Costa Rica

It rained the whole time.

Other than that, it was fine.

Oh, except that right before we left, we discovered a dear relative has prostate cancer, and just before we came back, the State of New York extracted $1700 from our bank accounts, to pay a tax bill from 2007 that I didn’t even know existed.

But otherwise, the vacation was great.

Here are some things you should know about Costa Rica:

1. Most everyone speaks some degree of English, and there are English-language TV channels.

2. Central and South American plumbing is…let’s call it inadequate. You can’t flush toilet paper, it will clog up the antiquated plumbing. It’s only designed to dispose of, you know, human wastes. So you have to wipe, and then deposit the used toilet paper in a wastebasket next to the toilet. (It goes without saying you can’t flush anything else, like feminine products or tissues or anything.) It also goes without saying that the contents of the wastebasket don’t really bear close examination.

When I told my husband that, he thought I was joking. He’s still convinced it’s all an elaborate prank on Americans.

3. The dry season is January through April. The rest of the year, it will rain at least once a day. Sometimes it will rain for two weeks straight and flood everything. Not little-bitty drizzly rain, either—that tropical rain, where it doesn’t so much rain as the skies just open up and vomit water.

4. The roads are dreadful. And all the bridges are one-lane.

5. But the animals are fun: I saw all kinds of birds and lizards, monkeys, even some caimans.

We arrived toward the end of rainy season, and spent most of our time at Arenal Nayara, a fancy-pants resort in the mountains, overlooking Arenal Volcano. Which is all very well and good, but we never got a clear view of the entire volcano, thanks to the rain and fog. In fact, the only times we saw the sun were when we took a day trip to a wildlife refuge near the Nicaraguan border, and in San Jose on the day we left. That’s it.

So there was no sitting in the sun, and we only broke out our bathing suits once.

At least it was warm.

The resort was very nice, if overpriced. Each room is actually a private hut, with its own Jacuzzi, hammock, outdoor shower, and view of the volcano. Of course, no one bothered to inform me that we wouldn’t actually be able to see the volcano, it being rainy season and all. There were full amenities, great landscaping, and a swim-up bar. Everyone was very helpful, there were pool boys to take your order at the outdoor hot tubs, there was full cable, free wi-fi, and free calls to the US.

But they nickel-and-dimed us for everything else—and at US prices, not at Costa Rican prices. Want water with your dinner? Flat or sparkling, $5 US a bottle, no tap water option. Want a massage at the spa? They start at $80 US. Want a bottle of wine at the wine bar? That’s $28 US for a bottle of Yellow Tail. (YELLOW TAIL. And that was the cheapest wine available. The rest of the wine options were South American, overpriced, and frankly no better than plonk.) Want transportation to and from the airport? $120 each way in a private van, no van-sharing option available. Breakfast was included (thank God) but dinner was at least $35 a person, with no booze. We never paid less than $100 for dinner, and I’m positive there weren’t any locals coming up the mountainside to eat $100 US dinners. The food was good, but it wasn’t $100 good.

Also, they were super-sneaky when it came to drinks: the drink menu listed most drinks at $6, but that didn’t include obligatory tax or 10% service charge, and the bartenders would never tell you what the house liquor was. There were several times when we’d order, say, a margarita, and the bartender would hold up a random bottle of tequila and say, “OK?” If you said OK back, chances were excellent you’d just ordered yourself a $26 margarita. You had to specify, “House is fine,” or else they’d automatically upsell you the expensive stuff. Caution: the local Costa Rican rum was apparently the expensive stuff, which we didn’t discover until we got our bill at the end of our stay. It’s the only place I’ve ever been where the local stuff WASN’T the house option. I don’t mind being asked if I have a preference for booze, but I really mind not being told what things cost up front.

This all makes me sound like a crank, I know. It actually was a very nice vacation—we got away, and spent five unbroken days with each other, with no work, gaming, computers or phones to intrude. Costa Rica is a beautiful country, even with the rain, and we’re definitely planning to go back at some point (to one of the coasts this time, rather than the mountains). And even though the food was overpriced, it was good. I ate my weight in ceviche and fried plantains.

I’m just cranky because the GODDAMN FUCKING STATE OF NEW YORK STOLE $1700 OF MY MONEY WITHOUT WARNING ME. WHILE I WAS OUT OF THE COUNTRY AND COULDN’T DO ANYTHING ABOUT IT. Which meant all our vacation cash had to go to pay our rent for next month, and then the vacation had to be charged to a credit card, which makes me exceptionally cranky because the whole point of the vacation was that we could pay cash for it.

Right before the road trip in 2009, I got a bill from the IRS informing me that I’d filed my 2007 taxes improperly and I owed over $3000. (Some paperwork apparently never got mailed to me, so I never included it.) I freaked out, called them, and worked out a payment plan to pay it back. I finally managed to pay off the last of it this year.

