March
2009 |
On Sunday March 8,
2009 we received news from Mexico
that Alberto's nephew, Fernando,
(perhaps accidently) shot and killed his current
girlfriend and then turned the gun
on himself. He leaves behind a wife,
ex-wife and four children under the
age of 7 years old. Fernando was 25
years old. Alberto talked with
his sister Julia, in depth two days
later.
Fernando
At first,
Julia said,
it was thought that there was a
possibility that Fernando's current
girlfriend was seeing someone else
and that it enraged him. But
throughout the morning, several
eyewitnesses saw them happily
visiting friends and laughing and
cuddling. Yet, others, like
Fernando's sister Jessica, felt that
Fernando was exhibiting strange
nervousness and look shaky and pale
when she saw him early in the day.
Fernando
told his mother Julia, several
months ago that he needed to
carry a revolver for protection. Julia, feels that
Fernando was handling the revolver
when it went off accidently killing
the girlfriend, and in horror and
despair turned the gun on himself.
Fernando's first
wife, Gabriela, from whom Fernando
has been estranged for more than 5
years. said that Fernando had
visited the children the day before,
telling them that no matter what
happened that they should know that
he loved them very much. Gabriela
thought it odd enough to say,"
Fernando, don't say things like
that. It scares the children. Why
would you say something like that?"
Services
were held at the local (catholic)
church and Fernando was given a
Misa (Mass). The
girlfriend's family had separate
services in another location. The
couple had one newborn girl
together. Fernando had 3 other
children as well. One daughter 2
years old, with Belén and two with
his first wife, Gabriela -a boy
Kevin 5, and a daughter Xochitl 7,
both of whom we doted on and tried
to spoil the way we did with
Fernando when he was only five years
old. We are sad and send our love
and sympathies to all the survivors.
Fernando leaves
behind his son Kevin
...and his daughter Xochitl
Fernando Age 5
February 2009
| It looks
like the Supreme Court of California
is leaning toward upholding
Proposition 8, effectively ending
for now, same sex marriage in that
state, by removing civil rights
protection of a "suspect class" or a
class of people historically
discriminated against. This will be
the first time a ruling actually
removes civil rights from a
minority. However, the SCOC will
probably uphold the 18,000 civil
same sex marriages performed between
May 2008 and November 6, 2008,
including our marriage. In
other news, there is renewed
enthusiasm for HR S.424, The United
American Families Act, a bill to
restore immigration civil rights to
bi-national couples.more here
"First they ignore you. Then then laugh at you. Then they
fight you. Then you win." M. Gandhi
February 2009 |
My trusty Quad band Razr was failing
and Alberto's Razr phone face was shattered so we
finally got IPhones. We are too poor and owe too
much money to think of this as anything but the
Christmas we didn't get, Alberto's early birthday
(Feb.24) present and this is my " I'd rather have this than
new red shoes" present.
more on the miracle that is
IPhone
January 2009
| Tortillabay Statistics Update from IPower, our
host-provider: We had 27,000 visitors to our website
in 2008 and they stayed an average of 20 minutes.
Our top-rated video on YouTube,
Cinque Terre, has received nearly 26,000
viewings. woohoo!
Cinque Terre: 25,000+
viewers since first posted on
YouTube
All the towns
are built straight up the
sides of steep ravines, and
are a rabbit warren of
labyrinthine passageways
covered in ancient worn
stone steps and pavement. We
had a view of the rocky
coast and ocean, and the air
was warm, sweet and fresh.
La
dolce far niente.....
Moretti Ranch Road,
San Luis Obispo, July 2007
photo by Alberto Vazquez
May 3, 2007
We Are
Leaving Los Angeles
Some
background:
On March 17th, nearly two months ago, I flew to Albuquerque
to meet with my brothers for a visit with my father
and his wife. We drove to the northwest corner
of New Mexico to spend a few days with him as he is
in very frail health. We were very worried about
about both of them. They are Hurricane Katrina
survivors, still coping with the horrendous events
of late summer 2005.
In August of 2005, my father and his wife lived near
Biloxi, Mississippi and made a harrowing escape just
minutes before Hurricane Katrina struck. They lost everything, their home and everything they
owned, barely escaping with their lives. After being
rescued by my nephew and shepherded to his home in
Tallahassee, they decided to do what many other
shell-shocked evacuees did: seek higher ground. In
this case, 5,000 feet above sea level in the dry
remote mountains of Northern New Mexico.
They are still very traumatized by the events by
Hurricane Katrina and still have not received any
restitution or assistance from FEMA. Nor have any of
their neighbors in Biloxi. Does this surprise you?
