Val D. Rah rah.

I'm glad I'm not doing a season here. Live and let live and all that, but no way I could live here even for a season. Couldn't handle the people. End of.

Bruises, bloody noses and other bad things

There are some bad things about doing a season and working as a chalet host (or in my case at the moment, as part of the team of helper elves that get everything organised before all the others arrive). Bruises for one, I have bruises on my knees from bed making, believe it or not. I also get bloody noses a lot. I never quite acclimatise to the dry, hot chalet environment so every morning I have a super blocked, dry nose and when I blow it it usually turns into a bloody mess. The other bad thing at the moment is tiredness and frayed tempers. All it takes is the wrong inflection in someone's voice, a certain tone or little dig and then, with me particularly, light the touch paper and stand well back. I am a fiery wee thing, a red headed Viking, that easily bursts into a rage. That just happened. I'm still angry and consequently keeping to myself, not going to the pub tonight. Angry drinking would not be good. Plus tomorrow is a busy day as 25 or so of the new staff arrive tomorrow evening.

So I shall moisturise my dry, already chapped hands from all the bathrooms I've cleaned. Lay back and stretch out my back, sore from two solid hours of hoovering. Relax and unwind, with a beer and my own moody, miserable company. Yay, oh to be a seasonaire.

Don't worry, normal service will resume shortly and I'll stop being such a mardi bitch.

TRASHED

three letters

FBI, CIA, NSA; all of those three acronyms figure in the books that I'm reading at the moment. They're a series of books by David Baldacci, The Camel Club. I'm really enjoying them, on the second one now.

Other three letter acronyms that are a part of my life at the moment are BVD, MOR and VDI. Part of our helper elves job here in VDI is to make sure things are going to the right places for the right times, food for cooking training, paperwork for certain modules, boxes for other resorts etc. So knowing what your three letters stand for is pretty useful.

There's one acronym that's not been a part of my life for some time, TLI. It was a Twitter interaction today that brought TLI into my thoughts. Made me a wee bit sad and angry if I'm honest. Bit of a mess of feelings actually that I don't quite know how to verbalise.... It's puzzling me and keeping me awake and all I should be thinking now is ZZZ. So going to give that a shot and see if the ZZZs push out all the other three letter acronyms dancing round my head.

The marmot is in the mountains

Day one of Team Clean is done. Hello to all from Val d'Isere. One day down, one lorry unloaded, one chalet cleaned and about 100 recipe folders put together. We took a drive down to Bourg St. Maurice to do some food shopping and the vistas were tremendous. Snowcapped mountains, the glacier, the dam full to the brim of ice cold water throwing up reflections and shimmering in the sunlight. Absolutely gorgeous. Next time I'll remember to take a pic of it!

Have a look at these:
To you they may look like a box of toothpicks, what's so bad about that you may ask? Well let me tell you, this box of toothpicks, despite the name on the front, bring neither Joy nor a sense of Festival Festivity to a chalet host. For these are not toothpicks with which you might spear a fat olive, use for canapes or even pick your teeth. No, they are toothpicks for picking off limescale in the bathroom and kitchen. Yes, you read that correctly. These little sticks of wood are used for chipping away hard calcium carbonate deposits. I would prefer to it another way but toothpicks are considerably less expensive than lemons.

We're in a huge building that houses about 70 staff and we're rattling around on one floor of it. We've relaxed in the common room watching a film this evening. Though we've all been slightly perturbed at having to utilise the sofas in the communal area. We've all heard stories you see, and we're concerned for the upholstery and its state of cleanliness. Just don't put your face on a pillow or the armrest and you'll be fine...

The rock and roll lifestyle of this seasonaire involves being in bed with a cup of tea nice and early on a Saturday night, for tomorrow we have a LOT of cleaning to do. Don't worry though, the blog will be interesting as the season progresses, I won't always be going to bed early with a cup of tea....

