Tag Archives: lie in

Sunday 3rd February 2019 – WHAT A GORGEOUS …

… afternoon it was today.

Beautiful and sunny, not too windy, not too cold. And hordes of people wandering around outside. Round about 15:00 I joined them and went for a good walk. I didn’t make it back until 17:30.

All around the headland, down into town, around the harbour, back into town and then back here. And had the ice-cream stall that sells vegan sorbets been open, I would have treated myself to the first ice-cream of the year.

Now, with having an early night last night, and nice fresh bedding too, that I would have had a deep, relaxing sleep. But unfortunately not. Round about 02:40 I had another massive attack of cramp and I was in total agony. I just couldn’t ease it off and ended by standing up and trying to stretch my leg.

All in all, it took about half an hour until the pain would ease up enough that I could go back to bed. But any chance of going back to sleep was long-gone. I was awake for hours until I finally slipped away.

But I must have gone to sleep at some time, because I was off on my travels.

I was in a some kind of weird pub last night – some pub not too dissimilar to the one next to the old Town Hall in Crewe. All dirty, run-down and very basic. And I was waiting for someone there. I’d actually booked a room in a hotel a couple of miles outside the town. But a couple came in to the pub and said that they had a room booked there, so the landlord showed them up. As this couple looked quite respectable, I wondered what the rooms were like so I asked the landlord to show me a room. He took me upstairs, and the room was dreadful. A really bad 1960s-type of room with about 10 beds crammed in any old how, with heavy plush bed coverings and really looking in the worst possible taste. I didn’t even hang around to see if it was clean and damp-free. I just made an excuse about it obviously being out of my price range and walked out.
Later on, I was on board the Good Ship Ve … errr … Ocean Endeavour again. We were going to have a meeting about our journey and to sum everything up, but it was postponed. A very short while later, I was reading a newspaper on board ship, and it gave an “account” of this meeting, clearly written in advance of the meeting in anticipation of it taking place. To my surprise, the person who had written it was an old comrade of mine at the Open University and he had written quite a lot about my role in the voyage, blowing it up to well beyond what it really was, and putting a link in to my blog where readers could read so much more about it. However, the editor had edited out the url of the blog which disappointed me greatly.

08.40 when I finally awoke, but that’s not the same as saying that I was up and about. Much more like 09:30, or even 10:00 when I put my sooty foot on the floor.

Breakfast was even later. Much later too.More like an early lunch. I wasn’t in any hurry. I had a nice relaxing morning doing the usual Sunday task of badger all.

Feeling a little peckish later, I made some cheese on toast. And that reminded me about my pie. I must do something about that later.

When I went out for my walk, I had a good look around, and saw a couple of things that I hadn’t noticed before.

There were four or five of these floats bobbing up and down just offshore, and each float was different. I’ve no idea what they are doing out there, and I’m convinced that I have never seen them before.

While I was photographing the floats, I was distracted by an aeroplane flying overhead.

This aeroplane is a Bolkow Bo-208C Junior apparently, a type that I haven’t noticed before. And it’s quite interesting because the Bolkow company was the successor to the legendary Messerschmitt aircraft company of Luftwaffe fame.

It’s amazing what is out there once you start to look for it.

Talking of things being out there if only you look for them, the air was so clear that there was an excellent view of Jersey today.

So cropping out a selection of an image, blowing it up, which I can do despite modern anti-terrorist legislation, and enhancing the colours, you can see some of the houses and other buildings dotted along the coastline of the island.

It’s hard to believe that that’s almost 60 kms (35 miles) away. But then that’s all thanks to the big zoom lens that I bought in October.

In the other direction, looking down the Baie de Mont St Michel, the view was just as good.

Going as far out as I could, I still couldn’t see the Mont itself and the buildings thereupon. But the big hotel complex just a few hundred yards away from the Mont is clearly visible.

To give you some idea of perspective, that’s about 30 kms (18 miles) away as the crow flies.

And so back from my walk, I started by making another rice pudding.

While that was cooking, I fried a couple of leeks and onions with a few mushrooms and a tin of flageolet beans. When it was all thoroughly cooked, I added the tofu mix from yesterday, thoroughly stirred it in and heated it all through.

While I was waiting for the mixture to cool down, I prepared a pizza and stuck that in the oven to cook;

While the pizza was cooking, I took out a roll of pastry from the oven. It had dried and cracked so I had to wet it slightly and roll it. Good job that I had bought my rolling pin a while ago.

After it had been rolled, I greased a pie dish and put the pastry in. Added the pie filling and then folded over the excess pastry.

The pizza came out of the oven and the pie went in. I also added the rice pudding so that it would cook further.

The pizza was delicious, although it could have benefited from a longer period in the oven, and so was the rice pudding. The pie looks really good and I can’t wait to try it.

There was just me outside tonight for my evening walk. It wasn’t really cold and wasn’t really windy. It sounds very good after the beautiful day but I bet that there’s more winter to come.

The tide was still on its way out by the looks of things but nevertheless there was a good photo of the wves rolling up and down the beach at the Plat Gousset just by the Casino

So now I’ll try yet again for an early night. And hopefully a good sleep, without an attack of cramp. I need it.

And I’ve just found out that we are going to have a visitor tomorrow. Neptune has just turned into the bay up by Cherbourg and there’s only one place where she will be going.

floats granville manche normandy france

st helier jersey granville manche normandy france

cabanon vauban pointe de carolles mont st michel granville manche normandy france

old military buildings pointe du roc granville manche normandy france

old military buildings granville manche normandy france

atlantic wall world war 2 bunker granville manche normandy france

trawler undergoing repair chantier navale granville manche normandy france

boat lift chantier navale granville manche normandy france

port de granville harbour manche normandy france

port de plaisance granville harbour manche normandy france

chemin de la roche gauthier granville manche normandy france

st pair sur mer granville manche normandy france

speedboat st pair sur mer granville manche normandy france

ullouville granville manche normandy france

speedboat st pair sur mer granville manche normandy france

rue st gaud granville manche normandy france

old crane port de granville harbour manche normandy france

art deco building rue du port granville manche normandy france

marite port de granville harbour granville manche normandy france

Friday 1st February 2019 – WHAT A WAY …

… to start the day.

