The BOOKMARK in Dolega

Just can’t be interested in promoting, promting, promoting, and want to spend my time in the store, and enjoy my brand new patio out back. If you need information about the Book Mark, drop me an email…thanks to everyone for your support Hal De Mun

So much has happened.  In Panama, we have a new president, and the PRD has been put out to pasture again.  Gateful for small favors.

I have finally acquired the lease on building next door, so am busy renovating and expanding…yeah, yeah, I know, and at my advanced age, I shouldn’t even be thinking about such things.  It is going to be terrific when finished, but that all depends on money descending on me.  I wish I was  a stressed- out bank.

Cody the magnificent Rottweiler is struggling along, but he has serious problems with hind legs, and falls and trips.  Got him on some new meds and Dr. Evers is shipping me more.  Meantime I am corresponding with others on Rottweiler.net.

Surprise…Michael and Alexander both showed up this morning at 7:30…it is truly the millenium….to work

It has been six weeks and I really should update my angry post , along with an apology and a health report on Cody, the Magnificent Rottweiler.

After our unpleasant encounter back in February, Dr, Whatsit, whose name is really Dan Evers, came by the store and offered to look at and treat poor old Cody, who was looking worse and worse.   Along with his wife, Dan was obviously a dog lover, and gave Cody a thorough exam and blood tests, which verified my worst fears.  The David vet who had treated the dog for parasites, had overdosed him on Doxicycline, and my old pal had kidney failure and anaemia.  I was shattered and even ugly Americans come close to tears when their ten year old canine companion is given a probable death sentence.

BUT I had underestimated the new vet, and he proposed a low-protein diet,  gave Cody a couple of shots along with a daily dose  of mild penicillin deriviative, plus…oh my…ear drops for a fungal infection, arthritis pills and lots of encouragement.

I spent the next two days googling dog diets for kidney failure (I couldn’t afford the canned K/D diet) and apparently have come up with a winner, even adding a tad of calcium carbonate to ease his kidneys.  The dog, bless him, has come back to life, like there is no tomorrow.  He is ravenously hungry, eats three meals a day, has gained more than 20 pounds, always ready for a walk or playing ball, or whatever…he thinks he’s five years old again.  I have trouble keeping up with him, and am thinking of perhaps making his diet up for the two of us.

So, though I am inclined to agree with those who call me curmudgeon (Cindy calls me Mudge, for short, which if far more pleasant than Cur, I must say), my Ugly American experience has had a -thus far- very happy ending.  Those of you who have vet concerns, be sure to check out Dr. Dan, who is planning to move here permanently, though he is here only periodically at the present.  So ends another diatribe in peace and happiness.

By an American yet, one who has a real anger management problem…let me tell you a true story of life in Chiriqui.

It was a frantic, but exciting morning…Cody was going to see the new American Vet, who apparently appears periodically in Boquete (afterthought, for R and R apparently). We prepared carefully, taking his vitamins, Brewers Yeast, eye drops, shampoo to learn how we can prevent constant shedding, along with his weight loss problem, as well as pick up a distemper shot. Arsenio, my taxi man, arrived on time, and we set off to do the usual Monday errands in Boquete, plus trying to time our arrival to be prompt. My memories of vets back in the States (in the 70s and 80s,) always involved being on time, but of course, I didn’t take into account the personal idiosyncracies of Doctor Whatsis, who obviously uses his trips to Panama to relieve stress…well, we raced through all the odd jobs, plus delivered new books to Romero, sent a MoneyGram to bookseller in Costa Rica, and picked up six boxes of books from Miami at Mail Boxes, etc. Needless to say, we were rushed and exhausted when we arrived at the Palo Alto rental pad of the vet.

Only to find another couple, waiting with a pair of Shepherds. I approached them with “Are you waiting too?” And they answered in the affirmative. “I have a twelve o’clock appointment. Is the doctor in?”

“Oh yes, he’s there.”

I started to simmer. “What time is your appointment?”

Ten o’clock

But, but…I am sputtering, and rang the bell.

At this point Doctor Whatsit comes around the corner, embraces Lady Botox, and starts noodling the shepherds.

I mouthed up I have a twelve o’clock appointment, and I come here and expect that we are working by American standards here, and here’s a ten o’clock appointment still here…..

no, no, says Lady B, It’s my fault. We are late.

Now you’re behaving like Panamanians, I say.

And Doc What pops in and says, you can just get the hell out of here.

