Holy Frijoles

• No picture today. I´m going crazy with this new capability, but it does take awhile to download my pix. Let´s take a break for a day.
• Ingrid is down with the flu. She was in bed all day yesterday, but is feeling better today. Talea still has the remnants of her cold; a slight cough that kicks in once she is sleeping. Other than that we are fine, but missing our Deltoso cohorts of last week. It is booooooring!
• Tomorrow there are no scheduled classes at my school. A large part of the staff will be in a training session, and the rest of us will be testing a group of students who are attempting to qualify for a national mathematics competition. Yippy-skippy.
• Last week we discovered that Talea scored better than average on the standardized tests at her school. Figure that out. No bilingual support, just weeks in country; she´s got her mom´s brains.
• Friday the Pepino clan is hopping a bus to San Miguel de Allende, where we will meet Ingrid´s sister and our niece. Big Aunt Talea and her daughter, Caroline, are attending the wedding of a friend and we are taking the apportunity to see them. SMA is a great town that I visited about 12 years ago while wondering around the states of Guanajuato and Querétero. The town is a magnet for artisans and still has a colonial look to it. It is the only place in my travels south of the border where I have been asked if I was from there. Lots of expat gringos reside in and around SMA.
• Election year is in high gear. Mexican politics are no different than anywhere else. Today´s headline claims they´ve got a key PRI official on videotape taking a one-million dollar (U.S.) bribe in a D.F. hotel room. Hanky-panky.
• The paper also reports that this year´s dry spell has wiped out the bean crop, one of the principle harvests in this region. The article notes that this will most likely increase emmigration to the States.
• Yesterday, Talea and I went to the neighborhood park with her school pals. First, they played with a wayward shopping cart from the Gigante. Next, they climbed a tree. Then they crunched empty pop cans under their feet and clomped around like horses. Finally, a group of older girls were dancing to a radio they had brought with them, and Talea and Rosio, her pal, tired of the monkey games and joined in the dancing. They laughed so hard they kept falling down. Yes, I took pictures.

Frijól Sagrado,

Pepinato