Planning Solutions? Not really

Mon 28 April

Well, it shouldn't have been a good night's sleep but a sleeping pill helped!  The gutters were overflowing when we went to bed and we were pretty worried that there was some problem.  We woke early, determined to be positive about today.

We ordered the windows we want, although they won't be installed til July.we bought stuff from the garden centre, we worked in the garden in the sunny periods, we ordered the suntunnel which might be installed this Friday.  Chris checked the gutters, which were simply blocked at the top of the down pipe, even though he checked it 2 weeks ago.  We've had terrific winds and storms and that is a big roof so the leaves had all backed up and caused the gutter to overflow.

I gave the house a good clean twice [well, the 4 rooms that we use anyway].

We went to the Mairie to get an update on the zoning issue, as instructed, this afternoon but the woman concerned had not yet met up with the Monsieur concerned.  Chris went back down later and came back with the following information:

For official purposes, the garage should be sited on cadastral AD204.  At Francoise's discussion with a 'monsieur' at the planning office, he suggested the following compromise:

The planning permission would show the garage to be sited on AD204, though if it was built on AD204/295 it would not be checked.  He further suggested that in the course of time, a retrospective adjustment of the zoning be requested, to include a small proportion of AD295 in Zone Ah.

 

which means that we have to apply to put it on the small plot.  We then build it mainly on the big plot and hope to God no one checks.  Apparently, they are so overwhelmed by these changes that they won't get around to check.  I am not sure that I feel too good about this, it's a bit too much of a risk for me. 

 

So new diagrams had to be drawn, new forms filled in and all before 5.30.  If we don't get the application in today, we wont be able to build anything bigger than 40sq m.  No pressure there.  The weather was lovely this afternoon but we were too busy drawing, copying, colouring and filling in to make the most of it.  Chris headed back to the Mairie at 5.20 and lodged the application.  Phew!

Chris has the same neck spasm I had last week [so unoriginal] and now I have a full-blown back muscle spasm.  Hope it goes soon.

Tuesday 29 April

Chris has blocked up the window holes so the house is pretty cold but at least we don't have that nasty North Wind whirling around.  Now that we've ordered the windows, I can't wait to get them.  At the moment we have to have the doors open to let some light in.  The suntunnel and windows should make a helluva difference.  Chris is sick of hearing me say that not since St Michael's have I lived in a house that is colder inside than outside.  The caravan warms up for a couple of hours later in the day so we usually pop in there for a while.

Rain made it impossible to do anything in the garden so I cleared out the caravan so that it can be moved and then I gave it a good clean.  Chris went to the loft space to clean it.  Unfortunately, unbeknownst to him, as he was hovering, dust was falling through the gaps and the 4 rooms I cleaned yesterday were covered in a coating of fine black dust and cobwebs.  So another clean up. We are both struggling with our back/neck problems.   Hopefully tomorrow we can get the garden sorted as Stuart will be here too.  We were too tired to cook anything so just sat in front of the fire with some wine.  We are ignoring the issue of the planning permission and struggling to find something entertaining or humorous about the situation!

My back really hurts and Chris's neck and shoulder hurt.  We're definitely not an add for healthy living at the moment.


 

 

Planning Problems

Friday 25 April

The new window spaces are looking fab.  Unfortunately last night we had a mammoth storm and the north wind whistled around and through the house, banging things all night.  The noises were slightly drowned out by Chris's snoring.  So not a lot of sleep.

Today started badly with 5 loads of washing to take to the laundrette to dry and another drying in between showers, well, until it fell over and got covered in mud.  I was busy cleaning up the mess caused by the builders yesterday and Chris went to the Mairie to discuss some recycling issue.  He was gone ages and came back in a total funk.  They have rejected our planning application because the garage is on the 3/4 of our land which has just been declared for agricultural use only.  It was rejected about a week ago but they hadn't got around to telling us, which as there is a deadline to meet if we want to build a garage big enough for Chris, is not very helpful at all. 

It's a real blow. Our choices are 1] forget the garage - can't do that.  2] put in another application for a garage the same size on the small plot of land  or  3] build a smaller garage - not a problem for me but Chris prefers one that can store all sorts of stuff.

Anyway, it was lucky that Chris went down when he did because after Monday garages will have a maximum size of 40 sq m and ours is supposed to be 54 sq m.  So we had to put in another application this afternoon - at this point it was noon and nothing was open apart from the laundrette and one supermarket - so we decided to get the 2 big bags of washing dry and go to the supermarket to buy some glue and scissors so that I could literally cut and paste the diagrams that I have spent ages creating at home in Pretoria. That way, we could hopefully submit a new application this afternoon.

