Is He Live Or Is He Dead?

With fond memories of Black Sabbath's early days with 'Iron Man'

B O O M !

Things immediately stopped. Was I still alive? It took a couple of milliseconds to make that determination. Yes, I was still alive. But, what the f*** happened?

I was pulling a just-filled 100-pound butane tank from the gate to the pool house when the very loud boom occurred and with it all forward (or is it backward?) motion immediately ceased. Oh my God! a blow-out... on a hand cart yet. Who ever heard of such a thing?

I could'a been killed. In fact, literally, I did check to make sure I was alive, it was that unexpected. But, it is in keeping with all the occurrences - just another in a long line of them that I've been documenting here recently.

Blown Hand Cart Tire

Once I got my heart rate back down below the red-line, I took stock of myself and the tank and the hand cart. I still had to get the tank to its destination at the pool house. No easy task now with a flatter-than-flat tire. Eventually, I made it there, got the tank positioned and hooked up to the piping for the pool house.

I put the hand cart into the Isuzu with the idea that I'd stop by Caribbean Tire or Northern Tire and see if they could either 1) fix it, or 2) put a new inner tube and tire on.

After hauling the hand cart around for good part of the day and a couple of trips right past both businesses (OK, so I completely forgot I was hauling it), I did manage to stop at Northern Tire to have them check it out.

What made me remember, was, I had to stop at Courts, where we had bought the washing machine to pick up our free ironing board for making the purchase. When I went to put it in the back of the Isuzu, I saw the hand cart. Oops.

So, back to Northern Tire... Can they fix it? "No Mon. Can't do it. You need to go to Phillip Batty's. They got the whole ting, Mon." I'm thinking he means buy a whole new hand cart. "No Mon. They got the tire and all, Mon."

Down to Phillip Batty's, otherwise known as Cinty's (of course). Why didn't I think of that in the first place. That was where I had bought the hand cart in the beginning. I stopped and talked to Junior, who runs the place. I asked if he had a replacement tire or inner tube that would fit.

Well, of course he did. He had just the inner tube that I could buy for $22.00 BZD, or I could buy a new tire, inner tube and wheel (same as on the hand cart) for $18.00 BZD - which was $2.00 off it's normal price of $20.00. Hmmm, which to choose.

Why there was a difference between the inner tube and the complete wheel set, I don't have a clue and neither did Junior. All he knew was that the costs to him for the items made the prices the way they were. High finance, I guess.

In case you're wondering, the carpenter's pencil in the photo above of the blown tire is just there to show the extent of the hole made by the blowout. It had nothing to do with the actual event itself.

Anyway, the hand cart now has a new set on the left and I have a leftover blown tire and tube on a spare wheel.

Ready To Go

If I get those repaired someday, I'll have spare tire setup for the hand cart for the next time it has a blow-out. Which probably won't be until my next life-cycle. I've never heard of a hand cart ever having a blow-out before, and probably never will again.

Bigga, Betta, Mo Storage - Right Now!

This morning as we were walking the girls, as usual, we saw Junior from Cinty's #1, working on his new warehouse.

Junior Tossing Rocks At the New Warehouse

Well, it'll be a while before it gets up and running, but it'll be big and have a beefy enough floor so that he can run large trucks into it.

We've been following the construction so far for several weeks. The warehouse is now getting to be some 'serious shit' as Jules Winnfield (Samuel L. Jackson) in Pulp Fiction said. The first time we saw Junior working on it and we asked what it was going to be, he said "I don't know, but I'm building it." Now, finally, he has admitted that it's going to be a new and large, warehouse.

More than likely, within a month of its being commissioned, the layout and organization will mirror any of the three current Cinty's stores. "Yeh, I have it here, I'm just not sure where. Come back in two days, and I'll have it located for you." seems to be Junior's watch words. Either that, or "Try my brother's/sister's place. I think he/she had a couple of those." The weird thing is that he's always been right. I swear if Cinty's doesn't have it - it doesn't exist.

