No posts since 30 September? I think it was around that time I stupidly thought we would move into the house before going to Oz for 3 weeks in November. Ha ha. October was a month of bedlam: frantic house building like the umpteenth coat of interior render, intense fiddling with the windows, watching the painfully slow progress of the plumbers, cars breaking down, friends I haven’t seen for 15 years visiting… My random lists of to do things ran roughshod over genuine priorities with the delusions of a stressed out mess head: finish first window, change banks, vacuum sofa, make door frames, fix washing machine, cut doors, get cat food, clean mattress, buy tracksuit, paint bath ceiling, die.
Thus somehow we arrived at Coimbra train station with 60 kilos of luggage and The One desperate for a pee. Train arrives, train departs, husband returns from men’s room. We buy new tickets for the next train which might get us to the check-in in the nick of time, with the kind cooperation of a taxi driver on speed. Once this feat was accomplished, Emma discovers she has no passport. Of the hundreds and hundreds of flights I have caught in my little life and it has to be this one: a great gorgeously generous gift from my sister-in-law to surprise my brother on his 50th birthday. This flight could not be missed. This could not be happening.
I’ll spare you the next half hour of head exploding panic in its gruesome detail. The passport was located, a new seat found for me on the next flight (lucky, lucky) and husband sent forward to Frankfurt on the existing ticket. Good friends, who will drive your passport to you two and a half hours away, are the most important thing in the world. And yes, I am your slave for life. Anyway, a couple of valium and several hundred kilometres later and The One and I were boarding our Qantas flight for Sydney only to discover we’d been downgraded.
Two more valium later and we arrived in Old Sydney Town and to husband’s delight we were picked up in a caramel butter-coloured Maserati. Even I had to restrain myself from licking the upholstery. It set the tone really for what would be three weeks of luxy decadent bliss, oh except for the sanding painting cleaning & repairing part. Let’s skip that story for now and start with the champagne-museum-of-contemporary-art-party-overlooking-sydneyharbourbridge-and-opera-house… in full jetlag, it was quite surreal.
The first thing The One did on his holiday was get a new girlfriend. Every time I turned my back they were in bed together. It got a bit embarrassing when our dear hostess would wonder where the hell her cat was and would search all the usual hiding places like sock drawers, lumps of washing and inside the hi-fi speakers, only to find that the guest was bed-hogging her, like, again. The thing with the Burmese is they have a supersonic sense of who is most likely to get horizontal regularly, and The One smells like an immanent lie-down.
So then we spent a week of surveying the damage to my other property asset abroad. Tenants, mate. Can’t pay mortgage without them, can’t kill ‘em. Broken leg on coffee table, sofa, and dining table, filth smeared from aft to fore, damage to this and that and a charming hole punched into a wardrobe door. So we filled sanded painted repaired and cleaned in sensational 37º heat, when we should have been at the beach, hanging out with friends, visiting mom, or lying around with the cat. Sorry darling. Nice holiday. Not.
Fortunately our hosts (oh let’s be frank. You remember tinyartdirector? Well she’s my sister and we are staying with her) had some sense and whisked us away for an enviable long weekend which looked like this:
Some whales dropped by for our appreciation. And hung around for three days smashing their tails on the water and mucking about. Priceless. I know it sounds coy but whales really are something special. They are so damn big and out of our league, you can’t help but gobblesmacked by them. We certainly were. Better than tele.
The One insisted on seeing kangaroos in the wild. We got dressed, packed our hats and sunscreen and even locked the door of the timber shack holiday house such was the anticipation of the hunt. An extremely short drive later, there were half a dozen roos posing for our photos, racing the Volvo and just staring us out as if to say yeah, take the pictures and bugger off, would ya?
There’s no doubt about it, kangaroos are funny animals. Firstly they look funny. And like camels, they have attitude. A sort of, what do you want, yeah come as close as you want I couldn’t give a toss and now I’m bored of you, type attitude. They are one of those rare animals who is firmly in control of the situation. Piss me off and I’ll kick your arse. They are cool.
