Letter from Espargal: 45 of 2010

Saturday: This is the state of play:

The day has been wet; about an inch of rain has fallen. Thunder is rolling around the distant hills. Dawn came late and dusk came early. The solstice must be right around the corner.

The animals are snoozing around the fire, except for the pups, which have been warring noisily in their enclosure on the patio.


Jones has taken some food down to the stray dog that lives in the field and is now brewing up soup for supper. (She's been making wondrous soups from Ermenio's donated pumpkins.)

This morning we did the shopping: this afternoon we lunched with friends at the Folclore in Alte, very pleasantly, I might add. The restaurant’s reserve white is a treat.

On the telly behind me Gregory Peck, David Niven and Anthony Quinn have blown up the Guns of Navarone for the umpteenth time. If those names mean nothing to you, you’re too young.

Pause here for a head-scratch. That was the easy bit. What to say next? I am taken back to the thank-you letters that my mother required me to write as a child for the birthday 10-shilling & 1-pound notes that arrived from kindly relatives. Sometimes even a fiver!

“Dear aunt (or grandpa),” I would start. “Thank you very much for the money you sent me…..” After that, the composition was a struggle. “Is this enough?” I would inquire of mother after managing a spidery sentence or two. It seldom was. Mother would suggest topics of likely interest to the generous relative. I couldn’t see the point. The punishment was hardly worth the reward.

Back to the present. As ever, one way and another we’ve been pretty busy – pressed to stay up, in fact. I’m quite good at shrugging off till tomorrow things that don’t get done today. Jones is a more driven soul.

She says she feels as though she can’t keep her head above water. I tell her to cross some stuff off her list but she feels she can’t. Mainly it’s those pups that have kept her so tied up – and me for that matter. Life would be much easier if we were able to keep them outside but neither the season nor the weather has been cooperative.

I’m not going to go on about the pups but I should tell you that they’re growing up fast. They’re a handful – smart, lively and quick, with very sharp teeth. We had some interest in the male from a couple but they were unsure about how big he would grow and we were unsure that we wanted to separate them. So it looks as though they will stay. We’re thinking of calling the male Russ T Nale and his sister, Mary M Aluca. We agreed that Barbara should give them their first name and I the rest.

The Bijou Ensuite is coming along. Idalecio has finished tiling the mini-bathroom and we’re now awaiting the delivery of the floor tiles before installing the utensils. The fossa man dropped in mid-week and advised us on the best tank for our purposes. It should arrive early in the new year. With luck the electrician should be here sooner. Idalecio and I spent the better part of two days, first finishing off the timber work and then putting up a ceiling acceptable to Jones.

To explain - Casa Nada already had a ceiling, panels of blue insulation resting on eucalyptus beams and carrying the roof. The panels are a bit discoloured and while they perform a valuable function, they don’t look great. Jones was all for (having us attach) tongue and groove wooden strips below the beams. I was against it as there is hardly room to stand on the mezzanine platform and we’d have lost another six inches by doing so.

We compromised by hiding the blue insulation with thin black panels that Idalecio supplies with his under-floor heating. They look good. Well, I think so and Jones feels she can live with them.

From a hardware store – we’ve made numerous trips to hardware stores - I bought (121) glass bricks. We barely fitted them into the car. Idalecio is now using them to create a partition in the adjacent room.

This will separate a basic kitchen for the Bijou Ensuite on one side from the tractor and implements on the other. That, at least, is the idea.

Ahead of us we have a mini-pause from some of our duties in the run-up to Christmas. This is usefully timed as (Barbara’s brother) Llewellyn and Lucia are due down on Tuesday. We hope that they make it.

You will be aware that Britain is semi-paralysed by snow and ice. We have been hearing the most miserable tales from bleary-eyed going-nowhere passengers at its congested airports. The Brits do not sound grateful for the white Christmas they were dreaming of. Here in the Algarve, although overnight temps sink deep into single figures and the rain is a pain, we do not complain.

Hard as I find to believe it, 2011 signals the start of our ninth year in Espargal. It’s the best place I have ever lived. The lovely environment and a pleasant community counts for a lot. So, of course, does relative financial security and good health. My day starts off with coffee and toast on my bedside table, which also helps. (“Do you get coffee and toast in bed every morning?” asked one incredulous female visitor. “No,” I replied. “Sometimes it’s tea and toast!” That shut her up. Well, it’s a man’s world, isn’t it?)

It’s nice to turn over and get a little more sleep. I don’t make a fuss if I can’t because big dog is nuzzling me under the duvet to get up and go walking. As you should be aware, every day has to begin and end with a walk. How we are ever going to manage this with six dogs I can’t imagine.

I hope that we are shortly able to purchase a piece of land that juts into ours, which will permit us to complete several hundred metres of fence around the property. That will give the dogs a couple of secure acres to run in.

Like many of my fellows I have to empathise with the Sugarplum fairy in the New York City Ballet who “looked as if she’d eaten one sugarplum too many”. (You must be aware of the controversy caused by critic, Alastair Macauley’s acerbic pen.) Jones continues well and enviously slim, even if she finds her plate too full and sometimes disapproves of the sexagenarian face that frowns at her from the mirror. She often complains that I make her out to be an eccentric. But she declines to write blogs in her defence. And, anyhow, you know her well enough to judge for yourself.

There we are. We haven’t sent out Christmas cards. But we shall write and thank all the lovely people who have sent them to us, whether in the post or via email. We hope that Christmas 2010 brings you all the blessings and cheer that you might hope for.