Sweat,sweat,sweat and more sweat......and even more sweat.....sweat after sweat......day after day......
......and whenever it gets this hot, we always go one better and go to the hottest place we know, the nearby town of Bacaxa.....
........it seems that whenever we can't take the heat any more we automatically have an urgent errand to run in A Town Called Sauna.
Xmas shopping por exemple. What fun with your clothes a'drippin.
Even sweatier than Bath on a humid day.....and at temperatures around 100 degrees, that's, well, sweaty.
So that was today......going to pick tiles for the new pad.
Then we found out we would be better going out to Sampaio Correa to a big tile warehouse run by the same people as my regular hardware store in Bacaxa.
Yes I have an account there.
How flash is that.
Sampaio however is for another day as it's at some distance, back towards the mountains that you drive through on the way in here from Rio.....it's distinguished by two large factory chimneys starkly standing out from the landscape in the middle of some fields.....slightly out of place.
There used to be a brickworks there.....a long, long time ago. Whooooooooo.
But that's tomorrow we go there.

Talking of sweat, which, come on, we were...... brings to mind one of my lesser known and more unlikely ventures-in-my-head, namely Sweaty Betty's Sweat Site.

OK, it doesn't actually exist as yet, but then neither did me in Brasil a few months ago.
You see, through all of my foreign plotting, one particular question has been on my lips throughout, and yet has remained unanswered.
I've tried scientific sites, meteorological sites, BBC educational sites, How Things Work for Idiots sites, even good old Wikithingia....
I've found out what relative humidity means.....
I've found out about the Dew Point.....
I've sussed out pressure and wind chill factors......
YET STILL NOBODY, NOWHERE, NOHOW CAN TELL ME THE ANSWER TO MY QUESTION....

It's a simple and straightforward question.....
I can ask it in any one of several languages including Esperanto and the Language of Love......
I can type it, print it, handwrite it, speak it, shout it, laugh it, yodel it, signal it with flags and even sign it in Braille in Welsh if necessary.....
I have requested an answer by email, on chatrooms, spammed it around the information superhighway, posted it on newsgroups, pasted it on billboards, pissed it into snow and scraped it into peoples scalps with a rusty razor blade.
Nothing. Absolutely nada as they say in these parts.

So you see that's where Sweaty Betty's Sweat Site comes into it's own.
I can't be the only person who wants to know.
OK, when you're off somewhere for whatever reason, there are a number of questions.....is it nice, is it built up, is it expensive, is there nightlife, are there snakes, what's the murder rate in comparison with Baghdad, and of course what's the weather like.....then we get to is it windy, does it rain, do they often have tsunami's, is it hot.....yes you can get an answer for all those, and understand it.....but there's another question....and this one, you cannot get a straight answer for.....
Yes folks, the big question is.......
I am going to ____ for my holidays.
How sweaty is it?
Sweaty Betty's Sweat Site would give you the answer in user friendly how-discoloured-will-my-t-shirt-look kind of on-the-ground no-bullshit should-I-even-bother-venturing-out-the -door-today kind of terms of one syllable.
For example, graded one to seven.....

1/ not sweaty at all..... (anything can happen day)
2/ fairly sweaty....... (take a deodorant)
3/ very sweaty ........ (take a deoderant and use it)
4/ very sweaty a lot...... (take a deodorant and use frequently)
5/ really fucking sweaty...... (take deodorant, use frequently, take spare T-shirt and avoid posh cafe's and restaurants above 3 stars)
6/ really unbearably fucking sweaty..... (take deodorant, towel, use frequently, take spare T-shirt and avoid shops, cafes and restaurants above 2 stars)
7/ really unbearably fucking sweaty like you wouldn't fucking believe..... (stay in, remain naked, avoid all people with whom you don't have sexual relations, shower every 20 minutes and try to avoid hypothermia from overuse of aircon....)

Sweaty Betty's Sweat Site would have the answers for you graded say, between 1 and 7 and explain it all to you in simple accessible terms.

Of course none of the above gradings would have prepared you for Bacaxa this afternoon.......

Anizio attacks the bathroom wall with verve and gusto, two of my favorite bands no doubt....also with a sledge hammer and a cold chisel.....beyond the tiles and bricks he is pleased to find 2 inches of concrete lining the other side....bring on the big sledge!!!! And the brawn of Richard Ashcroft ......

