I've found my home

messing with the clock

Two weeks holiday. Two weeks to accomplish anything you want. Two weeks is enough time to fulfil most dreams. It is now two weeks exactly since I walked out at the end of a video presentation and I have done...well, very little.

When I talked to my brother I mentioned that I was on holiday. He asked me where I was going, on my holiday. We'd had plans. Maybe we'd drive down to Torreon and see Maria's family. Maybe we'd drive over to Phoenix and see a friend. Maybe we'd drive down the peninsular and see more of Baja. However, before we did any of those things we knew we'd have to get the car checked. We'd put aside $400 (USD) expecting to have change, maybe enough to buy a tyre or two. Three hours after dropping off the car we got a phone call. It was the workshop with a list of things wrong with the car. Of the fourteen things on the list we could only afford the first six. Worse, two of the things further down the list could well cost more than $500 (USD). It always amazes me how the roads seem to be full of cars that are more beat up, more in need of repair, than the car I am driving. And yet, it is always my car that is in the garage. Is it just because I'm a bit of a freak? Anyhoo, the point of the new truck was that we would have a beaten up car that we could drive around with warning lights on and not care. We got the first six things done and we'll worry about the differential later. Yes, we are driving a car around that isn't as good as yours! It is good enough for going to the beach, going for tacos, and going shopping. It isn't good enough for driving to Torreon, Phoenix, or down the peninsular. So, I answered my brother, why would I go anywhere? I'm in Mexico!

I have to take my driving test. At some point I needed to sit down and go through the written part of the test with Maria. No matter what Emilio says, I wouldn't even know how to start bribing an examiner nor, to be brutally honest, am I brave enough to actually do it. My fear of Mexican jails is a lot stronger than my fear of failing a test. It probably goes without saying, but that has never stopped me, we haven't sat down and studied yet (as if the yet means we will).

I am getting hellishly unfit. Since breaking my foot, at the end of last year, I have done no physical activity. Before this holiday started I thought that I might take up some sort of exercise regime. You know, start slow - bit of walking - and then build up to something a bit more strenuous - maybe running. Of course I didn't start at the beginning of the holiday because, well because I was on holiday! I needed a break! However, as the days have progressed I have managed to not start. And now, it is so near the end of my vacations, that it just doesn't seem worth it. I'm sure that once I get back into the classroom, I'll start walking around (instead of laying on the sofa eating crisps and drinking beer) and that will suffice.

I have managed to read - success. Reading is a joy that I always rediscover. This year I have already managed to read nine books and I am loving it. I have just started another book (having finished two books this holiday) and it is wonderful to start immersing yourself in another world. My problem is that the book (Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrel - if you're interested) is over 800 pages long and I am worried that I am just not going to get enough time to read it when school starts again. With only a couple of days left I should be spending time with Maria but all I want to do is read my book.

Time with Maria - success. It always amazes me how much I love her. Every day I think that's it, I've reached the point of how much I love her, there can't be anything more, I'll just sit on this plateau. And then something else happens and I learn to love her a little bit more. Life is wonderful and the spectre of returning to work just means that I will lose eight hours a day not with her. But, the important fact is, we are in a better place than we were two weeks ago - and where we were was wonderful.

My body clock - success! The first week of the holidays I was still waking up just after six, even though the alarm wasn't set. True, I would roll over and go back to sleep but, at the back of my mind, I was still thinking that when the holiday ended I would wake up, on the first day of work, ready for action. Somehow I've managed to screw that all up. The kids stayed with us until Tuesday. While they were here we went to bed at ten, the flat is small and once the kids are settled into their beds there are only two rooms left in the house - the bathroom and our bedroom. However, Tuesday night we were on our own and ended up watching tele until 2am. W*dnesd*y I still woke at 6am but fell back to sleep almost immediately. That night we again didn't go to bed until after 2. Thursday I woke at 7, rolled over and didn't get out of bed until midday. Thursday night we went out, after 10, to a friend's house. We stayed until after 3am. This morning I woke at 9am and didn't get out of bed until after 2pm. I already know that tonight will be another late night - hell, we've only just got up! This will continue through Saturday and Sunday. Because it is Benito Juárez's birthday on Monday (yes, I know he was born on March 21st but the Queen has an official birthday which is different to her real birthday, so I am not saying a word), I have the day off work! This means that at about 10pm on Monday night I will suggest that we go to bed because I have to get up and go to work on Tuesday morning. Of course, the act of going to bed will not mean I will go to sleep. I have screwed with my body clock. Monday night I will go to bed, read, talk, read, switch the light off, toss and turn, talk a bit more, put the light back on, read a bit more, switch the light off, hopefully fall asleep at about 3am. The alarm will go off at 6:15am. I will go into school and the first question will be:

Enjoyed your holiday?

