OFF to sunny climes completely not expecting it to piss it down? These unfulfilling emergency pastimes will take your mind off knowing you could be in Britain for free.
Watch TV
There’s a big telly in your apartment you barely noticed when the sun was shining, but now it’s lamping it down stair rods you can resort to the great British pastime of vegetating in front of the box. Sadly for you, all the channels are f**king Greek and even the subtitles are incomprehensible squiggles. You stumble across a vaguely soft porn soap scene, but have to quickly turn off because you’ve got the kids with you. Bollocks.
Read a book
You’ve already finished the two paperbacks you paid a shitting fortune for at the airport on the way out, but good news is your hotel has a ‘book library’ comprised of novels others have either finished or stopped reading because they were shit. Unfortunately, none of the tatty selection of well-thumbed reads are in English so you find yourself trying to plough manfully through a copy of 100 Years of Solitude in Portuguese.
Sex
Theoretically brilliant. Shut the curtains, lock the door so the cleaner doesn’t stumble in, then hump passionately. Trouble is, your five-year-old and nine-year-old are in tow, so there’s f**k all chance. Make an excuse for needing a shower and knock out a rapid, guilty wank, while weighing the pros and cons of having children and discovering you’re really struggling to think of pros.
Sightseeing
The beach and pool are non-starters since it’s pissing down, so isn’t this the perfect opportunity to explore the local history and culture you’ve been avoiding while there were better things to do? That olive oil museum looked vaguely interesting, but it’s shut in the afternoons. Head for the obligatory ruined 15th century castle overlooking the bay, only to find it’s slippy as a post-coital willy underfoot now it’s wet, and there’s no f**king roof.
Souvenir shopping
It’s like a wet bank holiday in the Lake District out there, or to put a positive spin on it: an ideal chance to snap up those holiday keepsakes you neither want nor need. Emerge from your two-hour tour of the local tourist shops with three tea towels, a fridge magnet with a badly painted church on it, and a huge ceramic bowl with lemons on that you’ll never fit in your case and end up leaving behind. And that’s before the kids start draining your wallet on shite made from plastic.
Write postcards
You’re beyond scraping the bottom of the barrel now, but your super-organised partner has brought her address book with her, so this is feasible, hooray. Pass an hour writing lies about how much you’re enjoying yourself then pop them in the postbox to eventually arrive in the UK a month after you do. Oh, and Gemma walked out on Tom the day after you flew away, so now you’re in the shit for addressing one to the pair of them.
