Category Archives: st maurice près pionsat

Sunday 26th October 2014 – GRRRRRR!

Yes, I asked last night at the footy where the 2nd XI would be playing today. “St Maurice” was the answer, “but don’t forget that the kick-off is at 13:00”. So at 12:50, there I was at the football ground at St maurice, and I was there all on my own.

At 14:00 someone finally turned up, and it was then that I discovered that the kick-off was actually 15:00. It seems that I had been misinformed. But it wasn’t necessarily a waste of time, for I had brought my laptop with me. So I had sat in Caliburn and done another radio programme while I was waiting.

Pionsat’s 2nd XI lost 3-1, which was no surprise seeing as how they only had 8 players there. Nevertheless, at one stage they were 1-0 up. What changed the match was one of the outfield players being injured just before half time and so in the second half he went in goal and the keeper ended up playing up front (and he was the one who scored the goal, strange as it might seem).

But there was something good that came out of the doom and gloom nevertheless – and that was with Didier (the right-winger) and Vincent (the centre-forward) playong together as a completely impromptu central defensive pairing. And until they tired late in the game (which was hardlly surprising given the circumstances) they never put a foot wrong for 80 minutes and no-one was ever going to get past them. It was a revelation as far as I was concerned and they can both take a bow for their performance.

This morning though I finished off the rdio programmes that we will be presenting tomorrow morning and then after the footy I went round to Liz and Terry’s for rehearsals. Liz had made a vegetable crumble and while it might sound rather bizarre, it tasted really good. That’s something else that I will be adding to my repertoire when (if ever) I work on my kitchen.

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Saturday 16th August 2014 – I’M ON ABOUT …

bad parking intermarche commentry allier france… this parking again, aren’t I? It must be that time of the year again.

I just can’t believe just how selfish some people are. The Intermarché at Commentry is a busy place and there’s always pressure on the parking here – and even more when someone such as this takes up two places in an old nail like that. It’s bad enough when someone in a brand new car does it – it’s even more sad when it’s something like this.

So yes, I was in Commentry doing the shopping this late afternoon. And it was a quiet time there, apart from the stuff that I bought in Bricomarché, such as more trunking and also the cement rendering for the outside of the house.

Prior to that, I spent the morning finishing off the backups that I had been doing and sorting out the stuff for taking with me in 10 days time. I need to sort all of this out as quickly as possible.

After lunch I went over to St Maurice to pay the deposit for the stuff that I had bought the other day, and as usual I forgot to take any photos, so you’ll have to wait for a good while to see what it is.

And then, to the baths at Neris for my weekly swim. There were about half a dozen of us in there and that’s hardly surprising seeing as it was not that warm and the sides of the pool were open. But it did fill up a little later, and there were quite a few kids having a whale (well, we are talking about water) of a time. One girl was just 5 years old but was really at home in the water, leaping into the 2-metre depths and then doggy-paddling to the side to start all over again. It’s been a long time since I’ve seen a kid having so much fun, and I had a good chat with the girl’s grandma.

So then off to Commentry for the shops.

And the parking.

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Thursday 14th August 2014 – I’VE BEEN SPENDING …

… my money again today.

I went out this morning to go to visit someone who was finishing off the work on his house as there were some bits and pieces up for sale. One of the items on sale was a solid, proper Indespension Plant Trailer – 4-wheeled close-coupled low-loader with built-in ramps, 3 metres long and built to carry a tank. It has low loader sides but they can be raised by boards so that the trailer can carry sand and gravel too and it isn’t half an impressive beast, especially when you consider that it will carry all of my scaffolding too as well as the Kubota tractor and whatever else is lying around here.

But not only that – it was what was on the trailer that caught my eye. I had a goot poke around at that and although it’s old, it was in good condition, not leaking and not smoking, and the price for the trailer and the load would have been what I would have had to pay for one of the brand new trailers that I had been looking at if I had to go to the UK to pick it up. Consequently, I bit the bullet and that was that.

I’ve got to go back with some money and then I can take a photo of my new toy and you can see what it is that I bought. UNtil then, I’ll leave you all in suspense.

Back here I put the second coat onto the fascia panel and the beams of the roof on the front of the house (at least, as far as I could reach). Then I went to lunch.

