A relaxing day by the pool (sort of)

The hotel here in Pathos is OK. Today we actually managed to get up for breakfast. That is despite the fact that I was kept awake till the early hours by the couple next door shagging like rabbits. The walls are not particularly thick but add to that the adjoining door and I was treated to the hard core audio performance of a screaming banshee. Apparently if we had gone all inclusive they would have opened the adjoining door. I was a little disappointed that the hotel hadn't advertised that the beds all had plastic liners. I could have saved myself some valuable luggage weight by not packing my incontinence pants. At least I can now drink as much Stella as I like and bugger the consequences.

The Crown Horizon Resort hotel is listed as a four star. I would dispute that but it is reasonably clean and our only experience of the food, albeit a little 'Butlin' like, was breakfast this morning and it was as reasonable as european breakfasts go.
There is a distinct shortage of sun beds here and the occupants of the hotel have adopted the Germanic mannerisms of getting up at the crack of dawn to claim their territory. I didn't join in having had an interrupted slumber due to the sexual antics of our neighbours. Be did intend to go down the the beach but wandering though the gardens of the hotel we happened on a couple of sun beds so claimed them immediately.
A pleasant few hours later and moderately red from not applying any of the numerous half used bottles of various factor suncream I had brought with me I went for my late afternoon siesta. Matt was already asleep. As expected the first few days of the holiday. Catching up on sleep after four thirteen hour shifts in the A and E department of hospital.

Yesterday was a full day of sleep with a short excursion out for lunch so I had to occupy myself reading my book while observing my fellow holiday makers What the hotel lacks in sun beds it makes up for in Chav's. While familiar with the phrase I dint think I have really come across a 'Chav' close up before. That is till we arrived in Manchester Airport on Sunday. While having a drink in the terminal 1 bar we were treated to some choice language, followed by raised voices and closely after a 'youth' kicking a table full of drinks over his girlfriend. I have to say that, given we were sitting under a closed circuit camera the speed at which any sort of 'security' arrived was not as expected. The detritus was swept away and it was a good half hour before a couple of armed police came to 'have a word'. Clearly pissed, the gentleman was spoken to and sent on his way. Surprisingly he was on our flight, where despite the fact that the police had alerted the airline. (the captain mentioned the intolerance of drunken behaviour in his pre-flight announcement) the flight attendants continued to ply the individual and the rest of his group with more (a lot more) alcohol.
I'm surprised they were surprised when ,lo and behold he began to kick off again, this time at 37,000 feet above Croatia. Fortunately he wasn't in our hotel.

So all in all a relaxing day. I'm as red as a lobster. Matt decided that to get a consistent tan he would use Veet to remove his body hair. (this looks uncannily like the fondant that I use for my pink cup cakes) and he looks uncannily like one of those newborn creatures that should have fur but currently don't.
We are eating out this evening having decided that we will launch ourselves gradually into the communal tourist scene.......






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Location:Coral Bay Ave,Peyia,Cyprus

It turned out ok in the end.......

We should have been travelling to Turkey on Saturday. A call on the morning of the 17th soon put paid to that. The company who our flights were booked with has gone bust. Lowcostholidays were hopeless. Very little alternatives offered other than a full refund in 'a few weeks' which could turn out to be two years. After a bit of hectic ringing Thos Cook came to the rescue. I am now sat in the lobby of the Crown Resort hotel in Pathos,Cyprus. I feel for those who did not have the means to rebook something until they had a refund.





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What I like most about not working.........

• No more schoolnights
• You can have a drink when ever cos there are no more school nights
• Night becomes day and day becomes night.
• It's like being a teenager again.
• I can paint when I  feel creative and am not constrained by work.
• No more conference calls - especially Monday morning at 9.00 ;-)
• You get up when you  want and sleep when you want.
• Late night/early  morning TV is MUCH better than day time TV.
• Summer days and nights are better in the garden.
• Can't think of anything else cos I've had a few drinks

The Germans are coming... The Germans are coming.....

My dear German friends Christine and Volker are coming over to visit me this weekend and I am so looking foward to it.

We do see each other a couple of times a year but it is still really nice to have them visit 'old blighty' and experience our English hospitality. I have hired a car for the weekend and plan to take them out into Derbyshire to see the delights of an English summer and enjoy some English food. (I still don't have a car but guess I am offsetting my carbon footprint for my 3 month trip to South East Asia which will doubtless involve a few flights).
 It will probably be good deal cooler as they are apparently experiencing a heat wave in Bochum  (twinned with Sheffield I'll have you know).

They arrive around 9.30 in Manchester. Christine feels she may starve if she does not eat during the journey but I have suggested that she has a snackette at the airport and  I will have some supper prepared when we get back. That way I can have a drink - after all, it is Friday !