The alarms certainly went off this morning, but what did I care? I turned over and went back to sleep.

07:40 when I awoke and that in itself was nothing like what time I finally left my bed. All I can say is that I must have needed it;

And so that was the morning messed up. A late start, an even later breakfast and that was that.

It’s been a quiet day today though. I’ve been working on a 3D animation project for most of it. Three or so years ago I made a couple of animations but despite their being made on a 3D program they were really only two-dimensional and besides, I’ve forgotten most of what I did back then.

And so I set to work with a will.

The problem is though that you become so absorbed in a project that you don’t realise just how quickly the time goes. It ended up being a late lunch and an even later tea, and I don’t feel as if I have accomplished anything.

In the heat of the action I forgot to make any hummus today and so it was cheese again for lunch. There’s some old stuff that needs eating.

This afternoon there was a high wind and rain outside. The sea was pretty rough.

And I was lucky enough to catch Thora setting out from the harbour heading back to Jersey. No idea what she was carrying though. I couldn’t see clearly.

I hadn’t noticed her come in though. She must have sneaked in on the high tide during the night.

Having watched her sail … “diesel” – ed … off into the sunset, I went round to the other side of the headland too watching her disappear into the sea-mist.

The weather wasn’t really so good out there and the photography was not up to much. But it brought out an eerie view of the Ile de Chausey in the background, hidden in the mist

Tea was a burger in a bap with vegetables and potatoes, followed by the rest of yesterday’s rice pudding. Just as delicious as yesterday’s.

The rain had stopped when I went out for my walk. And there was no-one around at all. Minette was there but being stand-offish again. She wandered off when I tried to stroke her.

Today, with a late start, I just wandered off for a brief 10 minutes. I suppose that that’s an improvement.

But I’m looking forward to a decent sleep tonight and I might even have a good day tomorrow. After all it is a shopping day.

waves pointe du roc granville manche normandy france

fishing boat baie de mont st michel granville manche normandy france

thora marite port de granville harbour manche normandy france

thora port de granville harbour manche normandy france

thora baie de mont st michel granville manche normandy france

thora ile de chausey granville manche normandy france

Sunday 27th January 2019 – NOW THAT’S …

… more like it.

No alarm this morning. And when I finally did awaken it was a gorgeous, beautiful 10:15. And when I finally did rise up from my stinking pit, it was an even better 10:40. Now why can’t I do this every Sunday when I don’t have to catch a train?

There was plenty of time to go on my travels too. Last night I was once more upon the Good Ship Ve … errr … Ocean Endeavour. There was a musician playing the guitar and singing and at some point he had invited me to join in. But when we reached the point where I should have joined in, someone else from the back of the room took up the part. And that upset me somewhat. It was something similar to the scene in The Gendarme At St Tropez when, on his way to choir practice, Louis de Funès arrests a burglar. A little later I had to go to the restaurant and take with me a crate of stuff, including half a dozen bottles. But I was so weak that it was a struggle to carry it, and when I found that it wasn’t needed and had to take it back, I couldn’t move. I had to put it on the floor and drag it, but that was even more difficult.

With a very late breakfast, I didn’t bother with lunch. Just a few pieces of fruit and a slice of my Christmas cake. It’s even better as it matures, although there is a limit.

But with it being Sunday, I had a very lazy day and didn’t do too much at all. I downloaded a program from the internet and had a play around with it, but it doesn’t work as well as I would like.

I also resurrected an ancient program from about 10 years ago to give that another go, but there seems to be an issue with that. Mind you, it’s been transformed through several operating systems and several computers so it’s probably not compatible with new technology and there’s probably been an upgrade along the way.

I eschewed my afternoon walk today. The wind was howling around outside like nobody’s business. It didn’t look very good at all.

This evening though, when I went out for my evening walk after a delicious vegan pizza, the wind had died down somewhat.

It was now a mere hurricane strength, but because the tide was so far out, there were no impressive waves crashing down on the promenade at the Plat Gousset.

Had I been out this afternoon I might have had some kind of impressive view. But as Kenneth Williams once famously said, “I’m not getting wet for a load of bleeding birds”.

Minette the black cat was out there tonight on her windowledge. And believe it or not, that’s the only person to whom I’ve spoken today.

So tomorrow, back to work. there’s a lot to do and I keep on putting it off.

night sea plat gousset granville manche normandy france

Tuesday 22nd January 2019 – IT’S SNOWING!!!

Well, it was this morning.

it started at about 09:30 and went on until about 11:00. And by that time there was a healthy white covering across the courtyard out here. Not exactly an Alpine vista but it’s the first snow that I’ve seen this winter. We just don’t get it in Normandy like we did in the Auvergne.

You might be excused for thinking that having gone to bed last night and not set the alarms for this morning, I might have missed it. But with it having been an early night, by the time that 05:00 came round I was wide awake.

But wide awake is not the same as being out of bed.On a Day of Rest (to replace my Sunday lie-in) 08:00 was much more like it, although I have known better.

And Nerina put in an appearance last night. She was apparently doing some kind of research into performing dogs and I remembered that I had actually written a document on this during my University studies. So I started to sift through everything that I had written but to my dismay I couldn’t find it. I thought that it was at some time during the last year or so but I’d been all the way back for a few years and it wasn’t there. So I was wondering if I had written it but not yet submitted it. This all went on for quite some considerable time.

