Tag Archives: rosemary

Sunday 20th October 2013 – WHOSE SILLY IDEA WAS IT …

…to set an alarm clock for 08:00 and ON A SUNDAY MORNING too?

Well, actually, it was my idea. When I was at Liz and Terry’s the other day, Terry mentioned that he had a scaffolding to take down on Sunday morning and no-one to help him. Right at that moment, Liz was poised over me with a plate of vegetable curry in one hand and a slice of ginger cake in the other, and so my spirit consequently wavered, and here I was at 09:15 heading across the countryside to Rosemary’s.

At that time of the morning, with the rain that we had had throughout the night, there was a gorgeous mist rising serpent-like from the Gorge de la Sioule and I would have taken an photograph or two of it in order to regale you all, but that was when I discovered that I had forgotten my camera.

After a coffee (thank you, Rosemary), we attacked the scaffolding and we soon had it down and in Terry’s trailer. Terry then asked me, rather disingenuously, if I wanted to come for lunch. I said that that would be very nice, to which Terry replied “good. You can help me unload the trailer”. Drat! Foiled again!

So after unloading the trailer we had soup and bread. And I was supposed to go to the football at Montel but I didn’t have the camera and in any case I wasn’t in such an energetic mood, so we chilled out for a while.

Back here, it’s Sunday and pizza night. And then I had Cécile on the ‘phone for over two hours. It seems like she has forgotten something important at her house, and would I mind …

-5

Friday 5th July 2013 – IT’S POETS DAY TODAY

Yes – p … errr … ush off early, tomorrow’s Saturday and so I did knock off early too. Upstairs sitting in my room with a good book by … errr … 19:35.

This morning I had another couple of hours on the internet with the next instalments of web pages, with just a minor interruption from Rosemary. Her car’s gone wrong and she didn’t understand the garagiste.

Anyway, I gave him a quick ring and found out that a wheel bearing – roulement – has packed up. I duly relayed the message to Rosemary and after a little chat, I carried on with my work.

This afternoon I took off the sheet of plasterboard that I’d fitted incorrectly and dismantled the wiring that I’d assembled last week.

I then threaded all of the wiring down the channels that I had drilled, reassembled it and then fitted two (or rather one and a half) sheets of plasterboard, as you can see.

But there are two issues with all of this.

Firstly, you’ll notice a horizontal line right across the nearer sheet of plasterboard. Trying to put a sheet of plasterboard into the cutting position, I dropped it (these 13mm waterprrof sheets are flaming heavy) and it snapped.

And so I fetched another one – and did exactly the same.

I’m working in a confined space with no room to move around and I’m on my own with these heavy objects so I’m bound to have accidents.

But at least the split in this one will be below the level of the tiling and so seeing as how it will be bunged up with tile cement it doesn’t really make much odds.

The second thing though is more important. I’ve cut some of the wires too short and I’ve not much idea exactly what I can do about that. I shall have to think of something.

Last night though, I was in Nantwich. Of course I know Nantwich very well – it’s where I went to school and I like to go there for a wander around the shops and to sit by the river on a summer evening. In my dream Nantwich was very much like it is today except that although just recently that have built a new road around the back of the town, in my dream there was an old road system around the back there) that went to Winsford and Middlewich (and is much more logical that the road system of the late Victorian age). . A friend and I went for a walk through the crowds sunning themselves by the river at the back of the swimming baths and we carried on along this old abandoned road. After about half a mile, after passing some mile posts of the 1920s we came to a roundabout where the roads for Middlewich and Winsford diverged. This roundabout had all of the signs and street furniture of the 1920s and was probably one of the earliest roundabouts ever to be built, On the fourth exit off the roundabout, there were a couple of big cars of the late 1920s parked up. They were in fact die-cast models but life-size and I remember trying to lift up the bonnet of one of them.

Anyway, now I’m filthy dirty, unshaven, unwashed and in the same clothes for a week and feel totally uncomfortable.

Tomorrow, come what may, I’ll be going for a swim at Neris-les-Bains. You just watch the baths be closed for maintenance.

-9

Wednesday 3rd July 2013 – WELL, THE SHOWER ROOM …

… is looking much more like a shower room now.

All of the horizontal battens on the stud wall have been cut and shaped, drilled for the passage of cables, and then screwed into position.

