DAWN
Good day from Espargal on a blue-sky day with a welcome wind ruffling the branches of the trees in the garden below. Another scorching week is approaching its end. (I heard an interview with a resident of Baghdad who laughed out loud at the suggestion that 35* was hot. "Come and try it here," he responded. Well, everything's relative. Nearly everything!)
ALL IN A HOT AND COPPER SKY
It would be fair to say that Mini has been the focus of our week. Our attempts to find a home for her somewhere other than at Valapena have not met with early success. After three days' post-op confinement in the orphans' former enclosure, Mini let us know that enough was enough.
Twice she managed to wriggle out through the narrowest of gaps. Each time we enticed her back in. (She's happy to follow a food bowl!) Our concern was that she would take herself off and miss her daily anti-biotic pill - with potentially fatal consequences.
ARTY CAT
On the other hand we were confronted with her growing unhappiness and ever more frequent yaps of protest at her detention. A compromise was called for. We decided to leave the enclosure gate open for her to come and go, expecting that she would return for the meals that she'd been consuming with such gusto.
THE CATS DON'T SEEM TO MIND MINI EITHER
We also encouraged the other dogs to meet her through the fence - with generally benign results. For a while the day release policy seemed to work. Mini wandered off after breakfast to catch up with her acquaintances but would report back for meals - all she could get.
DINNER TIME
Then one morning, as we set out on our walk, we found her waiting on the far side of the top gate. It was the first time that she met the gang without a separating fence. With very little ado, other than some convivial bottom sniffing and tail wagging, she joined us on the walk as though it were her established daily practice.
The boys find her attractive - possibly a bit too attractive - and the girls don't seem to mind her company. I have to say that she is a clever and captivating little creature and that it's only our possession of so many other animals that has so far dissuaded us from adopting her officially ourselves. She has also attached herself to Jones although my wife says it's just cupboard love.
GARDEN SCENE
Changing tack: my Saturday morning workers laid two new sections of paving - yet to be grouted - which have met with Jones approval. As usual, this involved much ferrying by tractor of rocks and barrows of concrete from the mixer to the site under development. On Sunday I woke with a stiff back that by the evening was giving me a hard time. It was going unpredictably into spasm, leading me to grunt in a manner that Jones found most unappealing.
Jodi, who was able to fit me in the next morning, surmised that the problem might have arising from my peering over my shoulder as I reversed the tractor up steep inclines - not that this has bothered me before. (Travelling forwards uphill might endanger the load, often of large rocks, a cascade of which down the drive in the direction of Idalecio's fence would be the stuff of nightmares.)
Although the stiffness eased over the next few days, I was grateful for a second session of physio. As I passed through Benafim on my return, I was buzzed by a water-bag bearing helicopter that whizzed low overhead. A fire-engine was maneuvering outside the supermarket and a police car was hurrying to the scene. Something was afoot. Locals were congregated on the pavements. All that was missing was the fire. There must have been one for a second helicopter came clattering low overhead, spilling water.
DUNNO WHAT HAPPENED TO THE WATER BAG
At the petrol station I gathered from the attendant that the cause of the excitement was a blaze that had broken out in a large field between the church and supermarket. After filling up I drove to the top of the hill overlooking the town, hoping to get some decent shots for the blog but - like the angler whose big fish got away - I found little to illustrate my story. The upper part of the field was a sodden black; the fire was out, the crowds were drifting away and the firemen were packing away their gear. They must have been pleased to get the job done swiftly. I can barely imagine what it must be like fighting fires in heavy protective suits in 35* of heat.
Fires and Mini apart, the week has borne a close resemblance to those it has followed. In the morning we've been out shopping, banking, returning Mini's carrier, getting physio and annual check-ups. In the afternoons I've snoozed or worked at my desk, Jones has trotted off to visit Portuguese neighbours who are delighted to have her company once or twice a month. We don't walk until after seven when the day has cooled down; then come dog dinners and more garden watering so that it's nine-thirty before we sit down to a salad supper, generally in front of the news.
We have followed Boris's first week in office, Theresa's European travels and - Lord help us - the Donald Trump circus playing out in Cleveland, finding it hard to credit that millions of Americans are actually going to vote for him to lead the free world. We shake our heads in disbelief. Brexit was scary. The upheaval in Turkey is alarming. But the prospect of a Trump presidency is utterly terrifying.
So, let me end where the blog began, on Mini's arrival. The fact is that she's moved in. Somehow it seems that she's destined to stay. She has certainly made herself at home with startling rapidity. The rest of the gang appear content to have her. It takes only a couple of minutes to prepare yet another doggy meal twice a day. There are times when one just has to shrug in the face of destiny and accept that this is the way things are meant to be.
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