Angels, bridges (inc. Oresund), wind turbines, Danish pastry and the C word

I’m on my way to Copenhagen from Nibe, where I’ve been staying with my Dad and his gf Glaucia. I left their apartment at 7am this morning and I won’t get to where I’m going until about 9-10pm. It’s going to be a long day! Currently I’m on a train journey that’s going to take 5 hours and 20 minutes. Plenty of time to sit and think, and to see the beautiful Danish countryside as we chug through it. I’ve not seen as many cows as I’d like to have seen so far, that saddens me. I have however seen lots of wind turbines and that makes me happy.

I was born in Denmark and my parents left when I was 1 and half or 2. I’d been here for Christmas when I was 6 and then for a christening when I was 18. That’s it. That doesn’t add up to a whole lot of time. Since my Mum passed I don’t really speak Danish to anyone, the lingo is very rusty indeed. So rusty was it that when I met Christian this summer, I insisted that we should speak English! Now however, I would be so bold as to actually have a conversation in my mother tongue. It’s cool really how from the depths of my little peanut brain came this language that I thought had long left. I’ve chatted away quite happily to folk during my Danish dash, some times less eloquently than I perhaps would like but it’s made me happy! So I’ve decided that I should come back really soon and travel around a bit. I’d like to explore the country I’ve seen whizzing by outside my train window today.

The reason for my being here of course is that my Dad is here receiving treatment for his bowel cancer. The C word. That horrible C word that will affect 1 in 3 of us. If I should become that 1 in 3 then I hope that I will be able to fight it like my Dad has. So far he’s had 4 chemo sessions and it looks like that might be the worst of it over and done with. For a cancer patient he looks amazing, the hair loss was hardly an issue as he basically only had a handful of hairs on his head anyway! He’s looked after himself so well over the last few years and I think that has given him a real boost in dealing with this sickness. He’s not lost weight or his appetite which is great. His nurses all loved him and the last time he had chemo they all came in to say goodbye and to thank him for being such a great patient and that he’d been a breath of fresh air for them. That’s my pops, always making friends along the way. One of his nurses came in one day and asked him to please tell her his life story. She took time out from her busy day to sit and chat and listen, I love that. He’s done amazingly well and I know he’s not out of the woods yet, still a way to go and who knows what will happen in the future, but for the moment I feel so insanely happy that he is doing well and it certainly looks like he is on the way to recovery.

Those of you that know me will know that I think organised religion is a bunch of baloney. I am a ‘spiritual’ person though, for want of a better word. Glaucia received an email from a friend, one of those chain type emails that you’re supposed to forward on and you’ll be blessed somehow, you know the ones. Well I must admit the ones people send me usually end up in the trash cos I kinda think that if some God is going to bless me, it probably won’t be via email! This email said some Angels would visit us, can’t remember all their names but I know Gabriel was among them and Metatron (which is the cool cos it’s like a Transformers name!!). Anyway, this morning as I got in the taxi and drove away from Dad’s, a song came on the radio; it was ‘I Have a Dream' by ABBA, the chorus starts: I Believe in Angels. No, I'm not converted or anything of the sort, I just thought it was kinda funny/odd/relevant and I must admit it did make me slightly emotional. Sometimes things like that happen, don’t they?

Right then, I'm going to sit back and relax now. Next stop, Kastrup airport then Geneva airport and then the Alps. Mountains here I come!

Things I saw in DK:

A fox. Or rather what a fox used to wear. In the window of a charity shop. Did you know Denmark's number one export to China is fur? Bet you didn't. Not something that I personally would be proud of.

A place to leave your dog outside the supermarket. Love it. 

Kanelsnegle. Authentic Danish pastry. Perfect with a cup of tea after a bracing walk in the harbour wearing  your Sarah Lund sweater.