And if I feel like it tomorrow, I could even put the plasterboard onto the stud wall and that would make a whole world of difference;

In fact, you are probably wondering why I didn’t do that this afternoon.

I could quite easily have done too but in fact I was plagued by interruptions.

Marianne and Rosemary both rang me up today for long chats and I was there for ages with them.

And then Rob and Nicolette came round just as I was getting into full swing. Their internet had gone down and they needed urgent access, and then they needed to report the fault.

That took ages to sort out as well and by the time everyone had left me alone the hours were slipping away and it was ever so frustrating.

Of course, I’m not complaining about the interruptions. Quite the reverse in fact.

Firstly, it’s nice to speak to friends and have a good natter. It all helps oil the wheels of social intercourse.

Secondly, when I fell off my ladder back in November 2011 Rob drove me all the way to Montlucon, waited patiently for three hours while I was sewn up, and then drove me home – and wouldn’t accept even a centime for the fuel.

You’ll put yourself out for neighbours like that every time without a moment’s hesitation, but it always seems to happen at inconvenient moments.

And for the first time in I don’t know exactly how long (but we are talking years here) I had music while I worked for the whole day.And it’s quite true what they say, that “there’s none as thick as those that want to be”.

Having tried a whole series of devices to have music where I’m working, I finally worked out the solution that is so obvious to everyone else. Why don’t I simply take my little notebook computer and find a safe place to wedge it?

Exactly what I did and I had music all day. Berk!

As for last night’s dream, I can’t remember too much of it but I do remember having to rescue Strawberry Moose from an oven and finding that all of his antlers were burnt off – something that I found really upsetting.

I’ll have to give up this cheese lark, I’ll tell you.

-6

Sunday 23rd June 2013 – I WAS IN CHESTER …

… during the night in the street where I first went to live when I moved there in September 1972, only last night it was where I was working. Parking in this street was usually problematic but last night it was snowing lightly and there was hardly a car about. It had me worried – was it a working day or not?
But anyway I went in to my building which was a modern building of brick, concrete, aluminium and glass, well spread-out but not too tall, and with a couple of friends we went to the restaurant. But with having spent so much time talking, we arrived just in time to see the aluminium shutters lowered down, for it was 10:00, the time that the restaurant closed.
Just after this, there was a fierce banging from the other side of the shutters- it seemed that someone had been locked in behind them. I went off to the reception area where there were three women, one of whom by her behaviour clearly had the air of being in charge, and so I told her about this person behind the shutters. “That’s too bad” she replied. “She’ll just have to wait there until 11:00”
“Can’t you unlock a service door?” I asked with surprise. “There must be a way out of there”
“No – I don’t have access so she’ll just have to wait”. Our conversation after this became rather heated, but she still wouldn’t budge.
At this point the front door opened and a group of kids, dressed up as an American marching band, complete with instruments, came marching in, and behind them came three men, clearly officers of some import and wearing képis and cloaks of the style of the Royal Dutch Army. The senior of these was an enormously tall métisse, probably close to 7 feet tall, so I went up to him and told him the story of this woman locked in the restaurant behind the shutters. He went over to the woman at reception and said a few words to her that I did not hear, but she went bright red and took a set of keys out of the drawer in front of her and went down the corridor, opened a door, and let out the woman who was locked in the restaurant.This woman, for reasons that I did not undertand, was wearing an orange rotating light on her head.

That was another one of these dreams that it seems a pity to leave, but leave I did because Cécile bought me a cup of coffee in bed, which was extremely nice.

Yes, it’s Sunday, which means a day off, or, at least, it’s supposed to. But Cécile has so much to do at her house (well, I’m not convinced, but she is) and only a short time in which to do it, so we ended up repairing cupboards and moving shelves around and so on.

Sunday is also pizza day and Cécile cooked a lovely example for lunch (thanks, Rosemary, for fetching the vegan cheese), but as we were about to restart work, one of Cécile’s friends came round for a chat. Consequently we were late for Liz and Terry’s.

Terry is now a very happy bunny, seeing as he has all of the slates (and a darned sight more as well) to do the roof on his new extension, and I am aslo an extremely happy bunny, having been repaid in Liz’s home-made chocolate cake.

