SEPTEMBER SUNRISE
Friday. During our walk my troublesome left big toe, which Jodi has been treating, let me know that it wasn't happy. I made another appointment with Jodi, anxious to attend to the problem before the weekend. Jones ventured the opinion that I was becoming more dependent on the medical profession than was wise or possibly necessary (not an accusation that anyone could make of her). Whatever the case, the toe proved to be infected once more and Jodi did the necessary to disinfect it. Seems to have done the trick.
Saturday: I worked with Slavic to build more walls, steps and paths. We have virtually completed the terracing of the front garden. I think it looks brilliant and Jones is quite pleased.
Next comes the repainting of the numerous gates - we have about 11, interior and exterior - and some work in the garden, to be directed by the gardener. The gardener is distressed that her numerous chores distract her from the serious business of gardening. "If only I could get an unbroken morning in the garden," she is often heard to complain.
One of the distractions is carob picking, a task that continues to occupy us for an hour or so most days. I took another load down to Armenio's yard where you see them heaped up on a raised and walled concrete floor. He points out that a little rain will not damage the carobs and may even add a little substance to the beans, which are priced by weight.
I returned home with several hollow sections of trunk from his mountainous wood pile, much prized by Jones as natural pots for her plants. In fact she often sighs as we pass great stacks of cork (stripped from the trees) and wishes that she might have just one or two of them.
Sunday: I swapped the sim-cards between my two phones. Both are HTC models, one a 16GB flat-screen device and the other an older 32GB. With the addition of new apps, the flat screen kept on running out of memory in spite of my frequent deletion of photo and video files. Annoyingly, it refused to allow me to move factory files from the main memory to the SD card. Exchanging the sim-cards was fiddly because one phone takes a micro chip and the other a nano chip. But it's done; Whatsapp has been migrated and all the software updated.
Monday: While making a number of online train bookings, I (may have) entered the wrong dates for a trip. I'm convinced that I entered the right dates and that railway computer preferred others. But that's beside the point. The good news is that Portuguese Railways permits one free change to a reservation, assuming that the ticket hasn't expired.
A very nice man at Loule railway station made the necessary alterations without charging me a cent. He did warn me that the booking was now final. Seniors - such as ourselves - enjoy a 50% discount on most rail travel. A 1st class return journey from Loule to Lisbon in the luxury Alfa Pendular express costs the pair of us just €60. That wouldn't even cover the toll-road charges, never mind the fuel, if we were to make the journey by car.
Monday night: I watched a TV documentary on 12-year old Alma Deutscher, a musical child prodigy (with whom you may very well be acquainted). I had earlier read a BBC report on the opera she had composed; to see and hear her in action was to be in the presence of genius, a different model of humanity, for which a whole new vocabulary (that I don't possess) is required. The wonderkind, who has several works to her name, has performed internationally and is often compared to Mozart. Her quite extraordinary talent and sophistication you may judge for yourself: http://www.almadeutscher.com/
https://www.youtube.com/user/AlmaDeutscher
A new stray has arrived in the village, a large black dog that is being fed by a visitor (who is seeking a home for it). The animal drives our lot into a frenzy of impassioned outrage when it passes the gates. I dread a confrontation during our morning walks. Almost as bad have been moonlight barking sessions it provokes from the orphans. I stumble from my bed to hurl futile half-litre plastic bottles of water (Kim Jong-un style) from the top patio in the direction of the barkers. After several sleep-interrupted nights we have taken to shutting the orphans into the patio after supper.
Tuesday: After my weekly tune-up with Jodi, we continued to the Primeiro do Maio snack bar in Funchais for a sandwich lunch. Their generous cheese, ham, lettuce and tomato sandwiches, with a sprinkling of olive oil and a smattering of oregano, are the best in the world. We sit at the end table on the shaded patio (above), just out of the sun, often with the dogs at our feet. Midday temps are still in the 30s. Leaning on the post beside us was an unlocked bicycle. We wondered who the owner might be as there was no obvious rider inside.
The owner turned out to be Bruno, part of the family who run the snack bar. We explained that we wanted a picture of the bike to show that in Portuguese villages, bike-owners might leave their property outside without fear of theft. At the same time we thought it sensible to take a picture of Bruno himself. As you see, he has a lot of tattoos and sports a substantial black beard.
After lunch we carried on to see what progress had been made at the nearby Quinta da Ombria development - midway between Espargal and Loule. As the project website makes clear, Ombria intends itself to be a luxury resort offering golf, a fancy hotel, a spa, residences and every kind of extravagance for the well-heeled.
http://www.yellowpages.pai.pt/ms/ms/quinta-da-ombria-hotel-spa-golf-resort-8100-746-loule/ms-90064589/
From the road the green fringes of the golf course can already be seen creeping down the hillsides; future housing developments are still just in the planning stage. What strikes visitors at present is the impressive bridge that has been constructed across the (dry bed of the) Algibre River to the resort.
The dam (top left of the map above) has taken shape downstream. Clouds of dust arise from large earth-movers that grind their way around the area, dumping masses of gravel and sand in the appropriate places and carving the hill into the desired shape. In a year or two, I expect that Ombria will be the resort of choice for the affluent and aspiring celebs. Jones dreads it. I shrug. We're hardly likely to go there and, once the dust has settled, it may bring a little badly-needed employment and prosperity to the area.
MUST PAINT OUT THAT BARCODE STICKER
Wednesday: Jonesy almost got her uninterrupted morning in the garden. I completed the handrail down the steep winding steps to the bottom rockery and picked up half a tub of carobs. Note the aloes populating the rockery (on the left) from which Jonesy has stripped off the dead leaves.
Thursday: Jones has just completed the repair of a cushion cover that was remodelled by the dogs some weeks ago. She's done a great job. It looks better than new. She declined to show her face, explaining that she hadn't yet washed her hair or put on her make-up. It's a girl thing.
JONES MOON
We are lunching with friends and it's time to round off the blog. I find it takes the better part of a day to put it together. My neighbour says the new stray had been taken to a dog sanctuary. The poor dog had just started to settle in at his place. The prospect of adopting another dog crossed my mind but was firmly rejected. We are septuagenarians and we are full - never mind the canine chaos that would have ensued shortly before our house sitters arrive.
TB MOON
PS: Jones questioned my spelling of "wonderkind" as opposed to (the German) "wunderkind", which is more commonly borrowed in English. I pointed out that the former is Dutch/Afrikaans but, for any fellow pedants, I accept that it's much less common.
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