Yesterday afternoon, we made it over to Jim's house for Friday Happy Hour. Other than the usual suspects in attendance, a couple of new arrivals were there - Gary and his pet parrot, Dino.

Gary and His Friend, Dino

What a cool bird. What a camera hound. As soon as he saw the camera, he was 'on.' But, beautiful and very well behaved. Dino even has a little harness and leash that he wears when he's out and visiting. Too cool!

Dianna enjoying Happy Hour

Looking all summery with her new hairstyle... Dianna's grooving on the happy hour conversation.

Here's a last look at Dino. He's quite the social animal.

Dino At Happy Hour

And before I forget, our guesthouse now has a functioning microwave oven in it. It seems so weird to me to call it a 'microwave oven.' I mean, microwave, sure, but microwave oven? Well, that's what they called it in the instruction manual (I had to find an English language manual on line - this unit came with all Espanol instructions. So much for NAFTA, if you get my drift.

Anyway, and late breaking news... Just late this afternoon, we took delivery of a nice Mabe brand stove. Four burner and oven, just like ours upstairs in the main house. I'll include a photo of it after I get it all hooked up and tested.

Trying to Whup Cabin Fever

Well, the doggies have told us they're tired of confinement. I had just come back from getting a loaf of 'Dirty Olive' bread from 'Breadman' Charles' place a little after 6:30 AM, so we could have it for breakfast. Toasted with a little Happy Cow cheese spread on a slice, yummers!

Anyway, as I got out of the car, Secret and Deohgee were busily attacking Cindy. I mean, really attacking her. She's lucky to be alive right now. The attack started just as I turned into our driveway. I handed Dianna the loaf as she came down the stairs from the house. Then I waded into the middle of the melee. Of course, there's always danger in doing that of receiving a bite, but the alternative would have been a dead dog, so you do what you have to do.

After I got Cindy away from them I had both Secret and Deohgee by the collars and got them leashed up. Then, they started going after each other. I put the bite (Cesar's way) on them both, wrestled them to the ground and increased pressure, waiting till they both relaxed and gave in. At this stage, I was going to chain them up together, but realized that would have be somewhat counter-productive. So, I sternly told them they were bad dogs and let them loose.

By this time everyone has calmed down and the fight was over. I was breathing like a mad bull and was pumped full of adrenalin, so it took me a while to relax after that. We humans don't seem to be able to relax nearly as fast as do dogs.

But, what better way to relax than to have a hot cup of Belizean coffee (I think Gallon Jug coffee with a spoonful of cinnamon in the grounds is way fine) and the aforementioned slice of bread.

After breakfast and getting ourselves calmed down, it was time to shower and see what we were going to do for the day.

Today was supposed to be the day we got our new eyeglasses. I checked with Doug and Twyla to see if they wanted to go. No. Twyla was out and Doug was playing house guard, so we took off by ourselves to the hospital and the Methodist Eye Clinic.

We walked into the clinic, which had about three people sitting there and no one staffing the desk. Not a good sign. We waited about 15-20 minutes (see, we've adjusted well) we decided to call the number Elia had given us. She had been at the desk when we ordered the glasses. Whoever answered, said yes, we could get our glasses today. So, we waited some more.

Other folks came in, waited a while and left. One girl asked us if we had talked to anyone working there. 'Uh, not yet,' was our response. So, this time Dianna called the number again and talked to the same girl. She had more information. Elia was sick today, and besides our glasses weren't ready. The recent bad weather (Karl with a K and Matthew) had hampered eyeglass production, so they wouldn't be ready till next Tuesday. Well, that was nice and relaxing. Good thing we still had a couple of other items on our shopping list.

We left from clinic to go to Cinty's so Dianna could buy about 20 yards of fabric and about 30 yards of ribbon for trim for curtains in the guesthouse. We took all that to Alex the tailor, who added everything up and and had a good laugh as he said that we were way short on the ribbon, and it was too narrow for what Dianna wanted to do. So back to Cinty's. I remembered I had my camera just in time to snap Dianna shopping in Corozal's premier fabric store.

