It never rains but...

Quite an eventful week, all in all!

Monday

Monday arrived all too quickly, as it always does, and brought with it an all-day stint in the office not only for Helen but for me too - I could put off my admin and Christmas shopping no longer.

The morning was uneventful as a consequence, although I can tell you it was nice to get rid of months' worth of receipts and other related detritus knowing that I won't need to do the same again this side of 2016.

We both worked without the help of the gas heater until lunchtime, at which point I went to make a start on lunch, scrambled eggs on toast! With our own eggs of course.

As I was busy stirring eggs I heard a knock on the glass door immediately followed by Reggie going absolutely nuts at a face I didn't recognise.

I opened the door, letting Reggie out to have an up close and personal encounter and just about managed to hear that our visitor's name was Paul despite the volley of barks he was being greeted with.

Reggie was clearly not going to quieten down any time soon and when he REALLY wants to tell someone he doesn't like them, you can't lay your hands on him, he always stays a capture-proof distance away while barking at the target.

In the end I had to open the gate to driveway and let him feel like he was escaping and then run with him to the car. I opened the boot to put him in, as the car seems to be a place where he feels relatively secure and happy, but at that moment that was the last place he wanted to go, he had lost his mind and wanted blood, or so it seemed (I might be over exaggerating for dramatic effect, you'll never know).

I finally herded him into the car before he could realise there were chickens to go and harass and went back into the house to rejoin the conversation.

Paul, it turns out, has recently moved to a property near Castelvecchio and knows Carolyn, the Australian lady that we met a few months ago who now lives in the house near San Quirico that we viewed when we were house hunting.

On Carolyn's recommendation, Paul had made a visit to Amanda's shop and had got chatting to them and asked if they knew anyone that could give him Italian lessons. Of course, Samantha offered and told him that she currently gives Helen lessons, so he had come both to introduce himself and to ask Helen how she finds her lessons with Samantha.

We had a long chat covering all aspects of life in the valley, and of course bureaucracy, before Paul left us with his email address and to resume our lunch.

Lunch was a late affair as it was by now well past two in the afternoon, and when we went back to our desks in the afternoon the darkness of the evening crept up on us as we plugged away at our computers, both working and making a start on the dreaded Christmas shopping. Of course this meant we'd missed our chance to take poor Reggie out for a walk today - so we promised him we would take him for a good walk the next day.

Tuesday

Tuesday started mildly and with a little unexpected rain, but not so much that it stopped me loading a few tools into the car to head to Vellano - although the drizzle, combined with a migraine, was just enough to put a stop to Helen's outdoor exercise.

As I arrived at the house in Vellano, David was already there getting set up for us to pour another concrete step, which we did in very light drizzle and managed to get it trowelled smooth and covered just as the rain started falling with more serious intent.

We packed up the tools we didn't need and sat under the cover of the patio for a while to see if the shower was going to let up enough for us to have a fire to clear more of the terraces, but it showed no signs of stopping and after we'd eaten a clementine each we decided to call it a day and head to the Bistrot.

We bumped into Michelle and her dog Piff in the restaurant so we sat and had a coffee with her for an hour, and were joined for a little while by Ibrahim, one of the refugee guys, who we talked to about life and the status of his paperwork.

Ibrahim is a lovely guy and it was hard to hear how tough life is for him waiting around with nothing to do in a quiet mountain village for many months, flirting with depression and sleeping his young life away while he waits for his paperwork to be processed - seems like it is a tug of war between the refugees' appointed legal representative and the state until they eventually get their permission to move on and find work. It's heartbreaking to see these guys languishing like this but such is the state of immigration in Europe at the moment, a problem I'm sure is only going to get worse.

After coffee and feeling much more sombre I headed home for lunch which, due to a work conference call for Helen, was almost as late as yesterday's.

After despatching bowls of hot zuppa tradizionale (vegetable soup made with beans and farro) along with crusty bread, fresh pressed olive oil and boiled eggs that needed using (the last of our shop bought eggs), we headed into Pesica to give Reggie the walk we'd promised him.