While I was eating my butty I was interrupted by a visit from a couple of people from the Mairie. They were newly-elected councillors familiarising themselves with the area, and they had a little moan about one or two things here.

And that was my clue. I explained firstly that the untidy and unkempt land isn’t mine but is actually the commune’s land. And why I can’t move my stuff around any better is that the commune hasn’t maintained the land for years so I can’t move stuff past it. ANd so if the commune wants me to do something, they need to do something first.

Furthermore, I had applied to the commune to buy the land. Readers with long memories will remember that I deposited my application on 8th May … errr … 2009 – over 5 years ago. And the commune has taken no action about my demand.

This led to an animated discussion that went on for an hour or two, and finally they saw my point. They promised that they would bring up the matter of my application at the next meeting of the council.

We shall see.

After they went, I spent a pleasant hour or so sanding down the facade of the house where I’d drilled through for the air vents and then filled it. That’s comparatively smooth now and almost ready to paint, but a sad discovery was that the crepi had dried out and so was no use at all. I need to buy some more now before I can paint the facade.

I then spent a while sorting out all of the electrical fittings and making a bracket to mount the outside light that I want to fit. And by the time I had everything ready, it was time to knock off.

It was a dull day today with just a couple of odd sunny spells – at least until about 22:30 when we had today’s torrential downpour. This summer is really getting on my nerves now.

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Friday 29th November 2013 – I MADE IT OUT THIS MORNING …

… but it was rather touch and go as it as another one of those cold clammy mornings where I didn’t really feel too much like crawling out of my stinking pit.

But anyway after breakfast I had to unload Caliburn of all the wood that I had bought the other day and that’s all now in the barn. Then round to Marianne’s and then on to St Maurice.

laurent dumas pierrette ray jean yves gouttebel st maurice pres pionsat puy de dome franceFirst thing that was happening there was a meeting of the officials of the Canton of Pionsat and for the first time that I can ever recall, we had all 10 mayors present at the same time.

And not only that, we had Laurent Dumas, the canton’s delegate to the Departmental Conseil-General and also Jean-Yves Gouttebel, the President of the Conseil-General, in attendance. We were really honoured and it seems that I am once more moving in exalted circles.

new road opening st maurice pres pionsat puy de dome franceThe purpose of being at St Maurice was for the formal opening of a road. Not a new road, but a realignment of an existing highway that has just had a great deal of money spent on it.

Someone produced a tricolour ribbon and so we had Dumas and Gouttebel standing in the middle of the road cutting the ribbon – something that would have been quite exciting had there been a truck or something coming the other way.

Long-term followers of this rubbish know that St Maurice is famous for its exotic cars – there are a few crazy mechanics here and on one occasion they had an exhibition of their output.

la jonquille longest car in the world st maurice pres pionsat puy de dome franceOne such vehicle is “La Jonquille” – claimed by its builder to be the longest car in the world, and St Maurice is where it lives.

It’s rather loosely based on a Peugeot 403 estate as you can see – well, several Peugeot 403s in fact.

Later that afternoon I went to pick up Marianne again this time for Riom for the annual meeting of journalists of La Montagne – the local newspaper. Where the meeting was to be held was only a mile or so from the big LeClerc hypermarket at Mozac and so we went an hour or so early so that I could do my next week’s shopping. No sense in missing an opportunity for that and it saves me going to St Eloy tomorrow.

Back here later it was taters upstairs and so I had the biggest fire I’ve ever had. That increased the room temperature 15°C in an hour or so and that’s some going, and it cooked my tea in record time.

So now I’m off to bed – I’m doing “minding” duties tomorrow.

Now I

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Tuesday 12th February 2013 – I was dead right …

… about the weather.

This morning was horribly grey and overcast with a hanging cloud. And it didn’t get any better than that either. Talking to Terry a few hours later, he said that it was snowing round by his place, and sure enough in the late afternoon it started chucking it down here too.

With regard to Bill’s affairs, it was too cold to go round there and so we stayed at Marianne’s and went through a huge pile of paperwork and did the accounts to date. After that I went with Pascal round to Bill’s and we moved some more furniture out.