Here, she's looking for some 3/8ths- to 1/2-inch wide blue ribbon. Note the well organized and spacious shelves.

Shopping for Ribbon At Cinty's

Actually, to us, the place (and there's three locations (Cinty's 1 - the original, run by Phillip Batty, Jr. - Junior to everyone, Cinty's 2, the middle one on the corner, run by one of his sisters, and Cinty's 3, around the corner and a couple doors up the block, run by Junior's younger brother) looks totally disorganized, with years of stuff piled haphazardly on top of other stuff. All three stores use the same stocking system.

I Think That's It Up There

A while back I was at Cinty's 1, Junior was very vexed, as they say. It seems the girls who work there (all relations of his) had started to clean and reorganize the store. He couldn't find anything and had just told them to knock off the reorganization.

If you come to Corozal for a visit, you owe it to yourself to go shopping at Cinty's 1, 2, and 3. Don't miss any of them. It's like no other place you've ever shopped at. Guaranteed!

Anyway, Dianna got her fabric and the 70 yards of blue ribbon and we got it delivered to Alex.

I Only Need 70 Yards

Alex, who I've written about before, is a slight built Hindu, who's shop is barely a cupboard. He has two ancient (but powerful) sewing machines and he has an assistant. He can sew virtually anything and is very good and very affordable. All the shorts I have now are made by him as all my store-bought ones wore out long ago. All my shirts (other than tshirts) are also made by him, some with another shirt to use as a pattern, some made from scratch with no pattern. Everything fits great.

It's now evening. Rain is coming down again. I may have to take Cindy (not to be confused with Cinty's) to Dr. Sheila. She's limping pretty good. The rain is due to Tropical Depression 16, soon I'm sure, to be named Tropical Storm Nicole, heading for Cuba and south Florida. I hope it lets up this evening sometime. I just have to take the dogs for walkies. I'd rather not walk through a few inches of mud at the start to do it.

hospes domus exertus cedo

That translates from the Latin roughly, Guesthouse Projects Proceeding.

Guesthouse Kitchen Faucet

The latest project I've been working on is installing the kitchen faucet for the guesthouse. It's a beaut. We had gone to Chetumal to look at several places for kitchen faucets. We didn't really see anything we liked and they weren't very cheap. So, I went back to Lano's Supply and looked at their faucets and we bought one.

Drilled a hole in the resin and fiberglass sink, got the faucet installed. This took a while as I though we had a leak in the faucet after I first hooked it up. Turns out a gasket was missing in the hand sprayer, which Lano's replaced, free of charge.

Next up is the one I'm currently working on.

Under Sink Kitchen Drain

This bit has gone from bad to worse. It started as a small drip at the p-trap, and has now grown to a steady stream. Very frustrating. I'm currently rebuilding the white drain pipe assembly and will rework the glued connection to the stand-pipe. I think I've got some angles wrong. But we'll get it sorted out soon. It's just frustrating in that this side is the non-pressurized side, and the leak has gotten worse the more I've tinkered with it.

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On the other hand, a miss is as good as a mile, especially if it's visible for a mile or more. In this case, it's the new construction and signage on the forth floor of the new Cinty's building.

Phillip Batty dna Sons

We noticed this one the other day, of course, while walking the doggies.

Local Stores and Businesses We Patronize

Dianna had a good suggestion. That we post pictures of the stores we go to and use here in Corozal, so that you can see a bit of what shopping is like here. so, with that in mind, we'll be posting pics of the various places.

You've already read about Mrs. June's Kitchen elsewhere on the blog.

Next up is Frank's Meat Products.

Frank's Meat Products

Frank's is located at #2 Park Street North, just north of the central square. His place is a good supplier of fresh beef, hamburger, sausages, special orders, Chilean salmon, and other seafoods when in season.

Our friend Elsie King, on the eve of her departure to Guatamala, cooked up some bodacious salmon steaks for us at our place. She had cleaned out her fridge and cupboard and gave us all her leftover homesteading supplies, including the salmon. Was it ever good. Thanks Elsie!

