Tomas and I Are Not Friends!

It rained a bit on Tuesday, and because of this, my boss felt the need to ensure I had a ride home.  It may have also been because he saw that I went out to get lunch in the pouring rain and was squishing while I walked around the office.  It wasn't raining when I went home, but he still had the driver, A, take me.  I also made sure that Robert got in on the deal too.  We had to wait a while for A to get back to the office, and while we were standing out front waiting, we noticed this guy in one of the plants:

Snail (caracol)

As I've mentioned before, A doesn't speak any English, so our car rides together are usually quiet.  Tuesday was no exception... sort of.  He ended up taking a different way to the apartment than he usually does, and made a point of mentioning it to me.  He also did some whistling along to a song and then was making these weird noises with his hand... which sounded like kissy noises.  Robert had a hard time not laughing about this.  Then, when we were on Tiradentes waiting to turn onto Jose Contreras, he had this burst of rage about the guy in front of us who wouldn't drive forward slightly more so that we could make the right turn.  It was kind of funny and I was half expecting him to apologize and go back to his normal quiet and proper self.  He didn't really.  He still seemed upset and then proceeded to tell us why he was upset and such.  The guy also has the weirdest ring tone ever.  It is like the sound of a bubbly small waterfall.  Every once and a while, I have heard this sound around the office and couldn't figure out what it was.  Now I know.  Seriously, weirdest cell phone ring ever.  Of course, he didn't answer it so we had to sit awkwardly listening to it until it stopped ringing.

I went out for dinner to Adrian Tropical with Robert, Mari, Silje 1 & 2, and their new friend, Pedro.  Mari and the Silje's met Pedro in Jarabacoa this past weekend.  He came to pick us up and off we went.  I decided to have mofongo con queso for supper.  The presentation made it all the more awesome.

Mofongo con queso

Me and my mofongo

I was crazy tired after dinner and went straight to bed.  I slept really well.

Wednesday morning, Robert and I made an effort to leave a bit early so that we could have coffee together at Sweet Bakery.  Robert wasn't quite as successful as I was in being ready on time.  While at Sweet Bakery, I placed my order for some pastries to take with me on vacation.  I want to be able to share the goodness with Bart and the parents!  I had some issues speaking.  I was mixing up French and Spanish.  At first, I was trying to say I wanted 8.  My brain was like huit! huit! No brain that's French, give me the Spanish.  hmmm... Ocho!  Always slightly embarrassing.  Plus I had to switch into English because I wasn't getting my point across.  Sigh.

I met up with Pavol, Gerardo and Paula for lunch at Quiznos.  It was enjoyable as always.  I decided to walk back to the office and going up Lincoln is the best way for that.  But this also meant I had to pass by the spot of my slightly traumatic experience.  I was queasy the entire way and my heart was racing, but I just kept breathing.  But I'm glad I did it.  I like that area of the city and go there fairly frequently, so I guess I needed to get over that initial fear.

I was supposed to be going on vacation today.  But "Tomas" has decided otherwise.  Earlier on Wednesday, it looked like we would be okay.  But by the afternoon, things went horribly wrong.  Tomas was scheduled to hit Turks and Caicos at hurricane strength exactly when we were scheduled to arrive.  We decided to hold off until yesterday just in case things changed.  When I arrived at work (wet from a rainy morning and a damp carrito seat) I had an email from American Airlines saying that they had cancelled my flight and couldn't rebook it automatically.  I called them and found out that the earlier flight was fully booked for Saturday but that I could go on the evening flight.  Fine I said.  Then we debated whether to go with the 1 hr 45 min layover with the afternoon flight or the 9 hour layover with the morning flight.  The idea of spending nearly 9 hours in the Miami airport was worse than having to run to make the connecting flight.  So I went with the afternoon flight to Miami.  I'm really glad they have such a clear Hurricane Policy.  Helpful.  So then, mom and Bart had to call Expedia to deal with their flights and the hotel booking.  Of course, Expedia needed to be reminded that they too have a hurricane policy... Mom was able to get her and dad's flights rebooked for Saturday-Saturday as well as the hotel without any charges.  Bart had more issues since his customer service agent was slow and kept messing things up.  In the end, it all worked out.  Now we just have to hope that Tomas does what it is projected to do so that we don't have to go through this all over again.  And I was able to switch my pastry order till today!

One random moment yesterday was when my boss sat down beside me at my desk, while was eating my lunch, and asked me if I had "winned any weight."  I was puzzled at first and then said, "oh gained any weight?"  Yep this was what he was going after.  I said, no, I hadn't gained any weight, I had actually lost weight.  He asked me if I liked that, and I said yes, I was okay with losing weight.  Sometimes I think he thinks that I don't eat enough.  I attribute my weight loss to my 1/2 hour walk home each day, pilates twice a week and excessive sweating.