Water Works Etc.

  Friends who have read my comments on Facebook will know that we have been having problems with our kitchen tap. As you can see from the pic, it is of a type long superseded in the annals of French plumbing but it has served faithfully, I should imagine for at least 50 years and I had no yen to replace it out of misplaced modernity. It uses a 10mm washer which wears out fast, and the seating was worn so I had bricoléd it fairly frequently over the years.  Like a OAP it had developed a certain incontinence lately and had to be closed more and more firmly to stop it dripping. This proved its downfall, because the internal thread wore out a week ago and it finally died....
  It proved impossible to locate a straight replacement, and all alternatives had one insuperable draw-back--the inward-opening window just above it allowed almost no clearance above the pipe joint and all modern taps have long necks! It looked more and more as if the pipe-work would have to be hacked out of the tile work behind, not a pretty thought!
   However I had a cunning plan! If I replaced it with a brass, garden-type tap and used 2 linked elbow joints to lower the tap below the level of the cill, all might yet be well. Fortune smiled on this expedient and the result can be seen in the next pic. I don`t think it looks out-of-place with our butler-type sink, the tiles have been saved  and as an additional bonus it cost far less than a `posh` tap. DIY triumphs again!
  Musing on this minor victory, I was struck by the number of different skills we have had to acquire in living la vie rurale, quite apart from learning French. Vine trimming and harvesting, chainsaw operation and wood-cutting, dry-stone walling, roofing repairs and maintenance immediately spring to mind. What about sheep midwifery,lamb-rearing, sheep-shearing and foot-trimming, minor veterinary attentions to dogs and cats, plot tending with a cultivator, gardening(mostly Kim, that) jam making, preserving, the list is endless.
  Just to put the tin lid on it, another category has just presented itself in a most dramatic fashion!!! The fire alarm( smokey) in the kitchen prompted us to drop everything and race in there. Horror, the room was full of smoke and steam, a kettle was boiling its head off and overflowing on the top of the wood-burning cooker, and smoke was pouring out of the top of the stove. Either the kettle boiling over had started a chimney fire, or the fire had boiled the kettle over. Eventually I pulled off the cast-iron lid over the stove, red-hot of course, and poured a kettle of water into the back of the stove, which was well alight and starting to roar. The resulting steam smothered the fire as I had hoped and all is now calm. So I can add amateur fire-fighters to the above list!
   All`s well that ends well. Thank goodness for the smoke alarm!

       Bye for now, going to have a calming drink!

Life on the wild side

 One of the joys of living in la France profonde is the profusion of animal and bird-life. Not just our own troupeau, of course, though the sight of a dozen assorted cats jostling for the food bowls is impressive enough! I was thinking of the wild animals and birds we regularly see on our journeys and dog-walks.
  Firstly the birds. We see far more here than we did in the UK, even though my work as an insurance claims handler entailed driving extensively in Devon and Cornwall. They seem larger than the UK birds too. On our weekly trips to Church and choir practice we always see several large buzzards flap heavily across the road from their perches in the trees. Usually we see a couple of kestrels and often a hen-harrier, the male of which bears an uncanny resemblance to a seagull, with its white body and black wing-tips, though it is a hawk, sure enough. We also see the occasional sparrowhawk and probably other hawks we are not sure of identifying. Magpies, of course, and crows and rooks are common but what particularly struck us here is the number of jays. Always a favourite of mine with its exotic pink body, white rump and blue wing-feathers, it was a real red-letter day when we spotted one on our trips to Cornwall. If I spotted four or five in seven years, there were certainly no more, Yet here we have seen as many as five in a day and no Sunday goes by without seeing at least two. There is a field by the roadside where we regularly see a grey heron, odd to see it away from water. They seem to hunt mice and frogs here. Hoopoes are not uncommon in the summer, and We once saw a pair of Golden Orioles.
   Driving along recently, we saw a buzzard take off from the road and fly along in front of the car. It was labouring to gain height and seemed to be carrying something. Eventually it dropped its burden and flapped above us. Its prey fell in the ditch and as we passed we saw it was a weasel, seemingly unharmed from its brief air-lift. Or it may have been a stoat. Do you know how to tell the difference? In fact, a weasel is weasely recognised, while a stoat is stoatally different! We once saw a buzzard carrying a large writhing snake.
  Turning to animal life, we often see deer in groups of as many as five, in spite of the attentions of the local hunts. The occasional fox is seen and last Friday, returning home late from a function, we were delighted to spot a badger beside the road only just outside the village of Couture d`Argenson, the first one we have seen here. Frogs and toads are common of course later in the year, though I did move one out of the road two nights ago while walking the dogs before bed.
   I`m sure I have forgotten to mention others (mice spring to mind less pleasantly) to say nothing of the insect population but I must close now and get another coffee. Still, you can see that our country life is infinitely enlivened by seeing the wild life which shares our environment.