The arch to the soon-to-be en suite bathroom is visible from the ex-kitchen, now bedroom..............Anizio labours behind the wall....he didn't half get a shock when the flashgun fired through the hole at him....

The stairs will go, replaced by a spiral staircase to the left of the mezzanine...

.....there will be a 10 foot kitchen counter against the wall, then a workspace, then a second 10 foot counter freestanding with a brekkie bar on this front side....

Starting from wall to left, first strip of wood represents counter width, the gap is the workspace, then 2nd to 4th strip represent width of freestanding counter and brekkie bar. Length of counters is from the near end of the wood strips back to the strip of wood running across in background.

Don't forget you can click on the pix and make them bigger.....

.....or just move much closer to the screen.....

....the effect is the same if a little less elegant.....

....of course you can also combine the two, particularly effective if you are smashed.....

.......we used to watch color tv static late at night when tripping when we was kids with our faces jammed up to the screen.....aaaah the sixties.......

Scale-ish plan of the house and grounds.....

....access road on left,

....front(?) porch on lower right,

....barby (Auschwitz) to right above centre line, floor of which will be base of Guest House Number 1.

Left side of building is,
...bottom to top,
social bathroom,
en suite bathroom,
bedroom ( ex kitchen) ,
and store room/spare room.
Mezzanine is above.
New kitchen will be to right of bedroom, open plan in the main living space.
Stairs, marked in top left corner, will be replaced by spiral staircase on other side of mezzanine, in front of now blocked door into what has become the en-suite bathroom.
Got all that???
I shall test you all.......


Same thing, but on graph paper.....medium squares are 1 metre.....whole plot is 30x30, so 900 square metres.
Living room is 170 square metres.
Bedroom is 20 square centimetres approx.
In fact the bathrooms are so small that they don't actually exist in any dimension we can sense as human beings, at least at this time in space....( or is that space in time??)
(I felt sure I could get the word " continuum" in there somewhere.....)


This is a lizard, similar to the one I ordered the execution of. This one obviously escaped a similar fate by little more than a tail's breadth.


This is a charming poster I spotted, well was in fact glued to(?) for some time, in an underwear shop in Bacaxa....(ok, I was there with Hannah who was buying undies.....)
Anyway, the buyline says.....
"You can't imagine what Rio is capable of...."
......more or less.....
......and it's true.....
......who would have imagined that the nice lady in the underwear would take the trouble to feed the hungry young man on the um,swan....thing....
.....and what is that delicacy she's feeding him for his lunch anyway.....?

It is with heavy heart that I am propelled at the speed of despair towards a date with British Airways 2 weeks today......it's a shit time to have to leave just as the rebuild on the house is in full swing, and carnaval looms like a massive cartload of ripening figs on the horizon.......
......I like the figs analogy.....I think I perverted it from a Jilly Goulden wine reference.....saw her once with a large dog, also a tv "star ", at Castle Combe Car Boot. Oddly, it turns out I know her brother, Alastair....... that's Jilly's, not the dog's.
.....so no doubt I shall be in the Bell the night of Sunday the eleventh of Feb, or if in a jetlag state, definately for the Monday night after.
Whichever, it's bad news for Gary, usurper of my stool. HaHaHaHa.

So the last 2 weeks have seen much progress at the former Tennis Club.
The dividing wall is now complete, so I can no longer see shit-head the House-Seller-From-Hell.
Most of the demolition inside is done, and there is an arch knocked through to what will be my en suite bathroom, and the original doorway from the living area is now blocked off.
I'm pleased to say we remembered to open the new entrance before we blocked the old.
That's British efficiency in action.
Or it would have been had I thought of it, and then told the Brasilian workers.
I'm rigging both bathrooms as wet rooms, with non-slip-ish tiles.
I wouldn't want anyone slipping and breaking my leg.
Chose the tiles for the place last week.....white with faded black squiggles on the floor throughout the living room and bedroom, and also on the bathroom walls, with black/grey textured on the bathroom floors.
The electric supply was connected from the mains last week, and the 30 foot well I had dug has produced lots of slightly brown, slightly smelly water. Fine for pool and washing, though not for drinking.
However it turns out that mains drinkable water is imminent on the street, as the supply was installed last year....just waiting for the mayor's helicopter maintenance costs to be covered, and then if there's any cash left, the local tax payers can be connected.
Without mains water, I have to install cisterns and pump it in from trucks.
Or perhaps the Mayor will airlift it in for me with his chopper if I bribe, sorry, ask him nicely.