We settled in the caravan and worked at changing our plans to conform with the new rules.  The problem is that if the garage has to move, then the swimming pool will be really squished and we might even have to have an above ground one.  Although a bit disheartened, we realise the this change has affected loads of people not just us and we will just have to find a way around it.  This stoicism is the direct result of a lunchtime beer.

As well as working on paper, we had to get outside and measure up and check distances etc.  Every time it became imperative to measure something, the Heavens opened and we just had to sit and wait it out.  Of course, things weren't helped by the fact that the caravan is right slap bang in the middle of the area we needed to measure.  The whole thing was really frustrating.  We had just got an updated application ready when the electrician turned up to remove the electrics from the caravan and put the phone and internet in the house.  So no power. So no facility to produce the 4 photocopies of everything needed for the application. I stayed behind to continue cleaning up after yesterday's work while Chris rushed our revised application to the Mairie.  He is now on first name terms with Mrs Mayor. and was hoping to get her to do the copies for us.  I was washing the toilet floor for the 5th time and wondering if it would ever look clean [the answer is no, it won't] when he came back and announced that he'd talked to a woman who is ever so slightly higher up the hierarchy than the Maire and this lady is meeting someone who is ever so slightly more influential that she is in this system on Monday.  She had looked at the plans and agreed that it was pretty unfair to just take an arbitrary line 3/4 of the way across the plot and she intends to ask that the boundary for the agricultural zoning is moved a few metres which would enable us to build the garage we want where we want, as long as the application is in by Monday.

She is meeting God's representative in Gironde on Monday and so we should know by Monday afternoon whether we need to put in a new application with all the changes that entails or whether we can go ahead with the original application and hope that they pass it.

The good news today is that the devis for the sun tunnel is less than 1000 euro, which is about the first time I can remember something being less than I thought it would be.  We're definitely getting that, it's obviously a bargain!!

Did some gardening in between bouts of torrential rain and then ate at the hypermarket café.  My delicious chicken and lemon sauce was overwhelmed by the smell of Chris's moules frites but some red wine smoothed things over.  Tempers were short, it's been a hard day.

Sat 26 April
My longed-for sleep was interrupted twice at 2am by Chris's phone going off and I couldn't get back to sleep.  I am beginning to find the strain of all these sleepless nights is building up.

In an effort to be positive I decided to list all the things we've done this month [not involving paint or skiing]
1. Old roof repaired
2  Moved into house
3  Shutters sanded and primed
4  Garden tidied a bit
5  Window openings ready for windows but windows not yet ordered
6  Sun tunnel organised
7  Arranged for spare fireplace to be removed and taken away [if they turn up]
8  Ordered cabinet de douche
9  Arranged for caravan to be moved once the water is disconnected
10 Painted security bars [twice, because the workmen caused some damage]
11 Got internet and phone moved to the house from the caravan.

Not too bad.  But what I'd give for a decent night's sleep.

Of course, I slept in late and we didn't start working til after 10. I was repainting the black metal door furniture on the shutters, fiddly but not too taxing. Chris had had enough by 3.30 and kept asking me if I'd like a drink, which is code for him wanting a beer.  At around 5, I gave in on the 6th time of asking and had a few.....slept very well.

Sunday 27 April
Weather extraordinarily changeable so couldn't settle to doing any work in the garden as there were strong winds and downpours every half an hour or so.  Chris blocked up 2 of the window holes with the windows which had been removed and we really MUST make a decision about the new windows tomorrow and get things underway.  We spent most of the afternoon sitting in the caravan as it's warmer than the house during the day [and much colder at night].  I think we're both tense about tomorrow's planning decision and can't settle to anything.  Ate a mammoth beef stew, just to pass the time.

Things get going, eventually

Thurs 24 April

Yesterday was a day off/waste of time, depending on your point of view.  A lovely day, sunny and warm but after a couple of hours of tidying the garden we went out for a long, expensive but lovely lunch with Patricia and Joris as her mum had gone to hospital for more chemo and they needed to get out for a few hours.  The rest of the day was spent doing nothing, apart from drinking red wine and chatting to each other.  Chris has strained his neck and luckily I still have all the medicaments since I did mine a couple of weeks ago.

