The Scattered Thoughts of Me

Yesterday, for the third week in a row, I ate pizza on two-for-one Tuesday at Domino's. This time I ate pizza with some of my former students. One just graduated, and the other recently returned from a two-year furlough. I guess the latter will be my student again this year, if I want to get technical about it. Or maybe he won't, depending on the classes I teach and the classes he takes.

Speaking of the school, I just heard the news today that the school has bought property of its own. For as long I know, the schools here on the northside of Mexico City have been renting. The place where the school was located when I was here was actually rented from a mission organization that was renting the property itself from the owners. That property was sold as I was leaving in December 2002, and the school moved sometime during the spring of 2003. That, too, was a rental property, being shared with a church and a Mexican preschool. But now the school owns its own property. I actually don't know how the deal was worked out, with who owns what, but perhaps now we can work on things other than worrying about the next time we'll have to move (once we get this move out of the way). I haven't seen the place, but the people who have seen it have said good things about the land and the buildings. I hate moving, but it looks like I'll be working with the school's moving process during the next couple of months, before the new year starts in late August. So in the last three years, the school has had three different homes.

Speaking of moving, I will be moving again pretty soon, perhaps this weekend. I am actually used to the house where I am now, but it is far away from the people and the places I know. Traffic getting out here can also be a bear during the peak hours, which can last until pretty late in this part of the city. Today I saw the house to which I will be moving. Its layout and paint scheme are definitely more Mexican than either this or my old house, but it seems like a decent place. The people living there now told me that they have enjoyed the place, and that they haven't had any big problems with anything. So that's good. I'm not looking forward to moving stuff and figuring everything out all over again in a new house, but I reckon I'll be okay. I hope it doesn't take me long to adjust; it took me a little while to get adjusted to living here in this house. Hmmm... So this new house will be the third house I've lived in in Mexico. I've stayed here and there in places for a day or two at a time, but I really only lived in one house my first term, then this house where I've lived for a month, now this new I house where I'll be living in a few days.

I'm sitting here goofing off at the computer, and I look out the window into the darkness, and I notice a bright light... it's the moon... the moon! I haven't seen the moon in a long time. It's been raining every night for the last couple of weeks, which means it's been cloudy during the nighttime. I noticed the moon out the window, so I went out and looked up and saw the moon and two stars. I guess, considering the glare from the millions of city lights and the way the smog has been so thick for the last month, the moon and two stars isn't bad. I could actually almost see the outlines of the tall buildings in Santa Fe this afternoon... almost. That's about as clear as it has been in June. The moon and two stars isn't much, considering what a clear night back home looks like, but it is nice to be able to walk out into the cool night air and look up and see something other than orange-glowing clouds.

A strange thing happened to me yesterday. I was at the airport to drop off some people and pick up some others, and this guy came up to me and asked me if I was Joel. Who is this guy? How does he know me? Turns out he was one of my english students... from a class I taught three years ago... for less than a month. How did he remember me? I wouldn't have been able to pick him out of a crowd; I wouldn't have recognized him if I were looking straight at him. But he remembered me. Hmm.

I had fun this last week. We didn't do a lot of exciting things, but it was good to have people in the house, especially an old friend. We passed out gospels and tracts and church invitations in a rather wealthy neighborhood nearby. We got stopped and yelled at by the cops, who were trying to stop us from passing out stuff, but they had no authority to stop us, we found out. We went downtown Thursday night and ate enchiladas suizas at the house of tiles. Yum yum. When my older brother was here visiting a couple of years ago we ate at the house of tiles, and I got food poisoning. My brother and I both ate enchiladas suizas and drank limonada, but he didn't get sick. I had been here for over a year, and I got sick. It only lasted for a day, but it was rough for that day, and it forced us to cancel our trip to Acapulco.

Okay, this is the third time I've mentioned the "cannons" in my blog. I don't actually know what they are. We've always called them cannons, but I think they are like really loud bottle rockets. The first two times I mentioned them here I said that they didn't really bother me, and I didn't think about them too much. But today that changed. They started firing the stupid things at 5:00 this morning, and they probably fired 1500 or more of them from 5:00 to 8:00. And they've been doing it all stinking day. I guess now that I've begun thinking about them, and since they woke me up this morning, that now they are driving me crazy. If you want to fire those things off all day, that's one thing. But why do you have to be morons and start firing them at 5:00 in the morning? The sun doesn't rise here until almost 8:00. Absolutely ridiculous.

