I hope you hadn’t planned on going to the bank or many stores because today is Labor Day and you won’t find many people working. Usually that won’t affect the stores in the Chiriquí Mall or Plaza El Terronal because the malls in Panama are open year around.

I hope I can figure out something to do today that doesn’t require money. One of the dumbest things I did was to have my social security check deposited in Panama. It has to go through Costa Rica to get deposited here and it is rarely here before the 4th of the month.

That is one thing I hope to get changed this year is to have it deposited in a US institution. Besides the excessive time there are too many banking charges based on balance and usage. If I knew then what I know now, I would never have done it. I thought it would make some things easier, but it hasn’t proved to be true. Besides with all the HSBC issues that have come to light, I don’t want my money there.