Petrol Station Rage - AGAIN!!!

Today didn’t start off great. I was stressed about how stressed DD (my horse) was and worried about the little donkey escaping and as I drove to work in the golf, as my Discovery was off sick, with no radio to keep mind  off stuff I felt quite down.

On arriving at work I discovered both Rich and I had forgotten our laptops so off I went home again to pick them up. I’d only got as far as the roundabout when I realised I was seriously out of fuel. Why hadn’t Rich noticed this when he drove us to work???? I was feeling very irritated by this stage and as I pulled into the fuel station a car pulled in just in front of me. Great now I’d have to wait for him to fill up. The driver,  all 50 stone of him (OK, slightly exagerating, maybe 22 stone) got out of his gold Audi. He was wearing a pink jumper, now don’t get me wrong I’m no slim Jim but a 50 odd stone man really should not be wearing pink! Its just so not right! I just knew he was going to wind me up. He made his way towards the pump, stopping to give one of his passengers some money then he waited, yes, bloody waited a full 5 minutes for the attendant to arrive put his fuel in. Why oh why could he not put his own fuel in? It aint rocket science!!!! My car started spluttering away, obviously using the last few drops of fumes and I sat there planning my next move. I knew if my car ran out of fuel,it would never start again so I started playing out the scenarios in my mind. Maybe I could ask the attendant to push me out of the way whilst I made an SOS call to Rich, who incidentally is never too pleased about me breaking down or maybe I should call him now in anticipation. If only Mr Pink Fucking jumper could have just put his own bloody fuel in and I could put mine in things would be OK. The attendant eventually comes and puts in his fuel, a full tank, obviously, whilst he stands there and watches, then when shes finished, he has a little conversation with another of his passengers before going into the shop to pay by bloody credit card. By now I’m revving, anger pulsing through my veins, that will show him what a dick he's being!!!! So he gets back to his car, adjusts his radio, plays with his mirrors, puts his seat belt on, brushes his hair & lights a fag before eventually driving off. I did make it to the pump without running out of fuel and managed to put my own fuel in, pay the attendant and drive off, whilst putting my seat belt on like any normal person should!!!!

The Worst Day of My Life by Granadino (DD) aged 28 & 3/4

It all started off like a normal Sunday. The human was late feeding us and Lolly and I got a bit irritated. Lolly started throwing the water butt around but she’s like that, impatient. The water got refilled and we got our hay  and a bit of cereal then had a little plod around our paddock before standing head to tail and gently grooming each other, all quite normal.

 It was early afternoon that things went a bit strange. The human came in armed with head collars. This meant one of two things, either we were going out on a ride or moving house again (which we did quite regularly). Lolly was approached first and carefully avoided the human, doing a few laps of the paddock and attempting to jump down a wall which TBH was a fail as she misjudged it and stumbled, mainly due to the muddy terrain. The human gave up with Lolly and took me unaware and I was lured into the headcollar. It was all a bit sneaky really. She draped the rope around my neck whilst I was eating my hay and once I was secured that was it, the head collar was on before I knew it. Lolly couldn’t believe I’d been duped so easily so decided she may as well give in and be caught too. On the plus side there was no sign of any saddlery so perhaps we were just going out for a walk to eat some nice lush grass. Lolly had a damn good brush by the human, which she loved. Apparently girls love getting their hair done.

Let me explain about Lolly. Her real name is Lorelai but the man human couldn't say it so called her Lolly. We’d been together for three years and it was love at first sight. I was the main man in my herd at the time and she was always my favorite girl, I really fell for her, despite the age gap, I am 28 & 3/4 and have been for around 4 years, although my passport says I'm 23 and Lolly is 6. I taught Lolly so much, like not to be scared on cars. She hated cars when we first met. I taught her how to stand still when being brushed, as it was actually quite pleasurable. I taught her to tolerate the humans riding us as it meant at least we saw new, exciting things. I taught her that dogs & goats were OK but not to let them get too close. I taught her it was OK to go into a horsebox or was that her teaching me that? I can’t remember. I taught her that I was the boss and I always ate first and chose which pile of hay or bucket of food I wanted but most of all I taught her how to love. We really did love each other. I just didn’t realise how much.

After Lolly got brushed it started to rain and bizarrely the human came out and clips ropes to us, promising new adventure. I gladly led the way up the track, stopping off for the odd munch of grass, yummy. We stopped at the end of the track and had quite a picnic. Despite the rain I was really quite enjoying myself. Suddenly a big horsebox pulled up, really posh it was. So that’s what was happening, we were moving AGAIN. Never mind I was up for a new adventure as long as Lolly was by my side.

The back of the horsebox opened and there stood the tiniest little donkey I’d ever seen. I had a feeling we’d actually met before but Lolly wasn’t so sure. Although I’d taught her not to be scared of lorries or even tractors, I obviously missed the lesson on donkeys. My god, she freaked!!! Anybody would have thought it was a monster standing there!!! She spun the human around a good many times, it would have been nice to see her fall or at least get trodden on but nope she stayed up right. The little donkey just stood there,staring at us, I wasn’t that interested TBH, there was too much of a buffet going on for me. Lolly went to investigate and the next time I looked up she was walking up the ramp of the horsebox. I would make sure I wouldn’t do it that easily for them when my turn came. Suddenly the door shut and the lorry started to move! ‘No wait for me’ I shouted. ‘FFS I’ll go inside, just come back’.

I was being led back toward my paddock. My darling Lolly was driving off in the distance. I called and called but to no avail. I found myself getting quite angry and showed the stupid human just how cross I was by doing a  few rather large fly bucks, narrowly missing her head. To make matters worse that bloody donkey was following me, albeit slowly.

We got back to the paddock and I was released with the donkey. Seeing my mood, it ever so quietly tried to do a runner but the human busted it .He said he didn’t want to live with an old grump and quite honestly I didn't want to live with an ass!!! I wanted Lolly. The human tried to console me with some more hay and even some oates which made me even more mad, so I galloped as fast as I could past my human and bucked right near her face! That would show her! What a bitch for  In fact I’m still stood by the gate calling out every so often in the hope she will hear me. I can’t eat, I can’t sleep and that bloody donkey follows me around like I’m his parent. My life is in tatters. Will I ever get over this????

Yours Sadly

Granadino

24th November

Well its been a strange day so far. I was all happy this morning apart from a touch of wine flu. As I drove off down our track a farmer was fannying around at the end of our track & buggered things up a bit. I'd just opened a can of drink, put it in the drink holder and was looking forward to sipping it all the way to Alcalali, where I was heading to pick up some hay. Anyway due to the the farmer fannying around, I hit  rocky bit, coming out of our track, which was a bit steep and perhaps I accelerated a bit hard and my drink toppled over, all over my feet and new suede shoes and got wedged under the accelerator!

Next was a stop at the bins. I hate doing the bins! At the first bin, I tottered out in the suede high heels, opened the bin which seemed unusually heavy only to find it was full so I got back in and repeated the exercise twice more until I hit jackpot and found an empty one but the bin men came whilst I was mid emptying and I got bin emptying fright, dropped a bag on the floor, scattering it contents all over! I then had to scramble around, red faced with the bin men to retrieve it and it seemed every time I made a move one of the bin men would make the same moved and we would nearly collide, it was like some weird dance. Mortifying!!!