Veg beds full of lovely - and free - compost

But today was a different matter.  Chris hired a thingy to gouge out half the bathroom floor in preparation for the installation of the cabinet de douche. I planted a few herbs in the concrete sinks and we went and bought some cheap organic compost.

Stone sink with first of our herbs

 The weather was distinctly chilly in the morning, turning blooming freezing in the afternoon.  As Stuart arrived to start on the lawn, another window chap turned up, the heavens opened, the masons arrived to finish off the window openings [so that the window chaps can measure precisely] with their cement mixer and drills.  It got steadily dustier, colder and wetter and I retreated to the caravan to sulk.  Things are really bad when a caravan is the cleanest, warmest, snuggest place you can find.  By 3.30 the rain was torrential, I was under a duvet in the caravan but Chris and Stuart were filling trenches with compost, ready for the hedges to be planted.  I thought they should call it a day but they carried on.  But only til 4 pm, then they just had to call it a day.

There's so much to do but I'm paralysed with the cold and overwhelmed by it all.  Chris and I sat in the caravan and consoled each other about our lethargy.

End of the day:  3 lovely window spaces, security bars which will have to be sanded and painted
again, the toilet cistern is higher than the window cill so will have to be moved before the window is installed in order to give it space to open and the cabinet de douche will be wider than the wall space allocated and will overlap the window a bit.  No workers coming tomorrow, just time to get on with a bit of painting and/or gardening depending on the weather, so a restful evening with supper in the caravan with the rain battering down.... happy days.

Long, expensive, tiring and slightly fruitless day....

with Ricky and his JCB.    All the terrace works that Chris wanted done simply couldn't be done because the ground is solid rock.  The new, expensive coil for the electricity cable cannot be put in place.  An alternative has to be found. 

Bits of rain throughout the day disrupted work from time to time.  My beautiful compost is now in the raised beds [along with a snake or two, no doubt] but unfortunately Ricky didn't pay any attention to the strawberries or the rhubarb, which are now completely buried and may never recover.  Never mind, although the garden looks like a building site again I can see that some progress has been made.

I would have liked to have chatted to Ricky more but he smokes about 50% of the time so I was only talking to him whilst not breathing, so any conversations were, of necessity, short.  The evening was fine, although cloudy.  We could have ploughed on with stuff but chose instead to sit and eat bread and cheese and drink beer and wine. 

I can push myself more when Chris has gone back to SA.

A Pretty Uneventful Easter Weekend

18 April

Cloudy today and definitely cooler.  I had to get a few things at the shops and there was a pre-Christmasesque panic in the air, elbows sharpened, tempers short and trolleys being overloaded because the shops will be closed for the entire day on Monday.

More gardening and sanding, it's getting pretty monotonous now.

Saturday 19 April

I feel like I've conquered my infection, it really feels like it's gone.  Wow!

We headed off to Eymet to get the paint to replace the paint which is adorning the interior of my car.......  What with that and breakfast, that was almost 100 euro gone!

It was a lovely day and we just spent the rest of it in the garden, Stuart came for a couple of hours and cut the grass. 

We uncovered the enormous pile of soil which has been sitting under a black plastic sheet for 2 years.  It is all stuff that was dug out to make way for the boules court.  Probably never been near any chemicals so perfect compost to put onto the potagers.  I was the brave one who lifted off the first plastic sheet, to find myself face to face with a long, fat and very confident-looking snake.  Chris ignored my burblings and obviously didn't believe me.  I look forward to him meeting the snake face to face over the next day or two.  In the meantime I have been looking up 'Snakes in France' on Google but none of the pictures look quite as nasty as the one I met this afternoon.

Easter Sunday 20 April

Easter Sunday and blooming cold! 12C and raining all day.  Luckily, we wanted rain to dampen the beds so that I can hoe more easily.  Also, we've been invited out for lunch to Joris and Patricia's house.  The usual lovely meal, after a bottle of champers. Patricia's mother is staying with them as she has cancer and has just started chemo.  Patricia has often talked about her in the past and I had built up a mental picture of her [as we all do] so I was totally shocked with a chic, very attractive woman, looking 20 years younger than her age, walked, slowly and painfully into the living room.
She was very quiet and slept on the sofa between courses and obviously was unwell but quite frankly a photograph would indicate a very well-groomed, healthy woman heading for retirement, not a mid 70s woman with a possibility of just 3 months life left. It was certainly something to think about later when we sat in front of the log fire, listening to the wind and rain outside.

