eBooks

I am in a once a week book group. We have a library of over 1200 books. We buy one copy of the books we want so no one is reading the same book in the same week, but most of the books are read and discussed by everyone. There are about 14 active members.

Then comes the advent of ebooks and ebook readers. I have a Kindle Touch. I love it and enjoy reading on it because I like to read in bed on my side and with my Kindle I don't have to flip from side to side while reading the left and right pages of a book. I also like it because if I'm reading a large book I don't have to hold it or balance it on anything while reading.

Many people in our book group now have ereaders and download books. I learned about a wonderful website to manage ebooks called Calibre. It's a free downloadable program where you can manage your e library. Just today I finally learned how to load a book into Calibre and then transfer it to my Kindle.

This is big news because Roy is always doing all the techie/geeky stuff in our house and I don't learn how. He's out of town and I wanted to get a book from an email where someone had sent me a copy of the book. I figured out how to transfer it from my email inbox to my computer (Calibre program) and then onto my Kindle.

Woo Hoo! I'm feeling pretty proud tonight.

Waiting on the Rain

Where I live now, in western Mexico, there is a definite rainy season. It typically begins in early-mid June and lasts until the end of September and sometimes into early October. I came here from Houston, Texas near the Gulf of Mexico, so the idea of a season when it rains was a bit confusing to me 7-8 years ago when I first came to Ajijic for a visit. When I moved to Houston in 1999 from Dallas, where I had lived for the previous 25 years, I thought my toes and fingers were going to grow webs because it never STOPPED raining. It either was raining or the humidity was so high you could see the air!

Well, today is June 10, 2012 and I am waiting on the rain like an expectant daddy waited patiently for the nurse to come our of the double swinging doors in the maternity ward to announce whether it was a boy or a girl (circa 1950s). Lots of anticipation, impatience, and frustration at not being able to do much to help facilitate the deed.

For the past week or so Mother Nature has been teasing us here with clouds, thunder, cool winds, and no, no real rain. See the other part of this story is that here in Ajijic the locals say the "season" hasn't really started until it's raining so hard that the streets flood and water is rushing down to the lake. So even if we have a "llittle" bit of rain, enough to make your windshield a mess, that doesn't count.

So, I am waiting. Just this evening, the clouds have come, which drops the temperatures at least 10 degrees (thanks to God something the Mexicans say in Engligh -- translation gracias a Dios), the wind picked up, and it looks promising, but Mother Nature wants to make sure we're really ready and grateful for it when it does arrive. She can be so heartless sometimes, and obviously not menapausal or chubby!

Mother Nature, I am soooo grateful for the rain, to make the dust go away, and the mountain turn a beautiful lush green, and everything to grow like a house-of-fire, and the house to cool off so I can sleep through the night without a cool wet washcloth to ease my discomfort, and for the lake to fill up again.

So, tonight I sit with my washcloth at the ready, every fan in the house blowing away, the windows open, and a cold glass of water at my side, offering up my prayers. I would do a rain dance, but I'd get too over heated and sweaty and it would take me hours to cool off enough to get ready to go to sleep.

High today: 96
Temp in the house: 82
Relative humidity mid-day~15%
and did I mention   N O   A I R   C O N D I T I O N I N G!!

A few words on Pinterest

A few months ago I began noticing friends on Facebook were talking about this thing called Pinterest. My obvious first question was, "What is this and how do you pronouce it." Didn't know if it was a new foreign word I hadn't seen before or a new cyber word like Google, Groupon, etc. The comments being posted by my friends were exuberant, verging on obsessive and made me curious. I have really well educated, intelligent friends and family so I thought, "what the heck, I'll check it out."

So, just before Christmas I decided to Google Pinterest (how 21st century is that) and find out for myself what all the fuss was about. Huh, I don't understand. What are you supposed to do with it? How does it work? What's it for? etc, etc. etc. Then my Nephew, Mike, asked his wifeMarisa, who uses Pinterest what it was...she explained that it was a website for crafty people. (All this was done via Facebook -- another obsession I have developed). Well, I'm crafty. I love to knit, crochet, cook, read, etc. I looked at the site again and I still didn't get it. I was beginning to feel really old at this point.

We went to Dallas after Christmas to visit my brother and his family and Mike and Marisa were there with their Blackberries, iPhones, iPads, etc. So I asked them about Pinterest and the expression on Maria's face went from "oh it's nice to see you Aunt Donna" to "here let me show how cool this site is and all the cool things you can do on it."

Well, today is January 24, 2012 -- a few days shy of a month since I was in Dallas and learning from my resident "expert" about Pinterest and I too am hooked. I have 12 followers now and I follow over 50 people. I have created several of my own collections of "stuff" and can spend hours on the damn thing looking around. I now understand all the comments like, I think this is going to be a problem and I spent hours on the computer today on Pinterest.

I too am a new joiner. I found a meatloaf recipe (Paula Deene) that I'm making tonight. I have found knitting stuff, quotes I love, recipes, and pictures of places I want to visit and I've only just begun. This probably won't impact my knitting time too much, but it's a great place to find things that you like, pin them, and find more.

Happy Pinning Everyone! If you haven't signed up for an account, I encourage you to do so and explore the things you love!

Just a quick update

It's been a really long time since I've posted anything here. I got a replacement iPad for Christmas (2011) and I've been busy adding bookmarks and finding stuff in the app store.