While I was watching the snow falling, I attacked some work that needed doing. making all kinds of enquiries about my lost passport. But provided that I can negotiate the TGV back to France tomorrow, the urgency has lessened. I’ve had another message concerning something that I need to do and for which I need my passport, and that’s not going to happen for quite a while.

At lunchtime I nipped outside into the snow to buy a baguette from the supermarket down the road. Tomato and vegan cheese baguette was delicious.

This afternoon, I didn’t do very much at all. I drifted around going through some more paperwork and then made a start on the packing. But I couldn’t keep going for long and ended up having a little … err … repose for an hour or so. This really is getting somewhat out-of-hand and I’m becoming more and more dismayed by the fact that I simply can’t keep it up any longer.

It was about 18:30 when I finally came to, having missed the opportunity to go out and buy the second instalment of my medication. At least there’s enough to keep me going for the next month, and then we’ll have to see how we go.

Tea was my second weinerschnitzel with potatoes and frozen veg. Just as delicious as yesterday. And followed by the rest of the raspberry sorbet. With everything (almost) now finished off, I had a mega-washing-up and cleaning session; followed by the rest of the packing. Leave the place as I would like to find it, which will come as a major surprise to anyone who knows me.

It wasn’t that cold when I went out for my evening walk. A mere minus 2°C. There was some scattered snow about and everywhere was quite icy, and for that reason there weren’t many people about at all. And I didn’t go far either. The walk does me good but there’s no point in going mad.

Before going to bed, I finished the packing and had a good check-around to make sure that I’ve not forgotten anything. I’m fed up of losing stuff and as regular readers of this rubbish will recall, over the years I’ve left a trail of my possessions scattered all over the Northern Hemisphere.

An early start in the morning. I can’t afford to hang about.

Monday 14th January 2019 – NEW KITS ON THE BLOCK

On my evening walk around the old medieval town this evening I was accosted by a little tabby kitten sitting on a windowledge.

I don’t recall having seen this one before. But it’s small, young and very playful and even let me pick it up for a while.

And that’s not the only thing that’s new on the block either.

There was a phone call at about 10:00. “Which is your door?”
“Never mind – I’ll come down”

So down I went just in time to see a big van pull up outside in the street. And two minutes later I was staggering up the stairs with a huge box.

That’s right – the new computer has arrived.

It took quite a considerable amount of unpacking too – with protective devices everywhere inside it, all of which had to be removed.

The machine is quite attractive, but I’m not going very much by aesthetics. I want it to work and work well. Laptops are all well and good for what they are but there is nothing like a big powerful desktop machine.

It was just as well that he phoned up at about 10:00, because had he done so very much earlier there might have been a problem.

Despite having gone to bed at a reasonable time, I was wide-awake at 03:50, and just couldn’t go back to sleep.

Not for ages anyway. I was tossing and turning around for quite some considerable time before I could finally drop off. And then the alarm went off, I just couldn’t haul myself out of bed, and went back to sleep. It was more like 08:45 when I finally took my courage in my hands and surfaced.

I’d been on my travels too. Some old guy had been a professional diver and had been involved in a great many professional treasure hunts. He was now long-retired and was actually 102 and reckoned himself to be close to death. He wanted to do just one very last dive before he went the way of the west so went down to a place where he had been treasure-hunting on many occasions but with no success. So down he went, and at the very last moment he actually managed to find a heavy chain hidden in the silt that led to where the treasure was hidden.

This morning I finished off the uploading of data onto the external drive and then we had the interruption for the delivery of the computer.

After lunch, I started to configure the new computer. And I’ve already found one problem. The antenna on the wi-fi isn’t strong enough to pick up the fluctuating signal. It fades in and out too much. I’m either going to have to move the transmitter or else go for a cable hook-up.

But apart from that, it works about 10 times faster than the laptop did. And the image is so much clearer too.

There was the usual afternoon walk too.

My route was, as usual, around the Pointe du Roc. And there parked outside one of the old gun emplacements of the Atlantic Wall, were a couple of World War II jeeps.

I’ve heard a story that they might be reopening a couple of bunkers to make some kind of tourist attraction here, and so I’m wondering if these jeeps and the people with them have anything to do with that.

Tea tonight was a burger on a bap with potatoes and veg.

Later this evening, the evening walk around the walls was done in total solitude. Not a soul about in the streets except for my kitten of course.

But the air and the sky were quite clear and you could see for miles tonight.

Jersey stood out quite clearly and you could see the lights of St Helier quite easily on the horizon.

There were also the floodlights of three or four trawlers working out to sea.

I don’t recall if I have taken a photo of the rue Clemenceau just recently.

With it being such a clear, calm night I stopped and took a photo of it to add to my database of images.

And on that note, I turned tail and headed for home – stopping to give my kitten a little stroke on the way.

So while the new computer is busy uploading a huge pile of files, I’m going to bed. I’ll have to try to do better tomorrow.

night st helier jersey granville manche normandy france

Tuesday 8th January 2019 – IT’S JUST LIKE …

… old times in here right now. I’m up to my knees, and probably even deeper, in papers and documents right now.

As part of my little project I have to find all kinds of paperwork going back 6 years. This last 18 months is pretty straightforward since I’ve been here but prior to that, especially during the period when I was ill my paperwork was all over the place.

However, when I was back down there in August I grabbed as much of it as I could and brought it back. So now, I have to go through about three sacks full of paper to find what I need.

I’m not having a great deal of luck from that point of view (at least, so far and there is still plenty to go at) but it really IS astonishing what you find when aren’t looking for it. After I took early retirement in 2004 I worked for a couple of years for an employment agency and for two American companies while I saved up to buy the roofing for my house in the Auvergne.

I’d practically written off anything to do with that period of employment, but today going through the European Paper Mountain I came across my registration certificate for the Belgian National Pensions Office. I’m not sure if I’m entitled to a pension from Belgium and even if I am, it won’t be anything at all to write home about, but at least I can write and make enquiries. You never know.

