Tag Archives: caliburn insurance

Friday 22nd October 2021 – WE’VE HAD AN …

… aerial day today. After having gone several weeks without being overflown, I seem to have hit the jackpot today.

The first aeroplane to oveflow me as I passed along the path on the south side of the headland was this one, registration number F-PAIA.

She’s a French Henri Nicollier HN 700 Ménestrel II aeroplane, the “II” representing the fact that she’s a 2-seater craft. They are designed for home building and this particular model was first built in 1969. She’s powered by a 60 kW (80 hp) Limbach L2000 flat four engine.

The second object to flying by overhead is one of our old favourites.

As I was perched with my elbows on the wall taking a photo of the port area I could hear the familiar sound heading my way from the direction of the Mont St Michel and the only thing that I needed to know was its colour.

So today we have the yellow powered hang-glider going past overhead on its way presumably to the airport with a passenger on board. It’s nice to see a familiar face after all of this time.

The French have a saying “jamais deux sans trois” – “never two without a third” – and sure enough, there was something else in the air heading my way as I headed for home.

This time it’s one of the Birdmen of Alcatraz aboard his Nazgul going out for a quiet flap in the afternoon’s wind. Although the storms of earlier in the week have died out, it’s still fairly windy outside.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, I’d had another absolutely dreadful night. And this time I suppose that I ought to blame all of the coffee that I drank while I was out radioing yesterday evening. It doesn’t usually affect me that much from a “lack of sleep” point of view but it must have done last night.

However I forgot to set the alarm this morning so it was 08:05 when I finally crawled out of bed and the extra time in bed must have done me some good.

After the medication I had to check the mails and messages and that took some time because there is plenty going on right now and there were several mails to deal with. And then I had to attend to yesterday’s journal entry. It was 23:30 when I came home yesterday evening and that’s far too late to start work.

My work was interrupted by a phone call. Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that I wrote a couple of blistering letters to a couple of people a couple of weeks ago. It’s now provoked a response and I have … errr … accepted a cash settlement.

But then I noticed that the glass bottle that exploded several months ago has cracked the screen on the TV. Not that I use it very much at all but it just goes to show that what comes in with one hand goes out with the other.

More stuff on the dictaphone too. Some bossy woman was organising a party. Crowds of people were there and a lot of my family were there. We were waiting and waiting, then the person with me said that we had to go as we couldn’t wait any longer. Regrettably I went to get myself ready but just then everyone turned up. People came in and more people came in. Everyone started to talk to me and mentioned that they would come along to my wedding in the morning. I thought that at this rate it was so late this this wedding was just not going to take place, is it? A baby had disappeared a couple of years ago and there was something else that went missing and we had to look in the barn for it. The barn was even worse and more untidy than mine. We entered the barn and started to look for it and found this mummified cadaver of this baby while we were doing it. There was something about the clothes that it was wearing. What we found with this baby was that it seemed to be wearing different clothes so we wondered if in fact it was the same baby or a different one. Everyone came to see how we were and some woman, this bossy woman came in and started talking to me. I said to her “do you know that we’ve found this baby?”. She said “really?”. I said “yes. You’re standing on it” which she actually was. She just went “eeww! I hate babies” and going on like that, not really concerned by the fact that this was a dead baby at all.

And later we were somewhere watching Boris Johnson or Donald Trump, I can’t remember now, ruining a grant. When I looked round, the person standing next to me shaking her head was Angela Merkel. We had a bit of a discussion about it but I can’t remember anything else now.

After lunch, I had my medical expense claims to deal with and you have no idea how many there were. In fact by the time I knocked off I still hadn’t done them all. But I’m going to have to finish them tomorrow because a couple will be timed out if I’m not careful.

And look for the expense receipts from October last year that seem to have gone missing.

This afternoon I was only a few minutes late in going for my afternoon walk around the headland.

First stop is of course the wall at the end of the car park so off I trotted to peer over and down onto the beach.

Right now there is plenty of beach to be on, with the tide being so far out. And there were quite a few people taking advantage of it as well.

It’s also interesting to see that many of the rough ripples that were created by the storm earlier in the week have been smoothed out by the subsequent action of the tide.

There wasn’t anything at all going on out at sea – not a single boat anywhere.

However there was something moving about on a pretty inaccessible part of the beach amongst all of the rocks so I took a photo.

What we have here is someone who has been at the pèche à pied, armed with a bucket and a scratching stick. And by the look of his bucket from here, I would say that he has a fair old load of shellfish in there.

That’s what they call “flexing your mussels”.

There ere only half a dozen other people out there on the path this afternoon so I had a comfortable walk along the path to the end of the headland.

The sun is sinking quite low now over there to the west and the town of Cancale was looking really splendid silhouetted against the sky and the setting sun.

One of these days, when I can summon up the courage, I’ll carry on with my task of writing about my adventures on board the Spirit of Conrad while we were over there and I’ll show you all of the photos so that you can see exactly what it is that you are supposed to be able to see from here.

While I was at the end of the headland, I looked down onto the bench by the Cabanon Vauban

There wasn’t anyone sitting there this afternoon but there were a couple of people scrambling around on the rocks with their equipment for the pèche à pied.

Having seen the ripples on the beach the other day, what I imagine is going through the minds of these people is that all kinds of shellfish has been torn from the sea bed and thrown up onto the rocks so they are going about scavening to see what they can find for themselves.

And although I don’t know for sure, I suspect that this is storm damage just here.

It looks as if the wind has torn a couple of branches off the tree here at the side of the Boulevard Vaufleury and they have been busy cutting it up ready to take it away.

had this been the Auvergne, there would have been none of that wood left there by now. It would have all disappeared off into someone’s woodshed drying out ready for next winter.

Wood is a pretty valuable commodity over there and people seize every possible opportunity to lay their hands on as much as they can obtain.

So I continued on my walk around the headland and down the path towards the port.

