polk county public works

One of my favorite things is returning home to Mexico from the USA. I’ve done so twice now.

On the way I mentally review whether and why Mexico will let me back in. I review it a few times.

The light rail trip to the border in SoCal is magical.

Both times they’ve let me back in without hesitation.

I went to get my residency card renewed today for another year but it looks like I have another thing I have to do there first before I can do the appointment to get it renewed. But importantly they said nothing that would suggest I won’t be allowed to renew. I can apply for permanent residency in January 2027. Thirteen months from now. Citizenship is possible in January 2030.

Yesterday in some property listings I spotted a meadow for sale on the edge of town, to the east. 10,000 sq feet for $35k. I decided to get on my bike and go. See if I could get there. Manifest this meadow in my day. Though I hadn’t envisioned buying such a rural plot. I saved a mental image of the map and headed north and east.

This trip would take me further into the eastern reaches of the town than I previously had ventured. Further east means further uphill. The town is surrounded by hills on three sides, so if you look to the east at night you see the lights of all the houses reaching up the hillside. But I learned yesterday it’s not one continuous hillside, as it appears from a distance. Instead you climb a large hill and from its crest you see… the rest of the town. Like, there’s a whole other half of the city over there. Really I don’t know what’s over there, because I could only see to the next hilltop.

At times I was pushing my bike up and down steep hills. Or down and up. I started navigating according to the grade, in the manner of a goat, rather than by compass direction. I became disoriented. I never reached my goal. When I doubled back, I spotted what looked like it might be an unpaved road, a very chunky road with large eroded rocks, branching off from the paved road. It appeared more of a walking path than something cars could use. I looked at Google and it was there, on the map, an official road. It seemed like it might get me back to the flatter part of town more efficiently, so I pushed my bike into this more functionally and culturally ambiguous territory, a dirt road through a wooded ravine near a dried up stream. I remember it as wooded. And there were a lot of people living along the road, and nearby, in the grade above it, in improvised shelters. Cinder blocks, tarps, corrugated metal. And a lot of dogs in the road. Groups of dogs socializing. I rode and pushed my bike past many dogs, hoping none would be overly protective of the ravine and its inhabitants. They looked at me, but didn’t bark at all. I must have passed twenty unleashed dogs on that road, and none made any show of aggression at all. They adhered to the pattern elsewhere in town, where dogs behind fences bark loudly at you, but dogs roaming free are usually mild mannered.

A ways down the path, it turned up a steep hill, and a few cars made their way downhill toward me… they lumbered very slowly down the hill, steering around exposed rocks and deep ruts. I pushed my bike up that last hill and then a short ways after that I could see that the road was indeed connecting back to the less organic, more familiar parts of town.

I biked home, had another look at the map, and realized there are two separate communities in Ensenada where the streets are all named after South American countries, and the one I had set out for was not the one with the meadow for sale. The one with the meadow is substantially further east. I think I’ll try one more time to bike to it. The distance itself is not the issue. I need to choose a flatter route.

My record of not yet having talked to any gringos here was broken in early October. I was at the business where I pick up my U.S. mail, and there was another customer there who said something to me about the weather having recently cooled off. I agreed. That was the extent of the exchange.

It’s come to my attention that I have a blog. I was able to remember the domain, and by some miracle, the password.

I yet exist in this town. It’s my 323rd day in Mexico. I’m going to go outside in a minute, I mean, outside the property.

It’s been extremely nice here subsequent to the temperature inversion, which ended Thursday night. The inversion happens for a week or so every November, I have learned. I learned what it was about 24 hours before it ended. In the normal order of things, air closer to the ground, closer to the earth, is warmer. But this town and much of the coast between here and Tijuana experiences an inversion each November wherein a layer of cooler air gets trapped below a layer of warm air. This has the effect of worsening the air quality somewhat dramatically, as it puts a lid over the town and traps whatever pollution the town itself generates. But the inversion unraveled sometime Thursday night, and for the first time in a week the PM2.5 concentration was in a good range when I awoke on Friday. I have a meter. And then Saturday, air quality went from good to great, and then the past few days it has been extremely good. The immediate consequence is visual… the visibility is incredible. Whereas at times last week I couldn’t see the hills just 1/3 mile from here. I mostly stayed indoors during the inversion, where I have a filtration device and air quality is always good.

