Obrigado

I feel like I should be making an effort to learn Portuguese before I go to the Azores, even though it's a tourist resort where I doubt anyone will expect me to. But I tried and signally failed to learn the language back in the dim and distant history of thirteen years ago, when I went to Rio de Janeiro for that wonderful TV show that gave me the Brazilian Mystery Cloak, and (because I never throw anything away), I've still got the language course I bought back then. Granted, it's a course in "Colloquial Portuguese of Brazil", and I should more probably try to learn Portuguese Portuguese if I'm going to what is technically a part of Portugal, but I'm just impressed that I still own this big plastic box, containing a book, two CDs and two audio cassettes for people who hadn't upgraded to CDs yet.

I think I'll become fluent in colloquial Brazilian Portuguese, and make the locals tut about these Brazilian tourists causing trouble, instead of English tourists. It'll make a nice change.

This beats Joe-from-the-office's hairdryer into a cocked hat

Do you remember my blog post a month ago, when I recommended you all to buy a raffle ticket or two on Raffolux? And did you do it? You probably didn't, but you definitely should have done, because if you had, you might have won a luxury 5-day holiday in the Azores, complete with swimming-with-dolphins and looking-at-whales experiences. But as it turns out, it was me who won it!

I'll be going some time in September, most likely, as soon as I sort out tricky little details like who gets to go along with me. Not bad for a £5 raffle ticket, eh?