So I know I get a lot of crap because I stopped blogging.  Seriously people, I have things to do!  Okay, so I have been without cable for a month now and my eliptical machine is getting rusty...okay there's really no exuse.

So, a few interesting tidbits since last I wrote:
1.  As I mentioned, I've been without cable for nearly a month now.  One weekend I went to turn on the Food Network (as many gay men do) and alas, there was nothing but a red screen saying I should wait 30 minutes (= 2 seconds in Trinidad) and if nothing happened call them.  Right.  I promptly picked up the phone and spoke to a customer service rep.  I shouldn't be alarmed, she told me, because I was amoung the first in the country who's neighborhood was upgraded to digital cable!  Great.  So, she tells me that an appointment was set up and that someone would be out.  As I was was headed out of the country for the next week, I didn't pay it too much attention.  I could use more book time anyway.

2.  Okay, this is really still number 1 but it seemed to be turning into a runon sentence.  Anyway, I left and came back to discover that the cable company didn't turn up when they were supposed to.  Shocking.  So, the next day, they finally turned up and completed the wiring.  Our landlord's handy man (Dale) informed us that the cable company had made the necessary connection from the overhead lines to the house, but wouldn't coneect the cable until he re-wired the entire house with upgraded cable lines.  Fine.  [Insert deeeeep breath here.] 

3.  Yes, I'm still on the cable saga (see, this is an entire blog in itself!  So great!!).  So the next day, Dale begins to re-wire our house.  Furniture is moved, walls are cracked, new wire installed.  Now, this was over 10 days ago.  We are so close, only need the cable company to come back with the digital boxes and hook us up!  But, as with everything, we continue to wait.  I'll let you know when things get up and running.

4.  Finally, a new topic.  I saw a sign at our client's office recently:  "The Government of Trinidad and Tobago is not a stationary supply.  Employees should kindly walk with the appropriate supplies to perform their job funcitons.  Thank You."  Allow me to translate:  "Listen, we are too cheap to buy you pens, paper towels or trust you enough to put toilet paper in the washroom.  So bring it yourselves."

5.  Our power went out at work (again).  This time, the wire holding the power line snapped (again).  My car was parked underneath where it came down and the cable did serious damange to my hood.  The power company's reaction was: a) Send someone out to watch the cabling so that no one came to steal the copper out of the wire.  b) 1.5 hours passed before someone came to examine my car (it was raining, of course).  c) I now have to personally appear to have the estimate approved and then d) They MIGHT pay to fix it.  In 2010 I'm sure.

6.  This year's 2007/2008 fiscal year budget presented by the PNM party (the party in power) was deemed a "Love Fest" by the daily newspapers.  Apparently the country is so rich that everyone got a piece of the pie in the budget (it seems so).  I find this hysterical.  They estimate that T&T has 12 years of oil/natural gas resources left.  Perhaps that budget will be the "We're Screwed" budget.

7.  We (our parnters, actually) continue to get complaints about the working conditions of the project office here, siting electrical concerns (gee, I wonder why) and cramped working space.  Perhaps they would rather work in their own offices, which have paper piled to the ceilings and, as in the case of one office we visited, 1 inch of standing water on the washroom floor.

That's it for tonight.  Perhaps if my cable stays out, I'll have time to blog some more.