Stalked by a cat

As I was sitting in Chambao Beach restaurant having a solitary dinner, I became aware that I had given two weeks’ notice before I left Canada and tomorrow would be my last day. (If you are being pedantic, you could say I gave five years’ notice and tomorrow would be my last day, but quite frankly the two weeks works better as a prop and it’s my blog, not yours. I suddenly became a little maudlin and began to wonder if I would ever work again. It’s not as if we are blessed with tons of disposable income. True, there are the estates in Scotland and the islands in the Caribbean; the annuity from being seventy-third in line to the throne; the rents from the 16 houses in Mayfair; and, of course, the fact that I own New Brunswick, but it is not what you would call serious money. I mean, how the hell am I supposed to raise a kid on that?

Mrs. Ottawacker suggested letting some of the retainers go, but their families have been with us since Agincourt, so how would that look? I mean, honestly, noblesse oblige. No, quite obviously, some corners are going to have to be cut. I’m currently paying something like $6.49 Cdn/month to blipfoto, for example. How long until I am forced to stop paying that? And then there is the monthly gift to the cat sanctuary. It just eats into the millions, and before you know it I won’t be getting dinner invitations to JK Rowlings’ pad anymore. Seriously though, I do have a tendency to only think things through carefully after I have taken decisive action. No wonder Mrs. Ottawacker has a crick in her neck from all the shaking of her head.

Better night’s sleep, if four hours is your gauge; was sore and stiff this morning (which is great if you have spent the night with Michelle Pfeiffer, but less so if you have been alone in a single bed that is hard.) I did, however, manage to write the prologue to the novel. I might post it on here to see what people think. However, I warn you, I have thinner skin that a Chinese lantern. I know I come across as a gung-ho nihilist, but I am truly a sensitive sort. And, as any student of human nature will tell you, there is nothing worse than a wounded egomaniac.

Wandered put for several walks during the course of the day, primarily in search of a café/restaurant with internet that wasn’t full of English people. I finally settled on El Patio de Yare and began to massacre the Spanish language in an attempt to ask if they had Wifi. They didn’t, but frankly I was hungry and thirsty and so I settled down at the table and looked at the menu. It was all in Spanish, and I didn’t have my dictionary with me… this could have got ugly. In the end, I told her I had an allergy to nuts, and what did she recommend. Thank God I did, it was unbelievable. Started with prawns pil-pil, and then she brought a plate of chicken, cooked in a style I had never had before. I wouldn’t know where to start describing it. So I had to have a couple of glasses of white wine too… I left about two hours later, thanking Yare profusely and extremely happy with having had the intelligence to not judge a café by its wifi connection.

Two restaurants in a day though… the budget’s not going to work at this rate. At this rate, I might have to stalk my stalker...