So. Whales, tick. Kangaroos, tick. Savage sunburn on pommy skin, tick. Prawns on the barbie, naturally.
But then as some people have to work, we returned to Sydney and yet another week of culinary sensations. Thai, Japanese, quality beef, real lamb, Pacific Ocean fish and even bacon and eggs on damper breakfast at 3pm. My superfluous sister-in-law had also remembered our wedding anniversary (who is this woman and why can’t we all marry her) and sent us off to The Best Restaurant in The World, Tetsuyas. Extraordinary. Unforgettable. Quite difficult to find the words for its awesomeness, other than, say, perfect.
Somewhat staggered by everyone’s generosity towards us we loaded up our trunks and headed, sadly, for the airport. We did not want to come home, not one little bit. Not to winter, not to house building, not to the pressing need to make a living out of an oily rag.
And we wouldn’t be flying if they wasn’t some sort of industrial action impeding our trip. Qantas on the way over (CEO of which is a dipshit) and now a Portuguese general strike on the return trip. I am a card carrying socialist but I reckon the strike cost me way more than it cost Paulo Passos Coelho. Not to mention my sister-in-law. I’m sure the general strike in Portugal really changed her mind on a few policies.
Thus a day or two were endured in the most boring city on Earth, Frankfurt. And jetlag and minus 1º centigrade do not agree with me. Christmas Markets still do not charm me. The German language does not charm me. Sausages and Gluhwein make me puke. Just get me home, oh god, where there are some little fur-people waiting for me.
My brother-in-law suggested that this week I wax lyrical about the sensuousness of Autumn. The crisp, clear mornings, the changing light and the beautiful colours of this season that gently segues into the hell pit horror doom and evil of winter.
Yeah, he’s European. I’m not. I detest winter. Autumn is like an air raid siren warning that a million Messerschmidts are about to drop a billion big freezing bombs of depressingly dank dark wetness and torture upon us.
Frankly put me to bed now and don’t get me up until May. Was a grizzly bear in past life. Goes without saying.
So, if you’re not feeling the cold yet, here are some tips from my house that indicate winter is definitely well on its hideous way.
1. The cat sits on your lap while you are on the toilet.
2. Cat-Dog-Cat have settled their differences with the objective of sharing front row seats at the fireplace.
3. Mao howls incessantly about when we are going back to Australia.
4. Getting the electric blanket on in advance of bedtime merits a fridge reminder note.
5. Who left the door open turns into WW3.
6. Suddenly soup has become an acceptable meal option.
7. The ‘scalding’ hot water setting in the shower now feels quite nice.
8. Pyjamas. Quel horreur. Never forsake fashion, my friend Tessa once warned. Pyjamas. Oh the shame.
9. Pine cone collecting has reached obsessive levels.
10. Being in bed by 9pm doesn’t seem extravagant.
The real tragedy is, this is Portugal, where their only ski field is appropriate for toddlers. Well, ok, it’s a sweet little ski field but it will not challenge anyone Nordic. What I mean is, this is Europe-winter-light. Dear god, please bring me central heating and an entire wardrobe of Icebreaker. Thank you.
The other night I was standing outside at half past two in the morning waiting for a sick Wookie to finish tearing up the grass, stop vomiting and come inside. It was a clear, still night, cooler than usual but not yet cold. The sky was bright with the moonlight and there was complete silence except for The Wookie chewing his cud.
And there it was, from across the valley came the unmistakable call of the veado, the deer that roam the Serra da Lousã.
The One had said he’d been hearing them calling a few nights before, but I didn’t believe him – September is too early for the mating season and anyway, I had never heard them in Cú de Judas, where deer and silence were plentiful.
But sure enough, there it was again: a mooing that was not entirely sad but full of longing. A longing for deer love, I’ve no doubt.
So the following night we grabbed the cameras (The One’s new mobile phone actually, and the remaining camera of mine not destroyed by the freak wave in last week’s post) and we headed for the hills. Dusk, as all hunters know, is the best time to catch deer, and sure enough as soon as we reached the top of the Serra da Lousã the boys were braying away enough to make me sceptical once more that the sound was perhaps actually the gearing down of the wind turbines. I mean, it just couldn’t be that they could be so close, or so many of them, all calling at once.