Yesterday, while dealing with the IRS and the State of New York, I was told that in the fine print of that original bill, I was supposed to contact the State of New York MYSELF within 90 days so that my state tax return could be reworked. Naturally I never saw that provision, it being buried in the fine print, and no one at the IRS bothered to point that out to me. When I never contacted NY, they reworked my tax return themselves, and have been sending bills for said tax return to my old address in California—which never got forwarded to me, because I haven’t lived there for over a year. When they never heard from me, they issued a tax levy on my accounts, which meant the bank had to empty various savings accounts and send them $1700 on my behalf.

Now, let’s recap. They were sending bills to my California address, but I never got anything while I lived there, which meant they’ve only been trying to contact me within the last year. For a tax bill that’s now four years old. And yes, my address has changed, but my PHONE NUMBER AND EMAIL ADDRESS ARE EXACTLY THE SAME. Also, clearly they had no trouble digging up my current bank account information, so why couldn’t they be bothered to, you know, maybe CALL ME AND TELL ME I OWED THEM $1700?

I spent all morning on the phone yesterday, trying to figure out what happened when and what I could do about it. Short answer: I’m screwed. That money’s gone.

So now we have less than $500 left in emergency money, on an already tight budget, with Christmas coming up. Good times.

I wanted my husband to have an upscale vacation. By myself, I was always perfectly happy to stay in the local illegal Craigslist B&B and wander through the bars and restaurants the locals frequented. That way, I could spend my money on one or two really nice four-star dinners and museum admissions and the like. But I figured he’d want to be eased into international travel, which is why we opted for an expensive resort in the mountains—nothing to do but relax and be pampered, right? With no worries about being robbed in our sleep or getting Montezuma’s Revenge from the water. So, we had the upscale vacation, and thanks to the extra food and beverage charges, paid through the nose for it. Which I wouldn’t even mind, if it hadn’t been for that unexpected tax bill.

So, the moral of the story is: don’t bother with the upscale resorts. Stay in the cheap hotel, eat with the locals, really get to know the country. I can hang out with English-speaking white people at home for free, I don’t need to pay extra to do that somewhere else.

Also, be sure to have a healthy emergency fund, no matter what.

Pictures from Costa Rica

The view from our room at the resort. That's Arenal Volcano. That's as much of the volcano as we ever saw, thanks to the fact that it was rainy season.

The volcano at sunset.

Thoughts on Thanksgiving

Long-time blog readers will know that I'm not much on Thanksgiving.

That's not to say that I don't appreciate the holiday, or that I don't enjoy a turkey-stuffing-mashed potato-cranberry sauce sandwich from time to time.

But I've never really celebrated it on my own.

For years I did the "are we celebrating Thanksgiving or Christmas this year?" dance with my family. Since I was single, and living in New York, I had to travel to them--no one was going to visit me and sleep on the floor of my studio. (Not that I blamed them.) But that meant all the travel expenses were on my end.

Finally I got tired of it, and started my own tradition: traveling elsewhere for Thanksgiving. And by "elsewhere," I mean "internationally."

As I'm sure you know, domestic airfares around Thanksgiving are atrocious--easily three or four times what they would be normally, and the airports are packed. But international airfares--from America to anywhere else in the world--are super-cheap.

Why? Because no one travels outside America for Thanksgiving, it being a purely American holiday.

So, 1. Incredibly cheap airfares, 2. Deserted international terminals at the airport, 3. Still good weather in Europe, 4. Fewer tourists than usual (because all the Americans are at home), means A Great Time to Travel Internationally.

And I'll see everyone at Christmas anyway.

What am I missing by fleeing the country for four days? I can eat turkey at Christmas, see my family then, and I wouldn't dare set foot out of the house on Black Friday anyway. (I do all my Christmas shopping online.)

Speaking of Christmas shopping, I did a wee bit yesterday, to take advantage of the pre-Black Friday sales (since I'll be out of the country on Black Friday). I picked myself up a replacement camera--$180, marked down from $300--the Canon Powershot Elph 300HS. Essentially the new version of my old camera.

The last couple of years, due to moves (first to California, then to Massachusetts), I wasn't able to take advantage of this lovely tradition of travelling internationally. But this year, I'm reviving it.

So while you're listening to your in-laws griping, trying to defrost the turkey in time, and fighting stampeding crowds at Wal-Mart on Black Friday, I will be soaking up the rays in Costa Rica, drinking things out of pineapples.

Lots and lots of drinks out of pineapples.

See you all in December.

I miss having a day off

Sorry for paucity of news/updates lately. I've been working almost literally non-stop; temping during the day, restaurant at night. It's exactly like I'm 20 again, working two full-time jobs. Only, you know, I'm not 20 anymore.

I've been temping at a large drugstore chain's national headquarters for the last week or so, and that will probably continue for the next week. I remember exactly why I went back to the restaurant industry in the first place. I hate offices. I hate cafeterias, I hate cubicles, I hate office politics, I hate PowerPoint, I hate driving to a corporate campus every day. To add insult to injury, none of my corporate clothes fit anymore--I've lost probably 20 pounds since I started waiting tables, which is great, but now none of my clothes fit. To add further insult to injury, they're paying me $19 an hour. Which may sound like a lot, but I haven't made less than $20 an hour in an office since 1999. I was making double that temping in New York. Hell, even in San Diego, when I had to take a 35% pay cut just to work, I was making close to $23 an hour.