I watched Shrek 2 yesterday with some of my students and former students. It was pretty good, but not as good as the first. I'm looking forward to seeing Spider Man 2, which comes out here next Friday. I probably won't see it that day, but I'm looking forward to seeing it sometime soon.

So I've done it again. Another post full of scattered thoughts. At least it fits my blog title.

I can't get these three things out of my head.

The first comes from Romans 4. Read the whole chapter to see what's going on regarding the faith of Abraham, but the verses that have been eating their way through my brains since I read them a few days ago are verses 19 - 21. I'll copy them here from the New American Standard Bible.

"Without becoming weak in faith he contemplated his own body, now as good as dead since he was about a hundred years old, and the deadness of Sarah's womb; yet with respect to the promise of God he did not waver in unbelief but grew strong in faith, giving glory to God, and being fully assured that what God had promised, He was able also to perform."

Yeah, so Abraham looked around and saw with his eyes that God's promise to him that he would have a son seemed impossible, but he trusted God and believed not only that God was able to, but also that we was going to do that which he had promised. That was Abraham's faith. That is why his faith was credited to him as righteousness. He believed despite what his fleshly eyes and his fleshly mind told him to believe. I don't know how many times I've read Romans 4, but this is the first time that concept ever hit me. And it's such a simple idea. And it is stuck in my head.

The second comes from a song by Jennifer Knapp. It is called "No Regrets" and is off the album "The Way I Am." Here are some lines from the song.

"Should I be rich and poor and scattered in my dreams
while all the figures that surround me live unguarded with no regrets?
Should I be lost in forgetfulness with no regrets in my head,
faithfully shed and free from the worry,
free from the dark that lives in me,
free to embark on the passion You've favorably fashioned in me?"

I like the way the song asks a question rather than proclaiming an answer. Is that the way I'm supposed to be? Is that what this freedom in Christ is for? So that I can live life without regrets? So that I don't have to worry that the decisions I make today will haunt me tomorrow? So that I can follow the passions God has created in me? So that I can be the person God made me to be? And ultimately so that I can stand boldly and reverently before God without shame? No Regrets. It's a wonderful idea, and it is stuck in my head.

So considering these two things that I can't stop considering, here's the third. Metaphorically speaking, what do I do about this wall I'm facing? I've ne'er been able to get to the other side of this wall: I can't go under it; I can't sneak around it; I'm too timid to e'en attempt to climb it. Can I continue hoping that someone will come along and give me a push from below or a pull from above? Could I possibly understand or e'er prepare myself for what is on the other side? Do I believe that, despite what my eyes and mind are telling me about this wall and how tall it is, how steep it is, how difficult it would be to climb, that God will make the "impossible" possible? For me? In my case? Can I live with the regrets I will surely face if I ne'er attempt the climb? How could I have e'er given up hope that one day I would accomplish this feat? For quite a while now, this idea has been stuck in my head.

I am worn out tonight. I've been out in the sun all day for the past two days. It hasn't been hot here at all for the past few days, but the sun is so high in the sky that it is a killer. My face and neck are bright red. Fortunately, I remembered to wear a cap, so my scalp hasn't gotten too badly burned.

My geometry students have been out of the city on a youth retreat, so we haven't been doing geometry this week, but we'll start back tomorrow. We actually only skipped these two days, but it seems like weeks since we last had the class. So I had to pull out the geometry book and figure out what to do for tomorrow and the rest of the week. We're rushing through the class, but my students are sharp, so it's all good. The problem we're having is scheduling, with people being out of the country for this and that. We'll put the class on hiatus for a month or longer after the end of next week, so I don't have any idea when we'll actually finish the second half of the course.

Thinking and writing takes so much energy and effort, and when I'm tired like this I can't think well enough to write much of anything. So why am I writing anything at all? It's probably just to keep on the schedule it seems I've set of writing something every other day. That's why I took the time to write a lousy blog entry. "That makes two in a row. So don't bother next time if you're not going to write anything good," you say. Maybe I won't. That'll teach you a lesson. Yeah! Who's the smart one now?

Maybe it's too early in the morning to do much thinking. It's only 10:00, after all, and I've only been up since 7:30. The cannons were blast, blast, blasting away around 8:00 or so. As I said before, it doesn't bother me really, but there's a guy here in my house who is out of the USA for the first time. I don't know if the blasts woke him up or scared him or anything, but I remember how they used to startle me. Perhaps they sound like gunshots to someone who's ne'er heard them before and doesn't know what's going on.

