The times, are they a-changing?

St Jérôme
Yesterday's weather: cool, sun am, rain pm!

Reflecting on yesterday's blog had me remembering that some years ago I read Claude Michelet's excellent trilogy (forgive me if I have them in the wrong order) Firelight and Woodsmoke, The Scent of Herbs and Applewood (in French they are: Des Grives aux loups, Les palombes ne passeront plus and L'appel des engoulevents).

These stories are set in the Corrèze, a neighbouring department to our own and tell the history of a farming community from the early 1900s until the period just after the Algerian War (sorry, the French never admitted a war, they were événements). There is a fourth volume published some 10 years ago but it was never translated into English and I haven't yet given myself the time to read this book which brings the story up to the 1990s. I loved these stories for an easily-readable history of 20th century France but also for the insight into farming methods and the problems faced by rural communities.

It seems to me that things in France have changed much less than in the UK. Here in the South West, and also in Central France, there are communities of small farms. On one side of us we have a cattle farm; beautiful chestnut coloured Limousin cattle graze on the slopes of our hillside and wake us each morning honking their loud moos across the valley. Monsieur D has around 30 of these beasts and cares for them well, visiting them by car if he can't see them from his house to count them and make sure they are all well. Obviously they are very valuable to him and are his main source of income. He has a smaller field with what we refer to as his 'house cows', half a dozen or so cattle of mixed colour and race who live in the field adjacent to his home. Monsieur D supplements his income by acting as the local insurance agent for one of France's bigger insurance suppliers.

On the other side we have Monsieur C who farms sheep with his family. Monsieur C lives alone and only occasionally do we see his sheep who are moved on a regular basis from his farm to his family's farm on the hills behind us. There is another sheep farm across the valley from us and it is quite an occasion when it is time to move the sheep from one pasture to the next.

Two cars, another four men on foot and a couple of dogs (who seem to be quite useless) ferry the sheep along the lane, across the busy road (stopping all traffic first and making themselves unpopular) and off into the distance. Last week we were amazed that this was happening at dusk. We could hear it all in the distance sheep bleating to each other and bells jangling along but couldn't see anything and I wondered what would have happened if one sheep had wandered off during the process.

Another farm visible from our garden is, we have recently learned, a duck farm - not foie gras. Here there are two enormous metal barns closed during the day but often open at night with lights on. Our young neighbour complained that from time to time there would be the most abominable smell wafting into her house from the duck farm. We don't want to know the details.

There is little arable farming here but we do have a field of maize along the track which has just been harvested and there are other maize fields around and very few sunflower fields. Tobacco is also grown here and driving along the Dordogne valley a few weeks ago we saw the huge wooden drying barns full of leaves hanging to dry in the late summer warmth.

And now it is time for the walnut harvest. Walnuts are one of the Dordognes bigger industries, walnut oil, wine and cakes are sold in all the tourist locations and, although not as large as their Californian cousins, they are very tasty. Our own few trees have already yielded several kilos of walnuts and there are many more to drop yet. The biggest tree has, unfortunately, the smallest nuts and only one seems to give us nuts of a decent size, but the small nuts from tree number one are just delicious.

Well, today the sun is out and it's lovely and warm. Jon is picking lavender and I'm going to hobble over and see how many more walnuts I can find. Then I will need to find a use for them all.

Dogs, guns and battles.

St Michel
Yesterday's weather: sunny 20 deg.

I've just had to call the cats in. Luckily Jazz was already here, having been out all night, otherwise I would be getting frantic by now.

The posse of white vans and Landrovers has just driven up and there are dogs in our field dressed in the obligatory bright orange scarves. I think someone has been tipped off about the wild boar turning over our land the other night and they have come in search of some sport.

Figaro, who thinks he is also a dog, is quite keen to get out there and play with the other dogs but I have restrained him and he is now in the kitchen sulking. I hope the hunters soon become dispirited and go on their way. I loathe seeing guns right outside my door.

- - -

There was a report on Radio 4 this morning regarding Nicholas Sarkozy's intended reform of the EU Common Agricultural Policy. The report came from our local town, Cahors and interviewees included a local lamb farmer who explained that it costs more to raise a lamb than is recuperated in its sale. These people want reforms. Another, a wanabee young farmer, explained that many young people would love to farm but old farmers who are past retirement age receive more in CAP subsidies than they would from a pension. This young person also wants reforms but, it seems, older French farmers don't want any CAP reforms.

Also this week was a report on the BBC about Mr Sarkozy's reforms regarding the accessibility to the French health system for non-working immigrants. This has caused all sorts of worries for people who have taken early retirement to France and who will now have to fund private health insurance until they reach their pensionable age in the UK (i.e. 65).

It seems to me that France's 'New Broom' is going to have a few battles on his hands.

Passing the time (Passing = 7 letters, 10 points, plus 50 for a bingo plus ...)

St Venceslas
Yesterday's weather: Wet morning, dry afternoon

Still laid up, I have been trying to find things to do but find that my attention span isn't very long. It is so frustrating, I'm fit and well apart from my foot but I can't get around and I'm under orders to keep my foot raised as much as possible. I have crocheted, read six books in 2 weeks, Sudoku'd and caught up on my e-mails and letters.

Someone recently (you know how you are!) introduced me to Facebook, an on-line community where you can catch up with old friends, colleagues and family members. He introduced me to this with the purpose of playing on-line Scrabble.

My vocabulary is growing daily. I am learning all sorts of ways to use the letter Q, Z and J to gain the maximum points. I don't know that the word MUZJIKS is one that I will use on a daily basis, but I'd love to get it on a triple word - 287 points in one hit (79 for the word, three times plus 50 for a Bingo)! It's something I will aspire to. Two letter words are very useful and it's almost worth compiling a little list or learning them all. There are, apparently, 94.