This morning I had something of a surprise.

When I awoke it was 06:45. What had happened to the alarm?

And then I remembered. Tuesday last week was New Year’s Day, and the previous Tuesday was Christmas Day. So I had switched off the alarms for Tuesday, hadn’t I?

And being nice and relaxed, I’d been on my travels. In a hotel trying to do a pile of paperwork in my room but not being able to concentrate, I went down to the reception area. There it was even worse, so I went back upstairs and tried again, but with no more luck than before. So in the end I packed my things and went outside to try to work out there, but the lorry driver who was taking me on saw me coming and pulled out of the lorry park, did a lap around the block and pulled up alongside me, blocking the road. And so I had to climb aboard, even though it meant that I wasn’t going to be able to do what I wanted to do before I reached home.

A slightly later breakfast (but not as late as some days just recently) and then a chat to Liz on the internet. She and Terry had an important meeting this morning so I wished them luck.

First thing that I needed to do was to obtain a couple of certificates from the British Government. Luckily, this can be done by internet but it’s time-consuming and took a lot of research – as well as being quite expensive.

When that was finally out of the way, I went down to Caliburn and brought up all of the paperwork. And despite stopping for lunch (more soup from Liz), my two walks and tea (a stuffed pepper) I was hard at it all day.

A good proportion of the paperwork has gone in the bin as “no longer necessary” but I found more vital paperwork that I expected to find – in fact I ended up being disappointed in that with a little more effort I might have had a lot more and I’m wondering where the rest might be.

On my walk this afternoon, there were a few people around for a change. It’s been quiet just recently out there.

Another place that was busy was the Chantier Navale. There are quite a few ships hauled out of the water right now receiving some kind of attention there.

I don’t recall having seen it so busy in the past. It’s clearly a booming business and I would have loved to have seen it in its heyday prior to 1992 when all of the Newfie trawlers were sailing out of here.

But there are still a few ships sailing out of here.

We have the gravel boats like Neptune of course, and the ferries to the Ile de Chausey and Jersey, but we also have the little freighters like Normandy Trader and Thora running the freight shuttles to Jersey.

Here today we have Thora in port. We noticed her last night having presumably come in on the evening tide

But despite the crowds this afternoon, this evening the walk around the walls was totally deserted apart from me.

But there was plenty of interest to see because the wind had risen and it was blowing quite strongly outside. The tide was well in too and so the waves were crashing down on the promenade at the Plat Gousset with quite some considerable force.

There was no-one down there taking advantage of the free shower on offer, which is probably not a surprise to anyone.

And Thora was still in harbour too.

That’s quite a surprise because she doesn’t usually hang about here for as long as this. I hope that she’s not having any difficulties.

And no cats tonight. I came straight home, had a chat to Alison after I came back and that’s my lot. A decent night’s sleep and then I’ll attack the paperwork part II. At least, if I know what I don’t have, I can start from there.

And I didn’t crash out today. How about that?

storm waves night plat gousset granville manche normandy france

Monday 7th January 2019 – NOW THAT’S WHAT …

… I call a bad day

Despite what I might have said yesterday, it wasn’t an early night. I wasn’t tired at all and so it was rather later than I was hoping when I went to bed.

During the night I’d been on my travels – something to do with being on a train but I’ve no idea about any more than that. But when the alarm went off, I just couldn’t bring myself to leave my bed. In fact, it was at 09:15 when I finally emerged, and that was a really bad start for the day.

Much to my surprise, I’d had a reply from an enquiry that I sent out in early October. Not exactly the response for which I was hoping, but it’s a start. And so after breakfast I set to work.

There was an interruption at 10:45 when the postie turned up. Now I have a keyboard that works quite nicely, and also my new 60-litre rucksack.

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that I bought a cheap rucksack from NOZ a while ago and I’ve been going back and to to Leuven with that – and it works just fine. But the quality was pretty rubbish and it wasn’t lasting the pace. So I’ve bought one that’s much better quality and I’ll be giving it a go with that.

For lunch I had the rest of the squash and potato soup. And it was even more delicious today than it was yesterday.

Now I would have expected that with having had an unexpected lie-in this morning I would have been fighting-fit and raring to go in the afternoon. But instead I ended up crashing out.

And good and proper too – right away with the fairies until 16;45 too. And by the time that I had my feet on the ground it was far too late to go for my afternoon walk.

I’m starting to worry about things like this. It’s not doing me any good at all.

Tea was the rest of Liz’s vegan chili and it was even better than Saturday night. I’m really being looked after just now.

I did however manage to make it out for my evening walk tonight. Just for a change, there were a couple of people out there tonight with me.

And not only that, our old friend Thora was tied up at her berth underneath the crane. She’s apparently come into harbour on this afternoon’s tide.

And I have to say that with the weather just now, it was another really good night.

So now let’s see what’s going to happen tonight. It might be an early night or it might not. It doesn’t seem to make any difference.

But now that I know what I need to be doing, I can get ready to send off another huge pile of letters. That should keep me out of mischief for a while.

Friday 4th January 2019 – WHAT WITH ME …

… not feeling so good yesterday, I heard all of the alarms but I took absolutely no notice whatsoever. It was more of about 09:15 when I awoke, and 09:45 when I left the bed and believe it or not, because it’s not usually the case, I felt rather better.

During the first part of the night I’d been on my travels, but I’ll spare you the gory details as you are probably eating a meal right now.