We ate tacos yesterday. It's only the second time I've had real Mexican food since I've been here. I like tacos. They seem to like me, too; at least the steak tacos do. They usually agree with my digestive processes. I used to have problems with some of the other varieties, so I generally stick with the steak tacos now.

I'm getting ready for a week of being totally thrown off schedule. But that's okay. It's good to have people here. When I'm all by myself, I can make my own schedule and do things exactly when and how I want to do them. But I'm all by myself. When I'm with people, I have to change my plans and upset my schedule and neglect my desire to be in control. But I'm not all by myself. So it's the old tradeoff. I remember teaching physics and telling my students that everything we're doing is trading one thing for another: distance for force, work for energy, kinetic for potential. All we have to do is figure out how to balance these tradeoffs. But I suppose just about everything we do in all of life works on the same principles. We trade this for that, and we try to find the best balance we can.

Nickel Creek is already using the phrase "it's foreign on this side," as you know from reading my subheader above. But what the heck does that have to do with me? The chorus of the song changes as the song progresses, but the first chorus says, "It's foreign on this side, and I'll not leave my home again; there's no place to hide, and I'm nothing but scared." I feel like I could adopt those words as my own sometimes, e'en though the song is not actually talking about being in a strange country, but being in a strange state of mind. Yeah, I once said that I'd not leave my home again. Back in late 2002 when people would ask me what I was going to do back in Tennessee, I had a variety of answers. I told some that I would like to be a farmer. I told others that I'd like to be a mechanic. I told others that I'd like to learn how to fly planes and be a pilot. I guess I didn't think it mattered very much, because I was going back, and that was all that was important to me at the time. I was going home. Pretty soon I found out though, that yes, it did matter, and I had no clue. But that's another story, a story that I still don't think I know how to tell. I'm not going to declare to the world, as I did last time (mistakenly), that once I get back home I'll ne'er leave again; but looking ahead, thinking about two years, and considering my strange state of mind, I'm nothing but scared. The song ends with the chorus that says, "It's foreign on this side, but it feels like I'm home again; there's no place to hide, but I don't think I'm scared." Yeah, that's not me. I'll have to stick with the first one for now.

Tomorrow will make three weeks since I got here. The first week was spent in a whirlwind, the last two have been in the doldrums. How's my weather analogy working for you? It's interesting to see how perspective plays its role. The two visiting girls I took shopping last weekend had been here for just over a week, and were talking about missing their cell phones, american food, &c. When groups come down here, they talk about how much impact a week here has had in their lives, while weeks used to go by for me in which I wouldn't think about the things they find so touching or heart-breaking. I guess after so much time, things just lose their luster, and you get numb to the oddities. Like the "cannons" that blast from the churches here. I suppose they shoot these loud noises to celebrate the saints. This morning was the first time I actually thought about them, though I've been hearing them just about everyday. Maybe it's like asking someone who lives on the coast why he doesn't go to the beach everyday. It's not vacation for him, it's life. And it's life here for me, too. I go to the store and buy bread and milk. I go to the bank and wait in line. I talk with people on the phone who want to sell me stuff I don't want. The other day I argued with this one lady for 45 minutes about a bill I didn't think was right. I worked on my spanish with her a lot that afternoon.

My mundane life abroad... it will probably get more interesting this week when a friend from my first time here visits. I'm looking forward to that.

It has been hot here the last few days (but nothing like in Tennessee). It probably should be raining here nearly every day by this time of the year, but the rains have yet to get consistent. It finally rained last night, so I opened up the windows and door to try to get some of that cool air in the house, because several days' heat buildup had made the house quite warm.

I bought two pizzas yesterday, since Tuesday is two-for-one pizza day. So that's what I ate for lunch and supper yesterday and for lunch today. Yesterday's half-priced hawaiian pizza, totally douched with hot sauce, and a cold Manzana Lift (the original red apple, please)... mmmm... maybe life isn't so bad after all. What about Mexico is there to complain about anyway? The only way I could imagine it getting better would be to share it with... you know... her. How romantic, eh? Reheated pizza, caffeine-laden apple coke, then a half-priced Wednesday movie. If that's my idea of romance, then it might be a good explanation of why I've ne'er had any luck with the ladies.

