Category Archives: Les Guis

Sunday 4th November 2012 – YOU ARE PROBABLY WONDERING …

… where I was last night when the report of the daily activities never made it to the world.

The answer is that I was crashed out here on the sofa. I dozed off in the middle of the Panthers v Redskins gridiron game and that was that until about 02:00 in the morning.

Having lived for so long in splendid rural isolation, I can’t come to terms with modern urban living. Traffic all through the night, people moving about at 06:00, dogs barking, horns blowing.

No, it’s no good for me. I had almost no sleep in my little room.

24 hours ago though, I was some where completely different.

I was sitting up on the car park at the panoramic viewpoint just outside Clermont-Ferrand on the D941.

I’d bought a pot of jam and some orange juice yesterday, this morning I’d picked up half a baguette, and here I stopped for breakfast.

This is one of the best places in the whole of the Puy-de-Dome to come and admire the view, even when it’s raining.

It’s certainly a class above almost everywhere else (the St Lawrence River excluded, of course) where I’ve stopped for breakfast when I’ve been on the road

And I wasn’t alone here either because several other people had come to join in the proceedings

We’ve been to the cathedral of Notre-Dame de l’Assomption – Our Lady of the Assumption – in Clermont Ferrand on many occasions as regular readers of this rubbish will recall.

Unfortunately though, we’ve never been able to take a really good photograph of it because it’s all hemmed in by buildings.

No such difficulties from up here though, is there? Especially with a 300mm zoom lens

And when I crop the photograph and blow it up, because I can do that despite modern terrorism legislation, I can produce something magnificent because the building really is superb

It’s the third cathedral on the site. The original one was built in the 5th Century and was destroyed by Pepin le Bref in 760 and again by the Normans in 915 – this time rather more permanently.

Its replacement wasn’t considered grand enough in the period of the magnificent church-building programmes of the 12th and 13th Centuries, and so construction of the present one was commenced in 1248.

Clearly built by the local council, the final (for now) stone of black pierre de Volvic was laid more than 650 years later, in 1905.

But it’s the second cathedral that is the most famous. There on the steps on 27th November 1095, Pope Urban II made the call for the First Crusade to the Holy Land, and laid the foundations for much of what has gone wrong in the world ever since.

Regular readers of this rubbish – albeit in one of its previous incarnations – will recall the view in that photograph.

That’s the Plateau de Gergovie and Liz and I, on one of our fact-finding missions, went to sit on the top of the hill and have lunch.

That’s said by many, including Napoleon III, to be the site where the Gaullish leader Vercingetorix inflicted upon Julius Caesar the first major defeat that he suffered.

Having breakfasted and … errr … relaxed for a short while, I headed off down the D941 in the direction of the historic village of Miremont.

The claim to fame of Miremont is the church of St Bonnet situated on top of an isolated rock on the edge of the village.

This is another one of those places that has been high on my list of places to visit, and following the football club about is certainly enabling me to see the sights

It dates from the middle of the 12th century, although I would have given it perhaps 50 years more.

But never mind the church for a moment, jut look at the site that it has.

It’s situated on a pinnacle of rock overlooking the confluence of the rivers Sioulet and Chevalet, – an ideal defensive position for any nobleman bent on increasing his power in the region

And as we know, some of these noblemen were as bent as they come.

We’re lucky in that the church was built in such a place.

As peace descended onto the area in the years before the horrors of the Hundred Years War, the inhabitants left the safety of the tops of the inaccessible hills and into the more accessible and more fertile valleys.

Consequently this church escaped the rush of church “modernisations” and “rebuilding” in the 13th Century following the return of the Crusaders with the wealth that they had pillaged from Constantinople and the Holy Land.

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that I have a pet theory about early churches in rural France.

I’ve said before … "and on many occasions too" – ed … that I reckon that they started life as chapels to fortresses built in easily-defensible positions.

As the importance of the fortress declined in the era of peace, the importance of the church increased and gradually took over the site.

We are very fortunate here in that with this site being so inaccessible, it was never pillaged as ruthlessly for building stone when it was abandoned, as many other sites have been.

And so a good prowl around in the undergrowth produces very clear evidence that there was some kind of fortification up here.

This looks very much like the remains of one of these four-cornered fortified chateaux to me, the type that the Knights Templar loved to take over for their Commanderies.

As for the football, which is why we are here after all, it was a triumph for the FC Pionsat St Hilaire 2nd XI.

They’ve had some really bad luck in matches since the start of the season and at one time not so long ago they were hopelessly adrift at the foot of the table.

