Sheep Guarding Llama

Got up well before six again today.  So weird.  Came downstairs pretty early and set up in the dining room.

We had been thinking about traveling this weekend, maybe renting a car and heading out somewhere to see some more of the country, but Dominica’s ankle was hurting her this morning and she would not be able to do any walking.  So that idea was out.

We got passion fruit in our fruit delivery this morning!  Pretty exciting.  We ate some then Dominica made smoothies with it.  Fresh passion fruit, now that is something pretty exotic.

We did not do too much today.  Hung around the house and had a bit of family time.  Liesl had requested Kathy’s Waffle House for breakfast today so for breakfast (well, around lunch time) we walked downtown and got a big breakfast there which held us through most of the day.

In the late afternoon I set out for a long walk to the west towards the Laguna de Apoyo.  I went south through the city and west along the cemetery and up the mountain road that runs up from there.  It was quickly a dirt path and I ended up climbing up a mountain through rural farming areas and a lot of very, very poor regions.  I made it past the fork in the road, more than halfway to Apoyo but it was getting late and the light was waning.

Partway up the mountain a group of kids came out and talked to me and asked me to take their picture, which I did.  They thought that it was great fun having someone walking by with a phone.

It was a good, long walk for me.  About ten kilometers with a good change in elevation.  I was totally drenched with sweat by the time that I was done.  Really drenched. It was so humid.

The walk back got a bit tough as towards the end I could not see the “road” I was walking on and it was incredibly uneven (and there was a lot of poo on it.)

This evening Luciana requested that we have pizza for dinner.  She had actually asked for it while I was out on the walk and Dominica had texted me, but the pizza place was not on the way home and I needed to get home and clean up before going out to get pizza.  So I came home showered and relaxed for a little bit.  Then I walked uptown to Pizza Vale to get dinner for everyone.

I ordered the pizza and just sat down to enjoy a pina colada while I waited for the pizza. I did not have the energy to go to La Colonia and go shopping.  I was planning to just relax.

It turns out, completely by chance, that tonight was a huge pay per view boxing fight at Madison Square Garden in Manhattan.  That it was being shown at the pizza place tipped me off that maybe someone from Nicaragua was going to be fighting.

It turned out to be a huge fight for the world championship and I got to watch the undefeated, ranked top boxer pound for pound in the world from Nicaragua beat his American rival.  It was a good fight and the pizza place was completely packed.  There was a lot of cheering and everything shut down while the fight was on.

After the fight, which was a really cool cultural experience, I walked back home and noticed that the streets were completely empty like never before.  The whole country must have been at home or out at a bar watching the fight.  Probably the biggest thing to have happened in a while.

I got home and we put on The Nanny and we ate our pizza.  The girls enjoy our evening family time.

Boy Friday just sneaked up on us here in Granada!  We had been talking about traveling this week and here we are, the week already over and we never even seriously looked into going anywhere.

I was up well before six again and came downstairs and got to writing for over two hours before Johanna our maid came and was cleaning the house.  She works three hours a day, three days a week here.  Our pool and house maintenance guy came too, while she was here, and replaced a lightbulb and some other small things in addition to taking care of the pool.

After they left we rounded up the kids and went for a walk downtown to Kathy’s Waffle House which Liesl had requested last night that we do today.  Luciana fought the idea but was very happy once we got there and the girls enjoyed having pancakes.

It was raining lightly while we were at the restaurant and sprinkling as we walked back to the house.

I had a phone conference for about an hour this afternoon and otherwise just wrote most of the day.  Had a phenomenal day on MangoLassi thanks to our first ever “dual post” with another community.  Got nearly ten to one the posts and interest on ML compared to the other, traditionally busier, community while getting good info and a solution for the person asking the question while the other community just got a tiny bit of light conversation.  Pretty awesome change of pace.  Very excited about that.

I went for a walk in the light rain this evening, leaving around five.  I did eight and a half kilometers going south and then southwest of the city on the main “highway.”  It was a good walk and I discovered where a lot of things are and know much more of the city now.

On the way back, around seven, I stopped at a new panaderia that I discovered while out on the walk and got a bag full of pastries with which to surprise the family.  This was a nice, European-style cafe and bakery with lots of desserts and real espresso and everything.  I think that we are going to be pretty happy that I discovered this new place and so close to the house.  Things tend to be hidden on the strangest little side streets.  So much different than in the US where every business is on a main road.  Here you might find any random business on any little side street.  The idea of a main road with all of the businesses really just does not exist outside of the plaza mejor downtown.

I got home and we watched The Nanny with the girls for a while and ate our pastries.  Then we set up Liesl in our room with Minecraft on my HP Folio 13 laptop and she played that for at least an hour.  She had been playing Minecraft the entire time that I was out walking as well.  She has gotten so good at it.  She does amazing stuff and it is really encouraging her to write new words constantly.

I woke up early this morning but felt lazy and went back to bed until seven.  Got up later and moved down to the kitchen and got to work standing between the kitchen and the pool.

For breakfast, Dominica made fried rice.  We have a fruit and vegetable lady who delivers us fresh produce daily now, which means that we are heavily stocked on that stuff and need to consume it as we are running out of space.