But having gone back to sleep later, I’d been off to see my friend Rhys in South Carolina. Not out in the wilds but actually an urban setting somewhere. It was election time and I’d seen a few people heading into the Town Hall to vote and so I tagged onto the end. In the mayor’s office some woman there asked me for my name, which I gave. I suddenly remembered that I didn’t know his address (and doesn’t this remind me of an incident not so long ago?) but luckily she didn’t ask me that. She named a few names that corresponded in some degree to mine but I said that it wasn’t me and I could see this dragging on so I suggested that I go down to my truck ostensibly to fetch my ID but in reality to make good my escape, but she said that she wouldn’t put me to that kind of trouble to go all that way to the car park. At this point I began to have a feeling of unease, and I was glad when I awoke.

As a result of all of this, breakfast was rather late. And most of the morning had gone by then. And so I spent much of the rest of it tidying up. I’m expecting visitors tomorrow.

There was a brief interruption though when the doorbell went. Running after it, I found that the postie was there. She brought me a parcel that could only be my new computer screen.

After lunch – just a couple of slices of toast with hummus – I attacked my little project again and did some more research. And it’s not going to be easy as my lifestyle up until recently will cause me a few problems. But I’ll keep on keeping on.

There was a small hiatus in the work while I went out for my afternoon walk.

My route this afternoon took me on my route around the city walls where I could admire the view out to sea.

And despite the miserable weather, which you can tell by looking at the mist in the distance on the photo, there were still quite a few people taking the air on the Plat Gousset

My attention was drawn however to the tidal swimming pool.

It looked as if the tide was on its way in and the swimming pool was in the course of being filled, with a couple of spectators enjoying the proceedings.

It’s a shame though that the pool has a leak somewhere. It doesn’t retain the water like it ought to and empties pretty quickly.

As the tide goes quite a way out, a swimming pool just here close to the promenade could be quite an attraction.

There was a new boat out there that I hadn’t seen before. It’s a speedboat of some description and you don’t see too many of those out here on this side of the headland.

They are usually to be found, if at all, on the other side in the Baie de Mont St Michel where the sea is calmer.

The sea can be quite rough out here, as regular readers of this rubbish will recall. Not the kind of sea in which to go flat-out.

With an hour or so to spare, I unpacked the parcel that I received and it is my computer screen. I assembled it and plugged it into the laptop. it took an age to work out how it works as there was no instruction book, but it seems to work fine. The screen is the wrong resolution for the laptop but eventually I managed to figure that out and now it seems to be fine, if not confusing as I type in one direction and use the mouse in another.

After tea – a small stuffed pepper – there was a football match on the internet – Aberystwyth Town v Connah’s Quay Nomads in the Welsh Premier League.

You might think that the final score – 6-1 to the Nomads – indicates a right spannering but that was far from the truth. The Nomads’ first goal – a penalty – didn’t look anything like it and a slow-motion enlarged replay showed that the player caught his foot in the ground.

But the big difference included the fact that the Nomads took their chances when Aberystwyth didn’t, and that Michael Bakare was still going like a runaway truck long after the Aberystwyth defence had tired.

So now I’ll have a little play with my new screen for a while and then go to bed. Shopping day tomorrow.

Tuesday 1st January 2019 – AND A VERY …

… Happy New Year. Not just from me, but from someone else here in Granville too.

I’m grateful for all of the support and encouragement that everyone has given me over the last year. It’s the kind of thing that has kept me going.

As well as that, I’m also even more grateful to everyone who has given me hospitality over the year during my perambulations around the Northern Hemisphere. I may not have many friends, as I have said … “and on many occasions too” – ed … but those I have are the best friends in the world.

So back to the story.

Having complained about sleep issues for as long as I have, it’s much more exciting to report that today, I left my bed at all of … errr … 11:22. And breakfasting at 12:00 is much more like what I expect to see on a Bank Holiday.

I’d been on my travels during the night too. Into a veg shop in Germany to buy a couple of carrots. I’d pressed the key on the automatic machine and the carrots came down into the scales to be weighed, and then I had to go to the counter to pick them up and pay for them. However, I couldn’t remember the German word for “carrots”. In Flemish it’s wortelen and so I tried that, but the shop assistant didn’t understand me. I pointed to the carrots and she still didn’t understand.

After breakfast, or lunch, or whatever you might call it, I had a task to perform.

There was an upgrade proposed a while ago by my blog host but I put off doing the upgrade. However it was forced upon me and while I was in Leuven I performed the upgrade.

And it’s terrible.

The old interface was a simple text-based interface where I could (and did) add my own handwritten *.html coding which I saved in blocks in my text-ediiting program and which I used for every web site on which I worked.

But this upgrade wants everything done in blocks with the *.html coding incorporated into the site itself, and adding the search indices is next-to-impossible and is the most complicated procedure that I have ever seen – especially on a slow connection.

So while I’ve been trying to figure it out (or find another blog interface that does what I want) I’ve been recording my blog entries in my text editor.

Anyway, I’ve given up. It’s not working, and so I’ll have to go with what I’ve got. And that meant adding 6 days-worth of blog entries and editing the indices manually.

That’s what I’ve been doing today.

At last, I could open my Christmas present from Liz and Terry. And now that you can see it in all of its glory, you can see that it was well-worth waiting for.

And it really is delicious too.

This evening we had football. Welsh Premier League basement clash between Carmarthen and Llanelli. Carmarthen aren’t that good but they ran rings round Llanelli who looked determined to shoot themselves in the foot.

Some of Llanelli’s defending was suicidal. They just couldn’t get the ball out of their own defence and tried to play the ball around, losing possession on several occasions in desperate positions. Carmarthen won 2-0 – both goals coming from Llanelli mistakes.

On this showing, Llanelli look well-and-truly doomed and we’re only half-way through the season. And depending who comes up from tier two in the south next season, Carmarthen need to start to think about what they intend to do.

Tea was a vegan burger with a pile of veg and gravy. Totally delicious, as was the endive that I had as a treat.

Outside tonight for my walk, and there was no-one around at all. I didn’t see a soul.