Had our first fatality at the house recently, whilst demolishing the most heavily constructed kitchen unit in living history, and elsewhere. Tiles, bricks and steel reinforced concrete, and even the stainless steel top was filled with steel bars and concrete. The death occurred when ripping out the wooden cupboard, made of hardwoods of course.....what did you expect ? Balsa? Spruce?
The shelf detached itself and plummeted down inches and inches, gathering momentum as it fell, and unbeknownst to us, upon landing pinned a tiny lizard to the floor, crushing it's spine.
By the time we spotted it, amidst the settling dust, it was in it's last moments.
I was quite upset.
The locals nare batted an eye.
They did however erect a monument in concrete.
Well, they filled in the hole left by the kitchen unit.

Scribbles of my design for how pool and garden work....house in foreground, space for 3 small guest houses on right/back beyond drawing.....landscaping necessary as water table here is very high and pool must be built half above ground which looks appalling if not disguised.....
.......light soft stone terrace around the pool,..... grass slopes down from pool in front and right and then to de-emphasise the need for raised pool height, the wooden deck on the left will be even higher......like Clapton said, if you fuck it up, keep repeating it so it sounds like you meant it.....

....space for 2 or 3 cars at back left hidden by trees, ( gate is at far back left corner obviously ) bamboo screens along back edge of pool, and pool zizag shape allows steps in centre to look part of the picture......the side of the house nearest the pool will have a varanda running along the length of it.....

........so from open plan kitchen and living/dining area out through big door and windows to varanda seating and dining out to decks and pool and bla.....quick route from gate to service end of house to left, scenic route round behind pool to right and to main porch of house..... also wooden decking hides large tanks for water supply.....
........no mains water here mate, and no sewers neither.....you keep all the poo in the house 'til it's full and then you sell the house.....
.....so house pool garden are integrated visually as well functionally......and the scribbles are mine too......


All I have to do do is turn this into that.....doddle......or doodle
House is on right, pool will be on left-ish.....far end is where wall is being built and in leftish front of that will be guest houses.....for friends but also for commercial purposes......and it's all mine.....


Even the wheelbarrow is mine. And the half of this barby table and benches that we've demolished.....guess what.....they're mine too. The other half belongs to ass-hole next door.....the dividing wall we wrangled over cuts right through the middle of the piccy-niccy table and I don't want any bits of ass-hole sticking out of my wall thankyou....after all, it's mine.....


A steel and concrete post going in for the dividing wall.....about 10 feet deep.....steel goes all the way to the bottom and water comes nearly all the way to the top......which means high water table which means hydrostatic pressure which means your pool can pop out of the ground or at least rupture itself particularly when empty which is why the pool has to be built partly above the ground.... talking of which the ground on the left of the picture is mine......



....that's Lao with the barrow (mine) and Anizio with the inxada.....back hoe? matock?? My ingerlish has gone away.....guess who's inxada it is?
On the right is the monster barbie, which we call "Auschwitz", soon to be demolished.


I like to call this photograph "Bricks". They're mine too. Well half of them.
Actually, technically, half of each one of them.



The newly installed electric post. Connection due any day now. This is mine too.
So is the muck in the corner.


I like to call this photo "A Study in Steel". No-one else seems to like to though.

As a point of interest, although we've already stablished the ownership of the wheelbarrow, I'd like to say here and now that the reinforcing steel is not mine. Only half of it actually belongs to me. But that half of it is definately mine. I ordered it, I paid for it, and it was delivered to my address.....actually I didn't have one officially at that juncture. But I have now. The address is mine. And it's the whole of it.


However much later that night, after neo-Italian dinner and live samba in the street courtesy of the local bloco band who rehearsed their new number while I was having my haircut and I put lyrics into the song, or so I thought. But I ddn't hear my lyrics used last night, which is a pity. Imagine hearing your own lyrics played by a Brasilian samba band and thinking "they're mine".



Well, even later on that night here we all are, the whole krew....Hannah on camera, my right hand bro' Daniel on my right, Per my Norwegian buddy watching my back......all is peace, all is harmony........but it's such a fine line.....such a fine line........

