Saturday 13 February 2010

Some Improvement

We moved into our new accommodation on Monday. Its very nice. There is a huge living room, and three good size bedrooms. Out of one of the large windows in the living room we look out over rolling countryisde and towards woods. Its very tranquil. The down side is that even normal TV access is poor. The Freeview box keeps losing signal, and we are in two minds about what to do about Internet access.

The place is largely unfurnished, which was a bit of aproblem as we'd left all our furniture in our old home when we sold it. We had some good luck there though. The holiday lodge we had been staying at were doing some refurbs on the site, and we dropped in for beds, a TV cabinet, and curtains!

We had one other good bit of news. The dog has been having chemo for the last 3 years for lymphoma. Just before we we due to leave the vet told us he was not responding to his current treatment. We were preparing for the worst, especially as they told us that 12 was a good age for a greyhound, and most dogs only last between 7-12 months on chemo. But a couple of weeks ago we took him for another biopsy so they could advise on the best treatment. When he was first diagnosed he was assessed as being at level 3 out of four. However, his results have now come back showing him to be only at level 1.

In addition my son has had quite a lot of film work in the last few weeks that he would have had to fly home to do were we in Spain.

I suppose to look at things positively too, in the last few weeks the value of the Euro has fallen significantly against the pound so that we have gained around £20,000 against the price fo the houses we were looking to buy. I suppose you have to look at the cup as half full rather than half empty.

I'm too busy to write much at the moment, and its not convenient without Internet access back home. But, I'll write more when its possible.

Sunday 7 February 2010

A Bit Of A Nightmare

I had hoped by now to have been writing this blog under the Spanish sun. Unfortuntely, things turned out rather differently. We set off three weeks ago, having sold our house. We'd had a panic in the last few days, ebcause we were stuck in the house due to the snow. In the last 24 hours before we had to get out of the house we were frantically trying to load up our personal possessions into the carvan we had bought for the purpose of transporting them, and ourselves down to Spain. We werre then frantically unpacking stuff, and trying to relocate it with relatives for fear we were overloading it. Even firt thing on the morning we set off we were moving stuff, and ended up having to get hold of a removal comppany to put things into storage. Its amazing how much stuff you accumulate.

The weather had just about enough cleared to be able to drag the caravan up the hill on, which our house was situated, and we set off reasonably well. We'd just refuelled on the M6 Toll, and started off again hen we heard a bang that we thought was a stone flirting up in the wheel arch. It seems to have been one of the caravan tires hitting some debris on the road, and getting punctured. Shortly, afterwards, the carvan began to snake, and althougbh we had used a stabiliser bar, within seconds it was swinging about uncontrollably, before jack-knifing and spinning the car round 180 degrees. Fortunately, there was nothing else on the road, and the caravan embedded itself in an uphill embankment, which brought it to a halt, and prevented it from overturning itself and us. It was knackered, but did surprsingly little damage to the car.

In short, we ended up having to stay here to sort things out, and in the meantime found ourselves homeless. That has been an experience and a half, about which I will blog in more detail at a later date. For the last three weeks we have been moving from one temporary accommodation to another, hence tghee lack of blogs, or comments elsewhere. We are moving into a permanent address tomorrow, but it will take some time to install Internet access. Something approaching a return to normal service will then be resumed as and when, including a fuller account.