Bigger breakfast - I'm less hungry later

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Interestingly, this didn't used to be this way. When I used to eat a big breakfast, I was still hungry at my regular times, but it seems something has changed.

The last three mornings, I ate my usual protein bar, but also a part of a peanut butter sandwich (leftovers from my son as the bread I made last was HUGE). Don't believe me, take a look:




That is some seriously TALLLLLL bread. I tend to make whole wheat breads the most and they don't rise as nicely, so I think my technique of mixing dough has gotten too good as now my white breads are enormous!

Anyway, I ate a bit of his PBJ and the result was that I was less hungry. Like a lot less hungry. I ate about 150 calories extra in the morning and that saved me from eating about 300-400 calories  before lunch. So, both yesterday and today, I was finally able to eat a bit under 1500 calories for the day and it wasn't a struggle.

That was Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Let's see how it goes with the week. Tomorrow will be easier as I have a blood draw and since the form didn't say if I should fast or not, I'll fast just to be sure. I won't be able to eat anything until about 10 am (or so).

And you know I'm looking forward to a blood draw, right?

If money weren't an issue, would I get surgery?

To contact us Click HERE

I was just asking myself this question after reading another thread. I know I will never have skin removal surgery because it's a moot point. It's not covered by health insurance for most people and I'm sure I would never be able to convince a doctor of it's necessity either as it doesn't hinder me or cause me problems in any way.

But I never asked myself, "well, what if money wasn't an issue?" Would I get the surgery?" And you know... I don't know. I have loose skin on my abdomen that could be taken care of by surgery and I have terrible bat wings. My inner thighs are wiggly too - not sure anything can be done about that one.

I ask myself, "Would I be willing to put up with the pain and healing for vanity?" As, for me, it would be about vanity. And, could I risk serious health side effects and even death for vanity? Again, I don't know... I'm thinking that even if everything was covered by insurance and that I didn't even have to pay a copay or deductible, I wouldn't do it.

And I think that's because I'm 42. I would probably feel differently if I were 25 or something. I'm married, plan to stay married. I'm scarred by pregnancies and my husband loves me and is happy with my body now. So... why would I risk so much? I might be willing to risk more if I had more years of feeling young and beautiful ahead of me.

Now, don't get me wrong. I don't think you need to roll over and die when you hit 50. I want to be a rocking 50! 60! and on up. I want people to say, "look at that grandma go!" But I guess I can forgive my body for having more imperfections at this age than I would have been able to do when I was much younger.

On the other hand... once in awhile I get a tickle in my brain about, "Wouldn't it be great to rock my clothes without loose skin? Wouldn't it be great to erase (or mostly erase) from my body the evidence of my fat past? But then... why did I let myself get fat in the first place? I wish I could figure that one out the most!

I'm in for it now - working with a personal trainer

To contact us Click HERE
I did an interview today with one of the people in charge of the personal trainers with the organization I work for and for where I go to the gyms. I had no idea there was so much you get when you hire a personal trainer.

So, I learned a lot about what I'll be getting very soon with the Rock Your Jeans Challenge. For the Rock Your Jeans challenge, I'll be meeting with a personal trainer once a week for 8 weeks. In the first meeting, they spend an hour doing all sorts of tests - and I mean a lot of tests. Then, in the next week, they go over everything and use that information as a baseline as well as information on things that need work (along with your wishes) to come up with a program.

I just had absolutely no idea that they took measurements, used a fancy scale (no idea how accurate it is), did a stress test, a flexibility test, a physical fitness test (to exhaustion test) as well as a test on body alignment, and more. I'm sure I'm going to find out all sorts of things I had no idea about. I hope some of it is good news and not all bad!

When you are finished, they will retest many things to see your progress. This is, of course, what makes it worth it. Even if you don't see a loss on the scale, you should see gains everywhere else - flexibility, strength, agility, well, ok, losses of inches on the measuring tape!

I'm sure for most everyone this is super embarrassing, but hey... I can't see how I got better if I don't go through it.