That was quite a surprise because despite the cold, it was a really beautiful, clear, starry night.

There was some cloud pretty high up in the sky over St Malo, and the reflection of the streetlights was magnificent. The town of Cancale, over there across the bay, was nicely illuminated too.

Back to work tomorrow – I have such a lot to do. So I won’t be hanging around too long. An early night is beckoning and if I’m lucky I might just make it too.

Monday 31st December 2018 – BY THE TIME …

… I get to Phoen … errr … that you read this you’re probably already in 2019, so belated New Year wishes from me.

May I wish everyone for 2019 exactly the same as you wished for everyone else in 2018. And I also send special New Years wishes to everyone who was kind enough to offer me hospitality as I travelled around the Northern Hemisphere.

As I have said before … “and you’ll say it again<” – ed … I don’t have many friends, but those whom I have are the best in the world.

The morning, such as it was, didn’t start until about 10:15. That might sound much more like a reasonable time when I have a day off, but I forgot to mention that so engrossed was I about some things that I was doing during the evening that it was almost 04:00 when I went to bed last night.

A late breakfast therefore, and there was a treat in store for me.

Do you remember from Saturday when I bought the vegan pains au chocolat from LeClerc? This morning I made a start on them. A quick 30 seconds in the microwave to warm one of them up and to freshen it up, and on the table for breakfast

And they weren’t too bad at all.

I didn’t do very much for the rest of the day. After all, I’m on holiday, aren’t I?

Lunch was a couple of slices of toast with hummus followed by some fruit. No point in having a pile of butties when it’s late like this.

A little later on I went out for my afternoon walk.

There were the usual crowds of people about this afternoon around the walled town. And there were quite a few people out on the beach having a paddle in the sea to celebrate the New Year.

And good luck to them too – sooner them than me.

Tea was some falafel and pasta in tomato sauce. Delicious it was too

Rosemary rang me up after tea and we had a chat for … errr … one hour and forty-four minutes. And would have gone on even longer had the battery not gone flat in my telephone.

At 23:30 I went out for a midnight walk. It’s New Year and I wanted to be out on the streets.

My ramble took me down to the harbour, across the lock gates and into town. I took a few pics of the harbour at night and then wandered into town. There can’t have been more than a couple of dozen people around, and some of them were quite noisy.

It wasn’t actually the New Year’s celebrations that I was expecting, an so I came home. It’s not exactly early but it’s not late either. Nevertheless, I’m off to bed.

So while you all admire the photos, I’ll clear off. See you all next year.

fishing boat granville manche normandy france

beach plat gousset granville manche normandy france

night steps staircase granville manche normandy france

night port de granville harbour manche normandy france

Sunday 30th December 2018 – I DON’T KNOW …

… where I’d been during the night but when I came back I was running my taxi business again. In a wooden hut of some kind that was quite cold – but when I noticed how tall the hut was and how poor the heating was, this wasn’t a surprise. The phone hadn’t rung at all for the hole shift so I was puzzled as to how we could keep going. But at the end of the shift a large envelope and chart was pushed through the door. “Ahh, the Post” I said, but the girl dispatcher said that it was the work detail of whoever had been working the shift. So we did have a driver and the driver had done some work. I needed to visit the bathroom and so went outside to water the plants. This was in Vine Tree Avenue by now, and I noticed that the front garden had been planted with leeks and lettuce. Just as I started to do the necessary the woman next door came out of her house so I turned my back to her as if I was watering the plants. She came over to me so I had to hurry, and she began to chat. I noticed that her car, a Mark IV Cortina, had strange white numberplate so I asked her about them. “They are German” she said (which they aren’t). I told her that I was in Germany a few days ago. She mentioned that her trip to Toronto shortly had been cancelled due to insufficient bookings. By now we were in a hotel and someone, clearly the organiser, came over and started to usher us to the door. I told him that it’s a sad reflection on the state of affairs of his company that they cancelled the trip to Toronto, but he said nothing, except to continue to usher us towards the door. I asked hi if he was trying to throw us out, and if so, what was his authority to do so. So he began to push me – and I grabbed him by the lapels of his jacket and said that if he wanted to ask me to leave he could do so politely. This led to quite a confrontation, including mention of the police, which carried on back into the taxi hut that I had mentioned. he started to look at my books and papers so it was my turn to insist that he left my premises.

That took me up to about 07:15 but there was no chance whatever of my leaving the stinking pit at that time. 09:45 was much more reasonable.

A late breakfast, which is fine for a Sunday, and then a day spent doing almost absolutely nothing.

News from the UK is that Strawberry Moose has made a couple of new friends and is spending his night tonight in a different bed. He certainly has more luck than I do.

I’ve been talking on the internet to Liz and Alison on line too. They had a good Christmas and are having a nice relaxing time. Alison and I made a few plans for my next visit to Leuven.

For lunch, I just had two slices of toast. I’m trying to cut down on my food right now. I’ve definitely been eating too much just recently.

We had the usual two walks today too.

There were hordes of people around this afternoon enjoying the holiday atmosphere. The beach was quite popular too, with people down there scavenging amongst the rocks for shellfish.

Which, presumably, they would share with their friends because you mustn’t be selfish with your shellfish.

One of my neighbours was out there too. He was telling me that at Donville-les-Bains they had a sea dip today and he took part. All of them in fancy dress. They are braver people than I am. Mind you, I wouldn’t have minded being there to see them.

Tea tonight was a vegan pizza. And for some reason the crust wasn’t cooked as well as it might be. But it was delicious all the same.

There will be an alarm tomorrow so tonight is an early night. Last day of the old year. And I’ll have to make a list of the things that I have accomplished.

Wednesday 26th December 2018 – STILL NOT HAVING …

… to manage the dreadful mess that the new upgrade that my blog-host has forced upon me, wiped out all of my essential features and added piles of new features that do nothing but add total confusion to my site, and not having found a new, more suitable host that I can bring into my site, I shall press gallantly on regardless.