We dropped the car and set out on foot and almost immediately I saw what could have been a Y-shaped stump of a tree. Except it was a female deer, standing very still…watching me. As I moved closer, still deerly disbelieving, I saw the male’s enormous antlers twist around and they both made a move camera left. And then they were gone. Before I’d even drawn my mju to take a shot.
certainly not a shot taken by me, no, but this is the dude I´m talking about
Well that just whet our appetites for more venison really: we spent the next hour and a half tiptoeing around the pine forest after horny mooing wildebeest, who were relentlessly just over the next ridge. Finally, in the pitch dark, without the moonlight able to penetrate the forest and the mountain’s chilling temperature dulling the spirit, I gave up. There was no way my little camera could handle the low light anyway and using the flash would be way too slow for these sprightly antelope.
Anyone who’s done a bit of wildlife pursuit will know how compelling it is. Bird watching is all very well, but there’s something very special about the presence of big animals. You feel humbled. I feel a profound respect for them. Perhaps it’s partly because I’m Australian and deer of any kind seem very exotic, but the veado of the Serra da Lousã are awesome animals. Firstly they are big, as fit and statuesque as a horse. Add two square metres of antler and you have a beast as spectacular and mesmerizing as a sighting of Pegasus.
That anyone would want to shoot the things, well, make no mistake on where I stand on hunting. In Australia, the rabbit and the fox are introduced species and destructive vermin, decimating native and engangered wildlife. Kangaroos too require culling by the million each year, and make a lovely purse or carpaccio. Hunters, and furriers of the world come on down, but leave the gratuitous slaughter of nice animals elsewhere to killer whales. Who doesn’t laugh when a hunter gets shot?
this was taken by me, and yes it is a sleeping bullwinkle in sweden
On our return home, we saw another deer crossing the road in front of us – the usual way to have a deer experience in the Serra da Lousã. They are so robust and proud an animal that, like a kangaroo, they are likely just to stand there and stare you down rather than get out the way of an oncoming vehicle. But this spotty dude, possibly a roe deer or a young red, knew we had cameras and didn’t care for posing. So he sauntered off while we mere mortals fumbled with our instruments and swore.
Still twinkling with the thrill of having just been in their presence, The One then discovered while surfing the subject that our local pub the Palácio da Lousã is running a photo competition on the very subject!!! It’s not just us who are turned on by the mating season – they are even offering tours! I doubt they’ll be giving me a sneak preview of the pictures entered so far, but maybe after the 15th November I might get access to some of the pics for the facebook page. Naturally we are now determined to win – given the prizes are accommodation and dinner at what I think is a very lovely hotel (and I already have plenty of photos to prove it).
Okay now I guess it’s time to fess up – I have moved to the other side of the mountain. Don´t panic, punters, Emma’s House in Portugal is still there, it’s not being sold or even abandoned in any permanent way. It’s just that I’ve had an offer of a flushing toilet and plumbing in the kitchen and a handsome lump in the bed… did I say lump, sorry I meant love. And who can resist a flushing toilet?
For those that remember that this is a blog about building, thank you. The absence of mortar in my hands does burn at my heart. But the Great Financial Crisis will not be told and euros have not started falling from the sky as I have wished, so therefore dramatic erections of the scaffolding kind have not materialised at Cú de Judas. Actually that’s a lie. While I’ve been waiting for sufficient funds, the neighbours have built one house, one al-fresco kitchen and dining room with views, one garage, one adega, one storage shed and some ugly furniture cut with a chainsaw from an ancient chestnut tree. While the men at my scaffolding hire place are forgetting my name, their upcoming summer holidays are being fully funded by my neighbours. Maybe I am being melodramatic about the palace next door, and maybe there is a hint of jealousy finding its way out through my ramblings. Let’s remember they have very little cash too – but these people just get on with it, really rather putting me to shame with my permissions and engineers design talk.
