Category Archives: lifestyle

Song of the Sea: The Ocean- Dar Williams

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Here’s another for my Songs of the Sea series. Dar Williams is another of my favorite singer/songwriters. I love her stories, she can really sing too. I’ve got a couple of her CDs. I listen to them while I’m driving. 😉

The Ocean- Dar Williams

When I went to your town
On the wide open shore
Oh, I must confess, I was drawn
I was drawn to the ocean

I thought it spoke to me, It said, “Look at us
We’re not churches, not schools
Not skating ponds, swimming pools
And we have lost people, haven’t we though?”
Oh, that’s what the ocean can know of a body

And that’s when I came back to town
This town is a song about you
You don’t know how lucky you are
You don’t know how much I adore you
You are the welcoming, back from the ocean

I went back to the ocean today
With my books and my papers
I went to the rocks by the ocean
But the weather changed quickly

Oh, the ocean said, “What are you trying to find
I don’t care, I’m not kind
I’ve bludgeoned your sailors
I’ve spat out their keepsakes
Oh, it’s ashes to ashes, but always the ocean”

But the ocean can’t come to this town
This town is a song about you
You don’t know how lucky you are
You don’t know how much I adore you
You are the welcoming back from the ocean

And the ones that can know you so well
Are the ones, that can swallow you whole
I have a good and I have an evil
I thought the ocean, the ocean thought nothing
You are the welcoming back from the ocean

I didn’t go back today, I wanted to show you
That I was more land than water
I went to pick flowers, I brought them to you
Look at me, look at them, with their salt up the stem
But you frowned when I smiled and I tried to arrange them

You said, “Let me tell you the song of this town”
You said, “Everything closes at five
After that, well you just got the bars”

You don’t know how precious you are
Walking around with your little shoes dangling
I am the one who lives with the ocean
It’s where we came from, you know
And sometimes I just want to go back
After a day, we drink ’til we’re drowning

Walk to the ocean, wade in with our workboots
Wade in our workboots, try to finish the job
You don’t know how precious you are
I am the one who lives with the ocean
You don’t know how, I am the one
You don’t know how, I am the one

Pacific Blue

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Here’s another one for Jennifer’s Color Your World challenge. Today’s color is: pacific blue.

OK, it’s a little different. I took this when I was working onboard the Pacific Santa Ana drillship a couple of years ago (boy do I miss those days of being able to work now).

In honor of the challenge, the sign is blue and it says “Pacific”, so it qualifies as Pacific Blue, right? 😉

Hanbada

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Here’s a post for Jennifer’s Color Your World challenge. Today’s color is: pacific blue. 

This was a really hard color for me to find. I was surprised I didn’t have more pacific blue pictures. It’s actually just about a perfect match for some of the old Detroit Diesel engines. Here’s a picture of one (from google).

I ought to have more photos of engines, but since I quit working in the engine room and decided to stay on deck, I just don’t get down there too much any more.

Here’s a photo I took onboard the Korea Maritime Academy training ship “Hanbada” in Busan. It shows part of the engine room and looks like a pretty good match for Pacific Blue. 🙂

I met a nice lady online in a Facebook group when I was headed to Korea for a travel writing workshop. She is a ships officer like me. She was nice enough to show me around her ship and introduce me to some of the cadets that were studying there.

I had a great time there and was really grateful that she was willing to spend so much time with me. It made my trip to Korea just that much better. 🙂

 

Motivation

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Hmmm. How to get motivated when you’re not?

I just realized it’s been a few days since I posted here. It seems like the days flew by. Not that I’ve been all that busy. I haven’t been. In fact, I’ve been dragging around like a lump on a log trying to get motivated to do something.

Anything!

I was supposed to go to work last Friday. I didn’t. I finally got ahold of the guy I’ve been talking to about work yesterday and he told me that now he has ‘no idea’ when this job might really start. 🙁

Since then I’ve been trying to figure out how in the hell I’m going to be able to make my finances last. I’ve been blasting through my savings and I can’t even figure out where the money is going!

