Back up in Texas - Visited San Miguel de Allende - Cold Everywhere

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     We made it back up yesterday, without event as usual.   It was interesting to see that, in spite of the useless warnings by the State Department, there continues to be a renewed increase in the gradual return of folks going into Mexico for general tourism reasons.  San Miguel de Allende, for instance, is all but "standing room only" in terms of the number of Gringos visiting and taking up semi-permanent and permanent residence.   The latter category is now numbered to slightly more than 15,000 American and Canadian and Texian residents.  Transitory visitors at any given time are numbered roughly the same, with a per-year total being fixed at or around 600,000 such persons of foreign extractions.

 


El Gringo Viejo makes his way in downtown
San Miguel de Allende.

    One of our reasons for having gone down to San Miguel de Allende was to help advise and assist our neighbour, the owner of the Hacienda de La Vega which is found adjacent to our Quinta Tesoro de la Sierra Madre.
   They are decorating an apartment, as well as establishing a boutique hotel specialising in providing a theatre for wedding events, receptions, and accommodation for bride, groom, and families in a 9 - room middling deluxe setting.
      It is  a monster undertaking for three girls who are among the "poor-rich", investing several million  pesos into a facility located on the edge of downtown-most San Miguel de Allende.

     We were impressed into service, due to the fact that we have a nice little pick-up that could transport a fairly large neo-antique table and a couple of flat screen televisions of moderately large dimension.  The trip was longish, although shortened by a new, more direct toll-road and other highway improvements done in recent month and years.   Cruising at around 60 miles-per-hour wound up being about five hours worth of driving, with very brief rest stops.

 

     We had to join the main national central highway briefly, just south of San Luis Potosi, for about thirty-five miles.  The amount of heavy, commercial traffic is astounding,  to be brief.  It leaves no doubt about whether or not Mexico is a two-trillion-plus economy.  That even includes the recent jiggles in exchange rates, which oddly have given a fresh shot of "energy drink" to the old traditional tourism industry.

 

Very common downtown street scene of San
Miguel de Allende.  Flagstone streets, very
narrow, considerate parking, passive cops,
clean, ancient, with restaurants, bars,
shops, academies, repair places, fashions,
at every turn.   Clean.

    It was truly striking to see the "little old ladies with blue hair" still there, perhaps even in greater number.   The clientele is truly polyglot, poly-regional, and poly-national.   It is a deferential place, with the ancient civilities still being practiced in spite of the revered colonial community's growth of 100 per cent in the past decade.   The population now numbers 180,000.   But, in spite of all of that, there are still no traffic lights in the "Old Town", which is about seventy per cent of the geographical space.




Centre of San Miguel, with
the Parroquia de San
Miguel in the
 background.

     Still religiously practiced is the alternating  "A - B, A - B" process of merging into traffic at the peripheral rotundas,and melding at every downtown intersection. This deference even includes dealing with pedestrians, except at upraised "topes" especially placed for pedestrians who are attempting to cross the streets.   Even on some of the boulevard-type streets with multiple lanes on the periphery of the city, all traffic will voluntarily slow to a stop while pedestrians scurry (in a considerate manner) across the street....usually in a convenient gaggle....leaving the automotive community to go about its business again.   Almost no honking.   Very little urgency.  Most of the offenders are people with Mexico City license plates, and even they learn the etiquette after a few days.

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     The building of the boutique hotel by our friends and their friends is supposed to be done by the end of this month.   Professional personnel, such as head chef, administrator, chief maintenance officer, and the like have been employed, and work-crews (famous for ability and relatively quick work) are crossing the 90% line in terms of completion.
     Furnishings and appointments are coming in and terminal electrical works were well on the way to completion.   We shall post pictures after the opening, while deferring at this time.  It would be a bit deceiving to show pictures of rooms with the normal disorder of final construction, and also it is best to allow our friends to post first in the appropriate San Miguel, Guanajuato, Mexico City, and  other venues' publications.

     One picture, however, that is somewhat representative of the nature of Guanajuato is an exterior painting on the outside property wall of the new hotel.   According to our neighbour, this picture just suddenly appeared from one day to the next.   It was doubly remarkable because it was done in a style that is mastered by our new daughter-in-law, who is a highly accomplished graphic-design expert and artist.




