Tag Archives: crash out

Tuesday 3rd May 2011 – What was so strange …

… about my posting last night was that the moment I pressed “send” there was a tremendous thunderclap outside and we had a storm – and I didn’t have any idea at all that one was brewing. We ended up with 7mm of rain and that’s about 80 litres of water in the water butts. I’m glad now that I worked on my day off.

And so this morning I needed to print off the papers for the radio programme and some other papers that I needed. Terry needed me to accompany him to the quarry for some intense negotiations, and that was effectively the morning sorted out.

At the radio station, they weren’t expecting us. According to the engineer, SMADC (the Societe Mixte pour l’Amenagedment et Developpement des Combrailles) are now not co-operating with the radio station. Nothing new there – the SMADC ceased to co-operate with us a long time ago – but I suspect some developments in this field in early course.

Back home I crashed out for a couple of hours yet again. I’m going to have to do something about this.

Tuesday 5th April 2011 – I’m not going to be awake much longer

I’m absolutely whacked, even though I have done nothing today.

As I worked a decent shift on Sunday I decided that I would have a jour de recuperation, as they call it around here, to make up for my Sunday. And so when I woke up at about 08:30 I simply turned over and went back to sleep.

When I did wake up at 10:00 I had breakfast and started to tidy up in here. But my heart isn’t into tidying up – I don’t know how to do it anyway. And so I did a couple of pieces of really important correspondence but then a major snag – my printer wouldn’t print them. I was there for ages and even changing the ink cartridge didn’t work – in fact it comes up with an “I don’t recognise this cartridge” message. And so after badgering around with that for ages, luckily Clare’s husband Keith came to the rescue and printed them out for me.

So they are now sent off and I’ve done some shopping too. I’ve also changed the number plates on the Minerva and put mine on (Belgian numberplates belong to the owner, not the car) and that, dear reader, is that.

Well, not quite everything. I’ve also bought a trailer today, as I said I would yesterday, and I’ve also been taking steps so that my property empire can go west.

As I said, I have cunning plans. But right now, I’m going to bed.

Monday 4th April 2011 – Well, I’m back home again …

… after a working day of a mere 28 hours and 16 minutes – for the benefit of many of my readers.

After my exertions fastening down the Minerva back onto the trailer after we nearly left it behind, I set off through the dawn and carried on towards home. And things were, just for a change, going so well until I arrived onto the dual carriageway between Moulins and Montmarault.

Not far from Montmarault I was cut up by an artic that decided that 400 metres was sufficient to try to overtake me with just 2kph different but I got my own back on a dual carriageway bit when I ran him up behind a farm trailer and stuck him there for 8 kilometres.

Then we had yet another police barrage at Montmarault where I had an interesting 20 minutes with a group of gendarmes (30-odd years in driving in France and I’ve only ever been stopped once before – and now twice in a weekend. Time I was moving on, methinks). And when I arrived back here, there was the news of the sudden cancellation of one of the events that forms a major part of our radio programmes – and we had just recorded 5 weeks-worth of programmes advertising them too.

However, I didn’t take to much notice of anything as I cleared off to bed and quite right too. I deserved a really good sleep. But did I get it? Did I ‘eck as like because once I had dropped off, the phone rang again. Mind you, I’m not going to complain too much because the news that came down the telephone was good news indeed – but more of this anon.

belgian land rover minerva les guis virlet puy de dome franceTerry and Liz were on their travels about and they came by chez moi later this afternoon. That was rather fortunate because they were able to give me a hand to take the Minerva off the trailer.

The Minerva is now parked prettily on the hard-standing (isn’t that a good bit of work, that?) and Terry could then take his trailer home with him. That’s the quickest that I’ve ever tidied up after a trip away from home like this.

So now I’m going back to bed again ready for an early start tomorrow. I need to push on as I have some cunning plans to put into operation.

Wednesday 30th March 2011 – You can see …

… my apartment in Brussels on the internet if you like. But you’ll have to hurry. Someone has made me an offer already, and negotiations are proceeding.

That was quite a pleasant surprise at lunchtime, and it quite disrupted my flow of thought. What with crashing out yesterday late afternoon when I should have been catching up on my correspondence, I had to sped the morning doing just that. Until I was rudely interrupted, that was.

