Up just before 04.00 hours yesterday morning and on the veranda with my coffee and iPad within minutes of this (well it doesn’t take too long to make instant coffee – really good coffee is sadly wasted on me).
Straight to The Times on-line to read the pre match articles about England’s all important World Cup qualification Group H game versus Poland later in the day. The consensus of opinion was that we should win it but would it be a nail biter?
I then spent a bit of time looking at forward predictions for exchange rates for sterling versus the US dollar. When you live in a foreign country and your assets are in a different country the exchange rate you achieve can have an important bearing on your standard of living. We don’t have to exchange any sterling just yet awhile but if the market moves favourably then it makes sense to convert sterling to US dollars. The rate has improved lately but I have a gut feeling that it may improve a bit more so I am going to hold fast just a little bit longer. Time will tell , of course, if my instincts proved to be correct.
With this decision taken I turned my attention to creating (sounds very artistic, or should it be pretentious, doesn’t it ) yesterday’s edition of the blog. This took me an unusually long time ( around ninety minutes – if you read it I know that this will be hard to believe but it’s true …) to complete and I didn’t finish it until just before 06.30 hours. I think I allowed myself to be distracted too easily by people walking the beach. People watching can be fun (I suppose there is a bit of voyeurism in all of us) but sometimes -if you allow it (and I did) – it can be all consuming.
With the blog published I showered, shaved, got dressed and made myself some breakfast and not long after I had finished it Rose had joined me ‘in the land of the living’ so that we could resume and complete our selection of the items that we are going to purchase in and ship from Miami for our build in Ambergris Caye, Belize.
This took us around ninety minutes but it was time well spent. We now have to type up the list so that we can send it to our Customs Broker for submission to the Belize Tourism Board so that we can import under the auspices of the Qualified Retirement Programme and have duties and taxes waived. Having already checked with Roshel Godfrey of the Belize Tourism Board we will also place our orders in anticipation of the purchases being approved.
We completed our ‘shopping’ expedition’ and then focused on packing but in what seemed no time at all the time had come to set off for Pedro’s Hotel for the lunch that Pedro (aka Peter Lawrence) had organised as a pre-cursor to the England game.
There were nine of us for lunch and four of us were English but those that aren’t wanted England to win (well at least they said they did). And they did but it was a nail biting affair. We (well four of us at least) were on tenterhooks until with two minutes of the game remaining Steve Gerrard broke forward and scored the second , and clinching, goal. England is going to Brazil next year!
Feeling very elated Rose and I made our thanks to Peter for another great lunch (would it have been as good though if England hadn’t won?) and said our goodbyes to everyone and set off to visit our build in Ambergris Caye, Belize and got there shortly after 15.15 hours.
As we approached the house we could see that Victor (the welder) and his son Michael had not only finished welding the remaining railings and balustrades but had also sprayed and bolted them in place.
View looking west.
View looking north-east.
View looking south.
With the railings in place Angel was busily applying a ‘touch up’ coat of emulsion to cover up the scuff and dirt marks on the exterior walls of the self-contained apartment.
Walls starting to gleam.
In the apartment we found Moses , happily recovered from his fever, fitting the handles for the cupboard doors and drawers.
Up the stairs to the First Floor and in to the Utility Room where I found that I had been wrong. When I had seen slatted shelving on the previous visit I had assumed that they were for my walk-in closet.
Well, I was wrong because Moses had fitted them in the Utility Room. Just where they were intended for!
Around in the living room area we found Alfredo lying down on the job. He was varnishing the underneath of the treads of the stairs!
Where else would you get paid for lying down on the job!
Alfredo had already varnished the tops of the treads so we couldn’t go up to the Second Floor. And nor could Moses to actually fit the shelving for my walk-in closet!
Before leaving our build in Ambergris Caye, Belize we (well Rose actually because she ‘takes no prisoners’) spent a bit of time with Victor (the welder) negotiating a price for three stainless steel hatch covers to replace the concrete ones currently on the septic tank.
With the successful (well we think it was) negotiation completed we took one last look at our house
and set off for ‘home’ having enjoyed another day in paradise.
The headline for today’s edition is based on the single released in 1989 by Phil Collins which reached number one in the US Billboard Hot 100 and number two in the UK Singles Chart.
Belize- building a new life . A Belize blog. 
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