General Ignacio Allende
 y Unzaga

     There is very little, almost no, graffiti in San Miguel de Allende.  The town's colonial name was San Miguel de los Altos (St. Michael of the Heights), which is interesting because the town of importance of our daughter-in-law is Alto, Texas.   The Mexican town is a "bit" higher, running along at and around one-mile above sea level elevation.   The name of the city was changed after the establishment of Mexican independence from Spain to celebrate one of the four main "Insurgentes" of the Mexican resistance to continued colonial status to Spain.
     Ignacio Allende, an ethnic Spaniard, Mexican-born military officer was both an original conspirator and the second highest ranking commanding officer of the initial hostilities in 1810 - 1811.  He was captured, tried, and executed by firing squad in Ciudad Chihuahua, decapitated, and his head sent back to the city of Guanajuato where it was displayed for several months for public view and warning.   The head of  Allende's superior officer, Father Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla kept him company during this period.

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     The one problem we had while being gone during this period was the cold.  Whether at the Quinta or in San Miguel de Allende, we encountered all kinds of Climate Change with temperatures of 60 degrees or lower for 97 per cent of the time.  And by "or lower" we mean substantially lower with many nights in the 30's and daytime highs rarely hitting 50 degrees.  Cold, cold, cold, cold.
     It was substantially unpleasant, although it was as pleasant as something could be considering how unpleasant it was.  Our cats helped a bit, and BeBe, the Labrador that Alvaro brought home  several months ago, demanded being allowed inside which meant that 20 per cent of my time was spent in washing, cleaning, mopping, and de-odorising the front section of the parlour.   Another 10 per cent of the time was spent in hauling firewood into the house, burning it, and cleaning out the fireplace every 24 hours.   Of course, one of those cleanings resulted in the destruction of my second best 5-gallon (20 - litre) white plastic bucket.   Somebody shovelled a live coal into the mix of ashes, and it burned a large hole in the bottom.   Collateral damage, fog of the war on climate, friendly-fire casualty....at least the cats were not barbequed.

     We shall have more later.   Thanks for the continued interest.  We are trying to figure out how to begin a climate restoration employment project for the members of ISIS who have grown tired of murdering children, women, and Christians, and apparently anyone else who they feel needs murdering.    If they only had jobs, then....what difference, at that point, would it make?   Midnight Basketball and Globalwarmingcoolingclimatechange.  
Sheeshhhhh!!!
El Gringo Viejo

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Heading South

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     We shall be heading down to the Quinta to-morrow.  In all probability, we shall also be taking a bit of a trip over to San Miquel de Allende in a week or so to help our neighbour, the owners of the Hacienda de La Vega, begin the process of opening their new boutique hotel in that noble city.

     It is a six-room, colonial-style, with lots of stone work and points of finery that as of yet we have not seen in person.   For some reason or another the family seems to think that it will not be "real" until I have pronounced it such.  It is quite an undertaking and has been in process for about one year to this point.   Building anything in San Miguel de Allende is a bit of a wonderland due to the conditions concerning building standards and historical melding requirements.

     We should be back around the middle of the month.

El Gringo Viejo

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El Zorro Contemplates the Boiling Porridge.....

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Time does not support this idea but there is a scenario that one could ponder.  Just for fun imagine this: 

 

      In the circumstance that either of the obstreperous old biddies on the left, or any of their ilk including the phony Jim Webb, should become the next President;  The timeline notwithstanding, Ted Cruz runs for Texas’ Governor and wins.  Think of the position Texas is in.  If Texas becomes so fed up and gathers the fortitude to secede, Cruz becomes President (of Texas).  If Texas does not secede, Cruz becomes President (of the U.S.) with gobs of experience.

     Secession is very unlikely even though I would support it, but then this is my fantasy.  In my humble opinion, Ted is more qualified than the rest of the field as a Senator but having been a governor would be a credential difficult to ignore for a Presidential run.  Again, the timeline is an issue because Gregg Abbot will be Texas Governor beyond 2016 and likely will win a second term if he does not barf in his mess kit.

 

     Silly idea but sometimes this nature of daydream pops out of my grey matter.  Speaking of which, we would like to see TC pop out of the pack to take the nomination and win in 2016.  He is the best choice with no clear second.

    The field is strong with the likes of Mike Lee, Scott Walker, Bobby Jindal, Mario Rubio, Allen West, Rand Paul (maybe) in that order and a few others excluding Jeb, Christi, Graham, and Huckabee.  I like Dr. Carson but he will have to prove it to me. I also like Rick Perry but I do not feel he is up to the campaign… again.  If he is good enough to get the nomination I would worry about the general.  He tends to stumble and he is somewhat damaged from 2012.

 

It is too early to get excited but these are how I see it at this point no matter how improbable it may seem. 

 

Cruz for President!

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     It is nearly impossible for the folks on the edges of the Republic to stop and think long enough why anyone would support the candidacy of a person who is obviously a dangerous, radical extremist.

