Right up until the moment we put turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, gravy, asparagus, peas and 3 salads into our mouths, it was hard to imagine it happening. In the sweltering heat, we even found room for homemade pecan pie and cookies. I really don't know how. As we were cooking our first turkey yesterday -- without a baster or oven thermometer -- the actual temperature hit 95 F while the sensación térmica was said to be over 104 F. A friend joked that we had to stuff ourselves with stuffing to avoid wasting away to nothing -- we were sweating that much.

Ah, Thanksgiving in Buenos Aires.

Despite losing James just yesterday, there were many things to be thankful for. Out on the terraza, we heard the rhythmic banging of pots and blowing of whistles as we clinked glasses (and Henry stripped naked to wade in the baby pool). Many of our neighbors -- some right on our block -- were protesting the fact that they were without electricity. Poor souls. No electric fans, no air conditioning, ice quickly melting in the freezer. We were lucky this time.

So, we had a nice, if sweaty, thanksgiving meal. Would we do it again next year? I'm not sure the traditional, autumnal feast is quite right for November in Argentina. I may suggest we go back to a simple asado next year, like we did when we first arrived in 2005.

After almost 12 years together, I said goodbye to J./James/Jaime/Razor/J-zor/Cesare today. He was old, had kidney disease, and suddenly couldn't even walk or eat his favorite tuna. So I decided it was time to euthanize him.

When I adopted him in January 1997, his name was Razor and his estimated age was 4-5 years old. I found him while writing an article for Time Out New York's "Free" issue. The piece, titled "Free Love," involved reviewing Manhattan's pet shelters. Well, I was shocked. So many pets with nowhere to go. At the worst of the lot, where dozens of animals were put to sleep every day due to overcrowding, I told the volunteer I was interviewing that I'd like to take a cat home. Since I'd become an expert on Manhattan's pet shelters, I figured I could at least save the cat I adopted from that East Harlem death camp and place him in one of the well-financed shelters on the Upper East Side with a no-kill policy.

My boyfriend at the time was a little surprised when I came home to our shared apartment with a cardboard box with air holes. The cat formerly known as Razor jumped out of the box and hid below the stove for half a day. When he finally emerged, we renamed him James and I fed him. He quickly became devoted to me and suspicious of my boyfriend, which suited me fine. As a freelancer at the time, I loved the daytime company. I pulled up another chair to my desk and dubbed him my co-pilot.

When I went back to an office job, I felt bad that J. was left home alone, but he managed to make at least one friend through two window panes. I know this because one day I found a note under my front door in old lady handwriting asking me to please remove my books from the window pane. The handsome tabby-Siamese mix, she noted, could not watch birds from his favorite spot because of my offending books. Of course, they were promptly removed.

J. weathered my breakups, new boyfriends, moving from the West Village to the Lower East Side… After all that we went through together, I think J. thought Ian, too, was temporary. Maybe he was abused by a man back when he was named Razor. I don’t know, but he’s never trusted Ian. Well, I married Ian anyway and we moved to Buenos Aires. James and I flew pet-friendly United, where he could sit with me in Coach. We arrived 3.5 years ago (as noted here).

But for Jaime the biggest change of his life happened September 21, 2006. J. quickly realized the bassinet was not for him, but for a smaller, hairless rival. As much as Ian irked him, Henry was just too much. But they learned to live together reasonably well because J. could always run faster and hide convincingly. J. even enjoyed Henry’s warmth while sleeping.

When I came back from the vet today crying, Henry jumped in my arms, hugged me and started crying a bit, too. Then he said, “Donald Duck?” and ran off. Since he’s only 2 years and 2 months old, I doubt Henry will have any lasting J. memories, but I’ll be able to show him photos like the trio below.

An interesting article/blog in the Guardian about Diego Maradona's dramtic turn as head coach of Argentina's fútbol squad (Who will he play? Will he quit? Can he coach?). My favorite bit:

In his own extraordinary, egomaniacal way, Diego Maradona has lived by the motto 'Yes we can' all his life. Play football as easily as breathing? Yes we can. Ingest copious amounts of cocaine and enjoy as much female company as possible? Yes we can. Eat for Argentina? Yes we can. Shoot an air rifle at unwanted guests outside your house? Yes we can. Incite thousands to protest on the streets of Buenos Aires against the 'human garbage' otherwise known as George W Bush? Yes we can. Coach the Argentina national team to the World Cup success that came to him so naturally as a player? So sorry to be a killjoy, but no we probably can't.

Por fin! Starting Monday, Google Maps will come to Argentina. What took so damn long, you may ask? "Nos costo encontrar un partner con un producto de calidad y cobertura suficiente, por eso demoramos", said Marcelo Quintella, the product manager of Google Maps in Latin America. Ouch.

When I first saw this story, I thought "You gotta be kidding me?!" but I checked it out and, well, it's true. When you search for "Diego Maradona" on Yahoo! Argentina you get zero results. Why? According to the OpenNet Initiative:

Over 100 people have successfully secured temporary restraining orders that direct Google and Yahoo! Argentina to scrub the results of search queries. The list of censorship-seeking celebrities includes judges, public officials, models and actors, as well as the world-cup soccer star and national team head coach Diego Maradona.

All of the clients are represented a single lawyer, Martin Leguizamon Peña, who has claimed to have achieved a 80% success rate in obtaining restraining orders against Google and Yahoo!. Peña is also seeking compensation of 300,000 to 400,000 pesos ($90,000 to $120,000) from the search engines for each of his clients.

En serio?

Soon after his first art show in Palermo, we took city-slicker Henry to Mendoza province for a dose of the farming life.

Mendoza + San Rafael

Now that he's 2, Henry requires his own seat on flights. It's an expense but a privilege he enjoys thoroughly. On the flight out (pictured), he drew. By the time we flew back 5 days later, he had grown tired of sketching (we brought out those same crayons and pencils at many a Mendocina meal), but we had a new trick up our sleeves. We downloaded a 6-minute Donald Duck clip from youtube.com (with Danish subtitles, but I don't think he noticed) to play back on board. I think Henry watched Donald and Huey, Dewey and Louie scrabbling in the snow oh, 7 or 8 times. Meanwhile, I read the newspaper front to back for the first time in a long while.

(Click on the image above to see a small album of Mendoza/San Rafael photos.)

I'm so proud and happy.

Some lessons learned from Nov. 2004:
1) Do not buy noisemakers or champagne. (I know, I know. This was really stupid of me. It was just that almost every person I knew was voting against Bush in 2004. I refused to believe the polls.)
2) Do not invite prolific photographers to your house if you want to forget the night. (Actually, it was interesting enough to look back at these snapshots by Nadine and Micah that I'm posting them here today.)
3) Leave the country a few months after tragic election results. (Well, we didn't leave the USA for purely political reasons, but it's turned out pretty well for us here so far. Knock on wood.)
Ok. Now I feel ready for an evening of nail-biting.