And after running through the radio programmes for tomorrow, back here and that was that. Tomorrow is another day;

-5

Saturday 25th May 2013 – There’s a strange round object …

… out there in the sky. It’s a golden orange colour and it hurts my eyes when I look at it. Also, the sky is a funny colour. There are parts of it that are a strange blue colour, not the usual grey that I am used to. It’s absolutely weird.

Not like yesterday, though. Fighting the snow and the rain, I emptied Caliburn. And while there wasn’t a great deal of stuff that I threw away, the fact that it is all tidied up inside means that there is tons of space inside. And that’s good news.

After that, I went off to Pooh Corner and sorted out Caliburn’s summer tyres ready for changing. He has his MoT on Monday morning and then I’ll be changing them over and putting the winter tyres in store. I found the mountain bike that needs to be taken over to Rosemary’s, and I also sorted out my CDs and started to fit the CD racks that I had bought in IKEA in Brussels. The first time I’ve seen some CD racks that actually do what I think that they ought to do.

Back here though, a bit of bad news. Cécile’s mother has had another funny turn and so after Caliburn’s MoT we are hitting the road, but to Fromentines, not to Brussels. I’ll have to drop Cécile off to catch the ferry out to her mother’s island and then I’ll have to head off to Brussels from there – a mere 880kms again.

It’s all happening here.

-1

Thursday 20th December 2012 – WELL, FOLKS …

… I’m feeling a little better today.

I can cough without feeling that I have that piece of sandpaper stuck down my throat, although coughing does make my ribs ache. All I need to do now is to stop this runny nose before I run out of kitchen roll.

Apart from that, I’ve not been doing much. Spending an hour or two every so often writing the radio programmes – it’s difficult to concentrate to write a whole stream of stuff, and reading a few books.

But you’ll be pleased (or maybe disappointed) to learn that I’ve not had any interesting dreams just now these last few days.

I’ve also had a few phone calls from friends – such as Liz, Marianne and Rosemary, and that’s nice too. Cheers me up no end.

I hope that I’ll be feeling better by Saturday though because I have to go out and do some shopping. Must get the sprouts in for Christmas

And talking of Christmas and Rosemary, I forgot to mention that I’m still eating lettuce out of the garden. Yes – I built up a raised bed with some old planks and laid an old caravan window across the top.

That’s kept the weather out and while the leaves are quite small, they are still there and quite edible. That’s something of a surprise, especially with the horrendous weather that we’ve had.

We’ve had seven consecutive days of rain and since I’ve been back (2 weeks) we’ve only had one day of sunshine. I wish that the weather would improve because I could do with recharging my batteries some day soon – and those of the solar energy systems too

No wonder I’m all sad, depressed and miserable with all of this.

Talk about being under the weather – there’s a lot of weather to be under right now

-2

Tuesday 11th December 2012 – I rang …

… Marianne’s house this morning to enquire after her well-being and she was there. She told me that she had been released. “Expelled, more like” I told her, but it was nice to hear her voice. She certainly sounded better than she did the last time that I spoke to her.

What wasn’t so good was the news that I had from Rosemarie when she phoned up later. It appears that Bill has been rushed to hospital, quite ill apparently. That’s really sad news because his general health isn’t so good at all. I do hope that he recovers quickly.

Apart from that, the Christmas Special is progressing nicely. There’s enough now to make a decent programme and when Liz tells me of her choice of music I can tidy it up and finish it off.

I’ll be glad when it’s all done – I can go back to bringing up to date the Quebec web pages upon which I’ve been working since the summer.

-1

Wednesday 14th November 2012 – I DIDN’T MANAGE …

… to rip up the bathroom floor today.

In fact, I was considerably sidetracked.

This morning though was pretty much more of the same. 11 pages of writing about the French laws of slander and libel for Radio Anglais – important for ex-pats due to a couple of high-profile court cases just recently concerning postings on social network sites;

And you wouldn’t believe just how different is the law over here compared to the UK.

Yesterday however when Rosemary was on the phone, she told me that the swimming baths at St Eloy-les-Mines had reopened after maintenance, and that one of the few times that they are open is Wednesdays at 13:30.

And seeing as it’s been a good while since I’ve had a decent soaking, we agreed to meet up this afternoon and go for a swim.

