A brick in yer ed

About a month ago a brick from an old chimmney breast fell through our suspended ceiling. I was very concerned that one day it would be more than a single brick. Today I thought I'd do something about it so, armed with a lamp and wearing filthy overalls and goggles I went to have a look. This is some of what I saw



I managed to get the old bricks down without them smashing the ceiling. This is the stuff I removed. I felt very pleased with myself.

Yo tengo diez palabras de Castellano

It means I have ten Spanish words. I use it a lot as a way of showing that I can manage more than "A bit" as the response to the question "Do you speak Spanish?"

By the way, I use Castilian, in Castilian, to be more precise. There are several Spanish languages - Galician, Basque, Catalan and it's many variants, Valencian (a linguistic argument to be had with the Catalans about whether it is a language or a dialect) - and the one that is now the third most common first language in the World, Castilian. It's Castilian that is generally thought of as Spanish but, because we live in an area where Valencian is the first language for many people, I try to remember to say Castilian instead of Spanish

Anyway, for one reason or another I have been speaking a lot more Spanish than usual over the last few days. Notable successes have included a voicemail message that actually produced a plumber at a client's house and an enquiry about where to buy autogas that ended up with a full tank. I feel particularly cool when I am speaking to someone and then someone else I know turns up and greets me in Spanish. This has happened when Paco the man from the glass place, turned up in a house where I was collecting some furniture from Consuela and when Maribel turned up as I was having a discussion with Eli on the behaviour of town councillors. One day I will be able to maintain a reasonable conversation in my new language without having to make excuses as I stutter through a list of words.

The world ranking for languages by the way is now Chinese, Hindi, Spanish, English in that order. Though as a second language English is still way out in front. I felt I had to check this out when my language exchange pal was adamant that Castilian had more words than English. It doesn't; English probably has about twice as many words as Spanish but nobody knows for sure as it is so difficult to count them!

More on the drains

Excitement mounts as the drainage contractors move ever closer to our house with their diggers and big concrete pipes. At the moment one of the access roads to our house is closed off so they can dig a big collecting pit and one of our neighbours had a chat with the workmen who confirmed that the drainage system is definitely coming our way. Apparently we'll have to do the final connection from the current septic tank to the new mains drains at our own expense but that doesn't sound so bad.

That Bottle of Brandy

I think I may have found the Lord.

Apparently Lent started today, I know this because I saw a news item on the TV where lots of Spaniards were throwing flour at each other. You may also remember the blog I did in February called "Drinking too much?"

We have been drinking far too much booze and, as giving something up is what you do for Lent, Maggie and I have decided to go on the wagon for the forty days.

Cutting a log in Murcia

IKEA opened its doors in Murcia city today, just 60kms from Culebrón. Nobody was trampled to death and there were "only" about a thousand people in the queue to get in as the store opened at 10 this morning. We've been waiting for it to open so we can buy a CD tower and some new covers for our chairs - proof positive of our exciting lives.

Home and Huntingdon

Before we lived in Culebrón home was Huntingdon. My mum still lives there. So, when Maggie had a few days off work we flew back to the UK for a long weekend with my mum.

We had a really good time.

We (that means me) shopped for all those things we either can't get in Spain (Brylcreem, a Dutch hoe) or those things that are so much cheaper in the UK (Yorkshire Tea Bags) whilst Maggie just shopped. She's certain that clothes in the UK are nicer than those in Spain and she wandered around the M&S food section drooling.

Better even than shopping was seeing people and the kindness that people showed to us. My brother in law, John, drove us to and from the airport. John and Claire Morrison took great care of us all weekend and suggested a great money making idea that you may hear about in future. I got plenty of time with my mum and Maggie met with one of her old workmates, Cilla.

On Saturday my sister, Tracey, John and their lads Matthew and James turned up to see us at a local boozer. More surprising and very touching was that the three people I used to work with in St Ives also turned up - Sue, Janine and Tricia - they all looked healthier, younger and trendier than when I last saw them. It just goes to show that leaving work wasn't just a good move for me! In fact everyone in the list (except Cilla) was there.


It was very cold in the UK but it was probably more comfortable than winter has been in Spain. In Culebron it's generally sunnier and warmer during the daytime but at night it's cold and we have difficulty keeping warm. We've also had too many damp days recently. In Huntingdon it was cold outside all the time and I was really chilled to the bone a couple of times but inside it was much more comfy with all those nice thick carpets and heaters.

England was also very,very expensive. It's a good job that everyone bought us beers and fed us or we would have gone very hungry and thirsty!

No doubt about it though that as we got off the aeroplane at Alicante we felt like we were coming home after a holiday rather than landing as exiles and it was good to get back to the house and the cats even if the house was cold and the cats fractious.

Look at "Arthur Askey"

25 years ago (in 1981) there was an attempt to overthrow the democratically elected government of Spain. 

I've always liked the story about the King going on tele and telling the Guardia and Army to get back to barracks but my favourite character in all this is the balding chap at the bottom right of the photo with his back to us, the one who looks like Arthur Askey. He was called General Manuel Gutiérrez Mellado and he was deputy PM at the time. 

When Lt. Colonel Tejero, the man with the patent leather hat and the pistol, told him to get on the floor, unlike nearly all the other MPs, Gutiérrez refused and he told the Lieutenant Colonel, in no uncertain terms where to stick his pistol. He pointed out that he was a General and outranked Tejero to whom he gave the order to surrender. In the end all Tejero could do was to ignore the General. 

 Manuel Gutiérrez Mellado must have been one tough cookie.

Moving Images

My car was broken into in Elche at the tail end of 2004 and, amongst other things they pinched my camera. Since then I've been using Maggie's 2.1 megapixel thingy. Anyway, El Pais, the newspaper, was offering a digital video camera for 99€, or actually 129€ with the memory card, plus fifteen tokens. I collected the tokens and, on Saturday, I collected the camera. Now I wonder if it's possible to load video to this blog?

Small Town Life

I was pottering about Pinoso today for one reason or another.

I had to go and put some money in the bank for my boss. I didn't have an account number but when I went in the bank they just did it, they knew the man, they knew his business and they knew his account number.

Driving down a side street in town I had to give way to a car coming the other way. The car stopped and the driver wound down her window to say hello to me. It was one of the members of the local neighbourhood association.

In the Post Office the postie asked me if I could drop off the mail for our next door neighbour to save him the trip as I would be going there anyway.

I put an advert on the local TV station asking if anyone fancied swapping English conversation for Spanish conversation. I got two replies within half an hour of the advert going on and I met one of the people, Reme, this afternoon. Ah, she said, I've seen your car driving around. It's a very pretty car.

It's all rather nice.

Drains

Our next door neighbours saw us in the street. They onfirmed that the mains drains are coming to our block of houses.

Our next door but one neighbour was out walking his dog. He talked to the farmer at the bottom of the lane. No way in hell you'll get mains drains said the farmer.

No new models here!

There has been a picture on this blog of our "new" cat, Edu. This is a picture of our "old" cat Mary to redress the balance.

Someone mentioned to me the other day that they knew what it was like to be replaced by a younger model. No new model here.