Unfortunately Joris smoked throughout the meal [it is his house and it was pissing down outside, so why not?] and I feel my chest filling up again.  Such a shame

Easter Monday, 21 April

All shops closed!

Weather better, sunny but cool so we intended starting painting but we spent the first couple of hours trying to find cheap flights back here later in the year - no luck unfortunately so we had to bite the bullet and fork out the money!  I kept a blanket around me. UK Newspaper headlines were along the lines of  'Cor, what a scorcher, 19 degrees' while we wrapped up in thick jumpers as it was 20C here.  We are just too used to being warm.

Finally after housework, washing and cooking I was able to start painting.  At last!  By 6.30 all security bars were painted and Chris had done a fair bit of priming on the shutters.

So we went to take the black plastic off the potagers so that Ricky can put the compost on tomorrow when he arrives with the JCB, early evening, sunny, pretty relaxed then spotted another snake in one of the raised beds.  Luckily it was more scared of me and dived down asap.  But neither Chris nor I was that comfortable working around there after that!

The weather forecast for the next week is rain and that would be brilliant for the garden but we'll see.........

A morning off

Thursday 17 April

Kerry's birthday.  We managed to wake up early[ish] as a man was coming to give us a quote for 3 windows.  I think there was something lost in translation as he obviously quoted us for buying his entire bleedin' company.

Another very warm and sunny day so we decided to get all our shopping chores done so we could stay at the house and work for the next few days.

We did the chores, then decided to take a walk around town, then segued into an aperitif which then melded into lunch with some red wine.  This innocent little foray was followed by enormous guilt and a mad spurt of work in the afternoon.  I am still weeding and Chris is still sanding.  We had a visit from the plumber about the leak [shook his head and scratched it] and from the electrician about moving the phone and internet from the caravan into the house.  He said it would be easy and he'd do it next week.  Let's see.

We worked steadily until well gone 8pm, ate some bread and cheese and sat reading stuff on the internet until I saw Chris was reading site about - and I quote - Reviving the lost art of manliness.  Time for bed before he gets any ideas that I don't agree with!!

When closing up the house, I thought I could smelly something, well, pooh-y, but Chris couldn't smell anything.  I still drifted off to sleep thinking about Darren, who left France owing between 14-40k [depending on who you listen to] and who installed our sewage system.....

Day Off and then back to work

Sunday 13 April
We spent the day with Henriette and Jackie, ate too much, drank too much, still couldn't shake my bad throat and cough.
Watched Philomena in the evening.  Bit of a tearjerker.
We are seriously considering keeping the caravan as it is looking good, now it is empty!  It would be a bedroom for guests, as well as provide extra storage and an emergency backup.

Monday 14 April
24C again, very summery although chilly at night.  A weeding and DIY day with a bit of shopping thrown in for good measure.

Tuesday 15 April
A late start but then we really worked hard all day.  Chris strimmed and I weeded, oh the excitement of it all!  But by the evening the front of the house was looking neat and tidy and the shutters were half way ready to be painted.  Supper and a couple of beers and then we were ready for bed well before 10pm

Wed 16 April
I set aside this morning to do housework.  Unlike most houses, this doesn't involve dusting etc but it's closer to 'building site management' than 'housework'. I managed to do a bit but the weather is exceptionally, unseasonally wonderful so I headed off to the garden.

Chest still playing up a bit.  The self-medication regime doesn't seem to be working [expectorant all day, ibuprofen and sleeping tablet at night to get through with only a couple of bouts of coughing and coffee in the morning to get rid of the lethargy brought about by the tablets].  Carried on weeding, hoeing, planting and raking and have developed the same aches as last year - probably the first time I've used these particular muscles since I was last here.

A plumber came to look at the non-functioning boiler in the caravan.  He's English so there was a lot of tutting and drawing of breath and 'Well, that's going to cost, can't be repaired, it'll need to be replaced'.   Think I'll ask someone else. Or we might just keep it until it falls to bits and then worry about it  That would mean that I could invite people to stay and not have to share my bed with them, quite a useful addition to the house at the moment!!!!

Then the roofers came back to repair the small roof [which has not yet been renewed and has been dropping onto the new roof over the course of the winter].  Another expense we hadn't bargained for but we had no choice really.

A sunny evening spent between the caravan and house.  The days are all starting to meld into one at the moment.