I am a bit of a stickler when it comes to spelling and grammar (I'm sure there have been errors in my blog for which I am deeply ashamed), and would never normally use the Americanization (note the Z) of putting -IZE at the end of a word when in English is it -ISE (realise/realize organise/organize). However, it is accepted on the Scabulous program (I really believe that ought to be 'programme') and if it's on a triple - well, sorry but I'm going to use it. My sister has refused to play me any more in disgust at my acceptance of the American Z so I'm running out of competitors. Apparently there is another program(me) where you can compete with strangers over the internet. I'm resisting the temptation.

For now.

Enter the confessional (Part 2)

St Vincent:
Yesterday's weather: Miserable but not too much rain.

I am proud to admit that I have never watched more than the occasional, accidental five minutes of Eastenders. I have never, ever, watched Coronation Street or Holyoaks and haven't watched Emmerdale since Amos Brierly was running the Woolpack and Annie Sugden was ruling the roost on the farm. That was when I was home feeding twin babies at lunch times and was a captive audience.

I admit to a couple of years of Neighbours; at lunch time after playschool, it sent the youngest to sleep. Kylie and Jason were the stars and Mrs Mangle was the local busybody. I liked Mike, especially when he went on to star in Priscilla, Queen of the Desert.

Now we have become accustomed to turning on Radio 4 at 7 pm local time, 6 pm English time. We listen to the news followed by the 'funny' at 6.30. The confession is that the 'funny' is always followed by The Archers, and I fear I may be falling into a trap here. The current storylines are driving me mad so I hope I will be able to get out of this addiction before it is too late.

Apparently Radio 4 is about to be challenged by Channel 4 Radio, known as 4 Radio (confusing, eh?). 4 Radio is an internet only radio station at the moment and to be honest everything on there at the moment is very out of date. Channel 4 have now been given a group of digital licences and plan to launch their rival station to Radio 4 this autumn. There is no indication yet as to the sort of programmes they will be playing on this all-talk station yet but I doubt they could attract stalwart listeners away from the Today programme (John Humphries being argumentative), Desert Island Discs (Kirsty Young somehow doesn't do it as well as Sue Lawley) or my favourite funnies - Just a Minute (how old exactly IS Nicholas Parsons?), I'm Sorry I haven't a Clue, The News Quiz; or, indeed The Archers.

Based on their experience with Brookside, they could have a Liverpool version of the Archers - but I won't fall into any Boris Johnson type traps and suggest a storyline.

Getting in a pickle

St Damien
Yesterday's weather: Not much to write home about.

The weather is awful today, my foot still has stitches so it seems like a good day to make chutney.

An excess of cherry tomatoes and piles of figs should make for an interesting concoction I think. I would love to recreate one of my favourites, Sainsbury's tomato and chilli relish. I haven't seen anything like it here and it goes very well in a toasted cheese sarnie. My mouth is watering at the thought.

The chillies we have grown were labelled 'Java - Indonesian chillies'. That should have given us a clue about how hot they are. I won't repeat here what Jon said when he tried just the tip of one of them, for fear that young children may be reading this. I think 'Krakatoa' might give you a clue anyway, and the steam coming out of his ears matched any Tom and Jerry cartoon! We'll probably only need one or two for 2 kilos of chutney. I'll let you know how it does, since I don't have a recipe and will be making this one up.

I've found a collection of recipes for fig jam and fig chutney. I've also learned that you can wash them and put them in polythene bags in the freezer and just use them as they come out. The only thing is that with the number of figs we've got I might have to order a second freezer!

Who got all the talent then?

St Hermann
Yesterday's weather: Lovely

HAPPY BIRTHDAY to:
Catherine Zeta Jones
Michael Douglas
Felicity Kendall
William Faulkner
Sir Colin Davis
Declan Donnelly (of Ant and Dec) (?)
Will Smith
The late Christopher Reeve, Glenn Gould, Ronnie Barker, Dmitri Dmitriyevich Shostakovich, Mark Rothko

AND ME!

I'm in good company, aren't I?

I would love the musical talents of Shostakovich, Glenn Gould and the wonderful Sir Colin Davis, the looks of Catherine Zeta Jones and Felicity Kendall, the writing talent of William Faulkner and the humour of Ronnie Barker and I would like to paint better than Rothko who I never could understand.

So, we share with St Hermann. It brought to mind Herman' Hermits a 1960s pop group who I loved at the time. Peter Noone was the lead singer and very good looking too. That leads on to a 'whatever happened to ...?'. You can find out on Wikipedia if you are that interested. Annoyingly I will probably be humming 'Mrs Brown you've got a lovely daughter' all day now.

I've been keeping an eye on the weather as usual and I am extremely disconcerted to see that Mr Meteo is forecasting WHITE STUFF for the Aveyron region on Thursday. The Aveyron is not so very far from us and looking at this morning's lovely sunshine and warmth I find that very difficult to imagine. I can't remember ever seeing snow in September before. Please let them be wrong!

I've rambled a bit today, haven't I? You'll have to put that down to my advanced age.

Another unwelcome visitor

St Thècle

Yesterday's weather: Mild and mixed

Jon went out this morning for his usual wander round the garden before breakfast, just to see if anything happened overnight.

It never does, but you have to look, don't you?

Until today.

Yesterday, this was a nice green piece of, well, if not lawn then at least it was green and flat. This morning we found this.

There's only one thing that would have done this much damage. We have been visited by a sanglier, a wild boar. It was Sunday yesterday and we did hear the distant sound of Frenchmen participating in their favourite weekend sport, la chasse. Maybe they just flushed this one out yesterday and in our direction. We are quite relieved that we didn't get around to making anything of this part of the garden this year. Next year there will be a swimming pool there, terracing and, it is planned, a nice herbacious border. I don't know whether the boar would dig up a planted garden, I suppose it depends on the plants and their density. I think I'll need to do a bit of research on this one.

