Rural Life

I gather the winter solstice is on Friday 22nd and then the days will start to get longer - it can't come too soon this time!  While there is a certain Christmas joy doing the rounds, with the pub reopened and some lovely window displays, plus the Christmas Fayre in Baugé that is just coming to an end, and some lovely lighting decorations around the place, the hours of darkness are getting to me.  Yesterday was beautiful, with clear blue skies, but today we were back to the old grey and dank conditions which weigh on the spirits.

The wise women of the Baugeois tend to say that the weather will change for the better when the moon changes.  Like I say, yesterday was a lovely sunny day, and you could just see the new moon as we went out to the pub, but today dawned (eventually) cold and overcast, and the cloud hasn't really lifted as promised.  Still I did prepare a bed for broad beans (which included digging up a forgotten clump of potatoes) and then sowed a whole packed of Aquadulce Claudia broad beans, to give something to look forward to in about May next year.

During the week we had another dull day (well more than one, if I'm honest), but we also got a gleam of late sunlight, which meant a stunning rainbow appeared above the Christmas decorations in the village.  While the photo doesn't do it justice, it was a lovely thick one, and was spotted from quite a way around.

On Fridays I always go out and about to visit in Chinon and Azay le Rideau.  The other thing about this autumn and early winter is the amount of rain, and therefore the amount of water there is around.  I couldn't get a photo of the Indre at Azay le Rideau, but I could see that many of the lawns at the Chateau d'Islette (former love nest of Rodin) were submerged as I drove by.  It was a different matter at Chinon.  As I arrived at the St Luand end of the town, I was able to stop and photograph badly the width of the river, where it had gone over the far bank and spread into the meadows beyond.

In Chinon itself, once I had parked up, I was able to walk along the riverside and admire the spectacle.  A lone paddleboarder was working his way up against the flow, and having to stay as close into the bank as he could, so as not to be swept away.  There is normally much more daylight between the river and the arches of the bridge.

I tend to park in the Place Jeanne d'Arc in Chinon - it's free and unless there is a funfair camped out there, you can usually find a space.  It is dominated by a massive equestrian statue of Joan of Arc, donated to the town by the sculptor over a hundred years ago.  While there is a rumour that he asked for payment and was refused, I tend to wonder what Chinon did to him to make him offer them this "gift".

Special, isn't it?

Anyway, sadly Christmas cards aren't writing themselves, so I will leave you contemplating this work of art and wish you a good week.

 

The slow road to Christmas

Meteorological autumn was the wettest on record for Maine et Loire, no ifs, no buts.  There were few edible mushrooms as the rain didn't start until mid October, so the mycelium was challenged.  There was a brief flush and since then we have only found inedible specimens around the place, but lots of them!  The One Acre Wood, which we visited this week on a rare fine day, had an outcrop of what I call Slimy Grey Ones, which turn up in clumps and lines, I assume following a tree root or similar.  To me they are always the sign that there is no chance of anything more that is edible, and while they are relatively attractive, they mark a clear phase in the year.

During the year, one of the walnut trees at the Orchard died - the nuts didn't develop and the leaves fell in August.  It is hard to say why it has died, but the mushrooms at its base that started to appear last week may be a very strong hint that it was diseased.  This weekend, the mushrooms have opened up and while last week they looked relatively attractive, this week they don't!

The days are ever shorter, and with bad weather, it is now dark at 5pm.  So we start to look indoors for our amusements.  The village pub has reopened after some 18 months closed, so our regular Friday drink and debrief down the way can restart.  Now as it only reopened last weekend, we were a bit saddened to see that apart from us, there were two single blokes inside with us, and three lads drinking outside on the terrace.  Closer inspection of Facebook showed that another local hostelry had a band in that night, so hopefully next Friday will be rather more lively or the tenure of the new landlord could be quite short!