I continued my journey and managed to encounter more than my fair share of pesky cyclists. I nearly got one when I was changing the CD but sadly missed.

Then the bloody fuel light came on. No problem. I stopped at the garage where the person in front of me couldn't decide which pump was going to finish first so kind of hovered between them which meant I was also hovering with my arse stuck out on the road, I didn't get hit though but did get beeped at which was a bit stressful. It eventually chose one and I got stuck behind some retard who was filling up 4 bloody barrels in the back of his Mondeo. As I was waiting, feeling ver irritated, some woman in a black 4 x 4 drove by staring at me like I was some loony. Now normally I would have ignored her or maybe stuck my fingers up at her or maybe even give her an eye roll but no, I stuck my tongue out at her!FFS!!!! Why did I have to do that??? Thought she was going to get out and punch me! It did amuse the petrol attendant woman (not the lesbian looking one) who was pissing herself laughing, so much so that she couldn't find my petrol cap (turns out I didn't have one).

By now I was feeling a bit agitated and TBH if somebody had offered me a wine or Valium, I would have gladly taken it.

Things got a bit better when I reached the horse food shop. I managed to negotiate a deal, swapping one of my horses for a baby donkey, as you do. Although it was a worry how I would tell Rich, who was actually OK about it.

To top off my unusual morning, my car did the customary breakdown but that's my own fault for telling Matt, yesterday, that it was running fine and he could borrow it.

Never mind, off out to lunch soon with Daddio and having the last dress fitting.

TAXIS in Spain

I guess when you live in the UK getting a Taxi is just a matter of picking up the phone and dialing one up. I'm guessing there are lots to choose from, too. I'm only guessing as I haven't lived in the UK for 16 years but when I left, it was very easy to get a Taxi, absolutely anywhere. The only time a Taxi was a bit tricky to locate was after a nightclub finished and maybe New Years eve. I can actually remember having a really shit New Years Eve when I was 19, I expect I'd been dumped, I can't quite remember and failed to pull that night, probably because I would have had a face like a smacked arse that night! Then it took 2 hours standing in the freezing cold, with little flakes of snow, blowing in the icy wind, in my little white leather skirt with matching white leather jacket and I expect white stilettos and a bad, orange fake tan waiting for a sodding taxi, which cost 3 times the normal rate.

In Spain, getting a Taxi is a whole different ball game. Take the airport. There are loads of Taxis at the airport, getting a taxi there is no problem, that is unless you want to go further than Benidorm. If you do then you have to get a taxi to Benidorm then try and persuade a Benidorm taxi to take you on the remaining part of your journey, this may take some negotiating, as they are a bit reluctant to go our of their zone, maybe because of zone restrictions or maybe because of fear of not being paid, I'm not sure. I dread to think what the cost would be but the private (illegal) taxis cost around €130 one way so I'm thinking the taxis would be more.

So, local taxis!!! What local taxis???? Apparently most towns have one, yes one, but in my experience they don't like to go out after 9.00pm and as you may imagine, they get booked up. I found out the reason why we don't have taxis in our villages, the other day and its not the obvious, that everywhere is so remote and impossible to find, its because each town hall issues taxi licenses but only a few and at a cost of €80,000, yes!!!! €80,000!!! Then the taxi drivers have to give the town hall 42% of their earnings!!! Thats after buying their vehicle!

So, if you are visiting us in Spain don't rely on taxi's! You can hire a car from €42 a week. Its a no brainer. OK, it may seem daunting as you are driving on the other side of the road but there's hardly any traffic and even I can do it! Believe me when I tell you that you WILL need a car. All our villages and towns are very spread out and although there are buses, they may only run twice a day lol.

Wheel chairs and shopping

I’d never really had to think about what it must be like to be unable to walk, apart from the twice I broke my foot! The first time was the worst, as it was a bigger injury and I spent weeks wheeling myself around on a black, imitation leather, office chair to do everything I normally do in the house, you know like sweeping the floors, cooking, washing up etc and if I was lucky I’d get wheeled outside for a change of scenery but that was always a major task due to the rough terrain of the rickety flagstone path and gravel, it always presented an element of risk. The second time I just put up with the pain and walked the best I could with a cast, moulded to my foot.

Daddio has been in bed for around two weeks with a severe bout of gout and is, as expected nearly tearing his hair out. Every time I go around he was shrieking in pain as little Nelson (chi) launches himself at his foot, like he thinks it may be helpful. Mummio has decided to take to her sick bed as well, I joke that it’s probably due to the stress of actually having to participate in real life, like going to the chemist (which she managed fine), cooking (jury is out), putting fuel in her car (first time in 50 years), that could have been a disaster though as she went to a manned petrol station and asked for €20 of fuel. She was pretty lucky she actually ended up with petrol rather than diesel as she wouldn’t have been able to call for help as I suspect the mobile phone she has carried around for years, unable to turn on, would have been flat and she would never have been actually able to remember the code anyway. She did manage a little bit of shopping but could only manage to purchase bread, milk and cheese as she only went out with €10 and didn’t know how to use her credit card. Seriously though we're all very proud of the way she has embraced the tasks that she has never had to contend with before and she's had to do them whilst feeling poorly.

   Anyway I received the phone call from Daddio this week, requesting that I take him shopping. Panic raced through my veins! How the hell would I manage to maneuver a 20  odd stone man into and out of a car, into a wheel chair and then push a trolley whilst supervising the wheel chair???? Why couldn’t he just give me a list????

Daddio somehow managed to put his own wheel chair, which refused to collapse, into his car and we met up after I  had dropped off a customers car, and proceeded to Lidl. Now, I’m not the best person at shopping, as I suffer the most dreadful trolley rage. The old people & some young, who have all the time in the world, dither in the isles, debating the pros and cons of Heinz baked beans or for 2 cent cheaper Branstons or whatever. Then they block the isles whilst looking at the bargain basement isle so you can’t move! They really should invent a one way system, you know like in Ikea, although in Ikea, it always reminds me of going to see father Christmas, following the arrows, but you never get to father Christmas and get the present at the end, which is always  big disappointment. There needs to be better organisation in the supermarkets. If I was in charge of supermarkets, not only would they have a one way system with give way signs at the end of every isle, it would be more organised at the checkouts. I’m fantastic at check outs. My groceries are on the conveyor belt promptly, thrown on haphazardly, admittedly, as my worst nightmare would be the groceries going through before I’d unloaded the trolley and it has happened a few times when you get a bloody Speedy Gonzles throwing the items through, faster than you can put them on, until you get a pile up on the other side, forget your plastic carrier bags and have to throw it in your trolley before opening your purse, which I normally do after unloading onto the conveyor belt and I get the right money out as I add it up whilst I’m going around. It’s a very old habit, dating back to the days when I was on a very strict budget of €50 a week, for a big shop. Then its sods law that you drop your purse and have to scramble about on the floor, chasing your coins, red faced and flustered whilst the people behind you are tutting, loudly.

