I hate politicians, lawyers and TV commentators!

  The Ark registers its contempt for all these know-alls who are profiting from the recent tragedies in the Toulouse area. For any hermits who have not heard of the drama. a young fanatic shot and killed three un-armed off-duty soldiers, making his escape on a large motor-scooter. Later, he entered a Jewish school and shot four young children and two teachers in cold blood. Whatever the `political` excuse quoted, this non-human worm is beneath contempt.
  The Police succeeded in tracing him through the stolen scooter and cordoned off his home. After more than 30 hours of negotiation, the men of the RAID Police unit forced their way into the house, tried to subdue the maniac, who was armed with several automatic weapons but were eventually forced to shoot him when he tried to jump from the balcony, a pistol in each hand. I raise my hat in homage to the very brave men of this elite unit, several of whom were wounded. one even wounded twice in the course of the siege.
   However, after the drama comes the aftermath. Every politician tries to say what should have been done and how the Government should have acted. All the `learned` commentators with no qualification whatever apart from a big mouth say what should have been done and  ask questions beginning `Why not...` Even the father of this animal is now talking of suing France for`murdering` his son!!! I would like to add a `Why not` of my own.  Why not give these knowledgeable persons a flak helmet and a bullet-proof vest and let THEM enter the room where the assassin was waiting, armed to the teeth? They could gently lead him out to face arrest.  The answer is, of course quite obvious. These valiant and wise persons are far too clever and timid to put their own valuable butts in harms way. They confine themselves to second-guessing those who are brave enough to do what we are not capable of doing. May they choke on their own microphones!

  Bye now going to get a calming cup of coffee....

For this relief much thanks.

We were driving back from Roscoff on Tuesday, a drive of some 550 kilometers. We stopped after a couple of hours, as you do, for a rest stop for us and the dogs. After I had led out the dogs on a grassy area so they could perform their watering functions, necessarily in public,  I visited the `facilities` to perform the same task. The toilet block of this little picnic area was modern, in blue and white tiles and there was no door provided on the `Men`s` as is normal. A short passage with a dog-leg to prevent things being seen which should not was the normal lay-out. But, there, as usual the chicane was not sufficiently deep and I found myself quite visible to the outside, performing in public again. Now it`s not rocket science, the correct lay-out, any schoolboy with a piece of string could design better than this. However the French are not fools and one is left with the conclusion that it just does not matter to them.
   They have a much less prudish attitude to this very normal bodily function which surprises the more delicate British. Who has not seen at the side of a minor road a motorist, standing straddle-legged beside his car with no thought of retiring behind a hedge? Or a lorry-driver watering the off-side front wheel of his camion?  We once came across a twenty-strong peleton of cyclists, in their gaudy cycling outfits, bikes stacked in a heap, all engaged in filling a roadside ditch, a surprising sight even in France! Why do I never have the camera handy... I did have it to snap this notice on an alley in Lille, which expresses the French attitude to the problem.
   When I visited Paris in the sixties, the wide boulevards of the  Centre-Ville were well provided with Vespasiennes or public urinals, men only of course. This was a notorious arrangement of a curving cast-iron sight-screen, into which you walked. Having arrived at the end, you found a metal trough into which to perform, with little in the way of regular flushing, the smell was striking and pedestrians tended to pass to windward. Although the curving screen was better designed than the picnic area one, it fell short in another, surprising way--the screen only came up to chest-level, and down to mid-calf, modestly covering your centre section only. It was a weird sensation to be carrying on quite so publicly, able to look passing people in the eye,if you had the nerve! You could, I suppose, raise your hat to lady acquaintances or shout greetings to friends... I hope they drew the line at kissing or shaking hands! I was grieved to discover on Google that only one sole survivor remains, though interested to discover that they are named after the Roman emperor  Vespasian who had introduced a tax on urination... The mind boggles as to how it was assessed!

  Right, that`s enough of this unsavoury, though fascinating subject.  Bye for now, got to go to the loo....

The Circle game

Kim`s Hamamellis starts to put on leaf.

