November 5, 2007 – 6:54 pm
Halfway through shovelling and barrowing a mountain of rubble and broken bricks from one end of a building site to another AD turned to me and said…
‘I love doing this shit…’
‘Why’s that?’ I enquired, slightly bemused.
‘Well – I feel like I’m working hard…’
‘Uh huh’
‘It makes me sweat a lot…’
‘Er – okay…’
‘…and…’
‘Uh huh…?’
‘…and most of all… [...]
October 21, 2007 – 2:41 pm
It must be said that this week has been fine on the surfing front and to top it off every morning I’ve had the pleasure of laying concrete for the new shower block at Ollies campsite. I love a bit of concrete…
Almagreira campsite has a communal thing going on – people get to stay here [...]
October 13, 2007 – 1:46 pm
…I could go to work and get covered in cement and sawdust. Get hot and tired. Probably bruise my left elbow on a random rock and cut my little finger with a chisel. Lose my tape measure again and break a fingernail or two (I tell you – this building work plays havoc with your [...]
October 11, 2007 – 8:04 am
…we started off with something like this…
…did a bit of this…
…and ended up with some stuff like this…
You can find a few more photos on my flickr page. Quite tired now – I might go and have a snooze…
Nuts – I forgot to fit the kitchen – back in a bit…
I didn’t surf today.
September 10, 2007 – 7:10 pm
Being one of the few English people I know that has actually managed to get their mouths around any semblance of Portuguese I was most horrified to realise today that my mastery of the aforementioned lingo had completely evaporated. I was talking to the carpenter (giving him a slight roasting for making a few fundamental [...]
The Isle of Man – once described to me (by a Kipper) as 50,000 alcoholics clinging to a rock in the Irish sea.
10 years ago I took a team of builders, carpenters and sculptors to Douglas (the capital) to refurbish their council run nightclub ‘Captain Nemo’s Cave’. We were to cover the walls in fake [...]
…he works from 9 to 5 and then…’
A classic in it’s day. 1980 – a fabulous year for both music and fashion. The point is not to dwell on ozone destruction from hairspray abuse or the temporary worldwide domination of stonewashed denim across the Western world (legwarmers optional) but the fact that my life has [...]
Today I lost an old and trusted friend. He fought his ailments valiantly for months – subtle club hammer surgery and regular tractor grease enemas but sadly to no avail…
Ten years we’ve been together – a beautiful union of man and machine. Builder and mixer together as one, endlessly churning out muck for me to [...]
During lunch banter is usually fairly loud and predictable. AD rants on about how many women he wants to ‘do’ or waves he wants to ‘nail’ (I think that’s the right way round) and we listen and groan in the available spaces. Today the conversation drifted to interesting sleeping arrangements…
The usual drunken ‘halfway home ended [...]
Several days ago I posted about the ridiculous heat that was somewhat hampering progress at the Grindstone. Perfect for the weekend however, lounging by the river supping an ice cold Magners (yes I still have one left!) and an ice cream or two – until I awoke this morning to a heavily looming sky.
For several [...]