Anybody have any suggestions?

Neon Carrot

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I haven’t had time to get into this challenge much lately. It’s been going on for a while and still has a while to go yet. Check it out at Jennifer’s Color Your World Challenge.

Today’s post is for “Neon Carrot“.

I took these photos a few years ago on a trip to Argentina. We went to Puerto Rawson to catch the zodiacs to take us out looking for the ‘toninos’. If you look closely at my gravatar, you’ll see one. 🙂

They call them the ‘pandas of the sea” (click on the link- his post shows a lot more of what we saw down there and he got much better pictures than I did!) . They’re really fast little black and white dolphins (Commerson’s dolphins) and a real blast to watch.

Home For Now

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I made it home OK Sunday. I was too tired to do anything but pass out. Monday morning I spent all day in Houston, mostly waiting around, to complete my UKOG physical so I could go to work. That was supposed to happen tonight.

It didn’t. 🙁

 

Trumped Up

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While driving up to Houston this morning for the company required UKOG physical, I was listening to my favorite radio station (KPFT). They had a talk show on where they were making a huge big deal out of Donald Trump’s re-tweeting a certain quote.

WOW!

This is news today?

Apparently someone was trying to ‘trick’ Trump into re-tweeting quotes by Mussolini

Update, 11:45 a.m.: Gawker revealed it was their doing. The website created a bot in December to periodically spit out Mussolini quotes and credit them to Trump, hoping the presidential hopeful would eventually retweet them. “At the time of the account’s creation, Gawker Media Executive Editor John Cook expressed some concern that the joke behind the account was far too obvious, and wouldn’t trick anyone but a complete idiot,” writes Gawker’s Alex Pareene.

I’m not really sure what the point of that exercise was. Unless it was to create the kind of silly media firestorm that was going on this morning.

They were going on about would Trump endorse a quote by David Duke (former KKK leader), since he apparently endorsed a quote by Mussolini. I say, SO WHAT if he did!?

I’m not a big fan of Trump. I think he’s a jerk. I don’t think he would make a good President, but I think the same thing about all the rest of the republicrats running. I have no problem with the media attacking a candidate on real issues. Attack Trump on the Wall, on his temper and how he thinks he would deal with foreign leaders. But a retweet on twitter? About an outlook on life? Simply because of WHO said it before? WTF???

First of all, here’s the quote…

“It is better to live one day as a lion than 100 years as a sheep.”

Will somebody please tell me what’s wrong with that? I mean the content, not who originally happened to say it.

Hey, I would say that myself! I DO feel that way. I don’t understand all the people who would rather live like sheep. I don’t get that mindset at all.

To me, life is about living the way YOU want to live YOUR life! It’s NOT about following the leader, never taking chances or never having any responsibility.

This is the way I feel about life…

What’s the deal now? We can never express a view that someone we despise now happened to express in the past? Can’t some people we hate now have had some good ideas?

Does liking a quote somebody said once, mean that you love and endorse everything that person ever said or did?

I hope not, but that’s the way the media is playing it. Seems like the way the media plays it is the way most Americans see things.

Living like a lion means thinking for YOURSELF! It means living YOUR life in freedom, the way we were all meant to live.

Here’s a link to one story about it, here’s another. You can google Trumps Mussolini quote if you really want to read more about it. I’ll leave you with one more graphic (none of these are mine- they all come straight off google).

Let me know what you think, do you think they should make a big deal out of WHO said something rather than WHAT they said? Do you think Trump is a jerk? Why or why not? What about the rest of the republicrats?

Passed the UKOG

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I made it home yesterday, didn’t get much done. I was sooooo tired! I passed out about 3 PM and slept until 11. I woke up in the middle of the night and fiddled around with the huge stack of mail til I got a little sleepy again. I had to try and go back to bed since I had a long day planned.

First thing I had to do was to get my cell phone working again. I don’t know why, but every time I turn it off for a while it only lets me make emergency calls when I come home and turn it back on. It’s very frustrating.

