When  I got home the other day, I checked all the plumbing connections I had made. Everything was dry! I was most worried about the ones at the bottom, where I had to deal with a constant drip of water while I was putting the fittings together. 

The old broken water softener was a box-shaped thing that sat in the depression just in front of the jumbled TV cables. (That's another mess I need to untangle. A lot of those cables are no longer connected and need to come down.)

In case you're wondering, the water comes from the well pump through the pipe covered by the leaf. It goes up the right side, through the filter, and down the left into the ground. If I ever need to change to a different type of filter or a water softener, I can turn off the valves on the filter pipes and open the one at the bottom, and the water will go straight from the pump into the house (which is what it was doing before I installed this filter). That way we can still have water while I work on the plumbing. Those lumps on the two vertical pipes are universal joints, which let me disconnect the filter without cutting the pipes. (Whoever installed the old water softener had put universal joints on the wrong side of the cutoff valves, so they didn't do any good.)

This filter is supposed to condition the water as well as clean it. I haven't tried drinking the water yet because I wanted to wait for some of the sediment to wash out of the pipes. I need to ask Alicia if she notices any difference when she washes her hair or showers. 

By installing an Aquios filter in this simple housing instead of buying the full Aquios unit, I saved $360. I can't see that the Aquios unit is anything more than a fancy filter housing. This filter is supposed to remove VOCs and sediment down to 1 micron, which is nearly as good as a ceramic filter.

 

Last night Alicia and I drove down to Sarasota for dinner at Yoder's with Beth, her mom, and her sister. We had no trouble recognizing each other.

Beth commented on how tall I am. I think she's just short. (I used to wear this tie to my daughter Abigail's band concerts. Aaand I see my buttons, tie, and belt form a face.)


Alicia was struck by the similarity of Beth's sister to her own sister Esperanza, especially their sense of humor.


 

Their mom Mildred is also hilarious in her own quiet way.

Here she's ducking to get out of my photograph of the restaurant.


I knew Beth was sweet, but I had no idea how much she laughs.

The cashier asked if we coordinated our outfits on purpose. Yeah. It's a small sacrifice I make in the name of love.

The photo Beth took was way better than the one with my camera.


If you go to Yoder's, stay away from the country-fried steak, which was horrid. The smoked ham, on the other hand, was wonderful.


Beth was the third Xangan I've met in person. @Ideaguy came through Dallas a year or two ago, and I had a beer with @Bricker59 in Toronto last fall. Keep me in mind if you travel to this part of the world, or if I visit yours.

 

Beth's going to be in Sarasota, which is about an hour from here!

I think we'll eat at the Mennonite restaurant. I last ate there in August of 1979, after my epic summer traveling in Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru. (When we drove by the restaurant that day, some girls were coming out. My friend Doug yelled, "Hey, fellas, how was the food?" and got flipped off in return.)

I have nothing else to say today except a bunch of blather.

The washer in our house didn't work until I changed out the part to which the hoses connect. The electrical contacts on the old part were covered with blue acid, like a car battery. Where would the acid come from?

Our bedroom had a ceiling fan but no ceiling light. I took down that fan and put up a Hunter Five-Minute fan. (It took more than five minutes.) The fan I took down will get a light kit and hang in the smallest guest bedroom, which will become the study.

Alicia has been after me to get the car washed inside and out. I don't know why I've dragged my feet. Well, maybe I do, but I don't feel like writing about it.

Still have about 70% of my stuff in boxes. We emptied four more last night: our nice Colombian dish sets, and a bunch of battered kitchenware to give away...

I got my ring back from the jeweler, with the emerald glued safely in place. I like the feel of it. Felt naked without it even though I'd only worn it a couple of days before the stone fell out.

Alicia can't find the rest of the emerald jewelry we had made for the wedding. Apparently when she got out my ring to be repaired, she decided on a better hiding place, so good that neither of us can find it.

We also need to find her I-94, a paper they supposedly gave us in Immigration when we arrived. I need it so I can file her Change of Status. I may have it in a folder in my old briefcase. I hope.

It has been very hard to stay awake at work. Last night we went to bed at 9:30, so today was better.

Wednesday I took Alicia to a doctor's appointment, got Florida car insurance, and then got my Florida license and tags for the car. Insurance is over twice what it was in Texas. The tags were incredibly expensive. Apparently here people hang onto them for a lifetime and move them from car to car, like some kind of heirloom.

I also found out Wednesday that the house I'm selling in Dallas has to be insured by a different company for more than twice the cost, now that it's vacant. Another ridiculous expense. If it doesn't sell soon I'm going to be in deep weeds.

Love can be expensive. But oh so worth it...