And, I probably wouldn't have had the courage to do this until recently, which is a shame really as I think it would have been really useful to have this service - helping me along the way so that I had more support with my weight loss journey and my fitness improvement.

I had a few people tell me it would be useful, but there were several reasons for not doing it. 1. and mostly, was that I was embarrassed with my weight and my lack of fitness. Who did that hurt? No one but me, of course.

2. Money. with me not working, it was too difficult of me to ask my husband if it was OK to spend the money on a personal trainer. Don't get me wrong, he probably would have agreed to it if I felt it would have been useful, but I would have felt guilty about it. I would have wondered, always, if I was wasting money or not during a time we were pinching pennies more than now- like "Maybe I could have done just as well on my own without spending all this money."

And I guess 3. is Fear of disappointing someone else. I didn't know what I was capable of. I was afraid of failure. And, since I am a people pleaser, I was afraid of letting down a trainer. I want to be able to live up to what they expect of me. I didn't want to find it was too hard and that I gave up. Maybe not on all of it, but it would be hard for me to go to a gym later if I felt I didn't give my all to PT sessions. My problem, yes, but that's the way I am.

Now, with some time at this and some more personal growth. (Yes... even at 42 you can still grow! ) I'm ready for it. I'm ready for getting somewhere it would be difficult for me to do on my own and I know now that I'm really only disappointing myself and hurting myself if I give up or don't give my all. Personal trainers will care (if they are good), but they also won't be dissappointed in me either if I can't do one more push-up.

Will I decide I want to do more after these 8 weeks (besides continuing with working on my fitness)? Who knows. The gym will have a Biggest Winner contest in January and then following that The Next Great Eight (for the next 8 weeks following the Biggest Winner event). That would give me 24 weeks of personal training at a discount, working with others with similar goals to my own. Might even help me meet some new people too. (I still have a pathetically horrible social circle!)

All I know is that I'm looking forward to working with a personal training and working hard for this last bit of the year and I'm glad I'm overcoming a lot of my hangups.

Another op urgh...

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what is it with me and infections??  i have been fighiting an infection in my eyelid wihich is a big cyst on my lefft eyelid.
i have been trying to fight it off and make it smaller with hot conpresses, oral antibioitcs and eye antibitoics but to no avail its just got bigger and bigger urgh
so when we emailed newcastle where i had it done, the eye doc said it might be worth staying in and having another operation under local anestentic which i really didnt want.

They may have to take the whole brow suspention out alltogether which i really dodnt want either. but i hate how the cyst looks. its just about hidden by my fringe which helps
it doesnt help my eyesight any good either because the cyst is pushing the eyelid down. and im also worried about if it will droop more back to how it was before but hopefully they can try and save the eyelid from doing that. 

The face is the first thing that everyone looks at and all they see is a giant cyst on my eyelid and ask what its there for. When i look in the mirror i see it this big blob on my eyelid and wonder what other people might think of it. hopefully my doctor can salvage the brow suspension and get rid of the cyst. but at least it wont be til feb next year. il try and get a pic of it before and after
That is the plastic surgeons job to make sure it doesnt disfigure my eyelid coz the cyst is a bit big so hopefully they can get rid of it without disfiguring the eyelid.

Xmas is over...

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Well christmas is over for another year! and im still stuck with the huge cyst on my eyelid it looks awrful that wont even put a pic on here til im sure i can get it sorted out. which wont be til Feburary urgh so long to wait! iits also really sore1 hope my mito eye doc can sort it out coz its obviously caused by the brow suspension. i dont know if he will have to take it out altogether or will just might be able to salvage it but il have to wait to Feburay til i get those result as il be off to newcaslte in feburary when il having  a full MOT on my mito! to see how or if my mito has got worse or is just remaining the same. i havent really had an episode for a while where i cant get out of bed. Before then i see the eye doc at he local hospital and she will collarbrate with the mito doc in newcastle to how the cyst is.

I don't want to be a shit-disturber, but really.....

