THROWBACK THURSDAY

Back in the 1980's when SWMBO and I first moved to Mexico we found a house to rent in a small village on the shore of Ajijic, south of Guadalajara.

We began our Mexico stay with a visit to Posada Ajijic, a small hotel with a very active bar, especially at happy hour (which ran, as I recall, for hours!)

Ajijic and several other towns along the north shore of Lake Chapala had become very popular with the ex-patriates and the Posada was owned and operated by a Canadian whose name was Eager.

I've forgotten his first name but his son later had a new hotel built called the Nueva Posada Ajijic, which survives to this day.

But on that first night in the old Posada's bar I recognized one of the other topers as the legendary Jim Moran.

Moran was a long-time publicist and practical joker who, for instance, once changed horses in the middle of a Nevada river during the 1944 presidential campaign.

He was barred from a stunt wherein he claimed he was going to fly a midget over New York's Central Park in a kite to publicize a candy bar.

Moran's comment: "It's a sad day for American capitalism when a man can't fly a midget on a kite over Central Park!"

None of this talk about Jim Moran has a thing to do with the purpose of today's post although it might qualify under the heading of Throwback Thursday.

No, what I was going to tell you about was the annual chili contest, held on the grounds of the Posada.

Mr. Eager organized that, too, with the assistance of Ann Whiting, who was the president of the American Society in Guadalajara.

Several of our new friends won the competition in one of those years long ago.

Here we see Cookie, Walter, Bernard and Betty with someone in the rear peeping through whom I can't identify.

Their chili was named AMSOC Amistad Chili, meaning the American Society Friendship Chili.

From the picture it looks like it won each of the cooks a bottle of tequila.

I've lost track of Cookie and Bernard.

Walter, who was the father of New York actress Cynthia Nixon, died in Guadalajara some years ago.

And my Yellow Dog Democrat* friend Betty is still going strong in Olympia, Washington at the age of 90.

Good times gone by.

*The term Yellow Dog Democrat originated in the South during the late 19th Century. It refers to a person who would vote for a yellow dog before they'd vote for any Republican.