Yesterday, Oct. 4, we awakened to the umpteenth cloudy/drizzly/gloomy day in this seemingly endless rainy season in San Miguel de Allende. Let us now bow our heads and ask for forgiveness. Forgiveness from our friends in Chicago, New York, and points north of Indianapolis, for all our constant hee-hawing about the unpleasant climate in which they …
Continue reading Storm warnings: Be careful what you brag about
This morning, around seven o'clock, I drove to town and noticed heavy, slow-moving masses of dark clouds tightly hugging the tops of the mountains on the horizon. In other locations or under different circumstances, the sight may have been considered an ominous sign of imminent thunderstorms or other inclement weather. My first reaction, though, was one …
Late yesterday afternoon I was watering one of my garden beds, a chore which four months into the relentless dry season, challenged my patience and optimism.Surely, in six weeks or so—I said to myself—the rainy season will jolt the plants out of their brownish stupor and the ranch will bloom again.After a light dinner and …
The rainy season began last night. Maybe. The sis-bam-boom of thunder and lightning, and the crescendo of fat raindrops pounding the skylights, was a welcome spectacle last night, assuming it was the overture to this year's rainy season.The all-night rain ranged from furious to gentle and back again but it never seemed to quit. Our cheapo …
Non-San Miguelites, particularly those hapless folks recovering from yet another winter in places like Chicago or Montreal, may view our climate enviously: Current forecasts call for overnight temperatures in the mid-fifties, noontime highs in the mid-eighties, and brilliant sunny skies as far as anyone can predict.Indeed we haven't had any measurable rain in months. Great, huh? Not …
February in Chicago is cold, damp and most of all dreary. Daylight hours have shrunk; it's dark outside going to work and likely the same when coming home. Wistfully scanning seed catalogs doesn't seem to help. At Starbucks, sales of the Sumatran Vente Molto Loco blend have increased dramatically, which makes people bug-eyed but hardly …
During the time of the Romans, architects learned how to build huge domed structures, the Pantheon in Rome probably being the most famous. Then all that technology and skill was lost during the Middle Ages, and Renaissance architects and engineers during the 1400s pretty much had to start from scratch when they set out to …
El Rancho Santa Clara 