God help us all!

Luckily I was recording the entries into a text file so I can simply copy/paste, but that’s the least of my worries.

So, on with the Motley.

With it being another Bank Holiday, I had another lie-in. And although after all of my efforts this last few days, it wasn’t all that much of a lie-in either. Something of a disappointment in fact because I was rather hoping for another 10:00 session.

But it was a late breakfast anyway and then I had another day of doing very little. It’s what Bank Holidays are for.

Mind you, there was one thing that I wish that I had done, and that was to go out for my medication. You’ll remember me saying that the chemists were closed on Monday. They (or at least some of them) planned to be open today and I had intended to be out there to stock up as I’m running low.

Instead, I was crashed out on the bed, under the covers, for a good couple of hours. I remember 15:00 coming round but the next thing that I remembered was that it was 17:12. And that’s not to say that I was out of bed by then either. But regardless, I’d forgotten all about the chemists and that was that.

Tea was the rest of yesterday’s meal, including the half of Christmas pudding that I didn’t eat.

Later on, I went for a good walk around the town again.

Not with any purpose in mind, but simply to see what was going on, and to admire the Christmas lights that were illuminating the Town Hall, or Stadhuis of Leuven.

We’ve seen them before … “and on many occasions too” – ed … but they are still impressive.

And the temperature has dropped outside too this evening.

It was cold enough yesterday but it’s freezing now. Gloves and hat and everything.

But nevertheless I still stopped off to take a photo of the Universum tavern on the corner of the Herbert Hooverplein and the Tiensestraat. That was looking quite impressive in the dark too.

Back in the apartment I started to pack ready to leave. And I seem to be taking home with me more than I came with. It’s going to be a crush to make it fit into my luggage.

And I didn’t eat one of the packs of frozen veg either. I’m going to have to work out how I can get that home too.

But not right now. I have an early start so I’m going for an early night.

night monseigneur ladeuzeplein leuven louvain belgium

night town hall stadhuis christmas lights leuven louvain belgium

night eikstraat town hall stadhuis leuven louvain belgium

Monday 17th December 2018 – IT WASN’T …

… so simple this morning about raising myself from the dead. The alarms went off as usual at 06:00, 06:17 and 06:19, but I didn’t see the light of day until 07:45. One of those days, I’m afraid.

I had managed to go off on my travels somewhere too. Something to do with wild horses and chasing them trough a paper-covered archway. The idea was that the first horse through would burst the paper and the rest would rush through, but it seems that the paper didn’t burst the way that it should and the following horse ended up being stuck in the paper and the archway somehow and was galloping around the field still enveloped in the wreckage.

We also had a very slow start to the day. I know that I’ve been feeling not quite like it for the last few days but today was pretty dismal and I couldn’t summon up the energy to do very much.

It went on like this until lunchtime. And even my hummus and salad sandwiches did little to relieve the doom and gloom of the procedures. I really must pull myself together somehow.

This afternoon wasn’t all this much better but I did manage to wrap the Christmas present that I had bought the other day. And then I hit the streets, first calling at LeClerc where I bought another present that I had forgotten. Luckily there were some Charity people doing present-wrapping so they did the business on my behalf.

Back into Caliburn and off to Roncey and Liz and Terry’s. I’d been invited to a pre-Christmas meal and Strawberry Moose had come with me. He’d packed his suitcase, being invited to pass Christmas in the UK with his friends.

I handed over the presents and then we had a meal. Liz had cooked a beautiful, wicked chili meal which was delicious, and this was followed by home-made mince pies.

There was a surprise afterwards. Even though she is very busy these days, Liz had made me a Christmas Present, and when it’s Christmas you’ll all get to see it. Of course, I can’t open it until Christmas Day.

But shame as it is to say it, I had to come home early. I found myself falling asleep there and if I do that I won’t ever come home. I’m not as fit as I have been and I have to take care of myself.

It was a struggle to reach back home, but once I was here that was that. I wasn’t going anywhere else and now I’m off to bed. I’m going to have to push myself on over the next few days ready for my trip to Belgium on Friday.

Monday 10th December 2018 – BACK IN THE 1960s …

… General De Gaulle famously said that “l’Angleterre n’est pas prêt” to join the European Union.

And 50 years or so further on down the line, the only way that things have changed is that they have changed for the worse.

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that another recurring theme that runs through my writings is the failure of British companies to understand what the whole idea is of the European Union, and refuse to sell their products to the rest of the European Union.

Today, I’ve had it said to me not once but twice.

I spent much of the morning on the phone to the UK and I have now ordered my new desktop computer. It will have three hard drives, one of which will be a 256GB solid-state drive. A 3.9GhZ processor and a 8GB of RAM (upgradebale to as much as 32GB if ever I feel the need) complete the package.

And I learnt something new today too. Apparently the only option for an operating system for this set-up is Windows 10. I asked why that might be a problem, to which the salesman replied that most graphics people have abandoned Windows 10 and reverted to Windows 7, which apparently gives much better results.

We hd quite a good chat and he recommended a IPS panel screen. These are flat screens like most computer screens but the image looks the same from no matter what angle it’s viewed.

All I’ll need then is a keyboard, a mouse and a powered USB hub, and then I’ll have all I need.

But here’s the rub. Now that it’s ordered (and paid for) it needs to be delivered. And as soon as I entered my home address in the box, the screen greyed out.

After a considerable amount of trying, I eventually made contact again with the company, who told me that they don’t sell their products abroad. So in the end we inserted THEIR address in the delivery box. They’ll send me a mail when it’s built and I can send someone to collect it.

