An inquisitive old fart with a camera
A snake. Of the dogs, only Benji paid attention. When the snake adopted what looked like a striking position, we were both yelling at him to leave it alone.
He did, and it continued on its way off the path.
Recent winds turned the sand “roads” into recording media.
We stare at them, perplexed. We did settle on one type of track (not shown here) being caused by a beetle. But these remain mysterious.
And this must (?) be from a lizard, probably 20-30 cm long.
We were working feverishly at our chacra (mini-farm, 14 acres with small house) in preparation for the arrival of a tenant, the second Canadian-dwelling family member of Germany-Russian neighbors who really wanted to rent. Alas, also the second Canadian-dwelling family member of Germany-Russian neighbors who cancelled his trip at the last minute. (Can you guess to whom we won’t be offering to rent in the future?)
I thought it a good idea to flush the rooftop water tank (which overflows back into the well) by letting the windmill run nonstop, but the windmill suddenly started making dinosaur noises: give me grease! I immediately thought of my Namibian friend Burkhart, who lives a kilometer or so up Ruta 11. His farm hand dealt with our windmill a year ago, when Burkhart briefly lived there. Lubricate it myself? At age 63, while fit, I’m not particularly (read: AT ALL) comfortable messing around at the top of an 8-meter windmill tower, with the disengaged fins still pivoting in the wind.
(I’ll work on that: I should be!)
I had phoned Burkhart moments before for advice about our hot water heater (giza in southern Africa), but felt that asking help with the windmill warranted a visit in person.
So I drove to his place. Heading out our dirt road, I noticed a couple guys messing around with our neighbor Jerry’s backhoe.
Burkhart wasn’t at home. Nice chat with his wife. Noticed an accident a couple hundred meters further. Cops, fire truck, some truck off the side the side of the road, or something. Headed back.
Back on our side road, passed someone driving away with Jerry’s backhoe. Behind, a pickup with flashers on. I waved at both.
Got to our place. Phoned Jerry: is this legit, someone driving away with your backhoe?
Jerry: know nothing. Heading north or south on Ruta 11? If north, maybe going to Burkhart’s place.
Back in the car. Photograph the perps.
Call Jerry: they’re turning north on 11. If they proceed past Burkhart’s, I’ll go on ahead to alert traffic police that they’re stealing the backhoe.
At Burkhart’s driveway on the right, I pull off to the left and park. They pass Burkhart’s driveway. I speed on ahead to report to the police that the approaching backhoe is a stolen vehicle. I have to repeat it, perhaps because I’m not mumbling enough to be understood by a normal Urugayan. Another policía transito appears. I repeat my accusation of a theft in progress.
No no, he says, he’s a friend of the owner. The gringo?
And the backhoe turns off the road to help clean up the mess.
It took two hours for the clean up, Burkhart later tells me. Who’s paying the time? The fuel? The machine hours? I doubt Jerry cares, but…
….apparently it didn’t occur to them to tell the backhoe’s owner what they were doing?
Why do I even bother to pay attention?
Baby avocados: the beginning of our third harvest.
Baby orange — first time from tree #1:
Baby oranges — first time from tree#2.
This is what our avocado trees looked like in August 2015:
Note the large pine tree in the background to the right. It’s still there now:
The two little orange trees are front right. I had to transplant them from the country because wind and hard soil there were just too much. It’s taken them a long time to get comfortable here. Very cool to see fruit starting to form!
They must be cat tracks, because what else could they be? Something probably easy to verify with an intertoobz image search, no?
Of course.
…may or may not be ready when you need it.
But you will have easy access to the back.
I took this last Sunday. No sign of tire marks, pieces of vehicle (plastic, glass). Strange.
Friends did a lot of clearing in the overgrown yard of the house they’re renting here.
One long piece of wood that was perfect for their clothesline …
…decided to start growing again.
Time to replace the ceiling fan in our bedroom, a job I was not going to do myself — too high. The electrician brought a four-part folding ladder that wasn’t tall enough, and neither would my extension ladder work. By itself.
Since I had just started a massage in the next room when he arrived shortly after 2 PM (having said he’d be there at 10 AM), he poked around in my workshop, found rope and wire, and assembled this. My ladder is on the left; his is folded over it. Rope, many pieces of wire….
Hey, it worked!
But how did he transport a ladder on a motorbike?
Easy! Notice the tool box balanced in front of him as well.
I’ve been reading a fascinating book called Natural Born Heroes: Mastering the Lost Secrets of Strength and Endurance.
Christopher McDougall’s journey begins with a story of remarkable athletic prowess: On the treacherous mountains of Crete, a motley band of World War II Resistance fighters—an artist, a shepherd, and a poet—abducted a German commander from the heart of the Axis occupation. To understand how, McDougall retraces their steps across the island that birthed Herakles and Odysseus, and discovers ancient techniques for endurance, sustenance, and natural movement that have been preserved in unique communities around the world.
His search takes us scrambling over rooftops with a Parkour crew in London, foraging for greens with a ballerina in Brooklyn, tossing heavy pieces of driftwood on a Brazilian beach with the creator of MovNat—and, finally, to our own backyards. Natural Born Heroes will inspire readers to unleash the extraordinary potential of the human body and climb, swim, skip, throw, and jump their way to heroic feats.
Parkour has been on my radar for a while. Not that, pushing mid-60s, I’m not going to be jumping walls and climbing buildings any time soon, but the basic moves seem very practical, especially rolling after dropping a distance (as opposed to tearing your knees apart). It also inspired me to start doing pull-ups again. One of the first things I did when we moved here was install a pull-up bar. It’s been mostly idle.
Not the case 15 years ago in North Carolina, where it hung poolside outside my office door. At one point one of my son’s teenage friends was over and I did 14 in a row for him. Starting out now a few weeks ago, it was three. Now it’s six. And maybe if I keep up at this rate, in six months I’ll be able to do the Parkour essential, but *wow* difficult muscle up: where you grab the bar and end above it, with your arms straight below you. It’s how you can get over a high wall.
Which brings me to Leo.
I met Leo at a Uruguay Phyle meeting in Punta del Este several years ago. Doug Casey was the guest speaker. When I met Leo, I realized I’d seen him in a dream the night before. Kind of weird. As Doug was going on about the irrelevance of environmental awareness, Leo asked him, “So you’re saying ‘Fuck the rain forest’?” “Yeah, fuck the rain forest,” was his reply. Charming guy, that Doug.
But anyway. Fast forward a few years, and a couple guys who build small isopanel houses come by to give an estimate on replacing our casita roof. Leo is one of them. He apparently doesn’t remember me. No big deal. He wants to get a closer look at the roof, from the wall that separates us from our neighbors. I offer to get a ladder I have close by, but in a split second Leo has pulled himself up, and is standing on the top of the wall.
The wall is over 7′ (2.1 m) high.
Impressive feat, but hey, the guy was probably 30 years younger than me.
I had no idea exactly how impressive that was. Now I do, and I know what that move is called, and I get curious about Leo. Does he still do Parkour regularly?
If I ever had his email, that’s long gone, but fortunately he has an uncommon name, and it’s easy to find him online. Fascinating history: born in Holland, school in England, Lamborghini and Ferrari mechanic in Florida, bought a boat and sailed the Caribbean before moving to Uruguay and having a couple of children, the second of whom died very early on of heart complications.
But what happened next, I just learned today.
I’m still shocked. [link expired: he suffered a debilitating stroke in his 30s]