Well that was quite a gap between posts! Somehow after TEN YEARS blogging (my first blog post here was October 21, 2006!) all the little odd things that happen each day are no longer odd and blog worthy to me. I need to find my blogging mojo again, and I truly intend to try.What have I been up to?

– I had dengue. Well, that was awful. Seriously painful bone pain and overwhelming sleepiness for several days, then an intensely itchy rash and more sleepiness. I recovered just in time to go on my planned trip, thank goodness.

– I went to Mexico City for another week, without Paul this time. My son from Washington State was coming down to see his daughter (the one I wrote about who is doing a college semester abroad in Mexico City) so I flew over to horn in on his visit. It was great to have so many of us together for a week. We ate some great food at La Docena, Maximo Bistrot’s little sister Lalo, Diego Luna’s La Bipo and at Izakaya Kura while we were in DF:  Once we headed to Tepoztlán we cooked at home for most of our meals with a ton of roasted vegetables and other goodies, including mezcal of course. It was a great week of laughing, swimming, chatting with friends and family bonding.

– I found out that you don’t recover from dengue that fast. I am still feeling pain in my joints at times, I just need to be patient.

– Friends are arriving back in Mazatlán after their summers away so we are getting together for coffees and dinners.

It is great to see them and catch up. First Friday Art Walk kicked off last week and this week we had three cruise ships in town, too. There are more people every week at knitting group and my book group just reunited yesterday for the first time in 6 months. I even went to a Laugh Therapy class yesterday. In the aftermath of the US election and some seriously awful and sad news about a friend, I needed to try to find a way back to happiness. I keep telling myself that I shouldn’t stress about things that are outside my control, but it’s hard to do. I am using all the tools in my toolbox to find my way back to my old optimistic and confident self. The world turned into a much different place overnight, but I don’t want it to change ME.

– We’re going on a trip to Chiapas with the family soon, I am really looking forward to it. I am so lucky to have such a wonderful family – I need to remember that more! So Chiapas will be a family adventure and then after that Paul and I will go to Guanajuato for about 5 days. By the time we get home the weather here in Mazatlán should be in it’s winter perfection mode, that will be lovely. I can get back out walking on the malecón again after a much too hot summer.

I hope you’ve been having fun in the interim, too.  It won’t be so long next time.  But in the meantime be sure to check out The Mazatlan Messenger.  It was recently taken over by new owners and it is a great source of news about Mazatlán. See you soon!