This afternoon was yet another afternoon without working in the bathroom and this is becoming a tale of lost opportunities. Terry wanted to go to Brico Depot and wanted me to go with him. It was only fair and I’m not complaining as after all, a huge pile of stuff was for me but none of this is getting my bathroom done and for the last few weeks I’ve been continually sidetracked by one thing or another and it’s beginning to get on my nerves. What made it worse was that I was building up a list of things that I needed to buy next time I was there, and it went clean out of my head.

This evening I was at St Maurice. There’s a series of walks around France taking place every weekend and in 2 months time they will be walking around there, so they had a meeting of potential volunteers. I went along to find out what was happening.

 Back here, it was oven chips and baked beans for tea, and now I’m off to bed. Tomorrow we’ll have more hanging clouds and snowstorms. And who is going to come along tomorrow to put me off working in the blasted bathroom?

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Saturday 13th October 2012 – I DIDN’T MANAGE …

… my quiet day at home today. It all went wrong from the very beginning.

The boulangère forgot to come this morning so in one swell foop I’ve gone from having far too much bread to not having enough.

That prompted a quick visit into Pionsat to stock up with bread, and to hope that the boulangère remembers me on Tuesday

Anyway, despite being considerably sidetracked all throughout today what with one thing and another, I managed to finish the Additional Notes for the radio programmes for the month of November.

With the Rock Programme notes already completed, I just need to choose a main text for the November programmes. There’s probably enough in the pipeline already actually but it’s as well to be sure. And when that’s completed I can start writing the Christmas Special

As there was no football tonight, I had a little pause and watched a football match on the computer. Now, Oldham Athletic? Isn’t that another good oxymoron? It’s almost as good as British Intelligence or Government Service.

However, not to be outdone, surfing the internet I discovered that the football in the Creuse is organised slightly differently than in the Auvergne, and there are league matches this weekend, not Cup matches.

And if that wasn’t enough, Auzance’s 2nd XI was at home against Dontreix-Chard in the 3rd Division.

It’s probably 15 years since I’ve been to Auzances and seeing as I think that I should get out more often (a sentiment with which many regular readers of this rubbish will agree) I set off into the unknown.

auzances football dontreix chard creuse franceQuite a charming stadium in a nice urban setting, in what looked as if it might at one time have been an old quarry.

But the match itself was total rubbish. Dontreix-Chard were awful, but Auzances were even worse.

Even FC Pionsat St Hilaire’s 3rd Xi could have taken on both of these teams simultaneously and held their own – and everyone else’s too – quite comfortably, I reckon.

auzances football dontreix chard creuse france4-2 it finished to Dontreix, and the big mystery was how come Dontreix-Chard managed to let Auzances score twice.

Dontreix-Chard’s fourth goal was a calamity that came out of absolutely nowhere.

3-2 down in the dying minutes and having Dontreix-Chard (surprisingly) under the cosh, Auzances win a corner. It’s everyone forward, and even the Auzances goalkeeper decides to go up.

However, as he is about three-quarters of the way upfield, his team-mates take the kick, not having seen him advancing.

The Dontreix players have seen him though, and when they win possession it’s the long ball right upfield over the Auzances keeper’s head, and Goodnight Vienna.

The Auzances keeper throws down his gloves and storms off the field – “I’m not playing with you guys any more”. Reminded me of Roxanne at Primary School when she was about 7 or 8.

There’s a pizzeria right next to the ground, and so I treated myself to a take-away – second weekend in succession after all of these years of doing without. After all, it’s a 35-minute drive back home and who feels like cooking at 22:45?

And a nice pizza it was too, especially the spicy oil dressing

But never mind the Combrailles – how about the Creuse for The Land That Time Forgot? On the D988 out of Pionsat through St Hilaire and St Maurice près Pionsat, it’s a nice two-lane blacktop with clear white lines – a reasonably fast road considering the terrain.

But cross over the border into the Creuze – it’s like the lane up to my house from the bottom road. Narrow, grey gravel, no centre markings, potholes and patches.

It’s a whole world of difference. It’s just like turning the clock back 25 years, which is astonishing considering that here in the Combrailles we are 100 years behind the times.  

I forgot to mention that I put out the washing today to let it dry off, and this time I did bring it in before I went out. What has reminded me of this is that it has just this second started to rain.

