An inquisitive old fart with a camera
No sooner do I witness heavy frost and order a ton of firewood, than the temperature gets positively balmy outside. Remember, July 27 here is the equivalent of January 27 in the northern hemisphere.
Yes, I did polish our car’s scratched windshield with cleaning wax, as I mentioned earlier, and it worked! Reduced the glare probably 90%. Much safer now.
Morning sun makes quick work of the heavy frost on the roof of the car, while the temperature hovers in the low single-digits Celsius. One more day I won’t be using my new polisher to get scratches off the windshield, I think.
First time we came to Uruguay from Mexico, we were amazed to wake up to passport covers curled by the humidity. Where we lived in Mexico, March was so dry it might have been called Parch. It was refreshing; our skin felt moisturized.
It has a down side, though. In many parts of the world, locals build houses adapted to the environment. Not in Uruguay: a typical house is a single wall of brick, stucco, and no insulation, as if the objective were to grow mold. Ironically, now mostly-eschewed traditional building with adobe rarely has problems with moisture, as long as the walls are protected.
Today, the temperature is almost balmy, but the humidity continues to be incredible. They’re reporting it at 88%, which I’m tempted to disbelieve. I delivered the bases for some kitchen cabinets to the chacra, and almost got stuck just inside the gate.*
I’ve never had this happen before. Our mason has had a tough time the last few days; each coat of paint on the kitchen light fixture I’m making takes a couple days to dry.
* Called a potera; were I to bring that gate 10km to town, it would become a portal. Go figure.
You may have heard about the extreme flooding nearby in Argentina. In Uruguay, 15 people were evacuated near Montevideo. Lots and lots of rain.
And when it ended, the area surrounding us became an amazing chorus of frogs. In this short clip I kept panning, hoping to catch distant flashes of lightning, to no avail.
Rana is Spanish for frog. But you knew that 😉
Time to get ready for a new planting.
24 hours later, what appeared to be high tide appears to be low tide.
And the water has changed color completely.
Shortly before we returned to Uruguay, a powerful storm swept through. Here’s just one of many similar scenes:
On the ground in front you see a concrete power pole that supported the intersection of wires now hanging in the air, all knocked about by the large eucalyptus in the background.
By all accounts, it was a most exciting time 😉
The cold yielded yesterday: 100% saturated warm air that kept mopped floors wet all day, that condensed onto cold surfaces untouched by a mop. By afternoon thunderstorms rolled over, and we unplugged, plugged, unplugged again – everything, but first and foremost the phone line to the DSL modem. When that goes, you can’t just waltz by the office and get another. You wait and wait and wait on the phone along with everyone else, then you wait for a technician to come and swap the modem. Last time it took 11 days.
When the rain stopped, the low clouds remained, catching the light of the setting sun and turning everything incredibly yellow – then incredibly orange. We watched in amazement. I didn’t take photos. I knew they wouldn’t do it justice.
Then I was siting with my laptop at the kitchen island, and did an abrupt double-take. The yard outside the sliding glass doors had disappeared into black. One minute it was still day; only moments later it was night, as if someone cut off a light switch.
Had I been outside, I probably could have watched the shadow race past overhead, the line between light and dark on the top surface of the low clouds, lighting below as though through frosted glass. Next time, if ever?
Today we have just fog.
-1°C this morning in Montevideo; 93% humidity. Heavy frost in the front yard (none in the enclosed back yard where my latest planting of cilantro has just peeped out of the earth). It’s been a month since the chimney cleaner didn’t clean our chimney . I got some slabs of steel cut to replace the bricks he broke in the wood stove; just installed them this morning. Who knows when, or if, the guy will ever return. It’s Uruguay.
As I mentioned before, most mydayuruguay.wordpress are neither well insulated nor well-heated. I’m sitting next to single-pane windows set into single-brick walls. I finally wised up and put a small heater under my desk; it helps. As do multiple layers of clothing.
* no one claims Uruguay has tropical weather, but some people apparently have that impression.
When the rain comes, they run and hide their heads. They might as well be dead.
It rained much of the night, and the morning was unpleasantly rainy still. Our son went to catch a bus to his class in Montevideo.
There were no buses.
No strike, no holiday; simply no buses on the road in ugly weather.
My wife called the friend who agreed to translate for her at the hairdresser. Let’s do this another time, the woman said, it’s ugly today. This despite door-to-door transportation.
Perhaps the bus drivers knew no one would go anywhere, so they stayed home too.
My best guess is that people here have learned to avoid the risk of getting wet, and consequently chilled, because homes here aren’t built to be warm. There is evidence that this has a historical basis (1897):