A nice little earner, thank you

The day is spent getting ready for a big influx of visitors tomorrow. We are hosting a school re-union, for ten friends and spouses, from my time at St Michael's College in Leeds. At that time the school was run by Jesuits and I have to say that they gave us a good education. I remember my time there with fondness. The school celebrates its centenary this year but unfortunately, it will also close this year.

This is a good fun group and most of us have known each other since primary school in Harrogate, and then after that as school mates on the train to Leeds each day. I caught the train first and 'reserved' our seats by virtue of the fact that nobody wanted to sit near me/us. We had a great laugh. If we were late out of school in the afternoon we frequently had to catch a steam train that started in Liverpool and terminated in Newcastle. We developed a nice little earner by singing for home going seamen who would pay us handsomely for singing carols etc., as they traveled their drunken way back home to see their loved ones.

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I nip to Quissac to buy some salt for the pool. We favour Guines Frere who deliver our gas and clean the chimney amongst other things. My bill comes to 69 euros and I only have 60. "Pay me next time", he says (I have not met this brother before) and lets me walk away with a promise to pay. How refreshing!

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It's very therapeutic mincing meat! It's difficult to find minced lamb or pork at the supermarket because presumably they don't have much demand and they also have to have separate mincing machines for each meat (or so I'm told). I order Jan an old fashioned Spong type mincer from England (because I'm that kind of guy) and it arrives today. Moussaka is on the menu for tomorrow so I set too mincing a whole load of lamb. It was very therapeutic, goodness knows why.