Last Monday, I went through the first real ordeal that was more than just a little bit annoying. Welcome to Mexico. I knew it would come one day but it still took more than 10 months to finally fall on my doorstep, or whatever you want to call it: the little Mexican annoyances...
So here we go:

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Desperado en Playa del Carmen

never that glamorous though 😆

Monday my daughter and youngest son went into town to drop my daughter at the bus because she was going to see a friend. My eldest son was staying home since we weren't going to be gone very long, and it would give him the chance to just be on the PC without complaints...

After we walked to the shop to get some money from the ATM, we waited for the bus and saw my daughter off.
My son and I decided to walk further into Centro as we both had to pay a visit to the bathroom.
After the pitstop, we got a few necessities from the shop and I decided it would be nice to get a reasonably priced meal near a shop where I love to go to. I'd never been there before and even though finances aren't at their height for me at the moment, I thought we deserved a treat.

The restaurant where we went has some amazing fruit juices and quite a few good vegetarian and vegan options for dinner. We took our time with the food, as I wasn't worried about my son, who'd be entertaining himself gaming.
Well, I was wrong.

When we came home, around 3-3.5 hours later, the first thing I noticed was darkness in our house..
Oh Oh...
I opened the door, and my son immediately informed me that the electricity had shut off...about 15 minutes after we left!
Luckily it doesn't go dark until 7.30 pm here, so at least he didn't spend hours in the dark, with no means of contacting me.

source: tenor
Yeah, at least I saved a few pennies on the bill haha.

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I checked all the breakers in the house, and outside.
The main one inside the house was down but nothing happened when I turned it back up.
The breakers outside were fine.

I decided to ask the security guard if he knew anything. Maybe there was a power outage in the area. But no, it was just us...

I'm trying to practice as much Spanish with anyone who's willing these days but explaining this kind of stuff is beyond my knowledge. So google translate it was.

First he asks me if I checked the breakers...
Yah, that's usually one of the first things I do. Duh...
I'm not a complete idiot.

He walks over to the breakers outside, looks and tells me:
"They're up."

Uhuh...Just like I said. But yeah, single mother...must be stupid, has to be mansplained...

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So then the guy asks me how much I paid on the bill.
For a moment I was a bit confused but then it started to dawn on me.
I told him that the landlord pays the bills and then I pay to him...He gave me a smile. Not the kind of smile you want to see though. Now, I have to add, that out of all the security guards we have here, he's the most indifferent one. He's friendly but that's really all you'll get off him.
Nada mas.

He tells me that he'll check the bills, and pulls a big stack of bills from his desk...
It didn't take him long to find ours.
'Did you pay?'
Nope. I didn't. I've never even seen the bill so how on earth can I pay for something I don't even know is there?
So I ask him how long the bill had been there, as we pay the electricity bill every two months.
He shrugs and says: "Una mesa."

WTF?!? One month?

Breathe IN, Breathe OUT!

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So I ask him why we never got the bill.
He shrugs again and says: 'No se' Don't know...

WTF?!?

Yeah, in order to pay a bill, one has to receive the bill.
That's how these things work...In my book.
Apparently not in his. I wasn't blaming him because there are like 10 different guards there. But he isn't completely innocent either because he knew right away what to tell me. With a smile. A smile that says: "Look at you, now you have no electricity. Haha."

He then tells me I can pay it at the shop and it will be on the next day...Pfff...
I tell him that I just started a new job, and work nights, and having no electricity is a disaster right now.
Again that smile. He really couldn't care less.
FUCK!

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So then I decided I'd just have to work with my phone data, and hope it would last...
And as soon as the battery on my laptop would go, I'd move to the pool to work.
I informed him of that and he just nodded. Couldn't care less. Really.
Luckily we have that pool and electricity sockets...

Meanwhile I had gotten in touch with the landlord and realtor. The realtor ensured me he'd go pay the bill the next morning right away. And while he was at it, he'd pay the water bill too...(which was also due for more than 2 weeks...sigh).

Meanwhile, I didn't go to sleep when I should so by the time all of that was said and done, I would only get in 2 hours of sleep. Nice...So not only would I be working in complete darkness but also dead tired. UGH.

So yeah, that's what I did.
I managed to get almost 2 hours in before my laptop's battery said bye bye.
I then moved to the pool.
Trust me. It sounds more glamorous than it actually was.
I was constantly listening to jungle sounds, and looking around me if there wasn't a big tarantula or scorpion about to crawl over my feet...Or snakes slithering their way into my bag. Something crazy like that. After seeing two roadkill Fer-de-lance snakes on the road close to us, you just can never be too careful.
Look them up.
They're mean mofos.

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This huge ass bat kept flying right over my head.
I must have had lots of bugs surrounding me. Cute but distracting.

Not only that but it was also the very first cool night since we'd moved into this house. So being underdressed as I was, I was freezing my butt off.
I had to stick it out because I was too lazy to pick everything back up and walk into the house to dress better, and leaving the laptop at the pool...nah. Let's not do that.

I worked until the battery was full and moved back indoors. Into the darkness...

I've never been so damn glad for my workday to end. Pfff. I survived jungle-pool work HAH!