Friday 7/17- Wouldn’t you know it… it’s Friday afternoon and we are ready to start our weekend… while it’s never anything exciting, it’s just nice to be able to do our own thing without having to think too much about work… and Randall called Ramie to let him know that a container would be arriving and needed to be unloaded around 5pm tonight. Well, so much to an early start to the weekend! I made sure to have dinner ready early so Ramie could eat before he went, and good thing I did, because Randall called at about 4:30 telling him to come now because the truck had arrived. It didn’t take terribly long because everything was on pallets and easy to unload, so Ramie was home around 6:30 to relax for the rest of his evening.
Saturday 7/18- As I mentioned, we don’t do a whole lot on the weekends, and other than follow up emails to finish up a few tax returns for slow clients, it looked like it was going to be a lazy, relax around the house kind of day.
We hadn’t heard anything recently from our realtor regarding any potential showings or anything like that, but today we did get a message from him saying that property sales, and even just people looking at properties, are SUPER slow right now. He has even stopped taking on new listings because things just aren’t moving. Honestly, this is really no surprise this time of year, but originally he thought there would be a chance it could be busier. It’s not turning out that way, and he just wanted us to know that it’s all properties in this area in general, not just our house that isn’t seeing any action.
Sunday 7/19- Every once in a while when we don’t plan to leave home for the day we make the decision to smoke a bunch of meat for some upcoming meals.
That was going to happen today, and the menu included tuna steaks, chicken legs, and pork ribs.
Since it’s an old-fashioned charcoal smoker, not a set it and forget it electronic type, this takes skill and constant watching, so while Ramie was tending to the smoker and getting everything started, I decided to relax in the sun and catch a few rays. It was a beautiful sunny morning and this time of year that can be a rare occurrence. I wanted to take advantage of it while I could, because who knows if it will cloud over later.
The tuna only took about 30 minutes and we ate about half of it as soon as it was done as a delicious breakfast/snack this morning.
While we waited for the chicken legs to finish, I was sweating to death from sitting in the sun and jumped in the pool; Ramie made us some pineapple smoothies and joined me in the water since he could still keep an eye on the smoker that was just a few feet away.
Just before noon the temperature alarm for the chicken legs went off, and that meant no more pool time… Ramie dried off to take them out of the smoker, and since the time was right, we decided have some of these for lunch. It wasn’t planned that way, but worked out nicely. It was also time for step-2 on the ribs, so we wrapped them and threw them back on the smoker for a few more hours.
In the meantime, I decided to work on a fake Lego set of a Blackhawk helicopter that Ramie had bought for me a couple years ago. This one was all mine to build, and I made it about halfway through, before putting it away for the day. As Ramie found out with the set he built not too long ago, the fake Lego don’t come together quite as nicely as the real ones, and their build steps don’t necessarily make any sense, but it's coming along and I do think it will look pretty darn cool when it’s finished.
At about 2:00 it was time to unwrap those ribs and finish the last BBQ sauce step, but of course it started raining. That's ok, though, the smoker will keep doing its thing and we only have an hour left before they’re done. At 3pm it was finally time to take them off the smoker, and they looked fantastic! Even though it was only about 3:30 by the time Ramie had everything cleaned up and put away, we decided to eat an early dinner since they were hot, fresh, and smelled so good. There was no way we could resist holding off. Skye had been so good today, but was so curious every time Ramie tended to the smoker and she would be right next to him sniffing away, so we couldn't deny her a sample. I think she approved of them all as well.
With an early dinner finished, the rest of the evening was ahead of schedule so it gave us some extra relax time to finish off the day.
Tuesday 7/21- We are still dealing with trying to get Dusti legal again. In our last blog post we told you that Dusti didn’t pass the required inspection because they discovered that when Yamaha imported her they didn’t fill out the paperwork correctly and we ended up with the wrong license plates and wrong information in the registry. Since then, Ramie and Randall have been working with a local lawyer to get all of this straightened out. It’s not one simple process, there are several moving parts to this, first to get the registry updated, then to get the correct license plates, and probably a few other steps in between. Randall has been a great help with all of this, doing the translating with the lawyer and helping with the logistics of things that could only be done in San Isidro since he goes over there much more often than we do. We are at the point in this process now where we have been told that the old incorrect license plates have to be turned in before they can set up the order for the new ones. Randall had an appointment in San Isidro today so he asked Ramie to drop them off in the morning and he would return them today to get the next step going. One of the other things that had to be done before we could get all of these various items corrected was applying for and receiving a letter from the government engineer who had to evaluate the situation about how and why Dusit was originally registered and what the correct way to register it actually is. Ramie got that letter back today and tried to translate it, but none of it made much sense to him. He forwarded that letter to Randall who then sent it to the lawyer.