Inter-season travellings part deux

On to the Southern part of my inter-season travels and my first stop was ex-ville. Plan was to clear my crap out of the attic, but guess what? I’ve got a lot of crap and I know that if I actually got rid of it, that deep down TD would be really sad, cos then he wouldn’t have that to hold over me and tease me about! Anyway TD, been giving it some thought and who knows, maybe one day I’ll actually get round to writing the book that you keep pestering me about.....

The castle was next, glorious in its autumn foliage and the stable was cosy and welcoming as usual. ‘Trine’s room’ had been upgraded with a delightful double bed, C & D need to be careful, make it any more welcoming and they might have trouble getting rid of me next time! At the castle with my dear C & D I always relax and feel like part of the family; pyjama days watching Downton Abbey; leisurely pottering around C’s awesome kitchen baking a cake for them as they’re out at work; stressing with C as we sat on the edge of our seats watching Homeland; great food, great friends, great times!  My only complaint to the management would be that my pal Whinnie wasn’t there this time. She’d been on Skye all summer, good for her, but I missed her on my visit. I look forward to seeing her when I return in May, yay!!

From the country retreat I went to the town pied-a-terre with D & D. It’s marvellous having so many lovely friends with spare rooms! Again I did some baking, trying out my new winter recipe of hummingbird cake, I like to make treats for those who take me in. We had a cheese fondue night, nom nom, a taste of what’s to come (though actually I only had one fondue all last season!! Maybe this season I can convince folk to go for a fondue/raclette at L'Etale with me. Any takers? 247Snowman?!). Caught up with lots of peeps whilst in the Wells, super nice to see everyone and how things are developing; babies growing up – so fast, babies arriving soon, wedding plans in full swing, ceramics flourishing, jobs going well etc. etc. etc. It’s lovely to catch up with folks and hear about all that’s going on and to re-fresh friendships. It warms me inside to know that good friends are always still there, so long as you put a bit of effort in, you can keep hold of those that are special to you.

I also spent some time with my sisters and their families. Doesn’t time fly? I mean when there aren’t little people in your life I don’t think you necessarily appreciate just how quickly time passes. When I see my nephews and my niece it really hits home that time is flying past. My oldest nephew is about to turn 19. 19!!! At the risk of sounding like one of those ‘old’ people, I remember when he was just tiny and I was living with him and my sister at the time, he was such a little cutie pie. He still is of course, but he’s 19 now. My niece is amazing and I don’t doubt for a second that should she attempt it, she would achieve world domination. I am in awe of her. I had a great time with ALL of them, and look forward to seeing them again when I’m back. I am aware that I need to make a bigger effort with all the kids, because before you know it they turn 19 and aren’t kids anymore!!  

And so we conclude the Southern UK part of my trip. Kindly Miss L drove me to the airport; I can’t thank her enough as the journey on the train would’ve been a ball ache with my luggage. She drove me to the bus last winter, the bus that carried me to the Alps, when I was starting my journey and then here we are again almost a year on and I’m still on the journey. How things have changed in the last year, how much this journey has done for me... That’s a deep thought to ponder. Anyway, next stop my motherland, Denmark.

Inter-season travellings, from Mallorca to the UK and beyond... Part 1: Leaving the Island and The North

Furby and I left Mallorca on Wednesday 26^th of September, took a ferry over to Barcelona and stayed the night there. We went for a walk the next morning down gorgeous, tree lined avenues and saw the Sagrada Familia church. It was beautiful and I wished we’d had more time to stay and explore the rest of Gaudi's work around Barcelona. But sadly our road trip was calling. Barcelona to Val d’Isere in 9 hours. I like to think that we made it to hour 6 before the cabin fever set in and our grip on reality became slightly tenuous. A road trip with J-lee furby was always bound to be fun but I seriously didn’t anticipate laughing as hard as I did. At one point there was 20 minutes of laughter complete with tears streaming down faces...brilliant! I think it was because I unwittingly burped mid sentence, and it was quite a burp, doesn't sound that funny and I guess you had to be there, but anyway we laughed, and laughed, and eventually had to pull over for a nature wee and then laughed some more. By the time we got to Val the temp had dropped considerably and let me tell you, 3 degrees Celsius is most definitely not flip-flop weather.

