Good God, Woman, Must Everything Be A Full-Scale Debate With You?

Golf clubs and Belding bags. Ship on pallets via boat? Pack? Sell? 

True, I haven’t played a full round of golf in ten years . . . but I could . . . I know how. The few holes that I played with my shared/adopted Daddy at Lago Vista didn’t count, other than to confirm that my swing was M.I.A. (though I could still occasionally wow ‘em with my driver). Still . . . don’t let this diminish my commitment to and love of the game.

Movie maven that I am, Medicine Man is an all-time favorite. True, perhaps it isn’t Oscar-worthy; but it’s got a jungle canopy, a river, and Sean Connery . . . and it’s difficult to find a bad John McTiernan film. Die Hard . . . Hunt for Red October . . . hello? 

I’d seen Medicine Man long before our first trip to Costa Rica, which helps us date the completely forgotten time-frame of our first visit decades ago. DVDs existed then (versus VHS) . . . an additional hint about the forgotten time-line. 

Our first experience on a zip-line came during our first holiday in Costa Rica. My first zip-line was when I learned that the phrase My knees are shaking wasn’t just a random idiom. Knees really can shake uncontrollably. Anyway, the very afternoon that we arrived back in DFW I ordered Medicine Man from Amazon. It was that zip-line thing. Honey, let’s please pay for overnight shipping. The DVD couldn’t arrive quickly enough.

Medicine Man remains a reliable go-to film. In fact, it’s one of the three DVDs I’ve watched since our arrival in Samara (or partially watched . . . Jill may have watched, I recall napping in the A/C midway through). 

Mil Colinas was the very first home we saw (out of 30-plus) while house-hunting last October. The home and its 1.65 acres, more or less, looked nothing like it does today; but the view hasn’t changed. I’ll never forget Rusty looking toward the western slope and saying, There’s your Medicine Man view. And to this day, we call our western mountain the Medicine Man wall. But back to our tale and today’s tour.

Let’s disregard the majority of our 1.65 acres as it is a very steep slope down to the river, as Jill The Pill will tell you. It’s not that we can never build on this portion of the lot, but the mere acts of clearing brush and pouring foundation footings could prove a Sisyphean task (there you go, Sally). Today we’ll focus on the levels on which we (read: Lubos’ crew) are underway with relatively easy construction. Relatively.

Level I has the home with the garage/carport (should we say garport?), which is presently under construction. The garport will contain the first of Rusty’s play-rooms . . . complete with 220V power. Really? In any event, praise God, the tools will soon be off of the terrace.

Level II is the pool. I suppose level II B is what we call the cellar – below ground it holds the pool equipment, beach chairs and umbrella, and is storage for Rusty’s garden tools. After some discussion, I’ve been made to understand that Rusty is more adept than I with the WeedEater®. For this the philodendrons are thankful.

Level IV will one day hold Rusty’s studio . . . his true playhouse. A playhouse so far removed from my world that it will require our two-way radios so that Rusty can remain down the hill yet still call for a cocktail and hors d’oeuvres . . . pigs in a blanket (there you go, Mr. DeMille). Copy that, Catfish, operation Single Malt is a go . . . over. Level V doesn’t count -- it’s my understanding that this distant level is almost entirely an easement granted to Daniela’s home’s driveway. What? You’re wondering how I skipped Level III?

Level III. The tee box (and not Rusty’s pepper garden, as has been debated for weeks). Our tee box . . . elevated, no less. Level III has brand new stairs leading down from the pool level. They’re still not nearly finished, but you get the idea. Then there are numerous stairs for the hike from the tee box down to the Level IV playhouse platform. Level IV is way down there . . . thus the two-way radios. The tee box level also contains our star-fruit and cashew trees.

Though still a small tree, we’ve already harvested a star fruit. I believe that we waited too long for its harvest, but it looks fine when sliced and Photoshop’d, n’est pas? Soon the landscaping work will begin for the tee box. It’s small, requiring only 25 square meters of grassy lawn. Hey, it’s a tee box, not a fairway.

Surrounding the tee box lawn will grow all of those beautiful Costa Rican plants I’ve coveted since last October. The beehive ginger, several varieties of birds of paradise, and the oh-so bizarre lobster claw plant. I think that Rusty should carve a little Tiki head to hold sand and repair divots, but I suspect that this task is up for debate. Okay, notwithstanding the fact that I sold our clubs and shoes before the move, we've got a tee box.  

And each time I venture to the far end of the pool to walk down to the elevated tee box, I’ll picture Sean Connery smacking little balls into the rain forest. The forest is so vast, and they’re so very small. Surely I can snag a 5-iron somewhere and a sack of used balls; though with the current brush on the mountain, looks as if I'll need a lofted wedge. The question is: where am I going to find dozens of used Slazengers that I won’t mind losing to the Medicine Man wall? They get lost in the forest, you see.

Does anyone ever eat star fruit? Lo que hay.