Nicaragua Adeventure

I needed a little time to get my thoughts together for this post...and let’s face it...all-inclusive resorts are not exactly conducive to writing due to all of the top shelf liquor...but I digress.

We signed up the day before our trip in the hotel with Swiss Travel Services. The trip was advertised as an all day 12 hour trip to Nicaragua with stops in the town of Granada, a boat trip on Lake Nicaragua and a trip to the Masaya volcano. It sounded amazing so we signed up.

The bus met us at our hotel at 5:30am sharp...sadly before the cappuccino bar opened. :( But we were the first ones on the bus which meant we could pick the best seats. Trust me when I tell you that the cool kids on the Nicaragua trip sit in the front of the bus, not the back. I know all of you have been told repeatedly that the back of the bus rules, but when you are on an all-day journey, on twisty, windy roads it is way better in the front. And there was a bathroom at the back of the bus which we were advised that we “could only go #1”. Even so, you can imagine the smells and nobody needs to sit by the bathroom on a windy road with the smell of urine enveloping you. #justsayin

Our guide was awesome. He told us that his name was Dennis, but only because it was the only name tag he could find that morning, so that would be his name for the day. I already liked this guy.

Dennis was very knowledgeable about all things Costa Rica and was telling us all about what we were driving past as we made our way to the Nicaraguan border.  One of my favorite stories was about iguanas. Apparently, iguanas used to be called “the chicken of the trees” because Costa RIcans used to eat them. Iguanas are not a popular menu item anymore unless you really search for them. Luckily we did not have to partake.

We arrived at the Costa Rican/Nicaraguan border and let me tell you...it was a little like traveling in China during Chinese New Year...well...maybe not that bad. But all my years living in and visiting China prepared me for this moment and this type of border crossing. Dennis urged us to vamanos off the bus so of course Sam and I vamanosed as we saw how long the line was. We first had to leave Costa Rica, then get back on the bus and enter Nicaragua. The suckers who sat in the back of the bus took their sweet time and ended up at the end of the line #smh.

After about 1.5 hours, we were next in line to get our coveted stamps. Then, of course a local lady, seeing me as the weakest link and that there was a gap in the line tape, broke in front of me. Usually I am ready with my elbows, but she caught me off guard and I was not fast enough. Next time, I’ll be ready! #elbowsout

Sam moved the line barrier tape so that no one else could break in line again and the whole line got a good chuckle. #ohthosecrazyamericans

So once all of the slowpokes were back on the bus, we drove to the Nicaraguan border. This time Dennis took all of our passports into the border patrol office and we stayed on the bus and/or shopped at the little booths outside of the border patrol office. I offered to “help” him (make sure no one stole our passports), but he said it would be better if we stayed on the bus or went shopping. I told him to remember that our lives were in his hands.

Sam and I got off the bus and bought some coconut candy and other weird candy. I’m still not sure what it was but it would tide us over until lunchtime.

Finally Dennis came back with a border agent who handed us back our passports. I was amazed at how laid back the border crossing was.

Before we left the border, we picked up our Nicaraguan guide. His name was Elvis (uh-uh-huh) and he was full of himself. He talked kind of like the old televangelists and always wanted to get some kind of crowd response from us. I felt a little bit like we were in church on a bus...not in a good way. It was a tad annoying but entertaining none the less. I missed Dennis, but he was riding up front with the driver...I guess he needed a break from talking. So we listened to Elvis tell jokes and quiz us.

We drove for yet another hour or so and passed several volcanoes finally ending up the the historical town of Granada. I had no idea that there were so many volcanoes in Nicaragua or Costa Rica for that matter.

We ate lunch at this little boutique hotel and then walked around Granada for a while looking at the the old churches and architecture. We have had a lot of experience in the past with beggars and have seen folks that are truly hungry. There were 2 boys, probably around 15 that were totally trying to scam the group. One of them stuck his head in the window while we were eating and rubbed his belly...mind you, he looked very well-fed.

Then when we left the restaurant to walk around the kids were on us like white on rice. I thought Sam was going to fight them as they kept trying to grab our hands, my purse, and put their hands in our pockets. I smacked one their hands and my elbows were at the ready, but luckily I did not have to use them. The best thing to do in this situation is to tell them firmly to go away, which we did. Another guy in our group thought he would be a good Samaritan and give one of them some money...of course then he was swarmed by a group of them. Luckily he got away although I hope he still had his wallet.