Today being a bank holiday (the celebration of the immaculate conception - which left us baffled as to how Jesus was conceived and delivered with the space of a month!), it was very quiet in town so we parked alongside the river and headed out of town along the usual stretch of river bank.

Part way down I thought I recognised a couple walking in our direction with a border collie, and as we got closer the lady started calling Reggie to her, 'vieni bello!'. It was the older couple that I had befriended so I was finally able to introduce Helen to them.

We chatted for a while as Reggie played with their dog until another couple approached, more our age and also known to our Italian friends, the lady was Hungarian but I think the guy was Italian, they had been in Pescia for 13 years, although their tiny handbag dog had only been with them for two years.

We all stood around chatting, mostly in Italian, for a while as the dogs played, Helen and I both on tenter hooks while trying to converse in Italian and hoping Reggie wouldn't squash or eat this tiny dog in its knitted pink jumper with sparkly jewels attached.

He didn't, thankfully, and she only yelped when her Hungarian owner accidentally trod on her.

A short while later, the others started leashing their dogs having spotted another dog and its owner coming our way. We followed suit as the dog was quite a size and we were being encouraged to by our new friends as they didn't recognise either the dog or the owner.

The guy also leashed his large dog as he approached, and he passed without incident although a few words were exchanged - not that I could pick up a single word he said, whether it was his missing tooth that made it hard or whether he was speaking with something of an accent I don't know, but it was one of those frustrating exchanges that makes us feel like we've gone right back to the start with our language learning.

After the short exchange we were approached by another couple, ALSO know by our Italian friends, so as they chatted, we talked to the other couple. By the time we'd all finished chatting the guy with the big dog was coming back our way, yet again I couldn't understand a word he said, which was made even harder by the very loud growling now coming from both Reggie and his dog, who were having a stand off, both at the end of their leads.

This soon put an end to things and the guy walked on by and we unleashed Reggie once the other dog was a safe distance away. Reggie, however, was now obviously agitated, and next he took exception to a guy walking past in a bright blue fleece and wanted to tell him exactly what he thought of him (or maybe his choice of clothing). As had happened with Paul yesterday, I couldn't get a hold of Reggie as he followed his guy along the river, barking at him, and when I gave chase to try and catch him I ended up flat on my backside, having slipped trying catch him.

Excitement over, we bade farewell to our new group of friends and each went off in separate directions us heading back towards Pescia and the others away from the town.

When we got home Helen went straight to work making the most of the vanishing daylight by varnishing the shed doors while I played with the CCTV camera we've bought!

Helen has often said how hard she finds it sometimes working in the office while I'm not here, not being able to see out of the house in a way that allows her to see if anyone is approaching. It is indeed a strange set-up in that there are no doors or windows in the house that face the drive, so the first you know of when someone is visited is when they appear from around the side of the house. I suggested the idea of our old flat screen TV with a camera attached to act as 'window'.

With the camera fixed to the wall, the TV set up in the office and Helen out of varnish, we tweaked the camera with Helen in front of the TV and me out on the ladder.

Just like having a little window...

That done, and declared an unqualified success, we retired indoors to light a fire and settle into the evening which involved me on the sofa writing some of this blog and Helen at the dining table having relocated her computer to benefit from the warmth of the wood burner in order to do some more of her own Christmas shopping.

Wednesday

Wednesday's schedule once again included a 09:30 Italian lesson with David and Sarah in Vellano so little happened prior to that other than Helen squeezing in some exercise and both of us having breakfast.

When we arrived, it turned out that David was absent, having double-booked himself with some work, which left just the four of us.

After a couple of coffees we got into this week's exercise of filling in blanks, this week concentrating on cardinal numbers, days, dates, months, and times. This is deceptively tricky, especially writing long numbers; millequatrocentonovantadue (1492) for example, you can see why I pass my cheque book to suppliers to fill it in for me, as while I feel pretty confident with speaking numbers now, the writing of them is a whole other matter!

