Tag Archives: eric hall

Thursday 29th August 2013 – I PICKED UP MY CAR THIS EVENING …

… and they knew that it was me coming, as it has almost 17,OOOkms on the clock and quite a few scratches (some of which they hadn’t noticed). But I’m not complaining as it’s a top-of-the-range model with built-in 110 volt inverter and also a reversing camera, so I can see who I’m knocking down when I’m going backwards.

This morning though I went into the city centre to the railway station to see the trains but that didn’t work. It’s underground, the station, and they don’t let you down until your train is called, rather like an airport. But no worries – there weren’t many trains to see. The local rail network is a little, well, truncated. In fact there’s a line that passes about 1km from the airport and it would be the easiest thing to run a spur to it, there’s no obstructions in the way, but instead there’s just a shuttle bus running to the city centre at the mercy of the weather and the traffic, of which there is more than enough.

I went for a wander around the city centre afterwards, looking at the statues (and there’s more than enough of them too) and the skyscrapers (ditto) but as far as I can see, although the city centre has some pretty beautiful spots and corners, it has some pretty desolate windswept alleys too. Overall, it’s no different than any modern city enywhere else in the world and the part of Montreal that is preserved is really just a showcase for the tourists and everywhere else it’s pushed aside in the ruthless quest of mammon.

After lunch it was back to the hotel, back to thr airport, pick up the car and then off across the city to my storage unit to pick up my stuff. Now the car is all kitted up and ready to go and I’ll be off on my voyages.

But at the station I had the most excellent luck. A discount electronic place that had a sale on – and they had the next dictaphone higher up in the range to my old one – exactly the same and with a “pause” but with a data connection too. And that works fine and with GOM player and its facility to step back 5 seconds at a time, this is the works. It’s compatible too with “Dragon”, the speech recognition software that the OU used, so all I need to do is to find a student who might have a copy of “Dragon” for sale.

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Wednesday 28th August 2013 – AND THERE I AM

Totally whacked as usual because I’ve been on my feet for over 12 hours – and I mean “on my feet” too because I’ve walked all over Montreal today.

But the day started as it meant to go on – I had to leave the hotel three tiumes before I got anywhere – firstly I forgot my book and secondly I forgot the memory card for the computer. I missed the bus too but the driver of the bus 100 showed me where another metro station ” De La Savane” is, and so now that gives me more options. But the world is getting frightfully small. He’s from Morocco and spent 27 years living in, of all places, Brussels where he drove for the STIB on the 71 route – the one that we take for Marianne’s. And he gave me all kinds of tips about applying for a job on the Montreal public transport.

First stop was right across town (I’m glad I got this 3-day public transport ticket) to the arrêt “Viau” for the Olympic Stadium (it’s bizarre that the metro stations are named after nearby streets and not at all by the local attractions).

A magnificent pile (but that’s enough about me) but it’s blighted with rust and is slowly creeping into a bit of decay which is a shame. It was controversial enough when it was built and its end might be controversial if they don’t get a move on. But I’ve seen loads of concreting in Montreal that is crumbling away quite rapidly. Must be the minerals in the water.

From here in the scorching sweltering heat (and occasional thunderstorms at midday) I went down to the water. Absolutely beautiful, especially on a day like this. I had to keep stopping every half hour or so to stick my cap under some cold water to cool me down.

Loads of ships to see down here in the docks of course, but you can’t put all of your photos on the blog, can you, Eric? You’ll all have to wait for the definitive web pages. But I can tell you this – looking at the river front down by the old town and old port you cans ee just how much money there was here. The edifices are magnificent.

IN the evening I went out to the south shore of the St Lawrence just to say that I was there and on the way back stopped off at the metro station on the island where the Formula One racetrack is. As it got dark the lights of the city came onon eby one until we had a magnificent spectacle such as this.

From here off to the Cote des Neiges where I treated myself to a falafel abd chips and then back on two metros and a bus. And I stepped off at the wrong bus stop which meant that I had a 30-minute walk back to the hotel.

