Ruido issue 4

Today was the Los Llanos launch party for Ruido 4. This time they held it in the street at midday. I didn't really have time, what with the tourist office job and the state of the house, but I went anyway.

I was glad I did. We had music from local musicians, Jonny Acosta, Tomimoto and Aida, followed by a jam session. And I even found a good birthday present for my sister-in-law.

The dentist again

Well my son now has a brace fitted to half his top teeth. 200€ please, and that's just for the first month.

Which explains why I've taken on another rush editing job for the tourist office, even though I'm absolutely shattered after finishing the last one on time (and the fiction edit and all the critiques.) And the house is still grubby and the ironing pile is even higher.

It'll all get sorted out eventually.

Although I'm beginning to wonder if I'll get the Christmas decorations up before the New Year.

Poor kid

It's getting near the end of term, and my son's having his coursework marked. How times change! Last year it meant a panic as he tried to catch up on missed work in every subject at once. This term the only problem was French. So a good bit of the weekend went on that, and I helped as best I could, being almost recovered from the lurgy.

The one thing we didn't do was to pack his bag for morning.

So we had a panic trying to find the stuff he'd sweated blood over. It wound up with both parents giving the poor kid a loud lecture on keeping track of his stuff.

And it was in the bag all the time, hidden behind a folder.

Oops.

He really could have done without that.

Overload

I got behind with everything while I was ill. For one thing, my story These Eyes is supposed to go out at the critters workshop on Wednesday, but it hasn't been edited and I'm waaaay behind with my critiques of others' stories.

Now the Tourist office want their editing job by yesterday, the house is decidedly grubby, the ironing pile almost reaches the ceiling, and I have one urgent edit and five urgent critiques to fit in by Wednesday.

And people expect to eat.

Help!

A school excursion

My son was supposed to go on an overnight school excursion last week, but it was postponed because of the rain. He finally went this week. The bus collected him early Thursday afternoon and took them all to Roque Faro in the north of the island. They walked downhill all the way to the lovely village of El Tablado, where they spent the night in a new hostel run by the island's government. Then on Friday they walked and walked along the old coastal path to Santo Domingo, where the bus met them after lunch and brought them home for tea time.

The bus and hostel were free (great!) but I had to provide lots of packed food and some sheets, and of course waterproofs and boots. That meant I had to get out of bed and sort it out, flu or no flu.

As soon as the bus had gone, I collapsed back into bed. I surfaced long enough to eat the pasta my husband cooked for dinner (so much for our planned romantic evening), and slept almost through to lunchtime on Friday, when Helen and Theresa arrived.

They took one look at me, bought in lunch, fed me, cleaned the kitchen, and left me to sleep. Good friends indeed.

By the time my son got home I felt human again.

I'd given him a disposable camera, and I was looking forward to seeing shots of the magnificent scenery.

What he actually took was three landscape photos, and twenty-something shots of the boys dormitory. But the main thing was that he had a great time.