Moving Day(s) and a Planning Issue

Thurs 10 April

Very hot today, unfortunately just not in our bedroom in the caravan!   Bloody freezing, got dressed under the bedclothes.   So we've got the bedroom ready in the house and will try it out tonight. 

I spent the morning moving stuff from the caravan into the house and generally trying to clean up.  Chris went to the Mairie to find out whether our Planning Permission forms were OK before we actually submit them but the right woman wasn't there and the other one didn't know so he'll have to go back tomorrow.  He played on his new toy, the scaffolding, and cleaned out one of the gutters, something he hasn't done for 20 years.  He enjoyed being out in the sun.  Apparently it was 26 C today, incredibly warm for the time of year - although still very cold at night.

The plumber came to give us hot water in the kitchen.  Another step forward. 

When he had left we decided to get out for a bit so we drove to Eymet to see if we could get replacement paint.  There is a shop there that sells English paint, allegedly.  Well, we found it about 10 minutes after it closed but it looked well-stocked, although I couldn't see any prices.  Did a bit of shopping, made dinner and read and listened to the radio for a bit in the caravan.   Suddenly it was 9.30, really dark and bloody freezing outside.  Too cold to go over to the house so we found an extra duvet in the cupboard and snuggled down in the caravan bedroom for one more night.

Friday 11 April

The weather forecast was wrong, it's cold and cloudy.  Stuart came to cut the grass which was almost knee high, after only 10 days and Chris went to the Mairie again about the Planning Permission.  Well, here's the thing.  Our land consists of 2 parcelles of land, a smaller one on which the house stands and a much larger one.  The municipality have re-zoned the land and the larger bit is now agricultural land [note to self, must find out if I can claim some EU subsidies now] and cannot be built on.  The garage we want to build is too big under the new rules BUT they don't come into force until the end of the month.  The lady at the Mairie [Mrs Mayor, actually] phoned someone on the next tier of administration who said that if we submitted the forms today, they might go through in time.  How exciting [not].  I love the way they change the rules ad hoc, it certainly stops any feelings of complacency.  The zone change to the smaller plot means that we are quite restricted as to the size of extension we can build.  It's a good job we had reined in our original plans!!

Happy chap with a bit of kit!

 

 

Replacing the paint will cost 78 euro as they have to order it in.  Chris finished clearing the gutters and I continued with moving stuff from the caravan into the house.  We had a couple of enquiries about the caravan and it was lamb stew for dinner.  We lit the fire and as usual, eye-watering, toe curling smoke billowed out all around the house.  I was sitting thinking about this problem when I made a big leap forward mentally and decided to look up the chimney.  It was closed.  No wonder I was being kippered.  A pull on the chain, then weighting it down with an iron bar ensured a much more enjoyable evening.  We opened a bottle of red [a present from Nico's Mum and Dad] to celebrate our first night in our new home. 

First meal in our luxurious new home

The bed was comfy, the room was warm enough, even without windows.  I could hear music across the fields at around 3am, so presumably they put it on loud to drown out Chris's snoring.  Around 5 there were really interesting animal noises and I was tempted to wake Chris so we could go and investigate but I thought a] he might kill me and b] he'd start snoring again when he went back to sleep.  So I never did find out what was going on.

Sat 12 April

We had a late start and went to the market in Ste Foy, to a lovely new café with books all over the place, very busy and a lovely atmosphere.  The afternoon was given over to filling holes in the shutters [Chris] and weeding [me].  After supper we watched Sunshine on Leith in the caravan.  Caravan's warmer in the evening and house is much warmer in the mornings. We ran into the house and dived under the bedclothes.  Another night coughing and hacking.  A visit to the doctor beckons.

Not sure I want to be here at the moment!

Wednesday 9 April

Well, I got into bed last night, rolled over and did something horrible to my left front shoulder thingy - don't know the proper name for it.  So with an approaching chest infection and a nasty pain in my left chest every time I moved, I didn't have a great night's sleep.  But then again neither did Chris.  It wasn't that I intended to wake him up, it's just that he complained about my cold glasses on his back which I explained was my nose because it was freezing outside the bed.   [I had 2 blankets on top of my duvet]  Anyway, I ended up dozing sitting up and of course found it practically impossible to get up before 9 o'clock.  This was not just due to the pain and tiredness, but also to the fact that, although bring and sunny outside, the caravan was the temperature of a particularly frigid snowdrift on a cold night.  Got dressed under the duvet for the first time this year, although I suppose I really ought to acknowledge that it is only our second night here this year.