Thousands of families still are struggling to put
their lives back together after that event, but the
furious news-cycle and national interest in Anna
Nicole-Smith pushed the plight of the victims off
the screen and out of the short, undemanding attention span of the American public. The Bush
Administration never intended to help these victims,
of course.
We were sad to learn recently that the Bush
Administration turned down billions of dollars in
international aid to assist the victims of Hurricane
Katrina. It is likely that there are thousands of other
retired persons, veterans of WWII, who have also
suffered like my father, with dislocation, and the
inevitable health issues of heart attacks, strokes,
pneumonia and depression as they struggle to
understand why their government has abandoned them. Yet they remain optimistic and my brothers and
I are determined to honor their wishes to move back
to a warmer climate where they will be more comfortable. My father is 84, suffers from
blindness caused by macular degeneration, has
pneumonia and is currently on bottled oxygen 24
hours a day.
We are anxious to get them out of Northwest
(Four-Corners) New Mexico - beautiful New Mexico's
dirty little secret.
This is without a doubt, the
ugliest, most depressing place in America.
Bloomfield, New Mexico is a squalid, polluted grease
spot on the highway, dominated by 3 oil refineries,
truck stops and telephone poles. This area has the highest number of citizens in America living
on bottled oxygen, the highest rates of cancer and
the worst air pollution in New Mexico. The air is
full of radon and the ground is littered with
low-grade radiation from depleted uranium mining.
The local Navaho tribesmen are mostly dead or dying from 50
years
of mining work for the governments exploitation of this vital ingredient
for the nuclear industry. More than half of the
Native American people there, still live without
running
water and sewage systems.
The surrounding side
streets are filled with decaying, cheap,
pre-fabricated vinyl homes and abandoned cars, trash
and
all the rest of the discards, plastic bags and
effluvium commonly found blown into the chain link
fences that demarcate the property lines. Every
available space is paved in asphalt and lined with
fry shacks. The blatting roar of oil industry
traffic and cargo trucks fill the highways 24 hours
a day.
At night, the evening sky is silhouetted with the
steel pipes and erector sets of refineries and the
continuous poisonous belching flames from venting
exhaust towers.
I would like to ask Governor Bill
Richardson why he has not done something to repair
this cancerous blight on what was once one of
the most pristine and beautiful places in the
country. It is a horrendous place to live and
apocalyptic to see and experience. We are anxious to
get
them out of there when his health improves enough.
Beautiful Downtown Bloomfield, New Mexico
Brother Scott, Me, Brother Lindsay, Dad
My Father and his wife Hanna
When I returned home, I was more determined than
ever to move us out of crowded Los Angeles. But I
wanted to find someplace that would suit our new mindset about our quality of life and that would
incorporate our sensibilities and experiences in
Europe. We miss Europe greatly. And with the happy
memory of our last spousal anniversary in Barcelona,
we like the idea of celebrating our 18th year
together on May 31st by clearing the cache and
starting over in a fresh new direction. To that end,
and after much research and forethought, we are moving to San Luis Obispo next Tuesday, on
May 8th.
Three week ago, we drove to Ventura where we stayed
for three nights in a hotel, armed with maps,
resumes and apartment listings from www.craigslist.com . Ventura is about 100 miles from our little studio in
Paramount in South Los Angeles. We set up base camp
there and visited seven Trader Joe's stores including one in Ventura - then traveling the
101 north, to two stores in Santa Barbara, one in
Goleta, one in Arroyo Grande, one in San Luis Obispo, then a full 150 miles from Ventura to
Templeton our newest store just south of Paso
Robles. It was very exhausting driving up and down
the coast and I averaged 5 or 6 hours of driving every
day. But it is a beautiful, beautiful drive as you
probably know, crossing through what I consider to
be classic California scenery, intermediate coastal
range, at this moment covered in bright yellow wild
mustard and orange poppies and native oak trees in full spring green, vineyards, small
farmhouses and sleepy villages. Just the stuff I
love to paint. Both San Luis Obispo and the
surrounding countryside remind us of the best sleepy villages we
visited in Spain and Italy.
Templeton, the store I am transferring to, is just 7
miles south of Paso Robles in the heart of the
Central Coast wine and almond country. It's our
first "green" store, built like a hunting lodge with open
beam ceilings and natural skylights. It's doing HUGE
business. I will commute to Templeton from San Luis Obispo, 21 miles away through
lightly-trafficked highways, rolling hills and
stunning vistas.