This weekend is Telethon weekend - very similar in concept to the BBC's Children in Need, except that the funds raised go to support research into medical conditions.  This year the focus was on Duchene's Muscular Dystrophy.  We tend to avoid the events to be honest - games for children are not for us, the convivial evening sharing "poule au pot" is also something we avoid, as we don't much like boiled chicken.  We used to buy the knicknacks sold at the bakery, but that closed three years ago now.  This year the local society for protecting the village heritage put on an exhibition in the church - each year they do a photography competition, and the exhibition was of the 30 best images submitted this year on the topic of The Tree.  It was nice to visit the church, it was interesting to look at the photos, but when we went, it was just us and the organisers - I hope more turned up!

The heritage group also ensure that there is a crèche or nativity scene in the church for Christmas.  An old neighbour of ours, Monsieur André, used to make figures and would set it up each year.  He was a smelly and curmudgeonly old boy, who lived in a tiny hovel tucked back from the main road without mains water or drainage (hence the smell), but lived well into his 90s, the last few months in a Home.  The sad thing was that only a small handful turned up for his funeral, despite the care he took each year making the church ready for Christmas.

I mentioned that autumn had been spectacularly wet, particularly the latter half.  That humidity is carrying on into winter, and the last week has seen some truly awful days weather-wise.  The cold has moved on and now we have very mild (currently 14ºC) and very wet conditions, with some 20mm of raid in the last 48 hours adding to what fell on Thursday, and Wednesday.  Yesterday afternoon we had a short respite and I took the opportunity to see how the ponds at the end of the orchard were doing - the good news being that they are now starting to look much more purposeful.  I startled three deer that were lurking down there - two bounded away, showing me their white bottoms, while one stood still and camouflaged the other side of the fish pond.  My attempt to photograph him was of course laughably bad, but I know he was there.  Somewhere....

Finally, Rebus the Kitten had his second set of jabs this week.  He was also weighed and shown to be putting on weight mainly through size as he isn't fat, so he could grow up to be quite a big boy.  He has a lot of energy and hasn't mastered gravity at all.  He has learned that the best place to be in the evening is where you can see and feel the log fire!

Have a good week!

 

First days of winter

Yes, alarmingly it is now meteorological winter, and the year is really slipping away.  On a happier note, in about 3 weeks, the days will start to get longer, but we have the three cold months to get through now.  The area has got its Christmas decorations out promptly this year - to do with Baugé being a Pettit Cité de Charactère and they are collectively looking to brighten up people's lives.  What has livened up our village rather more is that the pub reopened last night after a closure of nearly 18 months.  New leaseholders, new décor, new name (not sure about that) and hopefully a new attitude towards the establishment from the locals.  The local mayor was pretty blunt when he announced that a taker had been found - use it or lose it!  Let's hope people take that to heart!  I took a photo at the opening night but it was truly awful, so here is the Christmas Tree instead.

On the sunny days this week, I have been determined to go out for a walk and admire the area.  On Wednesday morning, I was up at la Flèche for the market, and le Loir was looking particularly attractive after the recent floods.  Sadly I can't load up the photo of that - not at all sure why!

Later on Wednesday - as it really was so beautiful out - I went for a walk around the village.  I went part way up what is often called the Roman Road, and it may well be.  It is straight, making no apology for the gradient of the hill, and is well buried into the hillside, with tall oaks and chestnuts at ground level.  Half way up, when the water table is high enough, a spring follows the line of the path for some distance, so I only went as far as the mud from that, before turning back to the village.

I made my way down the hill and took the road to the Pont de Godot - yes, really you can go and wait for him there, but he never shows up!  The river splits into two arms upstream towards the town, and the water looks clear and bright and is flowing rapidly at the moment in both arms, apart from where measures are in place to slow the flow.

From the bridge the view up to the church shows the relative height of the hill and the thoroughly twisted nature of the spire.  It can be seen from quite a distance, if you know where to look!