Once up, I managed to drag myself to the chemist and get some stuff to try and make me better. [Oh yea, and that's going to work!!]  After shopping [this is important because we have to buy loads of boxes and cupboards to put things in when we leave the caravan] we couldn't post the very important letter about the speeding ticket which I should not have because I was not driving and so why should I have points on my licence, which is not even a French licence.  We couldn't post it because I couldn't find it in my bag.  We drove back to the caravan and I was distraught when I couldn't find it there. We both looked everywhere, with no luck.  So Chris hurried back to the chemist [heading for the noon deadline when all life stops for 2 hours] to see if I'd left it there or dropped it in the street.  In the meantime I searched again and eventually found it in the dustbin.  [Oh God, why didn't I think of that in the first place??]  I texted Chris to let him know and spent 20 minutes trying to work out how that was not my fault.  I just couldn't find a reason how it got there without me being the culprit, especially as it was screwed up with a load of other papers that I had thrown out.  I came to the conclusion that a conspiracy theory was probably a bit far fetched and that the only option was to admit to it, acknowledging that Chris would probably be mentally booking me into an Alzheimer's Clinic before lunchtime.

The garden is a tad overgrown.  There has been extensive rain this winter and not much cold weather so everything has grown like it has been drinking Red Bull.  This could be my exemption from the Alzheimer's Clinic as I know that Chris does not have a clue what to do, what should be prioritised and what should be left to grow so I now have a  way to blackmail him into keeping me here for a few seasons more!!

We did quite a lot of weeding, lots of raking and intermittent arguing.  Chris put together a very expensive scaffolding set that he bought but between us we couldn't actually lift it to the vertical, even with the help of ropes and all the goodwill in the world [albeit with a chest muscle problem!]   But, on the plus side the weather was good. The forecast for tomorrow is even better.

In the evening we had a visit from Mr Feltrin, who did the external stonework on the house.  He came to discuss what we want done next.  A nice guy, does a good job, we really like him.  So it was a bit of a pisser when he stood in the house and said 'You've got an awful lot to do here haven't you?'

Like I didn't know that!!!!!!!!!!!!

We start work

Tues 8 April

Woke early because of the pigeons walking across the roof, the sound of the hunt in the distance, the rain pounding on the caravan and the sure and certain feeling I am heading towards a chest infection.

Anyway, we dragged ourselves out of bed and got on with stuff.  A very nice couple came to look at the fireplace we want removed.  The deal is that they take out the chimney breast and fireplace and then they can have the fireplace  Win/win. They seem very keen but we'll see.  They were the sort of people that would be fun to get to know better but they live about 90 minutes away.

The plumber came and got the loo working in the caravan [and the water in the house].  After discussion we decided we are going to sell the caravan asap. It is becoming more of a worry than an asset.

The afternoon was sunny and we pottered around but really we need to get ourselves organised.

At the house

Monday 7 April

Bloody awful night’s sleep.  The next door neighbours were having a party, the upstairs neighbours were apparently moving furniture.  Chris, however, managed to snore his way through the whole thing.

We left Kate’s apartment by 6am, when it was still dark but due to an unfortunate being-locked-in-the-car-park incident followed by a going-on-the-wrong-motorway incident we didn’t leave Aix until 6.40!

Good weather and a fast journey, broken by a couple of pit stops meant that we arrived at the house around 2pm.  The house looked good in the sunshine and the garden was unrecognisable with weeds everywhere.  Oh good, I thought.  But the house didn’t smell musty when we opened it, the rat poison had all been eaten, most things worked [but not the hot water geyser, which is a disaster as the one on the caravan doesn’t work either].  No internet though so a quick trip to McDonald’s car park while the washing was drying in the laundrette, a meal in the local hypermarket and home to wrestle with the internet problem and drape damp washing over the furniture. 

Although it’s still light at 8.30.  We try to decide which bed to sleep in.  House or caravan?  They are both surprisingly clean after 6 months’ abandonment.   I’m too knackered to think about it so we settle for the caravan.  Better the devil you know, for tonight, at least.  So two of the great unwashed crawled into our caravan bed, hoping tomorrow will bring something good.  A hot shower perhaps?

Aix en Provence

Friday 4 April
A straightfoward day.  Got up, brushed the suede boots yet again, left the hotel, the weather was a bit overcast, the car is as clean as it could be after Chris's ministrations. We drove, stopped for breakfast: beautiful old city, authentic French café, miserable serveuse, strong coffee, large bill, drove on outrageously expensive motorway, got there.