 

My home page teases me with glimpses
of Friends no longer here:

NairobiPaul had a page just so he could comment on mine
Ian's Incinerator, tantalizing glimpses from Down Under
I never got to see what JacksonCroon's leg really looked like
Will Kathy ever post more poems?
Pass the Aura, gone to greener blogging pastors (a little wordplay there)
Some of Xanga's best fiction can still be seen at poosywhistle
Godfather Mike's Friday Funnies kept me going many a sleepy workday
There are some inactive friends I can't remember why I had
I saw Addy in Neeka1's photos not long ago, so I know she's alive
Nance probably still likes cats
Old Hat gave excellent advice: "Do not urinate anywhere near an electric fence."
JustAnotherStatistic, cryptic and fascinating
DickDoctor, a brilliantly funny Canadian
Lifeonacitybusem4's future looked very bright, last I heard
Nathanael posted great photos and great theological questions
Lovelyinsights must have run out of them
Sohopurple's last was a long post about towels
Binglebot was amazing and absolutely hilarious
GrampaDavid was interned with Eric Liddell in China during WW2

I was not the most faithful reader or commenter, but I miss these and dozens of other former Xangans, including my kids. Reminds me of an old song:

I think this is one of Silvio Rodriguez's loveliest songs. Translation and original lyrics below the video.

If I didn’t believe in the madness of the mockingbird’s throat

If I didn’t believe that trills and terror hide in the woods

If I didn’t believe in scales, in the logic of balance

If I didn’t believe in delirium

If I didn’t believe in hope

If I didn’t believe in what I accomplish

If I didn’t believe in my path

If I didn’t believe in my sound

If I didn’t believe in my silence
What would I be

What would a sledgehammer be without a quarry

A jumble of cords and tendons

A mess of flesh and wood

An instrument with no better splendor

than little lights mounted for the stage

What would I be, my love

What would a sledgehammer be without a quarry

A spokesman for the traitor who applauds

A waiter who serves up the past in a new wineglass

A priest of the gods of dusk

Delight boiled up with rags and lentils

What would I be, my love, what would I be

What would a sledgehammer be without a quarry

What would I be, my love, what would I be

What would a sledgehammer be without a quarry

If I didn’t believe in the hardest things

If I didn’t believe in desire

If I didn’t hold to my beliefs

If I didn’t believe in something pure

If I didn’t believe in every wound

If I didn’t believe in the woman who waits

If I didn’t believe in what is hidden

When I make myself life’s brother

If I didn’t believe in those who listen to me

If I didn’t believe in what hurts

If I didn’t believe in what remains

If I didn't believe in what struggles

What would I be…

Si no creyera en la locura de la garganta del sinsonte

si no creyera que en el monte se esconde el trino y la pavura.

Si no creyera en la balanza en la razón del equilibrio

si no creyera en el delirio

si no creyera en la esperanza.

Si no creyera en lo que agencio

si no creyera en mi camino

si no creyera en mi sonido

si no creyera en mi silencio
que cosa fuera
que cosa fuera la maza sin cantera

un amasijo hecho de cuerdas y tendones

un revoltijo de carne con madera

un instrumento sin mejores resplandores

que lucecitas montadas para escena

que cosa fuera, corazón, que cosa fuera

que cosa fuera la maza sin cantera

un testaferro del traidor de los aplausos

un servidor de pasado en copa nueva

un eternizador de dioses del ocaso

jubilo hervido con trapo y lentejuela

que cosa fuera, corazón, que cosa fuera

que cosa fuera la maza sin cantera

que cosa fuera, corazon, que cosa fuera

que cosa fuera la maza sin cantera.

Si no creyera en lo mas duro

si no creyera en el deseo

si no creyera en lo que creo

si no creyera en algo puro.

Si no creyera en cada herida

si no creyera en la que ronde

si no creyera en lo que esconde

hacerse hermano de la vida.

Si no creyera en quien me escucha

si no creyera en lo que duele

si no creyera en lo que quede

si no creyera en lo que lucha.

Que cosa fuera...

Life is very, very good. I'm living my dreams. The only thing that would improve my life is if my kids would move to Tampa.

I've been intending for over a month to upload photos and post more of our news, but it still hasn't happened. At work I have some time to write, but can't upload photos. At home there are always other priorities.

Our house is slowly coming together. The other day Alicia decorated the fireplace wall and set up a Christmas tree. We put lights in our front windows and around the door. Alicia put another tree in our room. That night we celebrated Christmas with Diego and Angelita's family.