Despite this the three of us seemed to get through the exercise fairly easily, which left us a whole heap of time in which Johnny offered us the option of moving onto the next lesson or having an attempt at a conversation. While I think all three of us would have felt MUCH less daunted by the next lesson than by having to attempt to string together comprehensible sentences in Italian, David's absence dictated we did exactly that, and after all clamming up with anxiety and being unable to suggest a solitary topic to start the ball rolling, Johnny kicked us off with 'do you like Christmas?', that was all needed for the three of us to chat away (with plenty of incorrect words, stumbling and stammering) unhindered until almost half 11.

A very fun lesson was had by all and we have arranged for the five of us to have a Christmas lunch get-together after next week's lesson.

Helen and I let Johnny leave the tiny car park first so as not to hold him up on the way down the hill (he's a much faster driver) then headed down through Pescia and out the other side of the town to see Enrico at the garage again - it appeared the car had a leak somewhere in the brake system as the break fluid tank was now empty and had been since Sunday (after having been refilled by Enrico on Friday), but today was our first chance to see him because of the bank holiday yesterday.

He seemed surprised to see us and I think he thought there must be a problem with something he'd fixed, so in a weird way he was probably happy to hear that it was a new problem.

After a bit of fiddling around, topping up the fluid reservoir and giving us the remaining bottle of fluid for safety, he booked the car in for Friday and sent us on our way.

It was now just gone midday and as another email from UPS had arrived last night telling me that our automatic chicken door was due to be delivered today to Frateschi, I wanted to check on the way home if it had arrived yet. The UPS website said the parcel had arrived in Florence (the last place it would be recorded before being delivered) at 8am today, and after the last attempt at delivery failed last week (as delivery was attempted at lunchtime when Frateschi was closed), causing the parcel to go all the way back to Cambridge, I wanted to do all I could to avoid this happening a second time as I was sure the vendor would be less understanding a second time!

We arrived as Paolo was whizzing around in his forklift trying to load a van before he closed for lunch, so I dashed in to check the pile of parcels inside but there was nothing yet for us, so it was back in the car and home for lunch and to check the UPS website for a status update.

As we put some eggs on to boil I checked the UPS website but there had been no update since this morning. I knew Frateschi would be closing up any minute so, after deliberating for a few minutes, I decided I needed to go and wait outside in case the delivery was attempted when the shop was closed. Grabbing some boiled eggs and a book I disappeared back down to the village to find Paolo still there but in the process of closing. I went in to ask about the parcel JUST in case he had put it somewhere else, but as I entered I spied a UPS parcel that hadn't been there ten minutes ago and sure enough it had my name on it - no need to sit in the car park peeling eggs!!

I made it home in time for lunch, after which we loaded Reggie into the car and headed back to Pescia for what we hoped would be a quiet walk along the river.

To make sure, we decided to cross the bridge and use the side of the river only ever used by dog walkers (no joggers or cyclists). We made it half way out of town before meeting anyone else, a lady with a tiny handbag dog and a 6-year-old male greyhound. Reggie and the greyhound hit it off immediately and they spent a few minutes running up and down the river bank, Reggie trying his best - but failing - to keep pace with the much older greyhound.

We then walked out as far as the path would allow before making a u-turn and heading back towards town just as the sky was brightening, Helen even needed to lose an item of outer clothing at this point, such was the increase in temperature.

Almost back in town we came across a familiar but not very friendly (towards Reggie at least) group of greyhounds and a large collie, we all leashed our dogs before we got too close and after a brief growl-off of a quite viscous nature, Reggie included, we crossed the bridge and hopped back into the car to head home.

By the time we were home there was only about an hour and a half's daylight left so while Helen went indoors to do some office work, I fetched more wood for the fire and tidied up a little before going indoors to light the fire.

As the evening wore on and the fire got to melting point we roasted some chestnuts, opened some wine and settled into a blog writing and yet more Christmas shopping before dinner.

Thursday

We had a clear plan for the morning today in order to maximise efficiency: breakfast, dog walk in Pescia, park in the square and do a little Christmas shopping before going home.

All went to plan until the parking in the square part - it was unusually busy in the square this morning and there were double parked cars along the length of it so we quickly shelved the idea of any shopping and instead went home, deciding to try again later in the day.

