Day 45

Anticipation & Consternation.

Fabio got fired.  There is really no way to soften the blow, or to beat around the bush--Fabio got canned.  And for what?  For the very thing that originally endeared me to the guy: verbally abusing the receptionist who is universally known to be a terrible person.  What Fabio failed to consider--or perhaps considered, but then neglected in favor of his duty to state the oft thought but ne'er spoken truth about this woman--was the power she held.  And in the long run, I'd have to say that this was a landslide decision for the receptionist, if not a straight up KO.  Sure, he landed a few good punches ("You're a terrible person!...  Not even talking about work--you, as a person, are AWFUL!!").  But he got the boot.  In slightly distasteful memorial of Fabio, here is a quick picture of what he did not look like:

So now I am a self-taught Spanish student, and I think actually prefer it?  Fabio was a great guy, and he had a huge advantage as a teacher, compared to me homeschooling myself, which is that he speaks fluent Spanish.  Luckily I work with some 500 Spanish teachers.  HR is trying to find a bona fide replacement for Fabio, but there's really no time frame for the search, so I'm not holding my breath.

On the sports front, we lost our first game to kick off the official Siemens league.  So tragic.  The team we played against wasn't great, and two of our best guys got hurt... seems like our next few games will only be harder.  Being engineers though, we took some time to talk X's and O's after our loss, and I think we have things pretty well sorted out.  Wednesday night, 7pm, at Las Canchas Hernandez.  It's going to be epic.  Unrelated, here's a funny picture:

That's pretty much it for the consternation portion of this blog (ugh, except that I totally just lost track of time and forgot about the tortilla on the stove...).  Apart from all that, there are actually a few opportunities that I'm real excited about:

1. for our Siemens team to redeem ourselves this Wednesday night,
2. for the Queretaro Gallos Blancos to redeem themselves this Saturday (the Gators as well),
3. to hang out with the small crowd of Peace Corps volunteers here in Queretaro (some very cool kids),
4. and to celebrate Mexico's 200th anniversary of independence from Spain, in the city where the whole thing began.

No lie: the story of Mexican Independence totally begins in Queretaro.  Obviously I'm not going to recount it all right now--you can read up on it on Wikipedia, just as I did, if you really want the cold, hard facts...  But assuming Wikipedia is halfway right (confirmed by my unbiased Mexican friends here in Queretaro), that really only makes my placement here in Mexico that much sweeter.  I honestly can't say enough about how lucky and blessed I feel to be here.  The short story is that I'm being paid to live abroad for six months, in a sweet house that almost rivals the one I left in Orlando (ALMOST), in a city that is bigger and safer than the one I just left, where said city also happens to be the epicenter for Mexican Independence, the 200th anniversary of which will be celebrated next week.  (Cinco de Mayo is totally not Mexican independence day; it's September 16.  Cinco de Mayo was probably actually more significant to American history than Mexico's, if Wikipedia informs me correctly.)  Oh yeah, did I mention that I'm just plain happy to have a job right now, period, let alone this one?  All that to say, things are going well.  Don't worry, mom: still no sign of cartels or scorpions.