getting hotter

June - I took up the first of the carpets today.  They all have to be washed and stored - under the spare bed. Winter clothes have been put away and we're into t-shirts, but it is still raining.  Summer showers which just make it muggier.  The lemons are falling off the trees at a dozen a day.  They make a noise like a small bomb falling in the deep silence of the summer night.  I made some lemonade but will have to get Georgie and Nels to squeeze them all and freeze the juice, to take it out a bottle at a time.  Fresh lemonade is excellent with vodka and gin, but a lot of sugar.

Yesterday was Kosta's birthday.  We gathered as usual and had a bit of lamb and wine.  Just a quiet celebration - except for Jamie who must have been on a sugar high.  He climbed over fences, up trees, under tables and followed Georgie like a shadow. He tried to beat us all with a stick but Elli and I grabbed him and the stick before he did any damage to anyone.  We arranged a treasure hunt which the older kids loved and they made up their own one after that.  It is a great idea - I'll do it again next time and make it harder so they are occupied for longer.  Treasure was a bag of lollies for them - more sugar!

The economy is following its rocky course.  We wake up every morning wondering whether or not to watch the news.  Today is a general strike and everything in the big cities has ground to a halt.  Not much happened here though the banks and P.O. were probably closed and the cafeterias full of strikers enjoying a free day.

We have stopped eating cucumbers although there is no threat here.  All our cucumbers are local.  Just the thought of an e-coli attack puts one 'off'.  At least it wasn't greece that was to blame this time but the first reports did a lot of damage to poor old Spain and all the time the source was in bloody germany.

I haven't got my mini-quad bike yet.  The first one couldn't find their papers and had to pay years back-road-tax.  We found another, got the papers together, and he asked another 200 for the repairs he did.  K said 'parto kai farto' - take it and eat it!   There are others around, most too expensive.  I might just have to learn to ride a scooter.