I forgot to say that the other day I was delighted to see that I am not the only one reading this blog, so thanks Mike the Trike for your interest and also for letting me know I am not the only one who can hear the strange sounds from the other flats. When I ask my Spanish friends or neighbours they all seem to say the same thing, usually 'what dog?'

It's very easy to get nothing done...........I realise that it took me so long to get this blog up and running because I spent the first few years on a spectacular bender in Spain. 24 hour licensing didn't exist in England and so it seemed incredible to me that I could go out at any hour here. All that has changed and now this town has curbed its licensing hours, I have curbed my drinking and the obvious has happened back in Blighty. I have fond memories of illegal drinking holes in Soho and the desperate measures we used just to have a drink. When I think about it, the problem was more to do with having somewhere to go and chat till the small hours and less about the drink. Just before the 24 hour drinking was introduced I remember we went back to London and spent half the night searching and pleading with various establishments and ended up in a stranger's house with a bottle of wine she found in the cupboard.

Apart from the insomnia and the ability to socialise at whatever hour another reason ( there are more) for coming here was the discovery that there is a fiesta somewhere in Spain every day. This seems to be true here especially in the surrounding villages. In France there is a cheese for every day, in Belgium it must be beer, The Netherlands is probably some vice or another and Britain it must be a gripe or a moan. The first time I really understood the meaning of 'Whinging Pom' was in New Zealand whilst watching the tele and some Brits where disgusted at the hurricane that had ruined their holiday in the Caribbean.

I used to scoff at the things my mother sends me through the post but I often find them useful especially for teaching English and for any metric conversion. I was a bit perturbed when she mentioned that she'd popped some issue of The Lady but the articles have come in good use for students here. I drew the line at a magazine that went by the dubious name of This England which bravely declares itself 'Britains Loveliest Magazine' but somehow it doesn't seem out of place on my shelf after all the shennanigans of the last few years. My favourite has to be the Dairy Diary with articles like Meat to Please You and Eating For Health ( as opposed to just eating ????) This diary came with the Mini Dairy Diary and opening at random I was reminded that in the same week King George the Third was declared insane, Norman Wisdom was born, not in the same year of course.

Piti kicked off around lunchtime and it seems the only way to cope is to join in. He soon shut up as I howled my house down. I heard one of my noisy neighbours tell me to shut up which I think is a bit mad seeing as they can't hear any of the noise they are making or the dog or anything for that matter.

It seems the 35 million Euros spent on our new Palacio de Congresos is going to be justified now that the Dance and Theatre Festival begins this week, never mind that hardly anyone goes and if they do we have the lovely renovated Olimpia Teatro and The Matadero, a converted slaughterhouse.

Talking of new, we have what seems to be another 'new' political party. The UPyD, El Partido Union Progreso y Democracia, as if we need any more, parties, progress or democracy! They will soon have a HQ where they can attend to 'members and sympathisers', somewhere people can complain about the Pharaonic actions of the council. Let's see what they come up with..................

I can't really complain about the Spanish NHS especially as there is anecdotal evidence that I was shouting 'don't leave me in the hotel!' to the Dutchman during my 'estancia' at San Jorge hospital. However, I am getting rather concerned at the volume of prescriptions that seem to be growing as we speak and the cupboard groans everytime I put in more medicines or Spain Killers as the Dutchman calls them. He told me one of his pupils who happens to be a chemist is off on his holidays again. Yes, with my money. I am going to have to keep an eye on this as I am beginning to think it would be healthier and cheaper if I took illegal drugs.


On the subject of teaching, one of his other pupils had to do sentence rewriting, which is very popular here, and had the following examples.His face is always sad...he is a sad faced man. The food looks tasty. It is a tasty looking food. No wonder he will never be out of work.

