Home again!

On our last day in Spain we weren't due to leave for the airport until around 16h so we had plenty of time to pack our bags and have lunch before setting out. I had withdrawn the cash to handle all the tips before leaving France (drivers, guides, restaurant and hotel staff and so on) and Monique and I agreed on amounts for each beforehand. Then I would put however many €€€ into an envelope with a "thank you" on it and hand it to Monique to hand over. In retrospect it was a good job I handled the cash because I'd withdrawn €700 for tips before we left France and carried it on me each day - and it was Monique that got robbed and not me! We'd have been down a helluva lot more money if she'd had it on her! Anyway, on the last morning I handed her an envelope with €50 in it, which was the amount we'd agreed on for the local rep at the hotel. After a little while Monique came over all pissy and tried to hand it back to me, and when I asked her why she made some remark about how "he'd not come to see her the night before so he could forget a tip"! I told her that maybe he was busy and that in all respects he had been excellent - and sure enough, about 30 minutes later he showed up with our boarding passes and final arrangements for our journey back to the airport. At this she came scuttling over to me and said "see, he must have smelled the money, what shall I do now" so I told her to keep it or give it to him because at this point I didn't give a rat's ass! I guess maybe people should speak to her like that more often because she immediately went quiet and handed the money over to him!

After leaving my luggage in the safe room at the hotel, I decided to go out to lunch rather than eat in the hotel. It was around 11.30 am when I set out and as I got down by the beach I saw a man, who I would guess to be in his late 60s/early 70s who appeared to be paralytic drunk! He could barely stand up and was holding on for dear life to a post before crossing the street. It was a case of two steps forward, one step back and he had that strange gait that you see with drug addicts on tranq. I've watched a few documentaries on this epidemic in Philadelphia (I presume it's the same the whole world over), but he was leaning so far back I don't know how he stayed upright! I suppose it could indeed have been drugs but I'm more inclined to think it was alcohol - either way it was very sad to see!

The sad gait of someone on
tranq - or something
equally horrendous!

We made it to the airport in good time to get a drink before boarding and airport assistance had been arranged for two ladies who had difficulty walking - one of whom was Motormouth's mom! As I was standing waiting to board a young Spanish man arrived pushing mom in a wheelchair and then asked if she was capable of walking to the plane (probably about 50 metres - she most definitely was capable of walking that far, as she'd already proven). At this Motormouth launched into "ah non, maman can't walk, she's disabled ...." so then I translated for him and said that was a shame because if maman had been able to walk on her own he could have boarded her ahead of everyone else! I had to laugh when he said that because all of a sudden maman was perfectly capable of walking - so I turned round to Catherine and smiled - at which she went "hallelujah, praise the lord, it's a miracle"! To be fair to maman, she was never the problem, but bloody hell, I'd have to swing for Motormouth if she were my daughter!

All in all I'm glad I went, even if it was exhausting, and I'm sorry we didn't make it to Ronda, which is apparently beautiful. Oh well, maybe next time! The return journey went well, even if we didn't make it back until 1 am but at a lunch the club had on Friday Miserable Chantal (the one with the nice Portuguese partner) said to me she'd heard that three people missed the plane on the way back and had to spend an extra night in Malaga????? I don't know if she'd genuinely heard that or if she was just sh€t-stirring as she is known to do, but I just said that there were 29 of us on the bus when we left St. Pierre and 29 of us on the bus when we got back, so unless we'd done a "Home Alone", nobody had missed the plane on the return journey!

Club started back up again on Tuesday and the atmosphere was tense to say the least. Then on Friday we had a committee meeting to go over what would be needed at our AGM in November and to throw out ideas for next year's programme. Well that meant that Monique had to go over yet again how Leone had missed the plane and how everyone blamed her for it, how if she'd known Martine wouldn't fly she would never have booked southern Spain, and how everyone had it in for her, and that was all she had to say on the matter! So then Catherine started to make some suggestions, only to be shut down immediately by Monique who had another monologue lined up - at which point Catherine exploded and said "you say that you want to give everyone the floor but then never shut up and allow them to speak". So Monique got up and ran into the kitchen (presumably to cry) and that pretty much set the tone for the rest of the meeting!

At sewing club on Monday they were asking me about my trip and I was regaling them with all the wonderful things we'd seen and all the pain in the butt stuff I'd had to put up with. At this point Chantal (a nice Chantal this time) asked me what the name of the president was and when I told her she said that she'd known Monique most of her life and no, it had nothing to do with getting older - she'd been like that all her life, taking on responsibilities and then attaching herself like a limpet to someone else because she was overwhelmed! Bloody hell, that doesn't augur well for the future does it! For some reason Monique told me that her son had asked for my telephone number. I've met him a couple of times and he seems very nice, but I also get the impression that he knows exactly how his mother is (well he should do really, shouldn't he)! I was very non-commital about the whole thing but if he wants to call me and talk about his mother I'm up for it. I really do think she's in over her head but I'm not sure her pride will allow her to step down. Oh what to do, what to do!

On Wednesday I had Charlie again but as he was invited to a 6th birthday party I only had him for a few hours. The mother invited me to stay for the party (it was André's girlfriend, Mel) but I told her I'd rather swim with sharks and I'd be back to pick him up later! At that I took myself off to the lake at Thyez where I sat and read my book in absolute peace for a couple of hours - man it felt good to be home!

The lake at Thyez!