But it's still $19 an hour more than I was making during those hours, so I suppose I should quit griping.

So as soon as that's done, I rush right over to the restaurant and spend all night on my feet. Doubles on the weekends. Which means I work 8-5 Monday through Wednesday, then 8 am to 11 pm or midnight Thursday through Sunday. Which means I never have a full day off, and Thursday morning through Monday night is basically one long shift, with six-hour sleeping breaks.

My husband is like, "Who are you again?"

Fortunately, in a week we're going to Costa Rica. So I'm pushing through, because there'll be an awesome vacation at the end of all this.

When we get back, I'll reevaluate finances. Hopefully at that point I can drop the day temping, and cut back on the brunch shifts at the restaurant, leaving me to work only Thursday through Sunday nights.

In the meantime, though, it's a slog. I remember feeling like this when I was 20, thinking "Once I get a degree, I'll never have to work like this again."

Heh.

More pictures of the new house



Entryway

Foosball coffee table!



Built-in wet bar





Guest bedroom



Master bedroom

And check out this tub!



Goodbye, little camera. You've served me well

Yesterday I killed my camera.

I spilled half a bottle of water in my purse, and my camera was in the bottom of my purse.

Of course I frantically took it apart to let it dry out. I even put it in a container of rice overnight. But, in the words of the camera shop pro I took it to, "it's fucked."

(I did get a flicker of life out of it this morning, after sitting in the rice all night; but only a flicker. I'll wait another day and try again, but I'm not optimistic.)

I suppose I should be grateful I didn't ruin my phone as well. And to be honest, I've sucked my money's worth out of that little camera. It's served me well. The road trip, all the moves, all the sightseeing, and all the food photography over the past two and a half years, and not once has it disappointed me.

So farewell, Canon Powershot SD780 IS with 12.1 megapixels. Bless your little camera heart.

So this means I'll be using my iPhone for blog pictures in the immediate future--they won't be as good, please forgive me, I apologize in advance.

I'll be in the market for a new camera; I have my eye on a Canon G12, but I'm open to suggestions. Any pros/fellow food bloggers out there, what camera do you use and why? Any recommendations?

Birthday summary

I DID have to work a double on my birthday.

I also got fired on my birthday.

Those two things, however, are not related.

Here's the story: I love the restaurant I'm working at in Providence. I'm hoping to get more shifts there in a couple of weeks, but because it's so small, I have to wait for one of the other four waiters to give up shifts. So I'm usually available if one of them wants a night off.

They asked me on Friday if I could work Saturday night, in addition to my already-scheduled brunch shift on Saturday. I didn't really want to, seeing as how Saturday was my birthday, but I found out Saturday morning I had to, because no one else was available. Fine, I like money, they threw in a bottle of wine to sweeten the deal and let me off early last night, which was very nice of them.

However, somewhere in the middle of all that, my other job called me. The upscale pizza/wine bar in Massachusetts, that I've been driving 40 minutes each way to a few times a week, trying to make a little more money before I got more shifts at the Providence restaurant. I've been wanting to quit there for a while, it's often not worth it to make the drive, but I was trying to wait until the last possible minute to do so.

So old job called me, wanting me to come in Saturday night as well. "Can't, sorry," I said, "my other job called me in, too."

I thought that was the end of the story, until I was checking my online schedule last night--and discovered my account had been deleted.

That's how they fired me--they didn't actually TELL me I was fired, they just reassigned all my shifts for next week and deleted my account from the online scheduling app.

"Fuck 'em," said my husband, "you were going to quit anyway."

"True," I said, "but my goodness, how tacky."

We ended up going to a party our landlords were having, so the very end of my birthday was quite nice, much better than the working part. I'm back in for another double today--so perhaps tomorrow I'll actually celebrate my birthday.

Happy birthday to me!

In celebration, I may have to work a double. To be continued!

Venda Ravioli in Providence, RI

My in-laws got me a gift certificate to Venda Ravioli for my birthday, Venda apparently being a Providence institution, in the heart of the Federal Hill Little Italy. (If any other readers want to get me something, my birthday is Saturday!) Being still new to Providence, I went to check it out yesterday.

I was expecting an Italian restaurant--and there is one--but Venda Ravioli is also a gourmet food emporium, complete with meat counter, cheese counter, and pre-made Italian yummies.

So, that gift certificate got spent in a hurry.

I got a few things I wouldn't normally get--dry-aged beef, veal osso buco--but I also got some standards: cheese, olives, cured salami, proscuitto. (Look for blog posts about how I use all this stuff soon.) Naturally, dinner last night was a cheese fest.

I'll be back for sure, and now that we're settled in to the new place, perhaps I can start exploring the city in my spare time now.