     Reasonable people who know the difference between a secular humanist, organic law democracy and a Common Law, Republic, governed by the rules of Natural Law and obeisance to time proven moral codes....like, admire, and support people such as Ted Cruz.  The "fantasia" described by El Zorro is not an uncommon condition that affects many who have tired of the demagoguery,

deception, obfuscation, and blatant criminality of the gaggle of vermin who have contaminated the "executive branch" of the central government for the past few years.

     We really long for the time that we shall not have to vote for things being processed in the Congress of the Republic in order to find out what is written in the proposition.   And the left thinks we are crazy....?

     Cruz for President sounds better every day.

El Gringo Viejo....  

 

From: El Gringo Viejo [mailto:privatouring@gmail.com]
Sent: Friday, January 30, 2015 4:01 PM
To: james@oldmolerfarm.net
Subject: [A Gringo in Rural Mexico] The Porridge Boils

The Porridge Boils

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     The news of Mitt Romney's very early departure from the "pack of possibles" is not entirely un-anticipated.  His machinations appeared to this observer as something like trying to strike matches on a wet matchbox.

Will the Elephant finally charge and
take what is his?

      It is difficult to base much of an attack when commanding an army who soldiers say, "Our general is really a nice guy."   Almost everyone agreed that Mitt is an awfully nice guy who drew a clod for an opponent in the last Presidential.   This writer extracted the impression that Romney could not believe that he would have to face an opponent who, for all practical purposes, has no soul.

     Hard medicine for a Mormon.

 

      It was of interest to really study this event (the withdrawal from candidacy), distilling  and centrifuging the words and trying to find out if we had brandy, whisky, rum, tequila,  or just a hang-over.   Romney's observation is perhaps salient;  that it is time someone with "new-car fragrance" should come to the fore and lead the Elephant stampede to better and greater victories.
     That observation also throws cold water on the notion that Romney and Bush flipped a coin to determine who would represent the "adult" Republicans and lead the party to another dull, moderate, daddy-socialist loss on election day.   Romney's parting words actually seem to point to the younger group of firebrands and ideological right-wingers.


   There is a batch of them, many with Executive experience as governors.   Jindal, Walker, Rubio was Speaker of the Florida House when he was 12 years old.   For dark horses, (no puns, please) we have Martinez, Haley, and Saldana who could serve well, especially as ticket balance.  This is not to mention other favourites, of mine and many, like Carson, West, and of course, Ted Cruz.

     It is amazing how the party of no inclusion has a horde of attractive, conservative / hard-case conservative "minority" - type full-blown qualified personnel available to postulate for the presidency and/or vice-presidency.

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     The Democrat National Socialist Workers' Party has the frumpy patrol:  (Sir Edmund) Hillary, Pocahontas Warren, the significantly mentally-challenged Biden, and a Mr. Webb who is going to take over the Democrat Party "from the right".   Frumps, lumps, grumps, and hypocrites.  Oh, excuse me, they also have the estimable Al Sharpton, the "Soul of America" and close advisor to the present holder of the office of the Presidency.  Of this composition of intellectual and moral debris, one non-biodegradable item keeps surfacing at the treatment plant.  It seems to be totally resistant to reconstitution, and so she has decided to not even campaign for the Democrat nomination, awaiting a coronation instead.



HRH(Sir Edmund) Hillary I
 practicing her first Royal Decree:

   "We deign that, From henceforth forward,
 it is our order and pleasure to replace the motto
 of the currency of the Queendom, changing from
 "In Whatever We Trust" to

"WHAT DIFFERENCE AT THIS
POINT COULD IT POSSIBLY MAKE?"
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     Just think about what those progressive and "caring" people have done for the Republic, for the women, for the minorities, for the polar bears, the geezerhood, and of course, for the children and for all the young black men who are always being shot all the time by all the white cops all the time, along with the New LGBT, and CCCP conmunities, (I think that these groups are the Lettuce, Gouda, Bacon, and Tomatoe people, and the Crony Capitalists, Crooks, and  Parasites - it is hard to keep them all straight, in a manner of speaking).

     So, we shall now be given the free entertainment from the Obsolete Press, watching the "reporters'' lug the Her Highness around in a wheel-barrow from one ultra-control-freak controlled environment to the next, reciting dutifully her pronunciamentos and sage absurdities.   With luck, the American Focus Group Society will come out of its self-imposed mental-process suspension and turn ever so slightly to the Right sometime just before election day, November, 2016.

More Later, and remember that we appreciate everyone's time and attention.
El Gringo Viejo

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Dysfunction and Mendacity....The White House will have to be decontaminated

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Don Quixote with Sancho and the wasted mounts
 after the attack on the Windmill

 

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(1)          We are working on the Fast and Furious matter and will be able to have a better understanding and a more complete report ready for Congress in the very near future.

