Winter Straight to Summer ?

After the wettest winter here I can recall we seem to have gone straight to summer, with the sun out, temperatures heading towards 20 degrees and everything looking much better than it did only a week ago.

The roof is down on the BMW, I can go on my scooter with a sweater on rather than look like the Michelin Man and the grass is growing again. My beautiful Magnolia tree is in bloom and even Shadow lies in the sun all day – the phrase ‘mad dogs and Englishmen etc’ comes to mind. The cats play with the shadows as they cross the lounge and just love lying stretched out soaking up the unusual warmth.

Of course, with the sun comes loads of work. Tan, who finally seems to have conquered the maintenance of his pool, continually shouts over that mine ‘looks a bit green’ and compared to his, it is, and so I’ve been cleaning mine, ready for the algae which comes with the sunshine and causes even more pool work.

I’m desperately trying to put off the annual spring cleaning of the terraces and poolside as the dreaded ‘yellow dust’, which comes from the pine trees, is due to arrive in the wind. This covers everything and on bad days you can actually see huge clouds of it swirling below in the valley.  That’s my excuse for not doing the terraces although according to my diary, the dust is a week late this year – maybe because of the rain we’ve had?   

The cafés and bars will soon have their tables outside, the rosé wine will start to be served and everything is looking good.

My beloved Alfa

I’ve used this early spell of good weather to put my Alfa up for sale as ‘the perfect summer car’. I’ll be sorry to see it go but if I’m left with it, I won’t be too worried although the stigma of having two convertibles in the drive might make me a bit self conscious, particularly when J has her ‘raise money for starving Kenya kids’ coffee mornings at our house!

And that’s about it for this update except to say that Guy is entering the final few days of his ‘stage’ which is a three week work experience programme. Through a friend, we managed to get him placed with an executive recruitment company and despite the fact that he’s been restricted to the accounts department, he’s thoroughly enjoyed it, is getting paid, and is now making noises about college being boring! I actually think he likes the prospect of two-hour French lunches or maybe it’s because he’s actually going to have some real money to spend next week after he picks up his three week payment!

Now, how much was that he owed me?