........what you don't realise is that a split second later, as a result of my being momentarily blinded by the flashgun, I involuntarily jab an undercut into Daniel's throat......
.....as a result, Per, a veteran of many a Stavanger street fight, responds to this without a second thought by ramming his fiery cigarette end into my left eye, and in my ensuing flush of agony I sideswipe the cooler and full bottle of Antarctica off the table sending it flying off to my left, unintentionally laying waste to a tablefull of drinks freshly purchased by a now enraged bunch of Brasilian hardcases and their molls fresh in town for the weekend from Rio.

Hannah of course senses immediately that all hell is about to break loose and pre-emptively brings to bear all of her freshly re-trained muscular prowess to bodily uproot and hurl our table of full drinks at this rapidly uncoiling nest of snakes, and then throws herself as well headlong into the melee, and in a flurry of combined Caipoeira and Kickboxing proceeds to lay waste to all about her.

Meantime, the deadly Daniel has unsheathed his awesome Bowie knife, eleven inches of perfectly honed Brazilian steel, and is cutting through the enemy in swathes, anxious to hack a way through to fight alongside the now near swamped but undeterred Orange Belt Hannah.

Meanwhile the giant Norseman, Per, never one to hang around, has limbered into action and is now picking off stragglers from around the perimeter by employing his phenomenal knowledge of a little known Norwegian martial art.
By this time the whole place has erupted.
The entire bar is in total uproar.....
And then as if to add insult to injury, a small Indonesian, screaming with the agony of a fatal chest wound, is sent hurtling skyward, only to pierce the canvas roof with his razor sharp machete, and the unforgiving heavens proceed to empty themselves through the ensuing gap onto the melange below.
We are now completely deluged by a ferocious electric tropical rainstorm. Flashes of deadly lightening illuminate the debacle below.
Water, water is everywhere.
Great gouts of it.
Blood and storm driven rain are driven together to form a bloodied torrent, a lurid crimson tidal wave of death and destruction.
Thundercracks deafen the remaining drenched and bloodied combatants, drowning out the cries of the wounded.
Chaos is heaped upon chaos.
Blood, booze, broken glass and body parts thrash and mingle as far as the eye can see.
I meantime have defined the quest of quests, and determine that someone must be the one to risk it all.
Someone must be the one to dodge blows, barrels, bludgeons and bullets to fulfill their destiny, to fight their way through to the grail.
Whatever the danger....
....whatever the hardship....
....someone must reach and save the holy of holies....
....forgotten amidst the mayhem....
....cast asunder.....
....knocked askance in the first onslaught.....
And so it is I.
I shall be the one.
I shall be the one to lean over and pick up the camera off the floor.
After all, it is mine.

MY CIRCLE OF FRIENDS BROADENS AS DOES MY GRIN (EXPONENTIALLY).....


HANNAH OFFICIALLY OPENS THE NEWLY COMPLETED MAIN ENTRANCE TO THE RESPLENDENT TENIS CLUBE DE NASHER.....


THE PORCH ......HOW CHARMING ON A SUMMERS EVENING....COCKTAILS, CHAMPAGNE, SHITLOADS OF CHEAP LAGER.......


......AND THEN ONE CAN ADJOURN TO THE LOUNGE......RELAX ON THE SPLENDID DESIGNER SOFAS......AND THEN PERHAPS A GLIDE AROUND THE DANCEFLOOR WITH A LOVED ONE TO THE MELODIES OF SOME OLDSKOOL HARDCORE CLASSICS.....


......AND THEN LATER WHEN THE LAGER REALLY KICKS IN, ONE CAN RETIRE TO THE EN-SUITE BEDROOM WITH WALK-IN WARDROBE.......OK STILL NEEDS A LITTLE TOUCHING UP....


.......AND NOW WE DRIFT BACK IN TIME TO A HALCYON DAY OR TWO IN PARADISE.....


BUZIOS WITH BRIGITTE..... ( see further down for Buzios post which got lost and
now has mysteriously reinstated itself.....Blogger has gone weird since they "improved" it.....much like my life in fact......)


BUZIOS WITH BARBARA AND BEACH BUGGY.....

U
HANNAH'S WELCOME BACK AND BIRTHDAY DO....