So much for my early night;

And did I tell you about my dream? I and someone else were reading a car magazine and the readers’ letters. One was about a type of Belgian microcar that was sold in India and used to bring home the shopping. Another letter was about a struggling Yahoo launching a caravan in the USA. Someone wrote to say that this was not as extraordinary as the editor suggested because no European caravan manufacturer ever sold in North America (and I know, by the way, for a fact that this isn’t true having seen several Sprites over here) and so they have never registered any designs, so all that Yahoo has done is to simply pinch a European design and market it

THen we went out into the large park, with long grass and the like and it was teeming with people. A deer appeared and everyone was saying “look, a deer” you could clearly hear all of their voices and it mingled with another herd of deer that was being stalked by a wild boar and a lion (it was really a tiger). Then the wild boar attacked … the lion, knocked it down and in front of the crowds took a huge bite out of its flank. Everyone gasped, I turned my face away, but the lion picked itself up and staggered off.

Yes, I’ve settled in all right, haven’t I?

-5

Tuesday 27th August 2013 – WELL, HERE WE ARE

And here is the rusty steed that brought me here. It’s not, as you might think, an Airbus A330 despite its looks – it is in fact a BE2c that was shot down by the Baron von Richthofen in 1917 on the Western Front and hastily reassembled by Air Transat the day before the flight.

Called The White Bird, it was piloted by those well-known Transatlantic flyers Nungesser and Coli and before I could sit down, I had to move Charles LIndbergh’s sandwiches off my seat.

Strangely, it was the most stress-free flight I’ve ever been on and I’ve no idea why – usually I’m terribly wound up on a flight.

But only a company such as Air Transat would install a full-length mirror in the beichstuhl so that you could watch yourself riding the porcelain horse. I’ve no idea what musthave gone through their minds when they requested this as a specification. Something to do with the “Mile-High Club”? I did notice that the door was very discreetly placed.

At the airport, again, a very unstressfull passage into the country and then outside where, surprise surprise, my shuttle bus was waiting (it’s a good idea to send them an e-mail) and down to the hotel – the Quality Hotel (although they didn’t say what kind of quality) – where I’m now safely installed.

This isn’t a hotel shuttle bus – it’s a Montreal service bus, the 202 to be precise, and here it is outside the Ducollege Underground Station. There’s a bus stop right outside the hotel and that was where I leapt aboard it to take me to the Underground.

Seeing how I’ve not booked a car for a few days, I’m on the buses (and the Underground) for a while. There’s loads of Montreal that I haven’t seen so I’m going to be doing some sightseeing, and by far the best way to get around is on the public transport, especially as a three-day ticket only costs about $18:00 and you can go everywhere with that.

I took the Underground to the Cote des Neiges station because one of the places that I had always wanted to visit was the huge Oratory of Saint Joseph on the side of Mount Royal. I’ve driven past it on dozens of occasions but never been in and it looks so impressive from a distance.

But not so from close up as it’s built of concrete blocks and even my bricklaying is better than whoever built this. It’s a site of pilgrimage and a true pilgrim will climb up all of the steps on his knees in order to seek forgiveness for his sins – and so why they have shuttle buses, escalators and lifts, given the current state of the Catholic Church, is totzlly beyond me. They’ve totally missed the point.

There was a supermarket around the corner so now that I’m stocked up with bagels, maple syrup and strawberry jam, I can have a good breakfast.

But whoever heard of a Canadian bar laitière, or Ice Cream parlour, running out of maple syrup-flavoured frozen vegan ice cream? Unbelievable!

-1

Monday 26th August 2013 – WELL, I MADE IT TO THE AIRPORT

But it wasn’t half touch and go, I’ll tell you.

I didn’t manage to get anything in the way of sleep last night either, because I couldn’t find the keys to my storage box and my safety deposit box in Canada.

