Snap!

Today had a “school day” feeling as I woke early and felt I ought to get up.  This is rather counter to the ideology of a Sunday, but I went with the urge and made myself a cup of tea.

The weather is still cloudy but with increasingly bright intervals.  Daunting enough weather to discourage anyone other than myself from using the pool.  Fir the whole of my swim I had the pool to myself.

There is something deeply pleasurable in breaking the mirror surface of a swimming pool and then churning the water up.  A pleasurable, yet worrying experience.  Surely a swimming pool in a seaside resort should be bustling with swimmers on a reasonable Sunday morning in the summer?  I want to have a lane to myself but I don’t want the place to go bankrupt.  Perhaps I ought to enjoy the place while I have the opportunity!

The newspaper reading via the Kindle after a swim while accompanied by a cut of tea is going well and I have to remind myself that there is life outside the swimming pool and café as it is tempting to while away the time reading and listening to the clack of dominos being snapped down or the cries of the petanque players decrying or applauding a shot.  The average age was well above that of statutory education and I should imagine that in the next few months I am going to be more in the company of the jubilados when the kids are finally forced back to where they belong – off the streets and in the schools!

The lunchtime drink with Frank was good and, as he paid it did mean that a further meeting is demanded so that I can return the favour.  We talked for a couple of hours and I only wish that there was something real that I could do to make his situation better – but I fear it will take an upturn in the Spanish economy before that happens.

And from my reading of what is going on in the country at the moment that “upturn” look very unlikely.  It would appear that our politicians are playing around with nomenclature so that the desperate situation of Spanish banks does not look Greek-like.  But it is, and I think that we are not far off a full-scale bale out.

The Euro drifts (on a good day) steadily downwards and is now trading at 77p, getting nearer and nearer to what it was when I first came to the country.  As I will, in future be dependant on my UK pension this is goodish news for the time being as I will be able to buy more for my money than I could.  What is more worrying is what might happen to the money that I have in Spain if the situation gets so bad that the government decides the time has come to revert to the peseta. 

God help.

Monday saw the rest of my Retirement Lucky Bag (eventually) arrive.  The camera (for who is so devoid of finer feeling that they do not need another camera) demands a considerable amount of time to get to know.  I have used the new printer to produce a version of the entire manual.  It not only explains how to use the camera, it also gives an idiots’ guide to basic camera work.  No harm in starting from the beginning!  As this is supposedly a “smart” camera there is far more set up work to be done than is normal with a camera and I have only scratched at the surface of that work – and of course, failed miserably to get the bloody thing to do anything more than take pictures.

Which is not enough for a camera nowadays!

I have to admit that the limited use that I have made of the camera does encourage me to believe that this machine comes ever nearer to what I am looking for in a camera.  But this is only day one.  If nothing more comes of the “smart” elements then I may well become a little more disillusioned!

The other elements in the Lucky Bag are not as complex or demanding as the camera and will be enjoyed in the coming days.

And you never know, I might actually start of some of my remaining tasks for the summer.