Busy doing nothing

The first thing to say is that we’re on a Canary Island. Lanzarote to be specific. In any ways, it’s as Spanish as cricket itself, with constant reminders of home, like wall to wall pubs and restaurants offering a full English breakfast, traditional fish and chips, bingo, Sunday roast and a quiz night. That description is a little unfair since there’s plenty of Canarian culture to enjoy, as well as the comforts of home. The thing is that it works. There’s something for everyone and I’m very happy here.

I’ve heard the Canaries described as “downmarket”. I’m not terribly interested in what is a snobby attitude to someone else’s choices. If “downmarket” describes mainly middle aged, and older, working class people enjoying what for many of them is a home from home, then it’s really no one else’s business.

It probably appeals more than it should to be because, I am afraid, I have little interest in history. Given the choice of visiting an historical site and a café for a coffee, or even a beer, then give me the latter any day.

As in so many other aspects of our lives, my partner and I often inhabit different worlds. In Corfu, for example, when my partner wanted to visit an archaeological dig and then visit Mon Repos, the birthplace of Prince Philip, I wanted to watch planes land and take off at Kanoni, high above the airport. Culturally, this probably makes me a bit of a vandal, but give me a Boeing or an Airbus take off and land than something that’s been hidden under the ground for thousands of years, again, any day of the week. That and reading a book and listening to music. What more could a poorly educated Philistine want?

So far, we have managed to embrace the best Lanzarote has to offer. We enjoyed an amazing Chinese meal the night we arrived, we enjoyed a stroll to a traditional Spanish bar to watch Liverpool demolish Rangers, where I’m afraid my standards slipped as I goaded the disappointed Scots with fist-pumping and shouts of “Get in” as Harvey Elliott slotted in Liverpool’s seventh goal and gently grilling by the pool, reading a book about professional wrestling. Common as muck, me. And I don’t care.

Once upon a time, I may have sneered at locations like this, showing off my proper tourist credentials by eating the local food and taking the piss out of the Sunday Roast full English brigade. No more. “When in Rome” and all that. But when in somewhere like Lanzarote, that Rome could be anywhere, even Rotterdam. In the end, you just do what makes you happy.

Although for much of the time, I’m busy doing nothing, I no longer have the time to post vast numbers of photos of me gurning, or sharing photos of my dinner (what’s that all about?) on social media. If you’re really unlucky, I might share the odd few from time to time, but I’ve discovered less is more. The better time you are having, the less you use social media for anything at all.

Now pardon me while I make plans for tonight’s steak dinner, a weekend trip to watch Lanzarote’s fourth tier football team play someone or other and take a dip in the pool. That’s probably not everyone’s idea of a holiday, but it is mine.

As they say in Lanzarote, cheers for now.