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So......I have been struggling with something.  I work for the Government of Canada.  We have a policy that says that we are not to book meetings or do business with places that are inaccessible.  Yet the department I work in consistently books some meetings (mostly for social reasons such as retirement or going away parties) at a nearby venue...an air force mess hall...that is completely inaccessible.  Stairs to get in, and more stairs once you get in.  I can't tell you the number of times over the years in which I have declined invitations to one event or another at this location, and explained why I cannot attend.  Recently, I learned that a colleague had booked a work-related meeting at this venue.  I thought, "I have to do, or say, something".  I know that these incidents are never intentional.  And the people booking the meetings probably never stop to think about what they are doing, and the attitudes they are reinforcing.  They probably think, if they stop to think, well no-one coming to the meeting is disabled, so it's not really an issue. And I wonder how they would react if the same venue had a sign outside that said, "blacks not welcome", or "women not allowed", or "no Jews".  Because a venue that is not accessible is saying that people like me are not welcome, that we are not valued, that we are not part of the community.

So I am going to raise this issue at our next management meeting.  And I hope that my colleagues will agree that if someone discriminates against one of us, they discriminate against all of us. And maybe, if this venue loses a regular clientele, they will do something about their lack of access.

Bigger breakfast - I'm less hungry later

To contact us Click HERE
Interestingly, this didn't used to be this way. When I used to eat a big breakfast, I was still hungry at my regular times, but it seems something has changed.

The last three mornings, I ate my usual protein bar, but also a part of a peanut butter sandwich (leftovers from my son as the bread I made last was HUGE). Don't believe me, take a look:




That is some seriously TALLLLLL bread. I tend to make whole wheat breads the most and they don't rise as nicely, so I think my technique of mixing dough has gotten too good as now my white breads are enormous!

Anyway, I ate a bit of his PBJ and the result was that I was less hungry. Like a lot less hungry. I ate about 150 calories extra in the morning and that saved me from eating about 300-400 calories  before lunch. So, both yesterday and today, I was finally able to eat a bit under 1500 calories for the day and it wasn't a struggle.

That was Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. Let's see how it goes with the week. Tomorrow will be easier as I have a blood draw and since the form didn't say if I should fast or not, I'll fast just to be sure. I won't be able to eat anything until about 10 am (or so).

And you know I'm looking forward to a blood draw, right?

If money weren't an issue, would I get surgery?

To contact us Click HERE

I was just asking myself this question after reading another thread. I know I will never have skin removal surgery because it's a moot point. It's not covered by health insurance for most people and I'm sure I would never be able to convince a doctor of it's necessity either as it doesn't hinder me or cause me problems in any way.

But I never asked myself, "well, what if money wasn't an issue?" Would I get the surgery?" And you know... I don't know. I have loose skin on my abdomen that could be taken care of by surgery and I have terrible bat wings. My inner thighs are wiggly too - not sure anything can be done about that one.

I ask myself, "Would I be willing to put up with the pain and healing for vanity?" As, for me, it would be about vanity. And, could I risk serious health side effects and even death for vanity? Again, I don't know... I'm thinking that even if everything was covered by insurance and that I didn't even have to pay a copay or deductible, I wouldn't do it.

And I think that's because I'm 42. I would probably feel differently if I were 25 or something. I'm married, plan to stay married. I'm scarred by pregnancies and my husband loves me and is happy with my body now. So... why would I risk so much? I might be willing to risk more if I had more years of feeling young and beautiful ahead of me.

Now, don't get me wrong. I don't think you need to roll over and die when you hit 50. I want to be a rocking 50! 60! and on up. I want people to say, "look at that grandma go!" But I guess I can forgive my body for having more imperfections at this age than I would have been able to do when I was much younger.

On the other hand... once in awhile I get a tickle in my brain about, "Wouldn't it be great to rock my clothes without loose skin? Wouldn't it be great to erase (or mostly erase) from my body the evidence of my fat past? But then... why did I let myself get fat in the first place? I wish I could figure that one out the most!

