A big lunch

Today and tomorrow are public holidays in France, the fourth, fifth and last holidays in May. We have to wait until July for the next one!! How will we cope?

We spend most of the morning preparing for lunch.

We have seven guests, Andrew and Nella, Nella's father Mike, Bob and Lynne and William and Christine. Despite what the names suggest, the first five are all Brits and the last two are French. Nella and Andrew run a ranch about 10 minutes away, Nella's dad is visiting and we have never met him before. Bob and Lynne are good friends from 'scratch supper' fame (6th April). William is the mayor, not only of our village but he is also the chairman of all the mayors for a few miles around, and Christine, if I understood it correctly, works for the local authority and might even be William's boss. That may have been his joke but I'm not sure.

It's a good fun group with enough English and French speakers to keep things moving.

Jan cooks up a storm. The meal starts with poached salmon and asparagus with hollandaise sauce, followed by lamb shanks, marinated overnight in wine and herbs, potatoes and roasted vegetables. The usual selection of cheeses is followed by a choice of Flummery Drambuie, (a zabaglione delicately flavoured with Drambuie) and/or strawberries. It makes my mouth water just to think about it.

The eighth guest was Bob and Lynne's new puppy, Harry. He and Max play virtually non stop for 5 hours. They play really nicely together, despite the difference in size, and I think that they will be great friends in the future. This is the first time that a puppy has visited the house and Max was very excited (listen to me babbling on like a proud father!) but he was also very gentle, despite getting 'beaten up' by Harry from time to time.

We thoroughly enjoyed the afternoon.

I was just following orders

Boy, did it rain last night.

We were woken at around 4.30 am by the thunder and lightening, dashed outside to pull the chairs on the terrace nearer the house so that they didn't get too wet, (look, don't ask me, I just follow orders!), and then took some time to get back to sleep, especially since Max thought it all great fun and wouldn't settle.

I heard this today and thought I'd share it.

A man said to his wife,
"I don't know how you can be so stupid and so beautiful all at the same time."
The wife responded,
"Allow me to explain. God made me beautiful so you would be attracted to me; God made me stupid so that I would be attracted to you!"

Why does Jan keep showing me these jokes?

What's the difference between a grockle and a Mozilla

It's raining this morning and it's a little cooler so I look like a real donkey walking around the supermarket in Sommieres, in shorts and T-shirt. Permanent residents here call tourists 'grockles'. They are identified by their penchant for wearing shorts, T-shirts and sandals, when the locals, particularly the French, wear several heavy layers at any temperature below 25C.

I suppose that makes me a 'permanent grockle'! (Expect smart ass comments from Bob and Chris - Ed.)

It turns out that there isn't a one click answer to opening a new page in a new window in IE, (if you don't have a clue about what I'm talking about, move on to the next paragraph, but more to the point why didn't you read yesterday's post?) and it looks like I'm going to give Mozilla Firefox a try. Thank you, Jon.

As I sit here typing, Jan walks in proudly, and asks me to try the elderflower cordial that she has just made. It's absolutely fantastic, as good as shop bought! (You're missing the point - Ed.) There are lots of Elderflower bushes around here so I anticipate lots more of this nectar. This high sugar drink won't do my diabetes any good but at least it contains 0.0001% of natural flavouring!

You want lazy, I'll give you lazy

Today I take "lazy" to a whole new level.

I decided fairly quickly this morning to take my time doing a few small jobs around the house because all the recent eating, drinking, laughing and entertaining has taken its toll. I spend quite a bit of time trying to figure out how to open each new web page in a new window and even, the usually reliable Google, isn't helping. I'm sure that all I have to do is is hit a key when opening the page but nothing seems to work. Hey ho, all will be revealed shortly, I'm sure.

Early morning decisions

I get an early morning call to help our favourite English neighbours, who are moving further west, and who have to meet their removers near the motorway to pick up some packing boxes. All goes well, and we return to ponder which house they should buy. Decisions, decisions.

Rob leaves today, so yet one more trip to the airport. As we are footloose and fancy free, we 'nip' into Truffaut for a load of garden plants and some more food for Max. This is our favourite garden centre because it has such a wide selection of everything, and they also offer a 'croc bonus card' which means that every tenth bag of dog food is free. It all helps!

Into Nimes centre to visit FNAC for the Oxford/Hachette, English/French dictionary on CD Rom because we still keep coming across words that do not appear in the concise (3 inch thick) edition. They don't have it and I have no intention of driving back to Nimes just to pick up an ordered copy. I buy it online when I get home. Why do I still mess about with shops?

In sales mode and lots of reminiscing

We have decided to sell our lovely little other house in the village so I need to contact agents today. If you have 150,000 euros (£107,000) that you would like to invest in a fully and tastefully restored rustic village house then take a look at the details on this web page http://www.masducantarel.com/la_villa.htm A bargain for a pied a terre in this delightful, peaceful, wine growing village.