Wiki What?

St Constant
Yesterday's weather: dull but dry and warm

I was about do search on Google this morning when I discovered a new (to me anyway) item on my home page: wikiHow. This 'collaborative writing project' is asking people to contribute their know-how on all manner of different subjects from craft to philosophy and religion to home matters, relationships and so on.

I thought I'd have a browse, well, it kills time you know. I found all sorts of 'interesting' things. How to make a denim handbag for example and denim socks - very useful if you have lots of pairs of jeans that no longer fit. Ahem.

On the same page as 'How to shave your legs if you're a guy' and 'How to shave your mustache (sp) if you're a girl' is 'How to give yourself a Brazilian Wax'. I assume this page is for masochists. As someone once said to me; 'No-one is going near MY fanny with hot wax!' Including myself.

In the 'Cars and other vehicles' category is an item on 'How to identify a car'. Now call me dumb but isn't a car a box with a wheel in each corner and an engine?

There are very practical articles on life skills, parenting and relationships, organising a wedding, understanding religions, the list is endless and I am sure will grow as other people discover this project. Naturally, something that is open to contributions from anyone and anywhere will attract some oddballs too. I found 'How to take over the world (Plan A)' - this one apparently requires editing, 'How to survive a night being arrested and in the precinct' ('Excuse me, Officer, while I just check out how to cope with this on wikiHow)'; 'How to appreciate William Jefferson Clinton' (?). Added to this are a list of requested 'How to' to be written. I would dearly love to answer one of these so I trawled down the list of pet requests looking for a nice easy one to answer. However I think I know which I want to write, it would be fun trying no matter what.

'How to train a walrus'

The mind boggles.

Whose breakdown is it anyway?

St Maurice
Yesterday's weather: Perfect for sitting in a friend's garden, eating their food and drinking their wine. Very nice indeed.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY ROBBIE! xxx

We did indeed have lunch out with friends yesterday. Their garden is right in the middle of vineyards full of ripe grapes ready for making the rich dark wine of the local area. Cahors wine is also known as the black wine because of it's very dark colour. It is probably still a little known wine much outside of the region and although some UK supermarkets do sell it in its general form, there are very few Chateau labelled Cahors wines for sale in the UK.

Wildlife is very different around the vineyards of the Lot Valley. They have a completely different range of birds to our collection here on the borders of the Causse and Bouraine where the landscape is to one side forest and to the other, limestone escarpments, so it makes a nice change of scenery too.

As we went to take our leave there was the usual flurry of questions concerning Millie Méhari, looking her over, asking about the odd gear change and 'umbrella' hand brake. They are collectors vehicles and so we are used to people wanting to look her over and sit in to try her out. People even give us a wave as we drive past in her!

Unfortunately Millie was unimpressed with the attention, had a sulk and refused point blank to start. The battery was working but she would not turn her engine over. We tried push starting. No luck.

She has done this before, the little minx. So we weren't too concerned at first. Often she just needs to stop and think about her sulkiness for a while and then decides that she really would like to go for a run and will start without any fuss.

It appeared not this time. She was out for the full blown, teddy in the corner sulk.

Jon asked me to phone the breakdown service. They couldn't find any record of his policy which was rather worrying but luckily they did find mine. The very nice young man left me hanging on while he located and called a local garage.

'They'll be there in 35 minutes' he said.

We wandered back to Millie who had been sitting in a bus stop around the corner, clambered in and Jon tried just one more turn of the key. I hate Millie. She started first time.

Back to the friends, phone the breakdown service again, apologise profusely and come back home.

She is definitely going back to the garage next week for a bit of anger management therapy.

Unwanted guests

St Matthieu
Yesterday's weather: Still basking in the sun.

We share our house and land with all sorts of creatures. You may have already met the deer in an earlier post. We watched two young ones, this years' babies we think, practicing their rutting skills yesterday evening. They met head to head and then, unsure what to do next, they frolicked like a couple of little lambs, stopped, looked at each other as if to say (in Tellytubby voices, please)

'Again! Again!'

There are the red squirrels who are feasting on the walnuts as I write this. Only one of the walnut trees has nuts of a good size, that is their favourite, of course. Dozens of birds of various types.

Inside the house apart from us and the cats of course are things I don't like. Spiders of all shapes and sizes, and a ghastly looking creature (can't load the picture for you so the squeamish are let off for today)!

He is a house centipede and I can't stand the creatures. They can be as big as about 3 - 4 inches long (including all the hairy bits) and are usually seen at night rushing around the walls as soon as they realise they have been spotted. They look like a small broom! There is usually one in the bedroom, although Jon found three the other night when I complained about just one. They feed on spiders, flies and other nasty house creatures so I know I should love them really, but am terrified in case one wanders over my face in the night - very unlikely, I am told.

I don't know of any way to deter them. I wonder if they are, perhaps, repelled by lavender or something else I like - if anyone out there knows, do tell please!

St Davy, Montcuq*

St Davy
Yesterday's weather: sunny, reasonable 18 degrees.
* All will be revealed

I've been trying to find out the origin of the French St Davy, and can't locate anything. I tried a search on French websites but there's nothing coming up. Why would the French use the diminutive form? I think I may have come up with an answer. Do you remember The Monkees? Davy Jones, he was quite small, I don't know how big they were in France, but maybe they have nominated him a diminutive, living saint. He was always my favourite Monkee anyway.

Whilst searching for information on St Davy I found on the Orange France website an article relating to a local village so I thought I'd spend a few minutes introducing you to French humour. It is fairly well know that the French love slapstick. Benny Hill is still a big hero here - there are hundreds of sites where you can download the theme tune to use as your ring tone. Luckily I haven't heard it anywhere yet. They also embrace Eddie Izzard but I don't know whether it's his dress sense they like or the humour itself.