A lovely drive (funny too, thanks Hot Tub Technician for the laughs and the stalled Caravelle at customs), round lake Annecy took us to Geneva the next morning and from there we went our separate ways, Edinburgh was my next destination. Couldn't wait to be there and see my friends. NS came up from London too. JM is now expecting and what a change that made to our weekend. What would usually have been a boozy affair; turned into a very relaxed, leisurely, eating extravaganza. Let me give you a couple of tips, if you ever should find yourself in the gorgeous city of Edinburgh; please go to Mimi’s Bakehouse and Cafe Andaluz. The second one is somewhere that we tend to frequent often, but Mimi's was a new one for NS and me. Oh my goodness, this place is amazing! Just go, and if they have it, get a slice of lemon and poppy seed cake, it is divine! We shopped, we ate, we relaxed and we laughed, a lot, as usual. Brilliant start to my inter-season travels.

 

From Edinburgh to Kilmarnock via Glasgow was next on the agenda. Now people may well think it’s a bit crazy to go and stay with someone that you don’t actually know. In all honesty I too would’ve said that’s a bit mental, but I’m super glad I did. I have a Twitter friend, AC, we’ve chatted on Twitter for ages, then it turned out we had a mutual friend RH, how bizarre! So when AC was in Morzine earlier this year I went to meet him and his pals, sadly we only managed a beer together but it was great to finally see a Twitter friend in the real world. So when offered a wee sojourn to the glitzy town of Kilmarnock, how could I refuse?! I imagined that I was one of those glamorous house guests from the 20s/30s and thought nothing of taking up someone’s offer to weekend at their country retreat. I always used to watch Poirot and think how fabulous these people would just take off for a weekend at someone’s house they barely knew and it seemed to always be cocktail hour. Well, it’s always cocktail hour somewhere in the world and that rule applies in Kilmarnock too, happily! The vino tinto flowed along with good conversation! I was made to feel so utterly welcome; it was like catching up with old friends. We had a fabulous dinner at The Jefferson one night, highly recommend this place, divine food and great service. I was shown some cool places around Kilmarnock – yes there are some; don’t raise your eyebrow at the screen in that sarcastic way!! Anyhow, the point is AC and his ‘family’ were so great to me, thank you my dears!

Next I was off to the Midlands, reunited with my furby J-lee for a night of fun and a day of shopping. A mountain of food at Wing Wah, J-lee trying 5 new things (well done!!), pulling over to take a picture of a road sign (Butt Lane, come on, that is funny!) and Primark in Derby. Great fun and can’t wait to see her again in just a week’s time!!!! YAY! In the meantime I get her lovely messages on What’s App that make no sense, honestly it’s good that I know her and generally understand what she’s getting at.

Whilst in Middle Earth one must of course call in to spend a few days with two of the best people on all of the Earth, so it is that I ended up with the Clan Mcleod for a gastronomically amazing time. Every time I come to visit it’s an assault of the culinary kind, I try new things, eat delicious foods and drink amazing wines and whiskies. There is something very satisfying to me to be able to sit and discuss food for hours on end, to share food experiences and the Mcleod Clan always have amazing experiences to share, which I love! Highlights: baked camembert, Bunnahabhain whisky, Derbyshire oatcakes, homemade hollandaise, Omar Allibhoy’s pig cheeks, golfing, Mr. Mcleod being the oracle and knowing everything about everything, two donkeys, some llamas, goats that smell like goats cheese (funny that one?!) and creaky chickens. I’m always sad to leave the Clan Mcleod but I always come back, like a boomerang, whether they like it or not! Who knows, maybe next time I will take that job as a pizza chef at The Bull’s Head in Repton and live in your spare room?! ;) xxx

OK, that was that section. Tune in later for more from my travels around the UK and further afield.