But don’t give up on me yet, there is a plan. I have to pick up my building licence before the end of the year or that will be the end of it. The council have been very patient but the ruin waits for no woman. One more winter of being rained upon and it will turn to soup. So a roof, at least, she will have. The dream is yet alive. Building action, albeit on a modest scale, will be resuming shortly, and I just can’t wait to get dirty again.
mao's new step-pet
And although Wookie and Mao have integrated themselves happily and I am a ga-ga with amor, I do miss my little hell hole. I liked cooking over an open fire and shopping in the garden for a meal. I miss my weirdo neighbours and their good humour and generosity. I miss my cafés and the fish truck and my routines. I miss my solitude.
On the other hand, the grass really does look greener on this side of the mountain. I’m in a stunning little village with a new cast of crazy neighbours. There’s the concelho of Lousã to show you, castles, palacetes, outdoorsy adventure and hidden local treasures to explore. It’s a whole new angle to the adventure. Stay tuned.
We learn as we go. We learn as we grow. A woman is not an island, I’ve discovered. And there’s something very grown about allowing yourself to be loved.
My life is a house
You crawl through the window
slip across the floor and into the reception room.
You enter the place
Of endless persuasion
like a knock on the door when there’s ten or more things to do
who is that calling
you, my companion
Run to the water
On a burning beach
and it brings relief
it brings relief
- ‘Nails in my Feet’, Neil Finn, Crowded House
My sister’s friend Pete died last Friday. About two years ago, in the earlier days of his illness, Pete converted to Buddhism and became a monk, which I now realise was ingenius forward planning on his part. As a Buddhist he believed in reincarnation. In the face of death, or even life, reincarnation is a superb concept. It’s comforting, for you and your people to see dying as a metamorphosis… an evolution… or even just a change of outfit!
You have to hand it to the Buddhists. Not only for reincarnation, but they also believe in peace (as opposed to violence), a concept that Christians, Muslims and Jews seem to have dispensed with altogether these days.
My sister urged Pete to come back as a Burmese cat. What a life! Of course in Buddhist philosophy you don’t get a choice, but seeing as it’s not a request to come back rich, powerful or beautiful, or even as a person, then I don’t see there’s any harm in an appeal to the people at front desk to come back as a cat.
The Burmese cat’s lifestyle is far better than an human one. Basically it’s a bit like being a rich and spoilt retired supermodel. You sloth about, with slaves at your beck and call, and everyone thinks you’re gorgeous.
If you’re thinking this might be a bit dull, think again. If you’re the adventurous type you can make the rounds of your territory outside, with all the security of a premium guided tour but no compromise of jungle safari danger and daring. For a cat, the world is extremely big, so there’s no pressure to climb Everest or go wingsuit flying to get your adrenaline fix. A trip out to the car park is thrilling enough. You might even meet a dog out there.
But to the Burmese, the outdoors is a bit common, really. There are superior pleasures to be found inside the home. If you’re bored by deep sleep in front of fireplaces, you can find any number of cosy hiding spots that change daily like a blackboard menu. There also might be warm bodied people to sit on, or even a light or a computer left on, ready to be exploited.
Sports? Burmese are famous for fetching; you throw, they bring back. They also have a pronounced imagination and revel in private fantasy games: sometimes humans might be invited to join in a game of chasings, invisible mouse hunts, or a battle against unseen monsters.
Burmese also have a rich intellectual life. They like reading and they especially enjoy surfing the net, especially on a Mac. You think I’m being silly now. It’s a fact.
I don’t want you to think it’s a life without some responsibilities. But they’ll only take on a task if there’s something in it for them. My Mao has a taste for bugs, so when we lived in the city I put him in charge of pest control. He would willingly eat 5 large cockroaches before I left for work each morning. Now we’re in the country, he keeps the mouse population subjugated, but he’s excelling himself as heating policeman. If the ambient temperature in the lounge room drops below acceptable comfort levels, he’ll come to the kitchen and say “Mao!” thus alerting me it’s time for another log. It’s a system. It works.
