I was rudely awoken this morning by a big black spider running up my arm! Nothing, it seems, gets you up and out of bed more quickly.
Today I had planned to do some work. After breakfast and a shower I set up my desk and office chair, complete with cafeteire full of proper coffee. Just like in a real office. This though is definitely the coolest office I ever worked in. I’ll try and describe it;
The office
Behind me are a row of olive trees and in front two much larger trees delimiting the left and right extent of my plot. The ground is sandy and covered with a layer of dead grassy stuff that looks and feels a little like dead pine needles but isn’t. It’s lovely and warm to walk on barefoot. To my left is the Landrover, to the right the tent and in the middle is my office. I figured from yesterday that if I place the desk as far back as I can, I get until 12.30 in the shade before I’m in direct sunlight. Then I move my desk forward and to the left and I’m in the shade of the big tree in front. Perfect! I also have my mains powered desk fan which is really coming into its own now. All around are birds and butterflies (I know it sounds a bit gay), but it really is pretty cool. Although not tame the birds will happily rummage around in the dirt just 2 feet away from my.. well.. my two feet. And there is something in the trees that sounds like a parrot. I’ve not yet seen anything resembling a parrot but I can hear it as I write this.
Now despite the great office environment I got little in the way of work done today. It was 35 degrees in the shade this afternoon and it was as much as I could manage to stay conscious. I did however refresh my memory on where I got up to on this work project. I checked the forecast and it’s going to be much cooler tomorrow so hopefully I’ll get more done then. I’ll aim for an early start too.
School-girl crush
By about 5.30 I’d given up and went for another shower.. you need at least two a day in weather like this. When I came back I decided to cook the last of my duck and curried vegetables. I know... but I’m getting sick of salad! Now a group of people have just turned up and moved into a caravan on one side of me (incidentally the big French motor home on the other side has gone). I think the campsite has a few caravans for rent if you don’t have your own. Now there is a young girl in this family group. I’m not very good at ages but I would have guessed about 18 but could easily be less. She said ‘Bonjour’ as I passed her walking back from the shower. This is standard procedure and everyone does it. Now she’s only a girl, but with very large lumps in all the right places and seems to know how to make the most of her curves. While I was cooking dinner she walked over to the water receptacle on the other side of my plot, bent over to fill her bottle and while bent over looked around at me to see if I was checking out her ‘derrier’, which well... guess I was.. a bit. She smiled at me then walked back to get another bottle and did the same again. Not just twice... four times! When she had filled everything she had with water she disappeared and came back with a massive black bucket, and each time she would look around and smile... whilst bending over the water receptacle! I put it down to a school-girl crush, but still, can’t she be locked up for that kind of behaviour?
Trouble with the beetles
As if this situation wasn’t already interfering with my cooking ability another one of those bugs that keeps flying into me did it again while I was cooking and not 5 minutes later another went straight into my bubbling pan of curried veggies! I hooked him out pretty sharpish, but then later again while I was sat down eating another dived straight into bread and butter! Jesus! These things are big black flying beetles and they don’t seem to have any kind of landing strategy. You know like flies and mosquitos and such like, hover a bit... go in for a taste, fly away quickly before you swat it, then come back etc.. strategy see! Now these aren’t the alien UAV bugs, at about an inch in length they are not quite as big but equally as reckless. What with the flies as well it seemed the quicker I could eat my dinner the better. As I write this another bug of some description has just piped up in the tree above me. Really loud... I’m sure it’s a Sikada.
While I sat there eating dinner with the sun still at full blast, the horizon to the east has darkened slightly and I can hear thunder quite close. Yet there is not a cloud above me and the sun is fierce! Still I think a storm is needed to make the temperature drop.
The girl next door has now taken to walking the dog. She’s done it twice already while I’ve been here working and later after dark she drags the poor exhausted animal out in her dressing gown! Somehow I don’t think it’s her pet’s health that is on her mind. Don’t her parents do any of the work?
After dinner I covered myself in insect repellent and then went for a walk down to the lagoon. Incidentally if you’ve ever gotten some of that stuff in your mouth you will realise why it’s a pretty good woman repellent too!! I stood in the lagoon with the warm water up to my ankles looking for shell fish in the silt. I found 4 tiny cockles and a welk. Hardly enough to make a paella with so I left them. Still it was a lovely time of day to be out there with the sun getting low, and there was a really hot wind blowing in my face. The thunder had stopped. It was great!
Now this schoolgirl crush thing is already getting out of hand. Later on as I’m back at camp updating the blog in the darkness she has an argument with her mum. Maybe she wants to walk the dog again in her underwear or fill something up with water. Clearly I am the source of the problem as she’s spent the last half hour looking out the window at me. I pretended not to notice. Why is it I’m always having issues with my French neighbours?
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