Paella Party

Our first weekend here is to be one with disrupted shopping courtesy of the “Immaculate Conception”, whatever that is or was.

“Was that good for you, dear?”

“Absolutely immaculate, darling; thank you for asking.”

Monday seems to be conception time but the shop opening times on Saturday and Sunday are somewhat variable. So, with that and our trip to Valencia airport on Saturday morning to drop off Geoff and Pam for their flight to England before heading out to Australia for their balmy Christmas and New Year, Carol and I needed to hit the food shops and get stocks in for three days. Time to practice driving Geoff’s car all by ourselves.

I’m fine on the right hand side of the road ‘cos we do that in France and in America. I’m pretty comfortable on the left hand side of the car, too, though automatics are easier (America again). There is, however, something inherently uncomfortable, one might almost say alien, about changing gear manually with my right hand; it seems like a most unnatural action. However, Ford makes just about the smoothest gear changes in the world and Geoff’s Ford was no exception. Other than one or two attempts to shift gears using the driver’s door handle, everything went very smoothly and we were soon parked in the Mercadona at Benissa raiding their meat and vegetable counters. Normally, we’d have been raiding their fish counter, too, but the timing was inappropriate since, on this occasion, we needed a longer shelf life than fish and seafood can offer.

We returned blissfully unscathed with our booty, including half a rabbit (conejo), a decent sized steak (beef: lomo) and a duck (pato) breast. It was then time to wait anxiously for the evening’s planned paella party. This was to be a bit like a company meeting of us with our house-sitting clients. Geoff and Pam, our latest customers, had invited Chris and Yvonne, our first customers, for paella and a reunion with us. Scamp, Chris and Yvonne’s energetic small dog (perrito), had apparently been invited, too, but he seems to chase away the resident cats whereupon they disappear for about two weeks. So he was, wisely in my opinion, left at home. Apart from which, as we have experienced, he has a habit of making yours truly fall, fully clad, into swimming pools. We’ll have to take a wander through the vines next week to be reunited with Scamp. That way, I can fall into his swimming pool in the privacy of his own home. 🙂

Pam’s paella was very good  and a splendid evening was had by all. Chris, who likes decent vino, even drank some of our disturbingly cheap rosado.