Mainstreet Burnel with the "rock" as backdrop. 

Eventually a window on my garden. 

Joyce and Brian in downtown Burnel 

A nice hole in my wall. 

Buddies 

Lazy

I admit to being lazy about adding to this blog. Spring has sort of arrived here, (at least it is warmer and the jacaranda are in bloom).

Took a little day trip to Bernal a couple of weeks ago. A nice little burg dominated by a very large rock sticking out of the ground nearby. Friends of mine were attracted to the idea of building a holiday house there. Land is still cheap. Don’t know whether they will do it. I would find it a little small to live there full time.

And for my birthday I punched a hole thru my kitchen wall. The idea is to move the sink to the “hole” side of the kitchen in front of what I hope will be a nice window on the garden. It will also give me a little bit more counter space. In the process I can make some needed adjustments in the shelving and drawer assemblies which I did not have time to do as I hurried to get the kitchen up and running early on in the renos.

I have also engaged a contractor to look into fixing up the façade of this old house. He has not gotten back to me yet on what the damages will be for all that I want done.

In the meantime the Winter Olympic coverage here is heavily weighted towards figure skating. The Mexicans like the romance in it I guess - particularly the dancing. And they really can’t understand the attraction of doing any of the other events in ice and snow and cold. I can sympathize. They did seem to get a kick out of the new snowboard racing event however.

In other news the World cup is only 109 days away! Mexican fans are counting down the days. The Tri-color better play better than they did in the friendly against Korea last week. They looked flat and gave Korea a gift of the only goal scored when Sanchez (their keeper) left the ball unattended in front of the goal thinking there had been a whistle.

The Germans unveiled the new FIFA-approved football (named Teamgeist) that will be used for the games and the Mexicans provided some interesting trivia to go along with it. The technology of the ball has changed significantly over the years including a gelatinous space inside the outer cover to prevent brain damage to the would-be headers and a softer, lighter shell with gas-filled micro-cells to make it go faster and curve better to allow for more goals - to satisfy those impatient Americans no doubt. The Germans expect to sell 10 million of these new balls. They are for sale in Liverpool stores around Mexico. Mexicans typically buy 2 million footballs a year and of all the footballs sold around the world each year, 75% are made in Pakistan.