So, we arrive at Lidl, the busiest branch in the Costa Blanca. I manage to unload the wheelchair without scratching the paint work on Daddio’s car. We manged to seat Daddio, after a few attempts and then I have to push…….. Now I’m no light weight but it was a struggle to push him, so he resulted in moving his own wheels, which incidentally he was quite good at. As I got the trolley, he’d gained quite a few yards on me and wheelchair 131 ( must have been a hospital wheel chair at some point), manged to enter the store before me. It took a few isles to gain a rhythm. We tried with me in front, with the trolley but I went too fast, so I went behind and he pointed at stuff for me to put in the trolley (think Little Britain). It was going quite well, until we both decided to aim for the cashew nuts at the same time, I slightly lost my balance and crashed into his bad foot!!!!! Well, I’ve never heard Daddio swear so much AND in public. I had a flashback of being 17 and in a crowded pub, in Woodley, where I grew up and turning around straight into a burns victim, dressed from head to toe in bandages. He also cursed, whilst I stood there, muttering apologies, whilst the whole pub went quiet and stopped to look at the idiot who had stood on the poor burns victim in her white stilettos! Utterly mortifying it was. I bet his scars healed in time but that incident has scarred me physiologically for life. Mummio would have departed in embarrassment, at this stage but I stayed with it and waited for it to pass which it apparently didn’t and I’ve put his recovery back a week at least!

We managed the rest of the shop and an added trip to Iceland, without incident and I didn’t lose my temper once. People managed to stay out of our way and looked on with pity in their eyes, probably aimed at me with having to cope with it all!

Can I have a list next week???????

Sunday with the Spanish Dingles

Rich had to go into work as he's had a brain wave idea about the generator he's building. Not sure what the brain wave was and TBH, wasn't particularly interested at 8.00am on a Sunday morning.

We meet at around 11.00 near the Rastro in El Vergel and wander across the road to the Rastro (car boot type thing). Straight away we're contending with people with little dogs, getting pulled and yanked by their owners and nearly getting stepped on by people who, amazingly are actually interested in the stalls filled with items rescued from the bins. Saw a wonderful empty coke bottle for sale and a few empty whiskey bottles and although was tempted to buy, refrained. We're soon negotiating people in wheel chairs, mobility scooters and pushchairs (I've never seen so many in one place) and even a few old women on crutches! WTF! One woman on crutches was so bloody fast that she overtook us! Why, oh why do they bring these people to the market? Why would anybody want to get jostled about just to look at some rubbish on tables? Why not just sit them outside the bins? They could get the rubbish for free! Better still take them somewhere nice, like the beach.

A rather showy looking, white, standard poodle passed by, with its equally beautifully groomed owner. It sported a cutesy little ponytail in its head, complete with little pink ribbons but when it over took us it had clinkers attached to its bum! Why spend so much money and time on a well groomed pooch and then embarrass it by not sorting its bum bum out? Poor old Pheobe Trixabelle or what ever it was called, the shame!

THEN!!!! A bike (my favorite), a bloody woman pushing a bike through the crowds, spiking many whilst barging her way through! Unbelievable. Never mind, I thought, at least the fruit & veg will be OK. WRONG! Brown bananas, bruised apples and limp lettuce. There were some rather nice plants on one stall but at this stage, feeling very claustrophobic, hot, sweaty & irate, I couldn't face hauling it though the obstacles.

Only one thing could make this trip a little better and that's the Chinese bizarre so off we go, in our cars, park miles away, hike to the chincy and yep, it was closed!

Determined not to spend the day in, we drive home and I make a hastily put together picnic and we decide to go sight seeing around the Vall D'Ebo. We fill up with fuel and off we go. I must point out that Rich and I aren't the best at sight seeing and when we didn't find Caves in the first village we came across, we settled for a castle. In we drove, looked at the crowded car park, looked at the castle, looked at the hike up to the castle and swiftly drove back out again. We drove around mountains in search of some caves or perhaps a Lagoon or even a pond where we could stop and have the picnic but had to settle for a Font. We sat on a cold, stone wall watching the water drip out, a drop at a time and watched the tadpoles swim in and out of the algae. Didn't really fancy the 'fresh' mountain water but thankfully I'd packed a sprite. Rich ate his tuna mayo sandwich, on white and I had a handful of peanuts. We took the obligatory selfie, to prove we'd made it out of the house and off we went.

We got quite excited at one point in some remote village, as we saw a sign for a monument but it turned out to be a metal lions head on a wall with water coming out of its mouth, far more water than was at the font. We also saw a tall rock with a hole in the top. It was a far distance from where we were and Rich was unwilling to actually get out of the car to investigate so he took a photo through the window.

All this excitement was too much so we went for the yearly trip to the beach. Found a beautiful sandy beach which was practically empty and went and sat, leaning against some wooden things. Were soon joined by an aging black dog, attached to a pink lead. Had a long cuddle with the elderly dog, slagged off her condition a bit, before realising the owner was sat the other side of the wooden thing, Ooops. Took a quick selfie and hastily retreated back to the car and home for a roast which didn't happen because the meat hadn't defrosted, so jacket potatoes went in the oven for an hour before I realised the gas had run out in the oven and we still had raw potatoes! Cheese on toast it was!!!!!

Still have sand in our shoes to remember our time on the beach.

New Metaphor for Sex

‘I scored last night’, ‘I got to base 1, 2^nd base & home run, strike out, pitching, catching’, ‘Any hole is a goal’, ‘if there's grass on the wicket, lets play cricket’. All these sayings are used to describe sexual acts. I’m sure there are many more but have you noticed they are all about competing. Is sex about competing? Maybe if you are a 14 year old boy (or maybe younger these days) bragging to your mates about fingering Courtney Hughes from class East 2, behind the bikes sheds or maybe the girls also do the bragging these days or maybe both. But my point is, with sayings like these, which I know have been around for years, it gives youngsters the impression that sexual activity is competitive.

I think what we need is a new metaphor for sex.

 Maybe something like ‘ We had tapas’ could be the same as base 1-2. You know a variety or little starters (foreplay). 

 ‘ We shared a pizza’ for base 3,that implies it was something you both enjoy and share and lets be honest if you are willing to share a pizza, particularly with extra cheese and chilli’s then it must involve a certain degree of love.

‘We participated in Cheesecake’ would be something very special that you would only share with somebody you trusted implicitly!!!!

I wonder is Pizza is on the menu tonight in my house???????

Horse Whispering!

I first learnt about horse whispering in 2009. I’d opened a horse rescue centre with a very talented lady called D. Her real name was …………….. but D was her Buddhist name, which I must admit I didn’t understand at the time. D was a new friend of mine and although her personality traits and views were alien to me, I was secretly intrigued. I was a little bit scared by her oversizes tattoo on her arm of some Indian chief, I think, I didn’t dare look at it for too long and it took a long time to follow her example, to only see good in people and understand why they are like they are, but I have to say that lady changed my life.  So much so I left my abusive relationship, along with the Horse Sanctuary, walked out of a million euro house, in the clothes I was wearing and never looked back, but that’s another story. Thank you D, you gave me the strength!

D, in my eyes was the most beautiful, kind person I’d ever met and I was truly in awe of her. D was undertaking a Natural Horsemanship course (Monty Roberts), which I had witnessed in Ireland a few years before and straight after, went out and bought a duly headcollar and expected my horses to suddenly become magically well behaved, well mannered and orderly, after a few tugs on the rope, attached to the headcollar, which was red, incidently. After probably two attempts, I can’t really remember and being stamped on by a rearing horse resulting in a broken toe, it was hung up in the tack room in Ireland, long forgotten, where it still probably resides, under years worth of dust.

