Top
Cart

Urban Eclectic Jewelry

Handmade Jewelry For The Bohemian Soul

Truth In Advertising

-

Wandering through San Jose yesterday I saw (not for the first time) a sign in a store window advertising that they were looking for an employee.  The sign read “Wanted, young attractive female.”  I giggled to myself because in the U.S. (and elsewhere I assume) when placing an ad for personnel, there are strict guidelines of what you can advertise for.  Advertising for a “young, attractive female” would quickly get you reported to some sort of labor board and you’d be subsequently fined and probably forced to hire an “old, unattractive male”.

But when you think about it, in theory, it’s a bit ridiculous.  If a business wants a young attractive female employee, regardless of the law, that’s what they’re going to hire.  Sure they may accept applications from everyone and conduct some interviews, but in the end the young hottie is the one that’s going to get the job.

Sure, there should be laws to protect potential employees from any sort of discrimination, but I have to say, I can kinda’ appreciate the what-you-see-is-what-you get mentality here.

It’s The Simple Things That Are Easy Forget

-

I normally open the shop around 10:30 (ish), however, this week I’ve been arriving between 6:30-7:00 a.m. to keep an eye on the construction project above my shop.  Let’s just say that after years of having to clock in at work at 8:30 a.m. – I am not a fan of early starting workdays.  I wake up early, I just don’t want to be working early.

So this week, when I got here, I brewed some coffee, took it down onto the (nearly empty) beach and watched the ocean.

Morning Coffee

This week an amazing swell hit Tamarindo, so every morning I’ve sat there and watched the sets roll in.  Normally, the ocean right in front my shop is pretty calm, the boats are docked there because it’s the calmest part of the bay that has four break points (translation for you non-surfers — means where the waves are!)  Unless, like this week, there’s a swell, then as we say “Bambora is pumping.”

It’s awesome to see this wall of swishing whitewater barreling toward the shore, forming into shape, growing in size and ultimately crashing against the sand.  This fascinates me because the swell has traveled thousands and thousands of miles across the ocean while maintaining (and sometimes gaining) strength.  Ok, that part I can sort of wrap my mind around, but why sets?  If the power is there to push these currents across the ocean, why does it only come in waves of 3-5 at a time? Why not just continuous wave after wave? I’m sure there’s a scientific explanation to it that I could Google and understand fully in the next 60 seconds, but a part of me doesn’t really want to know – I like the awe that I feel about it all.

So needless to say, the noise, the mess, the frustration about upstairs — well it is what it is.  But I’ve really enjoyed the time on the beach in the morning.  Something that I realized I should do more than I do.  This week inadvertently gave me some quiet time alone — just to hear myself think — and I can’t believe how long it’s been since I’ve done that.  I’m glad this has happened because I realized there were things brewing in my head that I needed to clear out before embarking on this next season.  Things that were lingering and creating mental cobwebs.  Actually paying attention to how I was feeling about those things and then being able to resolve them inside myself – it’s been good.

 

Stay Positive — Take II

-

The day before yesterday in the morning I wrote a post about the happenings with the construction above my shop.  This is how the shop looked as of that post.  I wasn’t super happy about what was happening upstairs, but I was really trying to put on my big-girl pants and deal with it.  At least my bougainvillea tree was masking most of the production above.

 

Then around 11 a.m. – this happened.

Rewind a few days.  The bougainvillea was trellised and secured to some posts that were in the space above me.  I saw them remove large portions of that and re-attach the tree to the side wall panel which was like paper from all the termites.  I pointed out to the workers that this was not going hold, we had to re-secure it elsewhere, which we did.  Well, apparently they decided once again to reattach it to that “paper” wall panel, which as I predicted, collapsed from the weight.

After blurting out a few less than pleasant words and “I told you” so comments, I realized I had to just let go and deal with whatever was going to happen.  It was a blessing no one got hurt because literally 1 minute before this happened, a woman was browsing the table of goodies I had outside and she had just walked away.  The tree is full of thorns that are nearly 2″ long.  I don’t even want to imagine what could have happened.

Obviously this Pandora’s box wasn’t going to get any better before it got worse.  I went and sat at the restaurant across from me, ordered a nice strong Coca-Cola on the rocks and just watched.  It was like watching a Three Stooges episode.  It just got worse and worse.

We had to chop a good amount of the tree because obviously there was nothing to tie it up to and with the tree gone, it was even more clear that the roof was barely hanging on.  There was one little board (on the left) that was propping up everything.  All other wooden beams were completely eaten by the termites.

Shop

Collectively, we all decided that the roof had definite potential to become a flying guillotine once the winds pick up here in a few weeks.  That the best thing to do is just remove it — for everyone’s safety.  Shop 5

So at the end of the day…..this what was left of my structure.
Shop 6

Morning vs. Afternoon

By the time they got the roof off, I had totally just exhaled the entire situation.  It is what it is.  Hopefully now with the roof off – this new tenant who was supposedly starting construction yesterday will look at the project and either think “Screw this!  This is too much work!” or he’ll say “Better to wait until after the holidays to take this on.”  Hmmmm….I actually wouldn’t mind taking the space over and raising my roof or maybe even making a second story??  A little loft space?