And so we did.

Flaming cold in there it was (although not as cold as that swimming baths in Québec last May), but at just €1:88 a ticket, it was value for money and I had a really good scrub in the shower afterwards.

I look almost human now.

We went for a coffee and a chat afterwards, and then for a wander around a couple of the DiY places.

That wasn’t all though.

I’m nice and clean now, but my clothes weren’t. In fact my bedding walks off into the cupboard every morning under its own steam. Consequently, off I went to the laundrette and washed everything that I could lay my hands on.

Yes, a nice clean me, nice clean clothes and nice clean bedding tonight. I won’t know myself, will I?

But we did have a culinary disaster tonight. I made one of my mega-aubergine-and-kidney-bean-chili things tonight, to last me for three days, only to realise that I had forgotten to add the kidney beans.

And then I dropped tonight’s portion on the floor in the verandah. Luckily that I had a few more helpings left over.

But what a waste of food, hey?

-3

Tuesday 13th November 2012 – I’VE JUST WOKEN …

… up 🙁

Yes, I went out like a light again in the middle of the evening and it’s hardly as if I’ve been working too hard either.

This morning after coffee I wrote some more stuff for one of the Radio Anglais programmes that we do – a delightful couple of pages on composting toilets, would you believe?

And then I went out to cut another pile of wood ready for the bad weather.

After lunch I carried on emptying the first floor and finally, at 18:00, I was in a position where tomorrow, if nothing else crops up, I can rip up the floor in what will shortly be the shower room.

It’s quite nice tongue-and-grooving but it has about 200 years of ingrained dirt from when it was the upstairs hallway – that is, until I turned the stairs around in November 2009.

It’s impossible to clean it – believe me, I’ve tried, and so it’s coming up and being replaced with new. Once that’s in and given a couple of coats of varnish, I can start on insulating the walls and then fit the plasterboard.

Yes, and I don’t know why, but I also seem to have been very popular today.

I’ve had four phone calls, from Cécile, Rosemary, Percy Penguin and Liz, although not necessarily in that order. Maybe its those that are wearing me out.

-1

Saturday 10th November 2012 – WHAT AN EXTRAORDINARY …

… football match!

I’ve just come back from Pionsat where I’ve been watching the FC Pionsat St Hilaire’s 1st and 2nd XIs in action tonight.

As for the 2nd XI, despite havng a decent team out there tonight, and despite their rather dramatic improvement over the last couple of matches, they ran out of steam tonight.

It seemed to me that several of the players out there tonight just weren’t “with it”.

That’s quite a contrast to the last couple of matches against the Goatslayers and Miremont.

In those matches they played with real enthusiasm, but somehow tonight they couldn’t come up with the goods, and ended up losing 3-1.

This wasn’t really a difficult match either because the opposition didn’t seem to be up to much either.

The three points were definitely there for the taking but they ended up being thrown away.

As for the 1st XI’s match against St Bonnet, I’m still shaking my head even now.

The FC Pionsat St Hilaire’s defence was ripped to shreds by a lightning-quick St Bonnet attack team which played in a very robust, even physical manner.

And things didn’t go very well from an official’s point of view either.

Pionsat were denied an absolute stone-wall penalty when one of their players was pushed (and a clear two-handed push at that) off the ball.

They also were awarded a penalty for something that only the referee saw – even the FC Pionsat St Hilaire linesman, who was down at that end, said later that he saw nothing to get excited about – and they contrived to miss it.

All in all, you had the feeling that it was going to be “one of those days”

And so when I tell you that FC PIonsat St Hilaire ran out 2-1 victors at the final whistle, you will be just as surprised as I am.

One slice of good fortune, one spectacular long range effort that could have gone anywhere – and usually does – but this time finds the back of the net, and some dogged last-minute defending, and FCPSH stole the points.

It’s not every day that they come out with three points from a match like this so they should make the most of it.

Despite what I said last night about an early night, it was after 04:00 when I went to bed – clearly my guilty conscience is pricking me. And with going to bed at 04:00, you can imagine just how difficult it was to raise myself at 07:45.

I was rather like a zombie for an hour or two this morning – “only an hour or two? … ed – although I managed to finish my rock music radio programme for Radio Anglais.

