El Invierno! Spanish for The Invierno!

Allright I'm not gonna beat around the bush here. It's been a while. I feel awkward. You feel awkward. We used to be so close, and now look at us. Here I was, blogging regularly about what I'm doing down here, sharing my thoughts, emotions, struggles, triumphs, etc., and then 4 months passes and all you've heard from me is that I've got a mean side part goin on and the kids think I look like David Caruso.

Shit, for all I know, you've been reading someone else's blog the past 4 months. Who am I to assume you're even still intereted in me? I hope you still are, but I don't want to assume that I can pick right back up where we left off. How about we start with something light? Maybe the weather? See how things go, and then hopefully we can get back to the real stuff our relationship was built on... you know political upheaval, teaching English, and getting E.Coli (by the way just took my quarterly poo test and not only do I have giardia again, but I've also been blessed with both worms and fungi growing in my gut... not to worry though I'm getting treated and I feel fantastic).

So, yeah, a lot's happened in the past 4 months, but I'll keep it simple today and tell you about how much winter sucks down here. Not in the cold as F way it hits back in the states, but in the hot as F way it hits down here. I recently realized invierno (winter) is 2 letters away from inferno, which means hell, and I thought that would be a funny and witty thing to throw in my blog... then I realized that was kinda lame and not that funny... but here I am sharing that little titbit with you anyway. Sorry!

Anyway, as if it's not already hot as hell here, things just got exponentially nastier starting in Diciembre, coming to a hot sweaty climax in Febrero. Winter means higher temperatures and more rain, and more rain means more standing water, and more standing water means more mosquitos. So not only is it in the 90s and 100s every day (nights too... I don't think it even dropped below 80 on most nights), but now the mosquitos are out day and night, and even going inside doesn't really help cuz those bastards are everywhere. I think the entire month of Febrero my beautiful calves were tainted with bites, scratches, and scabs from scratching. Needless to say, it was uncomfortable.

On top of the sweaty weather and mosquitos, Guayaquil has this annual plague of grasshoppers that has got to be some of the weirdest biblical shit I've ever seen. Supposedly every winter once it starts raining, millions (maybe billions I really have no idea) of grasshoppers just appear out of no where and annoy the shit out of you for 3 weeks. They don't bite or sting, but there's literally so many of them that they just fly into you all the time and sneak into your house and eat your clothes. OK they didn't actually eat any of my clothes, but they're known to do that and they were in every corner of our house, so I moved all my clothes back into suitcases and kept that shit zipped up all the time. After a couple weeks of having dirty grasshopper sex and laying eggs for next winter, they all die off, and one day you realize "Oh, the grillos are gone." It's weird.

Don't get me wrong though, there was a lot of good stuff in the winter, too. And all that hot, sweaty, mosquito, grillo stuff really wasn't that bad, either. I just have to make it sound tough and exotic down here sometimes so you guys don't think I'm just sittin around sippin cervezas in my hammock (which does happen from time to time). I've been having an unbelievable time, and I can't believe it's already been 8 months.

One of the highlights of winter was playing in the rain with the kids in our neighborhood. Since it's so damn hot down here, it's not that weird to go outside in the middle of a tropical storm (I'm no weatherman and I don't see any news down here, but when it rains so hard that the streets flood six inches deep, I think it's safe to call it a tropical storm). There were a couple nights where it just dumped rain for multiple hours and we went outside to play with the kids in the middle of it all. Brought the waterproof camera to the last one, so I'll let you check out the pics. Needless to say it was a great time.

una tormenta tropical

That's all I've got for now, but I will be back in the cyber soon--I promise. Got some great pics from Carnaval, Nuevo Mundo, and Valdivia I've been meaning to show you. Hope all is well back home! Can you believe I'll be back in less than 5 months?? Wierd...