Pretty Pictures of Snow Don't Make Me Feel Any Cooler

All over the internet -- the news, blogs and Facebook -- I'm seeing beautiful photos of snow piled high and ice covered lighthouses. You'd think merely looking at them would cool me off just a bit, wouldn't you? I really wish they did.

It's 91 degrees. And that's after a cooling rain! It was close to 100 degrees earlier.

I am very, VERY grateful for air conditioning. And ceiling fans. It was so hot when we got home from Cordoba yesterday that the a.c. alone wasn't cutting it, and I spread out on the bed underneath the ceiling fan. Completely wilted.

And thankful that I don't have to go back to the city for a while, since we took care of the bulk shopping that only has to be done about every three months. In fact, this should last us until our upcoming short furlough so I won't have to do that again until we get back in June.

I discovered today that I'm not the only one who sticks her oven out in the garage during the summer. We had lunch with friends, and they too have an oven out there, but theirs is a commercial size pizza oven rather than a small electric toaster oven like ours. They served a delicious meal of chicken in orange sauce, roasted potatoes and onions, and two kinds of salad. I took a fresh peach cobbler with real whipped cream for dessert.

We enjoyed four hours of conversation around the table, and I was once again reminded how different the culture is from the U.S. where we eat-and-run more often than not. The last time I remember a long leisurely meal with friends in the U.S. (that we weren't staying with) was when we had dinner with missionary friends serving in Guatemala who happened to be stateside at the same time we were, and are accustomed to a similar Latin American culture.

Ivan called Telecom again this morning. This is the company that we are waiting to connect us to both the phone system and internet. Do you remember when we moved? September 2012. It is now January 2014 and we are still waiting. This last round of waiting began when we returned from the states in the fall and Ivan got us back on the list yet again. They were supposed to have connected us by mid December. Then they said for sure by January 6. When he called this morning, they said to give them 72 hours. Any bets that nothing will happen by Friday morning? Yeah, easy money.

Even if we do get it, we're not expecting any great service. Our neighbor's internet has been down more often than it's up, and ALL internet, no matter the provider, slowed to a crawl on January 1. That's when the tourists arrived en masse, overburdening an already inadequate system. We can expect that to continue through March. It sure would be nice to sit in the casita and use the internet. We had been able to do that on a limited basis, using our phones (that have 3G) as a hotspot. But since January 1 and the slowdown, that's been impossible.

I continue to enjoy the photos of Simon that Kyle and Tina post on Facebook or send us via email. I've saved most of them to my computer and Ivan keeps coming in to find me with the computer open, just gazing at the photos. I'm completely smitten. We enjoyed Skyping with Tina on Sunday, although Simon decided that was a good time to take a nap and zonked out for most of it. Still, just seeing his precious little face was sufficient for this Nona.

We had hoped to get Taní and his crew to get started on the exterior wall of the garage that needs to be done before we paint the inside. But it turns out Taní went to Paraguay to visit family and we're not sure when he's getting back. So that project is on hold, unless we can track down his son, Guillermo, who didn't go (we don't think). So far we haven't been successful in finding him though.

But we did talk to the drywall guy about getting started on the portion of the garage ceiling that he can reach. Which isn't much, just one sheet across, but going all the way back, on the side that just got plastered.

Poco a poco.

I found it interesting that it was colder today in Atlanta, Georgia, than in Anchorage, Alaska -- or Moscow! I'm sure our friends in the south are not enjoying the blast of arctic air, since most are not prepared for that kind of cold. Even our family and friends in the north can't be thrilled with the extreme weather conditions. Just stay warm and stay safe, people!