The dining room is starting to look like something. The table and hutch are in place. On the wall hangs the lovely painting that @Oceanstarr sent, thanks to her and @WildWomanOfTheWest, @MeteorologyMan, @slmret, @plantinthewindow, @mlbnscga, @armnatmom, @BoureeMusique, and @promisesunshine. We really love it! Thank you all so much! I have taken photos of it in place, but they aren't uploaded, and in any case the downstairs wallpaper is not the ideal background. We might move it upstairs where the walls are white.

My shop is still a mess, but yesterday I did my first local handyman work, helping a friend of Diego's set up his recording studio. I cut a hole through the wall to route computer cables from his bedroom, and hung acoustic panels from the ceiling. I didn't charge him anything because he and Diego provided music at our wedding for free.

We expected visitors the other day, so we took my three old queen-size mattress sets upstairs and set up the guest rooms. Then I called to see when the guests would arrive, and it turned out they weren't coming! Oh, well, the beds needed to be set up anyway, and it's that much more junk out of the garage.

Found a great dresser at The Lighthouse, a local charity thrift store. Alicia was impressed with the quality and the price ($85).

Set up the TV and watched Brave (from Blockbuster) and Qué Bello Es Vivir (It's a Wonderful Life in Spanish, from Youtube).

Took my wedding ring with its loose emerald to a local jeweler for repair. They were hesitant to work with it (emeralds are fragile) until I told them it would be fine to use epoxy to secure the stone rather than modify the gold housing. The jeweler told me never to wear it while doing manual labor again, or he and I would both end up in the hospital with his boot up my butt. His appraisal of my ring (for the repair receipt) was more than three times what we paid for it. He said it looked like a very good emerald, and 18-kt gold is very pricey here in the US.

I wonder what the legal considerations are for bringing gold and emeralds to the US to sell. It could be lucrative but I would hate to have trouble with Customs.

I got Alicia a T-Mobile number and changed mine to a Tampa number as well. I also got internet service.

Our house has a well, and the water softener apparently died some time ago, so the faucets and drains are caked with minerals. A comment on Amazon pointed out that the cheapest salt-free water conditioner (catalytic type) is nothing more than a glorified filter, so instead of ordering the whole system, I bought a cheap filter housing and a fancy VOC-eliminating water-conditioning one-micron filter, at a total cost of $120 instead of $500. It will provide filtered water for the whole house, and should prevent scaling and possibly reduce existing scale. I'll have to replace the filter once or twice a year.

It has been humbling to realize how shabby much of my stuff is. We've gotten rid of at least half of my old kitchen paraphernalia. There's other things that we'll use until we can afford to replace them. My wardrobe likewise has gone through a complete transformation in the past couple of years. Most of what I wear was made in Colombia. A number of my t-shirts are now officially rags or cat bedding.

You should see my closets. (I use the ones in our bedroom.) Alicia is a meticulous organizer. She uses two guestroom closets for her own clothes, shoes, and purses. It's convenient to have a big house.

Alicia and I ushered in 2012 dancing on the street in Medellín. Tonight we will be in Miami at her cousin Raul Rosero's house, along with Diego and Angela and their girls and a bunch of people I don't know. Apparently Raul throws quite a party.

Right after work this afternoon, I'll drive south on I-475 to meet Alicia and Diego and Angela at the Ellenton outlet mall on I-75, where I'll leave my van and join them for the trip to Miami. I asked Alicia if I should wear my New Year's Eve party clothes to work or plan to change in the evening. She said just to wear them to work.

So I'm sitting in my cube in a tailor-made red silk shirt.

Have a wonderful New Year's celebration, and a most blessed 2013! I appreciate all of you.

Tim

I mentioned before that Alicia's sister Angela's mother-in-law met her husband at the von Trapp family lodge. Alvaro and Caroline worked at the lodge and sang with the von Trapp family choir during their courtship. They got married and established an artsy family of their own in Colombia. Their son Diego became Colombia's premier cellist, first chair in the orchestra, and head of the music department at the Universidad de Antioquia. Here in Tampa he teaches music in the Brandon schools, gives private lessons, and plays a lot of gigs on the side.

Angelita is a musician in her own right. She and Alicia used to go to the studio after school, still in uniform, and record choruses for the famous vallenato group Binomio de Oro. Later she had a group that performed Brazilian music. Once her bandmates persuaded her to go with them to sing for a friend's birthday party. The friend turned out to be Pablo Escobar. She refused to sing, and spent her time at his mansion trying to get a taxi home, while her bandmates snorted coke.