.....ME WAS 'ERE......Kilroy wasn't

BOUGHT HOUSE....WORK STARTS....VISIT TO BUZIOS.....HANNAH RETURNS......XMAS.....NEW YEAR.....GOING OUT A LOT...... HAHAHA......SWIMMING.....GETTING BROWN......MASSAGES.....LEG IMPROVES.....RANGE INCREASES.....ATTRACTIVE YOUNG LADIES.....A BIT OF A QUICK UPDATE AND A SUMMARY ALL ROLLED UP TOGETHER......

ALL THIS AND MORE IN THE FIRST PROPER UPDATE SINCE MID NOVEMBER......OOOOOPS, SORRY I FORGOT (FOR NEARLY 2 MONTHS!!!!

SO.......first I'll stick in some email excerpts which will summarise things including the update and then I'll fill in a few gaps.....I'll also stick up a load of photos when I can soon......

This written to very special and long lost buddy Donna Doolallys now in New Zealand and sprouting small children like nobodies business....with husband Richard Doolallys I hasten to add!!!!

Well bless my trendy havaianas!!! 'Ello you big daft Scots chucklet of a wooman!!!!
That was a buzz! I thought you'd all but disappeared without a trace!
I found a Scots performance artist Donna Rutherford who told stories or something but she had someone elses head on, which was disturbing as I knew you wouldn't go that far! And I couldn't remembered yr married name.....well you know I have a block about marriage on all fronts!!
I'm writing this at 6.45 in the morning having been on the piss/having dinner what seems like only minutes ago, though it was last night.
Yes that's 6.45 in the morning Donna.....not so long ago I didn't believe there actually was one. Now I am up to arm my mercenaries as they go off to fight in the jungles of....well, actually my back garden, and ok it's three mahetas and a xingada (hammers and a mattock) and they're hired hands not soldiers......but it still feels very butch!
I decided I fancied this "house" a few days after I arrived in August, and have been fighting to get it ever since.....finally succeeded a couple of weeks ago, nearly had a punch up in the bank during the final exchange ( those hypos still coming in handy!) and now I own a non bedroomed bungalow with a loft sized living room....it was a private tennis club clubhouse, plus a couple of half courts....I'm sticking in a big pool and garden and converting kitchen into a bedroom and putting kitchen open plan into living room which is 170 sq. metres.....so mmmm bung.one bed en suite.pool.gdn.mezz. no water or electricity but will have soon. It's about 90 seconds from the ocean with 20 km of white sand beach and ten mins from the lagoons (surrounded by mountains) and my 2 favorite bars and 40 mins also on foot from the little town which I love, where I had a haircut the other day at my regular barbers with the entire local carnaval bloco samba band jammed into the tiny shop working out a new number complete with (some ) instruments....my barber is the leader of the band!! I even slipped some lyrics in! .....haircut was the worst yet mind you!

So, you got the picture correctly in your letter pretty much.....closed shop end of March, left flat in July, stayed with mate in Batheaston for 6 weeks to sort out my affairs and got here late August .....moved into guest house of contacts, now good friends, Uli and Maria, in grounds of their big house with stunning gardens and big pool.....saw my tennis club a few days after arriving and knew it was for me....then found out owner had sold garden to someone else already, then made a deal for both bits, then broke my fucking leg! That got in the way a bit really, but mostly problem was that house guy said garden guy wanted more money after we shook on the deal but really it was house guy after more cash, then became impossible to get a deal sorted because garden guy refused to come to meetings but turns out it's because garden guy hates house guy because he knocked down roof of barbie area and now won't be in same room as him.....this, remember all going on in Portuguese and Brasilian Legalese and all while I'm incarcerated with broke leg, and mostly whilst Uli and Maria are out of country and I have no-one who speaks English and and and.....apart from that it was all pretty straightforward really. So eventually I told them all, in my best Portuguese, to take their (fucking) property and stick it up their (fucking) barbecue area.
And lo, did they not thenceforth come a-running and a-grovelling.....yeah, verily and it was so......and so it has been.

So the rules of the bazaar apply as ever....always walk away (at least twice)....(once was enough). So then things sped up a bit. But house guy still tried to pull a number in the bank actually whilst the money was being transferred to his account.....Hannah (daughter) is a kickboxer and I'm also quite handy at times....he doesn't know how close he came....I practically had to sit on Hannah!

