Ibiza Olympics

For the past fortnight I have been wrapped in Olympic fever watching the outstanding achievements of the British team, I can't quite go along with the "Team GB" label though but I am sure it will have grown on me by the time the Games arrive in Britain in 2012... I have to tell you that the Olympics have been well and truly entered into here in Ibiza in some new areas of sporting achievement. Let me give you some examples :-

• Singles Ironing - an unusual event in that it only comprises one participant but you can have multiple views. I for one have become exhausted watching this particular event but heartily recommend it as a spectator sport.
• We also have the short and long distance Vacuum Relays - this is a very participative sport which involves several changes of dust bag, or in the case of bag less cleaners, dust filter changes which have to be undertaken in less than 5 seconds.
• Mixed Double Washing up is the certain leader in the water sports category coming only second to Singles Laundry which is a rather lonely sport for the dedicated player.

I think I had ought to stop here as I am sure that Olympic thrashing could easily follow if I am caught writing this sort of sedition!

But it is with enormous admiration and pride that I have watched and read about British achievements in so many sports while living in a foreign country as it has been so many years now that we as a nation seem to have fallen short. I hope this is a sign of a recovery in both British esteem as well as sporting prowess!

Well, it's back to Olympic packing for me with only 2 days before the loading and then only Thursday and we are no the way home.

I pray there is enough room on the truck!

Hot ! Hot ! Hot !

The weather has been oppressively hot this week and last and the week before that in fact it’s been hot for weeks. If sweating really was a means of weight loss we would be stick thin by now, we are not!

The packing and disposal of unwanted items, that's those things that we should never have brought in the first place, continues a pace. I have been taking some things down to the nearby refuse point and then seeing how long it takes for them to be scavenged. I am pleased to report a record time of 1 minute between placing the item, the squeal of brakes and the rapid departure of the white Ford Transit van accompanied by a yelp of joy ... "Whohooo"! Well someone has to make a living I suppose.

I did good deed this week. Yes, me. I was busy assembling boxes using one of those kind of industrial tape guns you see being used in warehouses at the same time trying to avoid ripping the box to shreds with the cutting edge of the tape gun and secondly getting the tape to dispense properly without most of it wrapping itself around my hand. Well, as I was about to use the gun on a box I noticed something that was most likely to cause a "stoppage". You'll never guess! It was a small (probably a baby) Lizard!

So with great care and a large pair of scissors I managed to extricate the poor little creature from the tape without tearing it limb from limb or detaching its tail. It wriggled fiercely when I first removed it and then took off at about 100 miles per hour with a small red sticky label attached to its tail instead. I am now considering a late career as a veterinary surgeon or perhaps a keeper of reptiles at a world famous zoo... perhaps not.

I have had the usual visit from my friend the cat, Uva (sounds like "ooba") who is not quite so demanding these days, still as coy but soon gives up when ignored for a few minutes. However, this time she decided it would be good to explore the garage where the packed boxes and items of furniture are being stored and then to climb to highest point in there and have a wash. Once this was over she set about pestering us by laying on the roll of bubble wrap that we are using even at one stage managing to pop a bubble!

People watching in town is quite interesting at present with the various tourist shapes and sizes, numbers of tattoos and piercings as well as various types of "sports casual" attire. I used to think it was easy to "spot the Brit" but let me tell you that it's not these days. There have been some spectacular looking females of the species strutting their stuff in town which is both entertaining and also there is the added amusement of watching the men watching the ladies! But enough of that.... my medication is wearing off.

We have been making regular trips to look for and collect post from our Box in Ibiza town but in particular look for any form of reply from the two people responsible for the Police here on Ibiza. We decided to write to them to complain about the poor performance of the Guardia Civil in the manner in which they "investigated" the burglaries and the lack of any progress. We were advised to have these letters written in Spanish but after finding that the cost of this would be quite high we thought what the hell! Write in our own language and they can have them translated, after all they are quite senior people and must get letters from foreigners all the time. Our first letter was to Sofia Henanz who is the Directora Insular de Ibiza y Formentera and the second letter was to the Commander of the Guardia Civil here, Capitain Rafael Rosique Colom. So far we have not heard from them but we hope that by the time we return home we will have either received an acknowledgement or a full reply... we shall see!