Mostly just a standard day here in Granada.  Dominica and the girls did school with a long art class today – the girls are painting suns.  And I did a ton of writing and had a long conference call today.

This evening I talked the family into going out to dinner.  I was feeling like something a little more fancy but Dominica was feeling like something close so we just went to Cafe Isabella.  I just got the tuna melt, which I had been craving a little.  Dominica got the shrimp curry which she really liked.  The girls split an order of fish fingers and they were very happy.

While we were eating dinner it started to rain, very hard.  We were drenched by the time that we were back to the house.  Actually drenched to the point where I had to wring out my shirt to keep from dripping everywhere!

I dropped off the family and then went out again to the El Carmen Panaderia to pick up cake for dessert.  Dominica and I had tres leche while Luciana had a birthday cake slice.  Liesl did not want anything.

We watched The Nanny as a family for a while at Luciana’s request.  After a few episodes the girls decided to retire to their own room to do their own thing.  I played Back to the Future: The Game to catch up to where we had had the issue last night and managed to get past it which actually meant that the first episode of the game was completed and we are ready to start Episode Two now.

What a gorgeous morning in Granada, Nicaragua.  I woke up at five forty and hopped out of bed, took the laptop downstairs and set up on the kitchen “bar” counter standing by the pool.  There was a light but solid rain going when I got up which made it just perfect for being up so early.  Now I wished that I had gotten up even earlier so that I would not have missed any of it.  Granada is just so perfect when it is raining and this house being wide open with the central pool is just so amazing in the rain.

It rained until nearly ten o’clock this morning.  It was just awesome.  I need to get myself up early like this morning often.

Instead of sitting at the table like I have been, yesterday I started experimenting with standing on the back side of the breakfast bar with my back to the pool – where I have to be careful because if I back up I will fall right in – to see if I will feel better if I am spending my time upright, which mostly seems to be working but my feet are getting pretty soar.

By afternoon the rain was gone, the sun was out and it was quite hot.

This evening, after I was done writing for the day, I went out for a little walk around the city.  I was out for nearly two hours.  I got stopped several times by people asking me for money which made it much harder to do a good walk.  I need to avoid anything south of the cathedral, it would seem, of I am just not free to walk there, which sucks.

After I got home it started to rain, almost immediately after I got back.  I showered and then we set up the laptop up in our bedroom.  Luciana had fallen asleep while I was out for the walk.  She had been visibly quite tired today so this was good.  Liesl came over to our bedroom and we played about an hour of Back to the Future: The Game.  Sadly the game got glitchy on us and we got stuck at one point and then the game crashed!  That sucked quite a bit. We were unable to save our progress.  I am going to have to play it on my own tomorrow and see if I can’t make up the time so that we are ready for family game night again.  The game remains a lot of fun.  This is another one that I think that my dad would enjoy.  Good story, just good fun.

Liesl ended up sleeping in our room because she is snuggly and good at convincing us to just let her stay.

I talked to AJ tonight.  He is settled into Las Vegas and has a short term job lined up to start this weekend, just three days away.

We are becoming morning people here in Central America.  Up around six this morning and right down to the dining room to do some writing.

For breakfast this morning Dominica made fried rice (with eggs in it) as we have a kitchen full of produce that needs to be eaten.  We had some interesting new vegetables, some of which we did not even know what they were but they were tasty in the dish.  Our fruit and vegetable lady that comes by every morning has been introducing us to all kinds of new things.  We are slowly getting to know the local Central American produce. It is so interesting how much of what is eaten regularly down here is different than even what is eaten in Texas, let alone the rest of the US.

It was a hot one today, very little air movement and very sunny.  For much of the day I had to lower the big blinds in the middle of the dining room to block out some of the light so that I was able to keep sitting at the computer.

For dinner this evening Dominica made a pasta primavera at home which was delicious.  Our fridge is just so full of fruits and veggies, we have to use them somewhere.  We are having a big of a complication as we need a cutting board and Dominica asked the house owner where to get one and they sent someone to get one for us in Managua, which seems crazy as that is an hour away, but they did not bring it today so we are just kind of waiting on that.

After dinner I walked up to La Colonia to do grocery shopping.  I got a pretty good haul of groceries that we needed and walked back home.  Luciana really wanted jelly beans from the corner store which is the exact opposite direction from La Colonia so I walked down there and got jelly beans for her as well.

Once I was back home we set up in our bedroom for family game night.  There was an argument over what game to play but we finally settled on Liesl and Luciana playing Ankh.  But Luciana ended up being too tired and threw and temper tantrum and we had to cancel game time with the girls and sent them off to bed.

Dominica and I looked through our gaming library of stuff that we already had downloaded and found the Blue Toad Murder Files which Dominica had never even heard of before.  We thought that there was going to be no chance that it would work with a gamepad but we were surprised when it just worked and worked really well.  How exciting.

Since it worked, Dominica and I played all of the way through the first episode of the Blue Toad Murder Files: The Mystery of Little Riddle which cute, funny and fun.  We enjoyed it.  I think that my dad would enjoy this game.