I had to return the rental car I had to drive home yesterday, then headed back up to Houston for the UKOG (UK Oil & Gas) physical. I tried to get that done while I was in Mexico, but apparently there is not a single doctor in all of Mexico qualified to do that physical. WTF??!!

Why not?

What the hell is so hard about a general physical that no doctor in Mexico is qualified to perform it? I’ve been to a few doctors down there and I’ve been pretty impressed. I don’t think they’re any worse than doctors I’ve been to in the US (or Thailand, or Korea, or Singapore).

It’s really aggravating that I have to have a US Coast Guard physical every year. It is STCW approved and according to international law (treaty) is SUPPOSED to be accepted for every mariner everywhere worldwide. Now, I have to take them for every temp job I go to? Why? Why does the UK not accept the US Coast Guard physical?

So, I spent all afternoon up there, mostly sitting around waiting. It was worse than usual since they told me I needed to get a piss test, so I was holding it. When I got there, I asked if they could go ahead and take my urine sample if the wait was going to be a while. Nope. Grrrrrr!

So I sat there for about 3 hours before they called my name, trying not to pee myself. It was no fun!

I did pass the physical, it was actually less intensive than the USCG physical.

Seems to me the officials who force all these BS laws (treaties) on us sailors in order to have us all be considered equal, had better get on the companies to stop forcing us to keep wasting OUR time and money on these extra BS ‘requirements’. Why don’t these officials who are SUPPOSED to be there to protect the seaman ever protect the seamen instead of their employers?

If we’re all equal enough so that a company can hire an Indian or Ukrainian sailor for pennies on the dollar, only to benefit the company (so they can save on crew costs)- then we SHOULD all be equal enough when it actually helps US instead of the companies!

Heading Home

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That went quick! My month long TEFL course finished up on Friday and now I’m heading home.

I’m sure I could have had a job lined up teaching English if I hadn’t been so wishy-washy. I hope to have at least a short term job starting later this week, so I couldn’t really justify passing that up for any teaching position.

I’ll be home later this afternoon. That should give me time to sort through the mail before I go get my UK physical on Monday. I don’t know why the US physical isn’t good enough for them (and it kindof pisses me off that it isn’t= the whole point of it is that it is supposed to be accepted worldwide).

If all goes well on Monday and they’re OK with the paperwork, then I should be heading off to work sometime Thursday. Hooray!!!!

It’s only for 10 days, but even 10 days at this point will be a huge help. I’m just keeping my fingers crossed.

Moving Day

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Class is over and they’ve already started picking up new students for next months class. I need to move out of this apartment I’ve been staying in all month.

I found a nice looking place downtown. I’ll be packing up and moving out later this morning. I still have some food here, I’ll give it to the other girls in the class. They’re all staying on here for at least a few days.

We went out for a celebratory drink last night. We found a place right on the beach with margaritas for only 15 pesos (less than $1)!

I would try to put up a couple of photos, but my computer is refusing to let me see them! It is apparently stuffed full and I need to delete some programs to make room. I’ve already been storing all my photos on thumbdrives, they’re not even on the computer. I have no idea what I can delete without screwing up something I need. I guess that means I can’t look at any photos til I get home to see the computer guy. 🙁

Graduation!

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It’s over. The time flew by so fast. My time in Puerto Vallarta is coming to an end.

I went to class this morning only to have any last minute questions answered and to receive my final documents. I got my TEFL certificate and letter of recommendation. I have an official TEFL website now and it doesn’t look too bad. Check it out! Let me know what you think. 🙂

We had our class photo taken with our newly minted diplomas, and that was it!

Sailing Banderas Bay

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Sunday the whole group of us from our school went out sailing Bay of Banderas on a friends boat (thanks again Memo!). We had a great time.

We left around 1030 and came back in around 1930. We cruised from the Puerto Vallarta marina down to Los Arcos. We set out a couple of fishing rods and trolled along as we made our way. We passed schools of fish and a few dolphins along the way. It was so nice.

We stopped for a swim at Los Arcos, a big bunch of rocks just offshore. The water was a clear blue-green. There were hundreds of fish swimming around. There were a few other boats there before us and people were busy feeding the fish, swimming, kayaking, and just generally having a good time.

