It was pitch black when we arrived and it took us another forty minutes and one irritable late-night phone call to the owner, Mr Briggs, to locate the front door key, which we found under a brick in the disused barn next door. The cottage is beautiful, though – and will be even more so once we locate the Wi-Fi password.

Tomas is house-sitting for me and will look after the cat. In turn, the cat will be Tomas-sitting. Last year, I asked Mrs McNulty to help and the cat has yet to forgive me. It was also the first time that the RSPCA were alerted to my Twitter presence.

Sunday August 12th

Our holiday hasn’t had the most auspicious of beginnings: a day spent in vain pursuit of the Wi-Fi password. Mr Briggs was hopeless. He was pretty sure it had an ‘a’ and an ‘l’ in it, and quite possibly a ‘p’ or should that be a ‘t’? I grilled him about the names of his first pet, his mother’s maiden name and the name of his primary school, but we are no nearer to the truth.

Dylan got fed up with waiting me for me to crack the code and headed out for the afternoon, having borrowed one of my walking guides. I would have joined him but holidays aren’t all about doing what you want.

Monday August 13th

Gérard Depardieu is in Pieces!

Gérard Depardieu is in pieces!

He is dreaming of the Remora 2000 again,

steering it solemnly past the gobies,

while sharing silent jokes

with the clown tangs.

Gérard Depardieu’s head is all jumbled!

He is no longer sure

of the Remora 2000’s thruster capabilities

and at what kind of depths

it can safely operate.

Mais regardez! Voilà une tête flottante!

Tell the catfish he is coming!

He is slowly assembling!

Tell them Gérard Depardieu

is getting himself together at last!

The incessant rain has forced us to avail ourselves of the cottage’s entertainment facilities (excluding the Wi-Fi, that is, as we are yet to crack the password), the full list of which is as follows:

1) Three VHS video cassettes: Babe: Pig in the City, Pokemon: The Movie 2000, and volume 2 of a box set of The Thornbirds.

2) One slightly soiled paperback copy of A Surgeon in her Stocking by Tina Solomon, a Christmas tale from Mills and Boon’s Medical Romance series.

3) Board games: Monopoly (without the board), Scrabble (without the tiles) and Noel’s House Party, still wrapped in its original cellophane.

4) A 500-piece Photo Jigsaw Puzzle of Gérard Depardieu in a Submersible. At this stage, it’s unclear to us whether this is complete or not, although we have yet to locate Gérard Depardieu’s left ear.

This must seem a far cry from Marbella for Dylan but he’s putting a brave face on it all and doing his best to keep my spirits up.

Tuesday August 14th