After lunch, I went out to make a start on fitting the new chicken door while Helen changed into outdoor attire to have a bonfire next to the chickens to burn the last of the remaining detritus we made last weekend.

By the time the daylight started to fade I had managed to reconstruct the side of the coop to make the opening smaller to accommodate the new sliding door, fitted the door, programmed the motor mechanism and stained the new bits of wood I'd used as well as changed the roosting bar in the coop from a metal one to a wooden one of a larger diameter for better comfort.

With my tools packed up I went to see Helen was doing, but she was already done and watching the fire die down so very shortly we were Pescia bound again.

The square was looking very festive now, with the Christmas lights on, but it was still busy. Nevertheless, we were lucky to find a space just before we left the square again. With the parking meter fed, we headed off in search of Christmas cards and gifts and with some success returned as the ticket ran out just before six.

We went straight home to start the fire - this was the latest we had started a fire for weeks, I think, but it soon got toasty in the living room now that we know what we're doing with the wood burner. There's actually something very satisfying about those ten minutes or so of cold in the house as the fire warms up and the layers come off.

We spent the early part of the evening on the internet again updating the blog and doing a little more shopping before we settled into dinner and an hour of TV before bedtime approached.

Friday

Yet again, the car was going back to Amanda's husband, Enrico, this morning, this time to have the brake fluid pump replaced, so I left the house at 8:20 and arrived at the shop in the village to find Amanda just having opened. We chatted and Amanda gave me an espresso again - this time I said that I MUST pay, but her mum said that if she offers a coffee it's free, that's the rule!

As I was finishing my coffee our neighbour Paolo, who owns the house behind us, arrived, so the  three of us chatted for a little while although I find Paolo quite hard to understand - he struggles to slow his pace down and has quite a deep gruff voice, making things even more tricky. All that said I made a fair show of myself and managed to escape after my coffee leaving Paolo to buy whatever it was he came in for and walked on up the road towards home for breakfast.

With no car we had no plans but to be home all day, which gave me a rare opportunity to work on the shed while Helen got stuck into office work.

I wasn't sure how today was going to go - the next thing I needed to do was 'tweak' the shed doors so that they closed together nicely and level with each other. As my mitre saw has had a tough life since arriving here (during which time the cutting guide behind the blade has snapped in half), I can no longer do millimetre precise cuts (I have ordered a new one but as yet there is no sign of it) so this meant when screwing the framework for the doors together with bits of timber that hadn't been cut with precisely 90 degree cuts, the whole door ends up warped. This was the kind of job that could have me setting light to the whole shed, but with a good night's sleep under my belt, two coffees inside me, a clear blue sky above me and the sun threatening to bathe me in winter warmth any time soon, I was happy taking the job at the slow and thoughtful pace required. The job eventually involved me removing the cladding from all but the first door and adjusting the cuts on some of the framework timbers.

Happily, I had a productive and successful morning, and by the time lunchtime had arrived I had four of the six doors back in working order and shutting beautifully. This did mean that I hadn't thrown down my tools in a rage and gone to strim the terraces, but the strimming can wait.

After lunch and making the place presentable for Samantha's arrival, I headed back outside for a little more tinkering, but it wasn't long before an abrupt halt was called to both my work and my good mood.

Helen had been saying for the past few days that there was an unpleasant smell in the utility room, but neither of us had given much thought as to why. We keep all the vegetables picked from the garden in this small room, so it does sometimes has an odd whiff about it as some of them go past their best. However, having moved all of the garden produce out of there to deal with a mouse problem that has recently appeared, we could no longer dismiss the whiff so easily. Helen suggested we check the apartment for dreaded smells next, and it was this subsequent check that put the brakes on my work and good mood. Helen appeared around the corner telling me I needed to 'come and look at this' in a more than concerned tone, so I downed tools to inspect what I assumed was the source of the whiff.

Indeed it was (Paul and Marie, if you're reading, the place will be better than new before you arrive next week, we absolutely promise). The smell it seems, has been caused by a blockage somewhere in the drains between the house and the septic tank, causing the whole lot to 'back up' into the apartment bathroom and beyond.

