More Notes From the Guanajuato Twilight Zone

1) This isn't really a twilight zone moment Guanajuato style, but I thought I would share just why I haven't written anything in ages. No blogging, no articles, no books have come forth in two months. Here's why:

I have a blood clot, which I've named Bruce. To be even more exact, I'm calling him Bruce Bla'clot. He is currently living in my left calf muscle in which he is plotting my death. The entire Guanajuato medical community is working to save me from Bruce's evil machinations with an array of highly sophisticated and very spookily technical medications, one being aspirin.

So, how did this come about? In a word: computers. I have typed my last on a desktop and have been suddenly thrust into the market for a laptop.

I simply can't sit at the desk anymore.

I will keep you informed about who wins the thrombosis battle…me or Bruce Bla'clot.

2) Twilight Zone News:

a)It was the middle of January 2009 and in the middle of the night, to the sound of a small riot outside our bedroom window, that I awoke. When I jumped into action and peeked out the window, I saw the entire neighborhood, or at least an ambassadorial representative from each house on the street.

There were 8 to 10 groups of 2 to 3 people each having what appeared to be a verbal donnybrook over a situation that had evidently evolved during the night. One of the neighbors, Doña Doneitall, was flitting from group to group trying to comfort or disperse them in a panicky throat-clutching and hair-pulling dramatic display. She reminded me of how Italians act when participating in some of the most innocuous everyday life activities…like buying a train ticket. Utter chaos.

Well, as chaos ensued before my eyes, I saw what was causing the face-claw melee: I almost stroked out.

Let's take a trip back in time so you know why I almost stroked out.

Around the beginning of March 2007, I began receiving death threats for writing in my books and articles that if one is going to expatriate to Mexico and earn the right to be called an expat, one should learn Spanish and integrate into the Mexican culture. Otherwise, one is not an expat but a "fakepat."

That statement brought a credible death threat just 24 hours before the memorable night of June 4, 2007. I was up at 3 a.m. suffering a session of torture caused by my chronic illness, Fibromyalgia Syndrome, when I heard a strange noise outside the bedroom window. I got up from the computer to investigate and found that someone had set our neighbor's taxi, which sat less than 9 meters from our bedroom window, on fire.

Fast forwarding to January 2009, I was at the same bedroom window from which I saw the taxi engulfed in flames eighteen months previously. This night, I was watching a neighborhood meltdown over our neighbor's new taxi that was parked in front of the car belonging to Doña Doneitall's son.

The street has "assigned" parking in the form of carports carved into the side of the mountain with the houses built on the side of the mountain and extending over the carports.

Doña Doneitall's son, visiting his parent's house for a family party, had parked in the space that belongs to our taxi-driver neighbor. When his taxi shift was over, he came home to find his parking space occupied. Not wanting to park in a neighbor's designated space or block the narrow street, the cab driver parked his taxi perpendicularly in front of the car belonging to Doña Doneitall's son.

Fortunately, the second space in the two-car carport, which actually belongs to Doña Doneitall's family, was empty (why the son didn't park his car in his family's space when he came for a visit is anyone's guess). Doneitall Junior was actually able to extricate his car from the cave-like carport by making hundreds of micro-turns, but it took him from 10 p.m. to 4:30 the next morning!

What makes the event beyond bizarre is that the cab owner lives just up the steps from the carport. Instead of engaging in this marathon of a typical Mexican operation, Doña Doneitall or one of the bystanders who were "helping" could have climbed the steps, woken the cab driver, and asked him to move his taxi so Doña Doneitall's son could leave. They could have even offered the cab driver a few pesos for waking him and inconveniencing him, but apparently no one thought of that.

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