Today was a good day in terms of food - it was raining for a lot of the morning so we didnt work as much as usual. We made beans, rice, pasta, tomato-basil sauce, lemongrass tea and popcorn with carmel sauce, which was amazing! We have both been craving sweet things, because we havent really been eating any dessert-type things at all other than fruits and sugar in our coffee, so of course weve been trying to invent things but this was the first one that worked! It was amazing.

The picture-uploading abilities of this computer seem to be working today, so Ill take advantage of the internet connection and post some more pictures ...
This is me working hard, washing the disgustingly dirty dishrags in the rain after I washed practically all of my clothes ...
This is Volcan Concepcion this afternoon, which you can see from our shower and sleeping area. This is the view from the road a little bit up from where we are staying. Every day the clouds are completely different, but always surrounding it in crazy patterns!
this is the view from our little hut -these are the gardens weve been tending to. in the front there is a papaya tree, basil, oregano, lots of peppers, spinach, that plant between the two poles on the right side of the picture is a big vine whose flowers are used to make loofah sponges (is this a commonly known fact? because i did NOT know that!) and some banana palms in the background. and thats the table where we have been spending inordinate amounts of time.
THIS cat is the Gus-imposter: his name is Donald and he is the biggest whiner Ive ever met. He really does remind me of my cat in Minneapolis though, its incredible. He has gotten so used to us yelling at his to stop eating the food that he has no shame - he climbs on the stove, tries to get into my bowl while Im eating, and so on ... but he also is brave enough to scare away stray dogs that try to come into the kitchen. I mean, literally, he ran off a dog last night that was trying to look for food. Hes our guard cat!
This is a picture of a HUGE snake that I took a picture of from a high vantage point! Just kidding, it was a baby sabanera snake about the size of a worm, but it still scared the pants off of me and I had to stand on the other side of the kitchen while Elvin took the picture. Luis, one of Totocos employees who works in the fields, brought this snake in his BAG to show us on his way home. I almost fainted when he said he was walking around with a little snake in his bag. Apparently I really have a snake phobia, but at least we got this picture!