Whoa, I say, you have anger management problems.

Get out, he says, and you know what you are THE UGLY AMERICAN.

So dog, Arsenio and I beat it back to the sanctity and security of the Book Mark here in Dolega…lots of work to do, about three hundred books to unpack, sort and shelve. I chuckle…me the ugly american, and I haven’t seen the country in twenty years (back when vets kept both appointments and their courtesy

Must we wait for a multiple vehicle accident to slow down the traffic here in Dolega? This is a TOWN, for the benefit of those who don’t believe. ..a pueblo, a poblado, people, perros, peatones, pollos, for Pete’s Sake. Add to this the infernal brakes of semi drivers who suddenly decide that 70 mph is just a tad too fast for town, and hit the brake exactly in front of the Book Mark…the roar alone would give a healthy man a coronary. Not just 65-70 mph, but passing besides, just before a bridge and an intersection. I would be happy to see transit police doing something besides collecting Morditas; perhaps slowing traffic down in the middle of a village…what is the bloody rush anyhow. The economy has slowed to a near standstill, though we pretend otherwise, and still we must rush those 70-ton loads of concrete blocks along a highway with a ten ton limit, we must get to Price Smart to buy whatever, we must get to the dentists who will keep us waiting an hour anyhow, we MUST…we must we must

To start our Obama-inspired housecleaning, we (actually Michael did it while I was in Costa Rica last week) reorganized and straightened out our paperback fiction shelves, so they are better organized with fewer duplications. And to make room for our upcoming Large Print section, we are selling all our foreign-language books (except Spanish) at Wall Street prices, all at two dollars each. These include both fiction and non-fiction, in Swedish, Norwegian, Danish, plus one in Finnish, several German, Dutch, Flemish, French and Italian. We have boxed them by language, so come in and globalize your libraries with our cosmopolitan collection.

I just have to air my opinions, which will probably get me deported some day, but my life with Banistmo has finally reached its climax. Staring tomorrow, I am going to take all my banking, as I can arrange it, to Banco General. Having talked with several people, and wqith my increased dissatisfaction with Banistmo, since it is under the aegis of HSBC, reached a breaking point when they started charging me a 25 dollar fee for my monthly direct deposit for online book sales. In addition to this, I have been trying to get another hundred dollar Cash Back from my credit card since late September. I finally got fifty dollars on November 28, but the other fifty dollars became fifty cents Friday, when I was credited thgat amount for Cash Back…I spend two to three thousand dollars a month on my credit card, but the only credit I can get is what I have deposited in my credit card account…so it entials constant depositing of funds in the bank. I am tired of writing on line emails, as I have for more than six months, on a weekly basis, and have yet to receive a single acknowledgement. The nCustomer Service girls try to push me off on the others, personnel from 15 years back, are now managers, and won’t talk to me. When my debit card was eaten by an ATM machine in San Jose last year, a direct appeal by their sister bank in San Jose was denied to forward me funds from my account. I hate impersonal banking, and in a small town, it should be personal. Banistmo tops my list of Failed Friendships of 2008. I want to thasnk those of you who read this blog, for your support and I wish all people will have their hopes and expectations met in 2009. You have made this my most successful year ever, since I opened these doors ten years ago. I am optimistic, and will continue to be so, through the coming weeks, as we wait to see what this most portentious year will bring

Money – how to get it, keep it, stash it or hide, move it make it, a whole table full of money books, many brand new,  worth up to 30 dollars…on sale for the holidays at just 4 (FOUR) dollars each…a good investment..no pyramids here.

if you had asked, I would have given you the large , young plant growing from the finest pink striped bromeliad I have ever owned. Instead, you came by in the night and uprooted the entire plant, the pride of my entrance at the bookshop. This plant, a proud replacement of one stolen two years ago, required strong nurturing, and cautious watering during the long months of the rainy season, to keep it thriving without drowning. Wherever you have taken it, I hope that it dries up or rots quickly and dies…thieves in the night deserve no better. I have few joys these days, though my faithful companion, Cody the Rottweiler, has improved to the point that I feel he will outlast me, and I am considering buying some of his geriatric dog medicine for myself…but plants have always brought me pleasure, and you have stolen from me, one of my favorites. An to whatever person that receives a beautiful double, pink and green striped bromeliad for a gift, please check its provenance. Garden thieves are a nasty lot, not at all like snippet borrowers, of which most plant lovers have been at one time or another. Bromeliad thief, I sincerely wish you ill.