Retail therapy

William arrived for tennis at 8.00 and very enjoyable it was too. The set swings one way and then another, always competitive and with plenty of exercise. At one point I said, "Can you smell it?" He understood immediately what I was talking about. The smell of fermenting wine was very pleasant and very strong. There is a cave a couple of hundred metres away, run by Vincent Auquier, but nothing closer, so we put it down to that. Heaven knows how strong it must have been in the cave.

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Jan has a well deserved lie in and finally emerges at about 9.30. It's sunny with no wind and very quiet. Blissful in fact, but the silence magnifies the lack of extra bodies in the house. We have had people around, virtually non stop, since May, and we are taking some time to adjust to being on our own again. The silence this morning was deafening. I know it won't last.

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We headed off to the new Ikea near Montpellier this afternoon. For those of a foreign persuasion, Ikea is a huge store, from which you can furnish a house. It is a shopping experience like no other I know, and many hate it, mostly because it is usually so busy. We went for a look see and were generally impressed. It has a massive underground carpark which will be useful in the heat of summer and a similar layout to other Ikeas. As usual there was little that we needed but also, as usual, after two hours we left with a trolley full of stuff. Some of it unbelievably cheap, like an attractive glass teapot and 6 glass mugs for 5 euros. How do they do it? As Jan said, as we drove away, "A little retail therapy without breaking the bank."

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It was a warm, still evening, so I barbecued Dorade, and Jan cooked pan fried leeks and stir fried cabbage with caraway seeds, yummy! Very healthy, but not when you include the bottle of wine each or the bar of chocolate! Sorry.