Some years ago now, a television series called Le Petit Rapporteur, an irreverent look at news stories, did an article on a small village in the Lot called Montcuq. Twenty years later, in recognition of the boom in tourism created by this programme, Montcuq named one of it's roads rue du Petit Rapporteur. Now, isn't that nice?

Locals pronounce the final 'q' in the name Montcuq but normally in French the final consonant is not pronounced. Thus Montcuq would be pronouced 'mon coo' or to the French 'mon cul' meaning 'my arse'.

The reporter began his report by announcing:

'Aujourd'hui, pour la première fois à la télévision, je vais vous montrer Montcuq' (Today for the first time on television, I am going to show you my a**e').

It went downhill from there:

'I have the impression that my a*s* is very narrow, does it often become blocked?' He asked of the narrow streets.

'I believe you can get here by bus, but I've never seen the terminus of my a*s*'.

Continuing with refrerences to the 'pure, clean air of my a*s*', he was followed around by locals reminding him that the 'q' is not silent (unlike the p in bath - think about it).

Nowadays the village thanks him for the notoriety he gave, there are postcards on sale with pictures of scantily clad (female) behinds promising 'lovely kisses from Montcuq'.... Dear me.

Toilet humour lives on, thanks to the renaming of one street in this very pretty Lotois village!

Anyone for rugby?

Ste Emilie

Yesterday's weather: Cooler, mixed sun and cloud

I'm not a great sports fan as anyone who knows me well will testify, but I do love a World Cup. Bring on a few underdogs who somehow have managed to get through to the finals and I'm there waiting for them to be thrashed by the best.

I don't actually enjoy seeing these teams humiliated, it's just that there is this inevitability about it. Take poor old Namibia - beaten by Ireland the other day and thrashed well and truly by France this week, they are bottom of their group with 'nul points'. Gerogia aren't faring much better but France, host and favourite are only in the middle of their group and need to do so much better to get through to the quarter finals.

We live in Rugby country here mid-way between Brive and Montauban but it has been strangely quiet so far. There are a few flags out in Cahors, some of the shops have 'World Cup' displays but there has been a bit of a hush so far. Just wait and see if France get any further in the tournament, then there will be a big noise.

However, if they don't the French team can surely take comfort from the success of their annual calendar, the 2008 version of which was on sale in our local bookshop just last week.

Here's a taster from the 2007 edition:

Unfortunately the 2008 one was still under shrink wrap but I think I should add it to my Christmas list. It must be better than the offerings from the local firemen and postman - actually my postman had better not pose for his, it would make everyone refuse to buy it!

Global communism?

Ste Nadège
Yesterday's weather: Started well, then a terrific thunderstorm lasted for ages. Nice and warm though!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ROLF!

The wireless do-dah on my laptop has given up the ghost. I've no idea why, I've reinstalled everything I could and it still won't work. Luckily it still works on my desktop PC otherwise I wouldn't be able to blog at all.

Much as I curse Mr Gates from time to time (admittedly less now that I am not using Word on a daily basis), I am not entirely convinced about the Brussels ruling yesterday that Microsoft should share secrets about their operating system with rival companies. It seems to me that this is totally against the concept of patenting a product. If all companies were made to share the secrets of the operation of their major products where would that leave business?

Copies of all sorts of things would be made cheaply (probably in China, thus boosting their rising dominance in production even futher). People could make anything they wanted to without fear of contravening trade marks or patents.

My first thought was 'sour grapes' - just because it's an American product and has made several people extremely wealthy.

My second thought was that it smacks of global communism. All shall be equal.

Or do I mean 'Animal Farm'?

Reading matters (no, not the town!)

St Renaud
Yesterday's weather: glorious.

How to amuse oneself when one's foot must be raised all day long?

Reading? Yup finished two books and I'm currently working my way through Memoirs of a Geisha by William Golden. I've been putting it off for ages thinking that I would read it when I could devote some time to concentrate on it. It's lovely, I'm really enjoying it. But where do I go from here? I have James Clavell's Tai Pan on the bookshelf if I want to stay in the Far East, or should I go for next month's book club read Pirate Hunter which is the biography of Captain Kidd. That looks like a long and heavy read so I could get a start on it. Or I could continue with the Jean-Paul Sartre trilogy that I started some years ago - I did pick up the second book but never actually got very far with it. I've also got Daphne du Maurier's Rebecca staring me in the face and several of the last few years' 'big readers', Labyrinth, The Time-Traveller's Wife and Paul Auster's New York Trilogy. I think that's why I enjoy the reading group I joined, they tell you that you have to read a particular book at a particular time and you just get on with it.

I love reading and have collected lots of books over the last few years to save up for such a time as this. I still keep going to Amazon for new ones even though I haven't finished this pile yet! I really should go to Book-Buyers Anonymous or something. Jon seems to think I should anyway. We are planning a trip to the UK later this year, beware Waterstones in Guildford (all three branches) me and my credit card are heading your way!

- - -

Unfortunately the tiramisu is still in the fridge. Our friends weren't able to make it for lunch after all as their car has broken down. A bit like me. I'm hoping that things don't come in threes and there isn't another piece of bad luck on the horizon.

The finished article

St Edith

Yesterday's weather: Gorgeous again!

Since I've been banging on for weeks, nay months, about the blasted chalet I thought you might like to see the finished article.

7 weeks to deliver, plus another two and a half weeks for the floor to arrive. Three days to erect. A couple of days to tidy the outside, build the steps and paint it. Finally we have our little garden room. Actually it is quite a big garden room. At present in there we have a double bed, chest of drawers, side table, bedside table and there is still room to swing a cat (no I haven't tried it - yet).

What it doesn't have yet is a name. It may be called Les Pommiers as it sits between two apple trees but it will probably change with the wind.


So the last week has been quite a week. Chalet built, windows installed, seven stitches in my foot. I'm looking forward to a quiet week this week. Whatever will I find to blog about each day? Especially as I can't get out until the stitches are out. Ah, well, I'm sure the muse will attack me each morning. You'll just have to come back to see!

