Letter from Espargal: 14 November 2014

This past week has been various things but mostly it has been wet. In a different life, wet mornings would be welcome as nature's invitation to enjoy a sleep-in. But my dogs in this life don't believe in sleep-ins. They believe in walks come rain or shine. And they come pestering me at my bedside until they get one.

There was a time on wet mornings when we would pile the dogs into the car and take them down to the valley to walk along the tarred road. That way we could keep them out of the mud and the mud out of the house. But then we had four dogs rather than six. Six dogs (plus two humans) don't fit into the car, not convivially anyhow. And there's no realistic way to walk them on leads through the village without causing chaos.

JONES'S SPECIAL DOG NEXT DOOR WAITING FOR HIS EVENING BONE

So, on wet mornings it's up through the park to the top gate as usual and into the hills on our regular trails. Inevitably mud and small stones compact into the dogs' pads. Sometimes these intrusions are so uncomfortable that the animals pause to pull out stones with their teeth.

When we get back home it's a case of push-pulling each reluctant beast to a bowl of warm water to rinse the muck out again - and then drying its paws before it rushes back into the house.

Saturday Slavic and Roslan turned up promptly at 8.30 as I expect them to do again tomorrow.

I set Roslan to burning off piles of cuttings on the field while Slavic and I took the tractor down into the veld to collect rocks for our wall.

With Slavic I speak Portuguese. With Roslan I am still limited to hand-signal communications.

The wall is gradually making its way along the base of the Leonilde field (named like our other plots for its previous owner).

Roslan collects the stones (that litter our property in their tens of thousands) to be concreted into the gap between the rock frontage that his brother builds and the earth bank behind it.

Slavic has an artistic eye and it's seldom that I ask him to make any changes.

Several of our neighbours have already admired our walling efforts, as indeed they might.

You may admire them for yourself.

On Sunday I gathered my courage and stood for the first time since our return from holiday on the scales that reside beneath the bathroom dresser. My suspicions were confirmed. So I'm back on to the straight and narrow until I dip back down below 90kgs. It takes extraordinary resolution to enjoy a cruise with a drinks package included and return in the measure that one started out.

On Monday the computer shop that was testing my non-printing printer called to say that the problem lay with the expensive new printhead (ordered via Amazon) that I had just received and installed. I emailed the suppliers to say it was defective. They responded promptly asking me to send it back.

May's electricity has been tripping with the additional load that her autumn heaters have been putting on it. Before taking her to lunch I phoned the EDP to get them to increase the potential. They said they'd send a technician around within the next week to make the changes.

On Tuesday we visited the computer shop, retrieved the printer, extracted the printhead and sent it off via express, registered mail to the UK suppliers. With luck, a replacement printhead will be posted out shortly. And with more luck it should resurrect my printer. This is a fine multifunction device that I should be most reluctant to throw on the scrap heap.

My wife was sceptical about my chances of receiving a replacement part from the suppliers. I explained how particular Amazon was about the behaviour of the firms that advertise on its site - and how anxious these enterprises were to avoid negative feedback. But she remains dubious - at least until such time as the part arrives.

The news in Portugal has been dominated by an outbreak of legionnaire's disease in the north of the country that has put hundreds of people in hospital and several in the morgue. A fertilizer factory is thought the likely source. The writs will fly!

RAYMOND AT REST

Wednesday: Both Ana and Marisa looked tired when they appeared in the midday drizzle to remove the car-load of dog-food that we took up to the kennels in Goldra's heights. Ana confessed that they were struggling under the load of looking after 100-plus dogs. Among other things both were receiving medical attention for bad backs.

It's hard to know what to do about it. They get by on a wing and a prayer. The kennels are their life, 365 days a year. Although volunteers help out from time to time the burden falls on the sisters and they're not youngsters, either of them.

In the evening one of those big, determined brommer flies got first into the bedroom (whence I chased him out at Jones's request) and then into my study. I spent an hour, swatter in hand, trying to zap him each time he paused, as I ploughed my way through Yuval Harari's account of the rise of humankind - a most fascinating tome! Twice, I smacked him as he settled on the wall beneath a light - and this with one of Brendan's murderous leather swatters. Each time the fly fell behind my desk where he took several minutes to recover his senses before returning to buzz me anew. Eventually I (thought I) gave him the coup de grace with a whack that would have dazed a buffalo! (But either he or his brother is back.)

Thursday: May phoned to say that her electricity kept tripping. I called her Man Friday, Fernando, who'd already visited her house to see what he could do. There was nothing, he told me, but to wait for the EDP to increase the potential. In the meanwhile May had to go easy on using electrical devices. The swimming pool pump complicated matters, Fernando said, by kicking in from time to time, adding a large load to the supply.

We phoned the pool-man to ask if he could turn the pump off. He, it emerged, was at Loule Hospital getting a broken toe mended. He'd dropped something on it. So we went around ourselves, turned the pump off and set May's electric heaters to half-load. Hopefully the EDP will be there before the end of the week.

Thursday pm: We are misted in.

The rain falls steadily.

There's a welcome fire in the stove.