Selling the car is now becoming a major priority, I have an offer from a dealer which I need to get improved a bit and then we should be clear to sell. We have fingers crossed so are on the road this week "negotiating" - Perhaps I should don my velvet collard overcoat and trilby and start going round the garages here speaking like Arthur Daley... Again, perhaps not!

Scare of the week..........

Came home today and could not hear the BBC on my PC, we leave it on to deter unwanted visitors. Anyway, no sound, in fact no Internet and then I discover NO PHONE!!! Telefonica have cut us off..... A call from my mobile FREE would you believe and I have advised that as we requested that it was to be cut off on the 1st September and we had not confirmed this they had cut it off now!! So where are the documents that I am supposed to confirm I ask.... We don't know is the upshot. Can I have the phone back on, yes, in 10 to 15 days!!! Can I have it on Urgently, yes, in 8 Days.... and it will cost you!.... OK goodbye. About 3 hours later I picked up the phone to pack and guess what... Yes, there was a dial tone... the phone had been put back on. Spain..... Ibiza..... Europe..... come back BT all is forgiven (and probably forgotten)

Getting ready to go!

OK, it took me ages to work out just where to start with the massive task of packing all our stuff into the dozens of boxes we have, many of which now contain the stuff that was in the house when we moved in! With only a couple of weeks to go we have now packed 57 boxes and also prioritized the order in which the box is to be shipped to us in the UK. Now we have run out of clean wrapping paper as I have now been banned from using newspaper as the ink on the Majorca printed editions of the paper comes off and you end up looking like a coal miner.

Temperatures have risen to as high as 30 degrees so I have toyed with the idea of packing in the nude as packing, dressed in even the lightest of clothing, leaves you dripping with sweat and feeling like an old dishcloth ( I have been told smelling like one too).

We are somewhat nervous at the moment about the ability of our removal man to get ALL our stuff into his box van even in two stages. We can only pray now and hope that we can get into a rental house as soon as possible after we get back.

It's hard to believe how much we have brought with us that we didn't want! We put this down to the over zealous packers when we moved out here as they moved so fast ahead of us we couldn't control what they were doing. So as we repack we find an item that is now destined for the bin down the road.

Right, back the sauna pack house and see if we can lose some weight... I know I ache like the devil now and will be jumping on the scales at the end of this week to see how much weight I have lost... unfortunately this does not come with a six pack these days, more like a Keg!

Me and DIY

I have always been a reluctant participant in that pastime called "Do It Yourself"or more fittingly DIY, that all my friends seem so skilled and adept at. For they, as well as saving Hundreds of pounds in erecting and assembling all sorts of things from shelves to complete buildings outshine me in all DIY respects. Now it's not difficult to explain to you just why I am a reluctant participant, it's that pure and simply, I am just plain useless at it.

I recall times when I would try my hand at anything DIY, be it a job on my car or a small job at home only to discover I was missing a critical component or had run out of paint for the final window frame or a roll of wallpaper that would let me finish the whole room. So I stopped DIY all together only to be shamed back into yet another stressful and temper shredding "small job" in the kitchen or bathroom later on. I have had some successes though but they were often spoiled by forces outside my control, like the kitchen carpet tiles I laid only to have the cat decide to have a "dietary malfunction" and bury it with the newly laid bright red and grey tiles. Or then there was the £50 wall.. in emulsion terms! Oh, there are more, but too many to mention.

Well, DIY here in sunny Ibiza has been infrequent but none the less stressful. I have already mentioned in an earlier posting about the smell we had from the septic tank that thanks to an ex-pats Blog I was able to solve at a cost of €1 and some minor discomfort as a result of sealant being stuck to me rather than the toilet base.