Beware, low fliers

St Roland
Yesterday's weather: More lovely sun, 25 degrees.

One of the things that has been missing this summer, probably due to the awful and unpredictable weather is the French airforce doing their low flying practice overhead. They are usually around on a clear day (of which there have been all too few this summer). They come out to play in the late morning or during the afternoon. You usually can't hear them coming until they are immediately overhead, unless they are more than three kilometres to the south or north of us. Now that we have had a spell of lovely clear and sunny weather they have come out to play again.

The other day we happened to be on the patio when two passed over just to the south, followed by another a minute later who was immediately overhead. We are always surprised that the cats don't run and hide when this happens as we once had a cat who would hide from microlights and hot air balloons which passed along the Tillingbourne Valley on a regular basis.

The pilot who was lagging behind the other two obviously had a bit of a sense of humour and must have spotted us watching him as he sneaked up on us a minute or so later coming even lower and directly overhead, taking us by surprise again. We had this happen once before when staying at a friends house not 30 kilometres from here. There was a pair of jets who passed low over the house when we were outside and quite exposed, we jumped out of our skins. They banked around and came back. Twice. Catching us completely unawares each time as we hadn't heard their approach. It made us wonder if they were using us as a sort of unarmed target practice.

I hate the idea of combat, wars and the damage these aircraft and their weapons can inflict, but I admit that I find them totally impressive and have to go and look whenever we hear them pass. The nerves of steel these pilots must have to fly so low and so fast is just incredible. Stress-free work? Not a bit of it.

Je suis blessée

St Materne
Yesterday's weather: Just grand. 28 degrees

For non-French speakers, the title does not mean 'I am blessed', I only wish it did. No, the verb blesser means 'to wound', thus: I am wounded.

Jon says I like to try things out, the Préfecture (local government offices), the tax office, you get my drift, and he says I must have planned yesterday to try out the health service. I assure you I planned nothing.

We had a great day, enjoyed a lovely lunch out in Cahors and found some more corners of that town that we hadn't discovered before. We did a bit of shopping and returned home. The weather was amazing, 28 degrees in the garden here and just a hint of a breeze. However, we are (were) expecting friends for lunch today so I took my sisters famous recipe for tiramisu and assembled today's dessert.

Looking for space in the fridge and finding none since I had just filled it up again, I decided to put the dessert in the overspill fridge in the garage. On the way my flipflop caught on the bottom stone step to the garage and (and I can remember this as if in slow motion) I tripped, panicked that I would drop the tiramisu and (I really don't know how) managed to save it.

If, as I know many of you do, you are reading this whilst having your breakfast (or any other meal), you may like to delay until you have finished eating. Likewise if you are of a squeamish nature or at all sensitive, look away now and come back tomorrow.

Somehow in the rescue of the blasted tiramisu (I don't know if I will ever eat one again), I managed to cut the underside of my big toe very deeply. I struggled from the step and collapsed onto the grass shouting for Jon who was way over the other side to come and help me. I realised immediately that there was a lot of blood and it wasn't a very pleasant injury, so it was off to the hospital emergency room.

At this point in time I would like to point out to my sister that it had not yet reached aperitif hour - not far from it mind, but I hadn't touched a drop.

We arrived at the local hospital and found the emergency room. I rang the doorbell and a young lady came to see me, ushered me immediately into a treatment room and started cleaning the wound. Now, if this had been The Royal Surrey County Hospital in Guildford I would have been looked up and down a few times, told to wait in a queue and (at seven in the evening) been informed that the waiting time was 4 hours, if I wanted to bother waiting. Here in France I was already being cleaned up and treated like a human being instead of a number.

Within 10 minutes a very nice doctor came to look at me, collected up a kit of nasty looking implements and told me to turn onto my tummy so that he could look at my foot better. I anticipated what was coming next - it would be a needle. This time he spoke to me in English, obviously thinking that I would understand the word 'painful' more than the word 'douleureuse'.

'Eet will be a leetle painfool' he assured (?) me. 'Don't move the foot'.

Don't move the foot? You're kidding, mate. The needle hit me and I flinched. He held my foot steady and tried again. After a couple more prods he announced 'Eet is not painfool any more'. Yeah, right.

He gave five minutes for the anasthetic to work and started work on the stitches. The first three were fine, couldn't feel a thing. The next one was different. As I climbed down from the ceiling he said 'Eet is painfool?' No, no, I just like visiting ceilings, I thought to myself. The fifth stitch was worse.

'Just one more,' he said 'or maybe two'

'Make it one.' I thought. It was two. Because of the angle of the cut, the anaesthetic had only taken on half of my toe, he explained. Thanks for telling me, but I think I had already noticed that!

He gave me a prescription for three different types of pill, antibiotic, anti-inflammatory and anti-pain (give me double of those, please) and told me to pay him a visit again this morning. I'll be taking double pain killers before I let him near me again, I can assure you.

So, I'm postponing todays lunch until tonight or tomorrow, if I can get hold of the friends who are coming. They weren't home last night when I phoned. Poor Jon will be doing all the housework and cooking until I can get around without flinching again, probably a couple of weeks.

Luckily he is an excellent cook and probably much better at housework than me.

So maybe I am blessed after all.

I can see clearly now

Ste Aimé
Yesterday’s weather: Still lovely

Two men and a van turned up yesterday morning. We were surprised really because they had told us they were coming and we aren’t used to people turning up when they say they will. More often than not they will arrive a week, two weeks or even six weeks later than expected.

They backed their van into our garden (it was a tight squeeze), shook hands (carefully in one case as his finger was bandaged in the manner of a cartoon character from the Beano) and promptly ripped out all the windows.

We were still amazed at their arrival and retreated to the chalet where I varnished and Jon worked on the steps.

