Mobility and the lifting toilet seat

After an illustrious career in the music industry, working with the good the bad and the famous and piloting Prince to his only UK No 1, I was brought back down to earth last night by the prospect of watching a Spanish Abba Tribute band at a hotel full of blue rinse crusties, who looked, but probably were not, older even older than myself. I exclude, it goes without saying, That Nice Lady Decorator who stubbornly refuses to acknowledge that she is anything more than 37, but the difference is she can get away with it.

Earlier, after a late breakfast, over which I had tried to persuade her to open an account with Currencies Direct, we had decided to walk to the pretty coastal town of Caletta, about 3 miles up the coast, which of course meant walking back again later. Later was after a couple of beers in the town and at the very pretty Playa Du Duque beach en route. We had been invited to the Thomson resort meeting, to which we had no intention of staying, but did pick up the welcome pack in case there was anything interesting or any special offers or discounts. Often one can get 10% discount at certain stores. As we excitedly ripped open the package, this was amongst the leaflets that dropped out.

Very useful for a codger

I think it gives a fair indication of the high number of coffin dodgers they expect to see at the resort, and I suppose that an Abba tribute band is a bit of a risk, probably better off with a Frank Sinatra impersonator, but I digress. Mobility scooters are, I am sure, very worthy appliances and I am sure also, that come the time, I shall embrace them (but obviously only in terms of time trials down the high street), but it was the top line of the bottom right hand section that stuck out. Toilet seat aids? How would that work? How is that going to make your holiday any more enjoyable? Well, except for making me laugh out loud? That Nice Lady Decorator was not quite as amused, and asked me “what mind of holiday I had taken me on?”

Then there was the Thomson Platinum Lounge. Being denied entry to anything on the grounds of age is something that I have not experienced for probably close to 40 years, if ever, but now I think it has happened. I think we were not allowed on as we were not old enough. I did not have a bus pass, which I think was the entry ticket to the graveyard bar.

Anyway, we managed to escape from the land of the nearly dead with an invigorating walk up the coastline and despite some cloud it was quite warm and I am seeing some colour returning to my features. Over a beer, we discussed the mornings events and I said something about the tour operators being Thomson rather than Thompson, a more usual spelling if the name. Quick as a flash That Nice Lady Decorator said something along the lines of “was not having a p something to do with old age as well? Actually, it is the opposite. Too many pees when you drink too much beer.

Anyway, after a siesta and troughing at the hotel buffet (there is such a range to choose from, there is usually something amongst the range that they have not managed to spoil, although a good portion of it is sugar stuffed fatty crap) we could take no more than a few bars of “Fernando” before exiting in a rush. They were so bad that the boys in the grounot even shown up.

So out into the rather squalid resort of Costa Adeje we went becoming more and more disillusioned with the number of establishments offering lining screens, cheap beer, English breakfasts and football until we found a half decent establishment where a band were playing. The sounds of REM were very welcome after the Abba debacle playing out on the hotel. They were actually quite good as a covers band and even played some requests. Once we had established that their repertoire spread as far as Pink Floyd, there was nothing better to prepare us for reentering the creeping graveyard that is our home for the next 5 days than their song “Comfortably Numb” although I am not sure if that applied to us after a another bottle of Gran Reserva (we had emptied the first at dinner) and a couple of Irish coffees upon our return.

Chris France
@Valbonne_News