Wind in the pillows

It is windy today.  Wind, as I think I've made clear before now, is dreadful stuff.  The more of it there is, the more miserable life becomes.  Some years ago Mrs O and I visited Tarifa on the southern tip of Spain.  There's a tiny (relatively-speaking) aperture betwixt Tarifa and north Africa where the Atlantic and Med meet.  Anyhoos, for reasons too dull for me to type-up, this confluence of geographical mishaps makes Tarifa the windiest town on Earth, more-or-less.

We had been warned about this, the wife and I, but as soon as we stepped off the coach, we realised we'd made a tremendous Iberian howler.  It was literally impossible to stand upright unsupported.  We hid in a shop doorway to take stock.  I'd assumed that the guide book was laying it on a trifle thick about the gales, but, no - they'd been faithful to the facts.

We stayed in Tarifa for a few days, and it's actually a charming place.  It's a testament to wind's ability of wipe the smile off one's chops then that it still managed to overshadow the stay.  We left with the avowed intention of never returning.  

This being Andalusia, the weather was glorious, so we trundled down to the beach for a gawp.  We were the only people visible for miles, even though it was the middle of the day and 35 degrees in the shade.  The reason for this is that the relentless gusts whip-up the surface layers of sand and fling them off into space at a rare old lick.  Even a grain of sand hurts when it's doing eighty.  In its defence, it is quite exhilarating for a second or two, but then it begins to grate.

So today's lesson: wind - it's shit.

And finally...
Someone on Facebook had the lovely idea of jotting down one's favourite writers and poets.  You simply write down 15 of the blighters in no more than 15 mins.  It's quite enlightening.  I haven't read some of the authors on my list for years, decades in some cases.  And yet - these people have had a huge influence on who I am today...hmm.

Here's my list: 1.Woody Allen 2.Charles Bukowski 3.Enid Blyton 4.John Cooper Clarke 5.Ian Fleming 6.Graham Greene 7.George Orwell 8.Thomas Hardy 9.James Joyce 10.David Lodge 11.John le Carré 12.Philip Larkin 13.Spike Milligan 14.Neil Simon 15.PG Wodehouse