I dyed my hair yesterday. No allergic reaction was detected (except for the slightest sensation at first, which is customary), so I’m still alive and will be having it cut today.

 

Here’s the after dye/before cut image (taken just now):

It’s still pretty short, but scruffy looking. I don’t know if I’m gonna get a super short men’s haircut (maybe just on the sides, if so) or just a trim. Still trying to decide. I’d better do it darned fast — the cita (appointment) is in two hours!

 

The color I bought down here works pretty well on me. It doesn’t look unnaturally red, which is what I feared.  I also bought a darker shade, which I’ll try next time.

 

I’ll also be going to the banco again and to DIMI to get a document downloaded and copied. (Jon sent it in to them for  me, bless his heart.) Neither of those two tasks will take more than a few minutes; the haircut will be the longest stop, and then Marianela will bring me back home.

 

Upon my return, I’m going to put baby back ribs into the crock pot to cook on low until dinnertime.  I put a few ribs in yesterday — what I could manage to saw through while the ribs were still frozen solid.  They were very good, so I took the frozen remains out of the freezer and semi-thawed them overnight so I can cut them apart and make them fit into the pot. (It’s a small pot, so not many fit in when the carcass is frozen!)  I’ll probably only cook half of what’s left today.

 

COFFEE HARVEST TIME IS HERE

 

I walked more than 6000 steps this morning.  Met two gentlemen who were harvesting coffee beans from a neighbor’s shrubs. I spoke to them both briefly before they started work, and one of them told me in Spanish what he was going to do, which I understood (woo hoo!).  I was too hesitant to ask permission to take photos or a video of him picking the coffee beans, so I didn’t capture that, but it’s just like picking blueberries. I live very  near Sarchi, so the coffee beans are probably of that species/variety. I’m not a coffee drinker, but Costa Rica has some of the best tasting coffee in the world because of our rich volcanic soil, higher altitudes, and plenty of rainfall.

 

NEW MOO IN THE BARRIO

 

I walked to the main road to deposit wet trash and heard a new cow or steer bawling like a baby in the corral that also holds the two brahmas I’ve shared pix of in the past. I would have gone over to see and pet her, but another fellow was walking ahead of me on Calle Esteban Salas and headed directly to her to give her some treat, so I didn’t intrude.  The cow/steer settled down as soon as he arrived.

 

HALLOWEEN-SIZED SPIDERS  LIVE HERE

 

On the way back, I spotted a web filled with what Marilyn Stevens identified as golden orb spiders. (If you’re spider averse, stop reading or scrolling down NOW, becauSe I’ve put up a picture of them below…

 

Marilyn says she loves golden orb spiders and that they reproduce like mad.  I can confirm that because two days ago when I went up to the main road, there was a single spider in the web. This morning there were at least six of them.

 

They are between two and four inches in length. I have no doubt they are excellent bug catchers, or they’d starve to death and be unable to reproduce.  Spiders are good guys.

 

I have only found two spiders in this casita in the month plus that I’ve been here.  They were about nickel sized and more like wolF spiders than the ones you see below.  I was able to catch them in my bug catcher and put them outside.

 

There are a few other, far smaller spiders in this casita, way up in the eaves, so high you can’t even see them. They are on constant duty catching anything that flies into the casita through an occasionally open door. I consider them the cleaning crew. They catch and eat mosquitoes and other flies, and since the mosquitoes here can carry some pretty dreaded diseases, spiders are definitely on my side!

 

But I will relocate the ones that crawl across the floor, few and far between as they are. Charli spots them, and I pick them up. But again, there have only been two in a month and a half. (We had that many and more in our house in Tacoma upon occasion.) Hardly an invastion!

 

I would NOT want to walk into a spider web like the one above — but again, the golden orbs are so big, I’d have to be blind not to see them in plenty of time to avoid doing so!  They’re doing what they need to do, so I’m good with them!

 

I need to get ready to head for town now. More later today, maybe, if I can think of anything else that’s worth your precious time!  If not,  no te voy a molestar!  (Figure that one out! LOL!)