A little after 12:30 Ramie got a call from Randall… there has been another slight problem. After he dropped the plates off to turn them in, he drove over to Dekra, the inspection place, to show them the letter from the Engineer, which was another required step in this process. Apparently, the next steps were that Dekra was supposed to read this letter and then provide a second letter for the lawyer to do her part in changing the registration. Well, instead of doing that, they just handed Randall the sticker indicating that the vehicle had passed it’s inspection and the form that goes along with it. Randall asked why, since this isn’t what we understood to be the case. They told him that the letter from the Engineer fixed everything in the system and the license plates that were on Dusti were now ok. Basically, our understanding is that this letter explained that Dekra could never fail Dusti for incorrect plates in the future. She’s now “safe” from failing that part of the inspection ever again.
Even though this is great news, this is also terrible news since we didn’t have those license plates any more! Randall called Ramie to explain all of this and ask if he could drive to San Isidro tomorrow morning to ask for the plates back. You see, Randall only had power of attorney to TURN IN the plates, but he did not have the power to ASK FOR THEM BACK. WTF!? It was around 12:30pm at that point and Ramie said he’d just come over there now since Randall was there and he would be able to better explain to the people what was going on and what they were trying to do. There is no guarantee that they will give the plates back, but it was worth going to ask. I was finished working and even though I didn't really feel like going with him, I figured we could do some shopping afterwards.
We met Randall at the bank where the plates were and they went in to see what they could do. Randall begged and pleaded, but they would not return the plates.
The only answer is that we had to apply for new plates. The employee got the form out to re-order the plates and asked Ramie how it was registered, under his US passport, or Costa Rican cedula. Ramie said that it was originally registered under his passport but it expired and he had a new one. Well THAT was the wrong thing to say!! They took the paper back and said before he could take the next step to order the plates he had to get that corrected in the national registry first. This wouldn’t have been an issue if the US didn’t change your passport number every time you renew it… (it turns out that not all countries do that, the US is “special”). We were so close to not needing to hire the lawyer to do anything in the registry… We kept thinking “If only Randall would have gone to Dekra first instead of turning in the plates first, we would be completely fine”. Oh, and if all of this isn’t bad enough, the icing on the cake of all of this is that the new license plate we are applying for is the exact same number as the one sitting on their counter right there, turned in and ready to be sent for destruction. They couldn't just “reverse” the paperwork that they did and hand them back to us. Sometimes, things make absolutely no sense here, and even Randall agrees that the government does some really dumb things here. And that’s why you need a Pura Vida attitude when it comes to all things “official”.
After we left the bank we decided to go to the upholstery shop to get some more foam so I could make some more dog beds. We still have a whole bunch of canvas fabric that we might as well try to use for a good purpose. After we got the foam we stopped at Pequeno Mundo, a store that is kind of a warehouse style, like Costco, but not so much “bulk” items like that. They carry food and lots of household stuff. I wanted to get a new room divider that was smaller and easier to store than the original heavy wooden one that we bought years ago. After we had those few things we headed home and arrived just before dinner time.
Friday 7/24- Finally, Ramie’s turtle team found their first turtle of the season & 4 nests. The season is slowly starting to pick up, and the timing is pretty much as expected.
We are just over a month out from heading back to MN and the family is getting antsy to know what our plan is, when we are going to be where, etc… So, after I was finished with work we sat down and figured out the majority of the schedule and relayed all of that to the family.
Saturday 7/25- While it was a Saturday morning, and this is usually our easy, laid back morning, Graham would be coming to meet Ramie at our house this morning. Yes, that's a new name you’ve never heard before. We have never met him before either, but Ramie has heard quite a bit about him, including that he owns a house up a mountain, he is moving here full time, or at least most of the time, and he is in the market to buy an ATV. Recently we were passed his contact information from a mutual acquaintance and Ramie reached out to him to see if he’d like to come check out Dusti. We also learned that he currently doesn’t own a vehicle, and just rents one when he has been here. He’s looking to buy something since he is planning to spend much more time here, and Dusti would be a perfect side by side for him to go up and down the mountain to run his errands.