I'm in for it now - working with a personal trainer

To contact us Click HERE
I did an interview today with one of the people in charge of the personal trainers with the organization I work for and for where I go to the gyms. I had no idea there was so much you get when you hire a personal trainer.

So, I learned a lot about what I'll be getting very soon with the Rock Your Jeans Challenge. For the Rock Your Jeans challenge, I'll be meeting with a personal trainer once a week for 8 weeks. In the first meeting, they spend an hour doing all sorts of tests - and I mean a lot of tests. Then, in the next week, they go over everything and use that information as a baseline as well as information on things that need work (along with your wishes) to come up with a program.

I just had absolutely no idea that they took measurements, used a fancy scale (no idea how accurate it is), did a stress test, a flexibility test, a physical fitness test (to exhaustion test) as well as a test on body alignment, and more. I'm sure I'm going to find out all sorts of things I had no idea about. I hope some of it is good news and not all bad!

When you are finished, they will retest many things to see your progress. This is, of course, what makes it worth it. Even if you don't see a loss on the scale, you should see gains everywhere else - flexibility, strength, agility, well, ok, losses of inches on the measuring tape!

I'm sure for most everyone this is super embarrassing, but hey... I can't see how I got better if I don't go through it.

And, I probably wouldn't have had the courage to do this until recently, which is a shame really as I think it would have been really useful to have this service - helping me along the way so that I had more support with my weight loss journey and my fitness improvement.

I had a few people tell me it would be useful, but there were several reasons for not doing it. 1. and mostly, was that I was embarrassed with my weight and my lack of fitness. Who did that hurt? No one but me, of course.

2. Money. with me not working, it was too difficult of me to ask my husband if it was OK to spend the money on a personal trainer. Don't get me wrong, he probably would have agreed to it if I felt it would have been useful, but I would have felt guilty about it. I would have wondered, always, if I was wasting money or not during a time we were pinching pennies more than now- like "Maybe I could have done just as well on my own without spending all this money."

And I guess 3. is Fear of disappointing someone else. I didn't know what I was capable of. I was afraid of failure. And, since I am a people pleaser, I was afraid of letting down a trainer. I want to be able to live up to what they expect of me. I didn't want to find it was too hard and that I gave up. Maybe not on all of it, but it would be hard for me to go to a gym later if I felt I didn't give my all to PT sessions. My problem, yes, but that's the way I am.

Now, with some time at this and some more personal growth. (Yes... even at 42 you can still grow! ) I'm ready for it. I'm ready for getting somewhere it would be difficult for me to do on my own and I know now that I'm really only disappointing myself and hurting myself if I give up or don't give my all. Personal trainers will care (if they are good), but they also won't be dissappointed in me either if I can't do one more push-up.

Will I decide I want to do more after these 8 weeks (besides continuing with working on my fitness)? Who knows. The gym will have a Biggest Winner contest in January and then following that The Next Great Eight (for the next 8 weeks following the Biggest Winner event). That would give me 24 weeks of personal training at a discount, working with others with similar goals to my own. Might even help me meet some new people too. (I still have a pathetically horrible social circle!)

All I know is that I'm looking forward to working with a personal training and working hard for this last bit of the year and I'm glad I'm overcoming a lot of my hangups.

What's the worst that could happen?

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My father has a motto: "What's the worst that could happen?" In college my friends decided that the worst possible scenario should always end with "And then you can never have sex again!" which requires quite a bit of creative thinking. And although it can be a little annoying when my dad says it, I find it a useful exercise to hypothesize about all the horrible situations that could happen and how I could handle them. (In fact my father and I did it just this morning when I found out that the building I live in is foreclosing and we decided that the worst would be if I had to move back in with them and commute 2.5 hours to school which would be logistically impossible because I don't have a car and I rarely leave the academic buildings to begin with...and that would most definitely result in the situation that my college friends foretold)

Anyway, L and A and I were all set to leave the ecovillage and head on to the beach (!!!). We had called a taxi to come at 7AM, figured out the bus and ferry schedule and gotten all packed. The taxi showed up! On time!  And despite my bruised little bottom the ride was not too horrific. The taxi driver and I spoke briefly about the semantics of the words parque, plaza and cancha...after he corrected me several times when I told him to drop us off in the central plaza. (Evidently their soccer fields are called plazas, their plazas are called parks, and their stadia called canchas...they also give all directions using meters instead of blocks "de la esquina 500 metros" which made me feel like I had to triangulate everything or carry a surveyors tape).

