Moving to a New House in Mexico

I moved into a 3 bedroom house very close to the school where I teach.  What an experience, I must say.  It is a newly built wood-framed house with some recycled materials like the kitchen cabinets and the doors.  Yes, I said wood-framed house, just like the United States. The part I really like is the windows are brand new with double panes.  And they tilt in for cleaning, if I had the desire to clean them.  I might... someday.

Here's a laundry list of things you do not get when moving into a new home in Mexico:

1. Stove
2. Refrigerator
3. Boiler
4. Closets
5. Curtains or blinds
6. Air conditioning

For item #1 just across the border in Texas is what I call "used appliance row". I bought a gas stove for $150 and Sergio installed a 45 kilo LP gas tank that he found for 700 pesos.  The stove is awesome. It is full size unlike my other apartment's little stove.  And the oven uses Fahrenheit degrees!!!!  My old stove was labeled 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5 for the oven temperature which I never did get the hang of and it didn't work very well.  Pizzas tasted like soggy cardboard so I did the Mexican thing and used the oven as storage.  I baked cookies in my new stove just to test it and they were AWESOME.  I can't wait to try a pizza.  While I was at the "used appliance row", I bought a washing machine for $80.  I hung clothes line around the palapa in the backyard. Oh, yes, I have a palapa in the backyard. How cool is that?

For item #2 Sergio's partner got a refrigerator from a school.  It is an Amana side by side and it is huge.  It needed a new compressor.  So for $120 I have this super cool refrigerator (pun intended).  At the old apartment I had an early 1970's vintage refrigerator that had been spray painted but all the rust was seeping through and when I moved in, I could tell it served as a roach motel. And the milk would last about 2 days before starting to become cottage cheese.

Item #3, the boiler.  I hate cold showers.  Everyone who knows me knows I hate cold showers.  All my blog readers know I hate cold showers.  I've bitched and moaned about cold showers because I had the world's suckiest boiler at the old apartment until the school finally decided I had bitched and moaned enough and installed a new boiler. Guess what? I am taking cold showers.  And I am not liking it one little bit. I won't last until December.  I won't last until October.  I may not last until next week even though it is 100 degrees everyday and the water coming in isn't exactly cold because of the heat.  Did I say I hate cold showers?

Item #4, the closets.  I can not believe that an American-style house was built without closets.  What's up with that?  So I went to Home Depot and bought the brackets, poles and boards for a shelf on top of the brackets.  It works.

Item #5, the lacking of window coverings is common in all new construction.  No surprise there.  I went to Walmart last weekend and bought 8 mini-blinds for (gasps in surprise) $3.96 each.  They look great!

Item #6, the air conditioning.  Even worse than having no boiler is no air conditioning in this incinerating, hellish, super-duper hot, tropical heat. Sergio installed a mini-split that takes the edge off of the blazing temperature, but it's not big enough.  It's being sent to the bedroom and so a better one can be installed for living and kitchen.  Soon.  Very soon.  Did I say very, very soon?

Also on the list is getting cable and internet.  Luckily, I have a neighbor who neglected to secure his wireless connection so if I sit in right direction and the sun and moon are aligned correctly, I can leech off the neighbor's internet. Which is what I am doing right now to publish this.

Moving is a good thing.  It forces you to clean out your closets and get rid of things you haven't used in years. Just ask my folks.  After a lifetime in Iowa, they are in the process of moving to Texas.  Mom, it's time to get rid of the Home Interior decorations from the 1970's.  Dad, the leisure suit in your closet should go.  But then again, maybe not.  After all, your closet/museum has been a source of amusement for me and my sisters for years.  We're talking about a man who still wore his Navy issued swimming trunks 50 years after discharge.  Woo hoo, way to go Dad!

Dad and his Navy issued swimming trunks, cerca 1951