For the most part I wouldn’t have noticed the poor air quality last week if not for its effect on visibility. And the meter reading. I’m not sure I would have known from the smell/taste/etc. Maybe in some moments.

You can set up camp near town, on a nearby hillside or wherever. If you want. You can build a shelter there, live beneath tarps, etc.  After you occupy that land for three years, it’s yours.  When the government eventually apportions lots in the area you occupy, whatever lot you happen to live on is your lot. For free. This info is based on one conversation — I’m not sure I have the details right.  You’d need somewhere to put your poop. Some kind of composting toilet, or tank.  I presume. I don’t know how that works.  I’ll ask my Mexican friend.  It seems roughly analogous to buying a house in Detroit for $1.  I don’t know the details about that either. People who set up on unclaimed land, in the hills for example, are called “skydivers,” he said. I came upon one myself when I tried to hike up into the hills, but I didn’t know it at the time. Presumably when the area is developed you would then have a connection to the sewer.

take walks.

errands don’t count as walks.

Most dogs are behind fences, but there’s no taboo here on letting dogs venture out of the yard. One nearby family has two dogs that live on their patio, more or less, but can run out into the street any time they choose through a 10-foot wide missing section in the fence. Only one of their two dogs ever chooses to venture out. It guards the half of the street nearest their yard. This seems to be the expectation of free roaming guard dogs in this town. They are entitled to guard the half of the street nearest their owner’s house. When you come to such a property, you pass by on the other side of the street and there’s no problem.

One dog dragged its teeth on my pant leg, but didn’t quite bite down on the fabric. An oncoming car had nudged me onto the dog’s side of the street. By then I had a feeling about this particular dog and wasn’t afraid.

Some of the neighborhood dogs only did the guard-dogging routine 1-2 times and then switched to ignoring me completely. A guy near here works on cars in front of his house and a couple of his dogs will hang out nearby, sometimes sleeping under one of the cars across the street. The first time I biked past, one of his dogs chased me 3 blocks. Every subsequent time I’ve passed, it doesn’t get up off the ground at all. It doesn’t even look my way.

A yard full of dogs took a week or so of my passing by several times per day to start ignoring me. When their owner is present in the yard, they still make some show of barking at me when I pass.

earlier this year I thoughted it was very dry here; I said so; this was wrong; I think. it’s not very dry. it’s normal? I had a lot of chills in january.

I remember in DC sometimes in mi casa I would feel cold and then I would remember I had left the heat off, I had turned it off earlier in the day, for some reason, maybe because I had doors and windows open for some project reason. and I would get a chill and look at the thermostat and see it was only 62 degrees. then I would turn the heat on and set it at 68, I think that was my normal.

here it is often about 60 degrees inside, and I’ve gotten used to it. I remember wondering, a couple months ago, if it was something I could get used to. well, I have. I never use the humidifier that at one point I was so sure was the key to my happiness.

I rarely even use the heating pad at this point.

a couple days ago I was sitting on the beach looking at a ship. and a boy was walking past. a man. I said hello, and as often happens in this town, or country, when you say hello to someone, they stop and talk to you for 30 minutes. I remember thinking he was substantially younger than me. but the next day, yesterday, I realized I didn’t know how old he is. he might be about 40, or 45. on the beach he asked for my number, which seems to be a thing latinos will do. they’re less defensive than americans — I’m ready to generalize based on scant data. we made plans to go see the bufadora the next day. it’s a rock formation on a the coast, a rare phenomenon, I suppose, where water hitting the coast shoots up in the air in an exaggerated geyser-like manner and then rains down on you. so of course, as often happens with these things, the street leading up to it fills with touristy shops.

he picked me up yesterday and then let me know he would first take me past a couple museums just so I could see where they were. this is also a thing an American wouldn’t do. he was like “we’re first going to backtrack into town so I can drive you past the museums but we’re just going to look at them from the car” and I said, ok. then we went to the tourist attraction which was a ways outside of town and took us through the south part of the municipality which is more rural. and there is a concentration of Americans who, I suppose, want to live in this town without actually living in the town. he pointed out the community where Americans live. we went to the geyser thing, spent a while there, then went back to town, having agreed to go to the museums we had driven past earlier. but they were closed, so we drove around for a while looking for a bathroom. then he drove me past his elementary school and his office, where he works as a lawyer, and then we went to a taquería, but it was closed, so we went to another taquería. then he drove me home.