And there has been a change of occupant in the chantier naval since we drove past there yesterday. The big yacht and the Government boat (well, I assume that it’s a Government boat) Les Epiettes have gone back into the water.

Instead, there’s a trawler come in to take its turn in there. Although I can’t see her name anywhere, I can tell from her registration number that she’s the Yann Frederic and she sails out of this port.

We’ve seen her before – about 6 weeks ago when she spent a week or so in the chantier naval.

While I was here I had a look over at the ferry terminal to see what was happening.

There’s just one boat in there this afternoon – one of the Joly France ferries that go over to the Ile de Chausey. We can see that there’s no step in the stern so she would be the older one of the two boats.

And for once, they have folded up the crane correctly, just as it’s supposed to. And I suppose that the hydraulic seals are very grateful for the rest that they are having right now.

Just one more item caught my attention while I was out this afternoon.

We’ve talked a lot about boats being parked in the NAABSA (Not Always Afloat But Safely Aground) position, and here’s one in a position that we don’t see very often.

She’s Jade III and why she’s parked there I don’t know. usually it’s to carry out some simple repair or to empty some of the contents out of the boat into a waiting vehicle.

But what I’m imagining is the strength that must be in those ropes to hold her there like that. It’s a good job that she’s a catamaran.

Back here at the apartment I had a coffee and carried on with my medical expenses until teatime.

There was some stuffing left over from my stuffed peppers earlier in the week so I finished that off with some taco rolls. And now I’m listening to MY LIVE MUSIC FESTIVAL.

Don’t worry if you missed it, by the way. It’s repeated on Saturday night too – 21:00 CET, 20:00 UK Time and 15:00 Toronto time. Enjoy!

Wednesday 28th July 2021 – SAY HELLO …

… to a new resident in the port here.

And we’ll be seeing a lot more of her in the future that’s for sure. She’s called Belle France and she’s came into port last night to take part in working the ferry service between here and the Ile de Chausey.

It’s not clear whether she’s in addition to the 2 Joly France boats or whether one of them wiil be sailing off into the sunset in early course.

But one thing that I noticed about Belle France is that she doesn’t appear to be fitted with a crane to load the luggage from the quayside, and that may well explain the presence of Chausiaise in the fleet.

My presence this morning can be best explanied by the fact that I managed to stagger to my feet at 06:00 despite not having gone to bed until 01:00 this morning and so for the rest of the story I only have myself to blame.

But nevertheless I kept on going for quite a while. Nothing on the dictaphone and so I worked on the photos from Greenland in August 2019 . And seeing that we are in the middle of the Olympics, WHALES WON THE GOLD MEDAL in the synchronised swimming.

What else I did was to carry on with loading the shelves in the kitchen. I’ve rearranged them somewhat and now I seem to have made much more room there, which is always nice. And while I was at it, I took out the waste paper and the rubbish to the waste bins and washed my bin. What excitement, hey?

While I was sorting through stuff I came across the filters for the water jug so I cleaned the jug and changed the filter over.

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that I’ve mentioned this before … “and on many occasions too” – ed … why I note down things like this. The answer to that is that this journal is indexed and so I can find out when I last changed the filter and when it’s time to change it again.

It’s important that I write these things down to remember them because two things happen when you reach my age .

you forget everything that it’s possible to forget
I can’t remember what the second thing is

Having done all of that (and you’ve no idea how tired that makes me) I came in here. It was round about 12:15 when I sat down and the next thing that I remembered it was 14:05. Yes, I’d had another one of these mega-sleeps that I’ve been sliding into just recently without knowing it.

That led to a very late lunch followed by a very late acoustic guitar practice.

After lunch being fed up of tripping over the clothes airer I put away the dry clothes and then had another look through some papers. And while I didn’t find the papers for which I had been searching yesterday, instead I found Caliburn’s insurance certificate for which I had been searching previously. So I wonder what I’ll be looking for when I find my missing paper.

After another 10 minutes or so dealing with the kitchen shelves, It was time to go walkies

First port of call is of course the beach down below the cliff just here so I wandered off across the car park for a look.

No buses parked on the kerb or young people on the verge in the car park this this afternoon.

I’m quite a bit earlier than yesterday so the tide isn’t all that far out right now. But nevertheless there are still plenty of people down there enjoying what they can, as I discovered when I stuck my head over the wall.

And that’s not really a surprise because the weather was quite mild today and I’d actually gone out without a jacket, which shows you just how brave I am.

And it’s not just in Granville either.

There must be a very low tide this afternoon because you can see that over on the beach at Donville les Bains the bouchot farmers have brought out all of their tractors and so on ready to begin the harvest as soon as the beds are uncovered.

And you can tell that none of those beaches is affected by the ban because there are quite a few people on the beach right out there, including something of a crowd by the caravan park on the extreme left, as well as a few people taking the waters.

Yes, when I go to visit the airfield, whenever that might be, I’ll pick a nice day and take my butties.

That was what my right eye was doing while I was there overlooking the beach. But what was my left eye doing?

As usual, my roving left eye was looking around out to sea to see what might be going on out at sea.

And the answer was “zilch” – nothing at all. There wasn’t a single (or a married) boat between here and the Ile de Chausey and I’ll tell you something else for nothing as well – and that was that this afternoon I didn’t even see a hint of a boat anywhere out at sea at all.

After he crowds of boats that we saw last week and the traffic jams of fishing boats heading for home, I have been amazed by the lack of water craft.

It’s true of course that the tide is out but even so, someone could have nipped out this lunchtime with his butties and gone fishing until this evening when the harbour gates opened up again

However one thing was not missing from our afternoon’s activities.

Having been overflown by endless squadrons of light aircraft and Nazgul over the past week or two, then yesterday aerial activity in the vicinity was conspicuous by its absence.