There have been some small jobs around the house, changing a light fitting, a picture hung there or a repair to a chair here..... nothing big. Then this week we had a small problem in that we lost a small(but vitally important) piece of plastic down the drain of the wash hand basin in the bathroom. Now I had retrieved this item once before by removing the pipe under the sink, retrieving the item and putting everything back together without difficulty. So when the same thing happened over the weekend I had no problem deciding to do the job again expecting the it to take no longer than 5 minutes. This was not to happen as the vital missing component was not to be found where I had expected it and I was forced to reassemble the plumbing to its former state. This is the point at which the five minute job became a 2 hour ordeal of bad temper, cut fingers, strained muscles and massive dehydration! First of all I could not reassemble the small length of pipes into their former configuration nor seal the pressure joints to any sensible degree where they were water tight. In the end I called a plumber - a "fontanero"!! My wounds are healing, both physical and emotional and the leaks have stopped too and I am resolved once more to avoid DIY, at all costs!

Living with Auntie!

I have been giving some thought to the fact that on our return to the UK we will be staying with my Aunt for a short while. Now, this is not a new experience for me but it is one I have not experienced for a great number of years... probably 39 years to be precise. I have quite fond thoughts about time spent with my Aunt going back to when I was a youngster, in London and later on holidays in "the country" and finally just after I came out of the Army.

As a child she would "baby sit me", take me out, take me to the cinema and generally have to put up with me playing gooseberry when she could have well done without me being around. On one occasion when we were alone in our somewhat gloomy London house we were disturbed by a noise in the house that she quickly decided was a burglar (or some sort of intruder) so, we barricaded ourselves into the sitting room until my grandmother came home and the police were sent for.... I was accused of leaving the front door open..... I didn't, I promise.

During these times together we would play games and one that has stuck in my mind involved me being blindfolded while my Aunt would lead me "Up the Bishops stairs", a small pile of books on the floor, or ask me to taste the Bishops blood (!!) and then get me to sip something that was perhaps vinegar only to be be followed by her placing a very soggy grape in my hand telling me "this is the Bishops eye" at which point I think I would freak out.

Much later in life, when I would come home on leave from the Army, I would stay with her in a bungalow she had near Portsmouth. Bearing in mind we were adults it may surprise you that on one occasion she decided to lock me outside in the Garden, I think she had "flicked" my head and I had chased her outside. In any event we spent about 15 minutes chasing round and round the outside as she tried to keep ahead of me locking doors and windows as we went. I think that the sight and sound of this accompanied by the barking of her poodle must have mystified the neighbours.

For some time after she was widowed I would act as a chaperone, going with her to parties and other events where she needed a partner, or course this hampered any ideas I had of "pulling" a young lady at any of these events as come the end of the night it would have been like Cinderella at midnight with me darting off to get my Aunt home. One memorable night "pouring" her through the front door we were confronted by a very angry Grandmother in her curlers and dressing own, toe tapping and arms folded. "What do you call this bringing her home like this state"? Well, something like that anyway.

I don't think things will be like that again as we are both now so far advanced in years that having an ASBO served would not be the type of award that we would look forward too.

I hope our stay is not too stressful for her and that we are soon out of her space and in our new house.... I must not outstay my welcome! We are very grateful her help with our move and look forward to seeing her and adding a new "Bond experience" to her retirement!!

Just a reminder.........

Will she notice I changed from this to this?

Bird Watching - Ibiza

Now I know that my regular readers will now be saying "ooh yes, bird watching, really"? Well let me tell you I have been really spotting birds, wild birds that is and not those at the clubs wild because they can't get in or wild because they could and the prices are too high. No, these are the genuine feathered variety and there are many to choose from and see each day.

When we first arrived here we were driven to distraction by the "squeaky" Owl that squeaked day and night until I was ready to go and hunt it down. Then there were the spectacularly coloured ones that came and went, the Hoopoo, an odd bird at first glance but a sight to behold. Then we had the partridges up in the small field behind the house that my daughters dog decided were to be played with, they didn't think so though. But most spectacular of all have been the Hawks/Kestrels/ Falcons.... I have packed my "Birds of Ibiza" book now so I can't be precise but I think we have two varieties lurking about the place. There is a rather large one that soars high into the sky with its wings spread like a Spitfire (a WW2 Fighter for those too young to know what I mean) using the thermals to rise into the sky and slowly circle down to earth in a most leisurely fashion, sweeping back into the sky as soon as it gets to near to the ground again. The other afternoon and I know I have mentioned in some detail in "it's Another Sunday Morning" posting, was the spectacular sight that swept past V as she was unlocking the gate when the falcon swooped down and over her head by no more than about 5 feet. Today, it happened again but this time it was hunting a small and very agile bird that flew in as erratic fashion as possible but the Sparrow Hawk (? ) never lost it in flight although we didn't see if the bird was caught...

