It's starting to look a little like ........

The Day of the Dead is rolling quickly, the plaza awnings are all set up, the first of the vendors have moved their rickety tables in, only preceded by the globs of sugar fashioned as skulls that were set up about 2 weeks ago  under the portals of the buildings on the plaza.
The transformation to a beehive of activity will continue and be in full assembly by Wednesday. The traps will be set for the exit of people from the tourist buses arriving to quench their thirsts for hand made ticky-tacky crap.

Some of the items are well made, truly artisan masters of their time and efforts, but mostly you will see the stuff that one sees while wandering around having your head dusted off by hanging armies of sweaters and rebosos ( Anyone remember Bebe Reboso) at your local mercado. (At least I do, since I am 6'2" tall and have to duck more than not ).

The locals  will come out once or twice during the event, either before or after , some not at all.
Yesterday I felt was one day that we would go out for a prepared meal, the stuff in the refrigerator didn't appeal to me and I didn't feel like cooking.

So we hop in the old pickup truck and head out.

Saturdays are a busy day, markets are open, roadside stands are staffed by bored attendants and heaps of double parked cars populate the streets and roads.

Every kilometer or two is the mandatory block party of a group of men, usually about 5 to 7 that are huddled around a few libations discussing the weeks real important social issues of the borough.

We had a decent lunch at a place at Ziruhuen about 4 or 5 months ago so the truck was pointed into that direction. As we arrived into the boundaries there was evidence that their too they honor the dead by whimsy and channel efforts of display. ( Lago de Ziruhuen, is a beautiful lake about 25km west of Patzcuaro)

Our lucky at decency had changed in the passage of time and changes were amassed due to the onslaught of the prospect of visitors from afar.  First of all their was an entry fee to park of 10 pesos. I told the keeper of the gate that we were headed to the restaurant, to which I was told that the 10 pesos would be refunded upon a purchase.

Huuum....kinda sounds like a work-do project or perhaps an additional profit center justifying the gate keeper.
The lunch was tedious, especially hearing the staff lose their mastery of carrying the tray of food more than once. Luckily we had already been served and were entertained at their attempt at trying to clean the mess up before the delayed patrons would figure out it was their food that got offered to the floor creatures.
After asking for the check I decided to visit the bathroom facilities only to discover that they were charging 4 pesos for the privilege........and this after purchasing a less than cheap lunch?
No discount or concessions was offered, and on principles sake I decided I could wait 15 minute for the trip home.
All in all, opportunistic times are created for the onslaught of prospective donors of pesos, so our idea of vacating the area to visit friends in SMA this coming week sounds even more attractive.  I have never been in SMA on this week of the DOD and hope that they do not take it as serious as the local opportunists do here.
Or perhaps that may be interesting to see what the "SMA Elite" do with Day of the Dead.