Granada was a beautiful city! You can still see the smoke stains on some of the building from where William Walker burned it down in the 1800’s. I have a pretty awesome coffee-radar, and Sam and I found a yummy coffee spot and I had a mocha chai latte. I know it sounds weird, but seriously...Starbucks you need to put this on your menu...yummo!

#becausegilmoregirls

that lady totally photo bombed my shot. I was trying to get those massive doors!

So then we loaded up on the bus and drove to Lake Nicaragua; the largest lake in the region. Apparently there are sharks in this lake near the river that feeds from the ocean to the lake. Luckily we did not see these sharks.

Notice how my vest is totally fastened, while my hubby likes to live on the edge

Yes, that's a volcano

Lake Nicaragua is huge and has 365 small islands (some of them for sale). Our boat driver’s name was Guillermo and he lives on one of those islands with his family. In fact, we rode by his island and saw these cute kids waving at us...not really...they were waving at their dad.

Guillermo showing us a crazy flower

There was an island with a howler monkey on it. I’m not exactly sure how the howler monkey got on the island as I don’t think they swim, but apparently she never leaves the island and depends on the kindness of tourists to feed her...so of course we did.

There were all kinds of animals on these little islands. There was one goat I took a video of because he kept crying and pacing like he was begging us to get him off of the island. So sad.

After the boat trip, we high tailed it to the Masaya Volcano as the park was about the be closed for the evening. By some divine intervention (according to Elvis), we were able to get into the park and able to hang out around the volcano much longer than they usually allow you to. Masaya is an active volcano and because it had just rained and the sun was setting, we had a great view of this massive volcano. We could see the red hot lava gurgling in the depths. Elvis asked for a sacrifice volunteer, but sadly none of us were eligible so the volcano gods will rage another day.

Check out the video Dennis took with my phone through binoculars....mainly because I am a big chicken and did not want to fall into the volcano.

What an amazing day! We ended up in a little village to see a crater lake, which we couldn't see because it was dark #fail. We then said goodbye to Elvis and loaded up to go back across the border into Costa Rica. Another longish border crossing mainly because the border guards were moving slow as molasses, but they were probably just tired like we all were.

Then we had to drop off several groups at two different resort locations...oi. The trip in total was about 18 hours...such a long day! But it was totally worth it even though we were tired and all of the restaurants were closed when we got back to the resort. Thank heavens for room service! (#allinclusivesrock).

So this was my long-winded way of saying that if you have a chance to do a day trip to Nicaragua from Costa Rica, DO IT! But just know that you are in for a super long and tiring day.

Prosthetic Hands in VB!!!!!

Check out this article about a local guy making prosthetic hands with his 3-D printer....AWESOME!
http://wtkr.com/2016/08/21/virginia-beach-man-changing-lives-from-his-own-home/

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MWF&M looking for Couple Friends

Have you noticed that the older you get, the harder it is to make good friends? I'm not talking about acquaintances...I'm talking about in your life, spontaneously showing up at your door, calling at the last minute for brunch friends.

Since moving to VB we have made friends, but VB is a very transient area. Being a military town, people move a lot. We moved here for my hubby's grad school and that is another transient population. Most of the friends we met during grad school have now moved on to other places.  But we ended up back here even after we tried moving away :)

I read a book about a year ago called MWF seeking BFF: My Yearlong Search for a New Best Friend by Rachel Bertsche. I highly recommend it as it is an entertaining read. The author goes on one friend date per week for an entire year and blogged about it as well as wrote a book . I recently started thinking about this book again and have been considering using some of her methods to make new friends. Basically she writes what she calls an"online essay" and shares this essay with all of her family, friends, etc asking them to help her connect with new friends.

I am very introverted and while I am friendly, I don't think I am the best friend-maker. So the thought of putting myself out there is really scary because of the possible rejection. It's like middle school all over again LOL

As we have gotten older, friends have moved away, or had kids and understandably have less time to hang out. So I feel like we need to expand our friend circle and make some new friends to hang out with.