Speaking of communication skills, the Burmese can be very persuasive indeed. Like Siamese, they have a tendency to be verbal, whether it be just enjoying a chat or expressing their concerns with your relationship. The good thing is, if there’s a problem, they won’t bottle it up. Take for instance a friend of ours called Moet, who is not at all a whinger or a noisy pest, but in fact an excellent communicator. When, at 1am she had an issue that needed addressing, she let her mother know by saying “Ma”. Ma opened the window, and Moet went out. But the issue wasn’t resolved, so she came back inside, and said “Maa”. Her mother got up, went downstairs and gave her some food. “Maaa”. Her mother gave her some of the other food. “Maaaa”. But her mother hadn’t been listening properly so Moet said “Maaaa!” and then, finally, at 1:30am, her mother had the idea of changing the kitty litter. Before the final pellet had left the bag, Moet’s needs were met.
It’s being sociable that the Burmese likes most. They love company. If you’re around they will be with you. They like to share the love. And that’s not a bad principle for life.
So if you happen to be adopting a Burmese today, I already have the right name for you. Lozang Dhondrup.
For Pete, safe travels, brave monk.
Walls Built: 1 Injuries: 0 (!)
And now for the weather:
Yes it’s a royal flush of sunniness; we are having a very proper summer and so far, not many fires. Being an australian I am paranoid about bushfires. The smell of dry eucalypt reminds me of the apprehensive summers in Sydney of my childhood. When I ask sweetly if the neighbours wouldn’t mind cutting the scrub on their land they snuffle and shuffle and say there won’t be any fires here, like they’ve had a message from god. Bloody hope they’re fair dinkum, or we’re all up shit creek.
I’ve built another drystone wall in the garden. I’ve finished the drainage on one side of the annexe and have started on the other side. I’m stacking up bags of lime ready for some serious wall building next week. And I’m on the search for decorative iron gates.
“Drunk-tired on heat, the pets are happy.”
“The rabbits have bunnies and the dogs have puppies
but the guppies just have little guppies.”
Haven’t been posting for a while because I’ve been busy dying. Almost.
A couple of weeks ago I woke up and then walked a few steps to the kitchen. Suddenly the floor fell out from under me and I was lying on the concrete yelling at Wookie to get his wet nose out of my ear. I thought the dizziness would pass, but as I sat with my head between my knees, a searing pain shot up my neck and into my head. Migraine. I crawled back into bed somehow, but I can’t remember much more except being hung up on by Emergency when I called them an hour or something later.
For those unacquainted with migraine: plucking out your own eye seems like an appealing solution to stop the pain. I would have been quite happy for someone to drill a hole in my head with the Black & Decker there and then to give me some relief. It’s like that. You’re insane with pain.
I rang Emergency not just to avoid self-harming with power tools, but also because the world was whirling around me like I was a 14 year old with a cask of Fruity Lexia. Except there had been no dancing beforehand. I did feel like spewing, but.
It’s a bit of a bummer for the ambulance people (Bombeiros, they’re called here: Portugal has the American system of combining ambulance with fire fighters. So you could have a Firey deliver your baby, which is an interesting idea, to me at least. Hi to my Colorado friends Dom Pedro and Vasco, if you’re out there). Anyway, bit of a bummer as I was saying, when you don’t have a street name or a house number. Basically they had to wander around the village looking for someone to ask where an urgently sick person might be living (or dying). It took quite a while, but they got here eventually.
And then we had to have a Portuguese lesson. Can’t imagine why, but the words Migraine, Dizziness and Vertigo had not entered my vocab databank. I think I got there in my little verbose way by explaining that the world was rotating and I had a really really big headache. Three new words that I’ll never forget! Enxaqueca, tounturas and vertigens!
Fortunately for me, but very unfortunately for her, my mother suffered an attack of Vertigo last year. It is a rare, very debilitating and very strange condition. Basically you completely lose your balance. Like being incredibly drunk but completely lucid at the same time. You can’t walk, can’t see, you want to vomit. Even when I’m lying down with my eyes closed, I still have a sense of being on a boat on the high seas.