Off then for a flying visit to the shops in St Eloy-les-Mines and then round to Rosemary’s to help her move some stuff and to receive the low-down on her date on Thursday night.

If you ask me, I think that it’s cute, all these people going out on dates. As for me, I can still chase after the women, even if I can’t remember why.

>So tomorrow it’s my weekly lie-in and then bits and pieces until the afternoon when I shall be off to Terjat to see AS Terjat in action at home – no footy tomorrow in the Puy-de-Dome.

I aren’t ‘arf getting about these days, aren’t I?

-3

Wednesday 7th November 2012 – I’VE FINISHED …

… making the shelving unit for the cupboard at the back of the stairs.

And after all this time too, but it’s made-to-measure and each of the shelves had to be cut and fitted individually. Anyway, there it is.

It’s not actually quite finished though – it needs varnishing and it will have the first coat of that tomorrow morning.

The shelving unit is actually a huge beast and weighs a tonne – I never expected it to turn out anything like this.

You’ll also notice that there’s a shelf missing. The original plans called for 7 shelves, which is how many 400mm pine planks that I had, but Brain of Britain seems to have managed to forget his original plans and has made it to take 8.

But never mind. I’m bound be in Montlucon sometime and I can pick one up then from Brico Depot.

That’s where it’s going to go – in the alcove there that will be the stair cupboard in the empty space at the back of the stairs that I built in the winter of 2009-2010.

That’s an ideal place to make a little cupboard – after all, I can’t think of what else to do with the space.

And I won’t know myself when this is installed in there and full of all of the stuff that’s lying about all over the place and that’s the whole point of making it.

And so apart from that and the usual stuff on the computer, that’s about that.

But I did have a phone call from Nada who has resurfaced in the area after all this time, and also a long chat with Rosemary. She’s going out on a date tomorrow night – it’s alright for some, isn’t it?

Anyway, my bed beckons. I feel like an early night.

Monday 15th October 2012 – I HAD AN …

… exciting, if unexpected afternoon out today.

Not this morning though.

I put in a good stint on the computer and wrote the match report for yesterday’s game at Pionsat, which is now on line.

It makes rather depressing reading but nevertheless it needed to be done.

And it took me all the way through to 14:30 – there was a lot to write.

Meantime, I had had a phone call. It seems that the window that Rosemarie had bought had turned out to be the wrong size – Terry had given her the dimensions of the hole, not the window.

It meant that the window needed to be taken back and exchanged – involving some fairly hefty negotiation and it seemed that I was required for that.

And so rather like Janet in Tam Lin, round I went to Rosemary’s I duly went this afternoon, “as fast as go can me” and we loaded up the window.

Being somewhat … errr … financially-challenged at the moment (I can’t get to my Belgian bank’s Montlucon branch right now and remember, I wasn’t anticipating being here at the moment), Rosemary very kindly put some diesel in Caliburn, and off we went.

Changing the window was no problem (except that they didn’t have one in and so it needed to be ordered) but no refund of any difference.

I don’t suppose anyone could complain too much about that – Rosemarie was half-expecting an argument.

Never being backwards at coming forward, I took advantage of Rosemary’s presence and we went off to Brico Depot where I loaded up Caliburn with a pile of grillage – the mesh mats that you use when you are laying concrete onto a hard surface without any hardcore.

I also bought 4 pylons – the steel mesh reinforcing that you put inside hollow breeze blocks to support the walls so that they don’t fall down on passing children.

These come in 6-metre lengths and so we cut them down to 8×3-metre lengths that I can use inside these hollow blocks that I have here to make pillars and so on.

Nothing like having a handy volunteer, is there?

After a coffee and a chat, I came home. It’s cold and damp despite the beautiful day that we had, so I’m not going out again. I’ll save my strength for tomorrow.

Friday 12th October 2012 – A RIGHT PICKLE!

I’ve been pickling today, and it looks as if I shall be eating beetroot for the next 100 years, with the amount that Rosemary and I bottled today.

And that tarragon-flavoured white vinegar didn’t half smell nice. By the time that we had added all of the spices to the vinegar and boiled it up, Rosemary’s kitchen smelt like a Babylonian boozer’s bathroom.

Still, it’s all done now.