The abstinence didn’t last long though. While I was walking along the path near the lighthouse a familiar rattle announced itself and sure enough, the yellow autogyro that we have seen so often in the past went flying by overhead.

And it’s a two-seater too of course. That’s something else I can do whenever I make it to the airfield – I can hitch a ride and go for a fly around. I’d feel much happier in that than in a 2-seater Nazgul.

Now here’s something that I haven’t noticed before.

The other day I took a photo of Le Loup, the marker light on the rocks just outside the harbour. So today I took a photo a little further inland towards the Place d’Hacqueville.

And doesn’t that look like a medieval fish trap to you? It certainly does to me.

It’s like two stone walls built in a V out to sea. The tide comes on and fills the pool with water and hopefully fish, and when the tide goes out, the water percolates out through the gaps in the rocks leaving the fish behind, trapped

Then the medieval fishwives wade in and pull out the fish for supper with their bare hands

Meanwhile from my vantage point above the harbour, I’m not too interested in the chantier naval because nothing has changed in there since yesterday

Instead, looking in the other direction, I can see that very shortly we will be expecting the arrival of Normandy Trader.

And how do I know this? The answer is that there’s a swimming pool on the quayside by the loading crane. There’s a company here in France that exports swimming pools to the Channel Islands and I know that the owners of Normandy Trader have the contract to pick them up and take them back to Jersey.

They won’t leave that on the quayside for long in case it’s damaged. Those things are not cheap at all.

You are all probably wandering what has happened to all of the boats that we haven’t been seeing out at sea just recently.

Well, here there are – or, at least, some of them. There’s a port de plaisance with a gate to keep the water in and that’s where the expensive stuff and the houseboats are moored, but the less expensive boats and the smaller fishing boats are out here in the tidal harbour.

When the tide goes out they simply settle down in the silt and wait for the tide to come back in and re-float them.

You can see what looks like a little river on the left. That’s water that drains out of the inner harbour quite slowly so that the inner harbour settles down and isn’t full when the tide comes back in, which means that they can open the gates a long time before high tide.

Meantime our two Channel Island ferries Victor Hugo in the foreground and Granville in the back ground are still here.

The Channel Islands have announced that entry restrictions to the Channel Islands are being slightly relaxed so people can at long last go to visit the islands.

However, that doesn’t apply to the two ferries. I’ve no idea why not, but it seems a strange decision to me. Maybe they don’t want the kind of numbers coming to the islands that the ferries could bring.

And I do know that there is some kind of issue about finance. The local region has been footing the bill for this for ages and they have suggested that the Channel Islanders put their hands in their pockets too, but as yet, no folding stuff has come from over there.

And as an aside, do you notice a resemblance between Granville and Belle France?

Back here I sorted out some photos, had my bass guitar practice and then went for tea. Chips and curried beans (I found a tin or two in my supplies while I was filling the shelves) and a burger followed by apple pie from the freezer.

Now an early night is called for as I have visitors coming tomorrow, I hope.

Tuesday 12th November 2019 – I USED TO BE A WEREWOLF

But I’m all right noooooooooooooooooooow!

What a beautiful full moon we are having tonight. And to be on the safe side, when I had my morning shower today, I shaved the palms of my hands just in case.

And there was plenty of garlic in my evening meal too – ready for when I go to Castle Anthrax on Thursday

Last night wasn’t as late as it might have been. I was actually in bed at some time round about 01:30. Furthermore, much to my own surprise as well as doubtless to yours, I was up and about long before the third alarm went off, sometime between 06:07 and 06:19.

There was time enough to go on a nocturnal ramble, but I’ll spare you the gory details. After all, you’re probably eating your evening meal or something. Needless to say, a member of my family put in an appearance during the night. And that’s enough to put the willies up anyone, especially me.

An early start and early breakfast meant plenty of time to deal with the dictaphone notes and by about 08:30 I’d done 6 or 7. And I’m glad that I stopped where I did because I’ve reached what might be called a turbulent period in my life when I fell into the pit.

A shower next and a general clean-up and then I was off up to the Centre Agora for a meeting. And the net result is that tomorrow I’m off to interview a rock musician. And on the way home, I was buttonholed by someone else and invited to do another chat to some different people about Uummaannaaq.

The walk up to the Centre Agora was very pleasant and interesting, especially as I stormed once more up the bank as if I was on my way to invade Poland.

But I came to a dead stop when I was this garage or car port or whatever just here. I wonder what the architect had in mind when he designed this. It certainly can’t have been anything that any normal person might have been imagining.

Probably some Cossack’s daughter. After all she must know the Steppes.

On the way back from the Centre Agora I called in at LIDL for some shopping. Not too much because I’ll be away for a few days starting Thursday and there’s no point in stocking up with supplies that won’t be eaten.

But there were grapes on special offer again and I love grapes, as regular readers of this rubbish will recall. Which reminds me – just excuse me a moment …

After lunch I bashed on with the web site amendments and I have run aground there. I’ve reached the L’Anse aux Meadows pages now and I’m having a serious think about them.

When I wrote them back in 2010 I didn’t know anything like half as much about the Norse voyages to North America as I do now since I’ve been able to lay my hands on books by people like Carl Rafn, Arthur Middleton Reeves and William Hovgaard.

Rafn is a very interesting author because his Antiquities Americanae, written in 1837, was the first book to take seriously the Norse voyages to North America and the first to actually give scientific study to the Norse Sagas.

It was dismissed, even ridiculed, by many subsequent historians, even such reputable people as Nansen who described the sagas as nothing more than “works of romantic fiction”, but nevertheless inspired a great many people to take his work forward.

It led ultimately to William Nunn’s epic “Wineland voyages;: Location of Helluland, Markland, and Vinland” from 1914. Munn was the first person to pinpoint L’Anse aux Meadows as a Norse site (and as far as I am aware, the first person to pick up on Climate Change too) and which led 50 years ago to the excavations of the Ingstads and their discovery on the Norse ruins.