Followed by the obvious question:

Are you well rested?

To which the answer is:

NO! I had such a good holiday I've managed to mess with my body clock. I've had three hours sleep and I really don't want to be here.

Gotta lurve going back to work!

[May 1st is Labour Day in Mexico. It is a Thursday. May 5th is the anniversary of the Battle of Puebla. It is a Monday. May 10th is Mother's Day. May 15th is Teacher's Day (it is also my birthday). For those of you who are now worried that I am not getting enough free time, I have the following days off:

May 1st to May 6th. May 10th is a half day. May 15th. Kids stop coming to school on June 27th. Teachers stop coming to school on July 4th.

Gotta lurve being a teacher in Mexico.]

day sixteen

And so it ends....

A morning in bed with me reading to Maria. Out to the shops to buy food for the week (while we still have money left). Back home I write up questions for the Maths Bees (don't ask) that will be happening next week. Maria irons and then cooks beans!

We settle down to eat beans and watch Road to Perdition followed by Being John Malkovich. Eight episodes of Scrubs - Season Six.

Bed and we have to set the alarm :^( Back to work tomorrow.

day fifteen

We don't get dressed all day!

The morning is spent in bed or on the balcony as Maria reads to me. We watch episode three of The Singing Detective and then Mean Girls. A colleague has lent me three films to watch over the holiday. We had already watched Dogma but had ignored the others because...well, because we don't tend to agree on films my colleague and I (his favourite film of 2006? Happy Feet!). We settle in to watch Matando Cabos (Killing Cabos) which is brilliantly funny and I learn how to swear properly - well, I learn that the phrase "no mames" can be used in thirty different ways! Well done my colleague!!! However, we only make it 30 minutes into Pi before we turn it off.

Maria cooks steak and I open a bottle of wine. We sit and watch our way through episodes 4-6 of series one of Black Books and then 4-7 of series one of Spaced.

Another wonderful day spent together. I hate the fact that the holidays are coming to an end. We go to bed.

day fourteen

We wake and although we thought the argument was over, it starts again. Dani has been fitted for a heart monitor and rather than go to day-care she is going to spend the day with us. We break from arguing and Maria goes to get her.

With Dani installed in front of the television we retire to the balcony to continue our discussion. Like all arguments/discussions it ends well - we are much stronger and happier for having expressed ourselves. More importantly we love each other more. In this case we see the future a lot clearer and we know that this is forever, we are not giving up on each other nor burying things that will eat at us.

The laundry gets done. We sit and watch Night at the Museum and About a Boy. Dani is returned to her father and we go out. A night sat in a bar drinking beer, followed by a mad rush to our favourite taco place (before it shuts), get home after midnight. We go to bed.

day thirteen

Affairs of the heart.

April 17th 2005 was the first time I said/typed: "I love you" to Maria. Only two years ago? Sometimes I look back over the last two years and realise that I have crammed more into them than I had the previous 20 years. Sometimes, two years seems like a life time and then...and then two years is not enough!

We wake late, very late but can be excused because of last night's film marathon. Slowly getting up, showering, pottering around the flat and then we decide to head out to San Clemente. The pier at San Clemente is where I proposed to Maria and she agreed to marry me. It holds a special place in our hearts. It also holds the restaurant that serves the best buffalo wings!

A long drive out meant that we arrived at 4.30pm. As we were hungry we didn't walk to the end of the pier but straight into the restaurant and ordered. Diet coke for Maria and Fat Tire for me!!! Then half a dozen oysters to whet the appetite before moving on to a 1lb bucket of buffalo wings. The phone goes.

It is Maria's ex, Dani is having tachi problems (this is a recurring problem but still not one to be taken lightly). We ask for the wings to go, jump in the car and head home - we don't walk to the end of the pier.

Unfortunately we are dealing with everyone else trying to get home. By the time we arrive back in Mexico Dani is ok and heading to her home. Maria goes round to see her.

We watch some television (Nip/Tuck), we argue, we go to bed.

I have buffalo wings in the fridge for tomorrow!!!

day twelve

I AM OLD!

At least I feel old when I get out of bed and try to walk to the bathroom. My calves are feeling every single inch of the walk round the zoo yesterday. The good news is that Dani is not feeling so well - she is a bit bunged up with a cold. This is good news because it means that she wants to spend the whole day in the flat in her pyjamas. So this what we do.

Maria and the kids spend the morning watching television together while I struggle to write a post while watching (following on the t'internet) England (finally) win a game in the Cricket World Cup (you have, of course, been following).