Desperate times call for desperate measures and so I put a couple of batteries for the Ryobi angle grinder on charge. It’s as well to be prepared, and that will sort out the men from the boys of course. After that, desperate measures were called for and I started going through all of the waste bins.

I’m glad I did because I found my missing personal telephone directory NOYE TO SELF – have a word with Cécile about her method of tidying up. I found lots of other disagreeable objects but no keys and at 08:52 I called it a day and started to pack everything away.

However, I had a thought. I definitely remember putting the keys in a zipped pocket and they ought to be in the zipped pocket of my “Canada Electrical” bag. But I didn’t remember opening the suitcase after I locked up the storage unit. I’d tipped out my sac banane where there are about four zipped pockets, and the keys weren’t there either of course, but there was a zipped pocket on the computer and camera hold-all.

And sure enough, with just a couple of minutes to go, I emptied that out, and there they were! Phew! That was a close shave!

So at Radio Tartasse I recorded two months of rock programmes, then Liz and I did 6 weeks of “Radio Anglais”. I stopped off at the Pionsat Intermarché to buy a pile of bread and salad and I’ve made a mountain of butties – I know all about the closed restaurant round the corner from my hotel and I have my suspicions about Air Transat and their choice of vegan food. It’s as well to be prepared.

After taking Julie and Clare’s furniture out of Caliburn, I garaged him right round the back of Liz and Terry’s where he can stay quiet for 6 weeks or so out of the way and be good.

Liz kindly prepared lunch, a salad and bread, and I shaved my head with the hair trimmer. There are First Nation Canadians, or Amerindiens, around by where I’m going and I’ve heard all kinds of stories about the Malicete. I’m not leaving them anything to pull off. Anyway, after all of that, we went down to Gerzat in Liz’s car to record 5 weeks of “Radio Anglais” for Radio Arverne.

That was for once quite straightforward and then Liz dropped me off at the station in plenty of time for my train.

I’ve no idea what make or model it is – I shall have to refer to my Jane’s Train Recognition Guide for that, but I can tell you that it wasn’t as rattly or as bangy as the one last time I came here. And as nothing at all exciting happened during the voyage, we arrived in Lyon, and Lyon is much more civilised than trying to go via Paris. I had time to eat some butties and drink a coffee.

In the TGV though we were like sardines. I was lucky in that I boarded early and so I managed to grab a place on the difficult rail halfway down the carriage. Anyone who came after me was struggling for luggage space. It really is ridiculous – why don’t they have a luggage van and a baggagiste on each of the trains? That would make everything so much simpler.

And a good 25 minutes late, due to a tardy connection, we hurtled off into the night with kids screaming and all kinds of things. And not even a place to swing a cat. I hate to think what this would be like on a Saturday evening.

That 25 minutes ended up as being a whopping great 44 minutes by the time that we arrived at the station at Terminal 2, and although that might seem like bad news, it is in fact the first bit of good news that I have had for about a week because it entitles me to a refund of 25% on my ticket – something that I shall be following up with vigour.

Up in a crowded lift from the first floor to the fifth floor and into a heaving mass of people waiting for the hotel buses. Last year I stepped out of the station and onto the bus – this year I think that everyone else’s bus must have done 5 or 6 trips before mine came. But at least that had dispersed the masses and we were a mere 12 on the bus.

Having now had a shower (and we aren’t talking about the OUSA Exeecutive Committee here), configured the new laptop for the internet and downloaded a pile of files as well as a FTP program, I can post this load of rubbish and go to bed.

-12

Sunday 25th August 2013 – I’M HAVING DISASTERS …

… and I’ve not even set out yet. I’ve forgotten to bring home my jacket – it’s hanging up on a hook back at Marianne’s. Luckily I took my passport with me to sign for this apartment so it was still in my back pack, however my dictaphone has been well and truly left behind in the jacket and, as you know, I’m sunk without that.

Not only that, I have two new bank cards to take with me and I can’t find either of those. They are probably in the jacket pocket along with the dictaphone. Also, my credit card expires on 30th September while I’m away and the new one hasn’t arrived yet.