So I decided to start researching...yes, I am a nerd. :) I found a website called Kupple.com. I was a little nervous about it at first because I was afraid it would be a swinger site...but thankfully , it was not! I set up a profile and viewed other profiles of couples in the area who were looking for friends as well. I need to draft a message to send to a few couples to see if anyone is interested in having a friend date. But I am nervous about that too! :)

There is another site www.dinklife.com that I signed up for...only to find out that my city is not one of the cities on the site. But the site is currently in Beta so maybe they will add the VB area? Fingers crossed.

Back to the book...so that author talks about how important social networking was in her search for her new BFF. She was introduced to friends of friends, acquaintances, a girl in her yoga class, she joined a book club, volunteered, and even tried rentafriend.com...yes there is a site called rentafriend.com! She was really all-in for a year of friend dating. This idea intrigues me and terrifies me that the same time.

 So I really need to get on this "online essay" thing. I think it should go something like this:

Married couple looking for another married couple to hang out with for last minute brunches, movie watching, traveling to fun places, dinners out or in, and generally good conversation. No, we do not have major issues and are not losers...we just find that as we get older, friends move away or it's harder to maintain friendships due to growing families. :)
While we feel too old to stay out until 4am drinking and dancing, we do like to have fun and aren't ready to go to bed at 8pm. (We still like drinking and dancing.) Our ideal friends must love dogs, beach life, and coffee :)
We are NOT swingers so don't go there...ew! Just looking for friendship and people to share life with.
If interested... yada yada yada

I'm trying to figure out if this is just too weird...or if I just need to get over myself and put us out there. LOL

I'll keep you posted :)

I need your help!

Hi everyone,

It's been a while since a Hanna update. Unfortunately, there hasn't been much to tell. She has been sitting in the corner collecting dust. I could not get Touch Bionics, or my insurance company to help me out. So I have been keeping my thoughts to myself :)

But yesterday I had what I think is a GREAT idea!  I have been seeing many articles in the paper, online, etc about prosthetic hands and myoelectric devices. So I thought..."what if I write these people about my situation?" They obviously have an interest in the topic and maybe they know someone they could connect me with to help me get the hand I've always wanted.

Technology is changing so fast! They have started making hands that have the sense of touch!  That is so amazing!!!!!

So today I wrote 2 different people: one was a writer of an article in the Baltimore Sun about prosthetics and 3D printers, and the other was a Biomedical Engineer at Case Western Reserve University who has been involved in a study where they implant electrodes under your skin and attach it to an artificial hand.
Here is the study: https://bme.case.edu/Tyler/Research


So here's my shameless plug for help: if any of you happen to see any articles of interest, would you send them my way?
I would be forever grateful! :)
Love y'all!

Long overdue...

7/1/14
Happy Mericuh week everyone!

I have had several people ask me for a Hanna update.  To be honest, I have been reluctant to write anything due to frustration and the desire to stay positive. But here it goes...Caution: I will need some cheese with my whine...

After continuing to go back and forth with the company and my prosthetist, they still do not have a good solution for me and Hanna. My prosthetist has offered to try and make me a cover for Hanna, but Touch Bionics is not going to do anything for me. I am really frustrated with them because it seems like they are shooting themselves in the foot by not supporting their prosthetic users.

Remember their website I posted stating that I was "required" to have a cover? Yeah, well they quickly took that down once they heard from me. Haha

And they have decided to no longer make the clear finger covers and are only going to make the black finger covers. So I will have a bi-racial hand once I wear out my clear covers. Awesome.

So basically I can keep trying to wear Hanna and keep scratching everything and everyone or I can use her as a very expensive paperweight.

I am pretty discouraged because I thought was getting a tool that would look more skin-like and that would be helpful in everyday activities. But I am scared to use her as I keep scratching stuff.

I am still working with my prosthetist to try and find a good solution but he thinks that if he makes a cover it will look "grotesque". Has he seen my little hand? Haha

I just really want to look normal, but I am starting to realize that maybe that will never happen; that maybe how I look is my "normal".

I am really blessed in what I CAN do. I have been able to learn to play guitar, piano, dance, type, etc. I realize that there are folks that aren't able to do those things and that I am very lucky to be able to function like I do. 

So just wanted to keep you guys updated. Thanks for your prayers and support! I will keep working to make Hanna work for me.

Hope you all have a happy 4th! Don't set your house on fire with fireworks :)

Awkward Handshake

This is hilarious to me because it is my life...everytime I have a job interview or meet someone new.

Little tip: Go for the left handed shake...it's much less awkward than the chest bump :)

EndtheAwkward