Oh and broken leg.....2 weeks after getting here, slipped on slimy paving whilst negotiating waterlogged sand road whilst going to buy bread at local shops! (diabetic hazard number 432).....what fun!\n\nHannah daughter came out in October for 2 weeks and promptly returned a few weeks ago as she loves it here, as I do. Even though stuff here could drive you nuts.....but only if you let it.....we tend to wonder at it all really.....from time to time Hannah still mistakenly asks me.....
"when do you think...."
....and I say.......
" you're doing it again...."
......yes, she's asking for a specific, and they don't exist here.....a better question is.....
"d'you think eventually....."
....to which I can answer with an assertive......
"yes, for sure, eventually my dear, I can almost guarantee it......"
.....this applies to dinner dates, weekend trips, business meetings, anything.....
....nobody can say anything will happen any time with any certainty at all......
.....I'm surprised that anyone can ever co-ordinate with each other enough even to have sex......but amazingly they do, eventually.

I must go now to my estates and wipe the sweat from my workers brows....if I don't I might feel obliged to pay them and that as you know goes too much against the grain. As the sun sets behind the lagoons, picture me swaying to the strains of their old negro worksongs, as they relax after a long and arduous day's labouring on my estates.....I can (almost) smell the hickory smoke mingling with the aroma of frying bacon, sizzling tantalisingly over an open fire.....I casually ask first the wizened old electrician, and then in turn the young sun burnished stonemason, if the work in hand will be finished soon..... they look across at each other wistfully through the rising smoke, and then, looking back to me, they both say as one ....." eventually....."

As I walk back to my extortionately overpriced temporary accomodation, I can hear them laughing together in the distance, over a private joke perhaps, or some workaday tidbit of gossip. I smile to myself, contentedly.
This happy breed.
This happy land.
Eventually......

Sorry, I nodded off there......must go ...will write more soon....there's pix on blogsite....address in last email........lots of love from Nashface the Lagoonhead XXXXX

this written to funloving friend just back in UK from summering in Malta.........

Hello Baybeeeee! ......not only am I most definately still a drunk, but I am still ridiculously proud to be such a good one......
Hannah is here again too and we just had a conversation on that very subject and she is proud too......I am proud, of me, of her and of you too, and also of ***** of course......or is that Roger the cabin boy? or is that you?? Or is that me? Does it really fucking matter ? any of it ? bOLLOCKS IT DOES.....
......I last nite changed my name to Preb.....due to realising last nite (late on) that I didn't know my name any more......about the same time I commented on how odd it is that at times I don't know exactly where my face is.....Hannah was throwing crackers (savoury not fireworks) at my open mouth....haha what a fun weekend.
All is cool here...Hann returned on friday.....we has been having fun. Yesto locals had a party for her return/last months birthday/me/any excuse in a beautiful house with pool by lagoon that one of them caretakes....then went to bar (also by lagoon) with stunning samba band from Rio and got further fuctup.....then all of a sudden back at ours and more beer til 3.....today found out one of guys (that didn't make it to ours) got run over last nite.....I thought he was having trouble unlocking his bike haha......he's a bit of a mess but nothing broken.....
.....it's now 91 degrees...time for pool....
....sorry about this email....hanging somewhat.....
....no blog recently as have been having a life finally but go to ...... http://biginbrasil.blogspot.com/ for tales and pics of hell in the Atlantic upto November end ish...
.....also see attached pic of young lady for whom I have appalling plans, and that's my mum on the right......must hit the pool.....approaching 95 degrees......

....how was Malta ....did you get the Victoria Cross, or did you get the Maltese cross......only when you were shittered haha a clever joke there......***** said she was worried you were going to fry your brain since your return.....I say BOLLOCKs.....nothing wrong with a good fry up.....send me tales of horror and debauchery and I will do likewise hahahahahahahah......Lots of love from Nashface the Lagoonhead XXXXXX

ps....also love from Hannah....she's in bog emptying out a hangover.

....written to buddy re weekend in Buzios, attached to which is pic of me sat on Brigitte Bardot's knee whilst drunk and behaving somewhat lewdly......me that is.....not the statue.....picture will be posted embarrassingly soon.....