Other days have not been so sunny and crisp, and have also been filled with distractions such as battling customs forms and websites to send a parcel, the French health service and finding an electrician.  Rebus the kitten spends much of his time trying to eat me, and when he isn't doing that, he is asleep and growing.  The slow descent to the "Festive Period" makes me less likely to do anything useful, and more inclined to sit under a rug in front of the TV with a pot of tea and a chewy kitten.  However, I need to give myself a metaphoric kick in the pants and design a Christmas card, write a Christmas letter, and more importantly, undertake the necessary steps to close my business and structure my retirement.

Here's hoping for some motivation sometime next week!

 

 

It's become cold!

Yes, we have finally had our first frosts.  I have a dim memory of this week back in perhaps 1969 or so when it snowed, and I also remember trying to drive through Flers in Normandy and negotiating drifts six inches deep, so it shouldn't be surprising that we have had two white frosts now.  Of course the cold makes everything very clear and crisp as we settle into a winter anticyclone.  That can make taking photographs a bit tricky.  This one of the turret on the back of the chateau in Baugé came out very nicely.

It was rather more difficult to get a decent shot of this hidden piece of the old town wall and turret, not least as I was down a narrow lane, with little room for manoeuvre.  The contrast with the light is really too harsh.

The weather brings out magnificent sunsets but they bring their own challenges when taking photos - this one worked OK.

The crisp clear air and frost makes it much easier to see the nests of the vile pine processionary caterpillar - last year we didn't have many, but this year this poor tree is riddled with them.  I now need to invest in attracting great tits to the garden as they are the only predator that will take the revolting things on.  I am anti pine processionaries as I am sensitive to their spines, while they can do really nasty things to cats and dogs.  They are a non-native invasive species, brought in with lumber in the past and have spread across the country.

The frosts have finally done for the cristophine vine, and it now looks very sad and ugly.  We will have to unpick it from the frame and compost all that vegetable material, and then feed up the area with manure and organic matter, as the frame is too solid to move to a different spot for next year.  John cut out the last large fruit yesterday, which had got itself well integrated into the netting and had started to sprout.  It will likely be the parent of next year's vine, although there is a spare if needed.

With the autumn and the very short days, farmers are more limited in what they can do - although I have seen quite a bit of twilight ploughing going on recently.  But give a French farmer a bit of thinking time, and their thoughts turn to their grievances and how to get their message across effectively.  Sometimes it's calendars with scantily clad peasants, sometimes it is taking large piles of lettuce and setting fire to them (never entirely sure how that works), sometimes it is dumping large piles of manure in supermarket parking areas (and removing every last trace at the end of the day as it is too good to waste), or spraying slurry on things.  This year, protests have taken a new turn, literally.  They are out in the evenings turning village signs upside down.  It is done carefully, and the markers are still there and easy to see (the village name sign is the start of the 50kmph limit for built up areas, so it is important), but they are upside down.

The argument is that French agricultural policy is upside down as the constraints put on local farmers are such that their products are more expensive than cheap imports from countries without limitations on the use of chemicals, fertilisers, a lower minimum wage for seasonal workers, lower husbandry standards, etc and while people say they want farmers to work to these high standards, they are not prepared to pay the extra so that the farmers can live from their work.  So they want a land free of pesticides, but won't pay the necessary premium for organic produce.  They have a point - Solidarity!!

Well, it is jolly cold in the non-heated extremities of the house, so I am going to call it a day and head for the fireside.  Rebus the kitten is doing well, is a bundle of energy and is going through the rather annoying teething stage - my hands are taking the brunt of it at the moment.  It won't last - or that's what I tell myself.

 

November musings

This isn't a classic autumn, with lovely colours, sharp, bright days, and cold nights with a log fire.  October was the warmest ever recorded in France, Europe and indeed the world, so the sudden shock of cold that is needed for the marvellous reds and yellows of autumn hasn't happened.  Instead we had a warm and relatively dry October, and since the start of November, we have had two named storms and at least 66 millimetres of rain.  Of course that is nothing compared to up in the Pas de Calais, where they have unprecedented floods, but it is quite enough here.  Our ponds (other than in the One Acre Wood) are filling with water finally and there are waterlogged fields, testimony to the areas of clay pan in the valleys around here.  There is some autumn colour, but really only offered by field maple.