NH as I’ll call it was a bit ‘out there’ at this time. It involved, amongst other things, riding your horse without a bit! Yep no control (through pain). Some just thought it a kind of hippy thing that would pass, After each course, D would come back and practise what she’d learnt, with me on the side lines taking it all in. The first thing she learnt was an exercise called ‘join up’. Basically (all you horsey types don’t get arsey if I’ve got this a little wrong) you bring the horse into a paddock wearing a headcollar and lead rope, bring it to the centre, move it to face north, then east then south then west, release it and chase it away. Every time the horse stops you chase it away from you. You get very red faced, out of breath and sweaty (you must wear your hard hat for safety, of course and to add to your sweat), then eventually the horses ears start twitching, the one nearest  to you comes forward (or was it backwards?), once this happens you then start strutting forwards with your arms folded,  head down, not making eye contact and eventually the horse comes up behind you and puts its nose on your shoulder and follows you. Unbelievable????

I did a lot of research into this NH and started to apply it to all aspects of my life. Poor Rich never stood a chance, after he met me. I didn’t exactly have him galloping around the paddock  with me banishing a long schooling whip, red faced and about to cardiac arrest, no. but every time he said he was wanting to go down the pub (something we couldn’t afford to do at the time) I told him to go. ‘ Yeah you go out and have a fantastic time. In fact why don’t you treat yourself to a nice lads night out in Benidorm, go on fuck off!!!!’ I simpered in my sweetest voice. He didn’t know what had hit him (not the whip by the way,) a woman who was standing before him, freshly out of the shower, in a silk nighty, encouraging him to go out on the piss. As expected he never did go out, although I always tried to encourage it!

I’ve had so much fun over the last few years using  NH on people. Well not so much fun but its enabled me to get exactly what I want in life without a fight. I just wish I’d known about it when my kids were young. When Harry was young and laying on the tiled floor of Tescos in Naas, which was covered in wet, muddy foot prints (it always rains in Ireland),waving his little legs and screaming at the top of his voice ‘ I want a bithcuit, give me a bithcuit, a chocolate bithcuit Mummy’, instead of dragging him by the arms, minus my intended shopping, out into the rain and into the car where I could yell at him in the privacy of my RAV 4, I could have got down on the floor with him and waved my legs about shouting& screaming ‘I want a bithcuit Harry’. Now that would have been much more fun and I bet he’d have got up and run away in embarrassment. I may never have been able to show my face again in that particular Tescos but to be honest it was a close call anyway, after dragging my screaming child, whose arms were rotating like a helicopter and legs treading invisible water at high speed!

Rich had seen me practise my NH at many dinner parties & event. My party piece involved parading husbands around lounges and chasing them with an imaginery whips only for them to start following me around like horses. However he wasn't really buying it, actually working on horses. So, when we got our first horse, I showed him (in a fashion as I’m no expert) how it works and thank goodness, to my surprise, as much as his, it did (thank you DD). I now do it with all my horses (& all the people I come into contact with),which in theory puts me in charge!

ps Sorry to all the husbands involved.

Viva Espana

We had Mark & Caroline, our best friends come up all the way from Murcia to celebrate Marks birthday, this weekend. Mark was celebrating 57 years but Caroline couldn't get the number 5 & 7 for his cake, a home baked fruit loaf, which she showed off about no end (bloody Delia), so she got 6 & 0 and wrote -3 on it! Nutter!

It was down to me to book somewhere to go on Saturday night (no pressure then) and I thought it maybe nice to go somewhere with a bit of music, not too far away so we could get a taxi. I just happened to be reading Female Focus, which we advertise in, don't get any customers from it but hey, it gets the name out there, when I saw an advert for a dinner dance on a Saturday night at Viva Espana. Now I'd been to this place many years ago (very touristy), we were meant to see the dancing horses which I actually think is terribly cruel and unnecessary but thankfully it rained and they put on an impromptu flamenco show which was a lot of stomping around on a stage above our heads, the noise was awful to be honest. I don't remember anything else about the night so I figured it was a safe bet as it couldn't have been too terrible.

We arrived at the restaurant at ten to nine, bloody starving, as us Brits do like to have our dinner at a sensible time, not the middle of the night. Thought we may have got the wrong night as the place was empty apart from a few staff faffing around putting bowls of salads in the middle of tables and a guy behind the bar that spent the whole night obsessively cleaning it. However we were soon greeted by a very pleasant Spanish lady who took us to our table. Abba was belting out over the PA system (that was a good sign, our type of music). Red wine was on the table but we soon ordered more, a bottle of white for me and some beers for the men. The waiter arrived. It took a while to remember who he reminded us of, it was somebody off the Adams family. We did kind of think maybe he was really an undertaker, he looked like the living dead and was moonlighting as a waiter to drum up a bit of business. Rich caught him outside knocking back 3 red wines in a row, when he went out for  fag!

Abba type music was still playing as the diners started arriving. Most of them were in big groups, all of them were Spanish, most of the men wore cream chinos, most of the women had orange hair and ALL of them were over 60! We stuck out like a sore thumb being the only guiri's ( not a complimentary word for foreigners) here.

The starters arrived. I'd asked for vegetarian when I booked. It was tapas. We weren't expecting much as it was mass produced but the quality was amazing. We even got Rich eating a little crunchy fishy! Had to take a photo as proof! The mains didn't disappoint, tuna steak and a vegetarian paella for me! Amazing! I can't believe I got a vegetarian dish that wasn't tuna (Spanish think tuna is a vegetable). dessert was just up my street, too, lemon sorbet. Yummmmmm!

Just as the dinner finished and I was about to fall asleep, I can't seem to manage dinner, alcohol and staying awake unless I'm dancing, the music started. It was quite a surreal experience. As the music started, the men in their cream chinos, got up mid conversation, as did the orange haired women, went to the dance floor and started shuffling about with their hands around their women who were all much shorter than the men, so their hands covered their dowagers humps! It was all Spanish, old fashioned music. It was a bit like being time warped back to the Franco era.They then sat down and repeated the process through out the night.

The only exception to this robot programmed dancing was a trio, 2 women and a man of about 100, in the middle, who continuously line danced at the edge of the dance floor, same steps to every song, straight faces, very serious business. After about 2 songs a vision in black appeared. Black tight trousers, black shirt, gold belt and an array of gold medallions. We'd noticed him earlier, looking rather glum sitting at a table for two with a Mary from Coronation street look alike who was tightly packed into a black sequin number. I just presumed they hated each other or hated their pork chops or something. The vison who was an ugly version of Mateo off of Benidorm hit the floor BIG style, arms waving, hips swinging, at one point we thought they may have been hired as the entertainment. 'Mary' soon joined him and they got right into character, he even snogged Mary when the part required it, even though he was very obviously gay. He loved the bull fighting song where he even did the bulls ears with his fingers.

Suddenly, 'You better shape up' (Grease) came on in Spanish and before we knew it, Caroline and I were dancing our way to the dance floor, you know where you do that kind of skip thing with your arms flapping a bit until you find a spot, not next to anybody that can actually dance and in hind sight not next to an oversized mirror where you can witness how bad your dancing actually is. I'd got the giggles by this stage and my trousers were nearly falling down and I was trying not to wet myself. We got right into it, shouting the 'woo woo woo' or was it 'woo hoo hoo?' bits as they were the only words we knew. This caused uncontrollable laughter, so much so that we had to sit down.

