Sat 7 May - Sofas, Sulking & Rabbit for Tea

The sofa arrived!  Woop woop! 

I aint listening

And we promptly fell out. 

KP and me. 

Over where the sofa should go.  How dumb is that?  After all the major life changing decisions we've made over the last couple of years, and being in each other's company 24/7, all in relative harmony, we go and fall out over whether the sofa should go diagonally across the room (me) or square in the corner (KP). 

An innocent looking sofa

I guess the day was doomed to failure from KP's agonising 2am cramping session in the night.  Absolutely debilitated by searing pain through the backs of both of his legs, both his hamstrings were as hard as stone and frighteningly knotted.  Never seen anything like it. Scary stuff.

So not a lot of sleep was had.

We had fun with the sofa delivery guys though!  We had the balance to pay on the sofa, which we expected to do by invoice either online or by card and/or cheque to the delivery chaps.  But no.  After the sofa was unloaded, unpacked and put together they just shook their heads when I presented my card, and rubbed their fingers together.  Money?  Cash?  Of course.  Silly me.  Everything in this country is done by the reddies alone.  But we didn't have the €685 outstanding.  Bugger.  Don't you dare take my sofa away!

Another fine mess!

I needn't have worried.  No problem, they said, we'll follow you to the bank!  Hilarious.  So there we were, Laurel & Hardy go to the bank, on a Saturday morning driving up through the village in convoy, us and the sofa delivery van men.  All very well, but we missed the turning to the post office cash point and had to wind our way down and round and through the streets of Serramonacesca once again.  Poor sofa delivery chaps.  They must have thought we were quite mad.  


We thought we were quite mad when we found ourselves counting out all those notes on the bonnet of the van in the street outside the busy little post office.  And then it was re-counted by the sofa delivery men, popped into chief man's back pocket, receipt was signed, hands shook and they were on their way trundling back through the village.  Madness.  What a crazy country.

But the jovial atmosphere deteriorated rapidly and the rest of the day was spent in a stomping grumbling silence.  He one way me the other.  Harumpf.   We had a stomping grumpy trip to the shops to buy a TV (check, success) and a gas heater (no check, no success, only sold in winter time).  The afternoon was just as grumpy, he reading in one corner of the garden, me in the other.

A brief truce was called in the evening when we thought perhaps a wander down to the bar to chat to our neutral friends might clear the air.  But we were thwarted by one of our neighbours who was sitting outside his house with a few others.  He raised his bottle and gestured for us to sit down.  We couldn't refuse.  But nor did we want to.  This was great stuff indeed.  Our neighbour had the most fascinating place ever.  He'd lived there for 62 years! 

The "new" principles of Permaculture

The place was cobbled together with all number of make do pieces, and brilliantly laid out to make best use of space, place, seasons, weather and time.  A real life Heath Robinson. Permaculture practitioners eat your heart out, this guy is the forefather.  No books or studying the principles for him, he lived and breathed Permaculture.  


Our guided tour revealed a deep, huge cellar complete with all the gear for a wine and oil refinery and the hay in the olive field was in the process of being turned by hand.   If only we'd known!  We could have made hay from our field and swapped the bales for eggs, rabbits, chickens, lamb, wine and oil!  His outbuildings were full of all of them.  Tons of rabbits in cages, sheep in pens, chickens split between the laying hens and the pullets, with a mean looking cockerel strutting around.  What a brilliant place!  I want it.  Lots.  But we contented ourselves (for now) with coming away with half a dozen of fresh eggs, an order for two rabbits, cleaned and gutted, and a handful of point of lay pullets to start our flock.

But we had to, eventually, go back to the war zone.  Another look at the sofa lying diagonally across the room and I thought maybe it would look better in the corner.  Not a chance, said KP.  It stays where it is. 


So I went to bed.