While in the UK not wearing a poppy is near criminal behaviour, here in France, you can choose to wear a cornflower, but have to look hard to buy one.  However, every village in our district has its own Remembrance Parade, before everyone converges at Baugé for the big one.  The local Cadets get to play a lot of jaunty marches and the fire brigade and police need to attend as many of the parades as they can get to, and pity the poor standard bearers for the Anciens Combattants, not in the first flush of youth in any case, and then needing to parade their standards at least twice!  However the stigmata of war are to be found everywhere if you know where to look - small shrines to fallen planes or murdered resistance fighters, bullets and marks in walls, hidden arms in roof voids or skeletons in cellars, and a repurposed Nazi bunkhouse doing time as a garage.  It is therefore more than just the uniformed groups that are out and about whenever the 11th November falls, not the nearest Sunday, but the real day, to remember, to demand the end of war, and to think of those that have fallen.

Despite the lack of frost so far, I couldn't wait any longer and dug up a couple of parsnips.  In my defence I found a lovely oxtail in the market, and you can't slow cook oxtail without a nice parsnip or two and carrots.  That's tomorrow's joy as we have the rest of the cristophine and cauliflower cheese tonight, plus I set the slow cooker off at about 10am for oxtail and at that time today, these beauties were still in the ground!

Although the leaves are still on the trees, particularly the oaks, we made a start on this year's firewood campaign.  In late summer I check round to see which trees are either dead or mostly dead, and mark them up for felling, and then through the winter, we will cut down perhaps five and process them, taking the long dead stuff away, and leaving the lengths of recently living wood stacked in the One Acre Wood to mature. 

Three years ago, the plot next to the One Acre Wood was clear felled and that has made a difference to the light and the wind patterns.  Added to that, the desperately dry and hot summers, and there are actually nearer 20 trees marked for felling.  Yesterday we took a huge one down that had a good position to fall nicely - an easy one - as it has been almost a year since the last felling.  It came down nicely, but with a huge bang - it had fallen directly onto an old stump!  Close inspection of the trunk showed evidence of a fence nail from some 18 years ago, before we bought the Wood.

Another bit of evidence of how mucked up this year is, is a late flush of kittens.  Normal kitten time is the summer, with them being discarded by the road or in woods between late June and mid-August as people go on holiday.  So to find a young kitten, perhaps 14 or 16 weeks old bouncing around the garden and the courtyard in November was a bit strange.  A plea on the local Facebook site did not bring forth a worried owner, rather someone else who had the same kitten bouncing around, two gardens over, and wasn't able to take it on.  Another neighbour had taken it to the vet to see if was identified (a legal requirement here in France), but no.  He also tried to take it to a shelter, but was told no.  The shelter I support I know has run out of space as well.  What to do? 

Well, as an xx year old Mad Cat Woman, what could I do?  Rebus - current gender unknown (but will be neuter as soon as possible) - has landed and made itself very comfortable.  Nibbles is unaware and so not fussed, but Poirot and Zola are unimpressed.  It's going to be a long winter!

Have a good week!

 

Looking for happy things

I find late October and November difficult - the change in the hour doesn't make the difference, it is the generally short length of day, the mess and the realisation that it will be at least 4 months before it warms up again.  Every 10 years, it gets worse, with the lurking of a "significant" birthday.  Twice we have managed to avoid that - but the holidays involved were expensive, and we didn't have as many cats!

Storms Ciaran and Domingos don't help either - I hate the way that strong winds bluster around the house and garden, howling and rattling and shaking.  The amount of rain also makes visits to the chickens and just generally around the garden fraught with dangers of slipping on mud, and of getting wet if I don't time it right.  So I look out for things to cheer me up.

