il trovatore

This morning began the great tear-down build-up on Avenida San Blas. Jaime and five of his crew arrived at 8 AM ready to chip-chip-chip away at the tiles on the 3rd floor. They went up and down the stairs, each carrying one very heavy box of tiles (the cheapest thing in Mexico is labor, next to oranges, flowers and taxis) or an even heavier bag of Pegapiso, the glue that holds the tiles down. Then began the Anvil Chorus, as they started scoring the old tiles with chisels and hammers.



After the 10 AM breakfast break the number of workers swelled to 8. With their noise, combined with the clang and bang from the repairs on the malecon just a block in front of us we are getting a stereo serenade.

We are not taking up the old tiles upstairs to preserve the integrity of the floor beneath which acts as roof to the kitchen and bedrooms. They laid out their grid and level lines with string. Then they began to lay the new tiles.


While we were eating lunch out on the terrazzo here, I thought I detected smashing noises that were NOT coming from the 3rd floor. So I walked over to see if indeed some of them had moved on to the kitchen and bathroom. Indeed they had. By the time they left for the 2 PM comida break, they had made great progress in destroying every thing in their path. Looks great. One of the things I am having done is the conversion of a small seating area in the kitchen into a counter-top and shelf. We never used it for a table/banquette but would use it as storage and food prep/service, esp. for all the fabulous parties we will now host. (Don 't hold your breath.) The only regret I have is that I will lose that wonderful fabric; I have no place else to use those tailor-made cushions.


My friend Marie came over a few days ago, did a quick sketch of what I wanted, which I then handed to Jaime. He gave it a look, asked a couple of questions, smiled and said ok, and here's the beginning of it.

The side walls on either end will be solid and tiled; the shelf and top will also be tiled. There will be an electric outlet put in on the wall top left, horizontally, to accommodate things like blender or whatever else I may need. This will be a great addition to the kitchen and will finally put to good use a dead spot.

The kitchen and bath demo should be completed by 6 PM tonight, quitting time. I'll take more photos then. Meanwhile, I have been informed by the store in Colima where I ordered 4 sq. meters of tile for the kitchen that they will no be in the shop until late next week, despite a promise they would be here 2 weeks ago. But the guys have plenty of other things to keep them busy, including taking up all the floor tiles everywhere except in the kitchen. The walls have to be done first.

Tonight we are going to Dago's for dinner with Fernando and Chuy, Shelia and Marie. Shrimp mojo de ajo I hope.