However a good win last Saturday night against the Goatslayers buoyed up their spirits.

Today though, for the first time in a couple of years, they played like a team with belief.

This was mainly down to Emeric who played today, being unavailable for the 1st XI last night. He drove the team on relentlessly from midfield.

And special mention must go to Kevin, who volunteered to play in goal and had an excellent game.

Vincent has come into the senior side from the juniors this season.

He has a lot to learn of course, but being coached from the crowd on the touchline, he managed to score his debut goal for the team – the first of many, we hope.

The tean finished by winning convincingly, 3-1, to move up to fourth from bottom.

And despite all of the criticism that I have given to the defence, the back four played magnificently. If only they could play like this in every match they would have no worries at all.

It’s a shame about the driving rain though – it put a dampener on the proceedings though.

And so, having had a nice weekend away from home, which surely does me good, I headed off back for my pizza and garlic bread.

I deserved them.

Saturday 3rd November 2012 – I’M NOT HERE.

Well, not all here anyway, and that shouldn’t surprise anyone, should it?

I’m in one of these cheap unit-hotels in Clermont Ferrand, having a weekend away from home.

There is in fact a very good reason for this.

This evening FC Pionsat St Hilaire’s 1st XI have a night match at Ceyrat, way out the other side of Clermont-Ferrand.

And I can’t believe that I’ve never been to a Pionsat night match away from home.

Tomorrow, the 2nd XI have an away match early afternoon at Miremont, just outside the north side of the city.

Seeing as it’s almost 100kms back home and then back 80kms at lunchtime tomorrow, it was hardly worth going home. And a little break would do me a world of good too.

So just by way of a change, I set out this morning to visit all of the shops at Mozac, the big shopping centre outside Riom.

It’s nothing special compared to Montlucon, but it’s different and at least all of the shops are right next to each other and not scattered across the town.

My luck was well and truly in too. There’s a bankrupt-stock kind of shop there and I found exactly the wire netting that I need to make my bean and pea frames, after all this time of looking.

And I also found a set of three decent tyre levers. I only have small ones for things like wheelbarrows and pushbikes, nothing suitable for motorbikes and cars.

The NOZ though is much smaller but they did have a decent selection of DVDs and so I treated myself to 5 for these long winter nights. At €1:95 each it’s cheaper than the cinema.

At the football, FC Pionsat St Hilaire could only muster a scratch team – it’s not easy travelling all the way down to Ceyrat for a 20:00 kick-off if you’ve been working until 19:00.

As for the game, there is no denying that the Espoirs Ceyratois were technically a much better side.

However FC Pionsat St Hilaire rode their luck, especially with François brilliantly saving a penalty late in the game.

But the team hung on and the score ended up a lucky 2-2 draw. And they all count as we know.

What was even more interesting was that I was not the only supporter to have come to cheer on FCPSH. A couple from Riom who have a weekend cottage in Pionsat and who attend almost all of the home games were here too to follow the team.

This is becoming infectious, isn’t it?

Finding food was the next difficulty. I cant believe that even in Clermont-Ferrand everything closes at 22:30. I had to drive for miles until I found something.

Eventually though I did manage to persuade someone to rustle up a vegan pizza and now I’m sitting here and eating it.

Then I’m off to bed.

-6

Friday 2nd November 2012 – I KNEW THAT …

… it was a mistake to have that second mug of coffee.

05:30 and I was still going round and round in my little room without the slightest thought about sleep.

When I did eventually drop off (simply lying down on the sofa), having switched off all of the alarms, it was all of 09:56 when I woke up – probably less than 4 hours sleep.

After something of a hurried breakfast I went off to Pionsat.

The tool lorry was there and I was bent on buying a new toy – and I bet that you are wondering exactly what it is

All cars made since 2002 (and many earlier ones, my 1988 Senator for example) are in principle fitted with an on-board computer, an ECU (Electronic Control Unit).

This analyses and stores all of the data about the running of the car, and keeps a list of faults on a computer chip.

Garages have machines that plug into the ECU (something with a connector like a SCART socket) which enables them to read the ECU and note any problem from which the vehicle might be suffering (a series of “fault codes”).

There’s a computer program that can decipher the fault codes and translate them into plain English.

In the USA all of this is in the Public Domain but in the UK, certainly as recently as 5 years ago, and maybe still today for all I know, this was all jealously guarded.

I’ve no idea what the situation might be in France.

Anyway, to cut a long story short – “hooray” … ed – the tool lorry was selling hand-held ECU readers and the associated computer program, for just €69.