This year, something that just keeps giving are the cyclamen, both the pink ones that have run away from gardens (or have been helped in their mission for world domination by mice and shrews) and the more delicate but wilder white ones.  We have white ones in the One Acre Wood and each year there are more leaves, and now, with maturity, there are ever more places where one, two or a whole clump of flowers poke up between the fallen leaves.  Later, I will drive myself mad counting all the sets of leaves that indicate where there are corms, but not just yet.

The garden escapees are bolder in colour, and stronger flowers.  Between the Garden and the Orchard, there is a disused green lane, which is a haunt of boar and deer, and is gradually being taken over by false acacia.  During the late spring, the hidden garden shrubs put on a fine display of flowers, but at this time of year, the lane is filled with pink cyclamen flowers, hiding among the ivy and detritus, and lifting my heart when I see them.

Today, the sky has been swept clean by Storm Domingo and underfoot is wet and squelchy, so gardening didn't appeal.  Instead, armed with my phone and escorted by Monsieur Clause, I took a long ramble around the Meadow and Orchard.  The phone has an app that is somewhat addictive, which identifies birdsong in real time.  Standing in the sunshine at one edge of the Meadow, I was told I was listening to robins, chaffinch, great and long-tailed tits, a common firecrest and a Cetti's warbler.  I also watched a small group of jackdaw mobbing a buzzard that had the temerity to be in the zone.  The rain has refilled the ponds a bit, or the three I could look into anyway, the access to the fourth was too overgrown.  I fear it is too late for my huge fish, but many other things enjoy the wetland.  Walking back up the Orchard, I found some weird fungi - not as dramatic as Devil's Fingers which are black or red, but still ghostly and strangely disturbing.

The trail camera isn't behaving at the moment, so my only photo of wildlife this week is this huge, orange, flesh-eating, jelly slug.  I had hoped to plant some tulip bulbs in that old WC cistern, but it might not be the best idea I have ever had, if that is what lives in it at the moment!  I'll have to find a plan B.

The big news in the village is that someone has bought the lease of the pub and plans to open soon.  No hint of when soon might be, and sadly they are changing the name of the pub too (I wonder if I could persuade them that is bad luck?), but it will be good to have something happening in the village during the next long, dark months of late autumn and winter.  I'll keep you posted!

 

Well, it's good for the ground water...

Thank goodness I got the last of the potatoes up before the vegetable beds turned into a fair facsimile of a battle field!  We have rain - it has rained for much of the week, since last Sunday, and is forecast to continue raining until at least the 5th November, but more likely the 10th November.  I think that date is also pretty arbitrary as the 11th is a holiday here and of course the day for Remembrance.  It could rain until Christmas!  The only thing that seems happy about that is the cristophine vine.  At one stage, we thought there were just 9 more and then it could go.  Today we totted up 12 good sized ones, including the one shown below which had been hiding, plus another 6 small ones that are unlikely to stay small, and are in any case a size that one might see in the shops.  It is a phenomenon.

It rained during the night, it was raining this morning when we got up, it is raining now, but for about an hour and a half, it stopped and we had sun (and a strong wind).  I was able to check the trail camera, which appears not to be suitable for rain forest conditions - something going on there.  I was able to spot a recently hatched butterfly - a comma I think - sunning itself on an apple tree.

Monsieur Clause was able to sun his portly self on the steaming roof of the wood barn - at one stage he looked like he might jump down onto me, and as he is a good 7 to 8 kilos, I was not so keen so moved out of range.

And then more rain came along and we headed home.  I have taken advantage of the poor conditions to do a bit of boring work, but soon I will not be able to find any more excuses and I will have to start on the hundred odd tasks of housework I have been avoiding for the past 10 years.  Dusty corners are sneering at me, and spiders' webs are growing in number, size and density.  There are still 4 kilos of chestnuts that need peeled, steamed and peeled again - and I know I will be pleased when they are done, but it is SUCH a boring job.  There is a final jam batch that I am trying to avoid too, but in a few minutes, I will be able to avoid it no longer, and jamming will begin again.