Anyway, it's back to the beach tomorrow for some proper bird watching although I think someone may be going to look at the muscular and tanned bloke who managed the pedalos and banana boats (He is easily spotted by the very large tattoo of a lizard that covers most of his back) and its NOT me doing the watching either!!!

I regret to remind you that "Failed medical experiments" posing as drivers in small very fast cars still give cause for concern as we negotiate the highways and byeways of Ibiza. Clearly these are highly specialised cars that are equipped with two pedals, "Go" and "Stop", one big lever that says "Fast Forward", a great big RED button in the center of the steering wheel that says "beep beep beep" and of course the vital missing component of all these cars (apart from a driver with a brain), the Rear View Mirror!

Crossing the road one day at a perfectly visible pedestrian crossing one such "experiment" approached us in a large version of this special type of vehicle (a 4x4 or SUV I am never sure which) and bearing in mind that we were on the crossing it was with some speed that he approached whilst gazing out to his left at the bevy of newly arrived beauties who were standing on the corner. His passenger kindly beckoned us to cross, but we being human and not "failed medical experiments" chose to stop and wait to see if he would stop... he didn't. It was only at the last minute that he spotted us out of the corner of his eye and managed to stop but only with the typical lack of grace a Orangutan driving an SUV could manage. I wanted to call out and quote an expression I caught in a TV series we have been watching here in TV called "Ed" - I wanted to call out and say "Hey, you upright St Bernard" or "you knuckle dragging cretin" but being of sound mind I erred in the favour of discretion And simply glowered belligerently and strolled across the road - who's macho now?

With D Day looming we will start the second phase of packing and then really feel the 30 degree heat and 70% humidity - but will we lose weight?

We will have to wait and see.

In the heat of the Night..... and the Day

The weekly newspaper, The Ibiza Sun, has been reporting the weather forecast for the next seven days and each week you may just have well have had single line saying, "Weather, same as last week - Hot"! The temperature has been hovering at 29-30 degrees each day with only minimal relief from about 10pm when there is a hint of cool breeze. However, this heat is made all the more oppressive due to the very high humidity levels that are blamed for almost every problem that may effect a human being from headaches to lethargy.

We have an air conditioning unit that pours out a stream of cold air at a freezing 16 degrees but even that is not enough to spread about the house in general. So with some "Heath Robinson" like ingenuity we have positioned fans that either blast us directly or divert the chilled air around the corners of each room in an attempt to cool the bedroom.... it doesn't work!

So, laying in (or actually laying ON) the bed each night it is not unusual to wake with the feeling that you had just emerged from swimming across the nearby bay from San Vincente. We were talking the other day and the thought that given all the fluids were were losing in this heat how come we were not losing weight given the sauna like conditions? After showering and cooling down we only need to take a few steps and find ourselves drenched in sweat once again.

Night time is of course very uncomfortable but sitting on the terrace which is sunny all day is like sitting in an oven and I can only spend a small time sitting or laying out before feeling the need to seek out a cold drink and some shade... I am not good at just laying and now that I have run out of things to read, broken my catapult, been defeated by the growth of weeds in the extensive garden (fields!!) I have filled in time by doing a bit of packing but even that is draining in the heat of the day.

Ants, there seem to be two species, are also a problem. There are the rather large ones who pretty much leave us alone, preferring instead to form a large column and do their work (what ever that may be). Then there are the tiny little ants which are more of a problem swarming as they do all over the terrace and seemingly immune to the ant poison that I have dusted liberally around. These little devils are easily diverted by taking an over ripe fig from the nearby tree and letting them go an deal with it in their own way. Those ants that are not attracted to his goody still seem to manage to get on to an exposed bit of skin where one recently sank it's fangs (do ants have fangs?) into my upper thigh which in the blink of an eye numbed an area about 6 inches across which was initially quite painful. I have declared war on this insect invaders but fear we will be long gone by the time they have gone to better feeding grounds.

