Time sure flies...

 So many years have come and gone - so many changes. I'm not going to try to make sense of it all. Just starting fresh! I understand there is something new called "Grandfluencers." That is, grandparent-aged influencers who younger folks are flocking to for advice, information, and a sense of history. I may give it a shot and start a YouTube channel called "What to do with Grandma Sue." It will take a lot of work and a lot of self-educating to get something worth publishing, but I'm going to have the time to give it a whirl. You see, I will be retiring in six months, and will need to keep my hand in the game, if you will. It will be a good time to get back to writing - even if I'm just writing my own scripts for making videos. Ooh - I'll need to make sure I know how to capture and create a video from my cell phone. No sense in getting any fancier than that, since it seems to be the new normal. That's wnough for now - I really just wanted to be sure I could still link to my site and all that!

Merry Christmas to all!

The Vacation Effect is Gone

Two weeks in the tropics - it's over.
Back to work, back home, back in the fracas.
The effects of the vacation are definitely gone.

Palapa #16

Choosing where to sit at the beach can be confusing, so I always pick a favorite number, today it was #16. I pulled the beach chair into the shadiest portion to protect my pearly pale pegs, draped my sarong over the headrest, pulled out my Kindle, and settled in for an hour or so of vacating. (Isn't that the verb for vacation?) After a bit, I glanced down and spied two eight-legged neighbors... One welcome, the other, not so much. Perched on the leg of the plastic table, where my umbrella drink was also perched, was a small spider.
He looked very much like the ones at home we call 'jumping spiders,' so I watched him carefully, daring him to come closer. He crept down a few inches, to the right a few inches, down a little more. I think he was trying to avoid the brisk sea breeze. Suddenly, he did indeed jump away from the table leg... Toward me! Fortunately, the sea breeze caught him, and he landed in the sand and scurried off.
I thought perhaps my other visitor would chase him down for a snack, but he was unperturbed. Wedged in between the post of the palapa and the ash can, the crab was busy watching me watch him (her?). This was not a little ghost crab or a fiddler crab, not sure what type it was, really. Slightly smaller than a Dungeness crab, I suspect he was of the tasty variety, hiding from the shore birds. Just as I was wondering how to tell where he was looking with those 'eyes-on-a-post,' he started walking. Slowly, he crept out (sideways, of course) and made a circuit of the ash can. He stopped and stared at me for a few moments, ducked under the shade of my lounge chair, then took up post again - literally. At the base of the post again... watching me with those round, black eyes.
We peacefully coexisted until the sun started creeping up on my toes, threatening to scorch them. I took my leave of my friend from Palapa #16, and dunked my grateful toes into the Caribbean, followed swiftly by the rest of me.
Ah, vacation...

Don't hate me because I'm on vacation and you aren't.

It's our annual holiday in Mexico. We arrived at our fabulous resort yesterday, after driving all over Cancun trying to find Costco. (To pick up a few essentials to stock the villa.) So hilarious... Driving in circles, not sure if the Oxxo on the right is the same one we passed on the left twenty minutes earlier... Passing the Chedraui on each of the bordering streets... Finding ourselves stuck on a dead-end in a sketchy neighborhood... Getting hungry... Not arguing really, but not agreeing on which way to go either. I would love to see our track from overhead, like a gps cartoon view or something. Finally stopped at a farmacia for directions to the airport, since that was on our way out of Cancun to the resort, and we were pretty sure we could communicate that much in Spanish. The kindly gentleman used register paper to make a map of sorts, drawing stoplights and arrows. Wasn't too complicated, fortunately we only had to make one turn to get on the right road. The funniest part... You can guess... We finally found Costco!
After picking up coffee, crackers, cheese, salami, bacon, eggs, wine, etc, we headed south to Playa del Carmen. Driving through the pouring rain in the dark was not exactly the journey we had planned, but arrived safe and sound. So good to be back! The little store on premises supplied us with juice and milk to round out the sparse larder. We like to cook a little when we are here, and eat out a lot! After all, it IS vacation! Polished off the first bottle of wine and called it a night.
Spent some time on the beach this morning and enjoyed our favorite grouper sandwiches for lunch. Lazy afternoon spent sleeping off the day of travel and reviewing the resort activity schedule, then a visit to the spa to schedule massage time & pick up a pass for the gym. Finished the book I started on the airplane, and we're off to dinner at La Palapa! I'm starting to unwind :)

Politics, Black Diamond style

We had a local candidate forum at the Lake Sawyer Community Club this week. All of the candidates for the local election came out, along with over a hundred local voters. Since I am a board member at the LSCC, I got to help with the planning, set up, and running of the meeting.

There was social time with glad-handing before the meeting got started, complete with coffee, tea & cookies. Folks greeted their neighbors and the candidates amicably, and some of the city council members whose seats were not up for election this term also came to join the group.

We had prepared four questions ahead of time and provided them to the candidates, and the Q&A proceeded at a good pace. With eight politicians answering each one, we allotted three minutes each for each topic. Then we had a few questions from the floor that were also presented, all targeted at the mayoral candidates. You can learn a lot about someone in a series of sound bites... For instance, (and of course, these are just my observations) the incumbent mayor barely looked up at the crowd or the rest of the panel when someone else was speaking, but was diligent about making eye contact when it was her turn. She gave the impression that the paperwork in front of her was filled with official business and much more important than the proceedings at the clubhouse. This was just another meeting on her calendar, another blip on the radar. Her opponent was well-prepared also, but in contrast, was constantly in touch with his eyes and face while the others spoke, allowing his expression to play around the room and show exactly what he thought of what was being said, almost in a comic way. Switching from smug to shocked to that sadly disappointed shaking of the head, he was using theatrics to communicate his opinion of the candidates. At one point he actually waved papers at the incumbent mayor and raised his voice over the issue. It seemed childish, and I was disappointed, picturing his posturing in the same manner at business meetings and during official functions.

The other candidates displayed their personalities on stage also, from seedy doofus to over-the-top slick, elderly, long-time resident to young, fresh faced newbie. They all had one thing in common- they purported to know what is best for our little community, and had answers to the big issues we are facing: How do we assimilate over 6000 new residents when the big PUD subdivision gets underway? How can we preserve the water quality of Lake Sawyer for our enjoyment and maintain the property value of those living on the water? What can be done about traffic control when there are thousands of new commuters making their way from the foothills into the cities? What are our options for preserving open spaces and how can we balance that with the need for parks and recreation services?

Our little town is going to grow - that is unavoidable. How that growth is managed will be critical to the health of our community. We have a long history of budget shortfalls, overspending, and non-responsiveness to the community. All of the residents deserve to have their voices heard, and each opinion matters. I pray for our city leaders, and hope that they will move forward as representatives of the voters here in this little slice of heaven we call Black Diamond.