It was so nice to dive in and luxuriate in the cool, clean, clear water. I swam around and took pictures of the fish. I wasn’t brave enough to try swimming through the arches and caves, but some people did.

We headed back out to sail some more after our nice swim, we were on our way to Las Animas Beach. Raul kept watch on the boat as the water taxi ferried us in to the beach. We had lunch over a couple of big margaritas at Los Conos.

The beach was actually pretty busy. Los Conos is right up on the beach. The view of the boats swaying on the bay and the kids making sandcastles on the beach was so relaxing. The few peddlers who wandered by were mostly entertaining, especially this one guy with his pet iguana. He was hilarious. 🙂

The restaurant was busy and the staff was a little overwhelmed, but they brought us our drinks quickly and the food was good. I had cheese quesadillas. I’m not big on seafood and that’s more their specialty. Everyone’s fish and shrimp looked very well prepared and no one complained about the food. 🙂

The water ferry took us back out to the boat and we clambered back aboard the Bella Maria. As we were getting underway, friends pulled up to say hi. They were in a little speedboat (the Calypso) and just out having a good time on the water.

We challenged each other with beer and raicilla, whistling and dancing to loud Mexican music. We rode together for about an hour before they got tired of poking around so slow with us and took off for home, leaving us in their wake. Who cared? We still had plenty of beer. They did make off with the last of the raicilla tho. 🙁

We sailed back towards the marina as the sun set to port and the full moon rose to starboard. It was a magical time. Everyone was in good spirits and happy to have spent the day together.

Class Cancelled

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I got up at 0530 this morning to get ready for my 0700 class. I was in the classroom, had my whiteboard ready and my CD cued up. Then I waited nervously for my students to show up.

They skipped class today.

OK with me, but that means I have to double up tomorrow. AND, it means I’ll have to wake up early again. I’m NOT a morning person. 🙁

I have my lesson plan ready for the 0700 class, I’ll just use the one I wrote for this morning’s class since we didn’t have class. I’ll have to wait until tomorrow to find out which other class I’ll be teaching (tomorrow evening) and then spend time in the afternoon preparing the lesson plan for that one.

Final Week

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Class will finish up this week, so things will be busy around here for a couple of days. Actually, I’ve been fairly busy all along. I haven’t been posting much (and probably won’t be) because the internet has been really bad the last couple of days and I can’t stand sitting here trying to work (and not able to get anything done) while I should be out enjoying Puerto Vallarta.

Saturday I spent the morning taking it easy. I had breakfast at the little cantina downstairs, picked up my laundry, picked up a few things at the store. I took the bus down to the marina after it started cooling off a little bit.

I was a little disappointed that it wasn’t bigger. Other than that, it was about what I expected. Lots of expensive shops and plenty of tourists. A few big yachts but most looked like they were actually used and not just show boats like a lot of them you see in Miami or Houston.

As expected, the gates to the docks were locked. I couldn’t get down to the boats to talk to any crew members. I figured there wasn’t much hope, but still worth a try. I wouldn’t mind working on a private vessel again. It might even be fun for a change.

I wandered around for a while, hoping to find a good sailors bar where I could hang out for a while and get the scoop over a few drinks. Sorry to say, I didn’t find any place that looked likely for real sailors to hang out.

I rode the elevator up to the top of the lighthouse (El Faro). I thought I might have a snack and watch the sunset. It was a gorgeous view. They only had chicken wings and I just wasn’t in the mood for those, so I took a few pictures and headed back down to wander some more.

I met a nice guy from Tennessee. He was a former USCG mariner so we had a pretty good conversation. It was nice talking to someone who ‘gets it’. I really miss being on the water. Most people just don’t understand. It gets in your blood.

I had a nice steak dinner at a place called the Rincon de Buenos Aires (Argentinian Steak House). They had a special offering of green salad, baked potato and skirt steak for 195 pesos. I paid about $15 for dinner and a drink.