A busy Weekend

Well......
Monday morning and I certainly feel my age!
Spent all of Saturday helping my mate David move house and then Sunday pulling up the for conifers at the rear of the Ballroom at they were starting to look a little jaded. As I fell out of bed at 8.30 on Sunday feeling as though I had just had two knee and hip replacements, I have to confess, I know exactly how they feel. However, by the end of the day they were in well and truly dead and strategically placed in a dozen or so bin bags.
David is not the most organised person I have ever met ! I have moved house four times now and stuff has always been neatly boxed up and labeled some weeks before the big day. Naively, Jason  (who was also helping) and I thought that's what everyone did. Think again.......

We arrived  (it's actually only next door), as requested, at 11.00 to find that pretty much nothing had been done. It was going to be a busy day. David rents the house from Jason and has done for a few years. Having just had a little one with his wife Deb's ( who decided to go to Canada for a month and leave David to sort the move out )

Not only were we lugging furniture but we had to pack the all his other stuff too. It was heavy work and at 9.00pm we were finally done. David has a new nick name, the Bag, Box and Bed man. 6 beds in a three bedroom house and there were more boxes than you can shake a stick at. He must have saved the box from everything he had bought in the last five years. Pity he didn't put anything in them ! And the Bags ! hundreds of them.....

I fell into my bed at 11.00 exhausted !

Sunday was gardening day. The small back garden had weeds the size of small trees. I have to say, David was conspicuous by his absence. Jason set about clearing it, putting down a membrane and depositing 15 bags of stone chips. I had my garden to sort out which basically meant taking up four 10 ft conifers and chopping them down to a size that could fit into a car and be transported to the local municipal tip. Again, it was a full day but we got them both done ( much to the delight of some nameless members of the residents association).

Unfortunatley the municiple tip was closed for 'green waste' - what do I pay my poll tax for please ? I never call the police, I'm already subsidising the council by travelling on public transport at extortionate prices, and i've never had a fire ! granted the roads are in quite good nick but 200 quid a month seems a little excessive.
Anyway, loads of green waste at the back of the house, only a motorbike to transport it... rant over.

That was my weekend !!!

Fortunatley life at the moment is one long weekend so who give a shit !  Not I sir !

The Muffin Man Cometh

Yesterday was the my first baking gig !
As John quite famously said to Mrs Craddock 'May all your doughnuts turn out like fannies'. I wasn't quite looking for that, but I was going to give my first trip out my best shot.
 
I had already made some muffins for my friend Sue's village art festival, but that was a donation of a dozen blueberry and white chocolate and a dozen double choc chip. In reality only a third of them made it to the festival as Sue thought they looked so nice she would purloin a fair few.
 

Granted, my first commercial outing was to start quite small, a school fete! but I was hoping to make it a profitable day.

I guess its always difficult to access demand and this is not the type of venture where you spend ages doing market research. Consequently,  I was a little anxious that I didn't take too make too many buns and get left with a load of stock. While I am partial to a muffin every now and then, one is quite sufficient.
I had decided that I would keep it simple and just make Muffins and Scones.

The 'gig' was at my sisters school. The annual summer fare rents out tables to budding entrepreneurs for just £10.00 and you get to keep all the money.

It was only for three hours on the Friday afternoon and to be quite honest, I was a little excited.
The menu 'if thats what you call it' was thus:-

• Blueberry and White Chocolate Muffins
• Banana and White Choc-Chip Muffins
• Lemon Muffins
• Double Choc-Chip Muffins
• Chocolate and Mashmallow Muffins
• Apple and Cinnamon Muffins
• Fruit Scones

I decided on a dozen of each and 40 Fruit scones, so on the Thursday evening set about the task of producing this plethora of delights.

It was very easy, bish bash bosh and done. The kitchen looked like a bomb had hit it, but the produce looked superb. I was tempted to test out the fruits of my labours but to be honest they looked fine so they were straight from the oven, cooled on a wire rack, dressed and boxed in the bargain plastic containers that I had bought for transporting from Wilkinsons  (They have some pretty good bargains !!)
As I'm still without a car (I'll stop saying this when I get one ... honest !)  my sisters partner had kindly offered to transport the goodies over to the school in Sheffield and I was going to travel on my bike.
How did it go ?

BRILLIANT

Within 50 minutes I had sold out of everything. I got loads of complements on the presentation but of course, the proof of the pudding is in the eating. I was helped by a couple of ladies who sat by the side of my stall, munching away at a bluberry and white chocolate and Banana and white chocolate muffin that they said were to die for.

My pockets filled with pound coins, I was well chuffed.

I'm sure I was underpriced and could probably have sold at least double the amount but that's all part of the learnng. I have been asked to do the same at the Christmas fayre in December. Looking foward to that already.  In the meantime I think I will have a little look around and see if there are any other opportunities. I have all the 'consumables' now in terms of tray's, containers, bags etc. The job was a gud un.

I didn't get any photo's as my sister clearly has no idea how to use an iPhone camera but that's OK.