So the Villa family has a lot of music in their genes. The older daughter Sara Elisa is an amazing classical vocalist. She did a couple of concerts in Colombia this fall and blew her audiences away. The younger daughter, Ana Isabel, has perfect pitch and is good at all aspects of music. The family sings Christmas carols together every year. Here's a sample:

This is what led to our spending the evening of December 24 at a novena at the local Colombian restaurant, Cali Viejo, instead of peacefully at home. I'll post more about it when I get a chance to upload my videos and photos.

Happy Boxing Day, y'all.

 

 

Merry Christmas, y'all! I hope you're having a most blessed time.

I'm going to tell you about how we got the cats from Medellín to Tampa, because I just uploaded those pictures.

Late in the afternoon two days before we were due to leave, we discovered that Spirit wouldn't carry pets. So the next day, I began calling shipping companies to see if they handled live animals. One company (which had quoted an absurd price to ship Alicia's belongings) had someone who handled animals.

The lady quoted me a price of $475 for one animal crate. "But if you can consolidate with another shipment, it's only $275," she said. "And I have a shipment going tomorrow." Amazing! The day we were traveling ourselves.

She instructed me to be at the cargo area of the airport the next morning at 6:00, with the two cats in a crate.

I went out and bought a largish all-plastic crate at Home Center, which is the Home Depot in Medellín. After I assembled it, it fell off the stack of boxes and broke two hinges!

The hinges are simple plastic pins on each corner of the door that fit into locking slots in the crate. To fix them, I drilled through the corner of the door and through the middle of the pin, then ran a screw through the holes. I also added epoxy for good measure, leaving those two pins far stronger than they were originally.

Unfortunately I didn't take a photo of the repair, which I consider one of my best ever.

A veterinarian came by in the evening and wrote up bills of health for both cats. Can you imagine getting house service from a vet in the US? I think we paid him $18 per cat. We put some used t-shirts of Juan Manuel's in the crate so the cats would smell something familiar.

We were up until 2:30 packing. (We brought something like 14 suitcases with Alicia's stuff.) I slept until 4:30. Alicia fortunately was able to catch both cats easily. We stuffed them into the carrier and called a cab. Alicia went back to bed and I lugged the cats down the four flights of stairs to my taxi.

The taxi stopped for gas on our way to the airport. It was a fancy little vehicle that ran on either gasoline or natural gas. In this case, he refilled the natural gas. I had never seen a car refuel under the hood. (There are no self-service gas stations in Colombia.) It ran with as much pep on natural gas as on gasoline.

We got to the freight terminal a little before 6:00. Some of the staff told us that the animals usually shipped from the Tampa Cargo dock, so we parked there. That's the cab on the left.

We were right next to the main airport. The terminal is on the right.

My driver invited me to have coffee with him at a little kiosk across the parking lot. He looks like a hit man but is a very nice guy.

Finally the animal people arrived. They had seven crates with dogs, most of them puppies from a local breeder. One lady had her personal dog there as well, a huge animal in a huge crate. The man in charge had me change out the t-shirts for shredded newspaper, and sold me a gerbil water bottle to strap to the door. He also showed me how to write a label and how to organize the paperwork.

Ruta was not at all happy to be locked in a crate.

They took the crates into the warehouse. After a few minutes, I got called inside to remove the cats for inspection.

Ruta hated my guts. I had never petted her, because she hissed and clawed at me whenever I got close. However, in this case she let me reach in the cage, pull her out, and hold her spreadeagled while the inspector looked her over. I was amazed.

Fortuna had also always run away whenever I got close to her, but she also let me pull her out and hold her.

Finally around 7:30, my driver and I headed back for the city. The cats would be flying out at around 10:00, and arriving in Miami before 2:00.

Our flight was that afternoon at 3:00. We landed at Ft. Lauderdale at around 6:30, and spent an hour getting through customs and immigration. A shuttle took us to the lot where I had left my van, and then we headed south to Miami.

The lady who receives the animals in Miami had taken the cats to her house, since it was well after working hours. We found the place without much trouble, paid her for some US fees and for boarding the cats for the evening, and put the cat crate in the car.

After supper at Boston Market, we took off for Tampa. I drove most of the way, with an hour to sleep while Alicia's sister Angela drove. We got to Tampa at 2:30 a.m. and let the cats out in the lanai around the pool. They seemed no worse for wear.

Amazingly, Ruta has sometimes been friendly to me in the US. She'll brush against my legs and let me pet her. Other times she hisses and swipes as usual. There's no telling. She found the move from Angela's house to ours far more traumatic than the move from Colombia. She was very grumpy for several days, but seems to be calming down again.

I promised puppy pictures, and here they are. This guy was at the airport ready to be shipped.