We all have a lie in, and then sit and reminisce on the terrace, after a late breakfast fry up. Stories about our times as tennis coaches abound. This one is funny and fairly typical.

Rob has been coaching a lady (let's call her B) and one very hot sunny day, whilst she was picking up tennis balls, Rob feigning surprise, and said "it doesn't look like you are wearing any knickers?"
B, not being the bashful sort, lifted up her skirt and showed him that she was.
Rob said, "oh, that's a pity!"
B said, "listen sunshine, one day I'll surprise you."
The next week, when she was picking up balls, Rob happened to notice that his every wish had come true! Surreptitiously he threw a few more down!!

Rob has never been to Montpellier, so we scrap the idea of the Feria in Nimes and head off to Montpellier by way of the tram from Odysseum and then eat at L'Entrecote, just off the Place de la Comedie for the best steak and frites around.

Will I ever tire of the trip to the airport?

Bloody right I will!

Especially after last nights barbecue. We drank rather a lot 'in aid of the local economy' so today will be known as 'fragile Monday'.

Anne, Cilla, Helen, Jane and Sue get to the airport on time, only to be met with an officious check-in clerk who insisted that they either redistribute their excess baggage (all bottles) or drink it on the spot. It was a bit too early for another drink, so knickers have to move over to hand luggage and bottles get to fly in the hold! It's just as well he didn't realise that we had lots of bottles hidden out of sight, which were going to be carried on as further hand luggage, or they might never have got away.

Later this afternoon, Jan and Rob drag me out for a 'short' walk with Max. This short walk consisted of walking over and around a mountain and lasted hours. Well, 90 minutes. You can walk for hundreds of miles in every direction, without ever touching another town, simply by staying on the DFCI's, forestry tracks to you and me. It felt like I covered most of them! Back for a well earned drink, just when I thought I'd have a day off the juice.

A right boring little horticulturalist

Rob will stay on for a couple of more days but today is the girls' last. Anne and Cilla go with me to Quissac to buy some bits for Jan. It's good to hear their enthusiasm for the countryside, because it's very easy to forget how nice it is, and reminds me of all the right decisions that we made when we first moved here. The sky is a beautiful deep blue, the temperature readout on the huge display on top of the pharmacie on the edge of Quissac says 18C which isn't bad for 8 o'clock in the morning. It's going to be another great day!

Today is another national holiday, the third so far this month, Fete de la Victoire 1945, which is VE Day to you and me. It means that the French will spend the day with friends and family, which is nice, but it also means that they leave their dogs chained up whilst they are away enjoying themselves. Some of these mutts howl and howl. It makes you want to throw some poisoned meat into their gardens, and then do something about the dog as well.

I never thought that I'd get enthusiastic about growing things. I'm turning into a right boring little horticulturalist. I spotted small caterpillars on some of the fruit trees today, so out with the insecticide to zap those pesky little critters. It's me or them, and I know who's going to win this one, even if it means the fruit is covered in nuclear fallout!

I'm not what you would call "green", more a deep shade of purple, especially if bugs get near my carefully tended fruit trees. I'd use a gun if it wouldn't make such a mess of the foliage! There I go again, showing off all my arborial vocabulary. (That's enough showing off - Ed.)

Sommieres and wine tasting - again

The girls were either coached or played tennis for over 7 hours yesterday. Makes me tired just to think about it.

Talking about making me tired thinking about it, I took Max for a walk at 7.30 am. What's going on around here?

By way of a change, we all leave for Sommieres market this morning with the intention of calling at the Carnas Cave Cooperative on the way back. They are running an open day with free tastings and organised viewings of wine production. We think that Carnas produces the widest range of good quality reasonably priced wines for everyday consumption. They regularly win medals for some of their wines and their Blanc de Blancs at about 6 euros a bottle puts most champagne to shame. What with all the wine tasting and wine for lunch, I have no idea how they played tennis all afternoon. But they did.

The pool hit 24C this afternoon and I was very tempted. So tempted that I put one foot in, UP TO THE ANKLE NO LESS, before sitting in the sun to assuage the offended appendage. Jan, of course, went straight in and nearly put me to shame, until I remembered that women have an extra layer of fat, so can withstand extremes of temperatures more easily than us men.

Thai green chicken curry tonight - yippee.

And the winner is...........

Last night the tennis group came off court at 7.00 pm and relax until 8.00. Jan then served up her famous moussaka - well famous to me. If you get a chance, ask her to make it, you will not be disappointed.

We try to stay up late and watch the election results but quickly succumb to sleep.

This morning we learn that Labour are returned to power on a much reduced majority. The next four years will be interesting and if you are reading this Tony, look at my rant yesterday and get that sorted please.

