Well, that was the wet weekend that was. Friday and Saturday saw thunderstorms, plural; they came and went and were short. When I woke on Saturday (might have been Friday), all was calm and dry. By the time I walked to work 10 minutes later, the rain had started, and the thunder was close behind. As it only takes me a few paces to walk to work, the brief storm took me by surprise, but there you go. Sunday was infinitely better, weather-wise, but we certainly had some interesting clouds passing overhead. Neil managed to take a shot of the view across the village to Nimos, where you can see the storm, and then, a second later, one just as lightning was happening within the cloud.

The rain came not long after Neil had washed the rust and muck off the flat roof where the old hot water tank had emptied, so it’s no longer the colour of rust, and the next job is to fill the cracks and paint the whole thing. (Note to self: we’re in town this morning, so finally get around to buying a pot of paint and don’t keep putting it off until next time or it will never get done.) I must say, it’s currently very pleasant not to have one’s water pump turning on for no reason, to have hot water, and not to have anyone staying downstairs. How long that will last is anyone’s guess, but for now, I’m enjoying the quiet, though I still start whenever I hear the pump going off, hardly believing that after all these months, it is meant to be happening.

The afternoons at the bar, despite the showers, have been busy, and even when it was raining, only a few people sheltered inside, because it wasn’t that cold and the rain wasn’t that heavy. The weather looks good now until Saturday, when there may be clouds, and there are still plenty of visitors coming over for the day and staying here for longer, even though the end of this summer season is approaching. That hasn’t stopped a film crew from filming a… whatever they are filming. I saw them distantly up at the Pontikokastro (the ‘mouse castle’) the other day, and took a photo on my phone, which shows you nothing unless you can zoom right in. In that case, you can just see a black tent and a few people milling about. More, though, you can see the colour of the sky behind the hill, because they were taking advantage of a break in the rain.

While all this was going on, I was seeing to the layout of my next book, which is now almost ready to go. I am just waiting for the cover to come back finalised before I can upload that and press the button. There will be news about this before long, I hope. Now, I am left with a ‘What next?’ Plenty of ideas, but which one to explore? Let’s see how the week progresses…

As one might have said in an old Kentish dialect, I be somewhat buffle-headed this morning. I just posted this on my other site by mistake. I blame the thunderstorm currently passing overhead. Here’s what I meant to put here…

You know I’ve often talked about water problems on these pages. Well, yesterday, we finally found ourselves with hot water after five weeks without. The water on Symi has long been a problem for many on the island; the lack of it, the condition of it, and, now and then, the colour of it. In our case, water problems have been a combination of corrosiveness and what can only be called dodgy plumbing. In defence of our local plumbers, none of them was involved in the installation of the plumbing in this house, their involvement has been to try and put right the problems caused when the late owner put it in himself during his renovation of the property years ago. It used to be that, to fill the sterna, we had to turn off the pump, turn the blue tap to the left and the red one to the right, and then open the mains for a couple of hours. Once enough water was in the tank beneath the house, we then had to turn the red to the left, open the mains, and turn the blue to the right, and only then turn the pump back on, with no water available during the time it took to fill. Then, the sterna broke, so we had a barrel on the roof instead…

It’s a dull story, and not an unusual one around here, so I’ll spare you the details, but since moving in, we’ve had to replace the water pump six times, we’ve had a sterna, a small barrel and now a larger one, and we are now on our third hot water tank, all within the last 11.5 years. Why? Maybe this photo below will go some way to explain.

The wonderfully patient plumber came on Monday and fitted the new hot water tank; sorted. Not. Once full, the pump kept running, so we still couldn’t use it, but he came back yesterday and fixed the problem (which had something to do with downstairs), and everything was back to normal after a long, cold-showering five weeks. However, not long after he left, we noticed a drip in an unusual place inside, and on investigation, I found that the old, disconnected tank, put aside in the storeroom, wasn’t completely empty, and was leaking. It was also fairly full, so we had to manoeuvre it out onto the flat roof so it could be emptied, and what you see above is the colour of what came out. That’s about five years’ worth of crud, and is the same stuff that gathers at the bottom of the cold water barrel. Nice.

Meanwhile, it could be that we’re in for rain this morning. Thunder is rolling around the hills, but it’s still too dark to see the sky and judge how the day may go. If or when it rains, we’ll probably get rainwater coming through the flat roof and into the bathroom, because we’ve not coated the roof with concrete paint yet. We need to clean that mess off first, then paint when the weather’s good, and fill cracks, and then, hopefully, there will be no more internal showers other than the one we want.

Now, lightning is coming closer, and the thunder is louder, so I best put this up and move on before this potential storm starts to interfere with the electrics and internet. For me, today and the weekend will all be about my final readthrough of my next book, and I will tell you incessantly about it once it’s ready for you to rush to Amazon and order a copy. In the meantime, have a great weekend.

Welcome to the first day of a new month (already). Yesterday, the harbour was in full swing, the day-trip boats were coming in and out with no let-up in the number of visitors, and the sun was out. We had a very pleasant lunch with our friends in a taverna that was quiet at noon and nearly full 45 minutes later. Afterwards, we battled through some just-arrived visitors and managed to find a taxi back up the hill, so that all went swimmingly. I also picked up another new keyboard for this typowriter, and so far, this one seems to work properly. The old one wasn’t 100% compatible, it seems. When I’d highlight a word or phrase with the intent to edit it, either the highlighting would disappear when I let go the mouse button, or else it would select more text than I wanted, seemingly at random. As this new one is the same make as the laptop, I’m hoping it behaves a little better. It’s narrower, and the keys are lower and not clunky, but it will take me a while to get used to it.

