La versión en español está después de la versión en inglés.
I’m hip. And mine’s improving. I’m still taking it easy on it and trying really hard to not sleep on my right side. But, I woke up at 4 this morning and found myself there. We went to our neighborhood Mexican restaurant, Restaurante El Tecolote Antojitos Mexicano, last night and it was excellent yet again. The pay phone above is displayed on a wall inside. Remember those? A little boy of about 5, a noisy and wild little imp who was on the terrace with his family but kept running inside to scream and then run back out again… His mother did come in and reprimand him. Once. Anyway, that little boy stopped short behind us when he saw the phone on the wall. He clearly couldn’t figure it out and stared for a while tilted his head every which way before running back outside. I considered talking to him about it, but we were about to leave and I thought he might just scream and run back outside anyway.
Around noon today, I walked to our nearby Día supermarket to pick up bread for lunch and more Ines Rosales tortas for dessert. San Geraldo asked me to pick some up just in case we were out. What was astounding is that he asked for Ines Rosales. Not Irma la Deuce. Not Toulouse-Lautrec. I praised him for getting it right, and he replied incredulously. “I did?!?”
We’re at the start of our fifth heatwave of the season and we have a severe warning for high temperature. Above 44/111! I might do some laundry. I can manage a couple of visits to the roof in the extreme (and beautiful) sun, but that’s about it. Time to be productive indoors.
Palm trees in our neighborhood are being trimmed. I love watching. When we had our hotel in Palm Springs, we would hire some guys to trim our many towering palm trees. The team would arrive in a pick-up truck and shimmy up the 50+-foot (15+-meter) trees. It was incredible to witness, and frightening.
My fragrance is currently Jean Paul Gaultier Elixir. It works well on me and I’ve been complimented on how good I smell. Of course, that always has me worried I’ve used too much, but everyone insists I have not. I know San Geraldo would be completely honest with me if I did. He always tells me he likes the way I smell. Anyway, I recently ran out and noticed the amber bands on the bottle are actually transparent. That was a surprise to me since it’s completely opaque when sitting full on the bathroom counter. I don’t know why that matters, but I liked the surprise of the light shining through. Maybe I should back-light it in the bathroom. What do you think?
As I turned the corner today I heard music and thought it was coming from the chapel in Merced Palace across the street. I then discovered a woman sitting outside Merced Gardens. You can enjoy a bit of her music below. That was a better elixir today than Jean Paul Gaultier.
Mi cadera está mejorando. Todavía me lo tomo con calma y me esfuerzo mucho por no dormir sobre mi lado derecho. Pero, me desperté a las 4 de la mañana y me encontré allí. Anoche fuimos a nuestro restaurante mexicano del barrio, Restaurante El Tecolote Antojitos Mexicano, y estuvo excelente una vez más. El teléfono público de arriba está expuesto en una pared dentro. ¿Se acuerdan de esos? Un niño pequeño de unos 5 años, un pequeño diablillo ruidoso y salvaje que estaba en la terraza con su familia pero no paraba de entrar corriendo a gritar y luego salir corriendo de nuevo… Su madre entró y lo regañó. Una vez. En fin, ese niño pequeño se detuvo en seco detrás de nosotros cuando vio el teléfono en la pared. Claramente no podía entenderlo y se quedó mirando un rato inclinando la cabeza en todas direcciones antes de salir corriendo de nuevo. Pensé en hablar con él al respecto, pero estábamos a punto de irnos y pensé que podría gritar y salir corriendo de todos modos.
Alrededor de las 12 de hoy, caminé hasta nuestro supermercado, Día, para comprar pan para el almuerzo y más tortas de Inés Rosales para el postre. San Geraldo me pidió que comprara un poco por si acaso nos quedábamos sin él. Lo asombroso es que pidió Ines Rosales. No Irma la Deuce. No Toulouse-Lautrec. Lo felicité por haber acertado, y él respondió incrédulo: “¿¡Yo!?”
Estamos al comienzo de nuestra quinta ola de calor de la temporada y tenemos una alerta severa por altas temperaturas. ¡Más de 44/111! Quizás lave algo de ropa. Puedo soportar un par de visitas a la azotea bajo el sol extremo (y hermoso), pero eso es todo. Es hora de ser productiva en casa.
Están podando las palmeras de nuestro vecindario. Me encanta verlo. Cuando teníamos nuestro hotel en Palm Springs, contratábamos a una empresa local para podar nuestras numerosas palmeras altas. El equipo llegaba en una camioneta y trepaba por los árboles. Era increíble de presenciar, y aterrador.
Mi perfume actual es Jean Paul Gaultier Elixir. Me sienta bien y me han dicho lo bien que huelo. Claro, siempre me preocupa haber usado demasiado, pero todos insisten en que no. Sé que San Geraldo sería completamente honesto conmigo si lo hubiera hecho. Siempre me dice que le gusta cómo huelo. En fin, hace poco se me acabó y me di cuenta de que las bandas ámbar del frasco son transparentes. Eso me sorprendió, ya que es completamente opaco cuando está lleno en el mostrador del baño. No sé por qué importa, pero me gustó la sorpresa de la luz que lo atravesaba. Quizás debería ponerle luz de fondo en el baño.
Hoy, al doblar la esquina, oí música y pensé que venía de la capilla del Palacio de la Merced, al otro lado de la calle. Entonces descubrí a una mujer sentada fuera de los Jardines de la Merced. Puedes disfrutar de un poco de su música más abajo. Ese fue un mejor elixir hoy que Jean Paul Gaultier.