There was another phone call to be made too. I still haven’t received the paperwork for Caliburn’s insurance despite my conversation of 22nd October, so I rang them again. They told me that they hadn’t received my e-mail with my attachment, something that I find totally bizarre.

So I’ve sent them again. In the meantime they’ve sent me an attestation.

Then I started to pack up all of the rubbish in the living room. Cardboard boxes everywhere that needed moving out and an object that needs packing up ready for returning, as well as taking all of the rubbish out to the bins.

So much involved in the tidying up was I that I missed my afternoon walk. But seeing that I was already at 103% of my daily activity, I shan’t worry too much right now.

But tidying up, hey? What about that?

Tea was a burger on a bap with baked potatoes and veg., followed by fruit salad and blackcurrant sorbet. And it was all absolutely delicious.

This evening Iwent out for my evening walk. And straight away I was blasted by a wind the like of which I haven’t felt while I’ve been living here.

Out at sea was a trawler on its way back into harbour and the poor thing was struggling through the waves.

Even at this distance I could see that it wasn’t having a very easy time of it. Like I said, my hat goes off to whoever it is out there in weather like this.

On and round the corner and into the shelter from the winds.

And here I could eve the spectacular beauty of one of the most perfect full moons that I have ever seen.

The one that I saw at the Phare des Monts on the North Shore of the St Lawrence in Québec in 2012 was certainly spectacular, but for completely different reasons and at a completely different time.

The moonlight was bright enough for me to be able to pick up some detail down at the chantier navale and in the outer harbour.

It’s not as clear as the photos that I took last winter, but that’s because this is a hand-held shot and the other one was on a tripod with a very long exposure.

However, I’m not going to be taking a tripod out in a wind like this. Regular readers of this rubbish will recall that it didn’t do the Nikon D3000 very much good at all.

By now, the trawler that I had seen out at sea was now close to home. And I bet that the crew members were relieved. And so was I too.

And having seen it safely home I headed for home too. At something of a run too and I managed about 300 or 400 metres before I had to stop for breath.

But I soon found my second wind because I was able to run up the top flight of stairs to my apartment. And that reminded me that coming back from my morning out, despite having come up the hill without stopping, I had run up both flights of stairs with no problem.

Rosemary rang me when I returned and we had a good chat for an hour. And now I’m ready for bed. The fitbit, or what’s left of it, tells me that I’ve walked (or ran) 11.2 kilometres today, or 132% of my daily total.

I really don’t know where all of this energy has come from though. I hope that I’m not going to en up paying for it.

Thursday 31st May 2018 – I HATE PEOPLE …

… who have no sense of humour.

What can possibly be wrong with, when you have a piece of paper that needs a signature, going up to a counter clerk in the Post Office and saying “hey, put your cross on this”? No reason for anyone to pull a face or get upset is there?

At least the guys who were digging the trench for the new fibre-optic cable (yes, they are moving on quite rapidly now) can still have a laugh and a smile.

Especially when Yours Truly goes up to them and says “don’t fill in that trench until I’ve brought the wife down, will you?”

Not of course that I have a wife around here these days, and even if she were around here, she would know better than to let me lead her anywhere near an open trench where there were people on the point of filling it in.

But that’s not the point, is it?

It was another bizarre night last night. In bed comparatively early but for some reason I awoke slap bang in the middle of the night and couldn’t go back to sleep again for ages. Mind you, when I did, I had a real struggle to leave the stinking pit.

After breakfast we had a shower and a shave and then I set the washing machine going. Even washed the bedding so that I can have a nice clean bed tonight (and I’ve just remembered that I’ve forgotten to fit the clean bedding) for a change.

And then it was off up town, calling at the railway station on the way for my tickets for next week.

talking of roadworks … "well, one of us was" – ed … the roadworks in the Avenue des Vendéens near LIDL are continuing apace.

They are now working on both sides of the road – digging a trench on the northern side (and I don’t know what they are putting in it that they couldn’t have put in the trench on the southern side when they were digging that a couple of months ago) as well as reorganising the kerbstones on the southern side.

They look as if they are going to be there for ever.

That wasn’t all of the excitement in the town either.

Here we have one of Renault’s answer to the CA Bedford and the Ford Thames – Renault Estafette. 20 or 30 years ago you wouldn’t have been able to move around France without stumbling over one of these. The police used them by the thousands back in the 70s.

Over half a million were built between 1960 and 1980, but I bet that you won’t find half a dozen on the roads in everyday use today.

I didn’t buy anything exciting in LIDL today except a magnetic tray for holding screws and bolts. I don’t have one of these here and I was bewailing the fact the other day that I don’t have a magnet to sift through the rubbish in Caliburn to find this missing spring clip.

Another thing that I didn’t buy today was some carrots. I have run out and that’s bad news.

And I was rather upset to say the least when I returned here. Nikon has finally sent me the prepaid return envelope for me to send off my lens for the little camera. As regular readers of this rubbish might recall, it slowly slid into oblivion and when I complained to them, they advised me that it was a well-known fault and they would repair it for free.

But had then sent the label earlier, I could have dropped it off while I was on my way to LIDL.

After lunch I packed the lens (I still had the original box) and wrapped it carefully, and then went back into town to the Post Office, where I had my “interaction” that I mentioned earlier.

And badger me if I didn’t forget the carrots AGAIN!

Back here, trying my best not to succumb to a wave of fatigue I sorted out the paperwork that I needed to change the address for my insurance. That took about half an hour – 5 minutes to scan a copy of my bank account details, and the remaining 25 minutes to try to find where my scanner had put it on the laptop.

Next step was to contact my clothing suppliers to see if they still have my logo on their records. I need to order some new clothing as the stuff that I have here is looking rather tired.