I am very jealous of the Cats at Home - they can just lie around, snuggled into fleeces and cushions, and sleep the next four months away!

Two cat photos in one post - that show's how bad the weather has been!  Stay warm, stay dry!

 

Hints of Autumn - finally

Here in France, Autumn is late, very late.  I am happy to be indoors with my computer as the temperature in the garden is over 30ºC at the moment.  Earlier, I was digging up potatoes - hard work in temperatures nearing 25ºC in the shade and the soil is pretty solid clay.  I can't totally complain, as look what just one seed potato produced!  They are huge and unblemished, and will take some baking later in the year.

But other, more autumnal signs are there - including my first bright orange, evil, jelly slug of the season, spotted mooching around between the raspberries and the wood store.  They are deeply unpleasant to my eye, but also seem to be harbingers of mushrooms.

I saw this fellow yesterday, plus there was a giveaway headline in the local paper this morning that mushrooms were appearing, so we just had to go for a walk in the One Acre Wood before doing any work at the Garden.  For once they were not wrong - there were mushrooms a plenty, but many had gone over or had bad slug or fly damage.  We found three nice ones for lunch - a delicious cèpe and comté omelette, made with free range eggs from the garden.

It goes without saying that if you aren't confident about identifying mushrooms, don't pick and eat!  We only eat what we know.

We also need to prepare to pay our rent for the Garden, Orchard and Meadow.  The payment is in a number of forms - obviously providing all the necessary luxuries for Donald, Spooky and Monsieur Clause the cats is part of it, keeping the Meadow under control with an annual mow as per legislation is another part of it, and then there is the tribute of a shoebox of walnuts too.  Knowing that the boar like the good nuts best, well they aren't totally stupid, we have to gather them as soon as they fall, before drying them so the inner skin isn't unpleasant and bitter.  We think we have the required tribute spread out in the sun!

The Meadow got mowed finally this weekend too.  Between Wildlife Trusts, the RSPB and the LPO, it is difficult to spot at time when you can do this without being berated for being a vandal and putting life at risk.  Seed heads, chrysalids, eggs, nesting time, flowering cycles, shelter etc. are all cited as reasons to not mow.  The reasons to mow include seed heads (some things aren't supposed to be allowed to spread, including ragwort and thistle), brambles, old man's beard, not required saplings, improving conditions for low growing wildflowers and those that need a short sward to flourish (including cyclamen and wild orchids), and a legal requirement not to cause a nuisance. 

I prefer to mow in September, but we didn't have a working mower available until now.  It should also be noted that some bits of the Meadow didn't get done last year for no good reason.  Anyway, it was jolly hard work in the hot sun, and at the end I was half human, half wild carrot seed, and it doesn't look good as the saplings didn't get properly trashed, so I will have to do some of it again during the week, but finally we can see across the Meadow again!  There are large banks of scrub for shelter for my friends the hares and for any pheasants that the fox  hasn't had too.

There are no new wildlife photos to share this week as last Sunday the hunt went through our land and the valley.  They don't come into the Garden, as it is well fenced off but do treat the Orchard and Meadow as their own.  While I recognise very clearly the need to control the number of boar, as there really are too many, what annoys me about the hunters is their sheer arrogance as they stalk through other people's property.  Plus I don't trust them not to fire towards us in the Garden if they spot something interesting.  We sang and whistled very loudly while they were close by.  Once they have done a sweep through, we see very little large wildlife for at least a couple of weeks, until they find their way back to us.

I leave you with the flowers of autumn, the cyclamen that pop up everywhere it seems and spread gloriously through our gardens and the Wood.  They always make me smile.

Have a good week!

