April – Our family tradition of egg rolling is such a big thing. All the family and some select friends gather to roll eggs at Easter and it is always followed by food and merriment. I never win, but I love taking part … ahem.  Maybe next year when the egg roll is in Scotland …

May – My review trip to Walt Disney World,Florida – I am still in shock that I was lucky enough to go on this incredible trip. One of the best things to come out of that trip is six new friendships with Erica, Lulu, Alice, Becky, Linda and Jane. I still smile when I think of the laughter we shared.

July – Camping at Robin Hoods bay in the Summer was great. The children are now old enough to enjoy camping without it being a chore. The 3 year old was in his element (the outdoors) and we made new friends. Such a relaxed time was had and I can’t wait for more of the same next year. Hopefully heading for Scotland to relive some childhood memories and perhaps take in some of the Edinburgh festival.

August – Wearing Magic Pants and celebrating my 31st birthday with my friends. I have battled 3 or 4 more times in a toilet cubicle with the magic pants since then.

September – Hiding behind that wagon in Port Aventura with friends old (Alice and Erica) and new (Tara and Jo B).

And so I pass the challenge onto 5 other bloggers!

Little Mummy

English Mum

Dulwich Divorcee

Insomniac Mummy

Sticky Fingers

Even the slightest hint of torture or some violence or an over enthusiastic ‘Boo’ can send me scuttling for a cushion to hide behind. If there’s no cushion I will happily peep through my fingers. The husband just doesn’t get it … “But it’s not real!” he says.

I don’t care.

I.Am.A.Wuss.

So when Oriol, the press officer at Port Aventura told us about Hotel Burn I was terrified … and I wasn’t even staying there.

The idea is that you pay around 240 euros per person per night to stay at Hotel Burn which is decorated with the Halloween theme, erring more towards death than pumpkins; electric chairs in your bedroom, bloody hand prints on the shower curtain, a bath full of blood … ‘You will die tonight’ scrawled in blood on your mirror if you’re really lucky.

You check in, signing a disclaimer which says you haven’t got a heart condition and go about your business in the park during the day.

When night falls anything could happen, in fact until the hours of 3am anything does happen. A ghoul, Freddy Kruger, Frankenstien, exorcist, shrieking possessed woman, chain saw wielding man or generally scary person could enter your room, leap out from your wardrobe or be hiding under your bed. These people take their job very seriously indeed.

Scared Bloggers

We spent an hour on our last evening stood outside Hotel Burn, hiding behind a cart, watching glimpses of Freddy Kruger and a man with a hideous axe wound to his face running up the stairs towards an unsuspecting room and its occupants.

I was so jumpy at one point that I thought one of the cleaners coming out of another hotel was about to kill me. Ahem.

Hotel Burn runs from the end of September to the end of November. Within 3 days all rooms are sold out. What is wrong with these people? Some people are willing to pay to be scared almost to death.

Me? I’ll pass. Whilst I find the whole thing fascinating I’ll have to pretend that I have a heart condition for now. Hiding behind a wagon was about all I could take.

Mojitos are our cocktail of choice (apart from Erica who likes to nurse a strawberry daiquiri … quite literally).

During our stay the bar staff didn’t change, which brings me to Fernando.  Poor, surly Fernando who had lost his smile somewhere between the bar and the kitchens.  Granted he seemed, at times, to be running the bar alone, but still … smile and your mojito smiles too.

Mojitos take more time to prepare than other drinks and this was clearly a problem to Fernando.

Our first round was delivered with gusto; no smiling but a definite enthusiasm … and straws. Second round … the eye rolling started, the crushing of the mint in the bottom of the glass became more violent and, well, get your own straws.  Luckily the measures remained the same. Fernando had been to the ‘pour a spirit to a count of six’ cocktail school, which was fine by us. Hic.