Next came 'Achy breaky heart' in Spanish where the whole dance floor started line dancing, they all knew the steps, bizarrely. The line dance trio were obviously delighted and Mateo and Mary strutted on wearing straw cowboy hats. Mateo had an unruly white tie which kept escaping and he had to keep flicking it back over his should, trying to make it look like part of his dance.

Next and maybe the highlight of the night, the bloke with the invisible wife hit the floor. he did 5 dances in a row with a woman that wasn't there. He was holding her hump and everything, talk about bloody funny!

By this stage we couldn't take any more laughter and had to retreat home.

Yesterday morning when Mark got up, he asked if he'd dreamt the whole thing!!!!!

LOST

I managed to finish work yesterday at quite a reasonable time. It was a tough day, what with the bus saga, the accountant coming (had to hide my in trays to stop her nosing through them), so when I got home, after putting the dishes away, sweeping up, putting washing out, putting washing away etc, I decided a little lay on the bed with my book was in order. After reading two pages I could feel my eyes closing.

 Now I could have given into a little siesta but it was such a nice evening I decided to go exploring with Ice. I couldn't take the chihuahuas as they are a bit too unruly and out of control so I decided I'd just take Ice. The problem I had was I haven't got collars and leads for my dogs, they have always run freely but with the neighbour situation which incidentally is going very well, I decided I needed to make a lead and collar.

The nearest thing I had was an old horses lunge line, which was full of knots and frayed but hey ho, a makeshift collar and lead were put on Ice, real Dingle style. The lead worked quite well and I kept  her on it, as it was long and then there was no danger of her accosting farmers, as shes a bit partial to the taste of farmers. I once caught her pinning a farmer up against his jeep. I should have gone to rescue him but that could have lead to more trouble so I hid behind the fence of my house which was covered with Ivy and pretended it wasn't my dog, she eventually let him go. Karma had its way though as the Ivy gave me a rather nasty rash.

We set off, successfully negotiating our way past the neighbours dogs which no major incident and off we went down a track. I have to admit even though I'm not into any form of exercise I started off down the track, jogging. I had to stop after a few minutes though as I heard somebody clapping. Turns out it was just my back boobs clashing together!

 This walk was amazing. I passed lots of interesting things, like a whole field full of pomegranates trees, lots of wild flowers, a random wooden chair and a white clio whose occupants were obviously doing something dodgy.

Before I knew it we'd been walking for an hour and I realised we were hopelessly lost. The path I was on seemed to go on forever with no left turns, which was the direction of home. I was walking towards Gandia!!!! YIKES!!!! Ice was getting tired, my shoes, had worn a bit thin & had stones digging in them, I was hot, sweaty and in desperate need of a drink. Ice found a nice puddle to drink our of but to be honest I didn't fancy it. I did start to get a bit panicky, I hadn't told Harry I was going walking as I only planned to go for 15 minutes and he'd be worrying as he knows how accident prone I am. I eventually phoned Rich ( who pissed himself laughing that I was lost) for some advice as to where I might be. He had no idea but luckily just after the phone call I came to a left turn which lead me back to my original path, eventually. Phew!!!!

We got home tired and thirsty, I found muscles I didn't know I had but I'm glad I got lost and was out for so long. Feeling fab now and looking forward to another adventure with Ice again today. Chihuahuas were not so impressed, took them a good hour to forgive me for not taking them! Oh and lost 2lbs!!!!

Battle of the Buses & a Spy in the Camp

Well the Fat Controller at the Buses has continued to block our garage in the evening. One of his people came in though and told us that he's ordered his drivers to do so. You can't blame the drivers they are just being dictated to.

Now whilst my boys fantasize about smashing his face in which would be a bit unrealistic considering his size and the size of my boys I have another plan. No, not disabling his buses in 2 seconds flat, outside our garage so they stay there much longer than anticipated or parking an old banger outside his nave at midnight. Although tempting, no. We could always just get our cars out and close our doors before the buses arrive but I've told my boys to kill him with kindness.

The plan being to accost The Fat Controller, hopefully in front of his staff and tell him that we believe he's a reasonable man and explain we are really trying to keep to his parking rules and are sorry if sometimes our customers don't always get it right but we are on to it as soon as we notice and tell him we really want to help make it easy for his buses and if there's anything more we can do .............

In my mind if we don't fuel his fire then really that puts us in control, which is of course where we want to be.

Watch this space ...............................

Dinner and Mobile Phones don't mix

Well I was going to talk about R.O.B's today but I'm going to save that one for you as I have something far more pressing on my mind.

Whilst out for dinner, at a rather nice Indian restaurant in Pego, we'd just finished our starters, mine a rather solid vegetable samosa (have had better at that restaurant) & Richs, a shish kebab (also had better), when a family came in and sat opposite.There was the Dad was mid forties, like ourselves and the son, who you could tell was the son as his body language, said so and the sons girlfriend (looked very timid and uncomfortable). 'Well here we are day two of your holiday' said the Dad whilst the kids got their phones out, ready for the off. There was another five minutes conversation discussing the menu, they went for menu del dia and a bottle of house rose and by the time our main course had arrived they had got the wifi code off the sweet little Indian girl and the rest of their meal was in silence whilst they all tapped away on their phones, including the Dad. I found it very hard to keep my gob shut and not say something to them. Bet its going to be a looooooooong holiday for them, especially if they have to keep finding wifi spots.

How sad is todays society that they can't enjoy a meal together with conversation & without phones. Its just sooooo rude. Why do people do this? Is it because families have dinners on their laps and don't sit around a table together? I'm never going to win Mother of the Year award (according to my kids but they're still alive, aren't they?) but I've always insisted on family meal times and still do. OK, its not always, well hardly ever, a jovial affair but we do sit and talk. I just feel very sad for all the families missing out on each others lives due to phones.

You only have one life and you only have one family. So if you are reading this on your phone, whilst eating your dinner, on your lap, STOP IT!!!!

BUS DRIVERS

As many of you know, we have had a garage in Ondara for a year now. We chose our Nave (warehouse) as it has plenty of parking. Its kind of  what us English would in call a cul de sac. It looked like we didn't have neighbours when we viewed it, even better! You know how I feel about neighbours. Once we moved in though we soon realised that we did, indeed have neighbours but that was kool.

We've had a whole year working in harmony with our neighbours, the water company (Spanish company who are meant to be moving but not sign of it. Got a police inspection once and the rumours went around that they were really drug dealers), tile maker (German guy who goes to Richs shooting club), dodgy guy who has his nave permanently locked (probably not dodgy but makes it sound more interesting), sign writers (sell very expensive vinyl) and the bus company (lots of big buses. One of the drivers fancies Mike).

To be fair, we have over taken the place with our cars, for every one that goes out 5 arrive! However if ever there is a car making it difficult for the buses to enter, we move it, straight away even if we're doing something important like messaging friends on Facebook.

