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!