I was advised to visit all the TJ stores first, a
great suggestion from my very sympathetic store
managers in Manhattan Beach, to get a feel for which
store would fit my personality. It was good advice
and I really hit it off with most of them, but I
chose Templeton for it's position as our newest
store on the coast. We will live in San Luis Obispo, a charming
old-fashioned walk-around European-style small town
with all the goods and services we need. The food
is produced locally, the town water comes from an
underground aquifer and high in the foothills are
two dammed man-made large reservoirs/lakes. They have a thriving fishing industry 20 miles away,
and they are the nation's #1 grower of artichokes.
Jamba Juice, famous for its fruit smoothies, was
founded in this town.
San Luis Obispo is precisely halfway between L.A.
and San Francisco, 100 miles north of Santa Barbara
in the rolling coastal foothills of North Central California. It's very beautiful. It's just
north of Pismo Beach, east of Morro Bay and Hearst's
Castle, two hours to Big Sur, 3 hours to Sequoia National Park. It is surrounded by mountain views
and vast, protected National Forests, great for
hiking. The population is around 44,000 plus a transient
student population at Cal-Poly Tech. Houses start at
LA prices in the mid 700's but that may well change as we now know. Efficient trains (Amtrak)
connect us to all the coastal cities from San Diego
to Seattle. San Luis Obispo (hereafter referred to as SLO) has a
"slow-growth policy". A women at the Chamber of
Commerce told me that growth policies are very
strict - it took 10 years for a Rite-Aid drug store
to get the proper permits to build. Town slogan is
"Experience the SLO Life". It is illegal to smoke
cigarettes in public and use plastic bags in retail
stores. SLO has a ballet company, many performing arts
centers, night clubs, live music, farmer's market on
Thursday nights and Saturday morning, free twilight concerts in the park on Friday night. At
various dates in August are the California Mid-State
Fair in Paso Robles (a real cowboy state fair with
roping and riding) , the Annual Central Coast
Shakespeare Festival in Avila Beach and the Annual
Olive Festival in Paso Robles.
We can finally visit Hearst's Castle and go camping in
Sequoia/ Kings Canyon National Park (our favorite
park that no one visits...bears, brilliant sky of stars, wild rivers and real wood fires, and the
largest tree you have EVER seen...we know where the
every biggest one in the world is - it's rarely visited.) Sequoia is 3 hours from here. We'll take
our high-powered telescope with us so we can see the
nebulas and galaxies in the inky black night sky. Santa Barbara is 2 hours away to the south. The
ocean at Avila Beach is 20 minutes away. There are
wineries and olive groves in every direction. There is brilliant winemaking going on up
there and we know which one's are a must visit. Paso
Robles has 3 four-star restaurants Me likey likey.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Luis_Obispo,_California
San Luis Obispo, California
Alberto feels like this is a better spot to find
work and he can walk or bike just 3 blocks to the
downtown area. The apartment is very, VERY small but
only $840 a month - with a month to month lease - so
we can find our way around this summer and move to
something more suitable when we wish.
We have some ambivalence about being so close, 20
miles away, to Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant and
the reasons are varied, but I suppose at least we will have lights and heat for a few
years more than the rest of the world. Given what I
now know, I think nuclear power has to be an option
put back on the table.
I insist you read the work of
a man I have been following for some years and who
is now touring to standing-room-only crowds at campuses around the country.
The Long
Emergency, 2005, by James Howard Kunstler rhttp://www.amazon.com/Long-Emergency-Converging-Catastrophes-Twenty-First/dp/0871138883 His blog is, with the unfortunate name of,
Clusterfuck Nation by James Howard Kunstler and can
be found here:
http://jameshowardkunstler.typepad.com/clusterfuck_nation/ Bookmark it and follow it for a few months. It will
capture you. His writing style is very amusing and
articulate and thoughtful.
But the following article, written a lifetime ago in
2005, (though it may may give you some thoughtful
nightmares) can be read in a few minutes, to give
you an idea of what is coming at us sooner rather than
later, perhaps as soon as this year. Kunstler is a
non-religious, avowed progressive liberal and a sardonic and humorous writer.
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/7203633/the_long_emergency His book is a great read. And if anyone you know
thinks that we will "blue-sky" our way out of this-
or "they" will find a fantastic new energy source-
or run the world on used french fry oil, ethanol, cow pies or
other bio-fuel, this will set them straight about the
realities of our energy future.
We are out of oil
and natural
gas and and the world is going to change
drastically. And it will happen shortly. This has
nothing to do with any other looming crisis at hand
such as
the changing climate, immigration, terrorism,
national debt or the imminent collapse of the real
estate/ US/world economy, not to mention Britney
Spears' life-threatening personal crises or the
recent tragedies of Sanjaya and Alec Baldwin.
You may feel
disinclined to pay attention to the energy crisis
looming on the horizon. I suggest to you that by facing
it head on, it will put you in control of your own destiny.
