The thing about waking up at five o'clock in the morning to be at the pool by six o'clock on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays is that you wake up at five o'clock on all the other days as well.
Today was one of those 'other days' when I sat by the early-morning fire reading "Arabian Sands". I heard a car and saw the postman heave a big parcel over the gate. A sign that my new RIVERBEND sign had arrived!
By the time I had brought the new sign back to the house, the fire had gone out and the cold started to creep back in. "Let's go to the warm-water pool to warm up!" I called out to Padma. When we arrived there, the old crew - 'old' in both senses of the word - had already left, and I found myself the oldest man in the pool. I was also the only man in the pool as I was outnumbered by women whose age I could only guess.
Two hours of warming up was enough hydrotherapy for us, and I'm back at "Riverbend" now and tinkering with the new sign. I'll spend the whole morning pre-coating it, then spraying it in a navy-blue colour, before screwing it to the retaining wall by the jetty. It's still a work in progress!
P.S. (four hours later) Are we there yet? Just a bit of paint work to fix!