Roy had some serious skin surgery in the early part of December so we didn't get to Texas till after Christmas. Visited JoAnn in Longview for a few days, then into Dallas for a few days. I got to see all the nieces and nephews and met the newest member of the Frizzell family, Lucy, what a cutie. Kathyrn was so cute this year, not so shy and spent a lot of time sitting and talking with Roy. Sergei was home from Texas Tech and it was great to hear how he's enjoying college and studying architecture.

We then went to Houston for a couple more days. I got to spend a couple of nights with my friend Susan which was so fun. We went to Berings one morning. I haven't been there for years. THE BEST hardware store in the world. We also went to Goode Company Seafood for dinner. Another place I haven't been to in years. I had the sweetest, juiciest fried oysters --- yummy!!!!

The bad thing, for me, about going to Texas in the winter is I always get sick. So again this year, I got a sinus infection which I came home with. I've been back 11 days and finally am feeling better. I'm going to suggest that we celebrate Christmas in July!

Rain, Rain, Rain

Well, the rainy season is upon us in all it's glory. We've had Hurricane Beatriz come from the Pacific Coast and then Hurricane Arlene come from the Gulf Coast. It's been cloudy, cool, and wet for a week. A friend told me last night that Arlene apparently had enough steam to completely move across the country and has reformed and is coming back inland on the west coast. Amazing!

In between the first major storm in early June and the hurricanes we did have a normal period of sunny skies and rainy nights which is perfection.

I LOVE the cool temps and the green mountains but I miss the sun and I am affected by SADD. I look forward to the sun coming back out.

Also, finished reading Geraldine Brooks first book, "Nine Parts of Desire" about women in Islam countries. It was written in 1995 but is amazingly relavent today. Highly recommend it.

40 years ago today

I remember it as if it were yesterday. I graduated from Martin Spalding High School, Severn, Maryland 1971. There were 150 ladies graduating that day. It was one of those great days in one's life that closes one door and opens the next. I worked that summer at a department store to save up money for my big move to NYC to study fashion merchandising at Tobé Coburn School on Madison Avenue at 71st Street. While I was in school I lived at the East End Hotel for Women on East End Avenue at 78th street. Nice easy walk to school from there (weather permitting).

My brother Don came to my graduation which was really a special thing. I always thought that I annoyed Don because he was 20 years older than me, his children were my age, and we had little in common except we shared a Mom and a Dad. Now, looking back, I realize that I was important to him -- I was his baby sister! :-)

One of my high school friends and I have reconnected through Facebook and she's trying to organize a class reunion. I haven't gone to any of the others. I left Maryland the Sept following graduation and moved to NYC. I lived there for 4 years and then moved to Dallas, Texas where my Mom and Spence had moved in 1971. I never really kept in touch with any of my friends from HS, so it was nice when Nina Picciano found me on FB and we starting chatting. She's still living in the area, Washington D.C. so she's kept up with more old friends then me.

Anyway, just was thinking about what today was this morning and thought I'd jot down my thoughts.

1971 - Graduated High School, Maryland

1971-1974 - NYC

1974-1999 Dallas, Texas

1999 - Married, moved to Houston, Texas (and retired --wooohooo)

2005- moved to Ajijic, Mexico

Beach, Rain & Pink Eye

Mazatlan, Sinaloa, Mexico 2011

We went to Mazatlan over Memorial Day weekend (it's not MD here though) with Marta & Lupe et al and stayed at the Riu Mazatlan -- one of our favorite all inclusive resorts.

I love this picture 'cause the sun is reflecting on the ocean. Taken from our 11th floor balcony at the Riu Mataztlan.

I think the Pacific Ocean is so beautiful because of the rock formations that come all the way to the edge of the beach.

1st Day after 1st Rain of the Season

Morning after the first rain of the season. Lots of wind -- blew over the table and chairs on our neighbors mirador. I'm going to chronicle the changes to our mountain as the rainy season progresss. I want to see how long it takes for the mountains to turn green starting from the first official rain (that's when the water is running down the streets from the mountain to the lake).

Pink Eye

How in the world did I get pink eye????? I didn't ever get it as a child (which is when I thought you got this kind of thing). My friend Judy, who's a nurse, asked me if I'd been swimming recently. I just got back from a weekend in Mazatlan and I did got swimming in the pool, but I've been to this resort many times before and have never gotten pink eye! The day we were leaving (Mon May 30) I woke up with swollen glands and sneezing (not like allergies though) so I took some antihistamine meds I never leave home without and the symptoms seemed to go away -- hahaha!

It's very gross. I woke up on Thursday morning, June 2nd with my left eye crusted over and I googled conjunctivitis and figured that was what I had -- it's the infection kind, not allergic conjunctivitis -- oh joy. So by that evening my left eye was swollen almost closed and my right eye was getting yellow crusties in it too. Went to see Dr. Lastra on Friday morning and he agreed that was what I had. Still have swollen glands and sneezing like a cold. Dr. L said I probably was getting a cold and it settled in my eye -- Eye Flu!

Now on antibiotic drops and ointment for 14 days, but that's not doing anything for my swollen glands or overall feeling of exhaustion. Haven't been sleeping well -- feel achy all over my body and I have a low-grade fever on and off during the day and night. YUCK!

One good thing, we had our first heavy rains last night. Cooled everything down about 10 degrees which has been very nice today.