Now for the Car Wash

This place is unreal. It doesn't seem to have a business name. It appears to be a used car sales place, auto and appliance parts, as well as a car wash.

Car Wash

Completely hand wash process. Very meticulous. Rinsed the the dust off the SUV, washed it down with auto detergent and water, water rinse, rag-dried, windows washed with Windex and newspaper inside and out. Dash and other inside surfaces Armour-All'd, inside completely vacuumed, mats beat and vacuumed, and tires dressed. I've never had that from a car wash before, ever! All this for $20.00BZ. A deal.

Course, two days later, the dust is beginning to accumulate again all over the rig. But for a while it looked sharp.

I asked him if he got a lot of business due to the road dust.

"No", was his answer. "Most people wait till rainy season and come in to get the mud off of their vehicles... (implying only crazy Gringos do it at this time of year?) Naw, I've seen lots of cars in there over the past few days.

Caribbean Chicken

Caribbean Chicken

This is the source for fresh and frozen chicken and eggs. They keep their eggs refrigerated where most other places don't. They also sell other grocery-related items. Easy access in and out from the highway.

General Discount and Drug Store

Clean looking operation. The proprietor (not sure if he was a doctor or pharmacist) had to get back to us on one of Dianna's meds. We'll check back with him on Monday to see if he can get it for her. No info yet on prices of prescription items. We'll let you know.

General Discount and Drug Store

They carry other drugstore related stuff, cough meds, etc. Behind the counter. You have to ask for it. Seems to be the way most stores do business here. Very customer-service oriented. Which is nice and a real change from some pimple-faced teen, chomping his/her gum and looking at you like you interrupted their bored routine for something even more boring, like waiting on you.

Justice of the Peace and Shoe Store

Interesting place. We went there to get some property papers signed and notarized. Senora Marzan, the proprietor, told Dianna and me that we need to have the other two folks involved in the transaction here to sign as well. I started to get PO'd, but quickly realized she was right. So we went over to Craig and Mae's place to get them. They were busy eating breakfast and designing a stairway to their loft.

Justice of the Peace, Shoes, Photo Studio

After a while we made it back to Senora Marzan's, signed the papers, and she duly notarized them. Then didn't charge us anything at all! She just said she wanted to see things filled out properly and done right. Too cool!

Also, her store seems to carry a wide variety of sandals and shoes for the whole family. We will certainly check out her goods when we need zapos.

New World Store

This is the first store I shopped at here in Belize. We've been making to them about every three or four days since, for various and sundry.

New World Grocery Store

They carry a wide variety of foods and household products, all crammed into a tiny establishment. They also carry some excellent imported hard cheeses, kept at or behind the counter. You have to know to ask for them, or you'll miss them entirely!

Cinty's

Cinty's has Three Locations Within Half a Block of Each Other!

Cinty's is one of those stores that seem to have everything. If they don't have it, it probably doesn't exist - sort of place.

Cinty's Middle Store

You always know when they are open. Merchandise spills out of the doorways and over the sidewalk at each location.

Stuff is everywhere. Piled on top of other things or hung by the dozen from overhead. It's hard to describe.

And the staff... Incredible! They not only know where everything is, but they know how many they have of any one thing.

Like I said, they have three locations, all within a half-block of the other. Each carries slightly different items, but all just a jumble with goods.

Their prices are very reasonable. Everyone shops there. Example: Dianna and I were talking to Connie of Copa Banana the other day when she brought over some real estate papers we needed to sign. In the course of the conversation, she mentioned that the door to one of the refrigerators in the guest house had fallen off, and that she had gotten a new fridge.

Dianna asked her where she had gotten it, thinking Connie would say some store over in Chetumal (she's well known locally for frequent shopping there).

Connie piped up and said, "Cinty's". "Where else"?

Like it was the most natural thing in the world to go there to purchase a major appliance. And, she got a good deal on it too!