fourth floor, top of universidad catolico santa maria in arequipa peru, i have access to a computer, but now facebook is denied as well as my e-mail, and i'm curiously cut off from the world, though i know that it's ny-ca and la-philly in the playoffs. why did i lose my email? had something to do with password expiring, and all the popup windows here using spanish language programming, making me unable to even type the password into a popup window. i wrote to them, to no avail. no email; i just have to wait. facebook? i have no idea. i had it last night.

arequipa is fantastic; beautiful city, old, pretty, beautiful weather every minute. views of volcanos hovering over the city that make me nervous when i hear rumbling, but day after day, blue sky, pleasant temperature, clear air. slowly my spanish comes back to me, but that doesn't help at a keyboard; where is the @? where is the question mark, or the other stuff? they seem to move it around for convenience, and not always mark it for old habit-worn guys like me.

one more day; i'll remember and miss the place, but i'll also be glad to get home to my family, my birthday boy, my medicine, keyboard, starbucks, siu beauracracy which i'll have to navigate to restore my e-mail. only sixteen-hour flight on the way back, as opposed to 28 coming. but, i haven't checked whether toilet water goes down in the opposite direction down here; i haven't done my basic shopping. life is busy, and full, especially when the weather's good. chou