Pedro is tired
cleaning up the block
One of the things I’ve learned in this dog rescue, car wreck, being alone and cobbling a life-ish together in remote goofball rural Mexico is that I don’t know shit.
I thought when you spayed a dog she would no longer go into heat.
False. Some vets (in Mexico and other lands not in the US) leave ovaries. There are reasons but I suspect it’s easier and that’s the end of that story. We’ve done a lot of spay “field surgeries” here on my patio for feral dogs and I’m pretty sure if the vet thought about it (or if I knew that the spayed feral dogs would still 4x a year or more have a heat cycle and draw every male in the barrio to our gates or just anywhere central small town, (but let’s face it, I’m a safe place for dogs so they come here—) I would have insisted on full hysterectomy. Duh. No unwanted litters is great but still having a bloody, male drawing heat is super disruptive. Males fight, the female is (usually) not into it, other dogs like mine who are inside gates go bananas when groups of roving new male dogs come by. And Andie, the feral mama to Rocky, lurks nearby always. Pedro is her old man husband and they sleep on the street together. Andie is a bit of a Jezebel and I’ve seen her literally stick her fanny in male dogs faces to get them to mount. And her heats, faux or otherwise last for weeks. Pedro is tired from chasing away all the suitors. He runs inside whenever I let him. Andie will not come in. The block being less horrible to strays means there are more of them. They aren’t taken in, but they aren’t throwing rocks at them either. Pick your poison.
Great neighbors are the ones who are retired, well to do traveling folks. They keep their side of the street tidy, they are welcoming, they have good gossip on the locals and they are quiet. The downside is they are never around. Thus far the Taco Dad has been here 3 days. The Italians (not really Italian but stylish and Euro dressed Manuel and Isabel) were here for 2 days and then off to Acapulco. The thing with multiple real estate holdings is that you spend most of your time checking and maintaining the house you’re not in at the moment. I learned that the hard way. I own nothing now and I’m pretty okay with that. But the block is mostly second homes and dark and quiet. Having a weekend house here is surprising because I can’t imagine anyone coming here on purpose, but I’m not the demographic. If you’re on a budget and have a small boat or a kayak to tool around in the not pretty part of the Sea of Cortez and can exist on beer and the occasional ceviche, this is your jam. If I was Mexican and wanted a beach scene that wasn’t full of tourists jumping on rubber bananas or ziplining I’d come here. It’s a real locals only vibe. Which can mean familiar or completely isolating.
Cheap rents mean cheap repairs. I’m sure the landlord wasn’t expecting to rent to an American woman who used to rehab houses at any point in his imagination. I think he’s rented to the contractor dudes who are super hard on places (on the company dime) and transient and recently to a local lady whose son put a bar in here that lasted 10 minutes. I’m foggy on the history but a lot of the repairs are of the Paint Over It variety. We’ve all seen this. It’s mostly fine and I’m not going over anything with a fine tooth whatever, I fix what I can, if I hate the lunky fridge I’ll pick up a smaller one at the used store. I can replace a faucet handle or upgrade a rusty sink. It’s a block house that has some cute windows and it’s quiet, cheap, has safe fencing/walls and allows my dog pack. Everything else is a DIY. EXCEPT Some electrical lights have blown and started little tiny fires on the fixture when turned on and if you don’t tag every single thing that needs to be redone or checked, the electrical dude (also a brother of a wife or a cousin who needs to be called three times) isn’t going to do anything on the proactive side. He’s not your dad. But I don’t do electrical. I can hit a breaker and know when stuff is unsafe and I’ll get someone to fix it. Is it included? Dunno. Also I’ve never seen anyone too keen on fire code in Mexico. Lots of places burn down and Jose grabs his duffel bag and sits on the corner until another house opens up. Mexico has never said “Just to be safe…” ever. They do damage control after the fact. One look at the trains in Mexico City that collapse on a regular and you’d best be your own building inspector. Not many second chances with an electrical fire. It made me glad I never leave the house and the dogs alone for more than 10 minutes but now I’m thinking about never leaving a light on ever. The padlock on the gate is a pain in the ass to remove and I’ve already noted that as a fire escape hazard so I’m not using it. If you want to come in and steal something that I already lost and deal with 8 dogs, go for it. I’m not padlocking the gate. 20+ years ago when I lived in a 4th floor walk up in Brooklyn I never thought of this stuff. It was a death trap looking back. Getting permitted for commercial code taught me a ton, life sort of pushing me down a flight of rhetorical stairs every once in a while taught me more. So we’ll see how it goes. I’m not buying a washing machine yet, let’s just leave it at that. I will likely spring for a wire pull on some lights and invest in an exterior plug and some conduit, not that the duct tape isn’t doing a lovely job, I’d prefer to sleep with both eyes closed. I’ve never seen a fire/smoke detector here either. I’ve installed solar lights outside for now and that seems to be the most practical option.
Living in Mexico is a bit like camping, once you wrap your brain around that, it gets easier. And for what it’s worth I’ve seen plenty of fabulous mid rise condos mudslide into the ocean or collapse entirely for no reason in tourist gringolandia rain prone Puerto Vallarta at 5x the price so unless you built it and supervised all the construction yourself, life here is full of surprises.