Only you will be able to take responsibility for
your own future, just as you always have. If you
feel that something is going on in the world that just is no
longer sustainable, then read his book. This is not
a doomsday scenario but it's going to get rough.
Those of you who know me well, know that I am always
the one with the answers, always the one who is
right about everything. (heh heh) Take from this
warning what you will.
While we do understand that no part of the world
will be unaffected by the end of oil and natural
gas, Los Angeles, a city that we really and truly
love, would not be a good city to live in long term
in any scenario above.
And yes, the
traffic in Los Angeles has actually become very much worse in the year we were
absent.
Los Angeles, last
week, officially became a city of more than 4
million -11 million in Los Angeles County plus the
commutable surrounding counties of San Bernardino (2
million), Riverside (2 million) and Orange (3
million) for a staggering total of 18 million
people, all of then on the freeway when I have to
get to work. And Los Angeles has the distinction once again of being
the most polluted city in the USA.
One of the reasons
we visited Europe was because of all these
challenging issues that are coming so quickly.
Europe is going to cope so much more effectively than the States.
It's so sad what we have done to American cities.
The suffocating ring of fry shacks, asphalt, traffic
congestion and big box stores that now clog the main arteries and doomed suburbs of the 21st
century is unbearable. I welcome it's demise even
knowing full well what lies beyond. In any event, I
am grateful that there will be a Progressive
Democrat in the Oval Office in 19 months. I hope we
can make it.
The other 3 reasons we are moving are grounded in a
daily reality.
I cannot advance with Trader Joe's unless I move
away from this administrative region so - we are
moving to a different region. I am
hopeful that my good record, experience and ability will
allow me to take on more responsibility by going
"fulltime" and significantly increase my take home
salary within a year. After a time, perhaps two
years, I can transfer to any other location in the
US, and we will finally be able to build a suitable
"green" home, with a pond, orchard and garden and
we can raise goats and tomatoes and chickens and I
will have a painting studio and so forth. We
continue to plan for a second tiny home in Italy or
Spain and one third small home in Mexico. Stay tuned
for some exciting news in this area.
Trader Joe's remains a progressive and interesting
company and I enjoy working for them. I am
especially grateful for having the continued support
and best wishes of my current store friends, Captain
Pete Zak and First Mate Rachael Galliano. I just
received a spectacular performance review from the staff at that store. I will miss them all.
I am very proud of them.
Alberto has suffered by not being able to find
suitable work in this blue-collar working-class
immigrant community of Paramount. SLO is full of
fine restaurants, all within walking/bicycling distance,
and we are moving there at the start of the busy
summer season .
Also, since Manuelito (our landlord) mom , 88 years
old, is arriving on May 18th from Mazatlan for her
annual 3 month escape from the heat and humidity of coastal Mexico, and since we are in her
apartment, we decided to make the bigger leap to
finally leave Los Angeles instead of looking around locally for suitable housing. (now, there's a
contradiction in terminology!) Manuelito is
sick about our leaving,
and
promises to visit us in the future.
We will get in touch as soon as we are back on line.
We are here until May 7th. We have arranged the
rent-a-truck, apartment, cable etc. in advance of
this move and we think we can get it all done in one
strenuous day. All of our things are still in
storage in Ventura and we will be glad to get them
back so we can stop paying for the monthly storage fee.
We just look at this as one more hotel/holiday trip
and have become experts at this. We just fall into
our "..if this is
Paris/Paramount/Guadalajara/Sorrento/Madrid it must
be Tuesday" routine. (heh heh). It helps that we are still living out of suitcases,
more or less. This is a no-sweat move.
We are in good health (I have lost 15 pounds
slamming cans and stuffing grocery bags!) and very
optimistic about this move. We think something wonderful is about to happen to us. Stay in touch,
come and visit and we will continue to keep you
updated. love, Craig and Alberto same telephone numbers
We leave you with our
favorite photographic image from our time in
Paramount, CA., taken at a Halloween event at a
local elementary school in October, 2006. Photo by
Alberto Vazquez. We ask you to look into the eyes of
this unknown child who happily posed for Alberto.
The power and optimism she projects, the
promise of a new life in a new country, the
immigrant's dream. The pleasures of childhood. The
power of Womanhood, Sisterhood and faith in the
future. She was born in Paramount. But what will
happen to her? Will she have to return to live in
Mexico with her undocumented parents? Or will she
stay here and continue to dream of being the next
President of the United States? What would you
decide?
This
is one of Alberto's most remarkable photographs.
Photo by Alberto
Vazquez 2006
January 1, 2007
January 1,
2006
HAPPY NEW YEAR!