Nikos and I go out shopping for a notebook and a glue stick. When we come back he settles down to make a guidebook to all the animals in the zoo he saw yesterday. Maria and he print pictures from the computer that we took yesterday (isn't digital technology brilliant) which he proceeds to cut out and stick in his new notebook, which he labels.

I sit and plan lessons for the 6th grade for the whole of April and most of May.

When the kids go home (7.30pm) we sit for a bit and then realise we have done NOTHING. We decide to cross the border and catch a film. The border crossing (Wednesday 8.30pm) still takes over an hour, so by the time we arrive at the cinema we have to get tickets for the 10.40pm showing of Grindhouse. We get out of the cinema just before 2.30am. Home just after 3am. Bed.

day eleven

The alarm - the alarm wakes us up for the first time in eleven days! Maria has to pick the kids up from her ex's house before he goes to work and so we have to get up at a totally unreasonable time (if you are on holiday).

With the kids in the car (after a looong conversation with the ex) we set out for the bank to withdraw money. Have I forgotten our pin numbers? Or is the machine in the bank being purposelessly obtuse? Panic sets in as I try to translate onscreen instructions that look like the machine is about to eat the cards. My Spanish holds out and I get the cards returned but no money. On to another bank where everything goes easy-peasy.

Across the border and on to the zoo (yes, you were right Alan).

Can I say now - San Diego zoo is beautiful. I have been to several zoos in my life but this zoo is the nicest (bestest) I have been to. We spend over nine hours in the zoo, take loads of pictures (some of which can be seen here), have a really bad meal, walk over twenty miles (up hill and down dale) and have a brilliant time.

The Panda. I have never seen a panda in real life (gotta lurve the phrase real life). Up 'til now I always thought that they just sat there, chewing on a bamboo shoot. San Diego zoo has two pandas (they also have a baby panda but we weren't allowed to see that). Neither of these pandas were just "sitters". Both of them paced around, walking through the water pools, looking busy. In fact, as we were viewing them it was time to clean out one of the cages so the panda was released into it's quiet area. Once there, in theory out of view, the panda chose to climb a tree so that those who were queueing to see it got to see it up a tree. The whole experience was incredible.

In fact (apart from the polar bear) the animals were most co-operative - which, even as I type the expression, seems a bit wrong to my liberal tendencies.

It was a wonderful day and we arrived home very tired - at least I was very tired. Bed by nine o'clock.

day ten

Monday is washing day - is everybody happy?
You bet your life we are.

The laundry monster has grown huge - we thought it was under control because the basket was not full. However, there is a pile of clothes that has been building in the television room - ok, we've watched a lot of tele over the last couple of days and we have been taking clothes off and crawling under blankets in the tele room. We are a bit simple :^)

I read to Maria as the first load washes and then we set up to watch some more television while she irons! The ironing never gets done but all the washing does (hurray!)

Episode 2 of The Singing Detective. Then on to a Leonardo DiCaprio fest! First The Departed - and there is so much I want to say about this film but I can sum it up in three words: Jack Fucking Nicholson! Great film, excellent film except for Jack Fucking Nicholson. If ever one man has managed to drag an excellent film into the sightly above average bracket Jack Fucking Nicholson is that man!

Blood Diamond is relentless, preachy and relentless. Am I glad I've seen it? Meh! Will I watch it again? NO!

Go to bed singing:

Maria's taking us to the zoo tomorrow, zoo tomorrow, zoo tomorrow.
Maria's taking us to the zoo tomorrow.
We can stay all day.

Can you guess what we are doing tomorrow?

day nine

Happy Easter!

Phone call to my mum - the weather is better in England than in Mexico.

Watch episode one of The Singing Detective then sit down for a Grey's Anatomy marathon. Actually it isn't a marathon, just a very long episode but I get the whole back story!

Out for a late lunch (early dinner) to a Greek restaurant - gyros!! Just like kebabs but with no toilet problems later.

Back home and we watch the whole of Blackadder Goes Forth - comedy at its finest (and tears at the end).

Bed.

day eight

I wake with a sore throat and a cough - me, I blame Efrain and Ilyana. Maria reads some more of the book and then we go get the kids.

Over the border and on to Krispy Kreme!!! A dozen donuts between us - well, everyone else had two each and I had six!!! On to Balboa park where we chased squirrels and then back home again.

Maria and Danny watch Ghost Rider while I go to bed and sleep. Nikos, Danny and I watch TMNT while Maria tries to sort out the computer - Microsoft have installed an update that buggers up the machine!!!

The kids go home, we go to bed.