Quit your day job. Go on. I dare you.

Sat at the bar at ‘Le Relax’ last night a young, very dishevelled bloke with a dog sat down next to me and ordered a beer. He asked me a few questions about how long it might take to trek to Italy from here. He spoke in English, but I could hear in his voice, he’d be more comfortable speaking German. So I started talking German, and have been doing so for nearly a whole day. I nearly forgot I speak German :)

So this guy. A Polish geezer called Swarbeck, who’s been living in Germany for years, is travelling on foot round this part of Europe. He’s got a dog, a rucksack and um…. that’s about it. He sleeps rough in the mountains (saving plenty of money on hotels) and has been in the valley for a couple of days. Then arrived Martin at the bar, cos the football was on, see?

When he asked if we knew anywhere he could sleep where it was OK to build a fire, I nudged Martin to let him stay up at the farm. He did, metWardo and stayed the night. Had a great time by all accounts. Today he came over to Gaylands with us for another short climbing session and a bit of lunch. Introduced him to a whole new sport so we did, and he loved it. Martin dropped him and his pooch off as far up the top of the mountain towards Italy as the roads go, and the geezer wandered off as happy as a clam.

I think we all gained karma points on this one. I love travelling, and I love meeting random cool people who accept me and hang out for a while, so it’s good to give something back.

The dogs are back with their owners and I’m back in the office today. This past week I’ve been stressing about a lot of stuff. Too much time on my own maybe. Basically I’ve got loads of money owing from all kinds of places - clients, the tax man, even some deposit money from my bling flat in the Houches. Try as I might, though - I can’t get my hands on any of it, and I’ve got people to pay. Mortgage, new car - all that. It’s a pain in the arse sometimes having a problem with authority and not being able to hold down a proper job.

So today I took a few hours off and went climbing in Servoz with Martin. One of the best sport climbing crags in the world and because it’s off-season we had the place nearly to ourselves. It was hot and sweaty and frankly just really nice to only have our own personal safety to worry about for a few hours. I think we’ll go again tomorrow.

Anyhoo - Martin’s put his pics up on flickr. Check it.

Well over a month ago now I wrote a post about how happy I was that the Inland Revenue in the UK were going to give me some of my overpaid tax back. I rang them up and they said, yep, no problem we’ll put your check in the post (or words to that effect). They didn’t. I rang them up a couple of weeks ago to see if the check had been sent. It hadn’t.

Since that time of course, I’ve included that cash in my day to day finances. It’s what has allowed me to replace the golf with my new bus and like a fool I’ve overstretched myself on all fronts waiting for a check from the tax-man. Duh. Of course you shouldn’t do stuff like that, but when the opportunity comes along you have to make borderline decisions at times.

So I rang them again today and still no check. There’s some problem with outstanding tax returns that might or might not have to get sorted before they can give me my own money back. Fine. But had they mentioned this a month ago I could have fixed the problem then, have my money now and now be stressing about the end of the month being on it’s way with no cash in the banks.

Damn it.

I’ve settled into the chalet up the hill. It’s very calm and quiet and the dogs are very well behaved. Even Otti the pupster recognises that I’m the boss and what I say goes. I took them for a walk up to the Heidi village in the rain yesterday which wasbeautiful . With full waterproofs on I only got wet boots and a few hours on top of the oil burner sorted that out. Only problem was on the way backOtti disappeared . I waited around for her, and Bubba waited with me. At least I could still see Bubba. When I finally decided to walk back up the hill a bit to see what the score was,Bubba didn’t come. When I got back neither dog was there and I walked back to the chalet with a heavy heart imagining the phone call to Corin I’d have to make telling him I’d lost his puppy.

Of course both dogs were sitting in front of the oil burner getting warm and dry by the time I got back.

This morning I’ve set up a temporary office for myself to use until Tuesday when the owners are back. It’s a basic desk made of trestles and chipboard nicked from the work going on, but look at the view. Stunning.