Bee eaters ...

It is one of the most evocative sounds at this time of the year when the bee eaters arrive in Argaka to herald what they consider to be the start of summer. Not only do they sound like no other birds do, but they are indescribably beautiful. When you watch as they wheel overhead it is as if the whole of the rainbow is on display. One of the things we have both done in the last few years is to take much more notice of the wildlife here. And the lizards are so much bigger than they were in Bexhill ...

Ann's birthday is approaching fast and I trust she will have thrown off this bug that has afflicted us both, and left us with little or no energy. We drove to Paphos yesterday, and I had to hang around for a couple of hours waiting for Ann. So hardly an energetic morning but, by the time I had driven back home, it felt as if I had run the marathon. So fingers crossed that we shall be able to celebrate on 12th, especially as we have been invited to another friend's birthday on the 11th.

Watching the farce that is the UK election on television has been hilarious and depressing at the same time. I cannot remember such an inept and hapless bunch of "politicians" in my life, and I refer to all sides here. Dianne Abbott's interview on the radio was hilarious and reminded me of that Green Party leader a couple of years ago who could hardly remember her own name, so confused was she. Taken together with Mrs May's obvious dislike of chips by the seaside (Ed Miliband eat you heart out), and the entire BBC news broadcast could have been from Spitting Image or Monty Python.

We are not a million miles away from being able to apply for permanent residency in Cyprus, after five years' of living here. Apart from the paper trail required, it is apparently a much simpler and less expensive process than applying for nationality (and you have to lived here for seven years). So come the Autumn we need to sort that out just in case our thoughtless politicians upset the EU even more in the coming years. So fingers crossed for that.

Strong and stable ...

What an enormous farce is the General Election campaign in the UK at the moment. If it was not so sad I could easily imagine that the Tory election strategy ("strong and stable" and "coalition of chaos") was part of a televised satire from Monty Python. If you want a laugh (before you cry) check out the YouTube video of Mrs May being interviewed by Andrew Marr on Sunday morning. I have never seen such a farcical response from any elected leader. It is almost as ridiculous as Alex Salmond being interviewed with reference to educational attainment - or the lack of it - in Scotland.

We are slowly recovering from the nasty bug that has afflicted us for some time now. I am much better but Ann has a little way to go before she is free of the coughs and lethargy. We are pottering around the house and just saving our strength at the moment as we have a trip to Paphos tomorrow which cannot be put off.

The cats continue to moult and it would be possible to vacuum twice a day if we desired. Sitting on the terrace the other evening we saw and heard the first arrival of the bee-eaters, which always herald the coming of summer. They tend to sit on the electricity cables on the field opposite and then swoop and warble as if the is no tomorrow. I assume the few we saw were the advance guard and so we await the arrival of the main party. Such beautiful birds and such an evocative sound ...

On the fourth day ...

This nasty little bug I picked up four days ago is showing no sign of going away, and Ann reported yesterday that she was sickening as well. So we now have two sick bays in the house and the cats think we have all gone mad. A maddening cough, runny nose and extreme lethargy is a combination I would not wish on anybody and we can only hope that it clears up soon. It was this time last year that we were both diagnosed with bronchitis and I spent a night in Polis Hospital, where the treatment was excellent.

Long gone are the nights when we switched on some heating in the late afternoon as the temperature dropped. Now if we only felt well enough to sit out in the sunshine ... life would be a lot better. Our friend Savvas dropped in this afternoon and started to paint the metal structure of the carport, which seemed sensible. But it will be good to have some shade for the car again. Even in April it can take your breath away if you jump into a vehicle that has been sitting in the sun.

Ann woke me up the other morning with the predictable news that there is going to be a General Election in the UK. Well that's just fine and dandy but leaves me in a predicament. Both the Tories (for whom I have always voted) and Labour (a party I could not consider voting for) have come out in favour of leaving the EU, which leaves the Lib Dems, and I could never trust a word they said. They would be likely to climb into bed with any party who offered them a sniff of power. And so, much as I want to see the UK remain in the EU, I have got nobody to vote for and I suspect that many other expats will find themselves in a similar situation.

So, apart from a bout of ill health, and with the most important decision the British government have had to make in my lifetime leaving me effectively disenfranchised, life is good. Trump hasn't started a nuclear war (yet) and for that we should all be grateful. But I cannot remember when such an unstable character was in such a powerful position. What a world we live in ...

Another dry month ...

Following the success of November 2016, when we had a month's abstinence from alcohol, we have decided to follow that up with a dry April. It is nigh on impossible to not have a couple of cold beers, or glasses of wine, when the hot weather arrives and so this is the ideal time. And the feeling of self-righteousness is a very secondary part of this scheme.

We were sitting at Saddles this morning and having coffee, when it was apparent that the whole world was waking up, sprucing itself and generally making ready for the next six months. And so, after supermarket shopping, we often call in for a drink as a form of reward for doing something neither of us really enjoy. Did we pull the car over? Absolutely not ... our determination did not waver and we headed for home. As a reward I went to put the chlorine tablets in the pump house and skinned my head on the door frame. There are times when being good is not enough.

War with Spain ... what bright spark in the Tory party came up with that idea. I used to think Michael Howard was an astute politician but after his comments yesterday I think he ought to be sectioned. Did nobody think to remind him that there are hundreds of thousands of Britons living in Spain? Between him, the three musketeers (who don't seem able to muster a brain cell between them) and the wannabe dictator - St Theresa - I am ashamed to be British at the moment. As a lifelong Conservative voter, who never missed an election from 1970 until we moved to Cyprus in 2012, I could not ever vote for them again. And I couldn't vote for the Labour Party (alongside millions of others) and the Libdems ... not a chance in hell.

