John reports a frustrating month; rain has spoiled play making it impossible to progress any work outside that involves concrete, so the retaining wall looks more like a fence of steel rods.  Spending the better part of the month indoors, John feels he has lurched from one bitty job to another and that said, when I call he is actually outside giving one of his seventy olive trees a good thrashing!

Gill is inside minding a house full of kitchen fitters.  When the long awaited kitchen units arrived it was discovered that the kitchen floor sloped by 3cm!  The fitters are back and currently reworking the base legs and squaring up the aluminium plinth confident that no one will ever notice. 

Still, there has been progress in the upstairs as John and Gill eventually decided on a bathroom tile design that amazingly was in stock.  John has tiled the en-suite bathroom, it just needs grouting and put up the pagoda leading off the bedroom.  In addition, the balcony walls present a cheerful sight with the chrysanthemums in full bloom.

 The mood however is not so bright down at the chicken coop and the sad loss of one hen has largely gone unnoticed, as not one single egg has been laid in months.  John has added a bout of swearing to the daily ritual of feeding and watering his flock though not surprisingly this has so far, failed to induce production.  Fruitfully, it turns out that John has happily managed to fill three sacks of olives from the three trees he singled out for a beating – surely that is termed as productive therapy!