Speaking of movies, I went to watch "Troy" today. I had wanted to watch it for a while, but since I knew I was going to Mexico, I thought I'd wait until I got here and could watch it for about two and a half dollars... man, I can be cheap. I e'en parked across the street so I wouldn't have to pay for parking. I didn't like the movie at all for the first hour or longer, until they started fighting a lot. Then it got better. But I get mad at movies sometimes, when people do dumb things for dramatic effect. Like in "Troy" when Achilles is tieing up Hector to drag him around, I kept thinking, why don't all those archers on the walls do something? I almost shouted "shoot the (guy)!" But no one would have understood. I might have done it if I were in the USA. I was actually thinking it the whole time they were fighting. What do they really care about "honor?" Apparently the Trojans didn't care when Paris acted like a coward, so why would it matter if it took all the archers of Troy to kill Achilles so that Hector could live? I also got mad at the movie because I thought Hector should have just turned into the Hulk and killed everybody. And isn't Achilles just a figment of Ed Norton's character's imagination anyways? And why didn't Paris summon the legions of Rivendell? Movies... make for so much drama, but so little sense.

Sometimes I wonder if I think too much. After talking with a friend a little bit yesterday about being a teacher, I spent a lot of time thinking about some of the teachers I had when I was in school. I was thinking specifically about two of my math teachers from junior high and high school, and the things I learned from them. I teach math, but I like teaching science much better. Teaching math is just part of the package that comes along with teaching science here, and I'm pretty good at the sort of math we do in junior high and high school, but I wouldn't have a clue with differential equations, finite math, or anything more than just the basics of calculus. In my little K-12 country school, I believe that I had two of the best math teachers out there. They were both gifted with the ability not just to do math and show examples, but to really explain and teach it. I had another math teacher in high school who was very good at math, but wasn't a very good math teacher. But my teachers for 7th grade math, algebra I, geometry, and advanced math were great. Mr. Anderson was a hippie from California. I'm not sure how he ended up in Bell Buckle, but apparently it was just the fit for him. He drove either an old VW bug that his son and he had spray-painted bright colors and written "Splendido Art Colony" all over (which by chance he later sold to my brother), or an old BMW motorcycle. Now he drives an old beat-up Jeep. He had quotes from Latin covering his walls, he made us do our homework so neatly that we could only fit two addition problems to a page, and he would make the girls leave the room to tell the boys jokes that made no sense. Some might call Mr. Turrentine a hillbilly, but I don't know about that. I would call him a genius from the backwoods. He was building his own house out in the woods; he paid his way through college milking cows; and his wife and he played the fiddle, the penny whistle, the hammered dulcimer, and a range of other mountain instruments (probably including the jug). Most of the geometry we learned was related to carpentry. These two teachers taught me math in a way I could understand and remember it. They taught me to figure out things for myself, to be meticulous, to pay the utmost attention to detail, to put my effort into doing things correctly rather than simply looking for the right answers, and to really enjoy math. They were great teachers, and I learned so much from them, but there is no doubt in my mind that the majority of the people in my class completely missed it all. Despite the fact that I consider them so gifted at teaching math, they simply weren't able to teach the majority of the students in the class the things they taught me, and most of those students left the class with the same disgust for math which they had upon entering. So now that I'm teaching math and wishing that I had that gift of being able to explain and really teach math, I wonder how much it would really matter. E'en if I were as good a math teacher as Mr. Anderson and Mr. Turrentine, many of my students would simply not understand. They would not come to love math or appreciate its importance or its centrality to all learning. They would simply leave being able to get the right answers (some of them), and never learn to apply it to life beyond school. I think very highly of my students (certainly more highly than I think of my old classmates), but that is simply the way of things. Most people don't see things the way I see them. I tried my best to instill in them a sense of pride for their neatly written work, or a clean classroom, or a well-swept sidewalk, but they ne'er got it. So sometimes it gets me down to think that if I did my best, or if I could e'en be the best, it would make little difference to most of my students. Most of them just want to get in and get out, knowing that they have to get in to get out, that they have to do math and science, just to leave it all behind, before they can finish school. So what's the point of me, then? I suppose I have to be the one to find a way to teach them the things they don't e'en know they need to learn. Is that my role, to force them to do things they don't want to do and might ne'er come to appreciate? E'en so, I still have keep up hope that I might be able to make a little positive difference or that I might make one spark set something off somewhere, though I may ne'er see it.

Man, I'll tell you what, this writing business is wearing me out. I'm probably doing too much at the beginning to get this blog started, and will soon drop off significantly in both quantity and (if possible) quality of writing. But for now I hope I don't. I consider this a worthwhile undertaking, e'en if very few people actually read it. You know who you are. Thanks again for reading.