Happy New Year to
Everyone! We hope everyone has a healthy and rewarding year ahead. We
have had a remarkable year in 2006. We hope you did too. But we wish the world news was better.
There will be some bright spots in 2007, but until we find
new leadership, every day will bring new sad stories from
Iraq, the American city formerly known as New Orleans,
Africa and the list goes on. We insist that you see An
Inconvenient Truth by Al Gore. If you cannot get a copy,
I will happily mail you ours. (On a lighter note, be sure to
see Happy Feet.) What's a New Year's Day without some spine-tingling
predictions for 2007? I don't actually guide my life with astrology, or understand
it. I am a reality-based non-believer. So when I do read my
horoscope, call it, um, a guilty pleasure. You may have already heard or read about this. It is the
astrological report for 2007 and beyond, for Bush (Cancer)
and the U.S.A. (also Cancer) that is causing such a stir in
Washington D.C right now, from well-known astrologist
Michael Lutin of Vanity Fair magazine, the January 2007
issue. I enjoy occasionally reading Lutin because, like the
other writers at Vanity Fair, he is deft, witty, urbane and
razor-sharp in his writing. Lutin always manages to
poetically lift up some sub-strata of my distressed and
nervous psyche, re-weaving it into a bright, pro-active
to-do list that stays pinned to my pocket. You get a task
but with a smart chuckle. He is always upbeat. This is
ultimately no different but but if you also get a guilty
pleasure from occasionally reading your horoscope , you
should read it. And buckle
up. It has the ring of truth. Lutin has tapped into our
national psyche. Something big is coming. You know
it's true. But don't be afraid. The world is not coming to
an end. These are exciting and challenging times.
And a truly
terrific and moving song by Pink. It remains a fact that the
American political progressive movement, in the tradition of
Guthrie, Baez and Dylan, still finds it's voice in music
(something I learned from my brothers).
Dear Mr.
President by Pink
click to
play
Dear
Mr. President Music and lyrics by Pink 2006
Happy New
Year Everyone. Stay
Strong. Stay Healthy. Stay Focused. Stay Alert. And
fasten your seat belts. It's going to be a bumpy ride. Love, Craig
and Alberto
We were excited
to meet Philip at the Los Angeles International Airport. We had
not seen him since June 6th in Barcelona, 6 months ago. Philip
had the month of December off from his busy schedule as
Principal Clarinet in the Liceu Barcelona, the Opera Symphony of
Barcelona, and he decided to divide the month of December
between us and his sister Evelyn and her family in Toronto.
Philip had not
made any plans about California other than to visit with
friends, stay with us and see a bit of Northern California. But
we could not go north without showing him a bit of our Los
Angeles. continue
December 2006
Happy Festivus to
everyone! Thank you Santa, for the early Festivus present
on November 6th. Nancy Pelosi? It's about time
that an Italian mother was running the
house(hold). Maybe by this time next year I'll have
sugar-plum fairies - reality-based, war-free,
partner-married, national-health insured,
stem-cell protected and green card-legal fairies
- dancing in my head.
Before I forget - at the end of this email is a
link to a new story I wrote. It's about
something that really happened to us during our
stay on the Ligurian Sea in Northern Italy. I
was reluctant to tell you about it, being the
reality-based, science-based person that I am
but now I have decided to share it anyway. I
think you will enjoy it. It's a real ghost
story. yikes..
On November 6th, I asked for book
recommendations from all of you. We thank
everyone for all the terrific ideas. You folks
are diverse, eclectic, traditional, and even,
well...outre (out there) in your reading tastes.
There are classics, favorites, off-topic
recommendations, and some thrilling new
suggestions. We liked them all so much, we have
started to go right through the list and
order/read (or re-read) them all.
If any of these pique your own interest, you
will see that I have included links
(click-throughs) to Amazon.com for each book,
for your convenience. We invite you use our
pages to visit Amazon or to view more
information about the books that are listed.
Every click-through from our website, whether
it's a Google-link or Amazon-link brings us $$,
or so they tell me. I'll use the money earned to
buy a $ digital projector for my painting. It
will allow me to project my photographs and
other images in a bright and clear format, under
regular room-lighting conditions, onto a canvas
to to enhance the layout and encourage me to
paint more often. And no, this is not cheating.
This is a common practice among many painters.
British painter David Hockney in his book,
Secret Knowledge: Uncovering the Lost Techniques
of the Old Masters ,suggests that some of the
old masters did the same thing using optics and
lens of the time. As Hockney is quick to point
out though, the use of optics does not diminish
the immensity of artistic achievement. He
reminds the reader that a tool is just a tool,
and it is still the artist's hand and creative
vision that produce a work of art. I agree with
that and this is just a tool I want to
experiment with. So the more you click - the quicker little
Craigie gets a shiny new digital projector.