We arrived at the parque and the girls ran for breakfast while I again guarded the bags and verified the bus schedule....we were an hour early. As I sat, I noticed that some buses arrived with standing room only which worried me because we had a lot of gear and I didn't want to stand for 2 hours. So we got on line early and got seats and set out....on the slowest and hottest bus known to man. About a half an hour out of town the bust stopped for the gazillionth time, but this time people were muttering "Puntarenas, puntarenas directo, hay que bajarse, Puntarenas." A quick survey revealed that the bus behind us was going directly to Puntarenas (our intermediate destination) so we quickly got our stuff and switched buses. I actually thanked my lucky stars because if we were in Bolivia people would have silently debarked just knowing that the other bus was better and having no need to state it to the hot and frustrated tourists. Although equally oven-like the new bus was indeed better, less crowded and much faster....and thus we arrived at noon to Puntarenas described by my trusty rough guide as the hottest place in all Costa Rica, fading and wilting in the sun. I had a general idea that the next ferry to Nicoya  Peninsula (yet another intermediate destination) left in two hours but I was hoping that there might be an earlier boat so we rushed into a taxi to the other end of town. No luck. A two hour wait. We chilled in a lovely gulf-side restaurant in perhaps the only town in Costa Rica where it is not recommended that you drink the water. A declined to take this advice citing the fact that she's Indian.

I am a nervous traveler and one of my quirks, besides needing to be fed at regular intervals, is being early. When I get to the airport I like to go directly through security and to the gate and then go to eat or pee or whatever. The same with buses or ferries or any mode of transportation. I am irrationally afraid of being left behind. (This phobia is in the same category as being afraid of being locked in the bathroom. Both situations have happened to me numerous times...sometimes with one causing the other.) So even though we could see the ferry from the restaurant and knew that it wouldn't leave for a half hour I was still nervous because we weren't actually on it yet.

But we didn't miss the ferry and not one of my numerous forays to the bathroom resulted in being trapped. It was at this point that I realized how ridiculously bad I smelled, which A had said was her travel quirk. Besides also needing to know where she would be eating next, she detested smelly people. L declined to let us in on her weakness but I suspect it's control. We quickly deduced that she is a youngest child and must always get her way. Luckily A and I are middle children and are capable of compromise or alternatively joining forces to get our way. The ferry was actually quite nice, although slow like molasses, and we arrived at Paquera to be shepherded into a waiting bus. The ticket taker was the least pura-vida Tico we met the entire trip and he was in such a hurry that we finally just threw some money at him and got on the bus. We had to stand.


Even standing wasn't too too horrific. At least we were in the front where there was a breeze. And hanging on for dear life builds arm muscles. So at approximately 7PM we arrived at Montezuma our final beach-front destination. Hooray! I walked up to the hotel and the man at the desk opened with (in Spanish) "You're the three girls who reserved yesterday. Please don't yell at me."

He had given away our room! Despite his request, I started to yell (just a bit). "What do you mean you gave away our room? I reserved with a credit card! Why didn't anyone verify it on the phone! Are there any more rooms? Are any other hotels free? Are you fucking with me?" At this point, my brain busted and my Spanish completely failed me so L took up the charge, "Can we call your manager? Will you pay for the taxi to another hotel? You have the responsibility to make the customer satisfied! You can't just give away rooms!" This man was exasperatingly smug and just sat there as we fumed.

