Episode 25: Flying the coop

Hello - remember me? What can I say??? It's been a whole five weeks since I last published a blog on here and to be honest, some days I totally forgot that this page existed. Then I remembered you, my public, out there in the dark and so here I am. There is, of course, a good reason for my tardiness - I just couldn't be arsed to write! No, bless you, that's not the case. As if! I shall endeavour to explain.............

Dolores, or Diego as he's known from
Monday to Friday, runs a naked knitting
group here in Spain on Saturday evenings

There are moments in one's life that are memorable for all sorts of reasons: your first true love, your first taste of alcohol, your first pay packet, the first time you wear ladies underwear and call yourself Dolores. Well, at the tender ages of 48 and 49 (I'm naturally the younger of the two of us), José and I are finally breaking the shackles of the family home and moving out into the big wide world on our own. We had planned to do this in our twenties, but his mother wouldn't let us! In all seriousness (and this is about as serious as it gets), we were planning to do this a little later in the year, but circumstances have forced us to do it sooner than expected. It's nothing sinister you understand, but I won't bore you with the details other than to say that it's basically to do with the business and my in-laws not losing their pension by us all living under the same roof. See, I told you it was a boring reason; I can hear you all yawning now. Stay tuned gentle reader, for there are tales of sex and intrigue afoot.


So, we went searching for flats and that was more difficult than expected. Some of the flats on the internet that we liked and were in our price bracket were also in the price bracket of 2000 other people, some of whom I wouldn't cross the road to smack. After a plethora of emails flying backwards and forward to various estate agencies (or Inmobiliarias, as they inexplicably call them round these 'ere parts), we received results equivalent to the amount of firing neurones in my head; ie none! Squatting entered our heads for one brief moment and we did see a place that would have looked rather lovely with its front window punched out and a manky old sofa from the landfill placed under the dado, but we decided that after one brief run-in with the local police, we wouldn't chance that one again. Well, I say run-in, I gave one officer the glad eye and sent a drink over, but I don't think I was his type. I was so embarrassed! I won't be going back to that Mormon church again; not even for the full John Travolta Massage Experience they were advertising.

So, we settled on going to see someone in one of these Inmobiliarias and actually paying some rent and several weeks ago, found ourselves in the back of a rather swishy Mercedes, being driven to look at several places. 

This is not the same paper
clip that I had in my pocket, but
it was a red one and is available
to see, should anyone not
believe me.

The first one was an attic flat. Two bedrooms, en-suite, small lounge, small kitchen, small second bathroom, small second bedroom and small cleaning lady once a week (although she doesn't do toilets!) It was small, with not enough space to swing my rather ample hips, let alone a recently deceased member of the feline family. We looked around the place and decided that the owner and his reasonably large-chested girlfriend were not strict Catholics, owing to the large packet of condoms that were opened on the bedside table and delicately strewn across as if to announce to all and sundry, "Look at us, we have regular sex". I had a paper clip in my pocket and the urge to punch a hole in one was so strong, but I resisted, although only because he never took his eyes of us when we were in the bedroom and I had no opportunity.

The wonders of modern medicine

The second place was nice, but at the top of the Galician equivalent of an Alp. Some of you may have realised that I'm not the most energetic of people and consider regular gym attendance to be once a year on New Years Day. What felt like sixteen flights of stairs later and with no lift in the building, we found ourselves in a rather nice little flat with a big kitchen and a view of the local roundabout - and I'm not talking about the ones that little children go round and round on either, which in turn would make me sound like a paedophile. It wasn't that pretty, but at least the journey out of there was much easier than the journey in. With excuses of "our parents are elderly and knackered and would never get up here without an iron lung", we left and went onto the next place.

I couldn't find a picture
of a rotting gusset, but
I think this comes close
enough!

Bingo!! Three bedrooms, one very large lounge diner, a nice sized kitchen, one en-suite and one large separate bathroom AND a parking space in the garage under the building. The only downside was the smell like an an old age pensioner's rotting gusset in the hallway by the second bedroom, but we decided that we could live with that as it was likely coming from the rug in the hall but we could buy another and put that one in the storage room we also had, adjacent to the garage space. The estate agent didn't speak a word of English, so in the car on the way back to the office, we were deciding how much we could ask the landlord to reduce the rent by and then we would snap it off him. Our driver received a call from his wife. She had another couple with her who wanted - nay, were desperate - to see this perfect flat. Bugger!!


I don´t think that JL and I have made a decision as quickly as this before. He literally shouted down the phone at this woman that we were taking the flat and under no circumstances was she to send any pond scum round to set foot in what was now to be our new home. Actually, when we got back to the office, the couple seemed quite nice, but that's not the point. It's perro (dog) eat perro in this Spanish world at the moment and so we found ourselves there and then with a new address. Paperwork was hurriedly completed and then the hard work began..............telling my in-laws!


Was anyone hanging on for the sex that I promised at the beginning of the blog?? Well, when we got back to the flat for the first time after we'd been with the estate agent, there were a couple of cats hard at it in the garden behind the flat. Phwoarrrrrrrrr!

Poor Bernard the cat was furious,especially as he'd told Tiger that those days
were behind him now and he was being faithful to his beloved Frou-Frou

Tune in next time for tales of derring-do with the furniture removers and I'll try not to keep you so long this time.