Anyway, you can see what kind of journey this is going to turn out to be.

Being a Sunday I had a lie-in and an interesting dream. I started off in Poland in the square of some big city. The place was being invaded, whether by the Russians or the Germans I didn’t know, but we had a 53-seat coach of the type that I used to drive for Shearings and I was vetting refugees to see if they were potentially British and if so, to pass them down to the door where someone would check them over properly and let them aboard. And for reasons that I do not understand, as happens in dreams, the scene decanted itself to Ostend where we continued.

From there I was in a house dealing with Marianne’s vehicles (of course, she hadn’t really owned one for a number of years). She had an Escort van, an old dirty red van something like an LDV 200, and a couple of saloon cars, nothing worth very much but I had to dispose of them nevertheless and it wasn’t easy.

So wide awake by now, I played “hunt the bank cards” unsuccessfully, likewise “hunt the charger for the movie camera that I have inherited” (which I also think is in Brussels – GRRRR) and then had a major packing session. I can’t find tons of stuff that I need but right now I’m past caring. I’ll leave here tomorrow at 09:15 and I shan’t be back til October 15th. I’ll go with what I’ve got and manage without the rest.

At least I do have a dictaphone though. Round at Liz’s for tea and rehearsing our radio programmes she had a rummage in her drawers ad foud a digital dictaphone that has the air of doing whatever I need it to do, for which I am extremely grateful.

So see you tomorrow from Paris (I hope).

-11

Saturday 24th August 2013 – I DID SOMETHING LAST NIGHT …

… that I haven’t done for years and years and years – and that was to crash out on the side of the road for a couple of hours durig a journey between Brussels and Pooh Corner. It wasn’t as if it was late either – not even 02:00 and I was only 2 hours away from home as well.

I know that I had a bad night’s sleep last night but that has never bothered me before either so I must be getting old, I reckon. It’s a depressing thought.

Anyway after saying goodbye to Esi I set off for home and straight into an enormous traffic jam in the Bois de la Cambre. There’s a show of some kind there this weekend – we saw them setting it up the other day – and it’s blocked all of the roads. In the end I gave up, did a U-turn and came out of the city on the other side by La Hulpe. But in the queue I was stopped alongside a couple of British builder-type guys and we had a chat – and one of the things they mentioned was that they wanted to buy Caliburn. “Buy Caliburn? You can’t do that – he’s part of the family” I told them.

Once on the motorway the journey was quite uneventful except at the péage. With it being the height of the tourist season and all kinds of foreigners on the road they are manned …“personned” – ed and the girl, having had a good look at Caliburn, charged me half the price of what the automatic system charges me. I shall have to look into this. THen off for fuel at Melun ad out on the other side until I fell asleep.

But no issues this morning and I was back here for 07:30. I’m not overgrown – Liz’s Agent Orange stuff has done the trick and there’s thick luxuriant grass now – and I’ve had a slow day of unpacking, repacking, crashing out and configuring my new computer. But here’s a thing – the ew one is more-or less the same as the old one but of the 500GB hard drive only 418GB is available as opposed to 451GB of the older hard drive. THat means the secret file space for recording all of your keystrokes has ow goe up to over 80GB – one sixth of the drive’s capacity. THis Government paranoia thing is getting completely out of hand.

-6

Friday 23rd August 2013 – CHOMP CHOMP CHOMP

Yes folks, it’s me again. Eating humble pie once more, ad we aren’t talking Steve Marriott and Peter Frampton either. Cécile made it back to Nantes by 18:30 which, seeing as how she had her mother with her, she was fully-loaded, she didn’t know the route and she had to pass via Paris, that’s pretty impressive going for all of 700-odd kilometres. Take a bow, Cécile.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, I spent most of the day tidying and cleaning, apart from lunch when I went to the Place Flagey for lunch with Esi and her boyfriend. Esi and I had a good chat about people that we had met during our time at Uni together and about what we were doing these days. After that tough, we all went back to my pied-à-terre in the city because their plans up to date were that they were staying with friends until Sunday and then having to book a hotel for the rest of their stay – a silly idea if you ask me with Marianne’s apartment standing empty and needing some kind of presence.

