New friends, old friends.

This is how we meet new friends:

Linda and Dan live close to us in Pinal Villa. Rosalie had been in contact with Linda through Facebook messenger but we had never met since they stayed away last year due to Covid. They called and asked if they could come by. Are we going to say no? I guess not! We had a really nice hour or so with them and agreed to meet again soon.

I, with my weird sense of humour, imagined them riding off on their bikes and the conversation going something like this: “So what do you think?” She replies “Well, Rosalie seems nice and I really like the dress she was wearing but he’s a bit weird with that phoney British accent and all”

Once they’re gone our conversation goes like this: Rosalie, “So, what do you think?” I reply ” She’s okay but I don’t like him. He’s younger and better looking and obviously way smarter than me.”

We all have these conversations when we meet new people and can only hope that they mostly go well; which in this case they did..

It’s so nice to see so many of our other friends arriving here. We were a little lonely last season but now we can’t keep up with the social life. We are suddenly inundated with invitations. I think that people we know here haven’t caught up yet and assume that we are the only Norteños here and invite us out.

Jim and Ylda and Art Sr. arrived on the weekend. We thought we were picking them all up at the airport but J&Y already had a ride so we thought we were taking Art home. He came out the gate and was greeted by a lady so we thought we had come to the airport for nothing. It turns out that this was the Mexican friend coming to pick up J&Y but they didn’t quite have enough room in their car so we got to take Art home after all.

I went to pay for the parking at the machine inside the airport. I inserted my ticket with the total being 60 pesos, I put in a new 20 peso note but the darn machine spat it out. I tried an old note and that was accepted. The guy behind me traded my new note for an old one and I tried again. No Luck! It spat that one out too.

I ran to the car to get change from Rosalie but she wouldn’t part with even 20 pesos. By this time I was getting desperate. The parking cost was probably getting in the 70 peso range and all I had were 500s. Finally, I borrowed 50 pesos from an acquaintance who happened to be waiting for his sister and I made it work. In the future, I won’t be going to the airport without a whole bunch of change. In the meantime, Art was waiting by the car sucking on a cerveza chatting with Rosalie.

I punished him by taking him home and feeding him one of Rosalie’s delicious dinners. He also had access to a cold beer on the way home so he seemed quite happy.

After we finally dropped him off at his place we dropped in to see J & Y who live almost next door. We only planned to say hi and leave but after a few cervezas we ended up driving home in the dark after all.

The following day we had to pay the money for the rest of our trip in December so off to the bank to take a hefty amount out, Like 70,000 pesos. We still owed Art about 22,000 so had to get that too. After paying all this out there wasn’t enough left for us so back to the bank. Unfortunately by then, the bank had run out of cash. I had to make sure I had enough for our car repairs the following day.

That evening we met with Dan and Linda for an evening of entertainment at Tito’s restaurant. We also met up with a lot of old acquaintances including Jim and Ylda and of course Art. Afterwards, we went by Banamex and picked up more cash.