That kind of thing is worth its weight in gold, as you can imagine. And now there’s one here.

This afternoon, with the pouring rain, I carried on with the shelving. One of the side rails is now finished, and looking quite impressive too, rather an upmarket version of Richard Hauptmann’s ladder.

The other one is cut, worked and polished and will be assembled in the next rainy spell.

All that will remain then will be to cut the shelving to size and to varnish it all.

With the temperature up here being just 13°C that was the signal to light the fire again. And I cooked rice and another helping of my red pepper-and-lentil curry in the oven.

Beautiful it was too.

So now I’m off to bed, early for a change. I have a full weekend ahead of me and I need to be on form.

-3

Thursday 1st November 2012 – I’M GLAD …

… that it was today that was a Bank Holiday and I decided not to work, because it has done nothing but pour down all day – at times with some really torrential rain.

And after a not-so-early night, switching off all of the alarms and so on, I managed to stay in bed until all of … errr … 08:56am. So much for that!

so after breakfast (which included coffee for the first time since when I was ill – i’ve been reintroducing foods one by one to see if there is anything that is bad) I sat down and watched Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone;

It’s a really excellent film, much better than you might expect if you can steel yourself to pass the dire 10 minutes of opening.

I had loads of other things to do as well, but I did … precisely nothing. Sat and vegetated for all of the day. I didn’t even go downstairs to make any food – just nibbled on bits and pieces (but I did make a second coffee though).

Still, as Joy said, I deserve a day off every now and again where I shouldn’t feel guilty about doing nothing.

But if it’s as bad as this tomorrow I’ll crack on with the shelving in the cupboard. I really want that to be finished.

-1

Wednesday 31st October 2012 – I WAS IN BED …

… at some kind of ridiculous time last night – long before midnight in fact.

And I went out like a light and didn’t wake up until about 06:30. I wish that I could do that more often.

What with one thing and another (and once you start, you’ll be surprised just how many other things there are), I was detained up here until lunchtime and so it wasn’t until about 14:30 that I went out to play.

Another pile of wood was cut and then I made a start on … the garden, would you believe?

In the potato bed pulling out the weeds and about three potatoes. It’s been a miserable year for spuds.

I also pulled the courgette and about 10 chili peppers off the relevant plants. The frost has well-and-truly done for the plants but the fruits are still there? just about.

The courgette will be in next week’s curry and the chili peppers are currently drying out.

No fire tonight either although it’s rather close to the limit. There wasn’t anything to cook particularly.

And tomorrow is a Bank Holiday here. I usually have bank holidays off but I’ve yet to have one this year, so busy have I been, and so tomorrow my feet will be up all day.

And quite right too. I deserve it

-4

Tuesday 30th October 2012 – I LIT THE FIRE …

… tonight too.

Not for any particular reason (it wasn’t all that cold and I wasn’t planning on cooking anything) but it just seemed like a plan.

And it was a glorious day today too – not a cloud in the sky all day.

First job, now that I’m on winter hours, is to cut wood. Some out of the lean-to and some from off this big pile that I’ve been moving around from one place to another.

That took a while, especially as I was interrupted by a phone call from Percy Penguin, who doesn’t feature in these pages half as often as she deserves.

But now that I’m a little-better organised … &#34ahem;" – ed … I can spend the usual 15 minutes per day on the wood.

After that, one job I’ve not done for ages is to replace all of the batteries in the ancillary equipment. I put a pile of those on charge and then went round changing everything.

We now have tons of stuff working that wasn’t working before, even including the projector clock.

This afternoon saw me tidying up some stuff (yes, honestly!) and then working on the bank at the back of the hard-standing – pulling out the overhanging rocks.

As for all of the soil, I’ll shovel it into the back of Caliburn one of these days, and move it somewhere.

In the verandah later I made a mega pepper-and-lentil curry, which should keep me going for the next short while.

No more courgettes though – the frost has done for them.

-4

Monday 29th October 2012 – I’VE BITTEN …

… the bullet and lit the fire up here this evening.

Coming back from radioing, the temperature up here was 12.4°C – that’s about the limit for heat but what clinched it was the fact that I had Sunday’s pizza and garlic bread to cook.

It’s cheaper (like “cost = nil”) to cook them in the little oven on top of the woodstove. In no time at all the temperature up here was a balmy (or is that “barmy”?) 20.4°C and the pizza and garlic bread were done to a turn.