The good news is that it can't really get any worse and that, I pray, tsome politician with a brain starts to pull strings behind the scenes. Otherwise, as Corporal Fraser said, "We all doomed."

Fuses ...

Enjoying the Spring sunshine this morning, my daydreams were rudely interrupted by Ann coming out to tell me that our freezer was no longer working. Fortunately it was nowhere near full so the "disaster" was not as bad as it might have been. We emptied the freezer, and moved stuff to our fridge.

Now my friend Savvas always makes fun of me as he says I am not a practical man. There is, I admit, an element of truth to this so I set out to find the fault. The incentive of not having to go out and buy a new freezer was a spur indeed. I checked the socket it was plugged into and that was fine. We moved the freezer out from the wall and had a look at the plug. It was one of those "sealed for life" ones but ... the fuse was visible, and with a small amount of persuasion I was able to remove it. On inspection it was fine but we replaced it and our freezer sprang into life. GCE "O" level physics has never been so valuable. For someone who has always telephoned a man to come and sort things out in his UK existence, this was a first and a triumph. Happy days ...

And, my goodness, don't we need some happy days with the lunatics running UK Plc deciding to trigger Article 50. I see that the people of Cornwall have finally woken up and smelled the coffee. Having voted overwhelmingly to leave the EU, the people have realised that this will mean an end to the grants and general agricultural funding on which the county relies. The Welsh have also seen the light dawn, and many of  "the people have spoken", "move on" and "suck it up" brigade will increasingly rue the day they decided to destroy the UK's financial future, and possibly cause the breakup of our country.

However the clocks go forward this weekend, and the weather is set fair. The Six Nations' Rugby Championship is over (and what a disappointing weekend that was) but the Grand Prix season is about to begin. I wonder how long it will be before we are able to swim in the pool?

Coptic Storms?

I suppose people are equally divided when it comes to whether Coptic Storms, and thus the Coptic Calendar, are a reality or are coincidental here in Cyprus. Thursday saw the arrival of El Hossum, the equinox gale which is apparently meant to last for eight days. Clouds of dust were very apparent on Thurdsay and Friday, and this morning we woke up to what (according to Ann) looked like the set for a zombie apocalypse.

Garden furniture everywhere, masses of debris in and around the pool and our heavy-duty car port tarpaulin in shreds ... all that was missing were the walking dead. Thunder and lightning, and seeming inches of rain, and the believability of the Coptic Storm Calendar was becoming more and more real. We remember back to our first year here, when we had been told about the Coptic Storms. One afternoon, I think it must have been in November, and the temperature literally shot up by seven or eight degrees within a few minutes, the skies darkened and the wind swirled from every conceivable direction. We watched the live weather feed from the Argaka weather station, and the wind changing direction every few seconds and gusting to 90 kph. The only thing we could do was shut the curtains and drink some wine.

On a more parochial note we have been enjoying the Six Nations' Championship on television. Side-bets on the outcome of each weekend's matches were going in my direction until Emgland played against Italy and the infamous "ruckgate" controversy. I had England to win by at least sixty points, whilst Ann was much more measured and had England to win by a much more conservative amount. Well, and it hurts to say this, she was right and I was wrong. If I ever hear the end of that ...

Our friend Jill has been quite ill with cellulitis, and it is nothing to do with having excess cellulose. We went to see her on Thursday in hospital in Paphos, and she was not in a good way. She had been taken from the private clinic in Polis by ambulance immediately she was examined and has been on intravenous antibiotics since. Her leg was badly swollen and discoloured and we felt very sorry for her. When she is released from hospital she will be out of action for some time, which will give John the opportunity to learn how the oven, microwave and washing machine work. Time will tell how well he copes ...

I'm a lumberjack ...

Exciting times here at home when I put on my check short, my boots and entered the world of the lumberjack. We have two large palm trees in the back garden and this is the time of year when they need cutting back. They are both very different and the one I decided to tackle has great swirling fronds. The general idea is to cut back the ones that dip down to the ground and leave the ones at the top of the tree to point upwards.

Grasping my trusty saw I advanced gingerly - not knowing whether the serrated edge of the blade would cut through the tough fronds. Ann advised, and what a good piece of advice it was, that I should wear thick gardening gloves as the spikes on the fronds are sharp and potentially lethal. The saw was up to the job and twenty minutes' later the offending fronds were stacked in the back garden, ready to be transported to the garden waste over the fence.

The other tree is too tall for me to attempt and I shall need to get some help in for that. Our friend Savvas was here the other day and he burned all three garden rubbish piles, which was a great help. We are reluctant to set our own fires, even at this time of the year, as we have seen the havoc our neighbour Demetrious reeked on the land behind his houses.

Through an Internet contact (all related to IPTV) we met, completely by chance, a couple who are moving from Malta to Argaka. David, my contact, was in one of the local bars with his wife and another couple and there was something familiar about him. My phone searched Facebook and there was David's photograph so I went up and introduced myself. The other couple have since been in touch and will make contact before their move in mid-March.

I remember all the help and advice my late friend Dave Travis gave to us over our first months on Cyprus. It is comforting to have people who are able to tell you how things are done and where places are when you first come to a new country. The couple from Malta are experienced expats but, as people never tire of saying, "This is Cyprus".