Who knows what’s going to happen with all this.  At least as of this morning, the inside of my shop is put together, although they did make a new hole in my ceiling this morning.   Hey people pay good money for skylights, I got it for free.  (Gritting teeth!!)

This thing is this – and if you’ve ever spend any time in Costa Rica you will recognize the truth in this – Costa Rica is a beautiful country with many things to love about it.  But, it’s completely jinxed with it comes to getting anything done be it pay a bill, get a part for your car, place an order for a product, or God forbid, try to get something built or fixed  Anything that can go wrong, will and whenever you think the task might be completed — multiple that by a few months!  Just bet on that from the beginning and you’ll have no disappointments or frustrations.

The upside??  Hmmmmmm…..how about this.  A good friend of mine knowing I was having a less than calming day came by with dark, melt-in-your-mouth chocolate!  Now that’s a good friend!!:)

Friendship is chocolateRead the follow-up to this post here.

Stay Positive

-

Ok,  I really do try to see the upside in things.  But sometimes a bunch of “look at the upside” moments come crashing down all at once, at the perfectly wrong time and it gets a bit ***ahem*** challenging to not scream at the top of one’s lungs and throw yourself down on the ground screaming like a 2 years old!!

So for those who have followed my blog/shop for the past few months, you know that over the down-season I remodeled my shop.  The goal (although there were small delays along the way) was to get it all pretty-pretty in time for the high-season which begins the end of November but really picks up the second week of December (now).  Lots of work but so worth it.

About 3 weeks ago, someone rented one of the two vacant shops above me, which is great because the space has been abandoned for over 7 years.  The more businesses there are near me, the more foot traffic I have.  It’s a win-win.  BUT my building (excluding my newly renovated space below) is in desperate need of a total overhaul.  The structure has been an all-inclusive resort for termites for years and so the new tenant really has their work cut out for them to get the place inhabitable.  How this impacts me?  Part of their floor is my ceiling so that meant ripping out a part of my ceiling, my wall and my entry to do their repairs.  This started last week.

Ok, ok, ok, in the long run, this benefits me because it makes my space safer and more structurally sound.  So I bit the bullet and had a moment of sadness watching my newly constructed wall and displays come down.  I figured ok, we still (at that point) have a week until the start of my high-high season – Christmas week.

Well, as with all things in Costa Rica,  this “little” project is taking longer than anticipated and has turned into a cluster-fuck because the more they tore back the surface of the building the more it was apparent that this building is in a state of impending disaster.  It’s a miracle it’s still standing and that it withstood the 7.6 earthquake we had 2 years ago!!  We discovered that the roof was not even being help up by any support beams, the beams were like cotton candy – completely devoured by termites.  So that needed be fixed.  Then as they tore up the floor, more and more problems became apparent.

As of yesterday evening it looked like they had put enough band-aids on the project to at least be able to secure things a little bit.  That’s the good part.  So as the pounding, sanding, pounding, pounding, pounding continued allllll daayyyyy loonnng — and all sorts of debris is coming down like the sky is falling, I’m thinking ok, in a few more days they’ll be done and I’ll at the very least be able to clean up and re-install the vibe in my store for Christmas shoppers.

Dream on Tricia.

So I get word last night that the landlord has also rented the shop directly above me.  Which again, in the long run is great news for me.   The bad news is, that they plan to start their reconstruction today or tomorrow.  Which means completely gutting the place, ripping out the floor (my ceiling) on the other side of my shop and redoing the entire four walls of the structure.  Ok ok ok….again, I realize long-term this is a good thing for me. Yes, it will make my place safer, having tenants above brings more people. Blah. Blah! BLAH!

SEVEN DAYS BEFORE CHRISTMAS!?!?

So I’ve resorted to pulling almost all my goodies out of the store and putting them on a table in front of the shop.  Sigh.  I’m hoping that the portion of my shop directly at the entrance will be done today (wishing again!).  At least then I can at least get a portion of the shop put back together.   But what does that matter if the other half is all gutted and they’re constructing it — thus dust and dirt flying everywhere, hammering, sawing, etc.?!?

I’m trying not to get too frustrated because let’s face it, what can I do??  I tried talking to the landlord about maybe waiting at least until after Christmas (although the season just gets busier after that!) but I guess money talks — renting the place after all this time.  We had such a bad season last year because of the horrific weather on the east coast of the U.S. and Canada (where the bulk of our high season travelers are from).  All the flight cancellations caused us to have about a 1/4 of the season we’d normally have.  I was really looking forward to recouping from that disaster last year, this year.

So fine, that’s where things are with that.

Compound that with the fact that I was supposed to move into a new house 2 weeks ago.  The new house is still not ready to move in.  Which means that not only am I trying to not get ulcers over this shop situation, I am also now stressing out about moving during Christmas and New Year’s week.  ((Take a deep breath, ok, exhale))

They say when everything seems to be going wrong, it’s because everything is about to be going really well.  Yay…..I’ll try to drum up some enthusiasm over that bit of hopefulness!!

Sigh.

******** Psstttt….A follow-up this is posted here.**********