Finally, I had a search of a couple of web sites to see about a lens for the Nikon D5000. But these web sites are just a mess. I want to find a Nikon AF-S lens – that’s the type that my big camera uses, but neither of the sites that I tried seems to be able to isolate that lens.

In the end I sent them mails to ask what I should be doing.

Having reached 103%of my daily effort I didn’t go for a walk, which was just as well as it started to rain. Instead I had a play on the guitar.

With no carrots, I ended up with baked potatoes, baked beans and the last of the sausages for tea. And strawberries for pudding too. LIDL had some more of the cheap ones in stock today.

The evening wasn’t as nice as it was yesterday which was a shame.

But the tide was high and so there was a lot of activity at the fishing wharf. And there were a couple of strange-shaped trawlers in there unloading.

Here’s one of them setting off back to sea. A long time since I’ve seen a trawler looking like that. Not much room for storage aboard it, so I wonder what they might be catching. And I bet they don’t go far to catch it either.

And not only that, La Grande Ancre was over there in the commercial docks.

She was in and out of here on a very regular basis earlier in the year but I’ve not seen her about for a while. Now she’s back, and she has a tractor strapped to her decks.

Another delivery to the Ile de Chausey I reckon. That was what she was doing here before anyway – running a shuttle to and from the island.

So back here and back into another argument on line. The Football Association of Wales announced a change to the rules in a press release dated 13th November 2017 and invited interested parties to submit their opinions.

In March this year, a definitive arrangement was announced.

And now many people are up in arms about it, saying that they knew nothing about it and objecting. I spent about an hour posting all of the stuff that I have, but no-one seemed to take the slightest notice of it.

I’ve long-since come to the conclusion that British people these days just don’t want to actually do anything – they just want to sit there and complain. THat’s an attitude that really annoys me and is one of the reasons why I emigrated. Many British people have problems. I don’t have problems – I have solutions.

And a big hats-off to Alison whose Belgian nationality papers came through today. So she’s been saved from the stuoidity of Brexit. Well done, Alison.

Wednesday 30th May 2018 – WHAT A NICE …

… tea that was!

One of those evenings where I couldn’t think of anything much so some spicy rice with peas and carrots, and a vegan millet and mushroom burger fried with onions and garlic. Add some nice thick gravy and it was absolutely delicious. I really enjoyed it.

In fact it was a relatively delicious day, although you might not have thought so with the weather that we were having this morning. When I left the stinking pit (at 06:30) it was raining buckets outside.

There were a few things that I needed to do though. Not the least of which being that the World’s Worst Bankers have struck again. I received all of the paperwork for the renewal of my insurances at the end of June – sent to the wrong address and featuring the wrong (closed) bank account.

What is worse is that it’s the Bank’s own insurance agency that handles it. Clearly joined-up thinking is not the strong point of the Credit Agricole, is it? Anyway, I had to telephone them to sort it all out.

Plenty of photos needed to be edited as well, with the result that I missed out on a few things that I needed to do. But no worries, they can keep.

What wouldn’t keep though is the bread issue. Buying a new loaf was one of the things that I needed, but instead in view of the time I just nipped down to town to the boulangerie that I like for a baguette.

At least that gave me an opportunity to take a photograph of the Marité now that she’s come back here for the summer season.

One day I’ll check to see if there’s an exciting sea voyage, but as you know I’ve had issues with the lazy people who manage her and they aren’t my favourite people.

You need to be very careful about your sailing companions when you set off on a long voyage on a ship like this. They don’t seem to be interested in the ship or their potential clients at all, and that doesn’t bode very well.

But at least the weather had brightened up by now, and it was heading to be a nice day. Although the wind was pretty strong and I didn’t enjoy sitting on my wall. And my lizard didn’t put in an appearance.

This afternoon I revised a few blog entries by adding some additional photos, had the usual session on the guitar and chatted to Ingrid again. And, on a couple of occasions, teetering on the edge of falling asleep. Even my mid-afternoon walk – around the walls this afternoon – couldn’t clear my head.

By the time that I’d finished tea it hard turned into a beautiful evening and I really enjoyed my little walk which, for a change, took me around the headland.

The late-evening sun was throwing up some beautiful colours and the lighthouse looked quite stunning. It was well-worth taking a photograph of it this evening. I do’t actually have too many of the lighthouse here, do I?

And there weren’t too many people around either. What you might call “Phare from the Madding Crowd”.

With the beautiful evening and clear skies, I took photograph in the general direction of Mont St Michel to see where or not you could actually see it from here.

It’s about 30 kilometres away from here as the crow flies, so the big zoom lens should pick it up if it’s in a line-of-sight, but it doesn’t look like it unfortunately. But I’m intrigued to know what those white buildings are down there. I shall have to go for a nosy some time.

But what’s the building on the Pointe Carolles, on the extreme left? It’s called the Cabane Vauban apparently and was a lookout point dating from the 18th Century. I shall have to go for an investigation, won’t I?

But it’s amazing the things that you can pick out of a long-distance photo with a really impressive telephoto lens and a good image-editing program.

So I’m off to bed now. It’s my “walk to LIDL” day and I need to pick up my rail tickets for next week. I booked them today, so I hope that we aren’t going to have another strike.

Thursday 1st December 2016 -I HAD A …

… very bad night last night.

Well, sort-of-ish anyway.

Remember yesterday when I told you about that good book that I downloaded yesterday? So there I was last night reading it and I happened to notice the time. 03:30 it was.

It’s been a long time since I’ve been so deeply engrossed in a book like that, I have to say. I was well-away. But anyway, I closed down the laptop, turned off the light, and went to sleep – or, at least, tried to.

I must have dozed off eventually because it was the alarm that awoke me. And surprisingly, I didn’t feel too bad just then. I’d been on my travels too, although I don’t remember anything about it right now.

After breakfast, I lay down here on the bed and closed my eyes for 5 minutes in order to build up my strength ready to face the morning. Next thing that I knew, it was 11:20. i’d been out if it for over three hours. And serve me right too.