I did it! Blog post # 2!

Friday night I saw some of my old students from my first term here. They moved to another city about a year ago, so I didn't see them during the first few days after I got back, when I saw a large number of my other old students at the airport, the school, and the graduation / awards ceremony. So this one former student of mine, when I had him last, he was in the eighth grade. He was already several inches taller than me, with model-type looks, smart as a whip, &c. So I saw him the other night, and I'm not sure if he had actually gotten much taller, but wearing this shirt that looked like an England soccer jersey, and his hair half-way covering his face, I could have sworn that he came right out of the pages of GQ magazine. So I was thinking, it's one thing to secretly harbor some "jealousy" or "envy" when I think about my hero, Bebo Norman, who is a big famous Christian folk-style singer / songwriter. But what does it say about me when I'm secretly jealous of a fifteen-year-old kid? Hmm... just wondering.

Before that I had eaten supper at the business manager's house. I ate two big delicious hamburgers, along with chips and what not, and a piece of very rich chocolatey pie. I also took another burger and a large piece of cake home with me, so I ate well yesterday also. That was great, because I haven't been eating a whole lot since I've been here. If I'm at the house, I'll usually eat a little sandwich and chips. And if I'm away from the house, then I'm generally not the one to determine what we eat. Except for today. Today I ate at Italianni's. It is an Italian restaurant, if the name didn't give it away. They have the best chicken fettuccine ever. The pasta and sauce are good enough, but the chicken is thinly sliced and tender and so good, and it comes with shredded carrots and diced tomatoes. (And broccoli, too, but I just pick it out). And the bread they bring, along with this olive oil with herbs and basalmic vinager mixture for dipping.... mmmmm. So anyway, I went to church this morning at the English-speaking church, and I met this Journeyman girl who lives and works in Toluca, along with two girls who are with her for about a month or so. So after the service I was like, "You have plans for lunch? Want to go eat something?" I'm usually not bold about making plans, especially with people I don't e'en know (I had just met them less than two hours ago), but when it comes to eating, my stomach will generally defeat my shyness in a one-to-one match. At first they said that they were going to attend the Spanish service and eat at the potluck-style dinner afterwards, but then the pastor's wife suggested that we go eat, and then I could take them to "La Ciudadela" market to buy cheap souvenir-type junk. Shopping... not my favorite thing at all. But what else do I have to do? And if there's a good reason to eat some good food, then count me in. I'll sacrifice a few hours standing around while girls pick through hundreds of pieces of pewter that all look like ashtrays to me; or thumb through cheap water-color paintings on cheap homemade paper; or pick out their wedding china from among the shops in this hot, dirty, smelly, crowded market. I'll e'en fight the traffic and risk getting lost (sometimes), if I know there's a good meal in it for me. So that's what I did today. We left the church to go eat, and I suggested Italianni's, e'en though I ate there last Saturday. And they said they were fine with that, e'en though they'd already eaten there twice in the last two weeks. First, I veered into the wrong lane and ended up getting on Viaducto instead of on the Periférico (which may not mean much to you). Then we had some problem with ordering our food: our waiter had no idea that the dish we were ordering e'en existed. After he brought something with just chicken covered in vegetables and some sauce, we had to show him the menu, and then he had to go back and ask someone in the back what we were ordering. But he finally got it right. After eating we went downtown to the market. Well, today the final game of the summer soccer season playoffs was being played, here in the city, and there were roads closed everywhere for people to gather and watch and celebrate. So I had to find an alternate route to the market. After shopping for hours and buying only a bottle of water to drink (one of the girls did buy quite a bit), we left to go back to the church. Once again, we had the same problem with roads being closed. But by this time, the game was already over, and people were waving flags from their cars and honking at each other and all in celebration. I made a wrong turn on the way back to the church, but it worked out because we drove by the Ferrari dealership, and there was an Enzo inside. Aaaahhhhh..... Ferrari....... Enzo.......... So I took them back and came back home. Now I'm exhausted and ready for bed. And that's the end of that story. You have my apologies for the abrupt ending. So until the next time....

So this is my blog. I am starting it today, Thursday, June 10, 2004.

