Ploughing my lonely furrow in the pool as length succeeded length my thoughts turned to the vacuity of my morning’s activity: prone, passive, inert. What achievement? None! Is this the level, I thought to myself, to which I have sunk? Is this going to be the sum total of my intellectual striving?
Now wasn’t that a kinder start to this piece of writing than brazenly stating that on the first day of term (for everybody else) I lay on the beach in glorious sunshine and then returned to the pool for a brief swim before going for a fantastic menu del dia comprising a shellfish starter, fish main course with a sweet of music tart (if you have to ask about that ‘music’ then you haven’t been to Catalonia!)
In the afternoon I went to a beach in Sitges (site of The School That Sacked Me) and lounged about until the evening. I was surrounded on this beach by my fellow countrymen, the colour, it has to be said, of my bottom! If nothing else they were a living reminder of the weather that I have left behind! According to Emma and the Pauls it has been a miserable summer; they are hoping for a better autumn. As I am returning to the UK at the end of November I am hoping for one too!
Our school project received a welcome boost in the form of a telephone call from a prospective parent asking how far we had got. That is a significant question. We have sufficient staff to form the basis of a group of teachers; the ethos that the parents want and the enthusiasm to get going. We do not have the cash or the premises – minor problems!
Our innocent idealism is not concrete enough for parents to make a financial commitment and our window of opportunity to make our pitch for the possibility of providing a convincing educational alternative in January is shrinking by the day, but hope springs eternal.
Does anyone know a friendly bank?
Now wasn’t that a kinder start to this piece of writing than brazenly stating that on the first day of term (for everybody else) I lay on the beach in glorious sunshine and then returned to the pool for a brief swim before going for a fantastic menu del dia comprising a shellfish starter, fish main course with a sweet of music tart (if you have to ask about that ‘music’ then you haven’t been to Catalonia!)
In the afternoon I went to a beach in Sitges (site of The School That Sacked Me) and lounged about until the evening. I was surrounded on this beach by my fellow countrymen, the colour, it has to be said, of my bottom! If nothing else they were a living reminder of the weather that I have left behind! According to Emma and the Pauls it has been a miserable summer; they are hoping for a better autumn. As I am returning to the UK at the end of November I am hoping for one too!
Our school project received a welcome boost in the form of a telephone call from a prospective parent asking how far we had got. That is a significant question. We have sufficient staff to form the basis of a group of teachers; the ethos that the parents want and the enthusiasm to get going. We do not have the cash or the premises – minor problems!
Our innocent idealism is not concrete enough for parents to make a financial commitment and our window of opportunity to make our pitch for the possibility of providing a convincing educational alternative in January is shrinking by the day, but hope springs eternal.
Does anyone know a friendly bank?
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