Tag Archives: amis du chateau de pionsat

Sunday 5th August 2012 – THIS WATER ISSUE …

… that I mentioned yesterday seems to have resolved itself.

When I checked the statistics earlier, we had had 5.5mm of rain up to that point. and it’s still teeming down outside.

All the plants will be having a good watering anyway, and you can’t say that they don’t need it – a few of them were really gasping a bit.

I worked out that the catchment area of the water is about 30m². Therefore 1/30 of a metre of rain – about 34mm – will give me 1 cubic metre, or 1000 litres, of water.

So 5.5 mm of water will give me 5.5/34 x 1000 = about 160 litres of rain. I won’t have any issues about using that lot.

fete annuel de pionsat brocante puy de dome franceIt started to rain while I was at the Pionsat brocante this afternoon. And it served me right because I didn’t arrive there until about 14:30.

Mind you, I don’t think that I missed very much because it was mostly awful as you can see.

But I did have the most extraordinary stroke of luck.

I use kee klamps to make the mounting frames for my solar panels and they are expensive. But there was a Dutch guy here with a box-full for sale for all of €5:00 – you can’t even buy one for that – and so I duly knocked him down to €4:00.

I had a very good reason for my somewhat-delayed start to the morning. Brain of Britain here forgot to cancel his early morning alarm and so at 07:45 I had an unexpected cacophony.

Anyway, badger that for a game of soldiers. I tuned off the alarm and went back to bed until 10:45, and that, dear reader, was that.

caleche fete annuel de pionsat puy de dome franceMarianne was there of course with one of her sons, in her role as active member of the Amis du Chateau de Pionsat and we had quite a lengthy chat.

Marianne was actually in charge of the caleche, the horse and carriage that had ben hired to give sightseeing trips around the town, and I was even invited aboard for a free lap of honour.

It goes without saying that if it’s free, I’ll have ten of those.

That was it really – a really lazy day. But I’m entitled to one every week. A day where you do nothing and don’t feel guilty about it is really important.

Saturday 4th August 2012 – NEVER MIND A PERSONAL BEST …

… this must be something of a new world record.

Believe it or not, I was up and about this morning at the stupid time of 05:50 and I’ve absolutely no idea why. It’s not as if I’d wet the bed or a mouse in the attic had been doing a clog dance or something like that.

Anyway, I had a really leisurely start to the morning and spent a load of time working on the website. I’m currently discussing the Battle of Québec, as it happens.

13:30 I nipped off into St Eloy-les-Mines to do some shopping and also to buy some bricks.

Cheze had them in stock – but at €0:94 a piece which is ridiculous if you ask me. Anyway, I bought just enough to do the surround for the second window that I’ll be fitting in the lean-to. It wasn’t until much, much later that I remembered that I had bought the original lot from Point P.

Just by way of a change, I did some work this afternoon – putting back into position the stones that I knocked off the wall the other day, cementing them into position and then concreting them in place.

But now I’ve run out of gravel, would you believe? It’s clearly not my destiny to finish this wall.

But no gravel means that I can use up the pile of scrunched-up brick that used to be two internal walls in the house until I knocked them down.

They were just lying where they fell all over the floor and so this means that I’m clearing them out of the way, which is A Good Thing. They make nice lightweight concrete too.

Tomorrow is a day off – no village Open Day to attend. I’ll have a lie-in and maybe go to Pionsat for a prowl around the brocante and see how Marianne is doing with her stall for the Amis du Chateau de Pionsat.

Monday 5th April 2010 – Blimmin’ ‘eck!

I’ve just noticed the time – 03:44! Yes, that’ll teach me. But I’ve made a couple of important discoveries with this 3D animation program and suddenly my attempted animations have come on in leaps and bounds. So I managed to get myself carried away.

I can see that I’m going to have to be careful with what I do with this program, otherwise my spare time will simply evaporate.

So with it being another jour ferie today I did just about badger all again. Coffee in bed, read a book, checked on the garden, worked on the website, wrapped a birthday present for Bill, prepared some entertainment for the Anglo-French group – yes, badger all as you can see.

At the group this evening we had quite a few newcomers – an American couple who have bought a holiday home here; my new Dutch neighbours; two French guys that Antoine knew. And with the welcome return from hibernation of Clotilde and the presence of Heidi back temporarily from Germany we were quite numerous. And wasn’t that a nice change?

But not so good news is that the new owners of the Queue de Milan, being much more businesslike than the previous, have now decided that they want to charge us €30 for use of the room. Well, fair enough – it’s their room and they can do what they like with it. But then on the other hand it’s our bodies and we are quite free to take them elsewhere.

We shall have a little sit-down this week and plan our next move. It’s a pity that there isn’t a club room at the footy ground. But there are plenty of other options – it’s a case of seeing what’s available. Marianne, who is the President of the Amis du Chateau de Pionsat, might even have a little room there that we can use.