The other bit of fauna news, I’m sure all our recent visitors will be relieved to hear, is that we seem to have won the Battle of the Woodlice. This may, of course, just be a temporary victory, only time will tell. We no longer come downstairs to find hundreds of woodlice littering the passage from the back door to the central hall. In fact not a single one since the end of July!

So what other excitement, oh yes we had a trip to Osuna hospital (sorry no photos!). Mick woke up with pains in his chest and although he tried to ignore them but mid afternoon he was looking very ill, so we called the ambulance.

The doctor arrived from the clinic in Estepa and checked him over, he thought there was a small heart problem, not too much to worry about but he should go to hospital, Osuna is about 25 miles away. Ruth was in a mild state of panic so when our neighbour Sandra offered to drive she was hastily taken up on it. The ambulance driver took this to mean all of us, so he disappeared! This did at least have a calming effect, we all reasoned they would have taken him in the ambulance if it was really bad!

We got to the hospital, and met one of our Spanish neighbours, who immediately took matters in hand found a security guard told him ‘ Miguel tiene dolor el pecho’ and hey presto a wheelchair was found, Mick was ordered to sit in it and the guard took us through the back way to Emergencies and he was whisked to the front of the queue!

After ECGs, blood tests, X-rays, blood pressure checks and an overnight stay he was allowed home with a note for his doctor. The doctor thought it was a muscular pain – not you’ll be relieved to know a heart attack.

This presented the next problem as we hadn’t got around to registering with the local doctor. We went along to the surgery to be told we needed a social security number and a ‘padron’, a document from the town hall confirming that we live here as well as our passports. Fortunately we had got as far as getting the E106 to transfer our health care from the UK, we just hadn’t taken it any further.

So a trip to the town hall for the pardon, then a trip to Estepa, a town about 5 miles away where our nearest medical centre is, to get the social security number. The office that deals with this is only open on Fridays. We returned the next day. A very helpful young lady explained that all our documents were in order but, our E106 had to be stamped by the main area health office in Osuna. So we drove to Osuna, waited in a queue for about half an hour and duly got our forms stamped. The chap who stamped our forms was keen to emphasise that we must not lose the form we must leave the original at home and only take a copy with us to the doctors or the hospital! We went back to Estepa where we were registered with the doctor in La Roda. Fortunately we do have a doctor here who speaks English, so as long as we’re lucky enough to be ill when he’s on duty, we’re OK!

Now we need to make an appointment. Off we go, down to the surgery in the village, queue up, do the ultimo thing (this is where when someone new walks into the reception area, they ask who’s last ? – ?ultimo? ) Mick gets an appointment for the next day.

That was another interesting experience! We’ll get the hang of it eventually, I’m sure! Now we are waiting for an appointment at the clinic in Estepa for more tests. Mick’s feeling well now though, in case you were wondering!

Just to remind you all what blue skies look like a couple of photos of our trip to Malaga. We went for the day, by train, and did the tourist bit. A lovely lunch and the open top bus tour!