 

All quiet here in our bit of rural France

Well, I say all quiet, but the countryside is rarely quiet.  There are frogs that make the most awful noises, sometimes just for the fun of it.  There are birds, so many birds, so many different songs, from the eerie cry of a buzzard having fun on the thermals, to the quiet but intense song of a robin - it sounds so melodic and sweet, but I think in the main they are saying "b*gger off, we want to explore where you are for a feed".  Annoyingly, after the quiet of lockdowns, there are planes, all sizes and at all different heights, from the air force boys who went over at about 200 feet last weekend, through the light aircraft from the local aerodrome, to the jets up high taking people to and from Scandinavia and Portugal. 

But this week it has been the Moisson - the grain harvest, with the combines out in the fields of wheat and barley, followed by tractors and massive trailers to take the grains, then more tractors with bailers to turn the straw into vast wheels, and finally lifts and more tractors with the big trailers to take those round bales away into storage.  It doesn't stop for weekends or lack of light - once conditions are right, the competition and demand for the machines is such that they are on the move 24/7, and bad luck if you are near where they are working overnight!!

Last weekend was fiercely hot and humid too - with temperatures up over 30ºC by lunchtime and not below again until after 6pm.  Two days of it was enough to undo the good that the rain the week before had done to the ponds, and sadly at least one of my fish has expired (no photo required).  It also blasted the ripe broad beans from the second sowing, and as it was too hot to pick them, they too got fried.  We rescued some beans and have sown them in some land that needs a bit of green manure, but whether that will work remains to be seen.  It was a disappointment.  The photo shows the fried out pods along with three carrots from the perpetual rounds of thinning them out, with one almost worth eating!

On a more positive note, and surprisingly with the cooler weather, I spotted a couple of my favourite butterflies yesterday - two swallowtails were enjoying a quick snack on the buddleia.  They are often found on lavender round here, but I've not seen them enjoying the buddleia before.  Of course it was pretty impossible to get close to them so these two photos are the best I could manage.

There was also some fruit!  Yesterday while doing the rounds, I spotted that the mirabelles were ripe, so went back for a bowl and picked all that I could, leaving those with a bit of damage or rot for the local critters, but for once getting some for us.  Enough for a 4 portion mirabelle crumble - wowzers!

We have not been responsible for any looting or destruction, but we have found evidence that it has been going on.  This year's thrush anvil is surrounded by empty and broken shells and it is hard to spot the stone that is being used.  I do love this as a sight, as I am very fond of the thrushes, and they do a good job.  Apart from a couple of well munched tomato plants, so far we haven't had any major snail damage this year to small plants, and this is why!

I like black flowers - I know they aren't natural in this part of the world, but i really enjoy them, even if they aren't really jet black.  This year I succumbed to temptation and bought an exotic petunia (just the one) called Black Glitter - the glitter effect comes from tiny white flecks on the flowers - you can't see that from a distance, but you can admire how happy it is in its beer barrel.  Another that is happy in its beer barrel is my black day lily - this really is stretching the definition but it is how it was sold to me!

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Not quite the grapes of wrath, but certainly very happy grapes and magnificent bunches on our vine this year.  Any marks are due to them being brushed past by a car as we drive into the courtyard.  The vine is loaded with them, so I am looking forward to making large quantities of grape jelly - no point making your own wine around here when you can buy excellent professionally-made wine en vrac (not bottled) for 2,80€ a litre!  Also these aren't wine grapes, but table grapes, although with pips so not polite eating grapes.  The chickens love them too.

On a serious note, the riots in the urban centres are frightening and disappointing.  Looting a carton of milk from your local convenience store that won't open for a while now as the owner tries to repair the damage, and your family have to find the money to travel to another, more distant shop is insane.  Similarly trashing and burning down the youth centre where you happily spend time in the winter and during the long holidays makes no sense.  It has nothing to do with the death of a young man, driving a Polish registered car in a bus lane without insurance or a valid drivers licence, and sadly paying for such minor delinquency with his life.  A minority of people are destroying holidays, livelihoods, neighbourhoods, reputation and ensuring that festivities people have been looking forward to for ages are cancelled.  I hope it stops soon.

Ideally by next weekend, if not sooner!  Have a good week!

