Counting Down The Days...

...until I leave for my holiday.

Here's the plan: this Friday morning, wee small hours: taxi to Airport, fly to Manchester via Istanbul. My old buddy Brian is picking me up and taking me to his fancy dockside apartment in Liverpool. It'll be about 2pm when we get there so no doubt we will retire to the Baltic Fleet to drink lots of beer. This is not just any old beer - they grow it themselves on the premises.

Two days later, fly to Valencia and try and find BetterArf and Offspring who will have arrived there the day before after a nine-hour bus journey from Granada.

Day after that, begin intensive two-week Spanish language course. Then a few free days in Valencia, followed by six days in England visiting the Northern Rellies, and then back to sunny Dubai.

I've been working all hours for the last few weeks trying to get everything finished before I go. Achieved a major milestone on one project this morning - practical completion. This roughly translates as 'I think it's finished, and if you can't break it then it is finished and here's the bill.'

So I gave myself a few hours off. I went to Madinat Jumeirah and bought myself a big fancy Sony digital camera: a real one with a big fat lens that sticks out, not one o' they tiny jobbies that are smaller than a fag packet. And then I had fish and chips at Left Bank and played with the new toy. Actually, I just read the manual (I know blokes should never admit to doing stuff like that, but there ya go).

And now, if I can stop playing with my new toy...back to work. But only for five days!