Tom's Retirement

Friday 17th December 2021 to Thursday 23rd December 2021

It was a boring week of DIY… until I delivered a baby!

pictured a couple of days later

Early on Tuesday evening Julie’s new nextdoor neighbour hammered on our door and asked for the ‘woman’ to help his wife as she was having a baby and there was no ambulance. Of course Julie took one look inside their flat and panicked! With the father shouting down the phone at the emergency services operator and Julie in a funk I thought I’d better step in.

Inside the flat I was confronted by the screaming mother laying in the hallway with a baby’s head appearing. Gulp.

As I knelt down the frightening responsibility dawned on me. So I calmed the mother down with a little reassurance that everything was going to be okay and encouraged her to push. I helped a shoulder and an arm out and after that, with the mother doing most of the work, it was all over in less than 10 minutes; little Gabrielle was born at 1920.

That’s number 99 off my bucket list and I’m hoping the success will help me find a volunteer for number 100 on my bucket list… perform open heart surgery!

Friday 10th December 2021 to Thursday 16th December 2021

Passed my Day 2 PCR test 😀 To Manchester with Elizabeth to see Lily’s new house; it needs a lot of work,,,

the last owner must have been related to John Wayne

I’ve an idea I might be spending quite a bit of at Lily’s in the new year.

Lily has some kittens…

Betty And Dotty

Betty is a little adventurous

She’s only 6 months old and already she’s managed to lose her tail

Boris has been caught lying again so he has announced yet more restrictions to combat the Omicron variant which has so far killed a whole one unvaccinated septuagenarian.

M25 J12

What we need is COVID passports on the entrances to hospitals. It’s ridiculous to as good as lockdown the whole country to protect the NHS from science deniers and conspiracy theory nutjobs; they’ve all been offered the vaccine so if they get ill it’s their own fault. They should not be allowed to clog up the NHS.

Friday 3rd December 2021 to Thursday 9th December 2021

Leaving week. Had a last visit to Burgau….

the fishermen of Burgau

and Salema…

this time next week I’ll be freezing my bollocks off in Reigate

Said goodbye to Yellito…

I do hope he’s okay while I’m gone

Saturday it was time to set off back to England

Friday afternoon P&O informed us France had changed its entry rules due to this Omicron variant. So setting off we had no idea if we’d be allowed to cross into either Spain or France.

At the Portugal Spain border the Portuguese GNR were stopping everyone entering from Spain to check their COVID status. Thankfully there wasn’t s a sole on the Spanish side of the border to check anything.

Saturday night while we were camped up in Caceres, Spain we discovered that Boris had decided we now had to have a pre-departure test to get on the ferry. This is on top of our Day 2 PCR test announced earlier in the week.

On Monday, to fit in our pre-departure Antigen test. we had an insane 10+ hour journey from Burgos in Spain to Tours in France. Set off in the dark, landed in the dark. All so we can get on the ferry to our own country!!

Tuesday; a wet day in Tours. Getting the Antigen tests should have been easy once Julie had patiently found a lab on a French website. The whole thing was massively complicated by a 5 or 6 year old French child screaming her head off in the tiny reception while we tried to give the necessary info to the non English speaking receptionist. In the end we both passed. Managed to get the Passenger Locator Form submitted too. A grind of a day.

Wednesday, Tours to Reigate. After jumping through all Boris’ Covid hoops it was genuinely a real relief to make it home 🙂

When we arrived home the government was in chaos due to Boris being caught lying, yet again, this time about a Christmas party. Later that day the buffoon announced the country was going to his Covid Plan B. Quelle surprise.

Friday 26th November 2021 to Thursday 2nd December 2021

Woke up to find we are at war with France over a letter Boris wrote and a there’s a new super variant of COVID called Omicron knocking about.

At least the weather has improved

This is our last full week in Portugal so I thought I’d have a lazy week

just like Cfor

A couple of hours after we got texts to say out Day 2 Lateral Flow Tests had been delivered Boris announced we now needed to have PCR test 2 days after we arrive back. Another £48.

Whatever happened to living with the virus now we are all vaccinated? Call me a cynic but hyping up the threat from this new variant looks very much like an attempt to move the news agenda on from the embarrassment of Peppa Pig and fact that in leaving the EU far from taking back control of our borders they couldn’t be more porous as hundreds of migrants arrive on the beaches of Kent by dinghies every day.

Elizabeth has had to have an operation to put some plates in her foot!!!

Friday 19th November 2021 to Thursday 25th November 2021

It was a windy start to the week and Friday night there was an almighty thunder storm that made the van shake. The rest of the week was very mixed, cold with a few showers thrown in. Not as cold and wet as Reigate though 😀

Elizabeth has broken her foot!

