Such tourists

 "That's Africa over there," pointed out my wife, as we sipped gin on our balcony whilst we sailed away from our final port. At that point, I realised I may actually be middle class. Rest assured, first day back and I've just picked up a four-pack of Carlsberg from our local Londis. But, for the past two weeks I've been winging it well enough, I reckon, wearing my tux more than I ever have done, eating the fine foods. I even washed my hair every day and only swore once at an old person who didn't know how to queue. 

We've just returned from our two weeks away on a cruise. I'm not a holiday sort of person, so two weeks away at sea, with limited internet (sometimes two days totally off-grid), away from my dog, who is my favourite thing in the whole world, away from...well, drums...on a beautiful cruise ship with amazing restaurants, top class entertainment but could easily be considered a 'floating prison' if you see it that way...I wasn't really looking forward to it. But I agreed to for Aggie, my wife, because she's had a gruelling first year as headteacher and I've never seen anyone need a break as much as she did. 

I got into it. I spent the first two days worried about Freddie dog, with no need - he was staying with our friends who have looked after him many times before and treat him like a king (even though they had to take him to the vets when he hurt his paw). I was worried about the house, with no need as Aggie's mum popped in every day to feed the cats and water the plants, and I'd just installed a new security doorbell...plus we live in a nice area with neighbours who spend a lot of time on their driveways, it was and always will be fine. I spent a bit of time worried about missing out on the outside world. Turns out, when I did get back online, I missed very little apart from a few nice gig offers abroad.

By day three I settled into a routine of wake up, breakfast, write for four hours on the balcony, lunch, read by the pool, dinner, watch a show, drinks and card games. Not bad really, is it? That was on 'sea days', but we also stopped off at six ports: Cadiz, Mallorca, Cagliari, Ibiza (weirdly, my favourite), Cartagena and Gibraltar. 

I wrote four episodes of a radio sitcom over the two weeks and I honestly feel they're the best things I've ever written. Maybe being offline and drinking hefty amounts of whiskey was good for my creativity after all?

Nice to be back, though. Edinburgh in a couple days.