Hello Blossomtoes.....
Have sent you a romantic pic of me and my new girlfriend at the weekend....oddly enough she looks like you......
....sorry to hear you're broke....still the living here is cheap as f****....last night best yet.....three 600ml bottles of beer, caipirinha with 6 (english size) shots of cachasa in it and a full meal which was wicked for 12.50 reais....thats £3.12p.....came home shitfaced, well pleasantly pissed and also replete.....

.....pic of me and BB is taken in Buzios....she discovered it in 60's same as St Tropez....it is an utter f****** wonderland.....you'd shit yourself with gleeeee. I said same to Hannah....can't wait to take her.....and you!
must dash....lots of love from Lagoonboy XXXXXX
ps very proudly showing off pics of my mate the magazine editor to people here!

....more to same buddy.....

Hello chucklet !

Just a quickie to say ta for the mags.....the postie found me at a different address standing in the street which I thought quite impressive....I even asked if it was for me and it was!! In Bath I used to get mail addressed to Nasher, Bath and that was before I had the shop.....will put together some ideas as I said and send to you.....theres a Brasil bit in Homes but its crap! Looks like my massive house is on again...have to dash to see lawyer now......just shows what walking away can do!!"

....written to buddy in Germany.....

Hello baby!! How y'all doing? My german pal Uli here was amazed at my knowledge of German language construction....unlike my teachers at school who were completely unmazed. My mum lived in Hamburg at the end of the war and taught me words like " eine disselstoppemfloppen" which apparently means brassiere. Or does it?
Re. time wasted blogging....broken leg is indeed the clue....although the Gordon the Movie stuff I wrote for other purposes and decided to try it on the bog, sorry, blog. And the major amount has been excerpts from emails already sent. The blog outlet has encouraged me to take photos though, and with my at present limited range, it makes a shortish walk into a mission of some kind which is an improvement. Also I haven't used a camera other than for ebay and family for around 20 years.
And thank you for noting the depth of my philosophical delving....I feel I am breaking new ground on several fronts....what is stuff? how big is it? can I take it home with me? and when I get it home, how far can I get with it? ( that's quite enough-ED.)
Ok I know when I'm licked (all over) as Frank Z. would say.

Yeh, looks like finally may have the tennis club, although this time I'm not holding my breath, and still looking out for other property, which I do anyway out of interest. I also know of a beach bar for sale in the trendiest busiest bit of town ( thats neither very trendy nor very busy by the way!!) which with the busy (and trendy) season coming soon might be a good move.....but the season is short , maybe 2 months and then you're down to locals and some hot weekends...still, always did fancy a bar.....on a beach....hmmmm
How is Kaarst? Are you there or on the touring lark? I saw you were doing "Greasy" or something?
I'd better dash...Uli's waiting on me (3 days....I was drunk) to translate a big website thing from German to Nashlish.
Tchou Tchou! stay cool, Love from Nashface the Lagoon XXX

.....written to Hannah before her return....

Hi Spud.....Buzios is amazing but too expensive but only round the corner....100 reais in taxi with my mate Dylan from Buzios and less with return trip.....he had Matt Dillon in taxi and had to show him documents to prove he had same name .....his dad was big Dylan fan!!!
.....just back from Josinos little bar round corner.....3 big beers, gorgeous meal....6 plates of food inc salad and beans and sausagey stew and rice and farofa and stuff....plus monster caipirinha....12.60 Reais equals just over 3 quid....food was lovely!!! I hate it here!!!!love from slightly squiffy dada XXXX

OK ENOUGH OF THE EMAILS.....DON'T HAVE MUCH TIME NOW ......AM UP AT 6.30 WITH OR WITHOUT HANGOVER THIS WEEK ONWARDS AS BUILDING WORK STARTED THIS WEEK IN EARNEST.....

............getting quotes from outside contractors re building pool, have designed landscaped garden and left space for small guest houses as possible commercial venture at later date.....

..............pool design is cool, stole from Uli's......see pix of his house early in blog......my front gate is hole in wall.....electric in house has been tested, we had to nick electricity from next door to test it.....now have leccy box on post outside wall, should have mains connected in 3 or 4 days.....

...........had to pick a house number first.....you have to wander around looking at completely unrelated numbers and pick one that may not be already used up.....Uli's house has same number as another one up the road....they just swap mail now and again!!!! I chose 1717 as there seemed to be a gap......next door one way is 1708 and the other side is 3889 !!!! Quite a gap really. I did fancy 3711 as it had a jingle to go with it....well nearly, that's 4711 ( the perfume ). So my address is (probably mine and few other peoples too).......