Anyway, if Mum hadn’t had it and hadn’t told me all about it, then I’m sure I would’ve been terrified. I can handle the feeling that someone left a sharp axe planted in my head, but having an uncooperative body as well is just a bit too much to take.
The Bombeiros really sucked. They weren’t that cute and they didn’t have gas! It’s almost worth being critically ill in Australia just for the hotties and their nitrous oxide. This scabby socialist country wouldn’t even give me oxygen on the house. Buggers. So I writhed about on the pointless voyage to the health centre, where, lo and behold, they took one look me and said “too hard” and off we went to Coimbra Hospital.
I’m not going to give a blow by blow account of the whole hospital thing. It wasn’t nice. The veryold were there. The dying were there. And the groaning were there. There were flirting frivolous stupid people who stuck needles into me without even introducing themselves. There were big machines on me at 3am. There were some drugs, but I needed them too much to enjoy them, if you see what I mean. At the end of it all, they said “too hard” and sent me home.
My arrival in the village was a soft fuzzy warm one: all the neighbours were out to greet me, including the dog-killer suspects. They were all being really sweet, just like people who care! I was really touched! (but I was also on drugs). I was forcibly removed from my home and taken to Tia Maria’s for some proper TLC.
But it wasn’t to last. Once the hospital-strength drugs wore off, the migraine came back- this time in my sinuses, all sharp and pointy and nasty. I was already verging on an overdose of codeine, so I had no option really but to call back the Bombeiros. And now I had a new, alarming symptom: half of my face had gone numb. I thought I was having a stroke.
The Bombeiros were delightful this time. A very nice person called Anna held my hand and stroked my hair on the way to the “still too hard” health centre where I had a fight with a couple of people for jabbing needles full of paracetamol into me without asking if perhaps I might be allergic to anything, like, say, paracetamol? My mother is, you see. If the stroke wasn’t going to kill me, a hapless nurse would. Thank god for Anna, who put in a good word, got me a shot of something strong, and then whisked me back to Coimbra. Another night of state sponsored torture to make Salazar proud.
Some of the same suffering people were there, ranting in that special dementia way. But the staff were a different horrible bunch altogether. One little charmer, raised on a diet of House and Grey’s Anatomy, tried arranging a date with a nurse-boy while attempting to extract blood from an arm of mine. She slipped with the needle, provoking a suitable flow of blood and a flow of words from me suggesting that she should pay a bit more attention to what she was doing. She replied by saying she could do two things at once (!) provoking another flow of words that included Fuck and Bitch. That put me at the bottom of the morphine waiting list for the rest of the evening. It didn’t really matter, as approaching death kinda feels similar to morphine anyway.
No one had a clue what was going on with my head, but seeing as they’d cleverly ruled out a heart attack, a stroke and swine flu, they decided that a forced discharge was the next proper course of action.
Disclaimer: Don’t misread me, people, I love socialism. I believe in free health care for all. I’m grateful to Portugal for allowing me access to the health system. It’s just that I’ve had better care in Africa. It’s also free in Australia and the care is of an infinitely higher standard. Why not charge non-citizens a surcharge so you can pay the nursing staff more or invest in better training?
So after I made sure that my surviving pets were still fed, medicated and watered, I went back to Tia Maria’s 5 star nursing home. It really was awesome. Big comfy bed, enormous and yummy meals brought to me in bed three times a day. Regular entertainment brought to me via children and naughty dogs. And two mobile phones running hot with international text messages. Top quality TLC. With furry visitors taking full advantage of the situation too.
Considering I was lying like a useless lump in bed the whole time, it was actually an action-packed week. Tia Maria’s is something of a transit point for all the neighbours so I got to see way more of all of them than I wanted to. They were all morbidly interested in the progression of my illness. In someone else’s house you inevitably get exposed to their dirty laundry, and here it was like the whole village was queuing up to use the washing machine. As a captive audience, I became in-confidence to everyone’s blunt little prejudices and grievances and ancient inter (and intra)-family quarrels. Reconfirming what I learnt when I first came to this little village, everyone has it in for everyone else. Even old granny got a serving. Forget Telenovelas: this here is a seething hotbed of hate and dirty little secrets, and everyone is a villain dressed as a saint.
