There Are Days

Is life here “perfect”?  NO WAY JOSE!!  There are days like today.  When I realize that because the workmen have carelessly trampled the zinc roof, in spite of my telling them I wanted to use it as an architectural feature, that now it has to be enclosed in a Plycem soffit, which I hate . . . or pull the roof off and redo it, adding months more!  Dumb!  Stupid!  Lack of planning and supervision . . . to say nothing of common sense! Ah, Panama!   And the three fans on the porch aren’t lined up because someone was lazy, or didn’t care or give a shit or whatever.  I’ve been doing good, but today I lost it.  Fortunately it’s Sunday and it was just me and the dogs, and the dogs wisely cowered out of my way.

And I spent 2.5 hours installing just three drawers in our Chinese cabinets.  They are VERY nice, but . . . well Chinese think differently.  No, the directions aren’t a computer translation from Chinese . . . there are NO directions.  So you just have to figure it out for yourself.  Frustrating!

Today is a day you wonder why you ever decided to build!

Unfortunate, since the green parrots were out in force, eating fruit from the trees right next to the porch.  Fun to watch, and fun to watch them in flocks swooping down with the sun glinting on their green feathers.  And the day started with a wonderful walk down the road with the dogs . . .

Oh well, tomorrow is another day . . . with lots of the agenda.  Let’s see if anyone actually shows up as promised!  Promises don’t mean much . . .  read “anything” . . . in Panama. 

So it’s not perfect.  And there are tons of frustrations.  But, I still like it here.  There were frustrations aplenty back in California.  But it would be nice to go to Home Depot or Lowe’s and by screws that aren’t so cheap they pull apart and break, or a decent set of drill bits . . .

Father’s Day in Panama Too

Mother’s Day in Panama comes in December, but Father’s Day in Panama is the same as in the US.  I’m grateful for two wonderful kids, now a great son-in-law, and this is my first Father’s Day with a grandchild!

Barack Obama spoke today (yesterday as you read this) in church in Chicago about the importance of fathers, in the black community as well as the entire nation.

One of the last songs that Luther Vandross wrote, but never performed live, was “Dance With My Father Again” . . . (excuse the rude commercial plug) . . .