We calmed down a bit while talking to a shirtless American tourist named Michael (Michael was a good distraction but A said he wasn't suitable because he didn't have six-pack abs just a four pack and I said he wasn't suitable because he was an idiot.) and the receptionist eventually found another hotel for us (far far outside of town). He was not willing to pay for the taxi or the extra cost for the other hotel and he declined to call the manager saying that she would only yell at him and at some point he made some comment to the effect of "At least you guys speak Spanish" which caused another round of yelling and fuming.

We left our bags and went to dinner where we took photos of our comic distress and decided to construct an alternative narrative of our day...something about a yacht and catching seagulls with our bare hands and enjoying cocktails at sunset. We finally arrived at our new hotel; L remained exasperatingly optimistic and went night-swimming while A criticized everything about it before going to bed. I bridged the gap by criticizing before going to check out the beach.

The girls set out on a three hour cruise, a three hour cruise

They are stranded on an island

The girls despair

But then with extreme facial expressions they realize their skill at catching their own food!

Also somehow they can do cocktails

Next up: socialism at its frustrating-ist and our own private beach

Intersection

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I am a little rattled. I think I have been since last night after getting home. Mike mentioned on the news that there was a terrible accident at a corner that I always have to stop on my way to and from work. I’ve always said it’s a bad intersection and one of these days I’m going to get hit. Last night, someone was hit and killed at that intersection. I was apprehensive about taking that route this morning, not wanting to cross where someone had been killed. It seemed almost sacrileges to me.  I know it sounds weird but that’s just my thinking. This morning as I pulled up to the stop sign, the only evidence was some broken glass. There was no other indication that there had been an accident and that someone had lost their life at that very spot. It makes me realize how precious life can be. One minute we are here, and the next gone.Then I started thinking about the horses that are slaughtered. Who will remember them? Who will mourn for them? Who will keep their memories in their hearts? One minute they are on this earth and the next they are gone. I know my logic isn’t here this morning. When certain things rattle me, my logic isn’t always explainable. All I know is that one of my biggest fears is to be forgotten. I know many years from now, I’ll be mentioned by my great grandchildren and great, great grandchildren in passing so I won’t be forgotten. But what of the horses? Who will remember them? It seems that the minute they are tossed into the auction circuit, they are forgotten as individuals.  I’ve seen a number of ads for people in search of their horses that they sold at auction.  We each have our own path in life. People come and go, horses come and go. We each make our own decisions but not every horse is given an opportunity.  Maybe it’s the mom in me where I have to keep tabs on my son (and the horses). I want to know where they are at, at all times. Once they leave my possession (the horses not my son), I don’t know what will happen to them. Maybe it’s a control thing, or maybe it’s my Type A. I don’t really know where I was going with this post, other than to let you know that I’m rattled. When we know a loss is coming, we can prepare. When a loss is sudden, it’s harder to handle. I guess with sanctuary life, I can prepare for loss. And those that we have lost will never be forgotten. The horses will be remembered by multiple people. I guess I’m just worried and sad for those horses that are not mourned over when they leave this earth.I’m sorry. I know this post doesn’t make any sense. I can’t seem to pinpoint down the emotions in my head.

Because of Love

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Theresa from Beauty's Haven Farm and Equine Rescue posted a beautifu post. I've read the story before and I'll read it again. It warms the heart, quiets the soul, and brings tears to my eyes every time I read it. We are all so busy this time of year but it's also a good time to remember others less fortunate and those that have gone before us.

I'll leave you with the post to read.

http://bhfer.wordpress.com/2012/12/07/here-it-is-again-because-of-love/

Reflections

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It's finally starting to snow. The weatherman is contradicting himself (as far as I can tell). I'm not sure if we will get 1-3 inches of snow or what. But it's nice to see the snow falling straight down. Horizontal snow isn't any fun. But the white stuff we are getting right now is pretty and at this very moment, calming.