As far as the Case of the Missing Babywookie, accusations were flying left and right: the accuser’s motives were more of interest than the accusations themselves. Once I could stomach the truth, it was pretty obvious. In three weeks, three dogs disappeared; first Dingo then Max then Baby. As I’ve said before I don’t really want to know the ugly details – but everyone has had their part to play, either by giving the orders, carrying them out or keeping mum about it. I feel sorry for the kids here, though. Old enough to know what’s going on and old enough to know it’s wrong. Silenced and confused, they are doomed to grow up just like their parents.
Lest we forget the little guy, here’s an encore pic of Baby at his fuzzy finest:
There are those who think we bring illness upon ourselves, and for those who think that illness is a manifestation of unprocessed emotion, I have this to say. I couldn’t properly grieve for my little pet, nor spit out a torrent of snowballing fury, because I just didn’t want to believe that a neighbour would kill my baby. In short, stress brought this on. These people give me a headache. But a victim, I ain’t.
The other night I had the sweetest dream, (in Portuguese they call them pink dreams) that Babywookie came home with six little puppies. In the dream, no one had realised that he was actually a she. When I woke up I realised that I had been waiting for Baby to come home. But he isn’t coming home. Under the influence of a potent pharmaceutical cocktail, I got really angry and confronted a few people and told them what I thought of their stupid, uncivilised, cruel little lives. Now I feel sad, but better, and more determined to get the house done and get the fuck out of here as soon as possible.
Meantime I’m still stumbling around like a hopeless drunk. Wish I was. It’s a good cover for ranting whenever I feel like it.
So as not to leave you on a bum note, two slightly amusing things happened while I was in my sick-bed: a chook got out (I love it when there’s a chook free on the streets) and the rabbits had babies. Check out the newborn bunny-kitten!
…and Wookie enjoying the spring weather.
Mao
Mao is a 7 yr old brown Burmese and he is the love of my life.
Mao’s interests include chasing imaginary monsters, fetching small mice, smooching and sunbaking. Mao also enjoys travelling… I brought him here from Australia. He’s never been happier, fatter or smoochier.
The Wookies
…were born in December 2007 while I was on holiday in Australia. The day I got back, the neighbours appeared on my doorstep with this brown puppy wondering if I wanted to adopt him. Mao wasn’t even off the plane. There was no way I could consider having a dog until Mao was settled and happy. Just No Way.
But Mao did settle in, and the caffé latte pup was very charming. He clearly stood out from his brothers – more confident and outgoing. We liked each other. So when he was about 10 weeks, I took him home for a trial.
It didn’t go well. He cried constantly and pissed and shat everywhere. He wasn’t ready. I sent him back to his mother.
But then, after a couple of weeks, he came to my house all by himself. It’s about 250 metres over steep and winding cobblestones, but this little guy had the goods. He’d stay with me during the day, and then go home at night to his mum and brothers. It was perfect. I had half-adopted a little brown dog. I named him Wookie because he’s brown and hairy. Like Chewbacca.
After a while he gave up going home at night, and then a funny thing happened. His little white brother made the trip to my place and never went home. I took him home several times, but apparently my house, with Wookie, is where he was determined to be. He was the smallest of all the dogs in the village, and maybe he was tired of fighting for his food. I denied being his owner for quite a while, which is why Babywookie hasn’t got a proper name. But Baby has stuck, because he is one.
Dingo
Dingo is not my dog. He just lives here. Dingo comes from the next village, and when his old owners became ill and went to Lisbon, Dingo decided to come and live at my house. For the first 6 months I fought him. I shouted at him, I threw stones at him, I stuffed him in the car and took him back to his village. I tied him up. Nothing worked. He always came back and sat on my doorstep. So eventually I gave up fighting and realised that he was quite a nice dog. He’s a loyal and enthusiastic guard. No one gets anywhere near my door without a serious warning from him. If the other dogs jump on me he’s always there to make sure they’re not hurting. He sits on your feet. He leans on you when he’s cold. The Wookies love him.