 

Something of a passive week - and the earth moved

Modern cars are marvellous - when they work.  I love my Peugeot 2008, but he has an awful lot of bells and whistles, and he is very communicative.  His latest communication was that the level of additive in one of his filters was dangerously low and I needed to do something about it.  Of course, with bells and whistles, you have to take the car to a garage to make any sense of it, and I have a quote for putting said additive into the required spot, but from 10 days ago, when the car started to tell me this, the garage couldn't actually put said additive in until sometime next week.  I was sent away with my quote and dire warnings about keeping my kilometres to a minimum as a problem would be even more expensive to fix (I believe them as a replacement wing mirror (new) was 650€ - I went previously owned).  Anyway, that meant that I got to play on public transport for my trip to the big city (Angers) this week for my rendez-vous with my rheumatologist. 

It was actually quite fun and relaxing letting the bus take the strain.  At a higher level, I could see over hedges and across fields that I can't as a car passenger, and shouldn't as a car driver.  The journey took about the same time as it would if I had driven myself, although the wait at the bus stop for it to arrive added on time.  it was less stressful as it wasn't me driving and of course I didn't have to find the entrance to the car park I use that seems to move every time I visit the city.  Overall a positive experience, and as I had to wait for the return bus, I could sit in a café and enjoy a pot of tea,  watching the world go by.

The big event in our village this year will be the 148th Comice - a sort of village fete/agricultural show/fertility festival/excuse for fun and games all rolled into one.  Most years I do a blog about floats and animals and the like, if you look back through August posts.  Since November last year, I have been part of the Decorating work party.  We have brainstormed ideas, then spent happy Thursday evenings making bunting, lots of bunting, panels with music, panels with silhouettes of dancers, templates for painting silhouettes of dancers on covered straw bales, bunting (did I mention the bunting), and table decorations for the sit down meals.  On Friday there was an open meeting to engage even more volunteers - an event like this needs about 240 volunteers in the run up and over the weekend of the event, and for taking stuff down too.  That is in addition to the municipal staff who have to do the 'at height' bits, and the farmers who provide the fields, the straw bales and other more arcane services.  These two photos are unashamedly nicked from the Comice Facebook page, while you can find more on the website.

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Along with most of western France, we have been on orange alert today for storms - it's been hot, consistently hot, for about 3 weeks now.  Not the seriously awful 35 - 42ºC we were going through this time last year, but consistently 28 - 31ºC in the shade.  Last week there was a bit of rain, which drove up the humidity to seriously unpleasant levels, bringing on a heat related malaise that I never want to experience again.  This morning was a bit cooler, but this afternoon the promised storms hit.  We reckon about 12mm rain here at home (probably more at The Shack as it is a bit further north and on the track of the storms), and for a while, a more comfortable temperature, but it will take a while to cool down the inside of the house.

And then of course on Friday, there was the earthquake - no pictures of that!  But at 18:38 on Friday afternoon/evening, as I was sitting perspiring on the sofa with a cat at my side, there was a bit of noise, and the sofa seemed to wobble.  I thought that there had been a particularly overloaded tractor and trailer going past, or wondered if the structural integrity of the sofa was about to fail.  Social media soon put me right.  We are so pleased we got the chimney fixed last year, or that would have come down I think.  Anyway, no damage hereabouts, although people are blaming poor internet and dodgy electricity on it.

The trail camera has been rotated about 90º to the west, as something was setting it off in the early morning, but with the rising sun falling straight on the camera, I had no idea what it might be.  I think this is the culprit and it is not one of ours!

The stag is out and about quite a bit, always handsome to see, and doesn't he know it!!

While the boar have been busy doing what boar do, at least twice a year, and then brought the latest batch to visit.  I have got a nice little video, but with the storm bouncing around making internet connections a bit hit and miss, really couldn't be bothered to fight the fight to get it up.  Perhaps for next week.  But here is a cute, stripy person.

And of course, not just one....  Have a good week!