Washing Trash at the Cafe

[smartads] As I ended the last post I was complaining about how they just turn off the utilities on a whim around here.  That started because our water was turned off, but they do it the most often to the electricity.  In this case ….

really early, at 0020, the water was turned back on.  Even till this time no one knows why it was turned off.

I did get out an early post on Sunday (5 & 6 Jan), so I did get caught up a little bit.  I hope to get caught up today, but it depends on if Lita watches the store long enough and I don’t get distracted.

Zambales is a province of the Philippines located in the Central Luzon region. Its capital is Iba. Zambales borders Pangasinan to the north, Tarlac and Pampanga to the east, and Bataan to the south. The province lies between the South China Sea and the Zambales Mountains. With a land area of 3,700 km², Zambales is the second largest among the seven provinces of Central Luzon. It has a population density of 170 people per square kilometer², one of the lowest in the country. The province is noted for its mangoes, which are abundant from January to April.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zambales

Zambales is served by the Subic Bay International Airport, which is located in Cubi Point, Subic Bay Freeport Zone, located in Bataan province. Subic Bay Freeport Zone is host to many tourist attractions which include casinos, beach resorts, parks, beachside huts and cottages and historical artifacts.

http://www.popcom.gov.ph/regions/03/Zambales.htm

It is now 0740 and I’ve had the store open for about 10 minutes.  I only sold 1 piece of candy for P1 so far.  Vicky arrived about 0710 to wash clothes.  We won’t have the food today because there is a lot of washing to do.  No one has washed in about a month.  Vicky likes to do the cooking, but she does not like to wash clothes.  She’d like for us to hire someone else to do it.  We tried to, but the lady never showed up.  That was a couple of weeks ago.  We’ll either have to find someone else or close the food down once a week for awhile to wash.  If we had a ‘real’ washing machine here, I’d do it.  At least I could wash my own clothes if nothing else.  There’s a place downtown that you can bring clothes and they will wash, rinse, dry and fold them for you.  I want to find out how much they charge.  I know it is per kilo because Blair told me so.  I think he even told me how much, but I have forgotten what he said, if he did.

I had to do some physical labor today.  I don’t do that often here.  It wasn’t that much and I only minded part of it.  I had to bring the trash bag to the front so the trash people can pick it up.  The bag is pretty heavy, but that’s not the part that bothered me.  The part I don’t like it tying the bag.  It sounds simple, and is simple, except that it has a bunch of little bugs, what I call fruit flies, swarming around the bag because it has discarded fruits and vegetables in the bag.  They fly in your face, up your nose and buzz in and out of your ears when you have to stand there and tie that bag.  The bag is now sitting out front waiting with a couple of smaller bags that Cathy dragged up there.  You have to watch the bags or the stray dogs will get in them.  Where’s BFI when you need them?

http://geotayo.com/zambales.php

I saw the trash truck next door at 0835.  When it got to 0900, they still were not here.  I thought, “What the heck are they doing, alphabetizing the trash”?  Come to find out that they were carrying the trash from the Ciriaco across the street and dumping it in.  I wonder why they did not get closer, or maybe they can’t get the truck to where the trash is dumped, I don’t know the answer.  I’m wondering if our good Mayor Aquino has any plans to upgrade our trash collecting procedures?  A BFI style pick up could work, I think.  Maybe I can find a place online to pose that question to the Mayor’s office.  I can’t get people here to do it for me.  They don’t like to rock the boat, they just follow as directed.  That trash truck finally got to us at about 0910 and they were only there for a few seconds.  I’m glad about that because I didn’t want to have to smell it for long.  Maybe if we had a trash bin with wheels, that would work.

I can hear the phone in the house ringing, but even though Lita is in the house, she doesn’t hear it.  She is sleeping right now, but I don’t think she could hear it from the next room if the door is closed.

http://www.tourism.gov.ph/SitePages/InteractiveSitesPage.aspx?siteID=14

Yesterday I was wondering how people come up with ideas for something to write.  Since then I have thought of at least 2 stories to write.  Well 2 posts not stories for the Altered Dreams blog.  Although I still have one of those to type up.  I’d like to be able to write stories with good plots, but I figure that will take a little time and some effort.  I’ll just do what I know for now and hopefully it will lead to something.

The cat is out of the bag on the plans I had in mind for this store area.  Titing, my fellow schemer, spilled the beans.  Just as I figured though, we did not get an argument from Lita.  I knew she would like to have a “bakery” here too.  She’s already thinking about things to sell in the bakery, some things that are not normally sold here or if they are, not abundantly.  Those items are secrets for now.  Neneng and Titing will be in on this with us and they will actually do the hard stuff.  If all goes as planned, Lita and I will still be able to travel as we have planned to do.  She’s itching to get back to Hong Kong and take a couple of tours.  She said she saw a commercial on TV and it looked nice.  I tried to get us on that tour before when we went, but she didn’t want to do it.  I should have done it anyway, but if she ‘wants to do it’, it will be more fun.

The plans for the Blue Gazebo Cafe have not been forgotten either.  All in due time.  I’ve learned my lesson about rushing into investments too fast, when you are short on capital.   I will do a separate post on the Blue Gazebo shortly.  Some of it will most likely be re-hashed from the previous version, but there will be updated information in there also.  I will also expand on the new bakery idea too.  Most likely the bakery will be built first.

http://www.backpackingphilippines.com/2008_06_01_archive.html

We closed the store up early again tonight, around 6:45pm.  With all the rain, no one was out buying and I was just sitting there twiddling my thumbs.  Time would be better spent catching up on the blog posts and trying to figure out how to write/publish e-books.  If I can figure them out, I might actually get a few dollars out of this Internet stuff.  My biggest obstacle with them will be how to get people to preview and purchase them.  I don’t want to have to pay to find out either, so I’ll have to do some extra digging probably.  I know the answer is out there somewhere.

Salamat, Paalam

Answers to 8 Jan Quiz in Green.

Filipino:

This was built in 1898 across the Old Daet Municipal Hall. Daet is the capital of the province of Camarines Norte in the Bicol region.

Texas: The Battle of San Jacinto, fought on April 21, 1836, in present-day Harris County, Texas, was the decisive battle of the Texas Revolution. Led by General Sam Houston, the Texian Army engaged and defeated General Antonio López de Santa Anna‘s Mexican forces in a fight that lasted just eighteen minutes. About 630 of the Mexican soldiers were killed and 730 captured, while only nine Texans died.

New Quiz Questions.

Filipino:  What island province is the smallest province in the Philippines in terms of land area and population.

Texas:  Near which Texas city was the first large scale production of oil?

Answers tomorrow.

Useless Knowledge:  William Morgan, a student of basketball inventor James_Naismith, invented a sport of his own: volleyball.

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