Thank crunchie it's Friday...

Just as you lot in the UK are heading into a gloriously warm sunny weekend (so we hear), it has (at times) been quite chilly here today - the thermometer outside the house read 10C when I went for my "Helen-pretending-to-exercise" session this morning (still not getting on too well with that). Brrr!! It took until lunchtime for the balance to tip over into being warmer outside than in, and I spent the morning sitting in my dank, dingy office wearing 3 jumpers. Of course, by late afternoon, things had warmed up considerably, and I ended up in the afternoon weeding the flower bed sweltering in the sunshine.

 

We both woke up feeling pretty tired today - Stuart more so (the tonsillitis and the exertions of the last few days - heck, even the last few weeks - seem to be catching up with him), so it's been quite a struggle to get going all day.

 

Nevertheless, Stuart set out on a voyage of discovery this morning in an attempt to find somewhere to order building materials for delivery to the house - he returned having managed to source some of the materials he needed (and having piled them into the back of the car), but still missing a lot of the vital components (including items as simple as washers with which to fix the strimmer) - so sourcing those items will be another conundrum for us to work out. To rub salt into the wound, we heard from Dodge that a Screwfix has just opened close to 'Abingdon home' - I think that news might just have made Stuart feel the most homesick he's felt since we arrived!

 

We were so pleased with ourselves for getting mobile phones (SIM cards) sorted yesterday that we completely overlooked the fact that we have no idea what either of our new numbers is! After an age playing around on my phone and getting increasingly annoyed with it, Stuart left the house this morning with both phones - mine with my UK SIM in it so that he could call my number and find out what his Italian number is, and then the plan was that he would swap my UK SIM for my new Italian SIM so he could call his phone and find out what my Italian number is. Unfortunately, when he tried calling my UK number, he got a message to say he didn't have enough credit to make the call (presumably because it's an overseas number), so we're still none the wiser!!

 

Talking of phones, I had a lovely phone call (on the landline) from Allison at lunch time - she called over her lunch break, and we chatted for ages. It made me realise that Stuart and I haven't had any meaningful conversations with anyone other than each other since a brief phone call to my Dad/his Mum a week ago! It was lovely to catch up with Allison, and while I love it here in Italy (most of the time!), it made me miss the office work environment, and especially miss having Allison to while away the time with and talk rubbish to.

 

We had a brief panic mid-afternoon, when Stuart received an email from the currency converting company we've used (to convert sterling to euros at a better rate than the bank would provide) to say that our account was in debt. Er... we made the (large!) transfer of funds over a week ago!!! We quickly realised that the problem was that, in all the confusion and tiredness of the travelling, I had made the transfer but failed to label it with the appropriate account reference number for them to work out who the money had come from/whose account the euros should go into. Thankfully, one quick call to the company's UK office later we had sorted out the problem, and the transfer will be made to our Italian euro accounts on Monday. Panic over. Thank goodness. (And lesson learned!)

 

In the afternoon, I gave up on office work and ventured outside to warm up in the sunshine. I spent a couple of hours weeding the flower bed immediately outside our front door, while Stuart eventually summoned up enough energy to go down to the apartment and start looking at constructing a wall from which to create a wardrobe in the bedroom. That lasted all of a couple of hours before we both conceded exhausted defeat.

 

Evidence of man at work.

The man - at work.

Flower bed weeding.

 

  

Nature news:

 

We forgot to mention our grisly discovery yesterday - when we went to check the post box, we wandered into a clearing in the woods towards the end of our drive (just to have a nose about on our land) and found a dead deer. Or rather, we found its head (quite fresh), two hooves and some ribs! Something had clearly taken/eaten ALL of the rest of it! Gulp. 

 

As well as the dead-deer-head, we spotted a mouse (or similar) scurrying into the flowerbed yesterday. We've seen a gazillion lizards about the place (of varying sizes and brightnesses of green colour), twenty-five-gazillion spiders (the less said about that the better), a couple of snakes, a slow worm, swifts, some sort of birds of prey, all shapes and sizes of beetle and moth and butterfly and bee, wasps (a few wasp nests around), and some centipedes.

 

I went to get dressed after my shower this morning and realised my trousers (on the floor of the bathroom) were making a very loud buzzing noise. That's not normal. Luckily, Stuart came to the rescue and took them outside to shake whatever was in them out. Turned out that an enormous hornet had stowed itself away inside one of the legs! Now that's what you get for drying your washing outside on the line in Italy (more worrying still, the trousers had been folded up in a drawer for a good couple of days after coming off the line)!!!

 

Food news (for Carolyn):

 

Dinner tonight is a quinoa salad made with lovely fresh tomatoes and cucumber from the supermarket and heaps of fresh mint from our garden - mint seems to grow like a weed in this place, so wherever you walk you get lovely minty-fresh wafts from under your feet.

  

I've been surprised by how much I'm glad it's Friday today, and how much I am looking forward to the weekend - I didn't think it would make much difference, what with us both working from home all week, but I'm finding that I'm really looking forward to allowing myself not to worry about work for two days. A lie-in is probably also in order in the morning - I haven't managed to sleep very well (at all) since we got here (strange surroundings, strange bed, too many spiders on my mind, back ache... etc.), but each time I've dragged myself out of bed at any time between 6am and 7am, I could quite happily have slept for another couple of hours - so maybe the weekend will be when I get to have those extra hours. I'm pretty sure that Stuart needs them too.