Our "Sentinal Bugs" seem to have departed the house. There were hundreds and we watched several hatchings but suddenly they seem to have flown away. Oh yes, they fly! I wondered if they were being eaten by the many lizards that are here or the Cicadas.

In retrospect.....

... I think my last post was, shall we say, a little venomous and so I have to apologise for that and promise to be more light hearted in future. I'm sure the heat has affected me to some degree because on my Veterans Message Board I launched into a very politically correct polemic about racism and bigotry... subjects not usually part of my oh so not politically correct persona. Anyway, I have recovered now and will only discuss the downside of sunbathing. I am unable to stay still for very long on a lounger with or without a parasol. First you have to strip off, I am doing nude these days it's so much easier than donning swimming shorts and easier to apply the lotion. That's another thing, when you put the lotion on it's almost impossible to get the stuff spread in the right places and no matter who you convince to disturb themselves and lather you up there is always a patch that gets burnt somehow. Then its you hands that become slick as an eel so that oily smudges are left on the pages of the book (possibly a rare 1st Edition that you were loaned and told "DON'T read it on the beach" or something) that no matter how much rubbing only get worse. OK, you slide into position, aim yourself at the sun and relax? No. First you find that your drink, book and sun hat (Baseball cap actually) are slightly too far away, there are ants crawling around you by the million and the flies have decided that the brand of lotion you are using is too good to pass with a good sniff and lick! We do have a number of wasps but unlike British wasps they are completely disinterested in us or our sweet sticky food and drinks, they live only to make elaborate nests and kill and eat other insects and eat figs - Thank Heavens!

Now that I am greased, positioned correctly, free from annoying insects and ready to read page 123 of the paperback (where all the pages have become unglued and have to be held together with both hands while reading) The cat arrives "Miiieeeoowwww", I suppose is Spanish cat speak for "hola", she wants attention! Up and down, backwards and forwards, under the lounger and then on it only to be ejected with a shove. Last time she did this she bit the back of my arm and when that only got her a reprimand she put her paws round my shoulders and nuzzled me behind on my neck!

I eventually give up, come in write some stuff for this blog and go back outside and start all over again. However by this time I am losing moisture faster than a leaking.... Oh I don't know.. but fast!

Right back to the lounger and another dose of sun....

It's another Sunday Morning

It's yet another hot and humid Sunday morning in Ibiza and I have just had my "healthy" breakfast (for the first time this week!) and thought I would have a glance through the weekly English speaking Newspaper - The Ibiza Sun, for last week just to see what has been going on.

The Front Page has the headline EMERGENCY FUNDING which on reading made me feel if I had truly landed in cloud cuckoo land. It would seem that due to the drop in visiting tourists (mainly the British) the Island Council have decided therefore to spend €600,000 on a Marketing Campaign in the UK... I don't think they have twigged that an exchange rate so bad the £ and the € were almost equal, that the prices here have consistently risen to make a "cheap" holiday a thing of the past. I saw a beach sign the other day that proclaimed a beach bed and a parasol at €3.50 each so for a family of four they could see themselves paying for 4 beds, 2 parasols for 14 days a nice sum of €294(£245) by today's exchange rate. Another beach was advertising these items at€4.50... Spend the €600000 on reducing prices and cleaning up the beach areas I say! The complain about the "credit crunch" here but they ain't seen nothing yet! The greed bubble is sure to break here soon and then perhaps they will see the light?

So, on to page two where the news is about the rising cases of skin cancer on Ibiza which comes at a good time with the number of fools wandering around like lobsters in the town. I have noticed the British seem to wear less in the streets when not on the beach. The Germans and Dutch are hard to tell from the Brits now though.. sometimes its even difficult to hear which languages are being spoken!! I heard a Scandinavian the other day only to realise it was a Welsh group passing us.