   Bye for now!

Licensed to kill.

 

  Some years ago we were the subject of an armed hold-up late at night on a country road. There, that got your interest, didn`t it.. It`s true, though, but the `highwaymen` were in fact the French police! One gendarme was covering his colleagues with a rifle from the other side of the road while another stopped the cars. Goodness knows what they were looking for, but it resolved into the normal check of papers, including, of course, my license.  This was the normal English license, the address of which was still my previous English address, even though we had been in France a couple of years..There is, in fact, no way of putting a French permanent address on an English license.
  Luckily, the Gendarme was bored with his night vigil, and had spent time in the West Country in the UK. He was more interested in chatting about Cornwall than in pursuing an infraction, and soon sent us on our way. Possibly he thought we were on holiday from the old address.
   However, a near miss like that concentrates the mind and we started the procedure to exchange our UK licenses for French ones with our correct addresses on them; luckily this did not entail a new driving test!! We have been French as far as our driving license is concerned for several years.
  I was surprised to receive, therefor a letter from the DVLA a few weeks ago, asking me to renew my English license at age 70, involving a medical check etc. I thought that perhaps my French papers would be invalid if I didn`t, but an enquiry established that they had omitted to note the change, and the reminder had been sent to my old UK address. They are now canceling details of my UK license as I have a French one.
  This saga has revealed an unsuspected benefit of French residency--I can legally drive my car, and indeed a motor-bike without any risk of prohibition due to age and possibly failing eye-sight! Whether this is a good idea time will tell, though one of our elderly neighbours does drive about, very slowly, though his sight is somewhat lacking.I believe someone in the French government did suggest a similar system to the UK a while ago, but roused such a storm of protest from isolated country-folk that they dropped it like a hot potato. Accident and insurance data seems to indicate that it is in fact not a dangerous thing. You`ll get no argument from me!

            Bye for now, got to drive over to Matha. Clear the road!!!
 

Weather or not.

I know I keep mentioning the weather or the climate but it`s an English habit, isn`t it?  In fact the weather this year has been very different from  that of 2011. Then the winter could be best described by the old rhyme--

         First it rained and then it snew
         And then it frizz and then it thew
         And then it snew again
.
This year the season started with a very dry Autumn, continued with mild temperatures over Christmas to well into January, with no snow at all  then shocked us with a fortnight of freezing temperatures and has now thawed again. There`s still plenty of time for snow I suppose, but I hope not. Pretty chaotic this year, and reminiscent of the old adage that Climate is what you expect, but weather is what you get.

   Bye for now, I`m off to tap the barometer.

The mouse that gnawed.

  I have told readers before of our little building across the road which has been re-roofed and which we use as a store of foodstuffs and other odds and ends. One of the items we have in store is a couple of boxes of walnuts from our tree.
  We were a bit surprised to find that something had been gnawing little holes in the shells to eat the kernels, obviously a mouse. No sweat, we have a tried and tested method of discouraging such attacks; as we don`t like to kill these little creatures, we have a live trap which catches them and we then deport them to trouble someone else. We have caught dozens in this little machine with no trouble. It consists of a plastic box, one end of which can be removed to insert a bait, and to eventually release any captives. The other end is fitted with a falling trapdoor held open by a little plastic mechanism. When the mouse enters, the trapdoor shuts and the deed is done.
  However this mouse was made of stronger stuff! His first riposte was to gnaw the mechanism inside, damaging it sufficiently to release the trapdoor. I mended the mech and reset the trap. But his next escape was even more dramatic-- he simply ate straight through the side of the box and took his leave as you can see from the photo above.
  I have replaced our trap with a metal one, but I am worried about what he will use next....explosives, perhaps? Beware the advent of the Supermice!!!

   Bye for now, Im going to eat some cheese while I still can...
 