Not only that, the kettle on the top of the stove heated the water to a respectable washing-up type of temperature and so this is not only the first day of heat for winter 2012, it’s also the first day of no bottle gas.

A bottle of gas for cooking costs me about €32 and lasts me roughly 200 days. That’s about €0:16 per day that I’m saving.

Add to that the fact that a bottle of gas (at €32) lasted about 20 days in the old gas heater, then I’ve saved €1:60 per day on heating – a total of €1:76 per day in total.

The stove cost me €279, which means that at €1:76 per day it will be paid for in about 160 days. And as I use the stove about 100 days per year, it means that sometime round about Christmas it will be paid off.

A shrewd move, purchasing this woodstove.

We’d been radioing today, and that wasn’t without incident.

Radio Tartasse at Marcillat en Combraille forgot that we were coming (despite me reminding them on Friday) and so nothing was prepared, which meant that we had to make it up as we went along.

But at Radio Arverne in Gerzat the wheels fell off completely and we had to re-record one of the programmes a couple of times, as well as do some heavy editing, before we had a decent take.

But there’s a reason for that.

Liz didn’t have much sleep thanks to a hyperactive mind, and I had about one hour because, presumably, I have a guilty conscience about something or other.

Walking outside beating the bounds of my property here at 05:15 in the freezing weather because I can’t sleep – that’s a new one, isn’t it?

On the way back from Liz and Terry’s as it was going dark, I stopped at my favourite spot – the birdwatching site at the back of St Gervais d’Auvergne – yet again.

We were being presented with the most magnificent sunset as the sun slowly sank beneath the heavy clouds.

If ever a moment called for the camera, then this was it.

It was even more interesting to stand there in the dark and watch all of the lights swich on one by one, like some kind of carpet of bulbs spreading out across the landscape.

And of course it called for a repetition of that well-worn old saying –
“Red sky at night – shepherd’s delight”
“Red sky in the morning – Les Ancizes is on fire”.

And that’s not all of it either. I also fixed the non-working flasher on Caliburn and readjusted the fan belt on Liz’s car.

It’s been a busy day today and I’m off to bed now – thoroughly exhausted.

-4

Sunday 28th October 2012 – BRRRRR!!!!!!!

It’s absolutely freezing outside. And I mean that too. Minus 1.6°C outside when I took the stats just now.

And it’s been cold all day as you can tell by just looking at this photo of the Puy-de-Dome that I took from my usual haunt – the birdwatching site at the back of St Gervais d’Auvergne.

Winter has arrived, early as we predicted exclusively on these pages just 10 days ago, and we are still in October too.

And just look over there at the Puy de Sancy and the Mont Dore. It’s more like Mont Blac over there right now. And those heavy clouds are threatening more punishment

And the snow isn’t just scattered over the high ground either. There’s piles of it in the middle distance too.

When that lot was unleashed last night, we were still on SUMMER time would you believe. The weather has gone totally crazy.

So this morning with the extra hour in bed, I was up and about at 09:20 and after breakfast and the usual paperwork, I spent a couple of hours doing some housework, cleaning and dusting and the like.

It’s certainly been such a long time since I’ve done any, and I can actually see some floor now.

This afternoon I went out to Terjat to watch AS Terjat play Neris les Bains’s 2nd XI.

An Allier Division 1 match, theoretically the same level at which FC Pionsat St Hilaire’s 1st XI play, but there wasn’t a single player out there whom I would chose for my team. The quality really is quite poor in the Allier.

Neris-les-Bains are quite high up in the league and AS Terjat are mid-table, yet you wouldn’t have thought so from watching this match.

The first half with AS Terjat kicking into a howling wind, the match was played mostly in the Terjat half, but Neris-les-Bains were to all intents and purposes clueless in attack.

In the second half, playing with the wind, AS Terjat scored 2 goals in quick succession and as the wind dropped, Neris-les-Bains scored late in the game, due to a defensive howler in the AS Terjat penalty area.

fter that I went to Liz and Terry’s to rehearse our Radio Anglais programmes for the coming week. Liz made a lovely tea and I had a nice warm shower for which I was grateful.

Back here though it’s freezing and I was sorely tempted to light the fire up here. November 17th was the first fire in 2010 – November 27th was the first in 2011,but the first fire in October is just crazy.

If it’s as cold as this tomorrow and I’m in all evening it will definitely be lit.

-6

Saturday 27th October 2012 – WHO WAS IT …

… who laughed when I said the other day that winter was on its way here and that it would be snowing before much longer?

Well, there you are. This was what greeted me this morning.

