Guanabara

It's always interesting, that flight down to Rio. I feel like there are several different versions of me on-board: Brazilian-born yanks fighting their way home for the holidays. We are of course yankee-fied in different ways, to different degrees, but there's a feeling that we're on this long commute back at the end of the day.

Rio is peaceful. We are quoting Jobim - New York is shit, but life is great. Rio is great, but life is shit. I probably got that wrong.

Amusing too how quickly we forget that the heat and humidity are oppressive. It's hard to envision doing anything, but we trudge outside, almost killing the sweet dog Gabriel in the process.

Pictures to follow, eventually.

Today we had home pedicures - you can get any service in Rio performed at home, don't you know. At night, we cozy up in the A/C with dad's blu rays and some wine. Or, for me, Macallan 18. One of these days we will break the go-to-bed-at-3-am-wake-up-at-noon cycle, but not just yet.

Mostly, we hope Monday arrives soon, so most people can go back to work and we can enjoy mostly empty beaches. We are going to the Botanical Gardens today to avoid the beach crowds and get some good walking time in before we collapse in a sweaty puddle at Porcao.

The colors, though. It's easy to forget just how many colors you see routinely here. Even when they are tiny and red, like the speedos on a heavy-set older man, or tiny and yellow, like dental floss bikinis on a blonde - but especially when they are greenish and faint, like the african palm trees out front that grow for twenty years, blossom once, and then die.