Location services needed

I turned on my iPad location services so Google Earth could tell me where on earth I was. The good news is that I am on earth. I wasn't sure there for a day or two. I am in some remote place, one of the most backward places I have been in the past ten years or so. It's a place where you can pet a cat while shopping for umbrellas at the market, where you can get breakfast for 16 cents, and where it is possible for a sidewalk pool table to become an actual, well, pool. We've been walking through lots of puddles, because the only public transportation that runs through town is Bus No. 11 (the two strokes of the number 11 representing our own two legs, that is). From the looks we're getting, white people don't walk these streets often.

The housekeeper at the hotel insisted that sweeping up the dead cockroach in my room was not part of her duties, as a dead cockroach laying in my room for another week wouldn't hurt anything. I insisted it become part of her job, and she went over and picked up the dead bug with her bare fingers. I had in mind she sweep it up into the dustpan, but, you know, whatever.

Sometimes I wonder if Twilight Zone is secretly filming my life for a new episode.

And by "sometimes," I mean right now.

I'm mentoring some college students this week. The variety of experiences I get to encounter in my life is a good thing, but I'm missing my little white fuzz ball that is usually underfoot.