Blue Skies

Henny just put up the very last shutter. Miserable brown forever eradicated! It's the one at the top; the only old shutter we had remaining since, one way or another, we've messed around with every other window. It has made an enormous difference. Our stamp is truly on it and the house is much happier with its new look, which today perfectly matches the sky.

Saturday Lunch

There's a bulletin board in Henny's loo where she tacks up various bits including the cards of local restaurants. On a warm and sunny September Saturday, we were looking for inspiration when one card leapt out, L'Auberge du presbytère.

The setting is gorgeous, the delicious food is presented with flair, the service friendly; it's reasonably priced and only about 10 minutes from home. In fact the restaurant wasn't that busy. When the other tables finished, we found ourselves alone on the lovely terrace...

looking out at this view with the occasional buzzard coasting on a thermal. The perfect Saturday lunch.

To Bidet or not to Bidet...

That is the question...when planning a new bathroom, especially in a French house. There was never the plumbing for one at LFH, but one member of the family will be desperately disappointed. It's about time he was introduced, Pou the cat.

The bidet at Henny's is considered his own personal watering station. His favourite thing on earth is to drink from it when the water's running, but Henny declared an end to such waste in an arid climate. Even so, Pou prefers a bowl of water placed in the bidet to any other source. When I come home with garden feet and decide to wash them there, I have company immediately. He teeters on the edge, or heck, he'll get right in. I'm now researching cat fountains for the other house, but it won't be the same.

The New Neighbours

I was chatting with Magalie one day, the owner of the next door parcel of land. Their house is down below, but they've moved our new neighbours on to the land, namely 7 chickens and 3 ducks. I referred to the chickens as mes nouvelles voisines. Magalie corrected me...5 voisines et 2 voisins. My heart sank. Two cockerels next door meant certain vocalizing when least desired.

I didn't know how much I enjoyed chickens until some years ago at Le Couvent, when I wrangled the young hens back into their compound one evening after the wind blew their door down. The next year I was thrilled to go to market with Lizzie to pick out new chicks, especially when one was named Hoxton. So I'm not immune to the charms of a chicken. And you've gotta love the ducks. They come running when I toss baby snails over the fence.

But the rooster's another story. We're not yet living at the house, but whenever we're there, his crowing borders on Wagnerian. And Ali assures me he's an early riser.

Public Enemy No. 1. Here's his mugshot. Coq au vin, anyone?

Plum Gone

In July '07 Lizzie and Josh picked the delicious plums from my reine-claude (greengage) tree and the next morning, as if by magic, these jars of yummy jam appeared.

This year, Henny went over to the house, basket in hand, to pick plums. She'd seen them ripening, but curiously now there were hardly any. Within a couple of days, all the leaves went brown and the beautiful tree died. (It's the one you see in blossom on an earlier blog). I was very sad. As a city girl without green thumbs and so little time to garden at LFH, I automatically think it's my neglect when things go. My poor tree.

The next day, J de P and I decided to investigate what had taken the tree so quickly. He pulled at a big branch. We were both rather shocked when it came off in his hand, the inside crawling with critters. A quick consultation with Lizzie over the fence: get rid of it as soon as possible. I'm not jittery about termites, not much. Henny called the terminator with a chainsaw, in this case, Hans.

Thankfully Hans didn't notice any evidence of the dreaded t-word, but he did say whatever blight the tree suffered from looked like it was getting the two smaller plum trees as well. What a shame. I had some of the plum jam on my bread this morning and thought wistfully about the tree it came from. Good-bye dear friend.

Now we have an empty corridor, a perfect place to put my dream pool, which at this point would require a lotto win. Perhaps a boules pitch?