The steak was great, cooked perfectly and plenty big. I could hardly finish it. The baked potato was big, but they didn’t put anything on it but butter. I asked for sour cream and they brought some, but it was not the same thing we get at home. The salad was big, but they only had Italian dressing and it wasn’t really very flavorful. They brought out a bread basket with chimichurra sauce, but I didn’t want to fill up on bread.

I did really enjoy my steak, but I wasn’t real impressed with the restaurant other than that. First of all, it was very hot. I was dripping. The hostess tried to help me by pulling my table (which was up against the wall in a dark corner) out so that it was under a ceiling fan. I appreciated the effort, but it didn’t help much.

The waiters were all polite and helpful, but it was very busy so they were slow to come by. A man at the next table flagged them down for me once after I had been waving at them for about 10 minutes.

It was definitely a very popular place. I would go back for the food, but only if I made sure beforehand it was a slow time.

Sunday morning we got to go out sailing with Erica and her friend Memo. He has a beautiful sailboat and kindly offered to take our whole class out sailing for the day. I’ll have more on that later.

Today was Monday. Back to school. I got my last 2 teaching assignments this morning, and so spent some time working on my lesson plans this afternoon. I’ve got early classes tomorrow and Wednesday, and we have another essay due Wednesday too, so I’ll be busy for the next couple of days with school work.

It’s already 2300. I need to get off here and get some sleep. I need to get up EARLY tomorrow! 🙁

Dancing in Mexico

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Here are some photos from the Fiesta Mexicana I took Friday night. I took tons of photos, but since I wasn’t very close to the stage, it was dark, and the dancers almost never slowed down, I couldn’t get many good shots.

I’ve always loved to watch people dance. All kinds of dancing holds my interest. I always wished I wasn’t so clumsy. My father was a great dancer and he tried to teach me a few times, but I never did really get the hang of it.

The dancers at this (free) show are all kids. I would guess the youngest is probably around 10, the oldest low 20s. They are very good!

I have to hand it to ’em. They’re all out there dancing up a storm and most of them don’t even break a sweat! I’m just standing there and I’m wilting.

 

Marina?

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Last night I went to watch the dancers again (will upload photos later). I got there 45 minutes early and STILL couldn’t get a seat where I could see to take good pictures. So I stood again for the whole show ( 2 hours +45 mins). My back was killing me by the time it was over, but I did at least manage to get some decent pictures this time.

I met my friends from the TEFL course there and we wandered down the Malecon afterwards. We stopped to have dinner and a couple of margaritas. I had plain and they had strawberry. Instead of salt on the rim, they had spicy pepper! I’m glad I stuck with the regular. They were strong! Dinner (for 1) and 6 margaritas for $15! Our waiter turned out to be from Houston.

Doesn’t it make you wonder about our supposed economic recovery (and “free country” status) when so many Mexicans are leaving the US and finding things much better in Mexico? I’ve certainly found things much better here than at home. I would love to live here permanently and I’m seriously considering it. That’s the whole reason I’m getting certified in TEFL. It will finally allow me a way to get out of the US.

I’ll just have to adjust to a serious pay cut (about 90%!) and so far I’m not really ready to accept that.

Today, I’m going to the marina. I’m hoping I can get in to wander around the docks and talk to people there. I’d like to find out about the possibilities of working on some of those yachts. If I can’t get down on the docks (which is more and more common today and a SERIOUS disadvantage to those of us who work aboard), then I’ll try to find a bar where the sailors hang out.

I’ll try to find  out through word of mouth if anyone is looking for crew, or if there is someplace with a bulletin board, or if there are any other hang outs. That has worked for me before. When I finished high school on the sailing ships and was supposed to have a job working my way home on a ship from London and it fell through, luckily I found a job helping out on a Thames sailing barge for the summer. I had the best time that summer!

I wouldn’t mind doing something like that again. 🙂

Sunset

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Today we had ourselves videotaped. We were all nervous in class and spent every minute practicing our grammar points and introductions. We went over to the other classroom (out of the glare) and we each got to present our grammar points in front of the camera. I’ll put up a link when they make it available.

