Letter from Espargal: 3 January 2014

This blog begins on a damp Thursday - the first Thursday of 2014. For inspiration the dogs and I have a view of the mist drifting along Benafim ridge to the rhythms of Brahms' second symphony . There's a small fire in the stove, sufficient to dry the air and the washing that hangs from the rack above as well as settling the beasts; as so often, it's miz rather than cold.

We've ventured out on a short excursion; neither the slippery going underfoot nor the bang-bang of the hunters somewhere in the murk encouraged us to venture further. At one point the dogs took off through the bush with that high-pitched yelping that they emit only when chasing a quarry - usually a rabbit - but they returned puffing and panting a few minutes later with nothing to show for their efforts.

It's been run-around week or two. I flew to Calgary for Christmas at the invitation of my brother and his family, whose hospitality was as warm as the Canadian winter was cold. Barbara stayed behind to care for the zoo and for Llewellyn and Lucia, who arrived from London the day after I left and whom I saw briefly on my return.

VIEW FROM THE BACK DECK

As my own flights began and ended in Lisbon and there were no convenient trains or connections to Faro, I opted to drive the 300 kms to the airport and leave the car there. Jones was good enough both to accompany me (on a trip that began at 03.00) and to meet me back in Lisbon a week later, making her interim journeys by train. On the way up we had the magnificent toll-road more or less to ourselves. The return journey was much busier as numerous travellers headed south to celebrate New Year in the Algarve.

With me I brought back a couple of Pebble smart watches http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pebble_(watch) that Kevin had obtained for me in the US; they're not yet available in Europe - and will be double the price when they are. One of them I had already paired to my phone; the other I gave to Llewellyn, who was as delighted with his acquisition as I am.

Apart from the usual time functions, the watches display SMS messages and (some) emails. They alert the wearer to incoming messages with a faint vibration and light up briefly in the dark with a shake of the wrist. They can also be used to control music and other functions that I'm not into. I should add that I did not forget Barbara, who was happy to receive low-tech gifts of her favourite perfume and cashmere.

I returned to find that UK television reception was still available to us in Portugal, apparently because testing of the new transmission satellites (offering a much smaller footprint) is taking longer than expected. However, we still expect to be cut off any day - a situation that we will confront when it happens.

LLEWELLYN WITH BOBBY

The dogs alerted us last weekend to the presence of two young fellows who appeared at the fence bearing strange devices. On inquiry, they informed us that they were surveyors who had been despatched to record the stone markers that residents have been painting and initialling at the limits of their properties. Their measuring devices were new to me, comprising a long pole with a sat-nav reader at the top - a modern version of the theodolite total station.

At each stone marker, the fellows would pause to take a gps reading before recording the position electronically on a screen. I conducted one of them around the markers within our fence, which encloses several plots. You may recall that I had earlier spent hours in Benafim sorting out the details of our various properties with Rui, as the first part of the process (to record the position and ownership of all properties in the parish).

A pause there to read an email that's just arrived, alerting us to a performance of the Messiah to take place in Faro this coming Sunday evening - and then to book tickets online. The system is a bit cumbersome. Although one pays immediately and receives confirmation by email, one still has to fetch the actual tickets from the theatre at least 30 minutes before the performance starts or risk losing them.

At least it's an improvement on the system offered by the theatre in Loule, where we hoped to attend a New Year's day concert. A notice in the window stated that the booking office opened at 14.00 each weekday. So last Monday, after taking May to lunch, we waited outside at the due time - in vain. On closer investigation it emerged that the office was closed on Monday afternoons. We tried again on Tuesday afternoon, when I had an appointment at the bank. Again no luck; presumably the staff had Old Year's day off. So we shrugged and stayed at home instead. Some things are not meant to be.

Another pause: Thursday evening: the house gleams; Natasha has been at work. We took ourselves and as many dogs as we could fit into the car to Loule, the better to leave her free. Her task is not easy when it rains and the hounds have to be accommodated inside. She preferred to come to us on a Thursday this week to take account of the New Year.

NOT NATASHA BUT LUCIA AT TABLE

Like her fellow Russians she will celebrate Christmas only on January the 7th - a curiosity of the difference between the old Julian calendar (still observed by some eastern orthodox churches) and the reformed Gregorian calendar.

This difference was the topic of my last English lesson of 2013.

The Julian calendar, as good as it was, gained three days every four centuries, gradually throwing the equinoxes into confusion and upsetting the clerical formula for calculating the date of Easter. This in turn upset the Church, whose liturgical calendar was then observed throughout the western world.

(For nerds only: The Gregorian reform of 1582 corrected the imbalance by skipping 10 days, restoring March 21 as the vernal equinox; it further amended the formula to declare
that:
it is a leap year if it is evenly divisible by 4;
but it is NOT a leap year if it can be evenly divided by 100,

unless the year is also evenly divisible by 400. Then it is a leap year.

Bet you didn't know that!)

Happy New Year!