the good news is that i bought a hamaca this weekend. it is perfect for sleeping, nice and cool. i now wish i had chosen different colors, i went for black and blue because the other combinations were fairly ugly, but really the color does not matter. it is so incredibly comfortable for napping. i have yet to spend an entire night in it, but that will change soon. i am going camping on the beach in afew weeks and the restaurant that is letting us sleep under their make-shift outdoor roof, has plenty of room for hamacas (hammocks if you had not guessed by now). also, it will be quite useful when the weather gets hot again. for now, things have definitely cooled off and i am very very happy about that.

not having hot water to shower with has tempered my good humor about the cooler weather, but i am adapting to the night shower because the water (it is stored on the roof tops down here in huge containers) is still slightly warm from the sun in the daytime.

i have acquired a new respect for anyone who has and who continues to wash their clothes by hand. going the cheap route, i have elected not to send my clothes out (or pimp my clothes out as i like to condescendingly say to my friends) to a washer lady. thus, i have begun the inglorious task of scrubbin the dirt out by hand. as i did not want to once again appear totally helpless (my spanish has really picked up so i can catch the gist of most things now,thus i rarely feel helpless because of my language inadequecies-i also cannot spell-), i only vaguely observed another woman who was washing her clothes in the outdoor sink-washbasin (long, with ridges in it and a drain at one end where the hose for the water is). thus the question, how do you really know your clothes are clean? i then began thinking about washing machines.

what is really going in there when you shut the top? i mean, you have the swisher thing that spins the clothes around, but what else? really, the clothes fill up with half soapy, half sweaty-dirty water and then marinate for a spell. sounds gross, no? true, there is that rinse cycle but that just sucks up whatever dirt was in the water back into the clothes even more. then that spin cycle really gets the dirt deep into the pores of the fabric. as the clothes whip around at 50kmh, i can just imagine the little dirt particles smiles stretching wide, like in the gravitron at kings dominion (or whatever the spinny ride is called at your local fair where the chamber spins around super fast and then floor drops out and you before you throw up, which is a bad description because that vomit ain´t goin nowhere but right back in your face, you think, ¨wow, cool, i am stuck to the wall¨).

so i ask you, ¨are my clothes cleaner than yours?¨ the obvious answer is of course not. why? because i do a half-ass job when i wash my own clothes. but i scrub and use soap and rinse and rinse and rinse again. then, i have a bucket with softener and water and i dip my clothes in there for that oh-so-soft feeling. still sure that my clothes are not as clean as yours?

this is my first softener experience down here. before, i did not use it because the washer at psycho´s house you had to fill with water from a hose, then there was a little plate at the bottom which aggitated the water and spun around(think the little plate in microwaves that turns) the clothes ever so slightly. then, when the cycle ended you had to dip into the visibly dirty water and rinse and rinse your clothes out before hanging them on the line. by that time, i said screw the softener. now that it is all manual, somehow i have come back to softener. donwy. love the malinchistas.

did you think i could spend this much time writing about clothes washing? sadly i could go on, but i will refrain. however, the next time you toss your clothes into the washer and-or drier, think of wilis in the third-world. then shut the top, turn the dial and forget about what goes on in the little tank when the lights go off. everything is better when you cannot see it. it is like eating in a restaurant in the states. normally the kitchen is hidden. often for good reason. the food tastes good right? then stop asking questions. nothing is behind closed doors down here. that is good but often bad. i will let you use your imagination on that one.

did you think i forgot? go hokies go!! what a crushing defeat! blanked at halftime? barely put the game to within 38 points? ok. enough gloating, we have two more games to play- assuming we beat the evil tarheels. then the title game against fsu. then, hopefully a big bowl game. gooooo, hokies go!