Hannukah with a Husky

Morning neighbour..... and how are we all? We're very well thank you, the only complaint being that we ate
far too much on chrimbo day!

Right, well, we're in the yurt now, and shall be here until mid feb, early march. The yurt is owned by Dea, Danish, Nir, Israeli and their daughter luna who is extremely cute. They,re really open, laid back people and we feel really lucky that they,ve trusted us with their magickal home.

It's a lovely home, with the electrics running on solar, everyone should have solar power and then we'd be a much more conservational planet. Instead of using electricity without thinking about it, we really have to think "do i need the kitchen lighton now or shall i save it for the stereo later?" Wonderful stuff. We also have an Alberca (big round open tank)which is the only water supply for the whole year round. It was running low, only a metre above the ground which is unusual for this time of year (and worrying because summer will no doubt bring another drought) but
then it started to rain...and rain...and rain, so we shot up the lane with a massive pipe and lodged it into the Ascecia, with the other end in the Alberca - within 2 days it was full to the brim! I looked out of the kitchen window on boxing day morning to see Tao - the naked German - on the brink of the Alberca (it was a freezing morning) before i could shout "don't pee in our drinking water" he had dived in.....what a nutter.

Christmas day was lovely. We invited Tao and Raz - Israeli - to spend the day with us, for raz it was his first English meal - so Benj and I cooked loads, including a massive nut roast, 15, 000 roasties, cauliflower cheese, christmas cake (x 2 - burnt 1st-funny story actually: We moved into the yurt and found loads of flap-jack in the freezer, we'd tuned it off to save gas so instead of wasting them, we decided to eat them over the course of three days. On the day in question i was in the middle of making my second cake when, being the pig that i am.....i ate the rest of the
flap-jacks. Well, before too long i found myself very confused, "did i put the baking powder in? have i added the sugar?" Then it got worse once i'd put it in the oven: "How long has it been in the oven? An hour? 10 minutes?" I didn't have a clue.
The mystery was solved when later that day we turned over the welcome note to find more writing....."Help yourselves to the ganja cookies in the freezer - they're pretty strong!" ) quince crumble and date and raison tart, complete with home made crackers! we played some games and drank mulled wine. Then on boxing day we found the mule path down the mountain, it was quite breath taking. We met some old boys on donkeys along the way to whom I mopped my brow and said "Phew, estoy muy casado" -
meaning I'm very tired, but i actually said "Phew, i'm very married", getting casado and cansado very mixed up.

While we were still living in Alfie - we picked 22 sacks of olives, taking them to the mulino and getting 175 litres of oil, half of which is ours. To earn some extra cash we took our hand-made chocolates all over Andalucia.....we did the local market, the craft market, and i went to Granada and found a really big market which seemed perfect! So, i set up and chatted to a lady next to me checking it was ok to sell there. She informed me that i was very welcome to SHOW my chocolates, but not to SELL them, as this was an ANTI CONSUMERIST market,focusing heavily on the extortionate prices people charge for chocolates. I smiled and slunked off as quickly as i could, hiding my extortioate chocolates as i went. I ended up selling on the cobbled road up to the Alhambra - after 3 hours i was sad not to have
sold a thing...Benny came back from his busking with 2 broken strings to kindly inform me that i had a moustache of dirt - perhaps that was putting the prospective buyers off? After a quick wipe my luck changed and i sold several brooches!

I've really enjoyed doing markets, but have found that it's more of a social gathering than a money-making scheme. I tend to set up next to food vendors - what a surprise! - and end up swapping chocolates for bags of veg and sea-weed!

We had a Hannukah meal here at the yurt a few weeks ago, and invited Ziza, Yair, Shanti, Tao, Raz and Norah - a girl whose house sitting down the mountain - it was really lovely. We've spent lots of time with Nora since, as well as Ian (my cousin) who arrived on New Years Eve. We ummed and arred "shall we go to a party on the river bed? Shall we play bongoes in tipi valley?" Then it hit us: "Let's stay on the mountain and not go anywhere!" Genius. So Norah made pumpkin soup, I made apple pie and Ian and benj made bread (in the shape of boobs, how mature)and we had a feast. We visitied some Danish friends at 11 and looked at Orion's belt through a 500 x magnified telescope...it was magickal.

And now benj and i have a dog.....Lyla. we met a guy halfway down the mountain - John - who was the drummer in Judas Priest. He had Husky puppies that really needed a good home, i was firm and said "certainly not." But Benj was so desparate to take her that after a few weeks we decided to have her. She's 3 months old and very beautiful. We're getting her chipped and doggy passported tomorrow. She has three long walks a day and is in the process of being trained. She nearly knows sit, she certainly knows Sssh, and she's slowly learning that she gets three "on your bed"'s in the morning and then she's outside - much to her dismay. Thankfully her waking up time has lengthened to 7am (it was 5).

So life is still good, I'm very happy. On a clear day you can see the Riff Mountains in Morocco from 2 terraces above the yurt, it's truly awesome. Ian and Ben are re-fitting Alfie so that we take 4 bottles of oil in him - at the moment he's too crowded.

So take care, love to you all, and please everyone conserve as much as you can. I know i may sound like a Yoghurt weaving lentil eater, but just for one day: Don't flush the chain everytime you go - or wee outside, save the washing up water for the next lot, don't have a shower, use one light at a time etc. If we all do it, and if we all tell everyone we know it will make a tiny, tiny, tiny difference.

Over and out, Jude x x x x x

Ben's cameras stopped working so no recent pix i'm afraid, Chrimbo day with tao, us on a beach (i'm not nudy) and benj overlooking a beautiful sunset...