"Why start a blog?" you might ask. That's a good question, a question for which I don't have a good answer. I'm not a prolific writer or a wordsmith at all. I've tried before to take my everyday life and give it some meaning in the form of funny little stories or analogies or parables, but I had little success. I think that I used to try too hard to impress people with my writing that it lost its honesty. During my first term in Mexico City, I kept journals fairly consistently, but got out of the habit quite as soon as I got back to Tennessee. These days I will write in a journal sporadically at best, whereas before it was every Thursday night, week after week. I really enjoy pulling out the old journals from time to time and remembering the things I did and my frame of mind those few years ago, like the first time I drove (and the first time I got lost) in Mexico City; the first time I saw the Pacific Ocean and the adventures we had in Acapulco that weekend; the troubles I had starting out as a junior high and high school teacher with absolutely no idea what I was doing; or all those times during October, November, and December of 2002 when I wrote about how glad I was to be leaving Mexico, forever, with no intention of returning, and no intention of being a teacher again. Recently I read the entry in which I wrote that I was tired of living alone, and didn't want to do it anymore. I wrote that back in August 2002, at the start of the last five months of living alone in Mexico. I still don't like it, but look where I am: living alone, in Mexico City, teaching math and science again. In my strength I wonder how much longer I can do this, because my strength is no strength at all. It's been so much harder than I had imagined it would be when I signed up for this, and I've only been here alone for a week now. "So what's your point here, Smith?" There is no point. As I wrote above, I used to try to write good stories and relate the mundane details of my life to spiritual ideas and principles, but by now I've learned that the best I can do is to be honest in writing. So that's what I'm striving to do now. Last night I sat down to journal my first ten days or so back in Mexico City, and I ended up writing seven pages (a new record for me). There has been a lot on my mind during the time here, and I've had a lot of time alone to think about it all. Perhaps I am now getting to the point where I can process some of it. When I left Mexico in December 2002, I left absolutely exhausted mentally and emotionally. I was in no shape for thinking about what had happened the last two years, and to compound the situation, I arrived to Christmas celebrations and things happening all around me that left me no time to process thoughts and feelings. So when people would ask me what I learned in Mexico, I never had a good answer to give. "What did you enjoy the most?" I don't know; I've never really thought about it. "What was the hardest part about it?" Um, yeah, I don't know that either.

"Why start a blog?" you might ask. I don't know. Maybe it's just for myself. Maybe it's to help me put some order to my thoughts and feelings about what happens in my dull, uninteresting life abroad. Maybe it's so that I feel like I'm reaching out to have some sort of interpersonal contact while living alone. Maybe it would be better if I asked you why you wanted to read my blog. Of course, and it should go without saying, I welcome anyone and everyone who wants to read my writings to do so. But if you're looking for good stories or exciting news from Mexico, or if you are reading it to pick up some insight that I might provide, then I'm afraid that you might be disappointed. To be honest with you, I can't give you a good reason to read my blog. If all you're looking for is a brief summary of what has been happening with me the last few days, then I guess it might do. I don't know how consistently I will be writing here, though, so I can't give you any promises that I'll be updating this on a regular basis. And of course, if you're actually reading this, then you probably know me. And if you actually know me, then you know that I tend to keep things to myself. So I probably won't be writing anything here that's very personal. Ask me in private, by email, or better yet call me, and I will decide what to share on a person-to-person basis.

So it comes to this: after spending all this time telling you why you shouldn't read my writings, I'm going to go ahead and tell you what happened to me yesterday, as a bonus for those who have chosen to endure. I spent three hours trying to pay a power bill, a power bill for which I did not use one single bit of electricity, a power bill which should have been paid two months ago. But that's the way things go here in Mexico. The bills come in the mail already a month past due, then they are wrong. The one I paid yesterday stated that there was a balance carried forward from the previous bill, but we had the receipt stating that the bill was indeed paid, albeit past due. So I went three places yesterday, got lost in a sea of buses, got drenched in the rain, and eventually stood in line for hours to talk to a man for three minutes who said he fixed it. I'm not holding on to very much hope that the next bill that arrives will have the problem from two bills back corrected, but at least I have the receipts for next time. But it wasn't really all bad. I actually only got misdirected once. I went first to the only place I knew to go, and there I was told to go to the wrong place, after waiting in line for a good while. The man at the wrong place told me the right place to go, but it took me a while to get there, getting lost and all. When I got to the right place I waited and waited, then I waited some more, before the man who "fixed" my bill was very nice to me, and didn't give me a hard time at all. So I got the bill fixed and paid, and I left happy that it was all over and done, until the next time it happens, at least.

What a day's worth of writing, I say. I really do appreciate all of you who read this, despite my pessimistic warnings against it. Maybe next time it will be better. So until then....