So while waiting for the Post Office to open I dug over another raised bed, and returning from my trip into Pionsat I planted my shallots and garlic. Well, not all of the garlic because I seem to have far too much. But I do know someone who can make use of it. But once that was out of the way I did some more digging over and I now have some sprouts, some carrots and some coriander in.

Tomorrow I shall have to make a start on making up some seed trays because there are a few things that need planting even though it’s too early to put them outside.

And then back up here and I crashed out again – it’s getting to me, all of this work.

Tuesday 29th March 2011 – I’ve spent all day on the road.

We started off at Radio Tartasse to record their programmes for April. It was the usual disorganised performance there but we managed well enough.

Radio Arverne wanted us at 13:00 this afternoon and so it wasn’t worth going home. We went to Chateuneuf-les-Bains for a coffee instead. That was much more interesting.

At Radio Tartasse, which is much more organised we did 5 programmes in less than an hour, and then went off to the Carrefour at Riom for a butty, a coffee and a nosy around the shops where I bought some 100%vegan margarine for my garlic bread for tea.

Back here, I sorted out some screws and some of the seeds for the garden but my heart’s not in it right now. I’ve not recovered fully from the effects of digging all of these raised beds. It’s taking it out of me getting ready for planting. So with that in mind I knocked off at 17:30 and came up here for a rest.

I’ll have a lie-in tomorrow to see if I’ll feel any better, and then I’ll go out a-planting. I need to get the garlic and the shallots in place pretty quickly. And I’m away at the weekend too.

Monday 21st March 2011 – And if you thought …

that yesterday’s 260-odd amp-hours was impressive, then what about today’s 300 amp-hours? We haven’t had many days like that in June and July.

Not only that, the water temperature in the home-made immersion heater topped 60°C and that was impressive too. In fact, it was more-than-impressive – it was the highest figure ever recorded. And it’s only March as well.

You can guess the kind of day that we’ve been having today. Cold and windy but totally beautiful.

And what have I been up to today? Last night just as I was going to bed Terry mailed me. “I need to give you your stuff back as I need the van empty”
“Okay” I replied. “I’ll see what I can do. Come round as late as possible”
And so today I started to tidy up in the barn again and make a huge pile of space to put stuff. But then I had a phone call. “I need to come to see The Beguiled. Can I drop your stuff off in an hour’s time?”

So the tidying went out of the window and stuff was thrown everywhere to make a big space. Terry arrived and so did my furniture, and that is nice. There’s still lots of space too, which I’ll need for when I go back and fetch the rest of the stuff. But the barn where I want to put the Ford Cortina 2000E – that can be cleared in a day or so. I just need to move the caravan shell.

I was whacked after that (strange things go on around here) and crashed out – I almost missed the Anglo-French Group meeting but I awoke just in time.

But I’m thinking about this barn. It’s not going to be difficult to put a suspended floor in over the garage bit, you know I’m going to be looking into this
 

Friday 19th March 2011 – I didn’t get my early night last night after all.

I was just on the point of going to bed when someone who I hadn’t spoken to for a while came on line. We had quite a bit to talk about and what with one thing and another it was almost 04:00 when I went to bed.

And so I crawled out of my pit at 08:00 feeling like death, and went to Montlucon. It was a big mistake to get my windows fron Lapeyre. I need an empty van for when I go back to Brussels, and while we got these windows in, getting them out on my own without breaking them – that will be something else.

It was gardening day at LIDL and so I have 6 more fruit trees for the Liz Ayers Memorial Orchard, a pile of seeds, and some onion sets, seed potatoes and seed shallots. I shan’t abandon the garden entirely this year. At Noz I spent a fortune, mostly on DVDs and I now have 5 or the 6 Don Camillo films, starring Fernandel. I really enjoyed the books when I was at school and I saw one of the films once and that was just as good.

At Brico Depot I set a new world record by buying nothing at all, but I was in tears nevertheless. Door Strips in Brico in Belgium €10.73 – same one in Brico Depot here €3:49. White Spirit there €3:89 – here €2:09. And it was all like that. I don’t know how they can get away with it in Belgium, I really don’t.

But I’ve made a conscious decision that now that I’m a little more financially sound, first thing that I’m going to be doing is to improve my diet. And to that end I bought a few things that I wouldn’t normally buy such as half a kilo of grapes (which I munched on the way home) and a little packet of sugar-free sweets.

