Tuesday 1st December, Marjal and ear muffs.

Yep, it's getting quite cold out here and although it's actually still in double figures, there is a wind that made it feel about 10º C. I think we are getting soft. Getting out of bed is a struggle nowadays, it's cold out there, no automatic heating. So I have to get up, switch it on and then go back for another quick snooze. As I got out Tricia grabbed the back of my shorts “Oh come back to bed it's so cold!” “That's more than my shorts you've got there” I squeaked.

Tricia spent all day yesterday looking for woolly pyjamas for God's sake but that is another story.

Sunday started bleak enough.

Maurice is a guy I've communicated with, via Motorhome forums and the like, for a while now. He, his wife Judy and son Paul arrived at Marjal two weeks ago. His son Paul was involved in a head on crash when he was young which left him physically and mentally damaged.

You would think that God had done enough work with his family but alas no. On Sunday Maurice (Old Mo) knocked on the MS and when I came out he told me that he had just learnt that his 34 year old son, Mark, had been found dead, apparently suicide. He had, four kids but was having matrimonial problems. So Maurice was driving back, he could not get a flight soon enough, to the UK.

He asked me to post the news on the forums as some of the members were due to meet up with him later in the year, I posted it and was flooded with responses of condolences. Best of luck Mo, happy Christmas?

Back to the pyjamas. We decided to drive to Torrevieja, the town where Phil TG has his place as mentioned earlier. It's only 9 miles and one day we plan to cycle to it. This day however, the plan was that I would attempt something I had never done before; Christmas shopping with the wife.

Bye the way, since I've started using OpenOffice, I have had to re put in all the words that Word understood, into this OO dictionary again and it's bloody frustrating having to stop every now and again to tell it how to spell Torrevieja or whatever. No I don't actually mean “to spell whatever”, it can do that, it was just a figure of speech, well a figure of writing I mean.

It also tries to finish words for you, a bit like predictive text on the phone (which I've never understood how to work anyway), but I managed to turn that office I think, oops, missed that one.

Where were we? Yes the shopping. So we get to the Mall, park and begin our quest.

Now I firmly believe that you go to the shops to get something, you have something in mind and when you find it, you buy it, job done! That's what us men do.  Not so.

I was looking for a spice rack and a pipe for connecting an extra gas bottle up to the MS. SWMBO actually found the spice rack, which I had wanted for, forever, in the house and/or the MS, I use spices all the time! But for some reason, and they have holes in them for such a purpose, I'm not allowed to fix them to the wall, just stand them where the spices were in the first place.

All right a spice rack and a bit of pipe is not quite “Christmas shopping” but I was also on the look out for a “toy” for Adam. Yes, yes, he is past 30 now but inside that head of his is a six year old wondering what the hell is going on around him and what's all this “responsibility” stuff anyway. Bye the way, of course a “toy” is not a water pistol, here we are looking at a radio controlled helicopter or something of the like. In your dreams Ads.

To a women, shopping takes on a completely new meaning! After H&M, Carrefore, Zara at Home and countless more I was waving a white flag; she was muttering something about why she didn't marry that young Doctor all those years ago.

I mean for instance, we were in somewhere, I don't know, and SWMBO was looking for those pyjamas when she came across a rack with belts on it and spent ten minutes looking at them. “That's a rack full of belts, Petal”. “Yes, but you never know”.

What the hell is that supposed to mean?

So we have decided that it just will not work, her basic premise is “That's nice I get it”, mine is “How much does it cost?” I actually know she is probably right and that's how you should shop for things, but after a life time of my one dimensional thinking, I can not change. So the deal is I drop her off, come back hours later and then we can have one big argument instead of lots of small ones.

I'm reading a thick Tom Clancy book at the moment, “Without Remorse”, it's the one about the early exploits of John Kelly the ex-SEAL. Well I know I've read it before, it's one of his early books, but I can't remember it. The early onset of Alzheimer's has benefits you know.

Well sometimes it works against you.

Went to the showers this morning and as I normally wear flip flop type of things, just wear them in the shower as well. This morning, because of the cold I was wearing slippers and, you guessed it, wore them in the shower. Here's the thing though, my feet hate slippers and I think it' a reciprocal thing. There must be some ingredient in all slippers that work with another ingredient in my feet to cause an affront to anyone unless they are acutely olfactory challenged. So problem solved by a lost of awareness.

Tricia has just joined me for breakfast, I'm having the usual, banana and yoghurt, she's having, well let me describe it. Boiled plumbs, reconstituted sultanas and porridge, all smothered in hot water. Sounds divine I know but what does it look like? We had a dog, Max, and when he threw up after eating too many pigs ears and tripe, well you get the picture. Mind you, I had been wondering why Tricia had been lately catching frizbies and chasing sticks, well now I know.

Which reminds me. Why do dogs lick their balls a lot, because they can.

Washing day has snuck round again, with the wind the way it is and the sun is shining, may as well make the most of it. I think I'll read now but I cannot remember where I put the book.

Stop press! Tricia is out sun bathing (AKA cleaning the bike), in her cossy and with pink slippers on, I tried to take a picture but she threatened to brain me.  A Spannish guy just came past wearing the works, gloves, scarf, big overcoat and furry hat, took one look at Tricia in a bathing costume and nearly walked into a tree, soft shit.

Just read an email from Derek L and he is going to become a plumber, the course last for two days, which kind of sums it up I guess. If he then attempts to do what he is planning, I just hope he is not on a water meter or can prevent it registering the equivalent of Lake Windermere emptying, when his gives that pipe “just one more turn”.