I’d missed the bank to pay my lodging, so I mustn’t forget under any circumstances to do that tomorrow. Otherwise I’ll be out on my aspidistra. And coming back from the shower room, I walked into the wrong room. I knew that I would end up doing that sooner or later. Did I say that I’m in a different room here? It’s the cheapest in the house but I have negotiated a good deal so I’m not complaining. It’s just not my usual room and so it’ll take some time to become used to it.

After lunch I cracked on a little with my pages on Happy Valley-Goose Bay. It’s amazing the stuff that has come on line since the last time that I researched into this in early 2011. Tons of stuff and I’m spoilt for choice these days.

Something else that I did this afternoon has shaped my plans for next week. You know that Caliburn was hit in the rear a few weeks ago and needs to be examined. And I’ve also been keen to go home for some time, just for old time’s sake.

And so I rang up the insurance and made an appointment with their expert for Tuesday afternoon. and it’s at Evaux-les-Bains, and so that means that I have to go home. And that’s what I’m going to do. I’m seeing Alison on Saturday afternoon, and so on Sunday morning I shall hit the road and head back.

My plan is to stop on Sunday night at Meaux, and on Monday night at Montlucon – a Première Classe each time. And then go and have Caliburn sorted out on Tuesday and go back home for a few days.

For tea I made a kidney-bean whatsit, with enough for tomorrow night. And then I’ve been searching on the internet. OH Leuven are playing away on Saturday night at Tubize, just south of Brussels. There’s a reliable train service which is quite interesting, as so seeing as I have never really been to Tubize, I’m thinking of it.

Or as William Shakespeare might have said “Tubize or not Tubize? That is the question!”

Wednesday 2nd November 2016 – I’M MOVING ON …

… tomorrow, so I must organise myself quite rapidly today.

I had a bit of a bad night again last night and had something of a struggle to make it up to breakfast at 07:15. I was joined by the usual crowd of students who popped in, made some butties and then popped out again, and then I was back down here.

I had an hour or so working on the website again – the missing bit of Highway 138 in Quebec – and then I headed off to Kessel-Lo.

As luck would have it, and in a complete surprise, the Fortis Bank had my bank card ready and once they had reactivated it, it worked fine too. That’s even more of a surprise.

At Bio-Planet I picked up a baguette and then drove back. I prepared an envelope for the insurance claim form, picked some stuff for tea from the collection in the back of Caliburn, and then came back here. And here, I cracked on with the web-site.

after lunch, I phoned up the hospital to find out the time of my appointment. And I know that I had hoped for an early appointment but this is ridiculous. They want me there at 08:10 and it doesn’t come much earlier than this. I’ll have to change all of the alarms.

After lunch I went off to the Post Office and posted the claim form. That’s another job done. Then I came back and crashed out for a while.

I found the time to carry out an amendment to the website – I’m trying to update at least one page per day, although today’s amendment wasn’t anything considerable.

For tea I had a tin of vegetables with chick peas, tomato sauce and rice, to finish off a few bit that were lying around. And when the washing-up was done, I took everything down to Caliburn except for what I can take tomorrow to the hospital. And finally I had a shower.

Now I’m having an early night again, ready for tomorrow. And then we’ll see what happens. There are three choices – they could keep me in hospital. Or if I’m released for at least two weeks, I’ll be off home. But if it’s only for a week or so, I’m off to the seaside.

I can do with a holiday after all of this.

Thursday 20th October 2016 – NOW THAT WAS A NICE TEA!

Start off with a knob of vegan margarine, and when it’s melted, add a pile of sliced garlic. Fry that nicely and then add a tin of lentils. When that’s all stirred around and cooking nicely, add a couple of teaspoons of curry powder.

When that’s all nicely mixed in, empty a tin of macedonian vegetables into it all, followed by a pile of bulghour and leave to simmer.

While that’s simmering away, put some rice on the go.

When the rice is almost ready, add a Carrefour vegetable stock cube to your lentil, veg and bulghour mix – and there you are. And there’s enough lentil curry for a couple of days.

Downright delicious it was, and followed by a pot of the new Alpro coconut flavoured soya dessert, what else could any man desire? Apart from Kate Bush and Jennifer Agutter of course.

I should have been out wining and dining with Alison but she’s come down with the dreaded lurgy and of course my health is rather fragile. She needs a rest and I don’t need to catch anything at all.

But as for the usual activities, it’s a good job that I went for an early night last night. This morning at blasted 06:45 I was awoken by a couple of residents shouting up the stairs at each other. Some people have absolutely no idea of what it means to “live in Community”.

But I had been on my travels during the night too. I don’t remember too much about it, but I was somewhere in Belgium talking to a group of nouveax arrivants. We were discussing income-generating activities and it turned out that four young boys were involved in making jewellery. They were planning on having an exhibition and so I was giving them advice, like holding in on a Sunday when most Belgians liked to have a day out, and where to go to have leaflets and flyers prepared.

Breakfast was crowded this morning. Hordes of people up there, and that makes a change. It was difficult to sit and read my book. And did you know that they had motor vehicles in Middle Earth? There’s a delightful little paragraph – “Legolas and Gimli were to ride again together in the company of Aragorn and Gandalf, who went in the van with the Dúnedain and the sons of Elrond.”. I wonder which van it was.

After breakfast I had plenty of things to do but for some reason or other I closed my eyes fora few minutes. Next thing that I remembered, it was 11:25. I’d been on my travels too during that … errr … three hours that I was away. Good grief!

I was chatting to a friend of mine on the internet until lunchtime, and then went to purchase my baguette for lunch. And after lunch, the bank in Pionsat would be open, so I needed to telephone them to report yesterday’s little accident. I was pushed around from pillar to post, as you might expect, but eventually I could register the accident and receive a file number. So that was all organised.

