What day is it today? Oh yes, Saturday. We should be off to the old post office to see what we can do to help the refugees who might be here, or to help the project generally if not. After that, we have a guest coming for drinks tonight and then we are off out for dinner. And on Sunday we have friends coming to see the house before we go and see theirs, a kind of hospitality exchange.

Symi is very quiet now. Some of the folk who stay here for the entire summer have headed home and there are few pert time residents and visitors remaining. There are only a few yachts in the harbour, but there are also some winter residents returning. Others, who live here all year round, have gone off on holiday or have gone to find winter work elsewhere and so the seasons are changing. You can tell that from the weather of course and the vine leaves that are falling on a daily basis.

It’s still grey and wet and we’re hoping we’re not going to see a repeat of last winter when were hardly got any walking in due to weather and work. (I still do my five mornings per week at the desk, and Neil is still working at the bar, but that surely must end soon.) And now with Saturday morning as our volunteer time it only leaves us a full day on a Sunday to do a long-long walk, or afternoons to do a four or five hour walk, weather permitting. That’s on top of the morning walks which are what today’s photos are all about – though these are from Thursday morning. I couldn’t go out yesterday as it was raining at 6.45 and on and off during the day.

For those that know Horio, Zoi’s taverna has closed for the winter as has the Windmill and the Olive Tree, Syllogos is still open but inside seating only, and Georgio’s is still open with outside still a possibility. Soon enough they will scale down to inside only. The bars are all still open and there is live music at the Secret Garden regularly and special events at The Sunrise from time to time, the cinema event on a Sunday at Mandeios is on-going and Rainbow has its multiplex two screen TV extravaganza for football, politics and Animal Planet on demand.

Through the winter there will be dance classes for children and some for adults, there will be name day festivals and other church events and celebrations, the walking is good and there should hopefully be some social time as well, dinner parties and the like. I’ve got my trip coming up at the end of next month and a book to finish before then: draft three of ‘Straight Swap’ is now the item on the desk and I am already in talks with the editor over certain aspects of it, mainly my atrocious punctuation, rather extreme spelling errors and a little bit of structure.

So, lots to do but now I am off down town, with hat and coat on and a note to buy an umbrella or two. Have a good weekend!

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When it rains on Symi… But first: You’ll be on the edge of your seat to hear about the duvet delivery and I can tell you today that ‘my (own personal) Hermes’ tells me that the package is now collected (18.40 21^st) and at 01.37 on 22^nd, was on its way having been sorted at the National hub. I wonder where that might be? Where would the hub of Great Britain actually lie? Probably somewhere near Birmingham and I don’t know why I say that, it just feels right.

Anyway… Sometimes, when it rains on Symi it really rains on Symi. And the first real rain after a long hot summer results in the surface dust and soil being washed down the hills and into the sea. There’s always a certain amount of top soil washed away but when you get as much rain as we did on Wednesday, and after a long dry spell (one small storm aside) you can expect to see the sea change colour. So, today’s photos will give you an idea of how the sea changes when the rains hit. The sea in Yialos was, at one point, chocolate brown.

We did some mopping up after the storm. Half our towel supply was used to catch drips that came in under the windows before we managed to shut the shutters and, as we had the balcony doors open for photos, we also had some splashes come in there. The offices now smell a bit damp as we had to have the washing in there overnight and some rain had come in through the windows as the wind was driving in that direction, but compared to the old house, we got off lightly. Our landlord rushed across to see us after things died down to make sure we were okay and had remembered to unplug the flower pots from the hole in the wall that drains the courtyard. He’d not seen the water flowing out that way from his view across the road and was worried that we might have forgotten and thus had the house flooded (as would have happened had we been away and not unplugged the pots. Note: leave flower pots out of the hole in the wall when going away).

Another thing to remember to do, when you live around here, when you are going away – or when a storm is coming in – is to unplug everything else. On Wednesday we were constantly unplugging the phone line, the router, the PCs, the TV, just in case… It does interrupt work, though the laptops run for four hours on battery, but it must be done. Also when we go out and the weather looks doubtful, just in case. You don’t want to be under one of these when they come in to land:

I cut that from a video I made on my underwater camera during the storm. If you want to get a feel for how things can be on Symi in the winter, then take a look at this one too.

And a couple more photos…

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Duvets and Detectives (and photos of yesterday morning’s weather which was pretty rough – more about that another day as I’m still drying out towels (so much rain it came under the windows.))