We're having a great but interesting Christmas ourselves. Most of my stuff is still in boxes in the garage. Alicia finally got the tree decorated yesterday. This morning was a rehearsal, and tonight we and the in-laws are singing for a novena at the local Colombian restaurant (Cali Viejo). Afterwards we might drive out to St. Petersburg for a Bach mass for which Diego is playing cello.

Colombian Christmas is celebrated the 24th, and they usually have a pork roast and buñuelos and natilla. We had natilla and buñuelos the other day and will no doubt have them again soon. But tomorrow I'm going to make a turkey dinner.

My life is extremely good, and my gripes are small:

Tampa traffic. Closed lanes on both of the major routes through downtown mean either half an hour of crawling or getting up an hour earlier to avoid rush hour.

Tampa traffic lights. They don't seem to do the traffic studies that they did back in Texas to avoid those stupid situations where it takes three light changes to get through an intersection.

Trains. On my way home the other day, a train crawled through an intersection and stopped, blocking US-60, the main artery of Brandon and Valrico, at 4:30 p.m.

Handsfree faucets. Most airports and my new office john have them, and they suck. I soap my hands and wave them fruitlessly until I get a brief trickle of water. Sometimes it takes changing sinks to be able to wash.

Handsfree towel dispensers. There's an oval marked "Wave" on the front of each. I feel like a mime as I make magical gestures in front of the dispensers. Eventually one of them (usually the one on the right) will spit out a towel.

Soggy soap. I haven't gotten one of those hanging racks for my shower yet, so the soap sits down by the tub and gets soaked.

Low-wall cubicles. If I fall asleep I'm in plain view. (Of course, my snoring would probably give me away in any case.)

Doors that open out. In our new house, the doors to the garage and back porch both open out. I'm finally getting used to them.

Poorly placed light switch. The garage light switch is 18 inches from the door frame, but the garage door opener is right next to the trim. Should be the other way around.

Other than these things, my life is very, very, very fine these days.

 

Our original plan for our Tampa wedding was to use our new house, since we were only expecting a couple of dozen guests. However, when our closing date was postponed, we considered Plan B (Alicia's sister's house) and finally settled on Plan C: Angela's mother-in-law's church, which was kindly made available to us for a modest fee.

The two family weddings were performed by one of my dad's dearest friends, Elías, who was one of dad's students in the Universidad de Antioquia counseling program in the early 1970s. He had been a friar but left his order over differences of opinion about what he should study and what he should do with his life. After my folks moved to the US, Elías handled their financial affairs in Colombia, and still handles my dad's university pension for my dad's widow.

Elías is not licensed to perform weddings, so we planned to have a civil ceremony on the Friday before the church wedding. However, while we were arranging to borrow the church building, the pastor offered to marry us, so we figured we might as well let him. We went to the county office to get the license, and learned that to be married by the clerk would cost $30.

That night we went to see the church building. The pastor showed us around. We arranged to meet him Friday morning so he could get to know us, and then to return in the afternoon after the house closing so he could marry us.

When I asked him what we should pay him for performing the wedding, he said, "I've been paid anywhere from $100 to $700. What is your marriage worth to you?" He went on to tell about someone he had married who had sent him and his wife on a two-week vacation to an island resort in the Caribbean.

Needless to say, I felt very awkward. I didn't say anything at the time, but when I told Alicia about it later that night, she immediately agreed that it was very strange, not to mention manipulative. After some rumination, she suggested I tell him that a couple of things had come up with regard to our house purchase (which was true; $100+ is a lot of money when you're paying nearly every cent you have in closing costs), and that we had decided to get married by the clerk instead.

So Friday morning I called him an hour before we were scheduled to meet. He offered to do just a brief ceremony like the clerk would do, or to officiate along with Elias at our Saturday wedding. I thanked him and said again that we would be married by the clerk.

We went to the house closing, and then gathered up my kids and Maritza and Angela and went to the county office. The ceremony was surprisingly dignified and pleasant.

Later Angela's husband Diego talked with the pastor about logistics for our Saturday wedding. The pastor seemed upset at our backing out. He said, "Was it about the money?" He also sounded miffed that I had cancelled at the last minute. "I get up at 4:00 to plan my day," he said, implying that we had thrown a monkey wrench into his plans. He talked about the sacramental aspect of marriage, implying that a civil wedding was inferior.

We had a most delightful wedding on Saturday afternoon. The church building was perfect for our group, and nicely decorated for Christmas. Our reception went on late into the night, with lots and lots of music.

A week later on Sunday night, we were back at the church for a potluck and musical event in which Diego and Angela and their daughters and his mom performed. (Diego's folks met at the Von Trapp family lodge in Vermont, by the way.) The pastor waved to me, but didn't say a word.