Ark Mark One

  We were in Church at Matha as usual on Sunday, and I was interested to find that Yves, our Pasteur, had decided to base his sermon, or reflection on the story of Noah and his famous Ark. As the current proprietor of an Ark, even if more in name than on the sea, I was naturally interested. Yves did succeed in finding facts which I had never noticed from this familiar story.
   Firstly, the extreme longevity of the people at this time. A detailed list of characters is included and they mostly seem to live 950 years plus! Noah`s father,Lamech, was 187 when Noah was born and died at the age of 777. Noah was 500 years old when he started building the Ark, and 600 when it floated on the Flood. Makes the work seem more credible, he had plenty of time to do it!
   Also, there is a puzzling account of how creatures from the spirit world,sometimes described as sons of God, took wives of beautiful human females and had descendants from them described as giants or heroes. They formed part of the events which disgusted God with his creation, and which led Him to decide to send a flood to erase all life. I had never heard this previously.
   The dimensions of the Ark were detailed, in metres, rather than cubits and spans, which don`t tell us much about size (do YOU know how long is a cubit?  Me neither!) The Ark was thus 150 mtrs long by 25 mtrs wide by 15 mtrs high, a sizable craft! It had three decks divided into stalls,a skylight one and a half mtrs below the roof, and a door in the side. After having embarked the animals as detailed by God, the promised 40 days of rain flooded the Earth and the Ark became the sole refuge for life on Earth. However I had not appreciated that the Ark didn`t ground for 150 days and a further period of 139 days went by before the ground had dried enough to disembark. Just think of the problems of feeding all the animals! You will be glad to hear that the effort of building and sailing the Ark did not kill off the 600 yr-old, and he lived a further 350 years, dying at the age of 950. There is hope for me yet!

   Hope you found this interesting. You can read all about it in Genesis chapters 6 to 9.

    Bye for now, going to feed the animals!
 

Keep the home fires burning!

I read an article the other day on the subject of the next ice-age. It appears these are due to subtle variations in the Earth`s orbit, plus the effect of a gradual precessing of the polar tilt of the Earth. By a process not fully understood this causes ice-ages every few thousand years and the next one is due in about 1500 years. Now that`s not long in historical terms, let alone in geological ones. I would remind you that previous ice-ages have wiped out life on Earth back to single-celled plants, very different from the heated- up periods where life, even if different, thrived extraordinarily.
  But wait, I have a crumb of hope for our descendants! The article went on to say that our increasing the carbon dioxide level of the atmosphere had already postponed this armageddon by at least 500 years and may indeed have rendered it impossible. Our `wickedness` in burning fossil fuel has saved the planet, or at least a sizable portion of its flora and fauna (shame about the Polar bear,but I doubt we`ll let it go extinct) As the event draws nearer perhaps we`ll be encouraged to burn as much as possible to help keep up the sagging temperatures. New subsidies for large cars will be announced and insulation will be banned! It`s funny how sins can become virtues and vice versa...

       Off to do my bit with a bonfire...Bye for now!

A Crumb of Comfort

A little incident occurred today which emphasized both the charm of living in rural France and the differences between our cultures, to say nothing of the problems which can arise if  you don`t speak the language. Our Boulanger on his round stopped his little white van in front of our door, which is unusual, as I confess we make our own bread and are not his most regular customers. He handed me a packet containing a gallette des rois, in this case, a circular brioche, complete with cardboard crown and containing the feve to decide who is king for the day. I was puzzled as to why, as I had not ordered it. He explained that a friend in a nearby village had asked him to deliver one to us, as we had helped her daughter out by lending an English adapter when she went to the UK recently, how kind of her!
  However, he was keen to tell us of a problem which had arisen with another customer, precisely due to lack of a common language. This lady,who we have only met a couple of times at village `does`, is, I think an American, and has bought a holiday home in the town itself.  She had gone into the bakery and had asked the Boulangere to sign a form, which the silly girl had done without having much idea what it was about. Her husband was aghast when told, especially when the American proved hard to contact, seeming to be out of the house. He even contacted the Police for advise only to be told they could do nothing. Eventually, he succeeded in contacting the lady and an unsatisfactory `exchange` took place, only terminating when she rang a French-speaking friend, who managed to pacify he Boulager. It appears she had asked the Boulangere to witness a signature on some form or other, and the signing of it didn`t commit them to anything. We were able also to reassure him that this signing went no further than to certify that she had seen the lady sign the form.  The practice seems unknown in France, even a Will is just written out in the testator`s own hand and signed. A bit of a storm in a teacup, really, but the Boulanger was really worried!