I'm not sure what type of winter we will be dealing with. I'm not prepared in the least. But we have enough hay and everyone has a dry and warm place to stay. My thoughts will be with those that are less forutnate. I can only hope that in 2013 we can provide a comforting home to a few old souls.

This coming year will be an adventure and I'm looking forward to the challenges. I'm also looking forward to the opportunity to meet new horse people. If my brain can function on all cylanders, hopefully I'll learn a few new concepts.

This year has had it's ups and downs. So much has changed for me this year both personally and with the sanctuary. I've struggled with the knoweldge that we can't bring anyone else in for a little while. That knowledge is heart wrenching. There is so much more we could/should be doing. I hope that 2013 is the year that we can do those things we could/should be doing.

As the snow falls and puts the white blanket on 2012, I'm sure I'll reflect more on the past year's adventures. I am excited for new beginnings but will also remember the past so that we can learn from our mistakes and move forward. I am hoping to have more brainstorming meetings in the near future (after the holiday hubub). Keep your eyes peeled for some new ideas coming to Borderlands in 2013.

I don't want to be a shit-disturber, but really.....

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So......I have been struggling with something.  I work for the Government of Canada.  We have a policy that says that we are not to book meetings or do business with places that are inaccessible.  Yet the department I work in consistently books some meetings (mostly for social reasons such as retirement or going away parties) at a nearby venue...an air force mess hall...that is completely inaccessible.  Stairs to get in, and more stairs once you get in.  I can't tell you the number of times over the years in which I have declined invitations to one event or another at this location, and explained why I cannot attend.  Recently, I learned that a colleague had booked a work-related meeting at this venue.  I thought, "I have to do, or say, something".  I know that these incidents are never intentional.  And the people booking the meetings probably never stop to think about what they are doing, and the attitudes they are reinforcing.  They probably think, if they stop to think, well no-one coming to the meeting is disabled, so it's not really an issue. And I wonder how they would react if the same venue had a sign outside that said, "blacks not welcome", or "women not allowed", or "no Jews".  Because a venue that is not accessible is saying that people like me are not welcome, that we are not valued, that we are not part of the community.

So I am going to raise this issue at our next management meeting.  And I hope that my colleagues will agree that if someone discriminates against one of us, they discriminate against all of us. And maybe, if this venue loses a regular clientele, they will do something about their lack of access.

What's the worst that could happen?

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My father has a motto: "What's the worst that could happen?" In college my friends decided that the worst possible scenario should always end with "And then you can never have sex again!" which requires quite a bit of creative thinking. And although it can be a little annoying when my dad says it, I find it a useful exercise to hypothesize about all the horrible situations that could happen and how I could handle them. (In fact my father and I did it just this morning when I found out that the building I live in is foreclosing and we decided that the worst would be if I had to move back in with them and commute 2.5 hours to school which would be logistically impossible because I don't have a car and I rarely leave the academic buildings to begin with...and that would most definitely result in the situation that my college friends foretold)

Anyway, L and A and I were all set to leave the ecovillage and head on to the beach (!!!). We had called a taxi to come at 7AM, figured out the bus and ferry schedule and gotten all packed. The taxi showed up! On time!  And despite my bruised little bottom the ride was not too horrific. The taxi driver and I spoke briefly about the semantics of the words parque, plaza and cancha...after he corrected me several times when I told him to drop us off in the central plaza. (Evidently their soccer fields are called plazas, their plazas are called parks, and their stadia called canchas...they also give all directions using meters instead of blocks "de la esquina 500 metros" which made me feel like I had to triangulate everything or carry a surveyors tape).

