Prospero Ano Nuevo

It doesn’t really seem like the last day of the year. We have no special plans, really. There’s a party going on in town at the disco (even though kids frequent bars with their parents, it’s not somewhere we plan on taking Wilder anytime soon). There’s also a dinner going on at a hotel nearby, the owners of which we’ve recently befriended, but it starts late and, again, we’ve got the munchkin to consider. So, after a leisurely day at home, we decide to take a jaunt into town -- every jaunt, mind you, means 20-minutes of teeth-chattering and kidney-crunching jostling down our stone and pothole-strewn road. (Our new neighbor, Stan, a 50-60 something good ol’ boy from Oregon with extensive conmputer experience – of course – has decided to rename our road, on his sister’s suggestion, Tit Shaker Road. Lovely image and moniker, don’t you think?)

We dined at Maverick’s, which is owned and decidedly frequented by American ex-pats. But, if you’re looking for a good burger, filet, or plate of seafood, this is the place. We met a lot of Americans and Canadians that night, mostly retired folks and all very nice and welcoming. We are definitely the youngest emigres in town, except for Patrick and Daninne (yep, another one lives here!), a couple from Pennsylvania with 3 kids (5, 3, 9 months). I met her that night too; so far it seems that we are as different as the spelling of our names, but we’d both heard of each other and it was a good interaction. It was brief, but hopefully we’ll be getting together with them and their little ones soon.