When he arrived, he had some general questions about Dusti and then wanted to sit in it and start it up. He didn't want to drive it though, which was kind of a surprise. After looking it over and listening to it, the next thing was that he wanted to talk numbers. After some negotiating back and forth they came to an agreement that was good for both him and us, and shook on it. After the business talk was done, they chatted a little bit longer about general stuff and got to know each other a little more. Now it's just a matter of making the money transfer and doing the legal paperwork. Graham is Canadian, so unfortunately it wasn’t an easy transfer between US Bank accounts, but it had to be a series of wire transfers from Canada to the US, and that would take a little bit more time and coordination.
After Graham left, Ramie came into the house and told me the news. Of course, we still had to take all of those steps like giving him our banking details and reaching out to the lawyer to find out what she needs to start the transfer. We can't officially do the transfer until we have the new license plates, and it can't be driven on the public roads until we have them either, and that will take about a week anyway, giving Graham time to send the money.
Ramie also got a message from Randall today that all of the registry paperwork for Dusti has been updated. One more step done in this long and ridiculous process!
I did nothing productive all day! This almost never happens. I mean, I did try working on the blog, but didn't feel like doing that at all, so that didn’t last long. I did finish my LEGO helicopter, though, and hung out in the pool. I need a day like this every once in a while, even though I was feeling a bit guilty by the time dinner rolled around.
Monday 7/27- Randall called Ramie to let him know that the final payment was due to the lawyer for all of the work she has been doing to get Dusti’s registration fixed. This final payment was for her to submit all of the paperwork for the license plates, and once it’s submitted she was told the new plates would arrive in up to 2 weeks, but they have been coming in about 5 days. This timeline worked out ok though, because Graham has to fly out of the country for a couple weeks and wouldn’t be here to take Dusti yet anyway.
Tuesday 7/28- Last night Ramie had a phone call with Josh and Steph about their 3 casitas that he manages. Their family is arriving this weekend to stay in one of the houses, and Josh & Steph will follow shortly after. The houses need some work done prior to their arrival, so they wanted to discuss all of this. Today Ramie gathered his tools and headed to the casitas to get started on his part of the work.
Wednesday 7/29- Ramie had a turtle walk this morning and snapped a photo of a beautiful full moon over the ocean as he arrived at the beach. Sadly no turtles or nests today.
At 8am, he had an appointment with the lawyer to sign all of the paperwork for the stuff she has done for us over the last month or so of dealing with Dusti, as well as having Graham sign the paperwork for the purchase of Dusti. It’s a little bit sad that we have to sell Dusti this early before we are ready to leave Costa Rica, but it’s probably for the best. Owning a side by side here is a “luxury” thing and the buyer would have to be a very specific type of person; one that can be difficult to find.
Down here these machines are 2-3 times the price that they are in the US, which means they are quite expensive and not a lot of people can afford them… even used ones. Dusti is probably one of the hardest items that we’ll have to sell, so having her go this early on is a good thing. We had a lot of fun rides and are going to miss going on adventures back in the mountains, but I guess if we want to do that again we can rent a 4-wheeler for the day.
After that, Ramie had to do a quick check out on Karen and Dennis’s rental casita. They were on their way back to the US for a short vacation and asked if Ramie could help out with this. Their tenant was also returning to the US and left the casita around 1pm. Ramie just had to do a walkthrough to check everything, to make sure the house was left in good condition, and to power it down since they don’t have another renter on the schedule anytime soon.
Thursday 7/30- Ramie got another call from Randall last night asking he was available to help unload a container with 13 pallets at 7:30 this morning. It only took about an hour to unload it and then he helped Randall with a few other things around the warehouse afterward. He was home by 9:30, so had plenty of day left to do whatever else he wanted to do.
He hasn’t worked on any tax work lately, but he did check his email today and saw that he had a few emails as well as some training that he had to complete, so he spent about an hour doing that and was able to knock out another return. He is still waiting for the clients to send him their documents for the other 6 returns he has assigned. This time of year it's always a fight to get them to respond. Sadly, most people will wait until the October 15th deadline is almost here and then send everything, causing Ramie to have to rush to complete them. It's frustrating but that's how it goes in this line of work. The rest of the day was very uneventful!
The Official Casa Costa Breeze end of July rainfall total was 8.82 inches
This is still a dry rain season and we are about 5” below our previous lowest Jan-July rainfall.
Pura Vida!
Comments
Post a Comment