Rv Repairs And Upcoming Trip

living.boondockingmexico@yahoo.com

Wacky weather continues here.  Today it will be 104F and tomorrow it will drop down to 55F.  We have a saying in Spanish, "Febrero loco, Marzo otro poco" which means, "Crazy February, March a little bit more".   I don't know what we say now that we are in the middle of April and it's just as crazy as it was in February.  

I bought a 100-pound bag (bulto) of Triple 17 fertilizer.  The weather for the weekend is 70% chance of rain and 40% on Sunday.  Ideal for putting down the fertilizer.  I have a spreader so that will be my Saturday morning project.  I figure if it is already raining I can cover the spreader so it doesn't get gunked up.  If I were to put it down today with the 104-degree heat, it would burn the grass.  So what if I get wet.

The cheesecake I made last week was a success.  Today I'll try my hand at chewy brownies with chocolate cream cheese frosting.  I noticed that some recipe websites now offer an adjustment calculator that allows you to adjust the recipe size.  Works great and I usually don't follow recipes very closely.  The cheesecake crust turns out much better being doubled and doubling the sugar in the crust but using brown sugar.  I used strained non-fat yogurt as well and it was smooth and light but with a lot of flavor and a crunchy crust.

As I said in an earlier post, I cleaned the roof of the rv and did some caulking.  The area around the never used antenna was looking a bit cracked so instead of filling it in I removed most of the old caulk and put down new.  Looks much better and sealed beautifully.  

I ordered new outer seals for the slideouts.  After a fiasco with the delivery of the seals, they arrived in Monterrey last week.  They were exactly the ticket I had hoped for.  It was a pain to remove the old ones as they had been glued on there for 13 years.  They were pretty much toast.  The saving grace is the additional gooey tape on the slide is still well-adhered and very sticky.  The seals I bought include a taped backing so it was double stick.  They went on pretty easily and they look great.  

Now that I've had my first jab I feel more comfortable outdoors.  I take my long walk to Santiago, still 10k.  When I get to the town I turn around at the 7 Eleven.  This little girl has a tag, scared to death, and very hungry.  I have been feeding her every day this week attempting to get close enough to read the tag but without any luck.  She may have gotten lost while tourists were visiting from Monterrey or escaped, I'm not sure but the tag has her name on one side and what appears to be a phone number on the other side.  Let's see if she hangs around long enough to help her.

We may have a two-week house sit coming up at the end of May in San Miguel de Allende.  A lot depends on second jabs and matching schedules.  For me, it's a done deal.  Anything to get away for a while.  Hopefully, we can do a hike with Les since he knows the area extremely well.

An update on el Presidente.  He is dead set on fossil fuels and spending 8 billion additional dollars to the already 24 billion dollar PEMEX debt.  He swears that gasoline prices are inflated by the station owners.  Prices have gone up 34% in the last year.  We are now averaging $4.50 a gallon USD.  Most of it is in hidden taxes.  The president has destroyed the energy business by now changing the energy reform kicking out private investment.  Those that are still here have decided to leave because they see the writing on the wall.  It's spelled V-E-N-E-Z-U-E-L-A.  The president has no interest in renewables and he will pour whatever funds he finds into PEMEX.  

He is also unhappy about the gubernatorial candidate from the state of Guerrero.  Salgado Macedonia has been accused of sexually abusing women who have come forward.  The president says it shouldn't affect Salgado's candidacy.  However, the INE (Instituto Nacional Electoral, National Election Institute that regulates and controls elections to ensure fair elections) decided that because of the accusations, Salgado shouldn't be allowed to run for office.  Well, Presidente Dingus thinks otherwise and has decided to create a constitutional reform.   

This is factual and you can check the information. Truly a sad situation we are in and the state elections on June 6th will either make or break the country.   Also, Netfli, Dinni, Apol as the president says them (Netflix, Disney and Apple), will now be charged an additional 7% tax and those funds will go to indigenous groups.  Wow, we've been working with indigenous groups now for 120 years, they receive everything for free, bilingual schools, food, monthly incomes, grains, fertilizers, farm equipment and much, much more but don't contribute to the nation or the economy in any way.  I'm slowly changing my views on these issues.