It’s the first snow of the year and it’s still October and we’re still on summer time here here.

I was up nice and early with every intention of going to Montlucon as I told you yesterday. But the main reason for going was to go finish off the day with a swim in the pool at Neris-les-Bains;

But if anyone thinks that I am getting into a swimming pool anywhere in weather like this, they are mistaken.

Instead, I stayed in this morning and did some more paperwork.

This afternoon the weather changed slightly and we had an hour or two of glorious weather – hardly a cloud in the sky – and so I nipped into St Eloy-les-Mines.

In this weather you have to go and do the shopping when you can, so there I was, doing a quicka dash around LIDL and Carrefour, spending a grand total of €18 on the weekly food shopping bill

The other day coming back from Nan’s, I noticed that Caliburn seemed to have his brake lights stuck on.

An investigation revealed that it was the driver’s side bulb showing both filaments at night, so I went to have a closer look.

I took out the light units and saw that the nearside lights worked as they should. On the offside though, a close examination of the bulb revealed that the bulb’s shaft had fractured.

As a result, the two internal wires were twisting and the current for the rear light was passing through the touching wires, lighting up the brake light as well.

Pressing the brakes, the current for the brake light was simply running to earth down the fractured shaft of the bulb.

Anyway, a new bulb has resolved that problem and we now have rear lights and brake lights like we are supposed to. My first guess of an earthing fault wasn’t so far out.

This afternoon I watched some footy on the computer and then prepared myself to go to Marcillat en Combraille to watch the footy. It’s cup weekend in the Puy-de-Dome and as you know, FC Pionsat St Hilaire were eliminated a couple of weeks ago by Clermont Foot Auvergne.

But to cut a long story short … “hooray” – ed … there was an inch of snow on the ground and it was falling thick and fast.

That put an end to the plans for going out, and I shan’t be moving now until it warms up again.

See you in April.

-3

Friday 26th October 2012 – I WAS RIGHT …

… about one thing.

And that was that I didn’t do too much today.

Up with the cock this morning (but that’s enough about my disgusting habits) and after breakfast (I’m back to 3 meals a day now so I’m clearly feeling better) I cleared off to Marcillat en Combraille.

Today’s the day for Radio Tartasse to record the Radio Anglais rock music programmes for the following month – get them out of the way as quickly as possible.

It didn’t take long either – a mere 28 minutes – and I was back here by 10:45.

Paperwork was next and then I carried on with the website – I’ve almost finished my walk around the city of Québec and it might even be on line by the end of next week.

I did intend to go outside today but the rain, that started as a slight drizzle, was by now a torrential downpour, and so I made a butty and came up here to watch a film. The Lady In Cement, starring none other than Frank Sinatra as a Philip Marlowe-type detective but with Attitude.

This film was a sequel to Sinatra’s Tony Rome, which I found in a junk shop for €1:99 and which so fascinated me that I bought the sequel full-price.

If there ever are any doubts about Sinatra’s acting ability then The Lady in Cement will dispel them completely. There are a few scenes in there that are magnificent, and it’s been a long time since I’ve said that about an acting performance.

These two films are so good that it did make me wonder whether or not they were ever going to make some kind of series out of them.

Anyway, after that I went downstairs and carried on working on the shelving for the cupboard.

Part of the problem with the wood that I buy is that it’s rough-cut stuff and so much of the time was spent sanding it all down ready to assemble. Given a few days of heavy weather though next week even that lot might be finished.

It won’t half be nice to have somewhere to store all of the stuff down there when the shelving is completed.

Tomorrow though I’m off to Montlucon if I wake up early enough. I need to make a mega-shop as I’m running low on stuff.

And that reminds me – the next monthly mega-shop that I do isn’t going to be in France. I might well be having my long-earned break 😉

-4

Thursday 25th October 2012 – A BIG THANK-YOU …

… to everyone who thought about me while I was ill. I appreciated it very much.

A couple of you have suggested taking it easy for a while – sentiments with which I totally agree. Accordingly when the alarm clocks went off, I turned over and went back to sleep for a while.

Most of the day has been spent with paperwork – or rather, fiddling about with the printer so that I could print off a pile of paperwork.

It didn’t print in black last month and so I did everything in blue, but today I spent ages cleaning the heads and managed to get half a black printout.

One of the nozzles is blocked, and so I went to clean the heads again, and it ran out of black ink. I changed the black ink, but it still wasn’t printing properly and so I cleaned the heads again.

This time it ran out of blue ink.

I changed the blue ink, cleaned the heads, and it’s still not printing properly in black.