Without a car there was nothing I could do right now so I shut the door firmly behind me and continued to work on the shed until Samantha arrived. When she arrived, we all spent a few minutes with Reggie to try and sort this little issue out, especially as today I couldn't take the easy option and take him out for a walk as we had no car.

He took treats from Samantha, of course, but wouldn't stop barking at her so we decided to head indoors and while Helen and Samantha sat at the table, Reggie eventually came and sat next to me on the sofa, calming down quickly and stopping barking. He occasionally hopped off the sofa to go and have a sneaky sniff of Samantha's feet and shins under the table, before re-joining me on the sofa.

He settled down so quickly that I was able to get up and get back to working on the shed, leaving Reggie indoors with the girls and I didn't hear another peep from him for the rest of the hour and  a half - which he spent dozing on the sofa while Samantha and Helen talked Italian verbs and prepositions. When the lesson was over and Samantha emerged to leave, I decided I should take the opportunity, as Helen has suggested, to get a lift with her to Frateschi so that I could buy whatever it was he had to help sort our blockage out.

It soon turned out he had nothing that could travel 20 metres down a 4-inch pipe taking in three 45 degree bends along the way as it descended down thee terraces, but we eventually hit upon the idea of adding two new inspection caps along the route so that I could the use a simple piece of metal to rod the pipe, so I headed off to the yard to have a poke around for the appropriate bits.

Confronted by racks and racks of the stuff, I soon doubted that I could remember the diameter of the pipe we had, I was sure it was 100mm... until I saw all these bits and pieces in front of me. I thought I'd call Helen and ask her to check it, except that wasn't going to be easy, yep, it was one of 'those' days.

I took my phone out of my pocket, or should I say Sarah's phone - my faithful old mobile died earlier this week and Sarah had kindly lent me her spare work phone until my new one arrives. Of course, I have no contact numbers stored on this phone - it was only last week I was thinking that I should commit Helen's new Italian mobile number to memory and now I wished I had done! Not to worry, I thought, our new Skype phone is now working happily and I definitely knew the number for that. It was only as said phone was ringing out unanswered that I realised I'd left the handset out on the patio table after speaking to my mum this afternoon. After three unanswered calls, Danielo arrived to help me out so I had no choice but to go with my guts and get 100mm fittings.

I eventually left the shop with said fittings, two new torches, some larger shelf brackets, three heavy bolts for the shed doors and three heavy padlocks to go with them as well as bolts and nuts to fit them all in a nice cardboard box. As I waited for the credit card machine to process my payment, I thought how happy I was with my productive trip to Frateschi ... until it dawned on me that I had a box full of stuff and no car, NO DAMN CAR! How many times was I going to say that today!?

There was nothing else for it but to trudge home up the hill with my box of goodies. As it got dark and cold I started to wonder what the onset of frostbite felt like...

By the time I got home daylight was fading rapidly, so I put all my tools away and collected firewood before going indoors while Helen went out with a torch to see a) whether the automatic chicken door had closed yet and b) whether all of the chickens were the correct side of it.

She soon came back to report that the good news was that the door had indeed closed, but the bad news was that there were only 3 hens snuggling up on the roosting bar with the cockerel - and having shone the torch around the enclosure she had made the upsetting discovery that there was a dead chicken in the enclosure. It never rains but it pours!

We soon realised that one of the white chickens seemed to have stopped laying over the last few days, and that this must have been THAT chicken. A quick re-read of the 'egg-binding' paragraph in the chicken-keeping book made us feel better that there was nothing we could have done to have stopped the poor chicken's demise (if that's what the cause was), so I went up to collect the recently departed chook and bag it up for tomorrow. So, instead of the planned terrace clearing, tomorrow now holds in store a fun filled day of chicken plucking, chicken post-mortem and butchering, as well as some very unpleasant plumbing and lots and lots of cleaning.

Now properly retired for the day Helen lit the fire and we settled down in front of our computers for a while to update the blog and do yet more Christmas shopping before dinner... of course with an obligatory glass of wine, happy weekend all!