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Wednesday 4th July 2012 – This was another day …

… where I didn’t really do all that much. An early start, though, and plenty of time on the computer even though I wasn’t feeling myself … “quite right too – disgusting habit” – ed … but at 12:00 Terry came round for a chat – he’d been working at Lieneke’s this morning.

One thing that we did was to look at that hole that I’ve been trying to drill for about 6 months. We came to the conclusion that I had grounded out on of all things a piece of granite which had somehow contrived itself to be in the wall. You wouldn’t believe that! Anyway, we took a gamble and hammered away at it for an age with a SDS drill and we managed eventually to shatter it. Drilling became a lot easier after that.

However I didn’t manage to do any more because Lieneke came round for a chat and it’s always nice to see her. She’s staying for 3 weeks, she says, and that’s good news.

After this I went to Marianne’s to erect one of these IKEA-type wardrobes for her. She’d been struggling for a while to do it but the Ryobi drill and the IKEA drill-bit soon solved that problem.

church st maurice pres pionsat puy de dome franceOnce we had organised that, we went off to St Maurice for her walk. We had 5 clients and we spent most of the time in the church there.

It’s really interesting as churches go because the original part is a tiny 12th-Century church that has been considerably expanded over the years in several different architectural periods, as you can tell.

12th century church st maurice pres pionsat tribune balcony puy de dome franceAnd yet the original bit, now largely abandoned, is still pretty much intact and original although it does have I suppose what in a theatre would be the circle – an upper floor balcony-type seating arangement dating from the 16th Century as a first attempt to increase the capacity.

I’m not quite sure that I’d want to go and sit up there, close as I might be to my maker. It’s not the soudest structure that I’ve ever seen.

church st maurice pres pionsat puy de dome franceAstonishingly, when an architectural survey of the church was undertaken by the bishop in 1842 he called it “worthless” and recommended its demolition. The congregation did move out into a temporary place of worship.

However that place deteriorated even quicker than the church did and so when that was condemmed they moved back into the church and instead of demolishing it, they planned its enlargement.

It just goes to show that Bishops and all these kinds of people can’t recognise a religious treasure when they see one, as I have said on a previous occasion. It really is a magnificent church and to think that the bishop wanted to demolish it.

Some people have no taste.

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Sunday 6th November 2011 – WE HAD MORE …

… football today of course.

Mind you, we nearly didn’t. If Percy Penguin hadn’t sent me a text message I probably would be still in bed asleep right now.

fcpsh fc pionsat st hilaire football club de foot biollet st maurice pres pionsat puy de dome franceAfter a hurried breakfast I shot off to St Maurice près Pionsat to watch the fist half of the 3rd XI’s match which kicks off at 13:00. I couldn’t stay long – only for the first half in fact, as I needed to be off to catch the 1st XI’s match that kicked off at 15:00

It was 1-0 in FC Pionsat St Hilaire’s favour when I left, but it turns out that they ended up by losing lost 2-1. and that makes me wonder what happened in the match because they were well ahead in the game from what I saw.

But then it’s always going to be difficult for the 3rd XI without a recognised goalkeeper and I wish that the club would make more effort to find one for them.

fcpsh fc pionsat st hilaire football club de foot biollet st maurice pres pionsat puy de dome france But Pionsat’s goal was a pearler – another absolute screamer from Xavier, 20 yards out.

He’s big and rather ponderous, just like a lower-league centre forward should be, but sometimes he pulls something out that is so unexpected.

And he can be like that when he’s playing football too.

He has probably the most powerful shot of any footballer I have ever seen, and like this one today, many a goalkeeper has put both hands on the ball but it hasn’t done the slightest bit of good.

If there hadn’t been a net in that goal, the ball would have probably made it all the way to the Atlantic without bouncing.

fcpsh fc pionsat st hilaire football club de foot es malauzat puy de dome franceFrom there I had to drive like hell through the back lanes to the suburbs of Riom to watch FC Pionsat St Hilaire’s 1st XI in the match against E S Malauzat. And that was a hard-fought game that turned out to be very bad-tempered, and what made me happy in one sense was that most of the physical stuff was being dished out for a change by Pionsat.

