Sorry folks, but it's been a hectic time of the year. As noted in recent notes the construction next door and just the normal dust of this place made cleaning almost impossible - so, if it's impossible, why try? - right? But, this is also the time of year the owners come home from Taiwan so it's a good driving force to do what needs to be done. Senora Moreau was the only one home this year and only for a few days, mainly to get her visa renewed, seems they'll be in Taiwan another 2 years. So, I was a cleaning fool for about 2 long - hard - boring weeks. I powerwashed the outside of the house (seriously considered bringing the powerwasher inside as well) I did decks and terrazas, outside furniture, windows - oh, lots and lots of windows and of course some are on the 2nd floor, so you need to not only do the windows, but drag the powerwasher wand up the 15' ladder with you and blast the spider condos out from under the eves.

Then, the real work begins, "top down" as Chris always admonished me, so dust everything, drag the rugs out and over the deck railing and wail the stuffings/dust out of them with an old hand ball racquet, then comb them with a large wire dog grooming brush thing to get out the cat hair and finally vacuum the heck out of them. Now, move all the furniture like a missing piece puzzle and mop floors, better known as "move & mop, move and mop". Move the chairs here, tip the couch up on end (repair a weak leg) mop here, roll the really big carpets back that are too big to haul outside. And, of course there is the mother-in-law scrubbing of the bathrooms and the kitchen, dust the brick ceilings (spiders love it up there). Also, you always tell the gardener the owner is coming, they work extra hard for a couple of weeks at least.

Finally the rain began, it takes time to wash 8 months of dust out of the air, off the leaves of the trees (under which I park the Jeep) etc. Senora Moreau showed up to take me to Sunday brunch, I was excited to show her the house, she briskly walked through out to the pool, didn't even go upstairs and said "I'm hungry, let's go to brunch"? I was crushed, absolutely curshed I tell you. Later, as we went different directions I said to her "you know the Olympics are coming in Oct", she nodded and I said "everyone assumes people will be bringing suitcases full of money and buy everything in site and so if someone shows up at the gate and demands to buy the place, how much do you want because everything over that is mine". She said "$350K and the rest is yours". I smiled and started looking at new cars (toys are what motivate a salesman).

Then 3 days after she left a huge storm hit, the worst I've seen since being here. Mexican houses are built to "breathe" - and this one was breathing water through pores I never saw before. I had water blowing in under the front doors, under the soaker towels and across 15' of tile floor to the couches, I was mopping like a fool and throwing down more towels. I came back upstairs and just as I sat down at the keyboard to update the weather station to 'MAJOR DISASTER SEND RESCUE TEAMS" There was a near lightening strike, actually I thought it hit the house, a very loud POP and everything on the PC desk went dark?

About the same time as I was wondering what had just happened I heard, & felt, a large THUMP up on the roof - you have to imagine horizontal sheets of rain and gusts of wind over 30mph. I figured the mast with all the weather instruments had blown over as the anemometer suddenly gave up the ghost. It was strapped to a concrete mount on the roof, probably 15" X 15" X 15" tall which was also the satellite TV dish mount.

Finally the storm blew by, I finished mopping and it was about 11:30 by that time and I was tired - oh yes, a new leak in the bedroom wall got two of my pics wet. I crashed and Max came out of hiding.

The next day I washed (because the water coming in was muddy from all the months of dust) something close to 20 towels. I always wondered why Chris bought so many towels, she thought they were for decoration, I found a much better use for them! I headed up on the roof first thing and yes the weather mast was down, but the entire block of concrete had been ripped lose and tipped over onto the solar collector. Long story short, the collector wasn't hurt, the sat dish only minor damage and was remounted in a new location, the weather mast relocated, found both pieces broken off the anemometer and epoxy seems to be holding.

Now, to the inside, the 6 month old regulator was toast, the Vonage phone adapter was the large POP - toast, the bug zapper on the upper deck and timer were toast - wow, the fun of it all? But, as with all things, we did ok, we're fine and the damage could have been much worse.

So, finally things calmed down a bit, we had a couple more horizontal storms, but nothing like the biggie. Then hurricane Arlene off the E coast pushed a weeks worth of ugly, mangy weather on us, windy, dark, wet, cold you name it and it's still not really cleared up, but yesterday we had an entire 24 hours without rain - hooray I guess, but it already rained .01" today?

With no excitement I decided my life was much too boring. Two months ago I looked and looked for a new house, found many, none were pretentious enough, or whatever for Max and me, so I decided to pass and suffer through the continuing construction next door etc. Yesterday the 5th I paid my rent and signed a new 1 year lease which will take me almost to the 5 year mark. There was a loud voice in the back of my head screaming "ARE YOU CRAZY???" - but, I ignored it as usual and signed on the line.

I've been doing some major behind the curtains rework on the weather station and one of the things is humidity, so yesterday I took a sensor and taped it to an outside mirror on the Jeep and headed out to do "scientific research" - or whatever. I ended up in Vista del Lago which is about 5 miles E of Chapala and the home of the Chapala Country Club golf course. I had found a house here 2 months ago, but they wouldn't go for a 2 year lease. So, I'm just driving around and - SHAZAAAAM - a "For Rent" sign on what appears to be a nice house up near the top of the place with a great view of the lake etc. I smiled and drove on - and then I looped around the block and back and wrote down the tele number, who knows, maybe the Lord wants me and Max to move out there?

Came back and called the number and long story short, I'm touring the house today at 1pm. Now I have the possibility of having found the "right" house at $400 a month less, two months late and 4 hours after I signed my new 1 year lease? We'll see how this plays out.

As I said "not enough adventures coming your way? - create some!" - and speaking of adventure, I'm sure MX has a "3 day buyers remorse" clause in their leases - ha, and I'm a secret millionaire, stay tuned.