Some of the books you recommended are also
linked to translated Spanish versions as well,
if they are available. Most of them will ship in
1 or 2 days inside the USA in plenty of time for
Christmas. Gift yourself or give someone you
know a book for Christmas! Raise the world's
reading curve! Again, I thank you and Alberto thanks you.
When you go to the book page linked below, you
will see that we have re-designed some things:
Every web page has been re-formatted to make it
easier to view in different browsers. ( I am not
yet finished with every single page but I will
be soon.)
Every web page now has Google ads and we will be
adding other carefully evaluated and
site-sensitive, progressive/green/appropriate ad
links as we go forward. Google scans each page
for keywords and presents ads appropriate to the
content of the page - some of it is hilarious.
Every web page page now has a little "Comments"
link at the top-left of the page which you can
click on (give it 20 seconds or more to open)
.You can use this little pop-up box to make
remarks, suggestions, criticisms, whatever - and
see what other people have written. You do not
have to identify yourself if you don't want to.
We invite you to use this! It gives us good
feedback.
Every web page now has a search box that allows
you to search tortillabay.com for content, links
and names. Every web page now links to a site map.
In 2007 this web site will have a mirror-site in
spanish, a daunting task with 90+ pages but one
that we think is very important.
In no case is any personal information
collected. These are just to make the visitor
experience more comfortable.
We are now getting more than 1,000 viewers a
month on tortillabay.com. Our travel videos
alone on YouTube and GoogleVideo and
http://tortillabay.com/tortillabayvideos.htm are
logging more than that. (Wow!) We appreciate
every time you tell someone about us!
And when you are ready - A new story. A Ghost
Story.....click
here.
November 2006
Alberto just finished reading, The Name of the Rose
by Umberto Eco, The Diary of Anne Frank and Pompeii
by Robert Harris. To cleanse his palate he's reading
the newest Harry Potter book right now ( What?!!
Hey!! It's not Eco or Pamuk, but they are very well
written and fun to read!!)
Since all of you are great readers and many of you
are published authors and educators yourselves, and
because my brain is numb and exhausted by all the
filthy vote-whoring and politicking, I ask you all
for some suggestions, to wit:
What really terrific historically-themed novels have
you read in your lifetime? It can be sweeping in scope like Jenning's Aztec or
Clavell's Shogun (but not those two) or focused and
centered on a culture, time, era like Name of the
Rose or DaVinci Code. It should be thrilling, entertaining and can be a
mystery like Pamuk's My Name is Red or Tong's Raise
the Red Lantern but red doesn't have in the title).
It should have scope horizontally and vertically and
leave you breathless, a real page turner. (But none
of the above, those are already done and on the
shelf.) We are favoring Western European themes right now
but we are open to anything. No sports, no Russians and no WWII autobiographies,
please. Okay. Let me hear from you.
ps. We are still fine. We are studying (Italian,
Yoga
and Flash) and planning for our next big step and we
are looking forward to a visit from our Barcelona
friend Philip, who we will be traveling with a bit
through December. (Maybe to the Canadian border
depending on how badly this election is stolen.)
I will collect the results and send them back to all
of you. (Then I will have to go find a copy of it in
Spanish..)
Hoping to hear from you, Love Craig and Alberto
October 2006
Hi! We are lucky to still be
at this little studio in Paramount, with our friends in an adjoining
house. I get to spend time with 10 year old Daniela who is such a
great person and one of the smartest 11 year old people I know. We adore each
other. She sits at our kitchen table to do her homework and we
discuss the vagaries of life. She wants to go to Harvard Law. Her
mother, our friend Angela, was the District Attorney in Bogotá but
now in the U.S., works in a jewelry store in a strip mall.
Still interviewing for jobs. I
really want it to be a good match for everyone involved. There
is no point working for a company that doesn't have ethical core
values. I have been spoiled by Trader Joe's. And I want to help grow
a business that helps people so I interviewed with some lovely
people today at a family-owned chain of stores that sell a wide
assortment of educational toys and teaching aids to educators.
Alberto interviews on Wednesday for a server position at a popular
local restaurant.
As you will notice (perhaps) we are
changing the layout of our website - quicker download time per page,
and a new narrower format that accommodates computer wide-screens as
well as traditional screens. We are adding Google advertising to our
pages as well as a Google-based website search engine, so you can
find what you want more quickly. Every click on the advertising
brings us revenue, so if you see something that interest you, click
away. Please.