I'm not sure what it is about the Dutch but they have a worrying tendency to share a similar sense of humour with the Spanish. The Dutch think it is funny to take the Mickey out of the Belgians and think it is hysterical that some people take it out of the Irish. After putting up with crap Irish jokes recently I thought I would see how they feel if I started on them. What do you call a man who cycles up a mountain above any vegetation line where he can buy sausages and sweets when he could have gone up there in a car and taken a nice picnic? A Dutchman. What do you call a man who climbs up and then over a mountain range, gets to the other side and then asks 'is there a bus back to France? A Dutchman. What do you call a man who decides to cross the Pacific on an inflatable banana with a trowel as an oar? OK, I made the last one up but the others are true and funnier than any joke about an Irish brickie.

I had a mini revelation today as I looked up and saw a Red Kite, that I would probably never go back to England. It was reassuring as opposed to the usual angst of 'what have I done' when I realise I have left the motherland for sunnier climes. It is nice to live in a place where you don't feel as though people might stab you. I am not sure I could go back unless I was rich and could afford a chauffeur to pick me up from the pub.

The sound effects from our flat seem to be coming from a radio play. The footsteps clip clopping from God knows where, the strange muffled sound of someone crying, snoring, and then talking in their sleep. Piti continues to howl but then he would as the bickering neighbours next door have had to close their windows on account of the cold so someone or something has to make up for the silence. Spanish friends have confessed to not liking silence and have admitted to having the tele on so as not to feel alone.

If there is anyone out there keen to rob a bank look no further than our local CAI. I don't wish to encourage criminals but there is a sign on the wall in the open plan office warning potential robbers that the door that leads to the safe is alarmed etc but I was amazed to see one of the staff take a key to said door from the top of a cupboard and let himself in.

Aragon

I'm trying to find out if it is true that an Aragonese, one Emilio Bellvis, invented the mop. So much time and devotion is spent on this subject here. On the tele the other night they devoted at least half an hour on how great this invention was and showed clip after clip of a mop being wrung out that by the end of the programme I was exhausted. Along with that other great invention the lolly or 'chupachup' I can't think of anything else. As the Dutchman says, ' they are not quite the Internet though are they?'

Flats in Spain are designed to leave you thinking you have understood the Doors of Perception or have entered a labyrinth from which there is no escape. Lying awake in the early hours I will often wonder what the hell the other insomniacs are doing upstairs. Sounds of screws being dropped on the floor, sweeping and strange twangs resonate through the whole block. There's also a strange scratching noise which I first thought was mice but is always followed by the bloke in 3E flushing his loo. This sounds like an applause and I feel compelled to bow everytime it happens. The Dutchman decided to change a lightbulb at three in the morning and have a converstaion and I said that now I can envisage the scenarios upstairs better. The worst is the man who needs a cane to walk and I find myself thinking 'now he's going into the kitchen.....' In our old flat there was a woman who insisted on making the beds at seven in the morning whilst wearing high heels. You could hear the style in which she made the beds too. When the sheets are tucked in with such a ferocity and tightness that it is impossible to pull them back later on when you try to get into bed. Now we have the lovely Piti the poodle who howls the whole afternoon during the siesta and can only be silenced with a lambasting from the Dutchman who has been given permission and the keys to the flat by Mercedes, Piti's owner.

Noise aside, I've just found out The Colony Room in Soho is going to be closed down. I can't go to Soho when I find myself in London as the change depresses me. Maybe the change is also within me but that after hours feel was killed off when the government allowed bars to stay open 24 hours and banned smoking in them. I don't lament my salad days as I now enter my cake years with a certain gusto.

The longer I live in Spain the more worried I am that I am turning into some sort of Judge Pickles. I discovered Facebook today and find myself baffled. I don't understand people my own age let alone the youth of today. People back in Blighty are dismayed when I say I don't know who Jade Goody is or if I refer to a DVD as a video. I do know who Jordan is but can I really be the only person who spent most of my youth trying to avoid these people and from getting my head kicked in by them? Now I have to admire them for their honesty and ability to earn tons of dosh for just being celebrity rabble.