Something you may or may not know about TIM.....

"TIM" is very frustrating, annoying, funny, strange and sometimes quiet amazing. We refer to "TIM" quite a lot, usually though when either of the afore-mentioned descriptive words have been used usually in an exasperating manner, as for example.............

when feeling irrate due to some very weird mexican plumbing defect ( frustrating) or.................

when someone says they will be at your house on Monday but forget to tell you which Monday (annoying)  or ................

they say they will do something manana ( man yahna ) silly me , of course it doesn't mean tomorrow ?
( strange) it means some indefinite time in the future.

 Oh and last but not least .................. you will find TIM  accompanying you in your car on almost every journey in Mexico.

Let me  introduce  "TIM".................."TIM" is an expression sometimes used to convey annoyance at any of a million and one ( not known to exaggerate) incidents that can only produce the exclamation........    'This is Mexico.' ...In short TIM.!!

Often  Tim is accompanied by the rolling of eyes and the upward display of open palms to the heavens with the addition of the expletive ' Huh'.

We have all come to accept that This Is Mexico and things just don't happen the same here as they do 'back home'. It is the most frustrating and amazing place and there is never A Ground Hog day here.

For those of you that don't live in Mexico I thought it would be fun to give you an insight into living here and for those that do live here, remember  ( before I offend someone) it is purely as seen through my eyes only ( all though you may find yourself agreeing to some elements I'm sure) .  It is my point of view albeit slightly warped and tongue in cheek at times. Also,  as we are heading back to the 'frozen tundras' of Canada soon so I thought  this might be a good time to remind myself of some  of the phenomena that can only be Mexico  .

So every now and again I will throw into my blog  a little Mexican 'blogette'.

Thus , here is my first  first blogette on  the wonderful world of Mexico and all her  many facets. Oh just one last thing.... when I say Mexico I say it as a rather sweeping statement. We live in the Yucatan and the Yucatan can be different in some ways to the rest of Mexico... but that's another story. For now 'Mexico' means here in the part of Mexico where I live.

SHOES, SHOES, SHOES, SHOES, SHOES


SHOES, SHOES, SHOES, SHOES, SHOES.








I love shoes, always have done ........ you can't have too many pairs of shoes. As Imelda Marcos once said " I did not have three thousand pairs of shoes. I had one thousand and sixty"

If Imelda had come to here she would have had a ball. One thing that is not in short supply is shoe shops  The big shopping malls have more than their fair share that's true but everywhere you venture here there are shoe shops. Almost every corner, be it down town in centro or in the surrounding small villages and towns you will find shoe shops of some description.

Ticul which we would probably call a fair size market town is about an hour & 1/2 from here. It is where they manufacture shoes so you can probably imagine what thats like. The sandals here are , for the most part amazingly cheap  costing around $8.00 or so . These are mainly  flip floppy type sandals , very pretty and as a rule all you really need . You can of course  get really nice leather sandals and styles that are more 'dressy' but I have to be honest in many instances you get what you pay for.

However , on the practical side , it is recommended to invest in a good pair of sandals as well, as the very flat cheap flip flops are ok for a vacation but if you spend any length of time in them you eventually end up with a duck waddling type gait . Honestly, you hadn't noticed? I can't wait to get my plates of meat into some good sturdy winter shoes I can tell you.

Mexican women love their shoes and really know how to wear them....... well there are some exceptions of course. This being one of them.......

A bit tarty don't you think?

They love the high heals with jeans look. It could have something to do with their height or lack of? It is after all a nation of smaller than average height and we all like to look taller and leaner don't we.

It isn't just the younger women  that like to put on those heels either. Meridian women are very stylish and very smart and can often be seen shopping or out to dinner in their fancy high heels. Whereas I on the other hand have got quite out of the habit  of dressing up and tend to dress more casually. There's no way in the height of summer would you get me into anything other than the coolest of clothes..... to hell with style when you are a constant sweating blob...... one of my many reasons for returning to the 'frozen wastes' who would have ever thought I would want to swop summer for winter....... bliss bring on the hot tub baby.

 My  footwear tends to be of the .... and I hate to use this word ( Stacy and Clinton would kill me ) but comfortable variety too.  What has happened to this fashionista I ask myself............. Can't wait to get into some nice high  fashionable leather boots, you know the kind... impractical for -20 degrees and snowing but look really chic. Yes!!

Sunday afternoon at the Plaza in Merida centro.

Last week at the symphony the soloist was  a piece featuring the piccolo. I have now come to the conclusion that I can live without ever hearing a solo piccolo piece ever again. Bare with me I'll get to the shoes. However during this time of piccolo playing one tries to elevate ones mind to another level to escape the catawalling  of this tiny but piercing instrument . Failing that I began scrutinising the orchestra, as I have been known to do on occasion and here's what caught my eye.........

Very classy.

By the way some people actually loved the piccolo solo .... go figure....