Rich & Mike got into conversation with the owner of the bus company last week and he explained how nobody had been allowed to park opposite our nave, in the past. Didn't think much of it as there is plenty of room but the next day he came out shouting and screaming that we weren't allowed to park opposite our Nave because suddenly he's the Fat Controller and Parking Police, which, you must understand is a very important job which he is taking very seriously. Now it seems, from this week, we can't park anywhere except outside our own garage. We think maybe you get a years free parking pass then you get put on a ban. Must some some Spanish law that we don't know about yet. The Fat Controller also has an assistant, Mrs Fat Controller. Now there's a lady that can yell and scream! I wouldn't want to be on the receiving end of that!

After being severely told off yesterday for parking nowhere near our garage or his, The Fat Controller decided to pick on Brian. Poor old Brian, 89 if he's a day, dared to park opposite our nave whilst he came in to book an appointment. Shortly after he came in, one of the buses peeped his horn in a continuous, obnoxious manner, much more than necessary, as Brian had dared to park in the invisible no parking zone. Brian shot out, feisty old devil waving his firsts and cursing like a sailor, told the driver he could wait, came calmly back in, finished his conversation with me, about his guinea pig (a girl) who he took to the vets as it had a growth on its tummy, which the vet said was heart failure but he took it home and the next day it gave birth to 5 babies. Sadly the babies were deformed as the rabbit it had mated with was its brother which had been to the vet before to confirm it was a girl. Are you following???? So it got shagged by its brother who should have been its sister. He then went outside, got in his car, did a bit more hand gesturing, stared the driver out, who got most upset and peeped his horn some more.Bloody chaos it was.

THEN, they parked 3 buses outside our nave for 2 hours, last night so we couldn't get out! Rich is plotting his revenge, if we have a repeat performance and those buses won't be going anywhere!!!! lol (the revenge thing is just in his head by the way).

Ruined day

My day is ruined and its only 8.40! Driving down our track this morning when I came head to head with the naked farmer (in his car, black mondeo). We kind of looked at each other and he just kept coming. Now, if I'd been a smoker, at this point I'd have rolled a fag and sat it out but as you know, I'm not, so I furiously slammed in reverse only to realise I had the roof up on my cabrio and its had a new roof fitted but Rich hasn't cut out the window hole, so its like driving a van. Now, I suffer from lack of spacial awareness at the best of times but being angry and now being watched made it ten times worse! It wasn't long before I was skimming boulders, trying to find first gear (car has a problem going into first, unless you are in second, then its a bit easier) to correct myself, failing to find first, doing a bit of gear grinding, gettting very flustered. Not very good for my high blood pressure, first thing in the morning. I eventually managed to wedge myself up against a cactus so he could pass and then give a false little smile and wave whilst really wanting to smash his face in! Think its time to get my Landrover back on the road, nobody will argue with that and its automatic so no gear problems.

The weekend

I actually had a day off yesterday, although when I say a day off, I actually worked harder than if I was a work. I’m a partner in a garage in Spain and my job is amongst other things isto listen to customers talk at me and jesus can some talk! I’ve even met some that talk more than me!!! Really!!!

 We have one customer who we are convinced is stalking us. It all started off OK. He came in wanting a service on his car, he requested a proper service which in his opinion, must take at least two hours to qualify as a proper service. I didn’t want to burst his bubble so I let him wander off to look around, god knows where for two hours whilst Rich performed the service which with his vast experience only takes around 20 mins. Customer came back happy as Larry as we had done a ‘proper’ service. Customer came back the following week asking where he could buy screws from ……………….!!!!! Ermmm Aki maybe, Chinese Bizarre???? Ask somebody on the street FFS, you do not have to make a 15 minute journey to us to ask, really! I think the mistake I made was engaging him in conversation for some ½ hours when he first came in. Over the weeks this customer came in for any kind of excuse, always enagaging me in lengthly conversation mainly about France, his Ex’s (there were 3), dogs and how many people he’d hit in his life (1, which was a woman). It also appeared he’d done every job I cared to mention (tinker, tailer, soldier, sailor), had had every car, been to every country, you get the idea. He came in one morning telling us that somebody had jumped over his fence and stolen his car key, not the car funnily enough, just the key and then we got chapter and verse how he knew it was his nutty neighbour and he was going to put razor wire on his fence, yeah that would show her!  The car came and a new key was purchased and programmed by an electronics expert, Ed. During this time, Ian turned up 4 times saying that we were doing it wrong and it wouldn’t work. Rich who is chief customer preventance manager actually told him to fuck off!!!! Which he did and kept a low profile for a day whilst we did what we do, FIX things. One Saturday morning Rich & I were in Aki when we spotted him and spent half an hour playing cat n mouse up the isles trying to avoid him, which we did. He came in on Monday morning to inform us that he’s seen us drive into Aki and and come in to say hello but couldn’t find us!!! Anyway, said customer, came in at least once a week for the last year but recently his had a real problem with his car, which incidently is a skoda. We fixed the problem but the next day it came back with a different problem. Ian had had his car re-mapped in the UK and Rich found a bunch of dodgy looking wires, held together with masking tape Rich suggested that there was probably a problem with the wires but Ian was adamant that Rich mustn’t touch those wires as they were fitted by a very trusted mechanic 10 years ago and have been perfect for the last 10 years. Rich gently suggested it maybe the wires have corroded but no, he wasn’t allowed to touch the wires. Ian had self diagnosed the alternator but Rich persuaded him to leave it with us for a day for him to test it. Whilst it was with us Rich touched the sacred bunch of wires and what do you know? There was a fault, which he duly fixed and gave Ian his car back.  Whilst all this was going on Ian used every opportunity, usually 4 times a day, to ring me and check his booking dates (sometimes 3 times a day), find out how his car was and even book in his partners car .The car was running perfect after the wires were fixed but Ian is still insisting on us fitting an alternator so we’re letting him spend €400 on an alternator to shut him up.

So yesterday I do what I do every weekend and clean the house, move the furniture to a different position, inevitably move it back, change the bed etc.  Some how it seems to take me around 4 hours to do all this WTF!!! We live in a two bedroom, 1 bathroom house. AND why is it that as soon as I’ve made the bed one of the dogs jumps up especially to vomit on the freshly laundered sheets???? That’s just so annoying.

We went out last night which is quite a rarity these days. Mummio & Daddio have a friend over and we all decided to go to the Gobble n Go. The Gobble n Go probably isn’t quite as exciting as it may sound. Its actually called The Wok and is a Chinese buffet. We call it the Gobble n Go as you eat it all very quickly then bugger off back home in time to watch X Factor. For your first experience Its always best to go with somebody who has done this before as the etiquette can be a little confusing. You get shown to a table, last night our was a round one which was very pleasing as it enables group conversation. You then get offered a drink, Mummio & I shared a fairly crap bottle of white which funnily enough improved after the first glass, so much so we drank a second (bottle that is)! Everybody waits in anticipation, until somebody on your table says go then everybody rushes up like greyhounds out of a trap to raid the buffet. They are quite clever though, they give you very small plates to disgourage over eating but it often back fires as the greedy bastards go up repeatledy, I know this because Mummio counts if she spots a serial muncher. Last night, I think there was an Elvis convention going on, there was quite a few men with receding hairlines, bouffant hair dyed balck, open neck shirt with a splidge of hair poking out. One even had black hair with grey roots! You could tell they were English but mainly by their stereo typical wives, its like all the couples were cloned. The wives were pleasantly plump and a bit more, covered in old fashioned tattoos and sporting kind of a mahogany short hair do. It was quie bizzare really. Any way after you have your starter or first plate of nosh, you retain your cutlery (weird I know but it’s a Spanish thing) and you go up for round two whilst the nice Chinese people take your first plate away and you repeat this process until you physically can’t move any more. You then pay the bill which is usually €11 a head plus drink and waddle off home, complaining that you’ve ate too much, to sit on the sofa, down more wine and for the men & Mummio – have a good fart!!!!!