We spent the afternoon and evening with Kate, Nico and Isis. Finally met our 'petite enfant aux quatre pattes'.  The weather perked up and we thoroughly enjoyed every minute.  They might not have done but who cares, quite frankly!  They found the whole paint-in-the-car episode hilarious, even if I didn't. Boots are now wearable, if not attractive. The weather was good enough to have the windows open all through the night!. The neighbours across the road are close enough to be labelled intimate!

I TOOK A SNEAKY PHOTO OF THE NEIGHBOURS
 

Chris had another email from Brussels, asking if he'd like to go to Washington after all.  Honestly, you couldn't make it up!!  Chris replied straight away saying that we are very happy with Senegal. So let's hope that the end of that.

Saturday 5 April
Hungover from last night so didn't do very much although the weather was good.  Kate was working. The dog is getting used to us.

Sunday 6 April
Big day! Meeting Nico's parents today.  Went to the food market in the morning.  Didn't bother going to the flea market as one of us already has fleas - not me, Chris, Nico or Kate - and I fell out big time with Isis after she got too used to us and actually licked my toothbrush.

Aix is certainly beautiful on a spring day but we had to get back to the apartment as Kate wanted to cook a mega meal for Nico's parents.  [nothing like a bit of self-imposed pressure - but who am I to criticise that?]

Not a great picture but a lovely meal

Anyway, they were lovely people, a super meal, and no - there was no big announcement.  It was just a meal and a walk in the sunshine with Isis and their giant German Shepherd Athos. [Athos took up half the sitting room even though he was asleep most of the day.]

A drink for Isis

I do like Aix at this time of year but so many people smoking outside, I can feel my chest start to tighten already!!

The search for keys

Thursday 3 April

On reflection, it seemed straightforward.  Go to the cordonnier, get keys cut, send them via DHL to the office in South Africa so they can open the house and switch on the electricity.

Of course the first problem was getting out of bed.  We didn't have one good leg between us and hobbled around the room like a couple of octogenarians.  Two bad backs and one aching shoulder added to our tally.

After more than 2 hours' searching and driving almost to Italy, we had to accept that the only condonnier within 100km is shut on Thursdays.  Over a late breakfast we talked through the options.  The dealbreaker was DHL telling us that if we took the duplicate keys to Marseille airport tomorrow afternoon, it would still be next Thursday by the time they got to SA.  I dread to think what the kitchen would smell like by then!

So we returned to the hotel room, discussed all options vociferously and finally decided to tell the real estate agent to get a locksmith to break into the house and get the electricity put back on.  I hope this doesn't happen every week when the gardeners come and I have asked them not to use that socket for the time being.  The lawn may be VERY long when Chris gets home in May.

Highest temperature today was 13C, it was cloudy and grey.  Why couldn't it have been like that when we were struggling up the hill gasping for breath yesterday???? 

So it wasn't the most exciting day ever but as a result of our lack of skiing, we have decided to book to ski in South Africa in June for Chris's birthday.  Probably a once in a lifetime thing!  It will help us decide whether we just had a bad day's skiing or whether we have reached the stage where we should really give it up.  We'll see.

Skiing at last

2 April

We were at the ski hire place by 8.30, raring to go.  Although the valley was green and spring-like, the higher slopes were gloriously white and pristine. On the slopes just after 9.  On reflection a bit early because the pistes had been groomed overnight and it was very icy so the first hour was spent rattling along [I did wonder whether my teeth would survive the day as they seemed to chomp against each other every second!]


The pistes were almost empty and it was a pretty glorious morning.  We stopped for a hot brunch around 10.30 and then carried on.  Lunch, which involved vin chaud, was around midday and we set out back to the slopes feeling reasonably confident.

Unfortunately something weird had happened to our legs during the rest period.  My thighs were screaming with pain and half way down a longish run, I realised that I no longer had any control over my skis.  I told Chris, who said he was pretty much in the same situation and we decided to call it a day. The problem was partly that the beautiful sunshine had turned the snow to slush; it was also partly that we are a couple of old gits!

It took a LONG time to get back to the cable car and we looked so wrecked when we arrived back at the ski shop, the guy almost rolled on the floor laughing.  We struggled up the hill to the hotel, in temperatures of 24C, just to add to our misery. We showered, slept and went out for dinner.