I attacked the website after that, and I’ve made some progress with that. Slow, to be sure, but progress all the same. It’ll probably be 100 years before it’s finished.

I had tea after that, and now I’m planning for an early night. After my exertions of this morning though, I’m not sure whether or not I’ll be having another difficult night.

Thursday 16th July 2015 – NO PRIZES FOR GUESSING …

… what was the first act this morning.

With it being rather hot up here, I went to open the window at the head of the stairs. And there on the windowsill underneath the window – well, I’m sure that you can guess what it was that I found.

The irony of it all is that I can see the windowsill from where I’m sitting. How I failed to see Cailburn’s insurance papers, I really do not know.

This morning I was up early once again and after breakfast I had another marathon session on the laptop and that took me right through until lunchtime. I edited a load of pages from 2009 as well as doing a few album lists from previous Radio Anglais programmes.

But I’ll tell you what – having seen the prices at which some of my CDs are on sale (one is on sale at €199:00) my CD collection must be worth a veritable fortune. And the irony of it all is that I doubt that there’s very much for which I’ve paid more than €10:00.

After lunch I cracked on with the ceiling in the shower room. That involved drilling a few holes, sorting out the wiring a little better and so on, as well as having to find a few tools and things.

But I came to a resounding halt, mainly because I’ve run out of the tongue-and-grooving that I’m using for the ceiling and I’ll have to buy some more. I’m about 10 rows short, which is a shame. I’ll have another scratch around to see if I have any more, but I’m not very hopeful.

Rosemary rang up too – she’s planning on paying me a visit on Tuesday, and then Rob called. The head gasket has gone on his car and could I help him fix it?

Yes, it’s THAT time of the year again.

Wednesday 15th July 2015 – I’VE FINISHED …

… the flying shelf this afternoon.

It took quite some effort and a pair of arms about 2 metres longer than mine, but nevertheless, after some considerable amount of ado about a great deal, I managed to do it. Strangely enough, the part that I thought would be very difficult was comparatively easy, and the part that I had expected to do quite easily was the part that took the longest.

However, looking for tools, nuts and washers was a considerable part of this too. But then that’s only to be expected.

It’s not as good as I would have liked – I can see several shortcomings in my work, but the design was good anyway. Just the execution was wrong and I’ll have to do better than this if I do it again.

But anyway, it looks OK if you don’t look too closely, and everything works as it is supposed to, so I suppose that that is something.

I was on my travels last night, visiting a football ground at a sports club in Crewe with a cement mixer – the lorry-based cement mixer thing. Someone connected with my family had connections there and they had ordered the cement, and meeting up with this person was the last thing on either of our minds. So I tipped the cement and when I tilted up the mixer into the vertical position, the lorry started to roll back. But someone from the football club grabbed hold of the bumper of the truck and hung onto it to stop it moving.

I was up before the alarm clock and so I spent a very profitable morning on the laptop doing some various assorted computer work, including finishing off a couple of radio programmes. I even managed to telephone the insurance company to have a duplicate label for Caliburn sent to me – which means that I will definitely find it now.

I had to go into Pionsat to buy some bread today for lunch, and also to try out the new bank card that I have received.

And tonight, I had a lovely warm solar shower that has made me fit for anything.

Tomorrow, I’ll be finishing the ceiling in the shower room, or at least, doing as much as I can.

Tuesday 14th July 2015 – HAPPY BASTILLE DAY

That’s right – the story goes that the reason why the French stormed the Bastille on 14th July was because it was a Bank Holiday, all the shops were closed and they had nothing better to do.

But I had plenty to do, such as trying to find this insurance sticker. I’ve waded through all of these papers and some have been filed, some have been put tidily in a box and the rest have been filed under CS. But as for the insurance sticker, well, not a glimmer of it, I’m afraid. I’ve no idea where I might have put it.

The only thing now is to contact the insurance company and ask for a duplicate. And then that will guarantee that the original one will come to light immediately.

I’ve also done the notes for four days’ travel around Labrador and I’ve now arrived back in Newfoundland. I’ve also done some research as well and found a few really good e-books about the region that I have saved to read at my leisure.

Not only that, I’ve collected the details for a couple more months of radio rock shows and made up the icons for the albums so that I can build playlists.

But all of that was later first job, before I’d even had breakfast, was to make some muesli, seeing as how I’d run out.

All in all, I’ve had a busy day, despite it being a Bank Holiday.

Finally, I’ve made a huge aubergine-and-kidney-bean whatsit and that will keep me going for four days. It won’t take much to warm up, the food for the next few days, and it won’t make much washing-up.

-1

Monday 13th July 2015 – IT’S JUST LIKE OLD TIMES …

… up here in my attic tonight. I’m surrounded by papers everywhere – all over the floor and over the bed-settee and it feels so good to have reverted to all of my old untidy habits.

It all started off so promisingly too. I had a nice lie-in to reward myself for my efforts over the weekend and then after breakfast I attacked the dictaphone notes from my voyage to Canada in 2014 – must get that done.

No bread today because the boulangère is off on holiday so I needed to go into Pionsat, and that led to a little complication.

The insurance on Caliburn will expire on Wednesday and here in France, you have a little sticker to put in your windscreen to display your insurance details. I need to put the new one in the windowand I know that I have it – it’s been in my sticky little mitt at least once just recently and I’ve probably put it safe somewhere so that I know where it is.

But where?

This led to a search around up here, in the most obvious places, but it still hadn’t come to light by 14:30 and so, fearing that there would be no bread left at all in the Intermarché, I shot off to Pionsat where I was lucky enough to buy the last baguette. Not even one for tomorrow and that’s sad, as it’s Bank Holiday here and all of the shops will be closed.

