The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Back to the grind of weekly blogs. For the two of you that actually read this, thanks for returning. Since I know that Candace is one of them, it will be like Christmas when I find out who the other one is. The great thing about writing a blog like this is that I get to remember what has gone on during the week as well. I have enjoyed doing it and appreciate the fact that I committed to Candace to do it in the first place. In fact, I'm so nerdy that I crack myself up writing some of the stories. In short, this blog has been a great way to entertain... um... well.... me! Hooray.

So based on the title, can you guess which one I am?

Let's start with the good. Our van is here. The Odyssey's odyssey was completed while we were in the United States, and thanks to good and understanding friends at work, the administrative portion of it was taken care of and our smelly car (3 months since we'd seen it, including weeks and weeks locked up in a container at sea) was waiting in our driveway (since it doesn't fit in our garage (and that could be a whole other post!!)). Here's another good:

Family time in Buenos Aires. Not only are we eating out on our porch on a nice Friday afternoon in 70 degree weather in mid-November (impossible for us to have done in our last two stops), did you notice our pool? It's almost warm enough to get the kids in there every day. The school calendar is reversed (due to the season reversal) so we're coming up on the kids' long summer vacation, and they will get full use of the pool.

Last good thing was the maid. After recent events, we have elected for a full-time maid and she started this week. If you ask Candace about the maid, I'd have to change this week's title to "The Bestest Thing Ever, the Bad, and the Ugly".

The Bad: Have I mentioned the traffic? I think I did. Borrowing the first part of The Outback Steackhouse tagline... "no rules" (the rest is "just right"). Is it just me, or do intersections need some sort of indicator on who gets to go? Not in Argentina. The main roads have traffic lights, while most of the side streets are one-way and have no stop signs, yield signs, or peace signs. Whoever gets there first, wins. Well, that doesn't go over well with a minivan full of kids so it's taken a little bit to get used to. One of the more enjoyable traffic scenarios is that most left turn lanes---OK. You have to stop and think about this for a second. Left turn lanes... to turn left. Visualize. You with me?---are on the right hand of the road. So you're driving down the road and need to turn left. What do you do? Um, get in the right lane, block traffic, and wait for the green turn arrow that's hidden somewhere on the right side of the road to cut all the way across the lanes of traffic to turn left. Man, the first 200 times I saw it, I couldn't believe it. And I'll see it this week. And I won't believe it. That is bad.

And what do you think could be Ugly?

Dave. (Who wrote that!!!!)

The Ugly? More traffic woes. So you saw the good, right? The van right? Well, do you think that a Honda Odyssey is bigger than most cars here, or smaller than most cars here? (Hint: The Honda dealerships don't sell the Odyssey--they sell the CR-V and the Pilot.) I mentioned above that our van does not fit in our garage so we park it in our driveway or on the street. Alas, earlier this week, Candace was out visiting someone, had the van parked on the street, and when she came out, we were down a side view mirror. Actually, the side view mirror was down... hanging from the electrical cord. It is now taped to the door of the van as we await a replacement part so I can further my mechanical expertise. What a drag! Not even here a week. Luckily, whoever did it left a very sincere note apologizing for hitting our car, left their insurance and contact information so we can get it all worked out. And if you believe that... you missed the fact this was the Ugly part of the post. Of course they didn't leave anything. They didn't stop. But now we'll be looking for some baby blue vehicle with chipped paint somewhere in Buenos Aires. Some Pale Rider will be Unforgiven when we send some Million Dollar Baby to go Dirty Harry or Gran Torino on them. For A Few Dollars More, we could Hang 'em High. I guess my car was just In the Line of Fire. Oh well.

We've spent the week putting our house together. We are still settling in, looking forward to Thanksgiving.