Quoted from Joanna

Can you clear something up for me, are these wild tortoises that you keep talking about and not pets of yours?  

Wild as you like Joanna.  I have no pets....it gets so bad that some of the locals collect them in a bag and deposit them far away from their gardens.  Cars have been stopped if one is spotted on the road and they've been given a helping had to get across quicker but I didn't realise they could move as quickly as they do, especially when hounded by a couple of males with dishonourable intentions..  

Sunday 31st July

Sticky, sticky weather again but very little breeze today.  Woke up at 6.00, down for coffee and then went out to  survey the garden.  Everywhere is so barren and if you water the soil it goes straight through so I have decided to see if the plants are better without it.  Maybe the roots will go searching further down and not come to the surface.

Did a little investigation into potatoes this morning.  When I dug mine up some of them are soft and as I thought, apparently they have some sort of fungus and I have been lobbing them over the fence and onto the hillside.  It's not all of them but won't do you much good apparently so I'll have to go through them again now that they are all harvested before I put them into my Tesco's hessian shopping bag.  The lining disintegrated so at least I have a use for it...

Well my lovely pyrotechnic neighbour that I took to the doctors yesterday came round at about lunchtime.  I wouldn't take any money for the trip into Djebel but clutched in her hand were two Turkish head scarves that she insisted in wrapping me in.  They are beautiful and pictured below.  She has one more trip to the doctors next week I think but I need my translator to find out which day it is and I've made the offer already but no scarves this time...

Sunday continued

Knocked up another table cum bench this afternoon and not really sure where to put it and no suggestions please.   It's currently sitting on the lounge terrace with a couple of pot plants on it covering up the fact that the wood needs the old cement taking off it and it's not very level.  As I was knocking in the nails I realised that it was not what I was supposed to be doing...it's not really resting my ribs but I am tired of being just a little incapacitated.  My mate KD of S came out with the fact that his hurt for about two months when he fell off something and injured his.  Always the harbinger of good news.

Forgot to mention that I had three not so little lambs that had lost their way, in the garden today.  Now this is only a small hole but watching them they just follow their noses and end up in 'places'.  So this morning I was searching around for something to block up the hole and I came across the old outside sink support, knocked another couple of planks on for good luck and it blocks it up beautifully.  Over they came to the gap at break neck speed and ....oh well, it was a good idea at the time.  No entry boys.

Nine fifteen here, too hot to eat so I'm just going to raid the fridge for something to nibble at and then early night...six in the morning comes round pretty quickly....LN....and it's white rabbits for the morning....new month...blank canvas...

Thanks for clearing that up. I guess I never thought about where tortoises live in the wild before.