fifty? fifty?!? it is only forty-six!

it appears that fifty words is now the norm for a bare bones post...just ask Nelle. so that last post of fourteen words was woefully short, eh? call it a 'low word diet'...Atkins would be so proud. they say that on the low word diet, you should avoid word fillers...like monosyllabic. words such as this one don't curb your appetite for semantic consumption. you'll just be hungry for a dictionary or thesaurus later...

looks like the above paragraph is barely sufficient. geez, 75 words. that's only enough for 1.5 postings...shriek! now, listen in yer best whiny voice: but i don't have anything to say. (actually, i do. you know me...getting me to post is not the hard part, it's getting me to do it on a daily basis that's like pulling teeth sans anesthesia).

let's call this portion (although a bit cliché-ish) 'a blast from the past.' my friend, whom i'll call 'PS', just e-mailed me. i hadn't heard from her since last may, when she was going through some really trying times.

we went to school together...she graduated a year ahead of me. a journalism major (a phenomenal photographer too), she was the editor-in-chief of the school newspaper who just happened to track in the same spanish classes. on two occasions, we traveled to mexico, belize, guatemala, and honduras. she even hung out with me and lois for about a week in january '96, through mexico city and oaxaca.

that was a memorable trip. we had met in mexico city because she had just procured a 6-month position with 'The News,' the largest English language newspaper published in Mexico. the weather was great. i don't recall much rainy weather at all until we left Oaxaca and headed for Chiapas.

it was in Oaxaca that things got interesting. the hotel that we had originally planned to stay was full and sent us to their sister hotel...which was more expensive. hmmm.

well, instead of waiting around for them to clean a room for us, we found a huge triple at the Hotel Virreyes for less than $11/night. it was a big corner room...with a wraparound balcony (that was about the same height as the power lines, not good)...and the solitary rainstorm that we encountered in our Oaxaca visit, seeped into our room (yikes, extra towels!). still, hot water, okay beds, and basically clean - well worth the price.

the first morning of our stay, i remember finding a story in the newspaper about an american man in seattle who had requested a refund for some item with which he was not satisfied. you know, something less than five bucks. well, turns out that a glitch in that company's accounting system inadvertently sent him a check for the amount of his ZIP CODE, not the actual amount of the item. my zip code is 80224...that would make a very lucrative refund for any 'store-bought' item.

well, after receiving a refund for something like $96000, this quiet, Mitty-ish man vacated his apartment and simply disappeared. did i mention smart? that man did the right thing.

anyway, we were about to head out the door when i read them this story, setting us back a couple minutes. don't worry, this is not another maya man and his japanese earthquake prognostication story ;)

we had a little chuckle over the story and finally left the room. when we reached the dimly lit stairway, there was a man who greeted us, upon hearing us speak english. he asked us where we were from. PS said she was from Boulder originally and lois and i said, "Denver."

and we didn't make it but a few stairs when the man, whose facial features i couldn't see, said, "Spencer?" my god, it was John Schoenwalter! he's a photographer friend of my brother, Steve. i hadn't seen him in a couple years. in fact, prior to seeing him in the Hotel Virreyes in Oaxaca (City), the last time was in Cancún. lois and i were going out for a bite to eat, waiting to cross the street, when John ambled past us. turns out that he had just arrived in town and was looking for a cheap place to crash. crazy thing is, the two times we saw each other in Mexico, neither of us had any knowledge of trip plans. we had no idea that john was gonna be there, nor did he of us. what are the odds of seeing someone you never see at home, in a place 2000 miles away, two years apart? fate or coincidence? and what about the refund story? had i not read it, we would have left a minute or two earlier, probably missing the encounter with John.

back to PS...in the past eight years, i think i've only seen her once, when she was pregnant with her first child. since then, she has added a daughter.

so it looks like she has resurfaced and is finally ready to continue that May conversation...i'm glad. moreover, i'm sure itching to see her kids in person ;)

thanks for emailing me, PS, it made my week!

well, did i fulfill the fifty word minimum? anyone crazy enough to count the words (manually)?