We also shelled all of the peas and beans and I ended up with two jars of those. A few of them have chitted and so I’m going to try them out as winter plants under one of my patented plastic-bottle cloches. It might be worth a try.

Another thing that we did was to sort out the garlic and onions. I have enough garlic to last me all my life, I reckon, but not as many onions as I wanted.

I’ve no idea what happened to the shallots though – I had plenty of those a few weeks ago but I couldn’t find any the other day.

So first thing in the morning I went off to St Eloy-les-Mines. Firstly, to buy a recharge for the mobile phone, but the Post Office is closed for renovations for a few weeks so that was that.

Secondly I went to the dechetterie to dump all of the rubbish, but they are on winter hours so the blasted place was closed this morning.

After doing the weekly shopping though (seeing as I’m out, I’ll stay out and it’ll save me a trip tomorrow) I nipped off to Rosemary’s for the pickling session.

On the way back this evening, I “picked up a hitcher, a prisoner on the white lines of the freeway” to quote Joni Mitchell.

Only from Menat to St Eloy-les-Mines, but in my youth I spent lots of time hitch-hiking around the UK and France and I was always grateful for the ride, and so it’s nice to repay the debts that I owe.

I made it to the dechetterie and emptied a van-load of rubbish, mostly papers and glass bottles, and enquiries revealed that it is indeed true – if you go to the dechetterie during opening hours but during office hours, you can indeed help yourself to compost, which is freely available

So Saturday I’ll be having a working day – doing the radio programmes. I’m not going out at all, especially as there is not footy anywhere at all around here tomorrow.

-2

Tuesday 2nd October 2012 – I HAD A GOOD …

… and profitable day out in Montlucon today.

Not the least of the reasons being that a chance visit to the LIDL came up trumps with another 5 packets of these LED light strips. That’s all that I shall be needing anyway for the foreseeable future.

So having picked up Rosemary’s window at Lapeyre we went off to Brico Depot. I bought a tarpaulin to go on the ground where I’m clearing, and I also priced up a whole pile of other stuff that I need for this concreting that I’ll be doing (yes, I have another Cunning Plan).

No suitable wood for shuttering though – I’ll have to have some cut at a sawmill.

Grand Frais, the Fresh food place came up trumps with everything that I need for my pickling, except the malt vinegar for the shallots, but then again at NOZ they were selling white vinegar flavoured with tarragon and that will do just as nicely.

So after dropping off Rosemary’s window and helping her with her shutters I came back here and did a little tidying up in the barn.

I found the other missing sledgehammer and a few other gardening tools, and I also worked out why the desk light in the barn, over the battery bank, isn’t working. Seems that the wire has become disconnected and its probably been like that for years too.

So when I finished that I took off the flourescent light and fitted one of these LED strip lights in place.

At first I was disappointed but then I realised that I had disconnected the good batteries and I was trying to burn some old ones, and I had a reading of just 7.8 volts.

With 12 volts it should be pretty impressive I reckon, but that’s for another day.

-3

Monday 1st October 2012 – BY THE TIME …

… that you read this I shall be well tucked up in the Land of Nod. I’m thoroughly exhausted.

This morning nothing much happened but with a good run at the website I managed to do all of the photos and write the text for FC Pionsat St Hilaire’s famous victory yesterday against Briffons-Perpezat.

You can read the text here if you like.

Rosemary came round at lunchtime.

So while I moved the scaffolding and cleared out the weeds, brambles and small trees from around the Mercedes, she dug up the onions and garlic and pulled some dried beans off the plants.

Tons of all of that stuff she harvested too – a good fruitful exercise

But doing this garden is driving me nuts. The brambles have torn lumps out of me, the nettles have stung me to death and so on and some of the tree roots took ages to dig up

But it’s looking all quite good there now. Just that one big tree to cut down and rip up.

Tomorrow I’m off to Montlucon with Rosemary to Lapeyre to buy her window and a few other bits and pieces that I need, and then I’ll be carrying on in this patch of land, sorting out the stones and levelling everywhere off.

Then I can bring everything round there from off the hardstanding.

At the Anglo-French Group this evening we had the biggest crowd for ages with two new attendees. Nice to see some new faces.

Anyway, that’s it. Off to bed before I fall asleep.

-1

EPIC HALL

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