We are also actively working as quickly as
possible to translate the website into Spanish. This will take a
while. But when it is finished, you will be able to click from
English to Spanish at your whim. We think this is important,
needless to say. And our family in Mexico demands it, as they
should.
Craig is adding an entirely new section
devoted to work: Our resumes and video podcasts targeted to
visual merchandise training. Look for this to go live by Spring 2007 (or sooner).
September 2006
We are alive and well and living
(temporarily) with friends in a spare studio apartment at their home in
Paramount, CA. Paramount is a working-class community squared between
arterial freeways 91 and 710, 105 and 605. Like most provincial Santa
Monica Westsiders, we don't know this area. We think it's where all the
gardeners live.
It's a location we only heard about from
morning traffic reports (
...Traffic is backed up on the Gardena at Artesia, There's a big rig
accident on the 710 near Rosecrans. There's a dog running in the left
lane on the 91 near Bellflower Blvd......) Every time we get on a major freeway we get lost trying to get back to
out little studio. But we are happy to unpack our suitcases for a while.
And the neighbors seem friendly enough, despite my gringo face.
We are looking for work. There are several Trader Joe's locations
that will happily take me back in January, when my sabbatical is over,
but do I want to go back?
Speaking of alive and well (and living) - I caught the 'in memoriam'
part of the Emmy's last night while typing up my (amazing) resume. I was
mildly shocked at the names of entertainers who died while we were gone
the past 8 months. And here's the thing- when you are living outside the country and the
fire hose of American Entertainment News is not blasting you in the face
24/7, your perspective on matters of relative importance changes
drastically. No Paris Hilton cavorting in yachts off Capri, No Brittany,
No Justin Timberdick or whatever his name is.
We had CNN in Europe, of course, but it is British CNN broadcasting, so
99% of the time, the parochial news reports were about former colonial
British possessions - Africa, Asia and the Middle East. And they were
typical British melancholy segments that always opened, " Nbeke Mhulu
and her children woke early this morning to another beautiful sunrise
over the ruins of Darfur, and wept inconsolably, for there would be
nothing to eat again today" (yikes) Or, "Stay tuned. Coming up -
the latest business news from Dubai and the Middle East in marketing,
advertising and media." or "British Parliamentary "Action Now "
protesters converged on the city of Eastwick- Plimpton to join with
Humanitarian Relief Workers to hammer out an agreement with Labour on
the allegedly frightful conditions at the Somerswick Park Petro-Chemical
Plant north of the M1 and it's undocumented South-Indian workers."
...whew...
Anyway. I was sad to see that Mike Douglas had died. And Red Buttons.
And Maureen Stapleton. And Clarabelle the Clown. And I thought, what's up with Ladybird Johnson? Is she still alive? What
about Jane Wyman? Olivia DeHavilland? Maureen O'Hara? Jane Wyatt
(Spock's mother/Margaret Anderson on Father Knows Best)? (Yes to all-
93, 92, 90, 86 and 96 respectively) I went to the website called "Dead or Alive?" to find out who was still
alive and over 85
http://www.deadoraliveinfo.com/dead.nsf/viewdocs-nf/oldpeople I felt cheered to find out Miep Gies (Anne Frank's Diary) is 97, Gian
Carlo Menotti is 95, Frankie Laine is 93, Lou Jacobi is 92, Richard
Widmark is 91. Kitty Carlisle is 95. (Great! I love Kitty Carlisle!)
We have updated our website with new streaming media videos from Paris
(two videos) and a weird little video on our flat rental on the Ligurian
Coast of Italy. Tortillabay videos / Italy.
I have to go now. On channel 4, there's a dog running in the left lane
of the 91 near Bellflower Blvd. Woo-Hoo!
Stay in touch. If I haven't returned your calls or answered your emails,
I am working through the list, thanks for your patience. We have regular
phone service and internet now.
August 7, 2006 from Guadalajara
Alberto is back in the States and I
am leaving tomorrow for L.A. as well.
We left to search the world for a place to retire and I believe we have
found it in Mexico.
It has all the things we loved about Europe,
classic architecture, history, good food, warm friendly people, good
climate. All of that at one thousand per cent cheaper than anywhere
else. (Europe was expensive!)
We always knew we would have to come back to the U.S. to work for
a while. Our Jeep is in storage with friends in L.A., our personal
belongings in a container in Ventura. But we are going to buy a house
here (Mexico). Until I close a deal, I will be flying back and forth a
lot I imagine. I have my heart set on one property in particular but
there are lots of serious bargains in this neighborhood and all of it at
unbelievable prices ($40-$70K). However, it's an area that is yet to see
it's full potential (reads: still dicey). All with in walking distance
to the center of town.