As it happens I have a friend who lives nearby. She works for a company down the road. She asked me what she should do with the parcel, to which I replied that she could send it over to me by a courier.
“Do you have a courier in mind?”
“No. Just use the one that you use. That should be okay”
“But we don’t sell our products abroad so our courier doesn’t go there”.

The UK has a population of about 65 million people. The rest of the EU has 450 million people and it’s a free, open market where anyone in the EU can sell any product anywhere else in the EU without any restriction whatsoever (not quite true of medicines and one or two other minor products).

And here are a whole pile of British companies refusing to trade with a market of that size!

I’ve never had any difficulty at all ordering stuff anywhere in the rest of the EU and having it delivered. And anyone in the UK has probably never had any difficulty in ordering stuff from the mainland. But for some reason, people in the UK just don’t “get it” and prefer to ignore this massive market.

No wonder there’s a recession and UK industry is collapsing. it really is unbelievable. 450 million people waiting for products and the UK won’t sell to them.

Last night was a late night because I was doing something and lost track of time. When I looked, it was after 02:00 and that’s not very good.

The alarm went off as usual but for once I couldn’t care less. 07:45 was when I plucked up the courage to crawl out from under the sheets.

I’d been away on my travels too during the night. You won’t be interested in the first part of it because you are probably eating your tea right now. But a little later I was in a room with a Muslim girl. She was fitting me out in a headscarf – a light green diaphanous one that when it was folded over double, became an impenetrable yellow. She went off somewhere and I had to get ready to go after her, but for some reason I was taking my time and I had some music playing loudly in the background. So loudly in fact that she came back to tell me to turn down the music and to ask why I hadn’t followed her.

After a late breakfast I sat down and made a list of what I wanted on this computer. It took quite a bit of thought, and once I’d made my list I phoned up and set the rigmarole in motion.

I’ve been using laptop computers since I moved to the Auvergne because of the issue about power. Laptops don’t consume much and of course they will work when the power is switched off. But now I’m installed properly here, it’s high time that I had the kind of set-up that I want.

After lunch I had another phone call to make. It’s only possible to call up on Mondays between 14:30 and 16:30 so I didn’t want to miss it; But each time that I phoned (five times in all) the line was engaged. Eventually I discovered that there was only one person dealing with this enquiry, she worked part-time, and had just one phone line with no queueing facilities.

Now that’s what I call efficiency.

I had both my walks today.

The wind had dropped dramatically this afternoon and it was much more pleasant outside.

And whoever was out there in his little boat towing a canoe somewhere out there between the Pointe du Roc and the Ile de Chausey was having a whale of a time out there

And there were some beautiful cloud effects out there today.

Here, around on the Pointe du Roc overlooking the Baie de Mont St Michel the sun was bursting really beautifully through the clouds and illuminating the sea over there by Cancale.

It’s come out quite well in this photo and I ought to have it framed and mounted.

Tea was a stuffed pepper again, and delicious it was too, with the stuffing having marinaded over a couple of days.

Out in the evening air tonight, the wind was almost still.

But there was that much energy stored in the sea that the waves were still crashing down on the Plat Gousset with an astonishing force.

There must be enough energy in the waves to power the whole of the world, I reckon. I don’t really understand why more effort isn’t being put into developing it so that we can continue our escape from a dependence upon fossil fuel.

Well, actually I can. But this isn’t the place to start talking politics.

Tomorrow I might go for pie and mash, especially as there is a leek to use. And that has got me thinking, which is quite a rare event these days. And I’ve decided that I’m going to add a handful of leeks to the shopping order every week in an effort to continue to improve my diet.

It’s probably far too late to do much about my health but there’s no harm in trying.

And did anyone notice the News this evening? Mrs Mayhem made a Statement to the House of Commons to the effect that because she feared that she would lose the vote on secession from the EU, she’s postponed the vote.

I’ve been trying to steer clear of political posts but no-one can ignore this. Mrs Mayhem’s remarks and actions – cancelling the vote because she won’t win it – is the kind of thing that Idi Amin or Robert Mugabe would do.

It’s not the kind of democracy of which any democrat would be proud and makes a total mockery of this idea about “our Parliament being sacrosanct”. It’s a Third-World dictatorship trick and it shows you
1 – just how low the UK has sunk
2 – Mrs Mayhem is running totally scared.

it makes the UK look just like a laughing stock and I really am ashamed to be British.

night trawlers ile de chausey granville manche normandy france

night storm plat gousset granville manche normandy france

Sunday 9th December 2018 – HAVING GONE …

… to bed as late as 02:30 this morning, there is no possibility whatever of my leaving my bed when I awoke at 03:45. Not even on a weelday, never mind a Sunday.

09:45 was a much more reasonable time to awaken. It had given me time to go off on a nice little ramble but it’s not the kind of ramble that I would like to recount, bearing in mind the fact that you are probably eating your meal right now.

Breakfast at 11:00 is just like the good old days on a Sunday. It brings back many happy memories of Sundays in days gone past.

With having had a late breakfast I didn’t feel like any lunch. But wondering whether or not I ought to go out and find a football match, I nipped out to bring some stuff from Caliburn – and was almost bowled over in the hurricane.

It was the strongest one yet and watching football in this weather would be impossible – and playing in it even worse. And so I declined.

Instead, I did some more work tidying up the files on the external drive – the files that I had downloaded from the big desktop computer early in the week. And the stuff that I am finding that I had forgotten is amazing. And there’s much more to come too.

Tea was pizza again, and the rice pudding was … err … soomewhat past its best. Just a couple of mouthfuls persuaded me that I ought to consider another dessert. leaving it fr three days in the oven was not a good idea.

This evening I did go out for a walk. The wind had died down somewhat and was now just gale-force. So I didn’t hang around.

Back to work tomorrow so I’m going to have an early night tonight. Capitalise on my lie-in and come out fighting-fit tomorrow.

EPIC HALL

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