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that I’ve criticised the team time and time again for being something of a lightweight side, easily hustled off the ball, but they were nothing like that today.

fcpsh fc pionsat st hilaire football club de foot es malauzat puy de dome francePionsat’s rather physical tactics were having the effect of making the opposing players become all wound up and the opposing specattors were baying at the ref to do something about Pionsat’s physical (but reasonably legitimmate) tactics, but it all made absolutely no difference as Pionsat won 2-1

Pionsat’s goals were two of the best goals that I have ever seen at this level of football. The one scored by Jerome was particularly outstanding.

This was what I called a good day out

And so back home in the miserable depressing rain to find out that it has been miserable and depressing here all day and there’s been almost no solar energy today.

It’s still raining now – misty and foggy outside and it’s probably going to stay like this until next summer I reckon. But it’s not important because if it is still raining tomorrow I can finish off the steps and I’ve also bought the boards to make the worktops in the washroom bit.

I also need to work out where I’m going to put the front door. That has come with its frame and so I reckon that it will be easier to fit it before it’s glazed as the door will be lighter and so easy to manipulate. I can then take the door out of the frame and have it glazed.   

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Thursday 25th August 2011 – Well, what a day!

And I had so much to do as well and I’ve ended up not doing very much.

Working unti 04:30 was one thing but another thing was being dragged out of the bed almost at the crack of dawn (well, 9:50, anyway) by the phone. Of all people, it wss the bank. Could I go down there?

That was eerie but what followed was certainly different. It appears that there has been some confusion at the bank, a sum of money hadn’t been paid, and a girl due to fly out to Canada on Saturday didn’t have any of the paperwork necessary. And so until about 12:45 I was engaged in negotiations down in Pionsat and then out at St Maurice pres Pionsat, which despite its name is nowhere near Pionsat.

Back at the ranch, I then had to make a few telephone calls to Canada, and thanks to Katherine for giving me some help as to who to call. All in all, I was involved in this for hours.

Having said that, though, I was flattered that the bank had called me in to help. It’s definitely a sign of progress.

And what else? I now have some web pages in French for my business web site, thanks to Marianne who made a few corrections to my text, I’ve almost finished this battery box idea thing, I’ve a proof of no-claims bonus for my Canadian car insurance, I’ve my train tickets, I’ve booked a motel in Montreal for the first night, I’ve rented some storage space in Montreal – ooooh, lots of things.

What with the late finish, the early start and all of the excitement I’m whacked so I’m off to bed. To listen to the wind in the trees as a strong wind has started up. It’s a beautiful breeze blowing through here.

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Sunday 16th May 2010 – Football isn’t everyone’s cup of tea …

fcpsh fc pionsat st hilaire puy de dome ligue de football league france… and as we were all staggering off towards the pie hut at half-time today during the match at St Maurice pres Pionsat I couldn’t resist taking this pic of a Biollet St Maurice supporter overcome by emotion due to the hectic pace of the game.

But the young lady fast asleep by the touchline and the blue sky will give you some idea of the weather today. Summer seems to be back – and about time too.

puy de dome franceMind you, I can’t blame the girl for falling asleep because it was one of THOSE games this afternoon. The heat was clearly getting to everyone and so it was played at something of a leisurely pace and in the end, finished as a 0-0 draw.

Pionsat were the better side though and did have one or two chances to take the lead during the match, but I do have to admit I’ve seen many more exciting games than this one. At least, is was a pleasant day out.

I woke up at 09:57 to the sun streaming in through my windows here. It looked beautiful and I couldn’t resist thinking to myself that it was so nice that someone was bound to spoil it. And right on cue the phone rang. Bernard, the football club chairman, wanted to tell me that his son (he who has the digger) wanted to talk to me and could he come round.

So I hauled myself out of bed to wait for him. I asked Bernard a while back if he knew of someone with a digger who can dig out where I want to park Caliburn and he recommended his son. But he was stuck on a chantier in all of this bad weather. It now seems that they’ve been able to work and it may well be that by Friday they’ll be finished. So he came to see the job and reckons he’ll ring me on Friday or Saturday to tell me when he can start.

I told him about Simon’s job and he’s keen to do that too. And by the purest coincidence it seems that where Simon is living is the old workshop of Bernard’s uncle and Bernard was born in the house just next to Simon’s.

This world is getting far too small for me.

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