This past weekend I heard this song, made famous by the inimatable Elvis Presley in 1960, and it lit up memories from the late 1960’s and 1970’s – when it was one of the many favourites of my sisters and it was the time when Elvis was bigger than any pop star existing today.

Today was a wonderful ‘WOOD DAY” – I’ve put that in all bold caps ‘cos it’s an important annual milestone in our life in the village and what we want to portray in this post is the love we have for our life here in Alekovo, Bulgaria – and the immense joy and pleasure that we get to experience and enjoy from seemingly small, often weird, and many times strangely domestic events or activities – and the wonderful people that have been inserted into our lives, of course.

Last week the wood supplier we have used for 2 years contacted us to say that he had Acacia wood in stock, gave us a price of 100 leva per cubic meter (which was a surprise as that was less than last year, and much less than firewood currently available locally) and that he could deliver (again, surprisingly) today, Monday – well after checking with Jane (of course) I jumped at the offer and we ordered 10 cubic meters – half of our annual need based on the past few years’ consumption.

Anyway, after a couple of false starts – the original plan was that he would meet me in the village centre at 11am, but he had lorry trouble and had to change down to a smaller 10 ton tipper truck, and then he had to go back to pick up the forestry ministry certificate – he eventually arrived in the village centre at just before 2pm. My good friend Momchil had arranged a couple of his mates to help unload the wood and stack it outside our main gate where it can sit and season until we are ready to cut it and store it in our woodshed. It took these three men – all of them at least 10 years younger than me, less than an hour to create the stack – then they wanted a quick look around our property!!

After our extremely helpful labourers had had some refreshments and then gone home, I sat down with a cup of tea and reflected on the day’s successes – and you would not believe it but on the BBC Radio 2 programme I was listening to, what did they play on their 60’s feature – blow me down it was Elvis Presley singing “I don’t have a wooden heart”!!

It is still a wonderful song – and elements of it certainly celebrate the enduring love I have for Jane, my darling sweetheart of over 50 years, wife of over 40 years and mother of our three amazing children, Ben, Toby and Ashleigh – why don’t you take a few minutes to enjoy it!