We arrived at the parque and the girls ran for breakfast while I again guarded the bags and verified the bus schedule....we were an hour early. As I sat, I noticed that some buses arrived with standing room only which worried me because we had a lot of gear and I didn't want to stand for 2 hours. So we got on line early and got seats and set out....on the slowest and hottest bus known to man. About a half an hour out of town the bust stopped for the gazillionth time, but this time people were muttering "Puntarenas, puntarenas directo, hay que bajarse, Puntarenas." A quick survey revealed that the bus behind us was going directly to Puntarenas (our intermediate destination) so we quickly got our stuff and switched buses. I actually thanked my lucky stars because if we were in Bolivia people would have silently debarked just knowing that the other bus was better and having no need to state it to the hot and frustrated tourists. Although equally oven-like the new bus was indeed better, less crowded and much faster....and thus we arrived at noon to Puntarenas described by my trusty rough guide as the hottest place in all Costa Rica, fading and wilting in the sun. I had a general idea that the next ferry to Nicoya  Peninsula (yet another intermediate destination) left in two hours but I was hoping that there might be an earlier boat so we rushed into a taxi to the other end of town. No luck. A two hour wait. We chilled in a lovely gulf-side restaurant in perhaps the only town in Costa Rica where it is not recommended that you drink the water. A declined to take this advice citing the fact that she's Indian.

I am a nervous traveler and one of my quirks, besides needing to be fed at regular intervals, is being early. When I get to the airport I like to go directly through security and to the gate and then go to eat or pee or whatever. The same with buses or ferries or any mode of transportation. I am irrationally afraid of being left behind. (This phobia is in the same category as being afraid of being locked in the bathroom. Both situations have happened to me numerous times...sometimes with one causing the other.) So even though we could see the ferry from the restaurant and knew that it wouldn't leave for a half hour I was still nervous because we weren't actually on it yet.

But we didn't miss the ferry and not one of my numerous forays to the bathroom resulted in being trapped. It was at this point that I realized how ridiculously bad I smelled, which A had said was her travel quirk. Besides also needing to know where she would be eating next, she detested smelly people. L declined to let us in on her weakness but I suspect it's control. We quickly deduced that she is a youngest child and must always get her way. Luckily A and I are middle children and are capable of compromise or alternatively joining forces to get our way. The ferry was actually quite nice, although slow like molasses, and we arrived at Paquera to be shepherded into a waiting bus. The ticket taker was the least pura-vida Tico we met the entire trip and he was in such a hurry that we finally just threw some money at him and got on the bus. We had to stand.


Even standing wasn't too too horrific. At least we were in the front where there was a breeze. And hanging on for dear life builds arm muscles. So at approximately 7PM we arrived at Montezuma our final beach-front destination. Hooray! I walked up to the hotel and the man at the desk opened with (in Spanish) "You're the three girls who reserved yesterday. Please don't yell at me."

He had given away our room! Despite his request, I started to yell (just a bit). "What do you mean you gave away our room? I reserved with a credit card! Why didn't anyone verify it on the phone! Are there any more rooms? Are any other hotels free? Are you fucking with me?" At this point, my brain busted and my Spanish completely failed me so L took up the charge, "Can we call your manager? Will you pay for the taxi to another hotel? You have the responsibility to make the customer satisfied! You can't just give away rooms!" This man was exasperatingly smug and just sat there as we fumed.

We calmed down a bit while talking to a shirtless American tourist named Michael (Michael was a good distraction but A said he wasn't suitable because he didn't have six-pack abs just a four pack and I said he wasn't suitable because he was an idiot.) and the receptionist eventually found another hotel for us (far far outside of town). He was not willing to pay for the taxi or the extra cost for the other hotel and he declined to call the manager saying that she would only yell at him and at some point he made some comment to the effect of "At least you guys speak Spanish" which caused another round of yelling and fuming.

We left our bags and went to dinner where we took photos of our comic distress and decided to construct an alternative narrative of our day...something about a yacht and catching seagulls with our bare hands and enjoying cocktails at sunset. We finally arrived at our new hotel; L remained exasperatingly optimistic and went night-swimming while A criticized everything about it before going to bed. I bridged the gap by criticizing before going to check out the beach.

The girls set out on a three hour cruise, a three hour cruise

They are stranded on an island

The girls despair

But then with extreme facial expressions they realize their skill at catching their own food!

Also somehow they can do cocktails

Next up: socialism at its frustrating-ist and our own private beach