I didn’t go swimming – I was too early and in any case I was whacked. So back here to crash out for a couple of hours. And it was a mistake to eat the grapes and the sugar-free sweets so quickly as I was in … errr … some discomfort for a while.

I went to the footy too this evening. Pionsat’s 3rd XI playing the league leaders so you would normally expect a hammering, but the 2nd XI have no game tomorrow and so there were several … errr … discrete changes to the team line-up, And although they had yet another makeshift goalkeeper (who did really well and I was surprised by that) they had a 2nd XI centre-half playing and it was amazing how much it stiffened the defence.

fcpsh fc pionsat st hilaire bromont lamothe puy de dome ligue football league francePionsat actually won 2-1, with two disputed goals. One was scored by three players cantering off down the pitch while everyone else was waiting for the offside flag. I was in no position to judge but one of their spectators thought that the ref got it right.

I’ve been saying all along that there isn’t much wrong with Pionsat’s 3rd XI that a real goalie and a couple of decent players in key positions can’t put right, and it was proved right tonight.

fcpsh fc pionsat st hilaire bromont lamothe puy de dome ligue football league francep>Pionsat’s second goal was a penalty – a clear foul, no mistake about that, but as to whether it was in the area, all I can say is that I was almost level with the area and the Bromont players had some of my sympathy. After that, the match became a little naughty and we had a running feud down each touchline for a while.

Still Bromont should have buried the game and they only have themselves to blame for losing it. Clean through on goal three or four times and one shot round the post, one off the bar, and two straight at Stephane (and didn’t he do well to hang on to them with forwards charging in and he’s never played a real match in goal before?)

But now I’ve had a doze this afternoon, it’s 04:00 and I can’t sleep at all. Crazy. 

Wednesday 16th March 2011 – Ohhh ‘eck

Errr .. yes, It’s almost 06:00 and I’ve been awake for a couple of hours.

What usually happens is that when I come back from a long drive I go for a kip for an hour or two in the early afternoon but today I wasn’t feeling tired. That’s a surprise because I didn’t have much of a sleep by the roadside last night. The dawn woke me up and I was back here by 08:30.

And so I pottered around for a bit doing not very much at all. At about 16:00 I went out to Caliburn and emptied the cab, and gave it a good brush, a sweep-out and a tidy up.

Back up here round about 18:00 that was when I started to feel a little tired. And so I reckoned I would have a couple of hours on the divan before tea. And that was that.

In other news, I see that the UK is up to its old tricks. The police are called to a local park by a local councillor for a most heinous crime – a couple of little girls are  …….. wait for it …… picking the flowers.

Clearly the local councillor is too afraid to go to speak to the girls himself, the hero, and so two coppers come along, spend 20 minutes watching the kids picking the flowers, and then go over and caution them and their parents. Heavy stuff, hey? Whatever would the Kray Twins have said?

And so that’s two coppers hiding behind bushes watching little girls for 20 minutes (Garry Glitter got 18 months in prison for doing that) becuse a Councillor is too afraid to carry out his civic duties, and all the while crime is rampant on the streets of Poole in Dorset.

You can’t make up a story like this, can you?

Sunday 13th March 2011 – The things I do …

…to get out of working on a Sunday!

The toothache kept me awake all through Saturday night and so in the end I tracked down the Dentiste du Garde and booked an appointment. Earliest that I could get was 10:00. Ahh well! When Liz came into the kitchen she took one look at my face and burst out laughing – the left side had swollen up like a balloon.

Anyway, off to the dentist’s I went. All the way to the back of Ixelles. I was there by 09:40 (no traffic on the roads) and I was out at 10:00. He cut open the tooth (no anaesthetic but it made no difference as the tooth is thoroughly dead and I didn’t feel a thing), pulled out the infected root, and that was that. Of course, with the emergency dentists there is no finesse or subtlety – it’s pretty much production-line dentistry but it was better than nothing.

Back home and with no pain at all, relatively speaking, I crashed out for an hour or two while Terry and Liz painted the woodwork in the new bedroom. I woke up at about 14:00 and pottered around to help out for a couple of hours, and then crashed out again. 20:00 that was,

Tuesday 1st March 2011 – AND NOW I’M NOT!

