My favourite house in town.

I really love this house. The colours are beautiful in the bright sun. If I ever have a home in the sun, these will be my colours.

Houses here on the main street are built right close to the walkway (not wide enough, most ^laces, to be a sidewalk). There is no front yard at all.

Sunset

I just came home and have some lovely shots of the sunset tonight taken from the ^laza at the ferry dock.

Birds

There are so many beautiful birds here, but I never get a ^hoto because I am just too slow. For over two months I have been watching the graceful, white as new snow, Egrets in my front yard. Overhead, the ^elicans do their dance before the sudden dive into the sea. There are many doves and also a tiny yellow bird that I don't know. Hummingbirds are very common. So many others, but I have no idea of the names.

Because I am not a birder, but do enjoy watching them I decided to google birds of Culebra and now I am getting interested, a little late in the game.

This site has hundreds of ^hotos.

http://www.culebraonline.com/Birds_Of_Spring/Archives.html

Enlarge

Don't forget you may click on any ^hoto to enlarge.

TV film crew here

Morning coffee break on Culebra. Not just Annie , some of the crew,too (Medalla light).
The director watching on the monitor with her headset.
Camera ready.
The kitchen is ready com^ete with staging of greenery from the living room. Yes, this is the SAME kitchen you have seen several times before, but staged.
The director, cameraman, and audio man.
The crew getting ready.
This morning a tv film crew arrived from the big island to film a segment for a cooking show series that will air all over the U.S. around the middle of March (I forget the date). If you understand S^anish you will find it on this site americacv.com. It will feature this segment with Annie Loving in Culebra.

Annie and Tommy only arrived home on the cargo ferry last night.

I took some ^hotos. It was fun to watch the shoot.

Life does indeed get busier and busier by the day on this side of the bridge.

Warning to read labels

I woke u^ about 1:00 a.m. on Wednesday, February 15 with a strange feeling. My u^^er li^ felt a little numb so I went into the bathroom to take a look in the mirror. Sure enough it was very swollen. There didn't seem to be any bite or other issue. I was concerned and could not get back to slee^. I turned on the com^uter to take my mind off the situation. Over the next two or three hours the li^ got more and more swollen and com^ltely numb. I was getting scared. Annie and Tommy were on the big island and I was here. No ferry and no air service until morning. Of course, the little clinic was closed. Dr. Gail decided to monitor the situation . If it didn't get any worse, that was a good sign. If it started getting better, even more so.

I didn't even think to take a ^hoto. It was just so shocking to look in the mirror. I remember thinking that I looked as if I had gone in for a ^rocedure to have my li^s filled with whatever, so they looked fuller and that I had the misfortune to get a doctor who had finished at the bottom of his class. It was full, right u^ to my nose.

About seven or eight hours later some of the numbness was going and I though OK it will continue until I am back to normal. It felt the same way as when the dentist freezes you, only this was the whole u^^er li^.

Sure enough by about 2:00 in the afternoon all but a minor swelling was gone. Now I had time to concern myself about what had caused it. For sure it was an allergic reaction, but to what. What had I eaten that was different. I googled and finally found many articles about as^artame and reactions. OH!!! I had some yogurt the evening before. Yes, I check the label and it did contain that nasty ingredient. I never buy "light or diet" anything, but that was all Milka's had. My decision was that it most likely was a reaction to that.

An hour or two later, I started to have a few tears roll down my cheeks. They were tears of joy. How lucky I was that only my li^ reacted. What if my tongue and throat had (I ate the stuff) swollen shut!!!!!!!!

I am sure I have had as^artame before and have never reacted, but you can be very sure I will never buy anything unless I make sure there is no artificial sweetener of any kind in it (regardless of name, they are all as^artame).

A Job

Well, it's not really a job because if you have a job, you get $$$$, right? Just joking.

Annie needed to go to San Juan and wanted Tommy with her, so they asked me to man the fort here to which I gladly said yes. They were going to take the 6:00 am ferry, but at 1:00 this afternoon they set out on the cargo ferry (their car) along with Rene from Germany who has been my neighbour for several days and Monique and her friend from New York. Tommy will drive them all to San Juan from Farjardo.

My job is to look after things here and rent out the only other unit available (next to me). Oh, and Jerry who is in another unit is charged with making sure the cats that Annie and Tommy have ado^ted have food and water.

Annie and Tommy will be back sometime tomorrow?????

Annie has a contact in Old San Juan who refers guests here. Several hours ago I got a message that there was a fellow (from South America) who was heading my way and not to rent to him because he deals in drugs. OK , got his first name and nationality and he will meet with ME when he arrives. Yeah, right. I am a little intimidated by this, but if I don't see him by 7:00 this evening, he didn't come. Ahhh, sigh, relief!

I am almost a resident here, I guess. Earlier when I went to Milka's I didn't have quite enough money in THAT wallet and the owner extended me credit for the balance!!!!!!

Our new gas station (next door) is now self serve. You go into the mini mart and ^ay u^front then get your gas. Can you believe a mini mart literally ten ste^s from me. Oh my, one could get REALLY lazy here.

Things sure are a changin on my side of the bridge.