By lunchtime we had new windows everywhere, fly screens (how I wish we had had those in June) and a hole where the back door should be. They left for lunch and returned less than an hour later. Now I was beginning to wonder if these were real French workmen or had been imported from outer space. We retreated to the chalet again.

At three-thirty we were called back to the house for an inspection followed by the completion of their satisfaction survey (Were we satisfied? Yes, we were) and to write a cheque for the amount one would expect to pay for one or two double glazed, high specification windows in the UK – we had five and a door.

We are so happy with our new windows. I couldn’t hear any traffic in the night (that is, the two lorries who pass along the road at 5am). There is no condensation anywhere in the house this morning. The back door opens and closes without having to force it open the last quarter and the kitchen window either tilts or opens which will be very useful in the winter.

The cats are confused (always a funny sight). The main kitchen door is now glass from top to bottom so they can see in from the garden. Misty finds this particularly puzzling and even when we open the door just enough for her to squeeze through she still thinks she should be able to walk through the glass. This morning I have had the three of them take it in turns to come up to the door, try to walk through, wait for me to open the door, come in, wait for me to shut the door again and then try to walk out through the glass once more.

This is amusing for the first couple of times but it soon wears thin. I am now considering getting a baby gate to stop them from scratching on the glass all the time. However I’m sure they will soon get used to it when I refuse to open the door for them every time.

No blog

St Appolinaire
Yesterday's weather: Beautiful

HAPPY BIRTHDAY DANI!!!!!

Builders moving in today, can't stop to blog, I'll catch up later.

Money, money, money

St Adelphe
Yesterday's weather: beautiful

Venus is still with us. I can see it shining brightly in the morning sky, just before the sun comes up. It is rising higher in the sky each day now and will soon be out of the view from our bedroom window. There will be a new moon tonight and we are heading for the equinox (there's a good word to get in Scrabble!) on 23 September - after that it's downhill all the way until Christmas.

We have been summoned to the bank this morning following a telephone call from Madame Prim our advisor. She is a very nice young lady but wants to control our money for us, we have to be firm with her. The reason we are going today is that the bank finally accept that we are resident in France as we have been here for more than 6 months. This will mean setting up a new account (so far we have had a 'non-resident' account and our old English address on our cheque book), new cheque cards and probably more fees! Unlike banking in the UK it is the norm here to pay a monthly 'management' fee to banks, it is less than 4 Euros a month, but it still galls me to have to pay it. We also have to pay an annual fee for the privilege of having debit cards. We haven't bothered with credit cards here because we don't want them to have any more of our money!

Barclays are upsetting the major French banks by offering a 10% interest on current accounts (if I have read the blurb correctly). However, looking into the possibility of changing banks, I see that their monthly fee is 15 Euros! We will stay with Madame Prim - for now anyway.

So I had better look out some smartish clothes this morning, I can't be going to the bank in my usual cut off jeans and tatty t-shirt now, can I? And I suppose I had better brush my hair too.

We had a surprise visitor yesterday afternoon. The grandfather of Swanne (and husband of Mrs Veranda, her of the flapping tea towel) appeared at our gate bearing a bunch of dahlias and a big bag of tomatoes. How very kind of him to take the trouble to come wandering across the valley bearing gifts, I thought. Jon thought that perhaps he just wanted to escape Mrs Veranda for half an hour or so. Cynical? Jon? Never ... ;-)

Harvesting and mites

Ste Inès
Yesterday's weather: Gorgeous

There's a bright golden haze on the meadow.

Oh, what a beautiful morning. The corn is even as high as an elephant's eye - so how about that? I could go on singing around the house and every word would be true. Thanks Mr Rogers and Mr Hammerstein!

Monday morning and we're not at work. Well, not in an office. Jon is busy hammering in the garden again adding the finishing touches to the chalet (piccie to follow as soon as it's all tidy) and I'm doing the housework to the sound of Terry Wogan on the radio. Ho, hum. What a life.

We're picking figs from the tree outside the kitchen window as soon as they are ripe to avoid a nasty sludge on the ground when they drop, there are walnuts galore (when the animals don't get them first), the courgettes are having a final burst and the cherry tomatoes are still prolific.

The only downside is being bitten. Even my mossie bands aren't making any difference, nor is the Avon Skin-so-Soft, nor the spray the pharmacist gave me the other week. The culprit is this little beastie: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harvest_mite. They really are nasty little biters. I've researched everywhere to see how to avoid them (you can't, they live in the grass), how to stop them biting (you almost can't - read on), how to stop the bites itching (anti-histamine and I'm running out of Clarytin) and how to keep them out of the house (impossible, you can only keep getting rid of them once they are there by washing everything, bedding and clothes at over 60 degrees and never ever go out again until they have died off in the cold) - not possible when you have three very fluffy cats. Apparently they don't like you if you taste of yeast, so it's either bath in lager or eat a jar of Marmite, or take a yeast tablet but that seems far too sensible for me.

So, a pint of lager and a Marmite sarnie taken three times a day looks like the way to keep them away. I'm off to have another cuppa and a Clarytin. 'Scuse my scratching, won't you?

Perfect Prefect

St Alain
Yesterday's weather: Beautiful

We had wonderful news this morning. Granddaughter Alice has just started in the top year of her junior school and has been made a PREFECT.

Well done, lovely Alice, and lots of love from the two of us in France.

- - -

Anna Netrebko, wow. I can't say much more about her performance last night in the final Prom concert on the BBC. That young lady knows exactly how to work her audience and had every man in the Royal Albert Hall last night clamouring for the red roses she was handing out during her stunning rendition of Lehar's 'Meine Lippen sie küssen so heiss'. She has the most stunning voice we have heard from a soprano for years and it isn't surprising that she also models clothes and jewellery with her amazing looks. I know I said yesterday that I didn't know many of the works being performed last night, but as usual I knew the tunes but not the names! Yes, the word 'Philistine' is still hanging in the air unspoken but I know my classical music knowledge is lacking.