I’m back on the road again heading to Brussels. I’ve had a hectic few days just recently and it isn’t going to stop either any time soon.

This morning I woke up in the cold to a typical Combraille-type hanging cloud (isn’t it good to be home?) and after a somewhat late start I emptied Caliburn of everything that I had taken down to the farm. It’s all stacked in the barn now and I’ll tidy it up in due course. Following a doze for an hour or so, I went to this CREFAD meeting at St Gervais where I was one of the guest speakers.

I met a new English couple there and their daughter. They haven’t long been in the Auverne, having moved from near Haltwhistle. What attracted them to the area was that it looked “just like home” and I can echo that. “I wanted a stone house” said the wife. “I’m a true border reiver and stone doesn’t burn”.

That of course brought back memories of my former connections with the border and Archie Fisher’s album Windward Away – “every time I think of you I see a border reiver”. That of course leads on to the story of the 9 year-old boy who knew how to make a marriage work – “you tell your wife that she is beautiful, even if she looks like a truck”. And of course from there we have “every time I think of you I see a Leyland Reiver”.

Once the meeting was over, I shot off straight back to Brussels. I didn’t make it all the way back (which is only to be expected seeing as how late it was when I left). I made it as far as St Florentin which is between Auxerre and Troyes, where I crashed out in the big lay-by there at the side of the road.

Monday 7th February 2011 – I’m still here

I haven’t been struck down by a thunderbolt for working on the Sabbath, and I haven’t been a victim of Extraordinary Rendition during the night for daring to criticise the Septics either. Mind you, I had a really uncomfortable night and didn’t sleep too well – my guilty conscience obviously – and I’m going to bed as soon as I press “send”.

This afternoon though, I had to pop out to see my notaire about getting the apartment paperwork together. And she sent me off to get a tax clearance certificate, but of course the tax office is closed in the afternoons so that didn’t work out as planned and I need to do that tomorrow.

Meanwhile, I have the makings of a beautiful bathroom now – not quite finished but the walls are all grouted, there’s a sink, there are new taps on the bath and on the sink, and there is central heating again. Tomorrow it will have a new floor, some wallpaper, and be painted if we are lucky, and then we can move the washing machine in there.

I also have a bedroom that is painted now, and there’s a radiator fitted too. And I may well have time to start on the flooring tomorrow as well. But fitting the radiator was exciting – the connector broke as we were coupling it up, so we fitted a spare valve but that meant a trip to Brico for an adapter, and then another trip to Brico for a longer connector for the valve.

It was after 20:00 when we finished, and we are all exhausted. And not surprising too. It was a hard day’s work. I just hope that I can manage to press “send” before I ……

…. ZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

Tuesday 16th November 2010 – SO WHAT HAPPENED …

… today then?

I vaguely remember the phone ringing at 09:30 to say that my freight from the USA was about to arrive, so I had to wake up, leave my bed, dress myself and go downstairs to sort that out.

Usually the arrival of a parcel full of new toys makes me quite excited, but not much chance of that today.

I retreated back upstairs to sit back on the sofa but feeling myself drifting off again, I set the alarm for 13:00 to remind me to wake up to go and record the radio show.

However, I was woken by a phone call at 12:45 to say that the recoding session was cancelled.

The next thing I remember was about 20:00 when I woke up and had to go outside to fetch something to drink, and after that it was about 23:45 when I managed to stay awake for a whole two hours.

So that was Tuesday. all of it.

Sounds like fun, doesn’t it?

Saturday 25th September 2010 – Well, I’m back home.

And hasn’t this been an exciting few days?

The journey back was just as exciting though – it was raining when I left Brussels, (which was actually at about 21:00 in the evening Friday) and it gradually came down heavier and heavier.

At Troyes it was starting to become difficult to see with the rain and my eyelids were becoming heavier and heavier, so I parked up at St Florentin at 01:30 for a few hours for a sleep.

A torrential downpour woke me up at about 08:00 and that set the seal on the whole day. It rained non-stop after that and I brought the whole lot back home with me.

But the exciting events of the last couple of days have worn me out and I crashed out this afternoon. In fact I was hard-pushed to make it to the footy tonight.

And don’t ask me what happened there because I really can’t remember. I came back here and was out like a light.