Grey clouds over the Vodafone Palm in Luz

The Boris shitshow continued when he went full Peppa Pig while giving a speech to the CBI. It was so bizarre that people were asking if he was okay; where have these people been for the last year? Boris will never be okay; he’s a walking fuckin calamity better suited to collecting trolleys at Tescos.

Friday 12th November 2021 to Thursday 18th November 2021

A beautiful week. We spent an afternoon at Ponta do Piedale looking for dolphins…

No luck but it a great way to waste an afternoon 😀

We took Sally to Alvor for a stroll around the town, lunch and then a walk along the coast

the beach at Alvor

On Saturday it was time for Sally to fly back to the UK…

there was a little chaos with the COVID passes

Is it really beyond the wit of this government to come up with an app that is a simple single form written in simple language which any idiot can easily fill in and at the end of filling it in you get a single QR labelled SHOW THIS AT CHECK-IN!

Gfor has a new friend. He/she keeps coming around but Gfor is having none of it.

The Boris shitshow went into interstellar overdrive this week. The whiff of corruption is so bad half his own backbenchers didn’t turn up for PMQs. If was classic Boris. He has no answers to the cronyism allegations and flounders everytime the issue is brought up. He was befuddled and that doesn’t bode well for the country. I always thought he’d hang on as he’s a cunt and has no shame but he’s unravelling faster than anyone could have predicted.

In other news I gave away the remainder of my pension lump sum this week 🙂 I feel unencumbered 😀

Friday 5th November 2021 to Thursday 11th November 2021

Julie’s sister Sally came to visit for a few days so we gave her a whirlwind tour of the western Algarve…

First stop Ponta da Piedale

and then a walk t0  Porto de Mos for Lunch

We had a trip to Sagres and the Cabo de São Vicente, the most southwestern point of Portugal…

Sagre

the lighthouse at Cabo de São Vicente

a

We had a day trip to and lunch at the old town of Silves

The cathedral and castle at Silves

Since Brexit EU Pet Passports issued in the UK have been useless so before we set off for France we had to get a vet in the UK to sign a 16 page Health Certificate so Cfor could enter the EU. It cost an eye-watering £161. Yet another BREXIT win from Boris the clueless tosspot!!!

On Monday we took Cfor to a local vet in Lagos and for £27 he got a fresh rabies injection and a Portuguese EU Pet Passport: how much are UK vets be coining?

Now he has a Portuguese passport he has a new name is Gfor, G for Gato 🙂

Friday 29th October 2021 to Thursday 4th November 2021

An overcast start to the week then it started to rain as the weather rolled in from the Atlantic…

Grey clouds over Black Rock

It was podcasts and boxsets for a few days.

Michel and Roselyne turned up.

This week was also COP26 so leaders from around the world turned up in their private jets and spoke about their concern for the environment and promised very sincerely that they would make sure their successors did something about it! As my mother would have put it, all wind and piss. But then again what exactly did anyone really expect?

The sun finally came back on Wednesday so I could get out and about along the coast 😀

No dolphins today

After flying back from COP environmental conference on a private jet Boris had enough time left this week to fit in another full blown scandal, this time cash for lucrative contracts. The shit is really piling up now and I get the feeling the tide is rightly beginning to turn against Boris. If only we had a half competent opposition.

Friday 22nd October 2021 to Thursday 28th October 2021

The weather has been cracking so I’ve been out and about along the coast…

Porto Mós

A large family from Manchester rocked up at the pool the other day. All buzz cuts, tattoos and lager. I wonder if other countries have towns like Manchester; do the Germans go, ‘Mein Gott, da ist eine familie aus München am Schwimmbad! Or o the French go, ‘Mon Dieu, une famille de Marsellies est arrivée.’

Of course it could have been worse, way worse… they could been Scousers!!!

Friday 15th October 2021 to Thursday 21st October 2021

I’ve been ill with sinusitis this week which hasn’t been a bundle of fun. Today is the first day I’ve woken up not in pain and that’s a relief. As an added bonus the temperature has now eased off a little so it’s now only 22°C which is a lot more bearable.

Swimmers and surfers taking an evening dip at Burgau

With COP26 fast approaching Boris has been spouting off again; heat exchangers for everyone, electric cars, Britain the Qatar of hydrogen! Of course it’s all just all bollocks. He hasn’t a clue whether any of this is practical or affordable. He’s just throwing out the words he thinks the public want to hear. He does the same for every crisis then quickly moves on to his next next fuck up.*

*I’m not for a minute saying Keir Starmer would be any better.  The UK is fucked while ever the choice is between a bumbling buffoon who is incapable of telling the truth and a Labour party still to riven by ideological battles Joe Public believes were settled in the last century.