The storm

What a storm last night! At one point I got up to pour some more wine, from the small table with the silver legs, by the bathroom and BANG!!!! I thought I’d been shot! It did get me wondering though, if I really was to get shot at THAT point, would I have been scared? I guess not because one doesn’t really expect to get shot when pouring the wine (a nice South African Chardonnay) into ones hugely expensive wine glass (inherited from Mummio) on a stormy Friday night and two, who would actually want to shoot me? Hmmm, that’s a tricky one. I guess there maybe various Ex’s that hate my guts but love and hate are a close thing. I can’t imagine anybody actually wanting me dead for Ex type crimes, you know like leaving the lid off the tooth paste, crashing their car (yep I have done that! Brand new saab 93 cabrio and I took the side out in Tescos carpark in Coventry. Hugely embarrassing  and if the partner of the time had have been mildly interested in sex, it would have been a lot of blow jobs owed) or mild infidelity! In fact is there such a thing as ‘mild infidelity’? Does that mean kissing or just texting/fb ing with intent? I guess I could be guilty, in the past of mild infidelity, not now though, I couldn’t think of anything worse now. In the past though I always had to have somebody ‘lurking’ in the back ground, waiting in the wings incase my crap relationship at the time was to go wrong (as if, hahahaha). Quite often the ones waiting in the wings would get pissed off and find somebody new which was always a bit annoying to be honest as I then had to recruit a new’ in the wings’ person which isn’t as easy as it may seem, let me tell you. You can go online and join one of these dating sites and pretend to be single but unless you are prepared to take pic of you fanny as a profile pic, you may not get any hits. I couldn’t actually imagine going through the process of taking pictures of my fanny, Christ I’m not sure I can even see it these days, over my belly. Imagine having to get the most up to date ‘hair style’ which is what these days? Brazillian? Clean shaven? Afro? Neat trim? Fuck knows!!!  Then you have to set your self in the best surroundings, probably not your garden amongst the tulips where the neighbours can see you. Maybe the bedroom, but make sure your partners slippers aren’t in the frame or maybe one leg cocked up on the bath? Its not really like taking a face selfie though, is it? which we all know has to be taken up high to eliminate your double chin, this would have to be taken low, at close range!!! YIKES!!! Imagine being judged on your fanny rather than your face, although I’m guessing there are some women out there with prettier fannys than faces.  I only know all this about the dating sites,  as my step son to be told me and showed me a photo of one, he’d been sent, I didn’t even know what it was!!!  Very strange behaviour, in the dating game these days.  You could also meet people the old fashioned way, you know like work although that wouldn’t work for me these days as I work with my Fiancee & sons! So really it’s a good job I’m not recruiting for a’ in the wings’ type person and if I have got one, I don’t know about it! Anway going back to who would want to shoot me, I think if it wasn’t a random stranger, wanting my worldly goods, which obviously it would be, then it would have to be either a jealous partner of an ex (hahahaha as if) but I do fantasise Blondie (can't put real name) is jealous of me but in reality she looks too bloody perfect to even contemplate.  It could even be a work competitor and lets face it, they have LOADS to be jealous of and there are plenty of dodgy mechanics around. Yes I think that’s who it would be.

Neighbours dogs

Bloody neighbours dogs have taken to barking for hours, consistently during the night. No sleep now for 2 nights, got the dogs barking, mine doing occassional backing vocals and Rich huffing and puffing, on the verge of exploding! Why have 2 guard dogs and then not investigate actually why they are barking for 3 hours??? When he did go out to them they shut up straight away.How the hell do they sleep through it for that long???? Oh I know the answer to that - weed!!!!! Grrrrrrrr.

Getting Old

I noticed the other day, when my nail narnish looked a bit kind of lumpy, that infact I have verticle (thats the standing up one isn't it?) lines going down my nails. Feeling rather concerned, I showed Rich, who also has them and he informed me that he thought it was a calcium deficiency. I must admit the thought of this rather excited me, it would mean I could eat unlimted cheese and youghurt, yes? I could picture it, 'Should you be eating all that cheese, Emma' (thats Mums voice). 'Yes Mum I can eat as much cheese as I want as I have a calcium deficiency' (in smug voice). You may ask why I don't just drink milk but I haven't drunk milk since I was 3, think I had a bad experience with it but can't be sure. Anyway I had to Google my ridges to be sure. I typed in verticle ridges on nails, not sure if I was 3 clicks away from dying but being brave, only to find out my nails are an ageing process, not even a bloody calcium deficiency! AGEING!!!!! Can you believe it????

Neighbours aren't quite so bad

Rich met the neighbours last night after their little dog came into the horses paddock and Ice nearly killed it!!! Juan or Jose, think it was Jose actually is the guys name. They have got their house looking great and working very efficiently off grid (Rich got a tour) and are even putting a fence up for their dogs who Rich also met. Satan turned out to be a Rottie (we love Rotties :-)) and he has a wife and 6 pups!!!! Its amazing how quiet they are for that many dogs in there. Getting quite used to this neighbours lark :-)

Still on about the neighbours

Passed the new neighbours in their car, a greeny/blue Opel, on the lane yesterday afternoon and nearly got knocked out by the smell of a certain type of cigarette. Rounded the bend and saw kids toys on the naya, christ noisy dogs, weed and now kids! Had to go to bed for a little lay down. Have to say though I've totally recovered from my pre-judgement, as Satan was quiet all night, they moved their generator to the end of their land, no noisey kids - yet, maybe this neighbour thing won't be too bad after all :-) Bit confused though why water was coming out of their chimney??????

Neighbours from hell

Well the new neighbours have finally moved in. I guess most people would be quite pleased to have neighbours but Rich and I are not, this is because we are very selfish and had the whole lane to ourselves for some time so our dogs ran around freely and we're also hermits, we didn't used to be hermits, people may say I'm controlling and don't let Rich do anything as he always went out before he met me. People may also say Rich is controlling as I was a party girl, Daddio says Rich tamed the beast! But the truth is we're just old, boring and set in our ways. Anyway the neighbours arrived, along with a little dog, not too disimilar to Princess LuLu Luna Garside, not too bad we thought, although we had to rapidly block our gates to stop our dogs terrorising theirs, especially Ice (big canadian shepherd) who is partial to the odd episode of pinning people up against their cars and showing far too many teeth. The new neighbours generator was quieter than ours which was a huge bonus. All was good. Then last night after much horn blowing (don't know why) bloody Satan arrived. We haven't actually seen Satan yet but it has a very deep bark and I imagine its going to be a Pitbull or Am staff, juts got that feeling. Satan decided to go for it all night, bark, bark , bark, I had to put the fan on high so Rich didn't notice then when I went to muck out the horses at 6.30am all was quiet. I clattered about noisely, bashing the new B & Q wheelbarrow against the wall a few times, to give it something to bark about but nope, it didn't make a muff, it obviously has selective hearing between the hours of 10.00pm and 5.00am! Lets hope it settles down and tonight is more peaceful.

