730 days, yes folks the lovely wife and I have survived our first two years in Spain. Survived is probably the wrong term, there's hardly a day goes by where we don't remind ourselves how lucky we are to have turned what for many is a devastating occurrence , the dreaded redundancy. Into our work free future in Spain.
It has at times been an emotional roller coaster, as any of you who have suffered enough insomnia to have gone the full 730 days with us can attest. I could bore you all even more by doing a BBC review programme of the last 2 years but it's all there, down below thanks to the good folk at eye on Spain who give us all the chance to un load the many stresses that pop up whilst we live this care free life in the sun.
I think the biggest difference between here and there is that here you have to work at living here. Life's not delivered in a two hour window; some times it's not delivered at all!
Just where do all the lost parcels get to? There must be a Spanish post mountain somewhere in an Indiana Jones size warehouse just waiting for some postie or delivery driver to decide what type of ID they require or if they will ever turn off the Tarmac and onto the rambler. It might be possible to settle part of the national finance black hole just by opening the packets and putting the stuff on e bay!
Prior to setting off on this journey we were THE online family, the shopping was delivered by Tesco any day any time everything else was sourced on line, Amazon , eBay etc life was too short to go to the store the nearest we got was online buy and collect , screw fix , b&q Argos to name a few .
When time was even too short to cook there was always the take aways, yes buy online and delivered, our local Indian , no name, even used to put the tiger beer's in for regulars on request.
All this convenience left more time to work, to return a profit for the company that was planning on handing me my ass, how their plan back fired LOL.
But here you really do have to work at daily life, interact with the vendors and neighbours, certainly run at a slower pace and just expect to make do, wait or some times just simply do without.
The daily chore of putting fresh bread on the table is driven by the facts that a barra de pan will double for a table leg just a few hours after you have bought it and secondly the fact that when it's good it won't last long at all. This pilgrimage to the bakery each day provides the staff of life and time to practice our Spanish moaning about the weather with the baker who seems to never be happy, often the whole trip is so tiring we have to stop and have a coffee just to recover. We were able to avoid this chore just by defrosting a value sliced white.
When our personal shopper was picking our Tesco shop in the wee small hours they were careful to ensure that all our fruit and veg were uniform and washed n packed to save time later and always within date. All of this meant we were able to sleep and prepare for the next days toil earning the funds required to have such a convenient life.
Now the funds are slimmer, we have to do our own shopping down the market rummaging through the fruit and veg where there's not a uniform pepper to be found all that's left are the odd balls unwanted by Tosco's, it's a good job they are cheap and tasty as they are well outside spec, it's a wonder they can sell them so far off spec? But it's all we can get now so we'll make do.
The lovely wife's even had to get her own trolley for market day as believe it or not non are provided and you're expected to carry your own shopping to the car. This is exhausting as these markets are run by insomniacs during the night, for some reason this off spec food rejected by super markets is so popular that if your not there by 8.30 you may miss the best of the worst, unbelievable.
Again as this foraging is so alien to us we have to take time out to catch our breath and be fortified by coffee and churro's. It's no wonder the local ladies seem so vocal and agitated having gone through this every week for years just to feed the family. I can't wait for the day we can understand what their being so animated about, or may be I should?
As the UK charges towards the digital age, encouraging all to do every thing on line and the government seems not to want to even talk to the population in favour of DIY services. Here you still have the personal touch where nearly all official interactions have to be done face to face so you can witness your tax euros at work, this interaction helps the authority stay in touch with the electorate by taking every opportunity to gather and save your details with some long lost plan of helping you in mind.
As all these interactions are in the mornings or early pm, the over whelming gratitude that their level of service and commitment to your needs supported by all the information they have gathered instils in you allows you to celebrate and give thanks in the afternoon with a cool drink in a shady bar whilst having multiple servings from the children's menu that seems to be available almost every where.
The celebrations over and replete after surfing the kids menu it's off home to work at staying cool, that might mean more cool drinks or a dip In the pool or sea or usually both as air conditioned interiors aren't so common thanks to the cost of electricity and interruption's in its supply.
After working so hard all day just to put food and drink on the table it's customary to gather in the evening outside a draughty bar with friends and neighbours to discuss how hard you had to work to provide for the family and how you had support and input from the authorities in your tasks.
As you wander home in the darkness of the cool night air there is no need for more cool drinks just a quite dip in the dark pool to look upon the stars that seem strangely out of place and ponder on why you would want to do it all again tomorrow.
When there's so much to do in just living here you must wonder how we would ever have found the time to go to work without the internet.
Contrary to popular folk lore Spain's no holiday resort it can be hard work, may be that's why the Spaniards have a siesta and respect the Sabbath as its just too daunting to face the week on a 24 / 7 basis , there's always tomorrow and that's a good thing as you'll need it to do what you didn't do today!
Someone once said to me "always have a project lad" his point being to keep active for a longer life and for now living in Spain is turning out to be a big project.
Talking of projects, after working so hard just to survive the day we have also found time to move things along a little more.
We have now got the fly free entertainment area enclosed all bar the doors. I'm in the process of making the double door set but have hit a snag as one of my router cutters has seen better days and it's proving difficult to get a replacement locally, so I've had to order it from the UK! Let's hope it arrives and isn't lost to Jones warehouse.
We've also got a concrete table and benches, the guy in the garden centre said that it's not too heavy, it's ok. So when it arrived and the crane on the truck groaned under the strain lifting it on to the patio we knew we were in trouble. The bench parts and bases were ok on the sack barrow but the top WAS too heavy thank goodness for friends as it took four of us to move it 10 m, once set it looks great and should be the scene for many a feast in time to come.
The same delivery was carrying a couple of potted date palms that have started us down the path of softening all the concrete and stone. Just by the way we're getting a regular supply of tomatoes and our surviving pepper plant is showing fruit along with our two aubergines. All the chilli plants both seed and sets have failed for some reason, the sets just failed to flourish slowly dropping leaves to a bare stick over 6 weeks. Our second planting of the remaining seeds has produced 2 lemon chilli and 2 inferno chilli plants but they may be too far behind to actually produce fruit, but they are strong plants so maybe.
DeeDee the dog is doing well, she seems to be moving on from chewing everything and has settled down well since the builders have gone, may be its the lower sugar intake that s helping. She now sits and returns when called and is responding well to whistle training returning over 50% of the time the remainder she pleases her self.
Our property is not fenced at the mo and as such she often wanders off for a play date at the neighbours, not ideal but not a big problem other than Paul's dogs are fenced in so start to bark, as you know we're up at six each day but Paul likes a slower start but not on these play days! She also keeps going to the local farm and getting in the slurry pit!!
So to be fair to the neighbours and so I don't have to keep washing s*** off the dog we have had to get quotes for fencing and a roller gate. This FREE dog is costing a fortune thankfully the euro is strong and is helping with these extras.
Bag-puss, well she's a cat and just flicks her tail and ignores it all as she finds a shady spot to look down on us all. May be the cat is the one who truly has found the Spanish dream.