After retiring, we will have to spend half the year there and half the
year here to maintain residency in the US for Alberto. I'm okay with
that. So now we are going to create a new income stream that allows us
to travel and that's also part of the reason we are coming back. I do
not yet know if we will settle in the LA Basin or in Temecula or some
other state. I will stay in touch and fill you in.
Thanks again for all your support as we
struggle to try to find a place that Alberto and I can live in, as equal
partners with equal rights, a place where we can finally settle down as
a family.
We are going "dark" after reaching the U.S. and we will experience
intermittent access to email, so forgive us if we don't answer your
emails right away. However...
we love hearing from you!
August 2006
We are trying something new for our
viewers. It's a new page called
Tortillabay Videos. You
can see them right here in a smaller, quicker format. Just click on
the center of the screen below to activate it then hit the play
button and it will download and play quickly from GoogleVideo.com or
from YouTube.com. This is streaming media, so it will do best if you
have broadband, not dial-up. To see our collection of videos go here
Tortillabay Videos.
July 2006
July 24 - It's time to leave Mexico for
now and return to the U.S. Pacific Coast. We have made arrangements
to live in with friends until we can find suitable housing for the
two of us. We should be settled in our own place by September 1st.
We do not want to live forever in the United States but we will
swallow hard and do what we have to do - wait until I am ready
to retire, and our (my) paperwork is processed to return to Mexico
as full-time permanent residents. We should be back in the U.S. by
the end of August.
We have updated our website with stories
from
Madrid and finally, new sections in
Barcelona.
June 2006
June 15 - Thanks everyone for your
continued support as we search to find a home/country. As
I wrote to a friend, Judy:
We came back to Guadalajara on June
7th.. While we are waiting to cross the border, we have
been helping Alberto's mother and sister and her two daughters
get the house updated a bit. His sister's husband is an invalid,
so they have that to deal with.
There was no one here that could help
them get the most basic stuff. They had no hot water at all,
except what they heat up on the stove. The kitchen badly needed
painting and cleaning. They are struggling with the most
ridiculous stuff. There just are no men in this house (I don't
mean to be sexist, it's just different here) and the women are
struggling to pay bills and feed themselves. We have been paying
their rent on this place for 10 years. It's $100 a month.(!) 3
BR downstairs, courtyard, additional rooftop spare bedroom which
is where we sleep until it's time to eat. They feel lucky to
have their own personal gay men for awhile.
We did some things that cost virtually nothing: repaired some
lighting, bought an inexpensive water heater, installed some new
water lines, painted some rooms. What a difference it made. We
had everything done for less than $300.
We would love to stay here. I see very little difference between
here and living in California in terms of goods and services.
Some are 'gay', Home Depot is here, Starbucks, etc. etc...some
are not, Sears, Office Max, Chrysler. Cost of living is so
cheap. I looked at some properties. One is $50k American,
the other is $90k. The one for $90k has two floors, a massive
interior courtyard and 12 bedrooms and 4 bathrooms,
with a secret garden and ancient 18th C. ruins in the back..
Built in 1948, good water and electric. Suitable for conversion
to retail/residential. Both are in a historic, rundown area
close to the center of town. Ripe for takeover. We dream, we dream..... I have all my painting stuff, I have been doing some interesting
little still-lifes, of all things. I am not ready to post them
yet however.
This time, we will focus on returning here to live, While we
were in Europe, we kept remarking about how much Mexico had to
offer than seemed so similar to Italy and Spain, i.e.. culture,
history, great food. Except that Mexico is about one thousand
times cheaper.
We returned to Barcelona from the luminous
Ligurian Coast in Italy, on the 27th of May and stayed until
June 6th when we left for Mexico.
Just before we left, we had a great time
seeing
Nabucco at the Teatro Liceu,
the opera house where Philip plays in the symphony as First
Clarinet. Nabucco was written in Verdi's youth and helped
establish him as an important composer. Starring the
electrifying Russian Soprano, Maria Guleghina as Abagaille and
conducted by legendary Italian guest conductor, Nello Santi. It
was Alberto's first opera, (and first opera house) and he was
mesmerized for three hours. Thank you Philip, for this
lovely gift. Nabucco- click
here
We were sad to leave Spain and our friends
there. Thank you again Philip, for opening your home to us and
for the fantastic adventures and the opportunity to get to know
your friends so well and Barcelona so intimately.
May
2006 A Month In Italy
........A
Little Song, A Little Dance, A Little Seltzer Down the
Pants...
|
ESPAÑOL
"First they ignore you. Then then laugh at you. Then they
fight you. Then you win." M. Gandhi
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