Back to bed by 8.30!  I settled down with  good book and Chris was helping the ref to police the PSG vs Chelsea match. Then today's bombshell hit.

An innocent-looking email from our garden service in Pretoria telling us the electricity had tripped, which means the freezer is now off.  Apparently Chris was aware that the outside socket could cause the freezer to trip but did not mention it. [I know, it's rare that Chris forgets to mention something to me!]  He had also forgotten to give spare keys to the office so no one can get into the house to sort it out. 

Well, we won't be skiing tomorrow..............

April Fools Day - how appropriate!

1st April   Best gloss over today really

It was mainly cleaning the car and trying to get paint off our clothes.  Our miniscule hotel room is now chockablock with white boxes and suitcases.  The hotel car park is a subtle shade of taupe paint.  We spent a small fortune on paint removing products and launderettes and only recovered our equilibrium after a long, expensive, liquid lunch.

So, to recap, we have spent loads of money but still have a paint splattered car and ruined clothes and shoes and haven't even seen a pair of skis yet.

The afternoon was spent cleaning the car [Chris] and sleeping [me].  We managed to find somewhere decent to eat and were asleep by 8.30.

Here we go again!

It's that time of year again.  I'm off to Northern climes to do some work on the house.  La vie diplomatique is being replaced by la vie rustique for a few months.

I took a week's so-called holiday, which mainly consisted of spending time in DIY shops trying to fathom out what tools do what and trying to arrange the delivery of the very specific shade of paint that we have spent months choosing.  I bought loads of plastic boxes to pack everything in.  Pretty tedious stuff, by and large.  But the weather was fine, the daffodils were out and I was treated to endless generosity and hospitality from Susy K.

 

 

 

I had some lovely moments with Beth and Barney and, all in all, I felt pretty good by the time Chris arrived and we set off, in high spirits, for France.

 

Sunday 30 March.  Very late  We arrived at Newhaven port to discover that Susy had left some cake tins and frying pans in the car earlier, which Chris had carefully covered with his coat [presumably to stop them feeling the cold]. Taking her kitchen utensils for a jaunt to the ski slopes wasn't on our itinerary.  So we rang her to ask if she could pop along and pick them up before we got on the ferry but she'd had a glass of wine or 2 so thought she'd better not drive.  So the pots and pans had to come on holidays with us until such time as we can deliver them back to her.

 

Monday 31 March. 4am  We arrived in Dieppe after very little sleep, disembarked and drove for about 3 hours until we were south of Paris before stopping for a drink, as which point we decided to have a sleep in the car for a few minutes.  The minutes turned into a couple of hours so we just ploughed on for the rest of the day and arrived in Briancon around 5.30, receiving only one speeding ticket on the way.  The mountains were magnificent, the sun was out, the hotel room was small and bijou but comfy and that's when things started to go wrong.

We changed and went for a walk, looking for somewhere decent to eat. Sleep-deprived and grumpy, we eventually plumped for a MacDonalds, a beer in the hotel bar and I returned to the room to do some banking stuff while Chris went to get his suitcase from the car.   A hot shower and bed beckoned.

After a while I started to wonder what had happened to him. The phone rang and there he was, yelling frantically at me to look out of the window.  I could tell it wasn't good news, so I put the phone down and went to the window.  Chris was standing in the car park, shouting down the phone at me and fortunately I couldn't hear a bloody word.  I was taken aback by the sight of the car and car park awash in Farrow and Ball's very best and very expensive paint.

I scurried down to the car park to discover Chris beside himself [and beside a small river of vert de terre estate emulsion].   Hotel reception found it impossible to find some hot water but managed to provide a cloud of absorbent paper - not a lot of use.  Chris told me to take his suitcases up to the room:  he didn't mention that the bottoms were covered in paint so I, the lift, my clothes and my 6-day-old suede boots were all splattered.  I put one suitcase in the shower to avoid getting paint all over the carpet [Chris later moved it without clearing up the paint so I finished my late shower with the soles of my feet with a sort of grey green sheen which left footprints on the carpet].  The other suitcase went on the balcony and I ran downstairs to try and help but Chris had taken off to find a car wash.  Car wash was closed so he came back to the hotel car park and raided the cleaners' store to do the best he could until the light gave out.

He sat on the bed, silently berating himself, so I went down to the bar and brought up a couple of beers, which seemed to bring a slight amelioration to the gloom.  We made a plan for tomorrow and went to bed where I tried not to mourn for my oh-so-comfy now useless boots!