Sorry for the Inconvenience.

A big orange sign has gone up by the Los Chavos roundabout: 'Disculpa las molestias', it says. This means, more or less, 'Sorry for the inconvenience'.

It also means the road from Alhaurin to Coin is closed for major repairs. It's about time, the surface, particularly in front of the sad and empty Venta, has been leprous with potholes since before Andres moved to the mountains to die. The English expats are ecstatic: after years of cursing the terrible state of the road now they can wax vituperative on the 7- mile detour necessary to get to either town. For most of them the figure 7 is arbitrary. 'We never done metricals at school.' Just as well, since the diversion is actually 15 kilometres, around nine miles.

It is inconvenient, I suppose. The loudest complaints come from those who have retired. People with no timetable to stick to. My sympathy is for the few with a full time job. It won't last forever. The road is closed – except for residential access - for two weeks, they say. Even if that turns out to be a month, the diversions will only last a few days. Then the traffic lights will come in for some Anglo-Saxon treatment as one lane opens.

Me? I'm lazy, twenty hours a week max. I'll just leave early, and enjoy seeing parts of the area I haven't seen before. Life's too short to be Victor Meldrew.