Leaving on a Jet Plane (don't know when I'll be back again)

What seemed to take forever is here. Just a day and a half until I lift off from Portland. Now at the last minute I am still thinking of things to do. Getting Mom and my sister ready for the winter is part of the prep. Getting myself kitted out for three months in a new culture is the rest. staying here, for you who are, is in a sense moving into a new place, the winter...lots to do prepairing for that cold country. I'll not be back til March, at the earliest, so Thanksgiving Day I put snow tires on the truck . Today I added 360 pounds of frozen traction sand over the rear axil. Thats what I want in the back when I head north from Portland in March. If I return in the summer no problem. For these trips I leave the truck at my daughter's house in Portland and getting up the hill from her back yard is a challenge.

Trying to anticipate what I might want down below the equator is difficult. Sandy (my host in Quito) says, "if you want it: bring it because here its unavailable or expensive" (caro). But there isn't room for everything. There is now a charge for EACH checked bag. Last year the first was free. I read in the NYT a few days ago that the airlines made $1.5 Billion ( Fifteen hundred million $) last year from baggage charges...As Homer Simpson would say, "Duh, do you think they will ever go back to free?", not in any universe I'll be inhabiting. Between the airlines and TSA !...don't get me started.

Hmmmmm think sheepish thoughts, Hmmmmm. I am Just getting ready for the screening. They look for angry people. Today's model citizen will be sheepish no matter how they're treated. As James Cagney famously said, "When you're slapped you'll take it and like it!" Anyway, I'll be there soon, and with red cheek.

Next post, the visa process. A game unto itself wherein "Jubilado" in Spanish is "retiree" or "Pensioner". The Pensioner visa will let me go back and forth as I wish...allowing me to maximize my interaction with the crazy wonderful TSA and their lovable friends, the airlines.

saludos (health)