Uh oh...I've Discovered Facebook...

Well, I am now a member of Facebook. You know what that means don't you? I will never experience reality again. Never. All of my understanding of the world will come through Daily Kos and Huffington Post and Mothering.com and now my connection to my friends will come through their and my Facebook pages. On the other hand, I wasn't calling anyone, and no one was calling me and I have now had little chats here and there yesterday and the night before with the fun, caring people who are my friends, but when do we have time to connect? We don't.

I've slipped into the Matrix...or have I? Or was my life before the Matrix?

Orchids at Xcaret

We walked on a path through the jungle vegetation on the way to an orchid greenhouse. I was struck by the beauty along the path.










I'm sure you can grow these anywhere in the world, if you get the conditions right. You don't have to go all the way to a greenhouse at a Mexican eco-park. Still, I was overcome by these orchids' beauty while I was there.














Today, here in Very-Republican-Town, Illinois, it is hovering around zero degrees with a wind chill of negative 14. And, in the summer it will be in the 90s with 80% humidity or even higher. We'll get ours in a few months from now--but, the wait is very long.

Slumdog Millionaire

Over the weekend, I visited my sister and parents up in Madison. My sister D. and I had a girls' night out and went out to a theater to see Slumdog Millionaire. It is beautifully filmed, wonderfully acted and filled with despairing scenes of slum life and little kids working in the garbage dumps in Mumbai. I cried at those scenes the most--more so than the plot line, which also moved me to tears. I wanted the characters to survive and then I wanted them to succeed.

I left the theater wondering if those scenes could have accurately depicted the harsh reality of the Mumbai slums. Was it real?

Looks real to me...





Here's a short film with real kids just like those depicted in Slumdog Millionaire. This looks real to me too...

On the Road to Xcaret

We led a very sheltered existence at our all inclusive resort when we were vacationing in Mexico a couple of weeks ago. I was curious as to how real people lived away from working or staying at the resort and so I took pictures as we were traveling by bus to the 80 acre eco-park Xcaret (Ish-cah-ret). Some of them are a bit blurry, but at least they're a small piece of another, less controlled reality in the Yucatan peninsula.

As we were riding in the bus, my husband was explaining to me that we might see new, old VW bugs. Up until just a couple of years ago, VW was still manufacturing the old bugs in Mexico. These are of the old design, not the cute new ones with the bud vases on the dash. And then what pulls up next to us, but a silver old, new bug. It looks great doesn't it?









There was loads of traffic, but it was mostly flowing fine on a four lane divided road with a grassy median. A couple of times, there seemed to be a police stop--still not quite sure what that was about. So we would be stopped and waiting our turn to get through the police blockade. A couple of guys on a motorcycle were next to us waiting to get through. I liked their helmets.



As always, there was beautiful and interesting vegetation.


Even in front of a ubiquitous Coke truck...


You could probably get a coke in here...



Just as at the resort, and at Chichen Itza, there are thatched roofs everywhere, including at this furniture store.



If you need the poles for the support of the thatched roofs, you go to places like these which I saw up and down the road. I don't think Home Depot carries them, but I did see stores like Home Depot, and they might...



And then we got to Xcaret after about an hour drive south.

Bottles were hanging decoratively just on the other side of the gift shop.



Parrots...