Your prayers were answered!

We made it! It was a long day. In order to save money, we opted for a five-hour layover at Houston, but, on top of that, our plane took off one hour late from Houston. We were all loaded and ready to go, but the door was still open. I thought they were waiting for a passenger with a late connection, since there is only one flight from Houston to our airport here on the Pacific side. After fifteen minutes or so, the flight attendant said, "Here he is!" It turned out to be the pilot! No wonder we couldn't take off! We lost our place in the take off cue, so we had to wait a long time on the tarmac. Finally, we were able to take off after an hour delay. Your prayers about healthy backs were answered because we were able to withstand the long day without back pain. Getting through customs was a breeze. They weren't checking any bags. I guess it was late, and everybody wanted to go home. They don't pay overtime in this country.

Today we had our traditional first morning breakfast of pancakes. I keep a box of pancake mix in the refrigerator here that only needs water. I leave butter in the freezer and syrup in the refrigerator. We need a lot of carbs to make it through the first morning. The place is in great shape. John saw that the garage had been swept, and the car started without any problems. It was so nice that he went next door to thank our neighbor who keeps it up for us. They are a Christian family from the capital, but they live here most of the time. They are such a blessings to us. After talking to the neighbor, we took off to run some errands and to the grocery store.

Our first stop was the mechanic. Our car needs to be taken every year in May to the local DMV for a complete check. In California you need a smog check, but here they check the entire car. We took it ourselves once, but after that experience, we decided that it is easier to pay somebody to do it for us.  We have found these cousins who run a shop next to their house. They are a blessing also. They are good and honest. They are so good that we did not have any issues with the car last time we were here, so we did not go by their shop. So Paul, one of the cousins,asked John how I was doing since last time he talked to him I had gone back to the US suddenly due to my mother's passing. I heard him asking, so I got out  and went to say hello to him. He told me how sorry he was to hear about my mom since he had not had the chance to give me his condolences. We told him that we had not come by because we did not have any car problems, and he told us that we should have stopped by just to say hello. It was a major faux pass on our part. We were thinking the American way, but the local way is to stop by and say hello to people even if you don't have any business to discuss. You would think that after ten years coming here we should have know better. OK, we have learned our lesson and will be more careful next time.

John is resting for a while now, and then in an hour or so we will start calling people and the fun will start!

Continue to pray for healthy backs and safety, open hearts and wisdom.

Our backyard from our balcony.

Until next time...from the beach...