    All`s well that ends well.

          Bye for now!

Piece of cake.

Recently I have been scrolling through the handy list of blogs attached to the late and very lamented Taste of Garlic. When Keith Epstein stopped updating the review, he said it would remain on line till the rent ran out, and I thought it would be prudent to make a note of all these invaluable addresses. In the course of selecting my favourites and deleting those who are no longer updating, I came across a referene to a quote from Marcel Proust which made me laugh out loud. All acknowlegements due to Farmhouse in France and I hope she wont mind if I recycle her idea in a slightly different form. I must admit that Proust is an author I have never read, though I will admit it would be A GOOD THING. But I have a feeling that it would be tedious, though good for the literary soul... But humour me a little and see if you can guess what our Marcel was experiencing to release these sensations.
    `No sooner had I..... than a shudder ran through me and I stopped, intent on the extraordinary thing that was happening to me.An exquisite pleasure had invaded my senses, something isolated,detached, with no suggestion of its origin`  He goes on in similar vein for some time. Have you guessed what he was doing? Well, he was dunking a madelaine in his tea!!! Everyone knows what a madelaine is, I should think, a little sponge bun quite unremarkable. What a sad life Proust must have led to find such an orgasm in dunking a bun in his tea! I roared and I now feel confirmed in my instinctive aversion to reading him, which I had thought was just laziness. Thanks, farmhouseinfrance for the timely warning. I`m off to read a cartoon..

        Bye for now!

Histoires de notre Moulin..

In my last blog I mentioned the thrill of recognition we bloggers get from time to time when someone mentions that our efforts have amused or interested them. However, sometimes the mention is somewhat more disturbing. I am a great fan of a blog called LeftBankManc which is written by a young Manchester girl, who has left her native town to take an au paire job and a waitressing job in Paris. If you haven`t seen this blog, I urge you to try it, you can find it on Google easily enough. The trials and tribulations of LBM make fascinating if horrendous reading, and she shows no reticence in detailing her riotous life in the City of Light, made more eventful by a liking for drunken clubbing, an inability to learn much French and an assorted love-life. But what struck me and Kim the other day was her horror in finding that her mum had become a reader! She had hoped to remain anonymous but a kindly relative blew the gaff... Doesn`t seem to have cramped her style or increased her discretion, though, thank goodness.
   I had a similar, though milder second thought the other day when my sister Catherine mentioned she had read the blog of our Christmas menus.( Hello, Cath if you`re there!)  I had given her the title so she could find the Ark, and our lifestyle is as far from the excesses of LBM`s as is possible to imagine but still I had a momentary qualm.  It`s not that I think she`ll criticise our lifestyle but I fear she may correct my grammar or style....Well, never mind the first qualification for a blogger is  the ability to ignore all comment which is not complimentary. Any audience is good, feel free to look all you like, whoever you are!

         Bye for now!

2012 A brand new Year

The change of the year is a time when you take stock and look back over the past year.  A glance at the statistics of the Ark reveals a total of 85 blogs published since I started.  The readership is not terribly elevated in numbers compared with more famous blogs, and sometimes I have the feeling of sending out these notes into an indifferent world. However from time to time someone remarks that they enjoy reading them, so it`s not entirely a thankless task,and, hey, I enjoy putting my thoughts on the air and blogging is to a large extent its own reward.
   Another statistic I find even more surprising is the geographical spread of the readers.  The last month the blog has apparently been read in France, UK, USA, Germany, India, S Africa, Japan, Lettonie,(wherever that is),and Holland. Sometimes people must have pushed the wrong button but it`s surprising nontheless. If any of my more exotic readers would like to let me know what they find attractive I would be most obliged!
  In the meantime, we will try to continue to provide a French slant on what catches the eye here in Poitou-Charentes and I hope that all my readers, even the accidental ones, will get some enjoyment from the blog.

   Happy New year and bye for now.

A Happy New Year to all Ark readers!!

           Very best New Year wishes to all our readers. I hope to welcome you aboard the Ark for another year of assorted news, views and musings in 2012.

     And so does Sox

  And Jilly and Laika

And Toffee

Plus, of course Mrs Noah herself.

See you aboard!