I must say that we felt that one thing let last night's concert down. The traditional 'Fantasia on British Sea Songs'. Could it be time for a change of programming? It felt terribly drab last night after the rest of the programme which was varied, jolly and so well performed. OK, keep in the Elgar (Land of Hope and Glory) and Jerusalem, but drop the Fantasia which, to my mind just doesn't work - especially when they are trying to hop around the country to different venues with satellite delays and just too much background noise to make it pleasant listening. (Am I turning into a Grumpy Old Woman? Good!)

Alan Titchmarsh said last night that the Last Night of the Proms signifies the end of summer. What a very sad sentence that is. When we lived in the UK we felt the same, but here in France today the sun is shining, there's not a cloud in the sky and we are having the best run of weather we have had all year! Maybe an Indian summer is going to visit.

There will be a lot of bleary eyes in the village today. I don't know about the orchestra, but the disco was thudding away until the very small hours of the morning. We are about 1 km away and could hear it very clearly. The vide grenier started at 8am so I am sure people were there from 6am onwards (we thought we could hear a lot of traffic). Tonights ball starts at 6pm so hopefully it will finish a little earlier and people will get to bed early ready for work tomorrow.

Last night

St Adrien
Yesterday's weather: Sunny and warm

It seems the gods are smiling on our village this weekend as we are en fête. There are marquees and dodgem cars, petanque matches are being played and there will be, for the second night running an orchestra and a disco - tomorrow night we just have the orchestra.

I am quite glad that we don't live in the centre of the village because with all these things going on until the small hours it will be very noisy down there. It amazes me that a village of 293 inhabitants where we rarely see anyone out and about can warrant such a three day festival, but there is lots going on here this weekend.

We are leaving my sling back stilettos and Jon's best teddy boy outfit in the wardrobe tonight as we plan to watch (it's traditional in this household) the last night promenade concert from the Albert Hall. I did suggest we watch the Prom in the Park for a change but the word 'Philistine' hung unspoken in the air, so we will be watching the whole thing.

Actually, I am quite glad about that because, apart from the usual sea songs arr. Henry Wood, Jerusalem and Land of Hope and Glory, I don't know many of the works being played tonight so I'm looking forward to hearing something new. Nicholas Kenyon gives up the directorship of the proms now after 10 years. I wonder what breath of fresh air his successor will breath over the concerts.

Meanwhile, lets see if I can find those Union flag hats and red white and blue banners.

BTW - that was a joke!

Venus in blue jeans?

Ste Reine
Yesterday's weather: Sunny, cool

September 7th, 1974. It was a day with mixed weather, a bit of rain in the morning, sunny and windy in the afternoon. The family home was buzzing with activity, family arriving with parcels, coming and going. It was our wedding day.

Here we are, 33 years later. It'll never last!! ;)

- - - - - - -

Jon spent nearly all of yesterday putting up the roof on the chalet. I didn't count how many slats there were in the end, but I believe he used up a small steel works in nails. There is just the roof covering to put on ('Just!' I can hear him echoing!) and the veranda piece to attach. It will make a great little pool house next year when the pool is built, and will be used as a spare guest room from time to time. It's such a shame that the company let us down with such a slow delivery, then losing the floor and only delivering that two and a half weeks later than the six weeks late for the main parts. If they had been on time, it would have had good use this summer too.

We're taking a day off today to let Jon's aches and pains heal, and to celebrate our anniversary.

Figgy (I am refusing to call him 'the kitten' any more because he is a year old now and must be old enough to know better), had me up at 6 again this morning. If anyone knows a cure for cats scratching on doors and waking the household I will be pleased to hear it. At the moment he is getting water sprayed at him when he does it and I refuse to let him out until I want him to go. He hates it when I spray water at him but it doesn't stop him from scratching the door.

Anyway, what I was going to say is that when I woke up I could see a bright light outside. I've just looked it up and discovered that it is Venus, which is apparently visible low in the east between 5 and 6am early this month. If you have a clear sky and a good view it is stunning. Apparently there are more meteor showers due on Sunday, so we will hope for a clear sky and a good viewing.

Sad news

St Bertrand
Yesterday's weather: Sunny, coolish. Perfect for chalet building

We woke up this morning to the sad news of Pavarotti's death from pancreatic cancer. Although he was already a huge (in more ways than one) success on the operatic circuit, he should be credited with popularising classical music amongst a new generation and a new audience of soccer lovers because of his getting together with Placido Domingo and Jose Carreras to sing at the World Cup Finals in 1990 in Italy. Although my personal favourite is Domingo, Pav's rendition of 'E lucevan le stelle' from Tosca always had me reaching for my Kleenex. I'm sure there will be many tributes and concerts in his memory over the coming days.

The chalet is coming along nicely. We have put in place the floor, walls and roof beams. Today we will be putting the roof on and covering it, and putting up the veranda. Must push on, there's a hammer with my name on it somewhere in the garden!

Back to normal?

Ste Raïssa
Yesterday's weather: Warm, sunny, cool breeze

Happy Birthday to Jack. 6 years old today. Lots of love to you xxxxx

Crikey! I'll need to keep an eye on the garden if this keeps up. It's only 2 degrees above freezing this morning. The figs on the tree outside our kitchen window look rather shocked, but it is warming up quickly now that the sun has popped his head over the hillside, so I hope they will soon recover and continue ripening.

The best news is that, finally, the chalet floor arrived yesterday afternoon only six weeks late. Unfortunately it didn't arrive in time for us to erect the chalet for our visitors to sleep in as planned. However, it will be ready for next summer. Actually we hope it will be all erected before this weekend as we plan to get going on it today. We need to get all the wood off the grass before it gets damaged by water or frost(!).