Cyclists - again!

Just chatting with the guys at work about this big cycle race thats going on. Everybody seems to be watching it and they have closed off the roads everywhere which is very inconvenient, especially when you feel like I do about these little blighters. Anyway what I couldn't understand is why? Why would so many people want to watch them when so many of us hate them? Luckily Matt knew the answer to this 'incase one falls off'. I now understand. Phew!!!!

DIY at the Dingles

Well I think we chose the most humid day of the year to decide to knock down my bedroom wall to create a new lounge. When I say 'my bedroom' it was the room I shared with my chihuahuas. We had to kick Rich out, he'll say he left, around 6 months ago as he was keeping us awake moaning about Betsy & I snoring. Anyway we've now had to give up our bedroom because of our dining room table. We had a kitchen/lounge with no room for the dining table which although not sentimental (although we have had some fab Xmas dinners at it and my plaster from my broken foot (first time) was cut off whilst I was on it), we are strangely attached to. Its nothing special, just a solid wood, very old farm house table so Its a bit drastic, changing the whole house to accommodate it. I was amazed how much rubble one, small, dividing wall can create and the dust!!!!! Of course once the wall was down we had to try the L shaped sofa in every position, along with the fire and the beautiful Ikea rug, recently acquired from Mummio who I knew would tire of it quickly after I persuaded her to buy it a year ago. After position number 4, lots of sweat and much cursing (from Rich) we finally had it all in place and he quickly mounted the TV on the wall before I could change my mind. I've had to put a barrier up though to stop our big white dog going in there as she finds it imposible not to roll on the rug, distributing white hair everywhere then having a little scratch to add a few more to the collection. Then the chihuahuas, who absolutely LOVE a piece of carpet to pee on, have developed a game of 'who can take a dump within the squares of the rug'. Get one in and you move forward two squares, hit a line and miss a turn! I think thats how it works. So the new lounge is in place, the dining room table is in pieces in the 'dining room' and the girls & I are installed in a new bedroom with Rich, who incidently didn't moan about us snoring once, last night although he did moan that Princess Lu Lu Luna Garside hogged the bed and dug her nails in his back.

Cyclists

I've been getting nagged to write again today, I was going to have a day off. I've been too busy to do so, so far but I really need to express my utter, ummm not sure I can find the right describing word, hatred???? for the people who choose to clog our roads and disrubt our traffic on two wheels! Yes the cyclists! Whilst I really, really do not understand the desire for 40+ year olds to dress in lycra and get all sweaty, whilst tackling hills that I can barely walk up, I do understand why Joe Bloggs from next door would like to keep fit or ride his bike to work if he doesn't have a car and I really have no problem with Joe Bloggs, really, BUT those w**kers who cycle in swarms, like a cloud of wasps, blocking our roads, riding 3 abreast with no consideration for cars, you know who are the ones who pay road tax, abide by traffic rules (most times), stop at traffic lights & zebra crossings (OK maybe not always zebra crossings) and don't exceed the speed limit by 30kms an hour (*coughs loudly), well they are the ones that really push my buttons and not in a good way, I can tell you! Driving a right hand drive car, myself, the desire to put my arm out of the car and push the first bike so the rest of them fall like dominos, is really quite overwhelming! The other problem I have is that when I drive my cabriolet, I seem to develop temporary tourettes and involuntarily shout 'Tu eres Cabron' at them, to which they sometimes stick their fingers up at me (how impolite) or look at me as if I'm nuts (as if)!!!! Twenty minutes it took to get past them on the road from Pego to Orba, last Saturday morning at 8.00am!!! Then just as we're about to get lucky and overtake them on a blind bend (they gave us little choice) they speed up to 70kms an hour (in a 40), go single file and leave us for dust! Luckily they decided to stop, in a bunch of course, at the first bar and Rich was able to drive very, very close to them, scaring the shit out of them, then take off, very fast as they waved their fists and made rude hand gestures at him. Sorry if I have offended any of my FB friends with this but I really am truly offended by cyclists on the roads in Spain.

Wedding dress

As many of you may know, Rich & I are getting married in Feb. I'm having a real dilemma about what is the correct etiquette for a middle aged, pleasantly plump (although I'll be a size 8 by then, obviously, if I give up my love of wine & curly whirlies) woman to wear on her wedding day. The first time around I had a choice of only 2 dresses as they were in the sale, so I picked the best one and somebody sewed sequins on it to jazz it up a bit, sadly that dress got incinerated in a garden fire, istigated by my phyco ex! Not my ex husband, he wasn't phyco, infact he was very nice but I was a bad wife. Anyway it went up in flames, almost taking the neighbours fence with it, whilst my very young children charged around with hoses, wearing hard hats, pretending they were fire men. I've been looking on the internet at dresses and to be honest they all look the same, apart from the one made of feathers to which I'm hugely attracted to but I'm realistic enough to know that instead of a fine, white swan I'd look more like an overstuffed pillow! I thought I'd cracked it and found something very suitable but Rich managed to convince me to show him a picture and said 'thats f**king awful, that is' so although I've chosen my pink cowboy boots (thanks Bexx Cowen) I'm feeling very confused. Time is running out!!! Any thoughts anybody?

Prostitutes

Travelling down the N332 every day now I've noticed that I've started to give directions according to the prostitutes. Theres dancing lady, a pretty blonde who incidently I haven't seen all week, maybe she's on holiday or on her period or got a disease or something, anyway then a bit further south you have the fat lady (arrives in a white Opel Corsa) who's been hit with the ugly stick, amazingly her yellow toxic waste bin bag is always full but I suspect its all pie wrappers, then you have the one at the end of our lane who stares at Rich through the window when he's turning right in a right hand drive car, he nearly crashed the other day trying not to look at her as he didn't want to look right (gives him a headache, looking at other women)! My point is that I really think I need to give them names, it would be much easier. Any suggestions welcome .......

A bit bout the Spanish Dingles

Welcome to The Spanish Dingles Blog. Here is a bit of background about us.

This blog is about the funny, beautiful, amazing life we lead in Costa Blanca Spain. We live in a place called Oliva, nestled amongst the orange groves, in a self sufficient house (no electric), which we are doing up. We do tend to move quite a bit, 9 times in 7 years!!!!! Gypsy blood??? 

Here we are:

Emma (the blogger)
Age 45, mother of 3, Matt 24, Charlotte 23 & Harry19. Also mother to Princess LuLu Luna Garside, Betsy Boo & Twinkle, my beloved chihuahuas. Works full time at Facebook & Pinterest (in my dreams) whilst also working at RED Automotive, our family garage as the BOSS, general Dogsbody, pot washer, cleaner (not very well), receptionist, customer liason officer, administrator( also not very well).  Hobbies include horse riding, macrame, sky diving, white water rafting & gliding. Likes large glasses of South African white wine & talking shite with Rich. Dislikes, getting hands dirty.

Rich (the husband to be)
Age 44, father. Works as a good old fashioned mechanic & wants to be the boss at RED Automotive. He is also chief customer prevention officer! We try to keep him away from the customers! Hobbies include, shooting from the porch, starting projects at home and never finishing them. Likes bread and butter with bloody everything. Dislikes water!