Jelly fish have also added to the beach problems this year, here and in the Med in general. The fishermen have been offered a bounty for each jelly fish netted... it's not working. The Italian resorts have placed nets off shore to protect the beaches, unheard of here.

The high price of sea-front holiday rentals is also headlined and I must admit that I was shocked to hear the other day that most rentals are in the €2000 to €4000 per week in the high season!! Out of my league I'm afraid.

There are short reports on the pending arrival of a natural gas pipeline to the Island ... someday.... a fashion show by the "Famous" Adlib label (?. The arrest of a Romanian thief who tried to steal a wallet from an unsuspecting Frenchman who he convinced had run over a cat! Looks like he faces 15 years in gaol and has already had to pay €1200 in compensation to the Frenchman. Of course the Spanish do not have ANY thieves in the community. Under the heading "Police State" it reports that the Guardia Civil is up to full strength with "close to 600" officers on the Island. Trouble is a "large number are trainees" - Yes and we had two of them come here to bumble around our "crime scene"

Oh, the summer sales have started!!

For such an Island in denial about crime, i.e. It's everyone apart from the Spanish and there isn't much crime anyway, there is an awful lot of crime reported in the paper and if you walk past the Court in Ibiza town there is always a queue of miscreants lolling about waiting to be dragged before the presiding judge. I have to say that most criminals are not detected they usually for some strange reason give themselves up.

Road accidents although frequent are by some miracle not as frequent as you would expect given my observations in my previous post so I will not add any more for the time being.

There are lots of pronouncements from the Authorities here to "move up market" or "improve the standards of tourists" - This is such a stupid assertion that I find myself lost for words. The facilities here are often poor (except in the exceedingly upmarket venues) and attract what they were designed to attract.. people wanting a lot of booze, cheap food, access to clubs and a sandy beach to lay on to recover from the night before. The Council here claim they want a better tourist yet ignore pimps, prostitutes and drug dealing on the streets in San Antoni... the police, many of whom police a visiting population yet do not speak their language even basically. Sorry, but the ethos here is based upon GREED.

Back to more happier subjects I think.... The weather while oppressively hot and humid is fabulously sunny for the next seven days according to the forecast. The paper prints a chart for seven days... why bother when they could simply print the line.... "29 degrees / Sun" !

Weight loss.... we continue to battle against the ravages of time and despite our "healthy Mediterranean diet" we are struggling to lose a few pounds before we return and despite a pretty big set back for me which I claim to have been "water retention" I am back on track and have got back to where I was happy a few months ago... I have to work harder though so no more "one beer a day".

Our diet is largely low or far free so we are at a loss what it is that causes us to put it on (weight) or not lose it!!

The wildlife is still very interesting and we have a new generation of Lizards now with several tiny new ones scurrying about the terrace and clearly unafraid of humans. There are the thousands of Cicadas still chirruping away at high volume and a new HUGE Gecko that is living somewhere in or on the garage block. The multitude of scarlet "Sentinel" bugs are not as prevalent now but they seem to breed in hundreds, but they seem a bit thin on the ground at present. Ants in their millions are plaguing us though, they vary in size to tiny highly venomous ones that nip you and numb an area on your leg as big as you hand! The there are quite large industrious ones that toil all day carrying small bit and pieces into their nests.

The most spectacular sight has to have been the Falcon that nests nearby. The other day on our return from town, V was unlocking the gate and I was sitting in air-conditioned bliss in the car when the falcon swooped down and over her head by no more than about 5 feet - she didn't notice it at all! I then watched the bird circle and glide all afternoon, simply using the thermals to soar high in the sky and then in a downward spiral ending with a sweep right across the field in front of the house giving a warning "screee" as it flew by. In the sky it looks so big with a wide wingspan that is reminiscent of the those photographs of a wartime Spitfire.

Our cat visitor continues to bring us gifts of the bodies of lizards that she thinks will endear us to her.... Hmmm. Not when she eats them and then suffers the consequences! Uva (grape) arrives most days and either pesters us to distraction or by studiously ignoring us by sitting with her back to us in the shade and the stalking off with a haughty strut when we ignore her!

Well, it's a new week now with only 24 days to go before we come back... I have to sell my car!!!!!

Back again soon....