The most famous family in Hastings (Rousse)

Posted on June 21, 2015 by Dreamaticus

We were all guests of BC, her husband G, 11 year-old Z and toddler N. Their house near Hastings was tiny: B and G gave up their bedroom so that TPR could have their bed. (They would sleep on the sofa with N.) It must have been around the time of N’s birthday because my father sent him a beautiful hand-painted card.

In the evening we all watched television together. It was a bit of a squash, especially when C the dog took it upon himself to wrap his warm furry body around my neck. We also found it rather peculiar that a series of strangers came to the window to look in at us from outside.

Z explained that this was the way that the locals entertained themselves. Until his parents put up some curtains, the whole family had to put up with this.

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Inconveniences of hotel life (Rousse)

Posted on June 20, 2015 by Dreamaticus

TPR and I were living in a hotel. This was not as glamorous as it sounded. For example, although the hotel had a pool, it was unheated and outdoors, and whenever I used it I risked drowning.

It was also very impractical to live here and get any work done. This was largely due to the lack of space in our bedroom.

So each day I headed off to the public library to write. This strategy, however, had its own problems. The first was the the entrance to the library was almost inaccessible. It was a long drop down a basement without steps or a ramp. You had to take your life in your hands each time you jumped into the entrance pit. Once in position I did my best to help tiny 3 foot tall skeletal pensioners, who all suffered from brittle bone disease, by lifting them down to the reading room.

I also suffered the height of embarrassment when my class saw me trying to hide my naked body behind a coat rack.

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A superhero in a silk top (Rousse)

Posted on June 19, 2015 by Dreamaticus

The knife sliced through DT’s blue and black silk top and into her skin – but I knew that she would survive because we’d been through this before.

Cowering on the bed in the corner, I predicted correctly DT would turn on her attacker and strike him down with a single blow to his midriff. Then we would be safe again.

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A menagerie and a monument (Rousse)

Posted on June 18, 2015 by Dreamaticus

My mother had done a great job with the garden. All the pets were happily installed in large runs, the chickens loved their coop, and the hedgehogs were so settled that they forgot their shyness. The only (very minor) problem was that you had to watch where you put your feet to avoid the goose droppings on the lawn.

My sister S took us on a short walk from the garden up the hill to the stone ledge from where there was a fantastic view of the valley.

‘That’s what I posted on Facebook’ she told us, pointing to the ancient stone tomb below us.

It was astonishing that we had never before noticed this neolithic masterpiece on our doorstep.

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Hotel blues (Rousse)

Posted on June 17, 2015 by Dreamaticus

I’d been away from home for over a week and was thoroughly sick of life in a hotel room. What made it worse was that the hotel was within a huge American-style shopping mall, so it felt like I never saw the light of day.

One day I hurt myself really badly when I caught my toe in the lift door on my way back to my room on the eighth floor.

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Hebridean pursuits: cycling, flying, and wildlife (Rousse)

Posted on June 16, 2015 by Dreamaticus

We met the French cyclists when they came off the North Uist ferry. Exhausted and soaked, they were not happy tourists. We agreed that the Hebridean weather was not the easiest and, as illustration, I demonstrated how I could launch myself into the wind to make little flights over the single track road.

Afterwards the weather cleared up and we took our new friends to the beautiful bay. Here, at high tide, a multitude of exotic wildlife – including a talented school of dolphins – performed in the water.

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Project crisis ‘cured’ with spray-on white hair and wedding invitations (Rousse)

Posted on June 16, 2015 by Dreamaticus

Our work was barely progressing from one meeting to the next so we decided that the only course of action open to us now was to bring the project to an end and cut our losses.

One of the team took the decision particularly badly and, in response, came to work the next day with a head of spray-on white hair and a pile of wedding invitations.

I later regretted our decision to give up our work. I ran around the campus of Queen Margaret University trying to find someone who could confirm whether or not it was actually legal.

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Bedsit Bernard (Rousse)

Posted on June 13, 2015 by Dreamaticus

I agreed to take on a fellow academic from another institution as my PhD student. He had told everyone that his name was Bernard, but I knew that he was really an Italian national and, as such, his real name was far more exotic than this.

I insisted that he move from his tiny bedsit so that he could start afresh in a new life dedicated to his doctoral studies. This upset him, especially since this would oblige him to take apart his computer and he had no idea where he’d filed the instructions for this. They were perhaps in the attic, but he could not be sure.

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How to fight off an unwanted suitor (Rousse)

Posted on June 12, 2015 by Dreamaticus

The man begged me for a date.

I agreed to go for a walk with him, but insisted that he first take a look at my left hand. I was a very married woman.

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An unprepared book group member (Rousse)

Posted on June 12, 2015 by Dreamaticus

Although it wasn’t an official book group meeting, when I joined the table at EH’s house it was soon obvious that I should have read some journal articles in preparation for the discussion. At this rate TPR was in a better position than me to join in, given his long career in the computing industry.

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