I have some must share shipping news (not that kind of shipping news). I recently ordered a new duvet for the winter as it was easier (and cheaper) than buying one from Rhodes when I was last there. So the other day I was delighted to receive an update on my shopping via shipping news. Kind of shopping-shipping I suppose. More of that in a moment, first the backstory.

I searched eBay to find something suitable and sifted through all the duvet possibilities, bumbling around confused in bed linen hell, flopping over onto my back to wallow in either eider or manmade and laying down in down, throwing aside anything that might set off sneezing fits and being tempted by things that sounded like British pubs, ‘Down and Feather,’ and staying well away from a ‘Bargain brand new king size duvet lemon,’ as the thought of a ‘duvet lemon’ filled me with dread – imagine that at the Rainbow Bar. ‘A G & T please Yianni with a slice of that delicious, if ever expanding, duvet lemon…

And that’s not to mention the tog thing. I checked up on a website that told me 10.5 was good for winter and anything over 13 was kind of ‘Antarctic-ready’ and then found things on eBay such as ‘Cool 10.5 tog.’ Oh, I thought it was going to be fine for winter. And ‘Cozy warm 13.5 tog.’ Oh, if only Captain Scott had taken his ‘cozy warm 13.5 tog,’ or even the rather startling ‘Luxury Hollowfibre 15 Tog’ (I am sweating at the thought). I was almost tempted by the ‘Luxury Hotel Quality Scott Goose Feather and Down 13.5’ which might have suited Cpt Scott well, as it’s apparently named after him, or a place in the Falkland Islands, or some luxury hotel somewhere – at least I assume it’s the quality of a luxury hotel, or do they mean it’s a luxury that is ‘hotel quality’ in which case I hope it’s not the quality of some hotels I’ve stayed in. That one by King’s Cross railway station where the action taking place inside the mattress was noisier than the action taking place in the next room, but I digress as there was no duvet at that hotel, luxury or otherwise. Where was I…?

Ah yes. Well, I found one in the end, after several minutes romping through the ‘heavy winter’ and the ‘Polypropylene’ and ‘goose feather’ and ‘duck down’ and ‘hey dilly-dilly, dilly-on down nonny-no nonsense luxury flame proof double hotel feels like luxury’ stuff and the slightly more exciting ‘Corovin quilt’ which I can only assume was something stitched in Medieval France to celebrate the invention of the word ‘duvet’ in around 1750-60 (French: meaning down (plumage), Middle French, alteration of dumet, derivative of Old French dum) and don’t get me started on that pun. Finally I settled on a 10.5 thing simply because it offered cheaper postage than the others.

And so, to the afternoon email and the message which I immediately misread but which turned out to be from My Hermes and not My Herpes and which highlighted the fact that I had been completely drawn in by the titling of my new duvet: “Your parcel containing LUXURIOUS 100% SOFT SILKY MICROFIBRE FEELS LIKE DOWN DUVET QUILT [Double, 10.5] from Simon Barber will be delivered to you by myHermes.”

It was/is such a joyous email I felt like dancing and thanking Mr Barber personally for personally selecting, wrapping and posting my new Luxurious 100% soft silky etcetera. And then, more joy! I can track it via this web address using that tracking number and you know how much I like to track inanimate objects across Europe. Okay so the disclaimer is fair enough: “You will usually receive it 2-3 working days after you get this email, although it may take longer.” And I am pretty sure it will take longer as the tracking page showed me that it hadn’t actually moved yet. And then joy turned to scepticism when I read the end of the email: “It will be delivered to the following address: GSP Shipping Centre, 1 Langham Park, South Normanton.” Oh, not Symi then?

Having rushed to Google and discovered where South Normanton is, I then realised that I had been the lucky victim of a four stage author’s coincidence. 1) My Hermes – 2) South Normanton is in Derbyshire – 3) a certain author friend lives in Derbyshire – and 4) the hero of her books, the Greek Detective Series, is called Hermes. I am sure my ‘Luxury microfiber feels like a duvet 100%’ will be in safe hands and that this storage facility in Derbyshire is only stage one of its journey. Watch this space for more duvet nonsense when the tracking starts.

