the power of ten (and puppy row)

i have a deep dark secret, dear blog readers.  and that secret is that i hate the metric system.  that's right!  i lived in England for 6 months and i refused to learn any part of it.  i pride myself on this.  in fact, one day i was bragging to the bolshevik about how instead of learning what my weight was in kilos, i asked my mother to bring over a scale in pounds.  that's right, i made my mother travel across the pond carrying a non-metric scale.  and i will never forgot my amusement when one of my british flatmates weighed himself and was utterly confused when he found out he weighed 145. he didn't even know what that meant because he was brainwashed by the metric system.

needless to say, the bolshevik thinks i'm a bit stubborn and possibly crazy.  but those are just some of my more lovable quirks!

why am i telling you this?  yesterday when we were exploring the city we found ourselves in an area that most likely isn't for tourists.  first, there was an area dedicated solely (no pun intended) to shoes.  not selling shoes, but stall after stall of various shoe repair shops.  there were even sneaker workers, shining up sneakers.

then, and this was my favorite, there was the area that we now refer to as "puppy row."   it was an entire block of people standing on the street selling puppie.  the gentleman above was even "double fisting" it, with a puppy in each hand.  one man even had a sack of puppies.  like santa!  if you look closely at the picture you can see a man in the foreground holding a puppy, with a box o' puppies at his feet, then there's a man to the left holding two puppies, and a woman on the right towards the back also holding a puppy for sale.

and finally, getting to the point, further on in this commercial wonderland there was a woman who had a digital bathroom scale, and for a small fee you could stand on it and find out your weight.  the bolshevik felt that i was the perfect candidate for such a service, since i like to weigh myself daily.  but i scoffed at the idea, explaining that her scale was probably in kilos.  unacceptable!  so now, yet another money making scheme is for me to import my own digital scale in pounds and slowly convert south america to the preferred anti-metric system.