It feels rather odd now that our little flurry of visitors have left. The cats are looking round to see who is sleeping where and finding no-one. I spotted Figgy wandering into the tent this morning to see if he could wake Joe up. No-one is expected now until the end of October (unless you know differently) but at least it will give us the chance to get on with some decorating. That is assuming the replacement windows turn up in the next 10 days or so - but I should really know better than to assume anything here now.

Is it, or isn't it?

Ste Rosalie
Yesterday's weather: Warm, mostly sunny 26 degrees

We had a lovely day out yesterday, showing off the local beauty spots to my brother and his family. The weather has been very kind and even last night was mild.

Our young nephew has been enjoying our cats and spotting the local wildlife, particularly lizards. Whilst his parents and Jon were browsing a shop yesterday I sat outside with Joe as he had an ice cream. Suddenly a lizard fell from nowhere and landed a couple of feet from us. Joe was very concerned as we watched it for signs of life. Joe was convinced it was dead but wanted to check, he gently rolled a small pebble towards the lizard. Not a sign of movement. He moved closer, still nothing. 'It's dead.' he said, looking more worried. After all, we hadn't known where it had fallen from, there were no plants around and the nearest wall was several feet away.

Joe gently moved towards the lizard with a small stick in the hand that wasn't clutching his ice cream (caramel flavoured, in case you are interested). 'It's definitely dead, Aunty Sue' he claimed, bending down to take a closer look. Suddenly the lizard had had enough, leapt to life and disappeared through a gateway. Joe was so surprised he almost dropped the rest of his ice cream. It was a close shave.

Oh, Joe.

Season of mists...

St Grégoire
Yesterday's weather: Lovely, sunny, warm

In previous years we would have just finished our holiday and returned to the UK ready to go back to work. We would have the feeling that summer was over and it is time to think about Christmas shopping and turning on the central heating. Sometimes we were lucky and the warm weather returned to give us a lovely long Indian summer, but that was fairly rare.

With the arrival of September this year we had the same sort of feeling (without the going back to work bit). The majority of tourists have gone home. The supermarket is noticably quieter and we can drive into the local town without getting caught up in traffic queueing at the one roundabout. The baker has shut for three weeks holiday and the butcher has bread for sale so that we don't have to go too far to collect it. The children are buying their last pencils and notebooks ready for the new term, people are returning to work after their long summer break.

This morning there is a mist in the valley and a chill in the air but we are promised a sunny week (at last) and that is a huge bonus. There are blackberries in the hedgrows, walnuts ripening on the trees and soon the cats will find it uncomfortable to walk under the horse chestnut tree because of the conker casings.

Not much different from living in the UK really. Oh, except that we don't have to sit in a six mile queue of traffic to get to work, we can profit from the free food in the hedgerows and wild mushrooms in the woods, and our supermarkets are much quieter than Guildford Tesco or Sainsburys. Do we miss it? Nah!

Toad Hall

Ste Ingrid
Yesterday's weather: warmish, sunny. 23 degrees.

We have a toad living with us. I haven't seen him yet but Jon keeps running into him (and over him - more of that later).

He seems to have taken up residence in the wood pile that will be the chalet just as soon as the floor arrives. Don't even get me started on Castorama and their delivery policy.....

Jon found him first and put him over safely into the wild area (code for we haven't yet cleared the bambles and nettles) out of reach of the cats. He his quite a chunky toad, nicknamed Teddy. The next morning he was back under the chalet roof parts, still lying forlornly on the lawn. Jon moved him again safely away from the cats.

The next morning Jon decided to mow (no, you don't need to look away). Later on, he found Teddy just where he had spotted him on the previous two days having already mown that area and walked over it several times. Teddy had created himself a dug out - maybe something he learned from his great great grandfather who was, no doubt in the trenches of the Somme. Jon put him kindly but firmly once more into the undergrowth.

He probably got totally fed up at this point as we haven't seen him since. Good luck, Teddy. Happy hunting for a new home.

Just a short blog today as I have to get four loaves and a quiche in the oven for lunch, plus all the salads. Beds to make up. What am I doing here at the 'puter???

Turn up the heat

St Gilles
Yesterday's weather: Sunny-ish, cool wind.

The moment we had been dreading arrived yesterday. No, it wasn't the end of BB8, although I admit I am relieved it is over and don't really think I need to go for rehab after all. Well done Brian. And well done me because I accurately predicted the exact order of the last 6 contestants (sad, sad, sad).

It was the envelope handed to me by Mr Postie yesterday lunchtime. I saw the dreaded letters on the top: E D F.

Pause for dramatic music chords ... da, da, daaaaaaaaaa. Cue screaming and pulling out hair by the roots. Cue pouring a whiskey and... no, really it was far to early in the day for alcohol even at this moment in time.

Trembling fingers lifted the corner of the seal.

OK, so I will tell you why we were dreading the electricity bill. It's because we have electric heating in the house. The heaters must have been installed circa 1962, well maybe a bit later because they all work and are pretty efficient. But we moved in on 1st February, there was snow on the ground and we were freezing for weeks in this house with three feet thick walls where the lower floor nestles into bedrock. It was a real struggle to heat the house through even with the help of a portable gas fire. We only get the meter read every six months so at least we were going to get a very accurate idea of just how much it would cost us to keep the place warm all year. The previous reading had been on 29 January, so when it was read last week we reckoned it would be an indication of half a winter.

Back to the plot. I opened the envelope and pulled out the bill from inside. I was trying to hide it from Jon so that I could break the bad news to him gently. The mid-term bill had been just 55 Euros so that had to be added on to this whopper of a bill.

It was for 260 Euros. Jon wondered why I suddenly burst into a hysterical laugh, then he joined in. We had been expecting something around 700 to 800 Euros as people had been telling us just how expensive electricity is here. Less than half price - bargain electricity!