rental counter, they look at the credit card and license and just let you rent the car. But, if you are in an accident and the other insurance company is looking for an out, they’ll dig into stuff. Then they’ll see if they can move the liability to you. Most expats do stuff like this and 99% of the time there are no issues. But it’s something for every expat to be wary of. It’s like you changed the telephone number on your credit card account while asking for an increase. The bank may well be able to tell that is not a normal telephone. And you’re applying from Colombia (or using a VPN) and their security department can get twitchy (some banks won’t process changes or issue cards for a period after a change of personal details). Hopefully everything goes smoothly, but sometimes just springing for the expensive auto rental insurance which allows you to just walk away if there’s an issue isn’t as dumb as it seems.”

One clarification, the bank I changed my phone number for (Capital One) is different than the bank for my credit card (USAA).

So, those 6 bottles of 60 Calendula flower capsules that arrived will last me a year if I take one every day. Since I haven’t had any osteoarthritis pain in my back, maybe I don’t need to take them that often. On the other hand, I see they have an expiration date of “12/26” so I should try to make them last only 2 years. So, I think I’ll take one every M/W/F and they should last me just over 2 years.

For quite some time (years?) I’ve been receiving phone calls and text messages threatening me to pay my Claro Hogar bill. The problem is I don’t have Claro Hogar and never have. This latest message addressed me as “Leidy” so obviously someone else previously had my phone number or Claro has just mixed up the accounts.



I left the apt at 7:45 and actually encountered a number of pedestrians on the way to Smartfit. I guess this is the time when kids go to school and some people are walking to their jobs.

I completed my workout (busier than usual) then went to Ganso y Castor for coffee. I ran into Stacey and we chatted a bit. He has a one bedroom apt across Calle 30 which costs about $1100 a month. This is a good photo of the new Colombian police uniforms.



I called USAA about my request to increase my credit card limit from $500 to $5000 (even though I would probably be okay with just $1500). The rep told me they don’t try to increase it to a specific amount but they will see what increase I qualify for. She asked me a couple questions then submitted an online request and came back and told me I’ve been approved for a credit card limit of $6,500. 😊 Now, not only can I put the auto rental on my credit card with USAA discounts but we may stay a few days longer.

Hey Bart, want to meet at Johnnie’s Beef or Mr. Beef for Italian Beef sandwiches?

Jack & Arlene: I thought we might meet at the Rivers Casino but is it true they no longer have the buffet?

I left the apt at 2:30 and walked to Eduardo Madrid bakery where I asked about sesame seed bagels. The woman went in back and came out with 6 freshly made bagels that she put in a paper bag because they were still too hot to put in a plastic sleeve. I left at 4:30 and returned to the apt.

I watched the first episode of Squid Game (8.0).

The weather has been beautiful lately with no rain and a high of about 82 degrees. Much more comfortable for me than when we hit 86 or 88 degrees.

I’m sad to have to report I’ve lost the dozens of funny signs, etc. I had saved on my laptop so soon it’ll be “t-shirt of the day” for a while.

 

EL ARROYO



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