Why take five minutes when you can take two hours?

I absolutely LOVE my ROOMBA. For those of you not yet acquainted, it is a Robot vacuum cleaner which cleans floors. It does a fantastic job against the cat hairs and unlike a conventional vacuum cleaner, it doesn't blow the air and dust back into the room. The only downside is that I have to remove all the obstacles for it to do a really decent job. Yesterday, I noticed the tumbleweeds of cat hair blowing around and decided to start early, move the furniture and set the Roomba to work whilst I walked the dog. For the first time ever, it refused to budge, saying that its battery needed to be charged. Since it's charging all the time, I thought this was a bit concerning so I better dig out the manual which came with it when I bought it three years ago. This led to me going through the pile of things waiting to be filed away and putting them into some sort of order ready for a better clear out before the BIG MOVE. No instructions or user manual to be found. Nothing else to do, I swept and mopped the floor the old fashioned way. Still bothered by the loss of the user manual, I had a brainwave and looked it up online. It just said to make sure the contacts were clean, and if it still wouldn't work to contact the manufacturer. I lifted the unit off the base. There, lying just against the charging contact, was a baby woodlouse, all warm and cozy and not very happy, quite frankly, at being disturbed! As usual, I managed to make what should have been a quick job into a morning's work. At least the filing is in some kind of order now...

Here I go again!

Wow! Imagine being back here after all this time! An incredible NINE YEARS has passed since the move to Spain, and I'm still here!!! So much has happened, I wouldn't know where to begin, so I'll just start with the most recent events. The day before I turned 60, I lost my job because of the Covid 19 crisis here in Spain, my relationship broke up, I gave away the rabbit and gained a dog! Needless to say, my birthday celebrations were a bit muted, to say the least. My darling daughter risked being stopped by the police to travel the 5 miles from where she lives with her beloved to spend a few days with her old mum. Good job she did - to be honest, or it would have been pretty grim and depressing despite the glorious weather. Thanks to modern technology, (and where would we be without it??) I had lots of calls, chats and good wishes on Facebook. I even had some birthday cards - now that's becoming old-fashioned!!! For my part, turning 60 was never going to be a joy and a pleasure as it seems like you're now officially on the downward slope, although I only feel 40 at most. Plans had been made to have a week off work, fly over for a family celebration in the UK, take the train down South to visit my darling son and granddaughter. All had to be postponed until the World becomes a little more stable. Having worked full-time in a busy office with a long drive each way, I was always short of time. Now I find that I have time to kill!! Thank God for the radio and my lovely rescue dog, Ellie, who between them have kept me sane. I'll try to keep this up now, as I always loved writing and one day I'll look at it and the memories will flood forward again. I might even get a follower! Here's a photo of my new best friend. She's about 5 years old now but was found by my darling daughter behind a fridge in the garden of her friend still with her umbilical cord attached. Long story short, when I went back to working full time, a very good friend agreed to look after her and she had a wonderful life with him and his other three dogs but always seemed to remember me and all that time, I had always thought that if I was ever in a position to give up work and retire, I would take her back. I'm so attached to her and she seems to have settled in brilliantly. She is definitely a ladies' dog.