Back to the heat!

Back in Catalonia it is even hotter than in the UK.  This surely must be the only time that I can remember that I can say something like that and not be bitterly ironic!  The weather in Wales was wonderful and it continues this side of the Pyrenees as well.

As always there is an odd sense of dislocation as I re-enter the world of Castelldefels and realize that the round of friends that I ate, drank and chatted to is now a cramped flight away.  But not too far away and one of them will be arriving soon to stay for a week.  And next month Paul comes to stay.  So I will have plenty of opportunities to do what I did over the last few days!

Meanwhile the OU work (which waits for no sluggard using the excuse of journeying to a foreign country) continues and the pace has stepped up.  I have at last written the second piece that I was supposed to have and have edited right, left and centre.  There is still a lot to be done, but it does look doable!

The moneymaking scheme of charging for erstwhile free parking has swung into operation today.  No resident’s ticket of course, but new information pointing out to us that a new (and expensive) headquarters for the implementation of this PP inspired money grab was open and ready for business.

Equipped with various documents and Toni we drove off to the office acutely aware that we would be parking on fair game spaces.  The office looked thrown together and was staffed by one harassed, though outwardly calm Spanish speaking lady who was having to try and placate people who were fearful of being submerged by a flood of tickets because of the lack of the magic card proving that they actually lived there.

No duplicate or copy was available and we were sent away with the wildly unconvincing assurance that we would not be fined.  Not be fined by the squadrons of uniformed children who were gleefully setting out with their portable ticket printers ready and willing to attack anything without the badge that they had not issued.

After much huffing and puffing and muttering dark imprecations against our totalitarian local government we made our disconsolate way back to find nothing in our mailbox.

At least nothing for about ten minutes when scooter mounted post people started ostentatiously stuffing official looking letters through the box.

I now have my vision obscured by a shoddy little card lurking in its cheapo self adhesive holder on the right hand side of the windscreen.  Shoddy it may be, but protection it certainly is.

I am waiting for a call from The Family to get them from the cinema where they have been eagerly waiting to be scared by a late night screening of a horror film.

I chose the OU over the outré!