Attacks by baby moles: 1
In an amusing diversion to sticking cement in holes, Babywookie caught a baby mole. I would’ve thought of all the dogs he would be the least adept at hunting, but there you are. Perhaps he too was surprised because he brought the mole in his mouth to show me. Naturally I stole it from him immediately with the idea of making a toy for Mao. The little bugger showed his gratitude for having been rescued from the jaws of death by biting me on the little finger. Or maybe he was trying to say that he preferred being swallowed by a dog to being battered by a cat.
I put the mole in a shoebox, as you do. Mao was initially terrified, but soon saw the potential of a pet mole when he escaped from the box and started running around the lounge room. This was fun. Then he bolted into the kitchen where Babywookie was waiting. Cat and Dog momentarily forgot their differences to join forces rooting out the scurrying furry turd together. But the cracks and nooks of the kitchen played to the mole’s strengths and…
He made it to the front door unmolested…
He paused on the brink of freedom…
Then he was met head-on by Dingo who, in a blinding flash, snatched him up and…
It was all over.
Injuries: 0. Cups of tea: 8
The weather has deteriorated. The day started with snow, which might have been nice except it was so unbelievably cold. Then came fierce winds, more rain, sleet and hail. Apparently now it’s officially the worst winter in 15 years. I heard this from two different sources on the same day so it must be true.
The dogs had to go to the vet to be chipped so we rugged up and went out. Only once we were about half way there I realised that I actually didn’t have the €120 that it was going to cost so I took the dogs for a galão e bola de berlim instead. Only the café didn’t have any bolas de berlim nor the milk required for the galão (caffe latte). Radical compromises had to be made. The dogs were having fun at least.
On the way home Babywookie did a major vomit between the two front seats. Not only was it on me and my seat but it oozed down onto the floor and very nearly got into my handbag. The handbrake was covered, so there wasn’t going to be any using that, and with every movement of the car it oozed around more so that every last orifice of the floor was filled.
Did I mention that I got out in the rain yesterday and washed the car, inside and out? Looks like I would be doing the same thing today. It snowed again while I was on my hands and knees scraping half digested batatas fritas from the tracks under the seat.
Which reminds me of the day wookie vomited eyes.
When Wookie was a puppy, he took some getting used to the car. I used to go out prepared with the dog equivalent of a sick bucket and towel, just in case. But this time, nothing could really prepare me for what he was to bring up.
I’m trying to navigate the winding twists and turns of the Serra do Espinhal, where one false move could put you off a cliff, and Wookie starts making vomiting gestures. I’m begging him not to, but there’s already this huge intestinal looking lump coming up his throat and out of his mouth. It looks like he’s giving birth rather than vomiting. It is one solid mass, a slimy salivery bloody fleshy gargantuan slug.
I almost immediately start heaving myself and slip onto the road shoulder in a brake- locking skid. I turn to look at the horror beside me just as Wookie starts up again. This time it’s a big white ball that lands at his feet in a puddle of masticated offal. It is an eyeball.
I can’t get out of the car fast enough. Nor can Wookie. After a few deep breaths I charge in to grab a plastic bag or anything that might help but I recoil at the smell. It is so intense, but all I can think about is that stuff soaking into the seats. I have to get two hands around the warm leaking pile of puke and in shifting it slightly I see there are actually two eyes, and they are looking at me in a just-died kind of way.
I had plenty of time to review the images in my mind while I hosed out the car that afternoon. Maybe I was in shock or something because I just couldn’t work out how this cute little puppy had been able to get a pair of human eyes into his belly. Certainly didn’t come out of my tin from the supermarket. After repeated recitals of the story to the neighbours (they took a while to be convinced I wasn’t babbling incoherently) all was revealed: Tia Maria had slipped them a rabbit that morning. I choose to believe it was an already dead rabbit. 
babywookie (l) eye regurgitator (r)
