Dry Season Started

Volcan Turrialba and Volcan Irazu are about 35 Kilometers distant
across the Valle Central, but when the dry season starts and they can
be seen without the rainy season cloud cover they appear much closer.

This morning they appeared. Not as clearly as they will a little
later when sunsets backing the plumes from Turrialba will be recorded
on all the digital camera in Atenas and on this side of the Valley. I
have a couple of good ones, but now that I am using HDR I hope for
somethingmore spectacular and check the view early while making
coffee.

Speaking of coffee, yesterday was the last of the first round of
coffee harvest here at Casi el Cielo. We got 58 cajuelasl, about 900
pounds. When the final accounting is done that will net us about
$500. I am very curious to see what the entire harvest thus far has
been, but hating number I will wait until Jean "does the books."

Jean is feeling a little better and will do her physical therapy in
the pool for the first time in over a month. And exercise is
essential to keep the blood moving in her legs and prevent further
arteriosclerosis of her legs, especially the right one.

So, good morning to all from midway up the Avocado Mountians in San
Isidro de Atenas.

-m-

Harvest Continues

Got back from Jean's dental appointment about 1:30pm and the pickers were waiting. Mari and I counted as they poured from bag to cajuela measure and then into another bag. EIGHTEEN Cajuelas, two shy of a fanega which is worth 80,000 to 90,000 colones.

The pickers say that they estimate there is another ten days of five or six persons picking left.

Do the math! If they are right there is another fifteen hundred dollars waiting to be picked.

And about the same amount of green cherries waiting to ripen and be collected in late December. Keeping the finca weeded, fertilized, and protected against insects and fungus has really paid off. Recall that these are just regrown plants which are only about half size. George, get those labels ready! =m=

Remembering Margaret

Margaret, Peggy, Mom, GG was: born in Jerome Arizona grew up in Anaheim, CA got her RN in San Francisco had two kids retired from Laguna Honda was a “getting old” role model died in Front Royal, VA and then did another two years teaching med students!

*

I got an email yesterday from the anatomical donation department of Georgetown Medial School informing me that the cremated remains of Margaret M. Lively were now available for pickup. Mom had made the gift of her body to the University years and years ago and had designated me as the beneficiary of her cremains. She wanted to avoid all last expenses and to continue her medical service into the future. In DC the dust of her sits in an 8x8x6 urn. I will get it in December and bring her memories to Costa Rica. She loved it here, lived at the Villa Alegria in Alajuela for a couple of years. The staff loved to see her wheel out into the garden after dinner to watch the flowers fade into black. Having to deal with her remains prompts me to think about my own, and Jean’s. Death is the final act of living and it is time to plan. So I will visit the City Hall and see what is available there for Mom’s urn and then later for Me and Jean and Terry. Dad is interred in a cremains niche in Sonoma with a vista of the vineyards of Sebastiani. It would be fitting for Mom to be near us surrounded by the Avocado Mountains and a thousand shades of green -gml-