I did wonder if I should explain in a REALLY patronising voice that it takes seventeen muscles to smile and forty-three to frown, but as the limit of my Spanish was ‘dos bread’ and his English extended to ‘Huh?’ I thought better of it.

On our last night we entered the bar parched and looking forward to our ice cold cocktails.

As we lined up along the bar and waited patiently Fernando dealt us a blow.  Using International sign language for ‘All gone/kaput/No!’ accompanied by some serious moody eye rolling he announced “Non mojitos”.  He meant it. We appealed in desperate voices.  He simply shook his head and wandered off  to speak to some other people at the bar leaving another member of bar staff to deal with us.

In blind blogger panic we ordered a drink which had Pisang in it thinking it sounded nice.  I now know it is a green banana flavoured liquer which sways more towards battery acid than banana.

It was then that Tara realised she had been doing what we had all been doing in our heads every time we saw Fernando.

We had been singing …

There was something in the air that night, the stars were bright Fernando

Unfortunately she had switched to ‘out loud’ singing.

Was Tara to blame for Fernando’s ‘Non Mojitos’ or had they just run out of mint?  We’ll never know, but I do know this … never again will I order a drink which lists Pisang in it’s ingredients.

Erica nursing a strawberry daiquiri

The unmistaken green hue of Pisang

A discussion began later that night around a table of mojitos and strawberry daiquiris, about whether the park attendant was a she or a he. I was convinced she was a she but the others weren’t so sure, so I referred to her as ‘She-He’.

Cut to the check-in queue for my flight home on Sunday …

A woman approached me and asked if she was in the correct check-in queue. We had a brief discussion before she turned back to her husband and daughter who were standing behind me.

I then heard her daughter who was around 3 say really loudly “Mummy, is that a man?”  The woman shushed her whilst flustering about in her handbag.  I turned to show the little girl that I was in fact a she not a he and cursed my new short hair.

Now that’s what I call karma.

I had intended to blog whilst I was away but here was a problem with the wi-fi connection at the hotel

Seeing as I need to recover from a lack of sleep and maybe one too many mojitos (cough) and a few scary occurences I shall let you read what I wrote at the airport on Friday … which now seems like a week ago.

Written at the airport cafe on Friday.

I don’t know what is worse …

Waking at 3.10am, precisely one hour before I was supposed to get up, in a blind panic thinking I’d missed my flight only to find when looking at my alarm clock that I hadn’t set it properly and would have slept through my flight.

Managing to get dressed, apply make-up and do my hair without making a sound only to trip over a Duplo zoo as I exited the bedroom sending bricks, hippos and dinosaurs clattering across bare floorboards. Before you ask, our zoo is part Jurassic.

Going into the children’s bedrooms to stare longingly, wishing I could have one final cuddle and kissing their foreheads for the 3 year old to sit bolt upright and say “Did you get me a present?” before lying down and going back to sleep.

Saying to myself “Don’t worry the airport won’t be busy, it’s not like it’s the school holidays or anything” to then realise that the children are on school holiday as of today.

At the check-in desk when the woman asked if I’d packed the bag myself and had full control of my luggage having the urge to say “Well actually, the dog has sniffed the bag several times, a small child has probably been rummaging in it and left me a present not to mention the taxi driver man-handling it”.

or; The ever so jolly Polish till operator in the airport café who asked me if I wanted cash-back when I handed him ten pounds for me to automatically say “no thank you” . Feeling foolish I giggled and said “Oh it’s too early for that sort of joke, har har harrrrrdy harrr”.  He wandered off saying “In Moscow, where I come from cash is cash.”

Then having to listen to him saying the same thing to every customer there after until I want to get up and ram a croissant down his throat.

So, here I am in the airport café at silly o’clock in the morning. I have to fly to Brussels and then to Barcelona, apparently the flight to Brussels is not full and it’s a little plane. I’ll feel like a judge on my way to X-Factor.

Who knows what might happen. All I know right now is that I’m tired and in Moscow where he comes from, cash is cash.