Andy's Blog

I looked at the ‘langostinos’ and rather disturbingly they looked back.  I’ll give most things a try, but not when those ‘things’ are able to look at me, with more than a little recrimination, and have more legs than foodstuffs should have!

“Look Dad! Buggly eyed beasties!” the boys bellowed across the table at me, knowing that the unofficial name that I gave this favoured Spanish dish gets me in more than a little trouble with the natives.

I also can’t help but feel a little queasy when said natives are ripping apart the aforementioned buggly eyed beasties and leave what looks like a slaughter of the cast of fingerbobs.

The Christmas meal just doesn’t seem the same without an obscene amount of roasted turkey and a feeling afterwards that you’ll be pooping feathers for the next few days.

This year I thought that, rather than ask for my usual ‘useful’ gift, I would get something completely impractical and feed the big kid in me.  Santa didn’t disappoint and I am now the proud owner of a mini Apache AH-64 remote controlled helicopter!  The little devil fits in my hand and buzzes around the room menacing all that are within the vicinity… mainly due to my ineptness with the remote and the fact that it’s an absolute bastard to control.

In fact the full danger of me being behind the controls of the helicopter meant that I was banished to the spare room to try and perfect my skills without taking out a family member.  The “you’ll take somebody’s eye out with that!” argument wasn’t won by myself when I pointed out that it *WAS* an attack helicopter.

Push the controls upwards and the helicopter shoots up and nearly hits the roof. Suddenly letting go of the control lever to stop it hitting aforementioned roof and it slams into the floor.  Buggar!  Push controls gently upwards and the helicopter lifts 4 foot off the floor and starts rotating in an annoying circle.  Looking down at the remote control for the “rudder trim”, as I remember the instruction sheet mentioning something about this, and the little bastard exits stage left and out the window onto the balcony.  “Ooooh shit!”

The little helicopter was never designed to fly outside, and it certainly wasn’t designed to hover from 6 floors up a block of flats.  As I run to the balcony it gave me one last look and started its rapid descent downwards.  I think the roadrunner type “meep meep” was of my own imagination.

Lunging over the plant pots that lined the balcony and desperately pointing the remote control at the gravity aided bit of plastic I managed to at least check the descent to a plummet.

I don’t think the shouted “Sorry!” to the bouffant haired old dear, tottering along the street outside, did much to calm her nerves.  I don’t think she appreciated the last desperate act of skill that changed the kamikaze dive bombing into a crash landing into the bush next to her.  I also don’t think the liberal sprinkling of potted plant dirt in her face as she looked up was also much appreciated.

My grasp of Spanish is basic, to say the least, but I got the gist of her feelings.  “Yeah, yeah, and that’s for the armada” I muttered after her angrily retreating frame, and started the long trek down the stairs to retrieve the errant present.

I am sat somewhere in the Toledo countryside with a killer view, a sunburnt head, arms which I am trying to convince myself are going a nice shade of oaken brown, the ubiquitous iphone playing random tracks, the bikes parked close by and the bustle of mi compadres finishing off their meal and starting to chill.

The complete lack of light around means that we have an unimpeded view of the stars above, which makes for a heck of a view whilst supping on the cold cans of beer that have magically appeared from somewhere.  Trying to decide whether to get under canvas tonight or just stay out in the open; Neither option seems to deter the mosquitoes from using all of us as snacking boards, at least outside is a wee bit cooler (temperature is apparently about 26c tonight!).

Tomorrow we’ll see how far we get on the bikes; there’s no particular route or plan, we just point ourselves in a random direction and see what’s around the next corner.  Probably not the most efficient way of getting from A to B, but it’s a damn site more pleasant and is loads more fun when it’s time to figure out where we are – the shrugs of “I dunno, does it matter?” makes for a more interesting holiday.

As for tonight, somebody is moaning “what are these?” as they scratch at the itchy, red mosquito bites that are starting to appear on all of us.

“Love bites?” comes an unhelpful reply.

“It certainly does” floats in from the dark somewhere.

…and suddenly the holiday is getting noticeably shorter and “normality” closer.

Just before I flew out to Madrid for Christmas with the in-laws I got myself a little early Christmas present. As some of you will know I am an avid gadget freak and my latest toy is the Nokia N810, which is the latest version of Nokia’s Internet Tablets (which I now have a full suite of).

Well colour me impressed! I haven’t put the damn thing down all Christmas, much to the annoyance of the wife, and am now fully mobile after installing some of my must have apps;

• Pidgin
• Skype
• XChat
• GPE Calendar with Google Calendar Sync
• Canola

Throw into the mix the pre-installed RSS Reader, which is currently downloading all my BBC podcasts, plus the Internet Radio streaming – you find yourself with one happy Troozers

In fact this article was written using the N810! Which brings me to the new habit… actually updating this ste on a more regular basis. Now I have the ability to do this from anywhere, let’s see if I can keep this particular New Years resolution (and try and update it at least as often as Mr Fitchett!)

Happy New Year Y’awl!

I am currently away on holiday in Spain, in a small wee village called Oropesa, between Valencia and Barcelona. My system is still trying to get over the shock of moving from the month long rainy climes of Britain to the scorching hot Spanish climes (32^oC and counting)!

Of course the inevetable happened; as soon as I took off my shirt I turned a nice shade of red all over. The top of my head is a lovely angry red and my shoulders a shade under that. This does of course mean that I am wandering around the beach in long shorts, t-shirt and my favourite Oz hat to shade all parts of the body, in a desperate attempt not to scare the locals with my luminous skin

During the height of the heat I am staying strictly in-doors and when not spreading thick wads of after sun on, I am dialling up the internet using my little Nokia N800 Internet Tablet and my Razr mobile phone. The speeds aint great, but I can at least post these little entries (thanks to BloGTK) as well as do small updates to my facebook profile. I was hoping to find some open Wi-Fi hotspots around these parts, but the Spaniards have been a little too security focused and not left any of them open

I may post a little entry about the Nokia N800 later on to show you how useful this little device really is, but that may wait until I get back from hols – or at least find an open Wi-Fi connection