 

(2)           Remember that the Fast and Furious Programme was inherited by us from the previous Administration

 

(3)           We need to get rid of Mubarak because he is a corrupt brute.  The Muslim Brotherhood has a proven record of popular acceptance and efficient administration.

(4)           We need to get rid of Kaddafi because he is a brute.  We will help a democratic government to establish itself there once he is gone.

 

(5)            The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant is a silly little group of thugs who are something akin to a junior varsity team.

(6)           We are never going to "arm" radical elements in Syria such as ISIL with weapons from Libya's stockpiles.  That will never happen on our watch.

 

(7)           We shall draw a line in the sand against Assad's regime, and he will regret crossing it.

(8)           We shall dedicate this 1,000,000,000,000 dollars to shovel-ready jobs, and overhaul the infrastructure of America that has been neglected for eight years.
 

(9)            Spain's unemployment has been reduced to nearly nothing by investing in ''renewable energy" like wind and solar.   (?)
       The truth is that youth unemployment in the southern half of Spain has fallen all the way up to 73%.   It has, with no humour, increased nationwide for all sectors, especially dating from the "big push" for energy renewables.  There are six provinces that have between 34 and 43 per cent unemployment, as one can discern in the real, live "fuzzy figures" to the left of the map of Spain.  

      Map of unemployment by province. Unemployment is a big problem in the south and west of Spain, especially in the least industrialized zones, 2014.   Windmills and sunlight had some kind of impact on unemployment by introducing the interconvulate retrogerablic factor over the socio-chronographic invervivision factor to all unemployed people who have been dead for more than three years and less than 50 years, except for Muslims and  Scotsmen living in the southern half of northeastern Western Spain.

     At some later date, we shall study other magnificent mendacities foisted upon the Focus Group Citizenry who are celebrating still the fact that "......and if you like your doctor, you can keep your doctor...and if you like your insurance plan....you can keep your insurance plan.....period."

El Gringo Viejo

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So much out of focus

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     We state with a bit of humility, and we have at least one wife who can bear witness to the accuracy of the following declaration, we surmised yesterday morning that any snowfall of 36 inches falling in Central Park of New York City would have to be from the blowing dandruff of the mayor of the city, with the help of Al Sharpton's breath condensation.

 

    It is all the urgent need for intellectual slummers like (Sir Edmund) Hillary and AlGore and George Soros and their little lackey-slaves like Barry Soetoro and Valerie Jarrett to control every second of every life in every country on the Planet.

 

   Which, since the hip-bone is connected to the thigh bone, means that it is necessary to have a body politic that cannot differentiate between the War Between the States and horseradish.   Common Core?   No child left behind?   Take in the image of a common core of ignorance and enforced stupidity, with extra helpings of procto-urological fixations and foul-mouthed profanity among the student body.  Fold in a teaching corps that is "professional" instead of "called by a higher authority". 

    Imagine then, high school graduates who can barely perform at a seventh grade level (now ), who will be celebrating that they are performing at a third grade level within the next five years.   We shall measure success by how many "students" were fed, and what the average daily attendance for the year was.   Perhaps there will be given extra credit for beating up a teacher.   We cannot comprehend the sloth and degeneracy found in public schools to-day, although there are a few who will excel, in comparison.   Those who "excel" by graduating from University without being able to differentiate the continents of South America and Africa have become the norm.

 

    The incessant reference to "Superstorm Sandy, easily the worst hurricane in the history of America"....when in fact it was a plain and simple Category 1 hurricane, poorly prepared for and misdiagnosed almost every step of the way.   What made the hurricane as bad as it was?  Bureaucracy, corruption, and an unwillingness to prepare on the part of the populace so as to defend itself.

 

    It was exactly like New Orleans, whose Gomorrah-like nature brought ruin upon the city, not the strength of a category 1 storm.  A now adjudged and imprisoned mayor, a stupid and insipid Governor, a worthless police department (in the main), a school system that is just as stupid, lazy, and self-centre'd  as the populace, a police department that broke and ran (a majority), while entire trains waited at the station to take refugees to safety, but nobody came.....the rail passenger cars sat empty.
 



The nouveaux Zombie intellectual class



 

    One tires of it.  There is no abnormal meteorological activity that can be traced to any Global warming, Global cooling, Climate change, nothin', naught, nix, nada, zed, zilch.   It is all a design meant to transfer money to the hands of people the likes of which compose the General Assembly of the United Nations.  Those hands, of course, immediately put their money into the banks that are controlled by National Socialists who pay Obama to give them money to build Solyndra solar panels....because of Global Warming-Cooling-Climate Change.   It is a wondrous game called "Look at the Emperor's elegant raiment!"

 

     And an ever duller, ever more ignorant, ever more self-absorbed populace falls in line.  Ya basta!

El Gringo Viejo

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