Afterwards, I taught my one student again, we reviewed adverbs and adjectives and then had a few conversations to try and get the idea of how we show interest in English across. I think it went pretty well. Tomorrow we’ll start a new lesson and then it’s the weekend!

I went to watch the sunset on the beach right behind my apartment. There was a girl sitting out near the water with her little dachshund puppy. I enjoyed watching it running around and having so much fun.

It was a beautiful sunset, the tide was low today so I didn’t get soaked like last time. It was nice, with a little breeze and watching the sailboats, birds and the little puppy on the beach. Puerto Vallarta really is a great place to spend time. I could definitely see myself staying here for a while. 🙂

Color Your World- Indigo

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Today’s color for Jennifer’s Color Your World challenge is: indigo. Here’s my entry.

I took the photo a few years ago when we were working out of Singapore a lot. We spent a lot of time in the shipyard there and so we had a few chances to go ashore and see a little bit of the island city. This picture was taken down by the river at Clarke Quay.

Mega Groceries

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Today was a fairly slow day. Class this morning from 10-1300. Then I worked on my lesson plan for my teaching practice this afternoon. I had the same class as yesterday so it was much easier to prepare the plan today. I practiced my grammar point for the video they’re going to do tomorrow.

I’m going to do the simple past tense. At least I do understand that one. I have the rules down. I just hope I can remember to say them all when I’m in front of the camera. 😉

I taught my class this afternoon from 16-1700. It went well. I only had one student show up and she’s a pretty smart girl. She did all her homework and so we were able to cover most of the material. I think I still need to reinforce the difference between adjectives and adverbs. I have to try to make it very simple since I don’t speak much Spanish at all and she doesn’t have a very large English vocabulary. It’s really very challenging.

After class was over I went home (it’s almost right next door) and tried to catch up on my email. I actually saw a couple of job postings so I immediately sent them emails. It would be nice, but I doubt I’ll get any replies. I’m pretty sure one of them was in Ukraine and they almost never crew up with Americans.

I took a walk down to the Mega to find a few things I’d been craving. It’s a big superstore, almost like a super Walmart. It has everything. Groceries, to sporting goods, to electronics. I loaded up 3 bags of groceries (mostly junk food which is even more expensive here than it is at home).

I got peanut butter and jelly, bread, ruffles potato chips, ham, sliced cheese, block cheese, 6 cans of chicken (to make salad), sweet relish, butter, apples, onions, cranberries, TP, fresh baked orange muffins, and about a half dozen packs of M&Ms. I paid only $24.66!

Halfway There!

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Today I had my 5th teaching practice. I have 5 more to go, so I’m halfway there! We passed the halfway mark for the class already. It will be finished on Feb 26th. It seems like it has been going by so fast.

The pace of the class has been picking up this week. We’re all very busy with our lesson plans and teaching assignments, we have another essay due Wednesday, and Thursday we have to make our presentations to be video taped.

Sarah gives us a grammar lesson

Sarah gives us a grammar lesson

I’m still confused over a lot of the verb tenses. I don’t remember ever hearing about most of them before. No, never in my life! I remember the past, present and future, but now all of the sudden there are 12 of them! WTF?! What are they and when do we use them all? I still don’t know but I am learning.

Maybe by the time the course is over I will actually know what I’m doing. 😉

Farmer’s Greens

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Here’s another entry for Jennifer’s Color Your World challenge for the color green.

I took these photos at the farmers market, downtown Puerto Vallarta last Saturday. There were plenty of ‘greens’ to be seen. 😉

Sunday Surfday

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We’ve all been looking forward to our excursion to Sayulita and Nahui. We took off at around 1030 this morning, it took around an hour to get to Sayulita.

It’s a funky looking little town, with narrow winding cobblestone streets. Brightly colored 2-3 story houses line the roads. Shops selling clothes, jewelry, crafts, tourist and surfing stuff seemed to be the majority of things to see. There were plenty of bars, restaurants and coffee shops around too.