This means that for the foreseeable future I’m back to printing everything in blue again. I never seem to have any luck with printers.

This afternoon, I selected all of the music for the rock programmes but this evening was something exciting and unusual – Nan was having a little do and I was invited, as were Cécile, Gilles and Zoe.

We had a snack and played charades and so on for a few hours. It’s not like me to be sociable, is it?< Tomorrow is recording the Radio Anglais rock programmes for Radio Tartasse and so I won't be doing too much tomorrow morning either.

-5

Wednesday 24th October 2012 – HELLO AGAIN EVERYONE.

Yes, I’m feeling better now and I’ve even been outside this afternoon. That’s progress.

So what happened then? Basically, I started to feel ill on Friday night. I reckoned that I’ve eaten something that disagrees with me – but what, I do not know. O

By Monday night things had calmed down enough for me to try some food and drink and as that seemed to work after some kind of fashion, I’ve been gradually increasing my intake.

So far, so good.

But I’ve not been idle while I’ve been ill. Ohhh no!

I’ve done all kinds of paperwork that’s been outstanding, watched a load of decent films and recorded a few DVDs and CDs.

Today, with the weather being really bright and sunny with plenty of hot water, I collected up all of the towels and clothes and so on that might have germs on them, dug out the tabletop washing machine and given them a really good wash

So now, I wonder what tomorrow might bring.

-4

Monday 22nd October 2012 – JUST IN CASE …

… you were wondering, I’m not too well at the moment. I’ve eaten something that has disagreed with me.

Anyway, I’ll be better soon and normal service will be resumed as soon as possible.

-3

Saturday 20th October 2012 – I’M ALL ICKY-POOHS

I started to feel ill on Friday night and I wasn’t feeling so good this morning either and so I decided to stay in bed to sleep through it.

Or, at least that was the plan.

But it didn’t quite work out quite like that as for reasons that I won’t explain because you are probably eating your lunch right now, I couldn’t stay in bed for longer than 10 minutes at a time.

Consequently I reckon that I’ve eaten something that disagrees with me – but what, I do not know.

On the basis that if nothing goes in, then nothing can come out, I decided not to eat or drink anything until the crisis passed but nevertheless I nipped into St Eloy-les-Mines (and wasn’t that an exciting adventure?) to do some quick shopping.

Having taken a few elementary precautions, I went down to watch the football, including watching FC Pionsat St Hilaire’s 2nd XI win their first game of the season against the Goatslayers. but that was really too much.

Back home, I retired to bed and that was that.

Friday 19th October 2012 – THE HURRICANE …

… finally calmed down during late afternoon.

But not before several really impressive records were set. We didn’t quite manage the maximum wind-speed – the 66.7mph gust from May is safe for another while yet- but everything else was historic.

So much so that the Air 403 wind turbine on the roof of the barn generated more electricity today that in the rest of the 15 months that it’s been there.

The Rutland WG901 on the house surpassed the previous record and showed me the magic result on the timer
“Time since I took the last reading – 25 hours and 16 minutes”
“Wind time since last reading – “25 hours and 16 seconds”.

As well as that, the temperature here in the attic is now back up to the 20s – and I should think so too. I was freezing the other night.

So anyway, after the usual messing around on the computer I went outside to rectify the damage.

I picked up the kindling bins and the kindling and reorganised them (I don’t know why I bothered though – they blew over again) and picked up all of the stuff that had been propped against the end of the barn (and that blew back down twice more)

Major work though was with the Air 403 wind turbine fastened to the fence.

The screws have given way under the fierce battering that they took from the wind and the whole affair was blowing around like crazy. Screws clearly don’t work.

As I didn’t have any bolts long enough, you can see the benefits of having lengths of stud iron (or threaded rod as it’s called these days) lying around. I cut a few lengths of that and made up some bolts, and now it’s all properly bolted together and I hope that that won’t move again.

With no bread and still no boulangère I went into Pionsat to find out why she doesn’t love me any more, and I soon found out, much to my dismay.

The boulangerie is closed.

According to the notice on the door, it’s closed “until further notice” following an accident on the premises involving the oven. That’s upset my plans and no mistake. I shall have to think again about this.

Back home I finished off emptying the back half of the hard-standing. I need to buy some weedkiller to deal with the weeds on there, and on Monday I’ll start digging out the soil that has collapsed.

This is going to be a very long job.

-2

EPIC HALL

The Poisoned Pen (or Poisoned Chalice, more like) – or my relentless struggle against reality