So having shown them around and explained things, they cleared off and I carried on with the cleaning. But not quite for in one of those “100 things that only Eric can do”, I managed to switch on the coffee machine to make the drink for my flask, and not put the bowl underneath it, so I ended up with a kitchen awash with coffee.

But anyway, as 19:00 came around I fetched Caliburn and loaded him up, and now I’m off to the Place Flagey to give Esi the keys.

-4

Thursday 22nd August 2013 – I’M HERE ON MY …

… own now. Cécile and her mum were up and about and wide-awake quite early and we were on the road for 8:45. I took Cécile to the motorway and pointed her in the right direction for Paris, but I’ve had no news since. She’s on course to turn up in Berlin some time in 2017.

I’ve been catching up with some paperwork (and not by any means with all of it) and that took me until well after midday and then I had to end up drawing a ground plan of the basement seeing as how there isn’t one ad we still need to sort out the cellar. And so armed with that, I went off to the notaires where we finally signed the compromis – meanig of course that a potential purchaser of the apartment is now locked in. Only a major catastrophe can release him from his commitment ow, but I’m not under any illusions as, what with one thing and another, I know all about catastrophes following my recent experiences.

Back home I crashed out for a hour or two and I’m not surprised. I’ve had a stressful week or two.

This evening though, I have done something that I haven’t done for years and years and years, and that is that I sat down and watched television. Belgian TV was broadcasting The Good, The Bad, And The Aardvark. That’s a film that ought to be in the top 10 of anyone’s film collection – one of the greatest films of all time – and not only do I own a copy I have watched it time and time again and in dozens of different edits. But I have to say that I have never seen this edit before, and it contains sequences that I have never ever seen. Furthermore, the added scenes go a long way to filling in the numerous holes in the story – holes that have always puzzled me.

Yes, I was fascinated by this, from start to finish.

But there are still holes in the story, and one day someone might get around to releasing the full unedited version.

-2

Wednesday 21st August 2013 – Cécile’s car …

… is ow fully-loaded ready for the off ad by the time may of you read this (like tomorrow mornig) she ad her mum will be well on their way.

Caliburn is still fully-loaded but with a different load aboard. This morning we went off to deliver a table to a woman who had bought it over the internet. That freed up a good deal of space inside the van and with the dosh we went off to the Bois de la Cambre and the Chateau Robinson to spend our ill-gotten gains.

You’ve see loads of photos of the Chateau Robinson, from my other visits there in the past and so that you kow that it’s on an island and reached by a ferry, such as the one in this photo, across the lake.

Even keener readers will recall that some time over Christmas 2011 I had a chat with none other than the present King of the Belgians, and if that little bit of shameless name-dropping doesn’t earn me any Brownie Points then there is no justice in this world.

Cecile’s mum had never been on the ferry, of course, and as she is a keen boatsperson, she was quite enthusiastic about the trip, and who can blame her?

Back here, the apartment is even more empty as the divan and easy chair have disappeared inside Caliburn. Cécile is having them for her new house, wherever that may be.

And that is that. Things are winding down here. It won’t be long before I’m going as well.

-2

Tuesday 20th August 2013 – I’M WHACKED

Cécile and I have just finished loading Caliburn and he’s now parked up back in his little spec down the road. Julie’s bookcase is in there, and so are Clare’s wicker objects and Cécile’s dismantled desk. There are piles of boxes too, some for Liz.

I had another dream last night. I don’t remember much about it but I was in a scrapyard looking for a car battery and they had a white battery that they were using to check out all of the electrical equipment. For some reason it was that battery that interested me more than any other and so I insisted on having it. They were obliged to check it and test it in front of me before I paid them the money.

