TMi

san miguel adventure fun time part six of six- para concluir I have no brain power any more today so I’m going to finish up this bloglet listicle style.  ( ¿qué? ) Here are some random final thoughts, random images, and a few places worth checking out if you are ever in the neighborhood. San Miguel is a tourist trap you WANT to be in!   It is a fantastic, safe place to visit in Mexico. Coming from a much rougher part of the country, I can’t find big negative things to say. Some have tried. They come off as incredibly spoiled. At times the level of hospitality made me want to cry. We stopped into the hotel next door to check out their cafe/bakery situation. We sat up on the roof and our server would walk up several flights of stairs every 20(?) minutes to see if we needed anything!  Travel light. Passport cards alone seem acceptable for domestic fights, but don’t press your luck. If you travel in the summer, be prepared for all the sun and some rain.  I cannot stress...

san miguel adventure fun time part four of six-    recorrido The major take-aways: do your homework and take a tour or two Guided, unguided- whatever you choose get out and tour around San Miguel. If you are able to deal with cobble stones and comically narrow sidewalks, walking ultimately is the best way to see the city.   You never know what you will find when out on foot.     Within a few days we got to see several wedding parties in El Parque Benito Juarez. A place which seemed to be the epicenter of all boda -dom, of all wedding-ness. These festive events are called callejonadas . The ones at the parque would be something like this: At an appointed time people would gather at this one particular gazebo. There would be wedding party guests dressed in white clothing with small clay drinking cups hanging at their necks, a mariachi band, a man with a festive donkey bearing tequila, two sturdy people wearing the appropriate mojigangas , and at least one professi...

flea bites and rash all over the torso The saga of tm's questionable health continues. Tests came back positive for Bartonella. Due to my wonderful  third world living circumstances, I contracted a new bacterial infection from fleas brought into the house by a kitten. The kitten was brought into the house by a certain SOME ONE. No one else has been effected by the bacteria. Just me. Just me because I was the one trying to build myself up after a year dealing with Brucella only to then be given the gift of COVID (thanks to SOME ONE) and while trying to recover from that, Bartonella took the opportunity to walk right on into my system. I fought it valiantly for two months. By April, I felt almost the way I did when I had Brucellosis. I saw a doctor. I traveled to New Jersey/NYC keeping myself going with herbs. And then the fun really began! As soon as I started taking antibiotics, the ever delightful Jarisch-Herxheimer Reaction took center stage. But no one warned me about it so I ...

Happy Halloween, biz-nich-izzles! Photo by  Karolina Grabowska  from  Pexels It's May. It's spring!  It's time to celebrate Lemuralia! Wut?  Is that a kind of lemur party? Well, no, not quite.  Before the Catholic Christians messed around with the dates- as they always seemed to do- the month of May was the time when some ancient Europeans would turn their thoughts to lemures  or the dead- the scary, unhappy dead. And how to make sure they weren't a bother to the living.  Romans, in particular, held observance for lemures on May 9th, 11th, and 13th.  May 11th just happens to be my birthday and it's an "unlucky" day according to the Romans. Which would explain so much about me? They warn against people getting married in May, but what of those born in the month? Are we screwed? For me, yes. I've been sufficiently, quietly screwed right over in so many ways through the years. Given the list of things that are wrong with my existence, I'...

Needle mark from my second blood test April ticks by.  I do not want the month to linger, but I don't want it to vanish without my noticing; without me having left my mark on this delineated section of time. I pressure myself to write a blog post and publish it before the month ends. I have to make up for the negativity of my last post . It was a downer. That was the truth of the state I was in. But no longer. Here is my good news:  Summary:  New computer.  I am no longer battling three infections.

Listen up, Veg-heads!   tm devours   vegan  pan de muertos  from Tierra Mona like- Saturn eating his kids? The horror. The HORROR.   Plant-based dining is still an option in Mexico during a pandemic.   So- good news for people who want to eat less animal products. A quick scan of google maps or happycow.com  will give you an idea of the options you have. I wasn't on a foodie tour so I didn't make it a point to try  all the meatless options in Morelia, but I can tell you about a few places. I can certainly recommend Tierra Mona . I ate there a few times because it was near by the hotel I stayed in. The space is tiny so I would not recommend going there during peak hours. Be considerate. And try their dish of the day. It impressed me that the folks who came to eat here weren't only idealistic youths or trendy 'strawberries' -rich brats. (I like to call them strawberries instead of fresas.  It's more insulting, in my opini...

I was invited to a cook out on Wednesday- yesterday at a little ranch up the road.  I social distanced in the shade of actual trees with other humans, sheep, goats, horses, a mismatched pack of dogs, chickens, turkeys, peacocks...  I really wasn't expecting this kind of place just off the main road, but there it was.   A lively young woman told this story in rapid, giddy Spanish that struck me square in the Absurd. The story was about this cup of coffee that just would not taste right. The woman had made her coffee and was dressing it up with her usual amount of sugar.  She drank some, but it tasted wrong; still bitter. So she added more sugar. Tried it again.  The coffee was still not to her liking, so she kept trying to make it taste better. She only gave up when another family member came and explained the reason for the coffee's bad taste. She had not been adding sugar after all!  It had been powdered snake!  She had drunk at least...

Wednesday I went to Tijuana and then across into San Diego. I didn't exactly know it at the time, but it turns out that was the last time I'll be making the crossing for at least a month. The border will be closed to 'non-essential' travel by midnight Friday- today. It seemed like there were too many people outside even though it was pishing doon off and on all day. And, oh, there is supposed to be this highly contagious, potentially deadly virus going around. It was like folks were furiously trying to pretend nothing different is happening in their little end of the world. The rain has been abundant recently, so at one point the car had to turn around and get on the toll road because of flooding. The border crossing took about 40 minutes. Not a long time, but not that quick either. The wet US roadways buzzed and hissed with drivers also desperately pretending nothing is changed; the pretending was so hardcore that there was a two car smash up on the fre...

Before I came down with a cold for my birthday, I took a day trip- no, this was  definitely a road trip- out to Mexicali. Why? I hadn't been there! And I had a chance to go. Simple enough.  What I knew about this city was hearsay: the only thing you can do in Mexicali is be hot, drink beer to not be so hot, but end up just being drunk and hot. And eat famously good Chinese food. Stopping at a Starbucks in the city to use the toilet and the wifi,  (my dudes, that is all Starbucks actually exist for in this dimention)  I did notice a distinct spike in the number Chinese/Chinese-Mexican people in the coffee shop. There had better be amazing Chinese food around here then, right? And did I even try any comida china? HA! Of course not! Why, would I EVER do that?!  I opted for a vegan place . (It was Asian fusion food, ok?!) The atmosphere was a little weird because they were in the middle of moving locations, but the food w...