Rua Maximino Fidelis 1717, Boqueirao, Saquarema, Rio de Janeiro......not bad huh!!!!

We decided the roadname in English is probably a bit pervy....maximum fiddling or something.....not sure of what it's significance is in Portuguese....maybe worse....

So I now have piles of gravel, sand, cement, bricks, reinforcing steel and I own a wheelbarrow, shovels, hammers, eclectic drill ( I think thats what they said) and a tile cutter.....4 buckets, a 2 metre and a 20 metre rule, and I have graph paper and set squares and pencils and all kinds of shit.....

...........i need a file next and a brief case ....and a mobile phone......the great thing is i own them all in a foreign language.....i own mahetas and a xingada as i mentioned above.....how far out is that.....first big job is the dividing wall to separate my property off from shithead I bought it froms house, which we are splitting the cost on......though only after he tried to get me to pay it all and i had to explain that I sunbathe naked and have sex outdoors a lot (naked ) and not always with my own species (naked).....he responded well to that as did his wife......the wife is so nice that Hannah changed seats so that her back was towards her.....

so......next job is to turn kitchen into an en suite and change bogs into 2 bathrooms, and build open plan kitchen in the 170 square metre living room.....also have to get some furniture made up to my own designs whooopeee wot fun......also quite fancy buying the cockpit of a light aircraft to suspend from the roof as viewing seats for movies....or am I being ostentatious?? Hannah thinks it's a good plan.......

.........so it will be a one bedroomed bungalow with MMMassive living room and swimming pool.......a bit odd but there's the mezzanine for spare bedroom and room for one hundred and fourteen crashers in the lounge hahaha.....plus guest houses at a later date.....

......my next problem is my visa runs out in 4 weeks and that means I have to leave and can't come back for 6 months, leaving my house in construction and my daughter here alone hahahaha and me in another country for 6 months with no house and almost no income....isn't life funny....so will come back to Uk for shortest possible time in Feb (anyone got a bed/sofa/hook spare ????) and try to set up retirement visa with the Brasilian embassy.....with my history, that should be a lot of fun hahahahahaaha.......in fact I'm hoping it won't be too difficult and am off later today to see my pal here who pulled off the same juggling trick successfully a couple of months ago.......

........so my leg is getting better but still pain at times.....my walking range is still limited but improving, and I can usually walk again after a rest......have been having massages and swimming a lot......as a result also getting a little muscle back here and there which all disappeared when I started disgusting NHS medicines 6 years ago......

.....am building up to starting at the gymn nearby which Hannah goes to nearly every day.....people there are brilliant....they owners went out and bought phrase books so they could talk with Hannah and they have language sessions with her as well as training!!!

The last week or two, since having our own place, we've started to build a more visible network of local friends and contacts....even though we haven't moved in yet.....we have friendly Italian restaurant on beach round corner....fresh italian bread every morning......gym just around the corner, our local bar operator works days just nearby, we've also met some of the immediate neighbours and a classical guitarist lives next door.....all these people will become closer and closer friends I feel, particularly when I get the sound sytem and the drum'n'bass and my electric guitar and amp installed, and the local samba band ( led by my mate the barber) start playing at parties in my living room.....oh yes, the future is bright ( tho' probably a little loud!!!!!)

.......talking of the local bar owner, he showed me round a house for sale the other day.....lovely with pool and two houses and 900 m2 and lo and behold.....a recording studio!!! complete with gold discs on the wall! the owner is a sound engineer who's worked with all the Brasilian greats....there was a pic on the wall of him with Chico Buarque, one of the greatest. Anyone want a beautiful house ( well 2 actually, house plus big 2 storey guest house with varandas) with a studio just outside Rio ......beaches, lagoons, mountains, me for a neighbour....what more could you want???????? Yours for £32,000 or near offer. I'll post pics when I go back for another looksee.

I must now dash off.....will post lots of pics asap.

My email btw is now nasher53@gmail.com or you can still get me on nasher@cyclesmaximus.com I think but sometimes it's a bit odd and I feel like theres a stash of unreceived emails piled up somewhere......