gambas pil pil and assorted ramblings

The weather continues to be the topic of conversation in the village. The tremendous thunderstorms, hail, heavy rain took everyone by surprise yesterday. From our roof, I watched the storm clouds race up the valley from the Sea; once they had settled over the village, not even the church clocktower was visible. Later, Almendena commented to Antonioformerpoliceman, "Yesterday, summer; today, autumn; tomorrow, winter." At least it appears she was wrong on the third count, but summer does seem to be a rapidly fading memory. My computer network managing skills had to be put into immediate use. One lightning strike knocked out our server (thank goodness for the old surge protector), and the Internet was out for about 15 hours or so. After the last storm, I got the server up and running, but Big Jim's computer is still not hooked up to the network. I think one of the pups jarred a cable in their mad dash under the desks (they really don't like loud noises, and thunder falls into this category), but I just haven't had the time yet to sort through the tangles of cords. Spent the better part of today cleaning and popped out to the market to pick up a few things. Not a decent red bell pepper to be found anywhere, but I managed to scrounge a couple okay-looking ones. Talked to Big Jim. Bored hanging around Schiphol, he checked out of the hotel early and has moved into J. and M.'s house in Weesp. He got his Dutch social security card sorted but then arrived at the townhall too late to register, so he has to do that Monday morning. Fortunately, the company gives new employees relocation time to manage these matters. He's also done some preliminary apartment searching and has found that even furnished apartment prices are sufficiently reasonable to allow us to keep the house here in Spain as well. Very happy about that. :-) Lots of people ask me how I'm managing without Big Jim around all the time. I'm fine; I actually am the sort of person who doesn't mind being alone. I'm more likely to go bonkers if I'm with people all the time. I rarely get bored; plus I do have the dogs and the kitty cat to talk to when I get tired of talking to myself. :-) But it is strange not having him here. He likes to talk, a lot, so the house must seem oddly quiet to the neighbors. Almendena did finally ask me a couple days ago where he was (I was waiting to see how long it would take them to note his absence, so we didn't tell the neighbors about the new job right away), and I explained he was working in Holland and would be gone until the beginning of October. She said, "Ah, you'll be fine; you have good neighbors, friends, and so on." And she's right, I do, which is comforting. I had trouble sleeping the first few nights, but then I started sleeping on Big Jim's side of the bed. I suppose I needed to smell him, on the pillow---he has a good smell; people always tell me that---and since then I've slept like a baby. I picked about 25 peppers today, mostly the tiny guindillas that are used to make gambas pil pil. We make them in individual, shallow earthenware dishes, although you can use any similar larger fireproof/ovenproof casserole. They can be done on top of a gas stove and/or in the broiler. Here's what you need: Olive oil 1 lb cleaned and peeled shrimp, medium size 2 or 3 cloves of garlic, crushed 2 or 3 guindillas (or small, hot red chilis) I add enough sufficient olive oil to the dish to cover the shrimp (about 12 to 15 shrimp per dish) and then heat on the stovetop with the garlic and chilis until the garlic is gold, a couple minutes at most. Take care not to burn the garlic; burnt garlic is bitter and nasty. I then add the shrimp and whack them in the broiler, again not long, a minute maybe, just until the shrimp are pink and the olive oil is bubbly. Serve straightaway with bread, to dip in the oil. Just watch eating the chilis if you're not used to them because they are picante. And as they say here, que aproveche! hasta manana, mylifeinspain