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Published: December 3rd 2010
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Not much to write about. No problems. Calm, sunny mornings. After my 'tilers' were dismissed a few days ago, I relaxed on the hammock and counted five layers of clouds during the sunset. One layer was climbing the hills below me, and the other layers were above me; some near, some far. A towering rain shower was over the Nicoyan Peninsula, to the left of the disappearing sun. For a while, I watched the lower layer try to make it up to me, thinking that it would engulf me, but it dissipated as quickly as it built.
Later I watched a movie on streaming Netflix. It seems like yesterday that I was tuning my short wave/fm radio trying to find something in English. Now I've got microwave internet, and, this year, the owner of the internet company boosted the bandwidth so we can now watch and listen to streaming news, music, movies, whatever. I even turn on WBZ radio in Boston in the morning. Soon there'll be a good story about a blizzard for me to listen to. It's raining heavily in New England at the moment. And so windy in New York, jets diverted. See. I keep up.
But it's not simple to stream Netflix and other websites from other countries. For reasons that are not important to me, they know where I am, and they block it. What's important to me is to how to work around it. I discovered VPN - Virtual Private Network. I subscribe to a service that makes it look like my computer is located in the US. Yesterday, I was listening to British Invasion music on AOL Radio while I grouted the shower floor. (Oh, by the way, the tile guys ran out of Bondex before the job was finished, and, of course, did not know it until they were out. Pura Vida. I finished the job myself, which I didn't mind because there was some detail work to do.)
Because I can now stream movies, etc., it was to my great satisfaction to come across a rock concert that I had never seen before. Have you seen Cher, The Farewell Tour? It was recorded in 2003, I think. I wondered where she went. I turned it on for laughs, and started thinking about when, years ago on the Johnny Carson show, Cher told Johnny that, just then when she was
backstage, a stagehand had walked up to her and told her she was a joke. She told Johnny that people either like her or hate her. I used to think she was a joke. And I still do. But back then maybe that stagehand was remembering when she had her new hubby, Greg Allman, testify against his drug supplier/road manager for supplying HIM with drugs. (Did you know that Cher used to think that the faces on Mount Rushmore were caused by nature? She even admitted it.)
So, anyway, I was watching the first few minutes of her show, and was thinking she still was a joke. I recognized the song she was singing in her deep, shallow-range voice. (Did you know that when the first song she ever recorded was released, her voice was so low that listeners thought she was a man. It was a flop.) So, that first song on her Farewell tour was 'Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For' by U2, and she was butchering it with a great lounge flair. I thought Bono of U2 would cringe if he heard her. Then I thought - Bono. She's singing a song by another Bono.
First Sonny Bono, now Just Bono of U2. I was still wondering what Just Bono would think if he heard this. He probably has heard it.
During the song, Cher slowly marched across the stage to a shadow figure playing the electric guitar. She started dancing and boppin' in front of him and then, as the lights came up a little, you gradually realized that it was Just Bono himself from U2 playing the guitar solo. What?
No. I'm kidding. Just Bono wasn't there. I'll go back to listening now and I'll let you know if I see Bono. Ok, here's a link I just found to a funny Cher/Just Bono video. You'll probably have to cut and paste it.
Okay, enough with the reviews and pop trivia. I'll tell you something about Costa Rica living now. I was walking down to look at my lower lot because Francisco, the new caretaker who lives in the bodega, had cut many walking swaths though the five-foot tall grassy weeds that had grown on that lot during the last six months of rain. As I walked by his bodega, I saw him leaning over and doing something
close to a tree. He was probably sharpening his machete because he's always doing that. I rarely saw Omar (the Peon) sharpen his machete. Most of the time he was busy complaining that the weed eater maquina wasn't working, and he was waiting for Jairo to bring it back from the shop. As I got closer, I saw that Francisco had his machete blade stuck horizontally right into the bark of the tree and he was busy sharpening the front end. Both of his hands were working his sharpening tool. Man, I never saw that before, I told him. Does that hurt the tree, I asked? He said, no, that the tree heals quickly. He pointed out four or five horizontal lines in the tree that were already healed over. Does everyone do that here in Costa Rica, I asked.
Francisco shook his head. No, patron, I learned this in Nicaragua. Oh, that's right, you're from Nicaragua. Oh, no wonder I haven't ever seen it before. Omar never did that, I told him. He shook his head again. "Sin preparation, suenos continua a estar suenos," he said. Translated, it means, "Without preparation, dreams will continue to be dreams."
I walked down to my lower lot, then back up to my house and I thought about what he said. There was some meaning there. The light bulb went on in my head. I walked back to Francisco's bodega and handed him three of my kitchen knives. I asked him if he could please sharpen them for me. He smiled and nodded.
Five, make that six crows, are fighting over the morning egg. It just disappeared. What happened? Maybe they broke it up and flew away with it.
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