Meanwhile, after five weeks, the hot water situation at home remains ‘almost there.’ We have a new hot water tank (arrived on Tuesday), it’s fitted and works, but it won’t stop filling up. That is, once the new tank was full, we expected the pump to turn off because all taps in the house were closed, yet the pump continued to run and refused to stop. This baffled the plumber as much as it baffled me. Where was the water going? It must have been going somewhere for the pump to run, right? Allegedly, our hot tank isn’t connected to the flat below, so even if a tap had been left open, it shouldn’t have been going there, but where else was it going? We can’t get into currently unoccupied downstairs to check, besides, it has its own hot water tank up on the other roof… The upshot is, still no hot water, and the plumber is due back today to get to the bottom of the problem. We shall see. Meanwhile, the cold showers continue… The joys of living in a house where the previous owner did all his own maintenance and most of his building, including the plumbing.

On the upside of things, my latest book is back from being proofread, and I am now making my final edits. The cover is coming along, too, so I can soon bore you with news of all that. In the outside but not too far away world, we saw new visitors arrive for their stay in the village, we still have day trippers reaching us up here and wandering the lanes, and there are still plenty of people about enjoying the variable weather of October.

Must be quick this morning. My latest draft has come back from the proofreader, I am getting towards the end of editing an older book ahead of republishing, and I have a newsletter to prepare. I have some ‘admin’ to do, too, and a book cover to decide upon, and to add to it all, I didn’t get up until five. Horror! To add to the trauma, my ‘new’ office chair has started to give up on me. Whereas before, I was sitting up and typing at a sensible position, over the last couple of weeks, I’ve started to sink, so now my hands feel like they are up to the level of my shoulders. I remind myself of one of the goblin bank tellers from Harry Potter. So, it’s back to using the adjustable piano stool for now, while remembering to keep a straight back, but also remembering not to lean back, because there isn’t a back, and if I do, I’ll go over backwards like a character in a dodgy farce. So, anyway…

I should have a new book out shortly, and I’ll tempt you to that at another time when I know exactly when. Also, a great friend of mine is about to release a book of reminiscences of his time working with Kindsay Kemp and his dance/theatre company, and I’ll let you know about that when it’s out there. Closer to home, we have been invited out to lunch in Yialos, and while I am there, I have a new computer keyboard waiting for me to collect from ACS. Let’s hope that when I sit to use it, I can reach it.

Meanwhile, after this confusion with Facebook and not being able to add the link to my website on the Symi Dream page, I have found a plugin for my website that automatically links these blog posts to FB the other way round. This may be a way of bypassing this new oddity, and we’ll soon see if it works. And talking of work… I’m off.

It’s changeover time. That was my last thought last night and my first thought this morning, and I was thinking about the temperature. We closed our front window last night for the first time in a few months, because the air is considerably cooler now than it was a few days ago, and the forecast ahead shows a few sunny days, and then some windier and colder ones. The sheets are back on the bed, and soon there will be a duvet, and later, blankets too. I’m already back to wearing socks and shoes, rather than sandals, and I’ve rummaged in my winter clothing store (a suitcase) for hoodies, jumpers and long trousers. We’ve started preparing other things needed for the winter to come, like the curtains that we hang over the front door and balcony windows, the spare towels for when it rains and the porch gets wet, and we’ve started discussing filler and concrete paint for the flat roofs. However, out and about, visitors are still investigating the village wearing T-shirts and shorts, visiting beaches, and enjoying the weakening sun.

The start of the change from summer to winter, via something resembling autumn, reminded me of another thing that’s changed over the years: changeover day. It used to be that we’d know what day of the week it was by the activity in the village. When you saw a mule coming up the steps with luggage on either side, when people who had been regulars were suddenly not there, and when you saw suitcases waiting unattended by the Windmill or the clock tower, you knew it was changeover day, and thus, you knew it was a Wednesday. These were in the days of holiday companies like Manos and Laskarina, Olympic and Kosmar, when there were reps on the island to meet and show in guests. You’d hear suitcases trundling by in the early hours, and know people were leaving and would soon be replaced by others trundling the other way. Now, holiday company reps are rare, if not existent on the island, and people come and go on all days of the week. I’m surprised anyone knows what day it is.

Some things remain the same. You might still see luggage waiting unattended, and know it will be quite safe until collected, but you no longer see uniformed reps herding their guests towards a boat and taking them over to Rhodes to say goodbye and collect another clutch. Independent travel is more ‘the thing’, making holiday dates more flexible, and it’s common to hear people are staying for ten or twelve days, rather than the standard seven or fourteen. There are no welcome meetings, and no reps running around trying to find guests and get them off the island a day early because the weather is set to storming, and boats are in danger of being cancelled. Visitors have to book their own excursions via the travel agents, rather than through a rep working for very little money, plus whatever commission they can muster.

It’s taken a while for this change to become the norm, but that’s where we are with the British companies, at least. I don’t know about the holiday companies of other countries. The change from summer to winter hasn’t changed much, though. That’s still the same, and every year is slightly different in timing, though the same in the result. To my mind, it’s not been a particularly hot summer, with nothing over 40°, which might indicate a colder winter to come (but who knows these days?), but preparations for it remain the same. Time to find and dust off the heaters, put away the fans, and give the wardrobe its own changeover. Summer clothes will soon be in the storage suitcase under the bed, and… Where did I put those blankets? ‘Seen the duvet?’ Answer, ‘I think it’s in a bag in the mousandra,’ and so on into the shorter days and colder nights.

What’s not changed, though, are the views, although the sunrises and sunsets can be a little more dramatic at this time of year.