The Landlady has a full house

It’s July, it’s pouring with rain and by the end of the month I have to pay a fairly substantial, yet quite unanticipated, tax bill. The New Cuban Boyfriend and my best Cuban girlfriend, Yusi, have had an argument in Havana. I’m receiving crapulous missives from both via email, and I still have no idea what’s actually gone on as both are contradicting each other. I have decided to take both views with a pinch of salt and to keep calm and carry on. After all, I’m not going back until October, by which time it should all be sorted out, one way or the other. Carrying on would be a lot easier if my student lodgers weren’t such an unruly bunch at the moment. My life currently feels like I’m herding a bunch of blind, demented sheep.

“My life currently feels like I’m herding a bunch of blind, demented sheep”

Landlady Towers is at the moment billeting a very nice Spanish man, who is no trouble at all, although he has way too many pairs of pants to wash. The real trouble comes in the form of an Italian woman of my age, who constantly complains about stuff, like coffee and tea not being made with hot milk. “Do you know that this is actually the last thing on my mind!” I want to say to her frankly over-made-up face as I contemplate different ways of paying my tax bill. There are also two Tunisian girls staying for a couple of weeks. They are very young and very sweet, but since the first couple of days have failed to turn up for dinner on time, if at all. They must have taken a leaf out of the Italian lady’s book, because she is always at least an hour late for dinner, then complains that it – along with the milk in her tea – is not hot enough.

Even with four extra people in the house, I would have struggled to pay my tax bill, had I not recently been offered the opportunity of renting out my own room to an Austrian family for a couple of weeks. If it weren’t for the fact that it’s a family, it would hardly be worth it, but the money is eye-poppingly good. Even though I have to cook for them, have their screaming kids rushing all over my house and share a room with the heavy-breathing Small Daughter – who complains equally about my snoring – for a couple of weeks, it’ll be worth it.
The worst thing about all this is, that I shall have to wave goodbye to my beautiful en-suite for two weeks and queue for the disappointing ‘student bathroom’ along with the disgruntled Italian woman, giggling Tunisians and ‘Man of Many Pants’. I hope the Tax Man appreciates my efforts.

Illustration: Jake McDonald www.shakeyillustrations.blogspot.com