In the square, they had set up a market with local artists selling their wares. This was the most interesting to me. They were teaching a bunch of little girls how to weave, and they even had a yoga session for the kids. That was fun to watch. 🙂

The beach was very crowded and full of surfers. It looked like a good place to learn to surf and I guess it must be, since I saw at least 3 different surf schools in the 10 minutes I spent on the beach!

Sayulita seems like a cool little town, but I think a little too crowded for me, and for sure too touristy! I had enough of that in Florida.

So, we piled back into the car and headed to Nahui. It was a nice drive through forested mountains, catching glimpses of the blue-green ocean every few minutes. We arrived to a full parking lot and I was wondering what happened to the nice, quiet isolated beach we were hoping for?

The view from the edge of the cliff behind the parking lot was stunning. The ocean was clear all the way to Tahiti! You could see the mountains lining the bay far off in the distance and a couple of islands way offshore. A few sailboats were out enjoying the beautiful weather offshore.

We found the stairs (thank god) and wandered down the beach til we found a good spot up near the rocky cliffs to camp out.

The water was cold at first but after a minute it was perfect. The waves were a lot bigger than I was used to. We just don’t get large waves in the Gulf of Mexico (except when there’s a hurricane coming close). The waves stirred up a lot of sand and there really wasn’t any calm water til you got out past where the waves started breaking.

I never did manage that. I got washed around pretty good for a while. Gave it up and took a break. The sun started getting to me so I went back in the water for a while. It was OK if I stayed close to shore.

As the afternoon was ending, we were all pretty beat and ready to head back home. I was nodding asleep in the car til we would hit a sleeping policeman going a little too fast. Whoa! That’ll wake you up!

 

Sayulita- Nahui

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What a day! Just got back from a day out exploring the beach town of Sayulita and the beautiful beach of Nahui.

We left at 1015, just got home. It’s 1930. I’m a little burned and beat. There was no shade (and I forgot my suntan lotion) and the waves were awesome.

I’ve got to go get some dinner. I’ll post a few photos when I get back. 🙂

Fresh Bread

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Today was the farmers market in the old town. The park was crowded with snowbirds and locals, all out shopping for the weekly needs. I saw people selling home made healthy pet food, potted plants, flowers, home-made clothing, art objects and food. Food from Mexico, India, Thailand, Malaysia, China and the US (gourmet hot dogs).

I was especially impressed with the bread. Check it out…

This is what got me to post the earlier one I did (for the recipe on how to make some great bread at home). Another issue with the new blog is that I can’t ‘press this’ on here. I still can on my old blog.

Color Your World: Green

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Here’s my entry for Jennifer’s Color Your World challenge: green.

I took it at our big St Patrick’s Day celebration a couple of years ago. That’s our big event of the year at Surfside Beach. We have a big parade and everyone comes down to see everybody they haven’t seen since last year.

I don’t know if I’ll be able to make it this year. I’m still hoping to find a job soon!

Saturday Morning Market

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We just got back from the market. Getting ready to go hang out by the pool for a BBQ. Tomorrow we’re going to Sayulita and Nahui. I could get used to this. 🙂

The market was cool (HOT, but cool). There were probably about 60-75 little stands set up with umbrellas to stay out of the sun. They had everything from healthy dog and cat food to artisanal chocolates.

I met some interesting people there while I was waiting for my friends from school. One lady noticed my Merchant Marine T-shirt. She told me her daughter had just graduated from the Great Lakes Maritime Academy. We got to talking about how we both loved the sea so much.

I’ll have to post pictures later, I don’t have the time to upload them right now. Check in tonight. 🙂

Color Your World: Gray

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I heard about Jennifer’s Color Your World challenge from Cee, her beautiful flower photos showed up in my reader and caught my eye. I had to click through to see the rest of her photos. 🙂

Today’s challenge color is: gray. Here’s my best shot. 🙂

I took it a couple of years ago. I was supposed to fly out to the rig for work, but they had canceled the helicopters due to the heavy fog. So, we rode the crewboat out instead. This supply boat was following us out the channel, they passed by pretty close to us as we exited the Fourchon jetties. This is one of my favorite shots. I’ve even put it on some of my business cards. It’s one of Aries Marine’s vessels: the Betty Pfankuch.

