OK, so I’m polishing the trailer. I know it’s the sort of thing I’d ridicule Namibian for – and still might, given half a chance – but it looks nicer now. And it’s a jolly sort of job in the sunshine, which is becoming harsher by the day.
In fact, it’s boiling in Portugal, which exacerbates Namibian’s leg cramps. Despite tipping shakers of salt on his dinner, he still makes sudden leaps, and yells, as muscles spasm.
‘What muscles?’ you say, plausibly. He looks as a gnu might after successfully evading a lion, only to drop dead from exhaustion. ‘This heat’s about the same as in Namibia,’ he says, mopping a rivulet from his brow.
Heat induces lethargy. So it’s a good job I’ve got ice-cold air-conditioning, then, isn’t it? Pah! Those blasted Greeks, with their blasted quarrelling, have made a dog’s breakfast of the AC on my truck.
You’d think a civilisation that can knock up the Temple of Zeus and the Parthenon would be able to spot a gas leak, wouldn’t you? Oh, how times have changed. Nowadays, it seems, they couldn’t organise a piss-up in a brewery.
DAF in Lisbon, however, has a better work ethic; three ho
urs are spent tinkering, with the cab tipped. Oh, what a nuisance when they jack up my living quarters; loose objects, now unpacked, must be stowed again.
A stray laptop, nestling on the top bunk, could easily smash the windscreen. To be safe, when tipping a cab, all possessions go in cupboards or round the foot pedals.
Hoorah! They’ve done it – my toes are cold on the drive back to the stadium. Now I can finally go and do something interesting..