I bought a table today at a nearby saldo shop. I now have all the tables I need. I might buy a couple more chairs, then I’ll be done with furniture. unless I buy a larger guest bed. the place came with a large couch, a full bed, a twin bed, a desk, a small table, and a lot of built-in drawers and cabinets.

in total I have purchased two chairs, two small tables and one dining table. and some lamps. and a bike. I have enjoyed getting set up here, the challenge of buying just enough but not too much.

Something you don’t know about me is that the internet content I’ve consumed the most this year are interviews with fentanyl addicts, heroin addicts and tricks.  Tricks are people who see prostitutes. All the tricks I’ve seen interviewed are men.  I’ve watched a lot of interviews this year.

Another thing you don’t know about me is that last year I looked up how far Ensenada is from the border, and it’s 70 miles. Then I immediately thought, that’s probably about as far as New Jersey is wide and I looked it up and sure enough, at its widest point New Jersey is 70 miles wide.  That’s a true story.

Sometimes 70 miles doesn’t seem sufficient, such as recently, and then I fantasize about Asunción and it helps.  I don’t think I would want to live there as the climate is not ideal but when I think about far away places in South America, Asunción is the farthest.  It’s farther than the southern tip of South America because it’s a large city, and it’s farther than Buenos Aires because it’s less famous. Its access to the ocean, via a river, also makes it very far away. Asunción has a harbor and beaches.  I should do a tour of the south, hitting Asunción, Montevideo and Buenos Aires.

I haven’t had a single interaction with a gringo here yet. I rarely see any. Today I had my closest encounter. I was behind one in line at the grocery store, so I watched a gringo speak Spanish for the first time this year. I had a feeling like I was watching and listening to myself. That’s called an out-of-body experience.

Last night I watched an interview with someone who claimed to be a porn addict but it became apparent that really he’s a religion addict and a disability (wheel chair) faker (“devotee”), and perhaps some other things.

I’ve watched a couple interviews with people who claimed to be marijuana addicts but it became apparent that they’re schizophrenic.  True story.

Most of the watch dogs are behind fences but a few have ventured into the street and a couple have bumped at my heels with their snouts as I walk down the street. When this happens I keep walking at the same pace and don’t look back, and a short while later they let me go without biting me.  A few dogs nearby that used to erupt when I’d pass no longer bark at all, no longer even get up off the patio/dirt when I pass.  This is a discursive post containing true stories.

the air quality here has been bad enough the past two days that I can’t easily go outside. Since I moved here there has been around 1 day per week where the air is bad enough that I stay inside. It’s worse overall than I expected. When it’s really bad, you can smell it, and you can feel a subtle stinging in your eyes when you go for a walk.

I bought an air purifier yesterday, had one delivered to my house, and it works incredibly well. I’m stunned by what a difference it makes, and how rapidly it improved the air quality throughout this house. I also have a little air quality monitor, so I can see how well the air purifier is working, and I can test the outdoor air as well.

It’s funny to think I don’t have to stay in this town, or this country. I signed a lease for eight months, but I’ve begun to fantasize about Cuenca again, and Uruguay. And Buenos Aires. Places where you can pretty much always go outside.

In DC, there are some days where extreme cold or extreme heat makes the outdoors difficult to tolerate. But there is a little bit different feeling when toxic air is the reason you have to stay inside. And this air pollution is less predictable. You can’t make plans to play tennis or go on a hike in the hills a few days ahead of time, without the chance you might have to cancel due to bad air. If someone wants to visit me in Ensenada, there’s no guarantee we’ll be able to go outside every day they’re here. It’s a matter of air blowing down from Tijuana and getting trapped up against the mountains that surround Ensenada. On the other hand it can dissipate very rapidly when the wind changes direction. The air can go from dirty to clean in an hour or two. Today marks the first time since I’ve been here that there were two straight days of terrible air quality.

I’m glad the air purifier works so well, but I’ll also want to get a HEPA mask in case the power goes out sometime.