That bottle is giving me I Dream of Jeanie vibes … perhaps it’s Jeanie’s home away from home???
Lovely music in the park; could have listened to her all day unless the heat finally did me in.
Bob:
I like the I Dream of Jeannie vibes. I hadn’t noticed that, master.
Stay cool dude, and enjoy the music in or out of the park.
David:
It reached over 112 yesterday! The musician was smart to be there in the earlier part of the day and in a bit of shade.
That was a nice little musical interlude. 111˚ actual degrees? Wow, hotter than here. Personal scents like after shave and cologne always make me sneeze. I always go for unscented products. Just don’t care for artificial scents. Every boyfriend I ever had, first thing I would do is ask them not to use aftershave. I prefer the natural scent of a human. I didn’t care for the way my first husband smelled, his natural body. Probably one of the reasons (of many) I divorced him but I love the way my current husband smells.
ellen abbott:
I’ve known a few people with your same reaction to fragrances. But those same people have never had a problem with mine. I wonder why that is. Fragrances always smell different on me than they do on others, as well. I had a fragrance for years when I worked and colleagues were always buying it for themselves and others because they liked the way I smelled, and then they always complained that it smelled nothing like what they expected.
Perfection would be sitting in that park with your eyes closed, listening to that woman’s playing. IF IT WEREN’T HOTTER THAN HELL’S KITCHEN!
I bet you do smell good. I honestly like the way a man who has chosen a nice scent to wear smells. Glen and I still joke about how I always loved the way the men in Cozumel smelled. “Mayan Man smell,” I would sigh.
The fragrance you have chosen would be worth buying for the bottle alone.
If SG really has learned the name “Ines Rosales,” will it be sort of sad, like when your child stops saying “buzzgetti” and starts pronouncing it correctly?
Mary Moon:
I thanked the woman for the beautiful music. I’m sure she left before it got too hot.
No worries. SG hasn’t learned. He called Ines Rosales Irma La Deuce last night.
I feel a little relief, knowing that.
Sometimes I’d like to run in and out of rooms and scream, but something stops me. What could it be? Maybe I don’t do it because if I had behaved that way as a child I knew I would be forced into a chair and not allowed to move, so I learned self-control. Sweet Cheeks always smelled good, which I really appreciated because X was stinky. He’s probably even stinkier now because my inferior replacement doesn’t have the guts to tell him to wash and use deodorant. Ah, I do enjoy making fun of her. Great work on the keyboard.
Love,
Janie
janiejunebug:
X’s stink should have been a warning to you. Sorry someone else has to live with it now (even if she IS inferior), but so glad it’s not you. I’m imagining running in and out of rooms screaming. It does sound satisfying.
Most perfumes make me tear up and cough, so I hope people around me don’t use them. I used to love perfume, don’t know when my system started fighting back. Oh well. Boud
Boud:
My mother’s friend and next-door neighbor couldn’t tolerate fragrances either. I didn’t know that when I met her and she was surprised that mine didn’t bother her at all. She and my mother even stayed with us overnight.
That’s quite a schmantzy bottle! The woman in the park sounds like she could play some cocktail piano in a nice bar or hotel — she has all the flourishes down. Glad your hip is better.
Steve:
I do loe the botles. They have different fragrances, each with their own different bottles. There was even a rainbow bottle for Pride. I was tempted to buy it, but of course it was even more expensive and I was practical that day. I did love the woman’s playing yesterday. I had never seen her before.
I love that Gaultier bottle! Back-lit is the way to go…
Now, there’s a pianist who puts her heart into her playing. Better than many buskers!
Jx
PS I hate parents who don’t control their kids, and just let them scream and piss everyone else off. Like our next-door neighbours, who are, unfortunately back from their several weeks in their native Bulgaria. I was hoping for lost passports, being stopped by border control, or even a natural disaster – but, no.
Jon:
I had never seen that piano player before. Wonderful. I threw a coin in the bowl, recorded that bit, and threw in another coin. If she were there all the time, she‘d cost me a fortune.
Sorry the noisy neighbors are back. We’ve been very lucky here. We had some awful neighbors in Fuengirola and the building was built so poorly that you heard every little sound. Fortunately, the building was empty most of the yea. Given so many apartments were holiday rentals, there was no predicting what else we might be subjected to. Some tourists were never allowed to return, like the two always-drunk Finns who were nightly seen falling out of a taxi onto the pavement, like a scene from AbFab.
The last time I used one of those phones was maybe 2005.
Kirk:
I can’t remember the last time I even saw one.
Beautiful music, love street musician, I always stop to listen to them. You can see she feels the music. Another heat wave you say, well we are arriving in 22 days and that has to stop. Can you speak to la madre naturaleza, I am sure you have some influence. Anything around 22 C is fine.
larrymuffin:
You should see 20 when you wake up in the morning, but 30s are more common during the day in late September. I’ll see what I can do.
I just love that gorgeous bottle! And I love it when a man smells nice. The best is when it’s subtle enough that you have to be almost within hugging distance to detect it. xx
Jennifer
Jennifer:
I always hope my fragrance can only be sensed when someone is very close to me (although maybe not hugging). I have always had my own favorite. When I was working, it was Royal Copenhagen Musk. It worked on me and on no one else I knew. They stopped selling it some years ago. I found it online last year and ordered it but it was from Shein, in an incorrect Royal Copenhagen box although the bottle was labeled correctly, and I have no idea what the fragrance was. It was something watered down. Then I did research and found this one.