After lunch, I started to search in the less-obvious places and that led to an unearthing of a load more paperwork – nothing to do with what I’m trying to find but there’s no sense in ignoring it so that’s being ruthlessly sorted out as well. I’m finding tons of stuff, a lot of which is really important and that I wish that I had found ages ago, but no sign at all of the insurance sticker.

Like I said, I know that it’s here somewhere, but the question is “just where?”

So guess what I’ll be doing tomorrow on my Bank Holiday day of rest? It’s not as if I don’t already have enough to do.

-2

Monday 31st January 2011 – For some unknown reason …

… that I haven’t quite worked out, I’m totally whacked this evening. And after our day of rest too. Mind you, day of rest, when we went off on a route march all across the parks of Jette (and there are a fair few of those) in a temperature of about minus 5 or something.

Today was better, a mere minus 2, and I had the morning off to go and be rude to an insurance company here in Brussels who are trying to charge me 3 months insurance for failing to renew Caliburn’s 2009 insurance. And a profitable morning it was as I managed to overturn a €390 or something demand into a mere €72.06.

While I was away Terry grouted the kitchen wall tiles (and what a good job he made of that – I have a beautiful kitchen here now) and Liz put the first coat of paint on the bathroom ceiling. This afternoon Terry and I disconnected the water (and that was an exciting project) so that Terry could finish off the de-tiling in the bathroom, and Liz and I worked in the third bedroom – me sanding down the window frame and the door and Liz trying her best to wash the ceiling and walls (and understanding now why I put polystyrene tiles on the ceiling and fibreglass wallpaper on the walls).

If Terry can finish the electrics in the third bedroom Liz and I can make a good start in there tomorrow. There’s a lot of work to be done in there.

-5

Saturday 8th August 2009 – DOESN’T CALIBURN LOOK SMART?

The postie came by this morning and she dropped off a letter. This was the definitive insurance certificate for Caliburn.

This had Caliburn’s new registration details on it and so I put his new numberplates on him. We’re all legal now.

This means I’ll have to pay more attention to speed limits and the like as I’ll no longer be able to drift past them with “sorry, I’m a foreigner”. But such is life I suppose.

Taking this time out meant that I only put two loads of cement into the wall this morning and that seemed to disappear without trace. I can see me thinking again about my timetable and having a dramatic change of plan.

This afternoon in St Eloy I spent about 33 Euros, but that was due in part to LIDL having brought back into stock their trail mix and crushed nuts and the like, things that I put in my home-made muesli. It’s been out of stock for ages and so I stocked up today just in case this is only a temporary supply.

But the bad news is that the special offer rows are reducing and reducing – looks like the weekly promotions are running out of steam.

And the Carrefour is even worse. Their stock is getting less and less and judging by the length of the queues at the only two checkouts open, the staff is starting to disappear now. I wonder how long this arrangement will continue?

There was a brocante in St Eloy too, and you know how much of a fan I am of French brocantes. But this one had just 10 stalls, some of which were professional overpriced nonsense and the rest were just junk.

Nothing of interest for me so I came home and did some tidying up for my visitor due at 18:00 and who rang me up to say that he would be coming on Tuesday instead. That was that as far as I was concerned and so I came in, had a coffee and looked at the football results.

Crewe Alexandra lost at home to Dagenham and Redbridge, but then I suppose that it’s always difficult when you have to play against two teams at once. But I can see how this season is going to develop and it makes me wish that I’d carried on with the pointing.

Ahhh well.

-5

Wednesday 5th August 2009 – TODAY, I CHANGED THE HABITS OF A LIFETIME

My usual working hours here are from 09:30 to 1400 and 15:00 to 18:00 or 18:30. So here I was today, 21:00 when I climbed down off the scaffolding.

But then again I was in full flight painting the front of the house and I totally lost track of time. Mind you, it was so hot at 14:00 when I stopped for lunch that I ate inside the house and stayed here until 16:00 when it cooled down. 35.5 degrees in the shade, and off the scale (more than 40 degrees) in the direct sunlight.

As well as having done more than half the painting, I fitted the fascia board and the guttering. Many people don’t agree with fascia boards when doing roofing (especially round here) on the grounds that they just collect the water, rot away and then drop off.

But that’s exactly the point. If it wasn’t for the fascia board then the exposed ends of the rafters would collect the water, rot away and drop off and if anyone thinks that in 10 years time I’m taking all the roof off to replace the rafters then they have another think coming.

We didn’t buy enough guttering – there’s about a metre short. And I also need two joining pieces. I won’t have time to go back to Montlucon to look for them on Saturday so I’ll have to see what St Eloy can offer.

And in other news, having gone to the bank yesterday to give them a copy of Caliburn’s log book, I had a letter from the bank today reminding me that Caliburn’s temporary certificate has expired and if I don’t give them a copy of Caliburn’s log book by 15th August they’ll cancel the insurance.

-5

EPIC HALL

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

Tag Archives: caliburn insurance

Friday 22nd October 2021 – WE’VE HAD AN …

Wednesday 28th July 2021 – SAY HELLO …

Tuesday 12th November 2019 – I USED TO BE A WEREWOLF

Thursday 31st May 2018 – I HATE PEOPLE …

Wednesday 30th May 2018 – WHAT A NICE …

Thursday 1st December 2016 -I HAD A …

Wednesday 2nd November 2016 – I’M MOVING ON …

Thursday 20th October 2016 – NOW THAT WAS A NICE TEA!

Thursday 16th July 2015 – NO PRIZES FOR GUESSING …

Wednesday 15th July 2015 – I’VE FINISHED …

Tuesday 14th July 2015 – HAPPY BASTILLE DAY

Monday 13th July 2015 – IT’S JUST LIKE OLD TIMES …

Monday 31st January 2011 – For some unknown reason …

Saturday 8th August 2009 – DOESN’T CALIBURN LOOK SMART?

Wednesday 5th August 2009 – TODAY, I CHANGED THE HABITS OF A LIFETIME

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