Here's an idea, for all my thirty- and forty-something friends out there. Get long term care (LTC) insurance. You think I'm nuts? You think it's a weird thing? I'm watching family and friends needing long term care right now, fighting systems, facing bankruptcy,...
"What did you find?" asked my boss, who I called Pastey, for being as white as cod and half as interesting. His real name was Leslie, or 'Les. I found that quite fitting as well. Pretty much what we expected. The warehouse is full of arms, and it's set up for...
You may have noticed I've been blog silent for a few months. I was finishing... This. My novel. It's ready for agenting, and I'm gearing up for that. I'd love to hear your comments on these first few pages. SPY ACT. Act One. Ash Shamilyah region, northern...
This week has been absolutely tremendous. I'm serious. I know from big scary mountainloads of work, and this week qualifies. I am responsible for three evaluations starting all at once. For the third one, I head to the field tomorrow to collect data in El Cauca, a...
Ooooh, if good wishes made a difference... and it turns out they do. I got GREAT advice from friends far and wide on my "Boohoo, I'm homesick" post last week. Amazing folks with great council and some of it very targeted while other recommendations were slightly...
I'm not on the move anymore - my home is here in Bogota. I don't know if I can convey how weird that is. In point of fact, I'm not sure I'm entirely in favor! How do people do this, all over the world, all the time, but for me I feel like a fish out of water? Now I...
Facatativa, or Faca, is where I went last weekend. The lady who gave me a facial has a sister-in-law who is really into bicycling and they invited me up for the day. It's an hour outside Bogota. There were six of us in the group - the sister-in-law, a guy who owns a...
A lot has happened in the past three weeks, since last I posted. I flew to DC, and saw Kyna before she headed to an out-of-town conference. She wanted my help in thinking about her work! It was cool. It's as if I were evaluating something related to health, and needed...
I got the apartment I wanted in Bogota. It's so lovely. It's light and airy like being in a plane or on a boat, navigating the city from the seventeenth floor. This is the view toward the mountains. The apartment hasn't been lived in recently, and when I moved in...
My first week in Bogota ended last Sunday with a spin through the city - on Sundays, the city closes down many major avenues and they fill up with people on bikes, people on rollerblades, people with dogs, people in wheelchairs, looky-loo tourists, police officers in...