IT’S just after lunch here on the hottest lump of rock in the Balearics and my resting heart-rate has slowed to that of a docile crocodile.

It’s 30c /89f in the shade and I’m in a pool the colour of toothpaste blue. Floating on a lilo and fully-buttered in Factor 50 Piz Buin.

Sashaying palm trees and spaghetti string bikinis...all modes set to ‘chill.’ But the English don’t have a word for Siesta, do they?

Because a back-to-front cap-wearing Rotherham Dad with no discernible neck and a torso like an advert for a bad tattoo parlour, then thrashes and beats his way into the shallow end with all the grace of a blind, wounded cow being chased into Morecambe Bay.

Closely followed by four spikey-haired stepsons who conspire to orchestrate the most vicious game of ‘fist football’ I have ever witnessed.

It was like watching Rottweilers discover water and balls for the first time.

Four Star Hotel, they said. Or is it Five Chav Hotel? We’ll soon see.

Will I survive 10 days in Majorca without windmilling at least one of them? Keep reading.

But sunshine does strange things to the British and I have sufficient self-awareness to realise that my serotonin levels are not yet fully charged.

Because of the job I do and the sights I've seen, I operate in a near-permanent state of misanthropy.

And the flooded English brain can’t cope with a 12-hour sunshine injection in one day.

First Day Craziness was everywhere, you could smell it. Even on us.

We’re from the Lake District. We’ve learned to exist on 12 hours of sun every three months. What’s 10 days going to do to us?

The first day, in my mind, was about securing base camp...dumping the cases then immediately getting shot of the kids so we could high-tail a fast black to the nearest bar where I’d pick out the two best beach-side stools in the house from which to sip Damme Cold Coors and people-watch...

The Madre Superior, it seems, had other ideas.

She wanted a slow and methodical unpacking of every case and all items of hand luggage, then a hot sandy slog to the faraway ‘Supermercat’ in the aggressive afternoon sun for a full-on ‘two trolley’ big shop and pool toys for the kids.

This, I feared, would inevitably lead to her interrogating non-English speaking retail staff on the appropriate sea-worthiness of every inflatable they have on public display.

For dessert? The formal Welcome Meeting, a full orientation tour of the hotel, then bed. #breakingthelaw #breakingthelaw!

Or!” I said, sarcastically. “We could all just go up on the roof now and jump off?”

Her eyes, usually blue and beautiful, narrowed to lizard slits. This happens during tiredness but sometimes she deploys them during one of my ‘episodes’.

Thankfully, I had a Get Out Of Hell Free card. Because this column waits for no man.

The Editor wanted me to write a column from Majorca….and this might be the time to abandon them and get it done...

So I slinked off to “Cockteleria Honolulu” - a bar recommended to me by The Man Sat Next To Me On The Plane who whispered conspiratorially, to: “Ask for Toni...”

Stay tuned for next week’s postcard…