Tennis, more tennis and a big rant

Today is a national holiday in France. There are 5 holidays in May alone, out of a total of 13 for the whole year. Very strange!

Rob's girls arrive in Nimes on the early flight from Stansted. We need to get to the airport for 10.00 am, so it's no problem for us, but these poor souls have been up half the night. The flight leaves Stansted at 7.00 am, so what with check-in, and an hour and a half journey to get there, they have to leave home at about 4.00 am.

Let me explain. Rob has a big reputation as a good tennis coach and has coached these ladies (Anne, Cilla, Helen, Jane and Sue ) before. They all come here, on a girls weekend away, get coached, play a lot of tennis, eat, drink, and generally have a good time. They leave kids, husbands and troubles behind and come and let Jan spoil them. Quite a lot of this spoiling rubs off on me as well. So thank you darling!

It's the UK elections today and we are fascinated as to the outcome, but then so are lots of other people as well.

Ohhhhhhh I feel a rant coming on!

I consider myself apolitical, and don't have strong feelings about who runs the country, as long as it is done well. However, there are two issues that really get my goat.

The first is school discipline and, what appears to me, the total lack of support that we give to teachers in the mamby-pamby society that has now emerged in the UK. By definition, children need a strong, loving, positive, friendly leadership. I have taught children in a tennis environment for many years so I feel I know a little about what I am talking about. A disproportionately high number of children are currently fed an unrealistic sense of self importance and power. They seem to have a high regard for talentless celebrities, an ill defined work ethic, and have little or no respect for their parents and/or teachers. We are all to blame and we should be ashamed of ourselves. However, the government of the day has a responsibility to empower its teachers, punish errant parents and generally help to get some children back into line.

What is happening to the education system? Not so long ago, the incumbent Education Secretary went through a long consultation process, and had, I believe, the support of the teaching profession, to replace the current awards system with a European style diploma. So far so good. He was being well paid to do this, he had lots of support and I trusted him to make the right decision. He then gets moved to the Home Office, and the new Education Secretary promptly cancels everything. WHAT IS GOING ON? I make no comment about the relative merits of any system; I don't have that information, but others do, and surely therefore one of them must be incompetent?

And the second is MRSA. If I can believe the figures, more people die from hospital acquired infections than die in road traffic accidents. How dare any government put itself up for re-election, and expect to win, without having sorted that one out. It's a national disgrace without any excuse whatsoever. No blaming previous administrations, no blaming overworked and under paid hospital staff just get it sorted NOW! No excuses. Move all the police from the roads and motorways, which are amongst the safest in Europe (if you want to see dangerous driving come to France!) and have them patrol hospital wards, which are far more dangerous.

OK, the last bit was stupid but at least it made me feel better!

You know what I said about being apolitical, well I reckon that I could be a benevolent despot! Hmmm, need to think about that one.

Let the good times roll

Rob arrives today and the five girls arrive tomorrow.

He is the most non-judgemental person you will ever meet, the most laid back and has a wicked sense of humour.

The afternoon is spent laughing, reminiscing, and after Jan cooks up a great Panang curry we go to bed early.

To lawn or not to lawn

Jan comes back from her art class where, for the first time, she had to draw a naked female model. On entering the house, she made some smart comment that maybe I had given up on the art classes too soon. Let's put it this way, either Jan has to improve her technique, or it doesn't look like I missed out on too much.

It is really difficult to grow a low maintenance grass lawn around here. The major problems are the amount of water needed, on a regular basis, and the right type of grass to withstand the searing summer heat. When we first arrived, the house was completely finished, but it sat in what can only be described as a field. Not a nice field, full of wild flowers, but a field full of builders rubble, bulldozed trees and piles of wood. Some of our first contacts with the locals made us realise that unless you are careful, garden maintenance can take over your life. Low maintenance and lateral thinking became the order of the day.

Weeds grow really well. So, under 'the orchard' (the eight fruit trees that we have planted), a weed lawn it is. All green and lush, it looks mighty fine.

Excuse me, I must go, I'm off to mow the weed.

Languedoc Roussillon or Septimanie?

The President of the Conseil Regional of Languedoc Roussillon has, for some time, been advocating a name change for the region. He wants to change the name to Septimanie, the ancient Roman name that was used until the middle ages..

Prior to moving here I could not have placed LR or any of the other regions on a map of France. And I suspect that the same applies to the French knowledge of English counties. One side of me says, well, what does it matter, but then I also have to sympathise with the already hard pressed vignerons who have been working hard to put LR on the world wine map.

A recent television advert by Marks and Spencer talked, in hushed tones, about 'a gold medal Chardonnay from Languedoc Roussillon', the first time that I have heard the region mentioned outside of travel programmes.

Personally, I quite like the new name, but I suspect that a name change would only confuse and undermine the existing efforts at promoting this region.