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As you can see from the picture below, the clouds are heading this way. There has been talk of storms in recent days and we are expecting bad weather on Symi and elsewhere in the very near future. We shall see…

Meanwhile, the Alarm Cat has been in a noisy mood since before dawn. I had my earplugs in but could still hear him out in the courtyard. And it’s not because he has nowhere to go, we leave the other kitchen window open for him so if it rains he has his own kitchens and bathroom to play in, and his dirt tray will be inside there when the weather turns, there’s water and places to sleep. He was just in a cantankerous mood I think. He’s been whingeing at me all day, sitting there staring up and me and telling me he is bored. It’s bloomin’ noisy.

But it did get me up and out before seven for a walk up the hills. The alarm clock was going off at the same time as the cat, but in the other room and I’d turned the volume down so couldn’t hear it – bit pointless setting it really. The walk was good, I managed the museum steps and up without stopping which isn’t bad as it’s the first time out in over three weeks. I then took it easy but at a decent pace up the road a way. The sun was up, behind the hills, and finally appeared around seven-thirty by which time I was heading back down, my new trainers rubbing on one heel where the ‘trainer sock’ had slipped down. Not sure about these ‘trainer socks’, I mean, I know how to wear socks, I don’t need training, they are really small and sometimes don’t fit over the heel, as in the case this morning.

Anyway, back to the blog. A good response from a few people about the idea of posting your own blog posts next month and into early December. A few people have said they will do it and I hope they all follow up on that as I think it will be good to see. I was asked when the deadline for submissions was and I’m saying November 22^nd as that’s the Sunday before I go away and I can spend the day getting the posts ready. If I don’t get any then I will have to put up posts about my own books again and do some advertising; so you have been warned.

And on that note, remember that Neil’s 2016 Symi calendar is on sale ONLY from Lulu.com at this link: http://www.lulu.com/shop/neil-gosling/symi-dream-calendar-2016/calendar/product-22165801.html and Christmas is fast approaching and the calendars can take a week or more to arrive. So, best get your skates on and plan ahead. And if you like Neil’s photography (and let’s face it, who doesn’t?) you might like to follow his Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/NeilGoslingPhotography I’ll let you go and have a look, a like and a comment on that and get back to this noisy cat – who is still there staring at me like something from a Poe poem.

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I’m going to try an experiment and see if it works. You can join in. In fact, for it to work you will need to join in and all you have to do is send me an email. Thing is, I’m going to be away for a short holiday in about five weeks’ time and that means there will be nothing to put up on the blog. I’m leaving my laptop behind on purpose and will be having a blogging break. But what I thought might be fun is this…

Anyone who wants to can write a blog post, about Symi, what you like, what you want to say, or about Greece or anything that’s relevant to my blog here – so about Neil’s photos, about one of my books, or more of them, or about your own writing or your trip to Symi, Greece or your creative writing course, your cat, our cat, holiday ideas, your own websites (links will be acceptable too) about your company, your ramblings, walks, holiday ideas, or well, almost anything really. (I will vet them.) You can email it to me and I will get posts ready before I go away so that you, dear reader, still have something to read while I’m not here – the post will automatically post themselves like magic.

You can write any length though I’d suggest around 500 words is a decent limit. You can send me images too (if you do, watermark them or put your name on if you want to copyright them). And the sooner you do it the sooner I can start loading them on. I got this idea from a piece of mail asking if I do guests posts. We have done in the past and I’ve even allowed a couple of dodgy ones where there’s clearly some advertising going on, but I thought it would be good for Symi Dream readers to have a chance to become Symi Dream bloggers, if only for one post; though you can submit more if you want and I’ll put them up too.

So, in the manner of those aggressive Facebook posts: ‘Share your Symi thoughts with us and write a blog post. I know that 99% or you won’t do this.’ So why bother writing it up there, matey? Stupid aggressive FB posts, they really get me wound up. Things like: ‘I know my friends will share this…’ Well, I won’t because I hate the way these things literarily bully people into sharing posts about ‘It’s Weak Bladder Week’ or ‘Show your support for Jockstrap Awareness Day’ or ‘It’s Herpes Month I know my friends will share this but will you?’ No, stop herping on about it and simply ask the question: Please will you consider writing a short blog post for other readers of Symi Dream? If you can, just email it and any pics to mail@symidream.com either as an email or as a Word attachment and I will post it up between November 25^th and December 14^th. That’s if I get any in, it may not work of course, and a lot of people will think, ‘what a great idea I’ll do that tomorrow,’ and then will forget, so I will try and remember to remind you.

Think it’s a good idea? Just let me know and send in a post, posts, picture or pictures. (And pictures of posts will not be considered.)

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