Counting Down

Counting down, but not necessarily to Christmas...those days with the youngsters have finally faded. I have been busily preparing for two trips! Tomorrow, Chris and I drive to Panama City to finally endure the process of obtaining our Panama drivers licenses. On Wednesday afternoon we will visit the Canadian Embassy/Consulate to verify/authenticate our Canadian licenses, then on Thursday, we will be off to visit a lab for blood work including typing, and  then see a Doctor for written permission for Chris to drive as he is so old! We will also visit the authorities to have photos taken and finally, with papers in hand, receive our licenses. If anything occurs differently, I'll catch you up next entry! All this will be aided enormously by a driver called Sergio who for $12 per hour will conduct us from location to location, guiding us through the process. He has also agreed to then drive me to the Tocumen Airport on Friday morning while Chris drives himself back to Pedasi.

On Friday, December 13th (guess I am not superstitious after all!) I'm off to Canada to visit with family and friends over the holidays. I have a huge suitcase packed with goodies plus a smaller case for my meagre winter clothing. There is a small winter wardrobe including boots and shoes, in storage awaiting my visit. Here I go once more - lugging big suitcases all over three airports each way, probably getting lost at San Francisco's huge complex again, and continually asking for assistance. Why folks think a little gal like me can lift all that weight beats me! Ho Hum...

Meanwhile,back at the hacienda, the rain has been pelting down, trying to flood us  out. The roof didn't leak, but just about everything else did! Our patio was completely flooded and the water rising so fast did little to dispel any anxiety about the house getting flooded too! Since two homes near us recently had their lots raised several feet, the water flow across our back yard has increased and altered enough to cause a BIG problem. Steve alleviated some of the problem with his 6 inch drainage pipe around the pool, but that system cannot handle the huge amount of water that poured across our yard! I talked with our site manager today, and he is quickly onto addressing this issue on our behalf. Our heartfelt thanks go to our pal for his caring attitude! Another piece of grief arose lately with our refrigerator (one year old!) deciding to no longer freeze or chill...we threw out a lot of food, and now Pedro is helping us once more to enforce the warranty. This isn't actually his job, and I hope he does not get into any trouble over this, but without him, we would be sunk (no pun intended!).

Meanwhile, I did manage to decorate a pretty decent tree with turquoise and acid green ornaments and it looks ok...Mitzi climbs the tree daily and extracting her is an act of delicacy. If I have to redecorate again, well....what is it with cats and Christmas trees? She continues to be a little devil and so obviously loves confounding me! Between 'fetch' every night, chasing her tail, and her tapping my ankles as I go by, I think I may have the world's first 'dat' or 'cog'!! Cagney seems positively angelic in comparison. However, he had, and still has, some marvellous idiosyncracies of his own that defy logic.

Chris and I will celebrate his birthday while in the City, and I come back on New Year's Eve so we can have a fiesta with pals Don and Connie. We all struggled to stay up until midnight last year, but maybe I can nap on the plane home - HAH!