Of Cardiologists and Plumbers

5:45 AM – The routine is working out to get up when the roosters start crowing, drive from Palmira back to my house in Valle Escondido, check email, blog, get hot coffee, if time jump in spa . . . and then head off to pick up one of my guys at “La Entrada” and head back up to the farm.  A day working, and at 3:30 PM back to La Entrada, home, spa, dinner, and back to Palmira.

La Entrada is the turn off from the road to David to Palmira.  When we first came to Boquete four years ago the road was a tiny, 4-wheel-drive road that had one been paved but was now nothing but a sea of potholes.  Our Palmira neighbor Linda Sanchez used to call it “a Zen experience”, but she had driven it for 40 years!  The only clue that this nothing road went anywhere was the “La Esmeralda” farm sign that our other neighbor, Price Peterson, had beside the road.  Price is the one who grows the world’s most expensive coffee, geisha, that sells in the few specialty coffee shops that are lucky enough to buy it at $131 a pound for $15 a cup. 

Now . . . at “La Entrada” . . . San Francico Plaza . . . you can’t miss it!  Huge sign, all lit up at night like a California prison.  And the road . . . new road, nicely paved, even a real bridge and a few guard rails . . . and a yellow line!   The little “road to the cemetery” in front of our farm has also been paved to beyond our house.  Yes, it eventually goes to the cemetery and Peterson’s dairy farm.  I’ve walked down into his farm and I’d swear I was back in Wisconsin!  Beautiful green pastures, rolling hills . . . nice!

OK, 12 days and counting.  Yesterday my wife went to David to buy a septic tank.  Funny thing about this septic tank, which is huge.  My builder kept complaining that they were on order, and it was so big it had to be delivered, and he needed more money . . . and when I gave him more money, specifically for the septic tank . . . two weeks and no tank, which is when I pulled the plug and terminated the builder.  (Well, the contract, but I’ve thought about doing it the other way around!)  So my wife was able to go to David, buy the frickin’ tank, put it on the back of our pick up and bring it home!

Actually she went to David with our new plumber.  I know . . . but I was tied up at the new house waiting for a guy to give me a quote on shower enclosures, and the woodworking guy who had promised to be there.  But since this is Panama, the woodworking guy didn’t show, but the shower enclosure guy did, which in Panama . . . not bad.  So my wife headed off to David with the plumber to buy everything we needed for him to do the job.  She also had an afternoon appointment with her cardiologist in David.  So they ran around town, bought the septic tank, and then the plumber waited while she had her stress test with the cardiologist.  Most people bring their spouse to such an event, not their plumber.  As far as I am concerned she could have skipped the treadmill . . . she’s under a whole lot more stress with the frickin’ house project!

But the trip to the cardiologist with the plumber reminded me of this joke that my college-days buddy Henry Kwant emailed me . . .

A mechanic was removing a cylinder-head from the motor of a Harley motorcycle when he spotted a well-known cardiologist in his shop, waiting for the service manager to come take
a look at his bike. The mechanic shouted across the garage, ‘Hey Doc, take a look at this?’

The cardiologist walked over to where the mechanic was working on the motorcycle. The mechanic straightened up, wiped his hands on a rag and asked, ‘So Doc, look at this engine. I open its heart, take the valves out, repair any damage, and then put them back in, and when I finish, it works just like new. So how come I make $40,000 a year and you make over $1 million year when you and I are doing basically the same work?’

The cardiologist paused, smiled and leaned over, then whispered to the mechanic… “Try doing it with the engine running!”

I’m doing the best I can, since the only place I have on-off Internet access is in Valle Escondido. It took me two years to get decent, more-or-less reliable Internet, then we got cable. Since I was moving and not about to sign a year contract, and my more-or-less reliable Internet provider bailed, I was back with my original on-off Internet access which seems to have trouble whenever it rains (which is always this time of year!), is foggy (almost every evening around 5PM this time of year), or their is a thunderstorm (when it’s not foggy). So it works well in clear weather, which honestly is almost every morning, and when it snows. You get the picture.