Anyway this morning I went and reserved my voyage to Canada and then to Greece. I bitterly regret that the branch of my travel agents that used to be up at IKEA has closed down – instead, I went to the one just around the corner and that was a mistake. Up there, they were always competent but here they don’t have the same esprit and during one attempt to do my booking, the girl had me arriving back at Paris on 7th October in order to take a aeroplane out to Greece on the previous day. And then, of course, the computer system crashed, didn’t it? That just was’t my morning. Unfortuately I’m having to fly Air Transat – the equivalent of long-distance Ryanair – and that is something that I vowed that I would ever do again after my voyage of 2011 but havig left my booking so late and having lost the benefit of my half-price voucher (it expired when I was here helping Marianne), flying by Air France was not an option (and I’ve just realised that I haven’t ordered my special meal).

Back here in the afternoon we sorted out all of the books and took four boxes to the second-hand bookshop. He chose about 25 out of them, and gave me €45 for those. Now I wasn’t half impressed with that – if I had received that for all of them I would have been well-impressed – and so with no further ado, the rest went to Oxfam.

And back here, we packed up and loaded.

It’s much more empty now and we can move around. But there’s still far too much stuff here for my liking and the sooner it all goes, the better.

-10

Monday 19th August 2013 – WE MADE IT …

… to the African Museum this evening. That’s situated a good 7 or so miles outside Brussels in the village of Tervuren.

We didn’t mean to be there – in fact we had only set out for a short walk but we decided to go via the clothing bank and dispose of a pile of clothing that no-one wanted. That meant fetching Caliburn and once we were all esconced inside him, well, we just set off and went for a little drive. There’s no point in Cécile and her mum being here if they aren’t going to be getting around a little.

We stopped off to admire the big elephant sculpture on the car park and then went for a walk around the grounds. As you might expect, the Museum itself was closed. Still, it was a very pleasant evening out, with the fine weather and all of that.

Apart from that, almost everything for sale has been put on the internet now and the cellar is empty apart from a wardrobe and two boxes of rubbish. Of course, we had everything all over the floor this afternoon going right through it and just as we were up to our ears in paperwork, the valuer came round, with the prospective purchaser, to value the property. Absolutely impeccable timing I don’t think.

Anyway, now the place is looking a little more like it and tomorrow we are planning to take the books down to the second hand book shop for sale. That will make even more space and from there it’s all (hopefully) downhill. I just hope that some more of this furniture goes.

-5

Sunday 18th August 2013 – WE HAD ANOTHER …

… afternoon out today. Or, rather, a late afternoon out because Cécile and her mum crashed out for an hour or so this afternoon.

First stop was to the cemetery to pay our respects to Marianne. Cécile and her mum had bought a pot of flowers and so we planted the contents on her grave. I hope that she will notice them.

From there I took everyone on a guided tour of the top end of the city and we visited the Square Montgomery, the Joyeuse Entrée, the Berlaymont, the Sacré Coeur de Schaerbeek, the Schaerbeek maison communale and a thousand other places until we arrived at the Atomium. Here, everyone alighted from Cécile’s car and we went for a walk around. After all, you can’t go to brussels and not visit the Atomium, can you?

Back in the car we came home via the Chinese Pavilion and the Japanese Tower, on the edge of the Royal Palace Gardens. 19:30 when we arrived home – that’s some going.

But Cécile’s mum is certainly having her money’s worth, visiting the town like this.

+34

-10

Saturday 17th August 2013 – ANCHORS AWAY!

Well, it was something like that anyway. Here we all are on the “Titanic”- a pedalo on the Etangs Mellaerts at Brussels.

We’ve had a full day out today (or, at least, an afternoon). We started off at the Carrefour down by Hermann Debroux where we did a huge load of shopping (I dunno where it all goes, this food). From there we went to the “Lunch Garden”, for the simple reason that they were advertising moules et frites and as we all know from our visit to the Ile D’Yeu earlier this year Cecile’s mother is rather partial to moules et frites.