I doubt I’ll be able to participate in this challenge every day. I’m in Mexico and in school and I don’t want to spend all my time here on the computer. It does look like a fun challenge, so I’ll join in and play along when I can. Here’s the link with more info, and you can sign up if you want to. 🙂

Mardi Gras

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Yesterday I finished early and went down to the Malecon in time for the Mardi Gras parade. I walked around the pier and watched the sun set, watched the pirate ship come in and talked to some of the artists.

When the sirens started going off, I followed the crowds up the street to watch the parade go by.

It was pretty good. Much smaller than what I imagine New Orleans or Rio to be. I liked the fact that anyone was welcome to join in. I loved that there were hardly any crowds. It was great to be able to see everything clearly. I was able to get some decent photos. The only problem I had was that they were moving by so quickly and a lot of them were dancing. It was hard to get good, clear, sharp pictures.

Everyone was having a great time. The costumes were ‘fabulous’. I loved watching the dancers. Those guys were really hot! Too bad they were mostly all gay. I kept thinking to myself, “what a waste!” The crowd seemed pretty subdued for a Mardi Gras parade. Maybe it was still too early? I do notice the crowd here in Puerto Vallarta is much older than in New Orleans.

After the parade, I went back to the Malecon to watch the pirates shoot off their fireworks. I’ve noticed they usually start right after 2100, they waited til after the parade. I’m not sure why since the fireworks only last about 5 minutes.

The clowns were putting on a show at the arches again and there was a pretty big audience. I wish I understood Spanish better so I could really get what they’re saying. Clowns are funny anyway, but these particular ones seem to talk alot. 😉

I got home in plenty of time to get a good nights sleep (but stayed up late on the computer again).

Teaching Practice #1

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I’m nervous. I still feel like I don’t know what I’m doing. I have zero confidence. I don’t feel at home or comfortable up in front of a group of strangers, especially when I don’t really know what I’m talking about.

I’d feel a lot better with a few margaritas in me. I do pretty good karaoke that way, but I don’t think that’s allowed. 🙁

Tomorrow is my first teaching practice session. I’ve had a few chances to observe already. I’ve been trying to concentrate on learning the techniques the teachers are using to get the information across and manage their classrooms. But they seem very comfortable with it and it’s obvious they know their material very well. I don’t.

Sure, I can speak English. I can read, write and spell it too. But I don’t know how to explain grammar. I don’t know all the rules and details. I struggle to use proper punctuation!

I spent about 4 hours this afternoon working on my lesson plan (for a 1 hour class). I’m still lost. Thank god there is a pretty good book to follow!

I’ll go over my notes again in the morning and try and get through this. After all, it’s not like they’re going to shoot me or anything. I should be happy to have the opportunity to work through my stage fright, right? 🙂

PS- this was supposed to have been posted earlier, I was having so much trouble with the internet I just gave up on it and didn’t get to it again til now. I taught my 1st class this morning. I survived. 🙂

Sixty-three Cents

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I just happened to check my Bigstock account today and found out I sold another photo (below) since the last time I looked. Woo-woo!! 🙂

This is what I saw today at Bigstock…

Date Time Description Type Amount
Jan 30, 2016 1:07 am Offshore Yellow on Blue Bigstock Partner – Single Web Use $0.63

So, I’ve now made a total of $5.33. I only have 40 photos approved and online with Bigstock. My approval rating is only 43%. I need to get better at figuring out why they reject my photos and I need to get more photos uploaded and approved.

My goal this year is to get 5 photos edited and uploaded to Bigstock, Canstock and Dreamstime each week. So far, I have not been doing very well with that.

I do know some people who have managed to do very well with this stock photography. They started from scratch, like me, but they’ve uploaded a lot more photos than I have, and so they’ve sold a lot more than I have. I need to make the time to do it too!