I’ll be dead for a week, I reckon.    

Friday 10th September 2010 – I found a hotel with free wi-fi …

… a Première Classe on the edge of the city near the motorway, but when I returned from this meeting on Friday night, I … errrr … crashed out! Mind you it had been a long day. I had to get up early to open up Lieneke’s for Simon – but he never showed up. Mind you I took advantage by catching up with some more web stuff. I’m really pressing on with that

And after lunch I went to Bill’s and fixed his computer as much as I could , but I couldn’t do it all as we need some new drivers and then after that I went to Clermont Ferrand for this meeting. And as luck should have it I fell into Auchan just as they were having a huge €1:00 sale – and there was also a printer for Liz and Terry too.

The meeting was the Annual General Meeting of the referees of the Puy de Dome where they discuss problems that have arisen during the past season and new proceedings for the forthcoming season. It was quite interesting, but not half as interesting as the “attitudes” of a few of the people in charge of the meeting. I wouldn’t have called them particularly friendly – not in the least.

I picked up something to eat on the way back and after that I crashed right out.

i’m clearly working far too hard these days.

Sunday 5th September 2010 – One thing that I promised never to do …

franglais translations moulin de braynant gorges de la sioule puy de dome france… was to criticise anyone else’s attempts at foreign language translations. And for two reasons –

  1. people ought to be congratulated for making any attempt at doing their best to make themselves understood/li>
  2. of course, the stuff that I do is nothing to write home about and I wouldn’t like mine to receive the same kind of criticism

But be that as it may, my imagination isn’t half working overtime about the condition third from bottom on the list on the right, and all kind of images are floating through my mind.

I had a lovely afternoon out this afternoon though, although this morning was something of a disaster. It was about 04:00 when I went to bed, I was dealing with a computer issue for all of Saturday until then – and yet at 09:00 I was up and about and breakfasted. And on a Sunday too.!

“How did you manage that?” I hear you say.
That was thanks to whoever it was who rang me at 08:10 and said “C’est toi, Albert?” And when I told him that he had a wrong number, rang me back twice more until I finally convinced him.

And so with my Sunday ruined, I did some more website stuff for the rest of the morning.

blot l'eglise fcpsh fc pionsat st hilaire ligue football league puy de dome franceAfter lunch I set out for the football at Blot-l’Eglise, a nice village up in the hills at the back of Manzat and Combronde.

FC Pionsat St Hilaire’s 1st XI won 1-0 in a good, enjoyable match played in a very friendly atmosphere in beautiful weather conditions, but in all honesty Blot l’Eglise could still be out there now, all on their own attacking an empty net, and they still wouldn’t have equalised.

moulin de braynant gorges de la sioule puy de dome franceOn the way back I parked up for a while at the Moulin de Braynant (where I saw the above notice) and went for a walk along the Gorge de la Sioule, such a beautiful afternoon that it was. The weather was gorgeous, the scenery was impressive and it really was a pleasure to be out and about.

This is quite a touristy spot here and a very popular place for watersports, as Lee Potty-mouth and Rick Hollyoaks will tell you.

moulin de braynant gorges de la sioule puy de dome franceThey also hire out kayaks (and this is what the notice above refers to, by the way) and one day I’m going to have a go at this. It’s a long time since I’ve been in a boat – I used to canoe for my school back in the late 1960s, which is just as well as there are no lessons on offer here.

I asked them how beginners manage, and the response was that they have to paddle their own canoe around here.

moulin de braynant gorges de la sioule puy de dome franceThey need to make sure that they take all the correct equipment with them otherwise that they can find themselves right up the creek without a paddle.

The notice above, by the way, omits two of the most important rules of kayaking, and maybe I ought to repeat them here.

  1. you are not allowed to light a fire in a canoe. After all, you cannot have your kayak and heat it
  2. it is forbidden to make love in a canoe. After all, making love in a canoe is just the same as English beer – it’s f*cking close to water

And after all of that, I came back here and crashed out for … errrr …. four hours – now I can’t sleep.

In other news, something has happened this evening that I have been waiting 10 months to do. And just like a hurricane, you know that it is inevitably going to happen and you are totally powerless – there is nothing that you can do that will stop it.

Yes, I have finally, at long last, managed to spill a full mug of coffee all over the floor in my nice attic room 🙁