We weren’t alone on the lake either. Loads of other boats and pedalos, newly-married couples, swans, ducks and all of that kind of thing too. In fact we only needed a whale and we would have had a whale of a time.

Conspicuous by his absence however was Strawberry Moose. He had heard Cecile and I discussing our proposed adventure and he was all up for it, of course? What made him change his mind however was that I told him that, no matter how it was pronounced, the objects for which we were going to be looking were spelt O-A-R-S. That rather put the kybosh on it from his point of view, I’m afraid.

The Etangs Mellaerts are only just down the road from the tram museum and there’s a tram line that goes out to the African Museum at Tervuren. Every so often they give one of the historic trams a run out along that line and, sure enough, an old-timer goes a-rattling and a-clanking past us.

So back home and the only disappointment was that we had another no-show this evening. The person who wants to buy the washing machine and who should have been here at 18:00 – he never turned up. I don’t know why people do this kind of thing.

-9

Friday 16th August 2013 – I HAD A REALLY EXCITING DREAM …

… last night, but when I woke up, it completely disappeared and I can’t remember a thing about it now. Ahh Well.

And so I had another really good session on the computer, did some “granny-sitting” while Cécile went to the shops, and did sme more emptying of the cellar. Tons of stuff gone out of there now and it looks a little more respectable. Up here though, it’s total chaos. MArianne has kept tons of stuff, some of which is , quite frankly, rubbish (and if you hear me say that then you know that it really is) whereas some of the stuff is quite crucial and I don’t understand at all why iy’s been filed as loose paper in the cellar when it’s clearly of some quite import. I have also found a photograph, that asks more questions than it answers. In fact it makes me feel like Nansen the Polar explorer …“and where are you going to find Nansen the Polar explorer at this time of night?” – ed … who famously said in his book In Northern Mists "… the more extensive my studies became, the more riddles I perceived – riddle after riddle led to new riddles and this drew me on …".

Most things are now photographed and I’ll be having a day putting everything on line. That will give people a Sunday to come and look at them and see what they think. I hope that I can get rid of some more stuff – I’m being plagued with people making derisory offers right now and that is getting on my wick.

-6

Thursday 15th August 2013 – I KNOW THAT I PROMISED YOU …

…that I wouldn’t discuss the question of parking any more, but I’m a bigger liar than Barack Obama when he promised to close the Concentration Camp at Guantanamo Bay.

I have in fact been obliged to continue my discussion and to post a photograph, because here is someone who actually did it properly.

I can certainly say that there was nothing in front of him – he could have advanced another 3 or 4 metres if he had so desired, and not only that, he actually looked out of his car door, saw where the line was and reversed back another foot or so to make sure that he was on the limit.

It goes without saying that the driver wasn’t a Belgian. He was of oriental extraction – East Asian or something like that. But anyway he did it properly.

So this morning I was up again early and while Cécile and her mum were sleeping I dashed off a huge pile of amendments to my web site, adding the “like” and “share” buttons, correcting the layout of a few headings, and also adding on some stuff about cookies. In case you are wondering, I haven’t coded any cookies knowingly into my website. The only ones that you might find are those embedded into third-party plug-ins;

Eventually Cécile and her mum were ready and so I sent them off out to the shops but they were back inside half an hour. It’s “Ascension”, isn’t it? And Belgians don’t need too many excuses for having a day off.

This afternoon we attacked the cellar and I can’t blame Cécile for losing interest half-way through because it’s a desperate job. I’ve no idea why Marianne tore up so much paper – letters and stuff – as she did and then put it all down in her cellar. I’ve sorted out most of that stuff but we’ll need to finish it off tomorrow if Cécile can pluck up the courage;

There’s much more stuff photographed and I’ve put a good pile of iton the web page as well as on the Deuxième main web site. There’s already someone in after the washing machine and I hope that the rest goes soon. Another day on this and everything should be on it, I hope.

But sorry about the parking again.

-10

EPIC HALL

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