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A few of my WEC items
[Prompted by this John Markoff article about WEC in the LATimes]
I was a huge fan of The Whole Earth Catalog (see also the Wikipedia page). I have many issues of the catalog and its offshoots, CoEvolution Quarterly, Whole Earth Review, Whole Earth Software Review, etc.. It drove my reading for many years. I made countless library purchase recommendations based on its listings. I visited the Whole Earth Truck Store on one of my first visits to the San Francisco area.
When I was at PARC, in Alan Kay's group, I was pleased to see so many WEC-recommended titles in the library, but until I read Markoff's piece I didn't know that Kay had started that!
When asked for my favorite book, I sometimes say The Whole Earth Catalog, despite that not being the kind of book the questioner had in mind. It was more important to me and influenced me more than anything else I read. It led me to so many new ideas and writers.
The timing was ideal for me, just as I went off to college. It also accelerated my shift away from TV to more reading, which has continued for my entire adult life.
I added time in Mérida before and after our Peru trip so that I could push forward on Victor's visa.
The U.S. Consulate in Juárez handles fiancé visas, and they say they sent some papers to Victor on February 7th. As of today, he still has not received anything. (See my note about Mexico's postal system!) Fortunately, they also sent a copy of at least the main page to me, mailed from El Paso instead of Juárez!
With that, we were able to complete Victor's lengthy online visa application. I expected to immediately see instructions for selecting an interview date, but that didn't happen. Even after returning from Peru, nothing. When I called, after fighting through the recorded prompts and hunting down my application confirmation number, I finally was told that I needed to pay (more!), wait for the receipt, and then schedule the interview.
The website says this additional fee can be paid online, and I spent a long time unsuccessfully hunting for that. The same page says the fee could be paid by phone, but when I tried that, they said the website needs updating; the fee can only be paid in pesos at specified banks in Mexico. They also could not help with scheduling the medical exam in Juárez, nor could they even tell me whether interview dates were available starting in a week, a month, or six months. Every little step of this process is aggravating. GRRR.
I paid the additional fee this morning and received the email receipt at once. That did enable me to get to the interview appointment page! So we finally have the dates for the final step. Victor will go for fingerprints, etc. in Mérida on April 30th, and we will then go to Juárez. The medical exam is walk-in, no appointment needed. The interview is set for May 7th.
Me with a tailless whip scorpion
Macaws at a clay lick
Link to more photos.
Given our love of wildlife and knowing that Victor would feel very comfortable in another Spanish-speaking country, I signed up for this Atlas Obscura tour along the Tambopata River in southeastern Peru.
Initially, I intended to add a visit to Machu Picchu either before or after, but that was more complicated than expected, and other things intervened, and ultimately, I didn't do it. We did have a few spare hours in Lima, but we didn't do much additional sight-seeing there, either. I had hoped to see the Circuito Magico del Agua, but Victor was too tired.
The trip went well. I was very pleased that we had little rain, mostly overnight. Given the mud, I was glad we were provided with rubber boots! The macaws were beautiful. I was disappointed by how few animals we saw in the jungle. Plenty of birds and spiders and butterflies and other insects, but few other animals. The river travel quickly got monotonous; the scenery varied little. Perhaps I should have sought out another tour, maybe including other areas of the country and Machu Picchu.