I used to be very fond of the song `The circle Game` which describes life as a carousel or roundabout. And one of the main events on this carousel is the circle of the seasons. As the Bible says, there is a time to sow and a time to reap and the seasons of the year succeed each other in a stately waltz.
  I love this process, even if it emphasises that with each season one is a year older!  The trick is not to anticipate trouble but to enjoy the ride.
  Here each season brings its own task. In Spring, it`s ploughing the veg plot with the cultivator, then planting out the chosen crops (this is Kim`s job, I just prepare the ground. ) Later, it will be time to shear the sheep before it gets too hot. As the temperature rises, the stove, which has glowed since Autumn  can be allowed to go out and be cleaned and its chimney swept ready for re-light in November. Summer is more a time for swimming and a trip to the mountains in June. Then Autumn is the time to preserve fruit, make jam to buy in or cut down our Winter wood stock ready for the onset of the colder days, when it is time to sit by the fire and look forward to our Christmas trip to Lille. Yes indeed, each season has its own unique flavour, and its the change between each season which brings interest to life and stops it from being dull.
  Yet of all the seasonal changes, I like the change between Winter and Spring, when the chill goes out of the air and life seems to re-start. Each sign is eagerly looked for, the first spring flowers such as violets growing in the hedgerows, the buds starting to swell on the trees, the first timid leaves almost yellow at first but soon turning a wonderful vivid green. On my way to Matha on Friday I saw that the Weeping Willow beside the stream at Cressé had put out its fronds, always an early tree. The birds also point the way, Jacqui has seen swallows at Loubillé and they will be here in a few days. We saw wild geese passing overhead a few weeks ago on their way to their summer feeding stations and the small sparrows and tits are starting to pair up. I saw large flocks of lapwings two days ago. In winter they are a sign of colder weather as they move South to avoid it. However I thing these birds were on their way North to take up their summer nesting ground. Even Phillipe`s goldfish, illegally introduced to the static fire reserve water reservoir, have increased and are feeding busily. Spring is a time of hope, of new life of promise of Summer days. I love it!

  Bye for now. Breakfast time!

Soon be time for the Quince tree to blossom.

Communication is the key.

Since Kim is away in the UK visiting Alyson, our daughter, I have been more than usually reliant on communication methods to keep in touch with her. Today we are really spoilt for choice. I can use the computer to send E-Mails, chat on Facebook, send pictures on Facebook status. I can send SMS messages or voice communications  on the mobile, I can use the ligne fixe telephone. If our computer was more up-to-date and our connection less hit-or-miss, I could use Skype or even send video.  More prosaically  i could even write a letter.  She can read this blog to keep in touch.
  It wasn`t always so. Just after we bought this house 20 years ago, Kim decided that, if she was to learn French properly and to test that she could survive alone in France, she should spend a few weeks here after I had to return to recommence work. We were confined to two ways of contact, letters or telephone; and at first we didn`t even have the phone installed, She had to ring from a call box. Mobiles were not in general use then, and were the size of a house-brick. Even after we had the phone installed, we used it sparingly once or twice a week but wrote almost daily. There was a strange problem of different time zones. A letter gave news which was a week old while the phone gave today`s news. Duplication was inevitable, rather disorientating...Things have changed so much in 20 years! It`s comforting to be in close touch.
   There was one other means but it was highly unreliable. At the time we were very much into CB radio. I suppose it still exists but it has been largely superseded by more modern media. We had a set in the Volkswagen camper and another in the house. In theory, the system had a range of about 5 miles but due to a phenomenon known as skip it could establish a tenuous contact over much greater distances.
    We really liked our CB sets and made many good friends.If I was out locally in the car I could call home where Kim kept a listening watch on the 38 band.  In Plymouth, the 38 frequency band was used by somewhat older CBers and supervised by a sort of honorary controller called Captain Bligh. I would explain that for security reasons nobody used his proper name on air but a call identity. I was Brown Bear,  Kim was Dragon Lady for example. No, this was not in allusion to her character, but to her Welsh upbringing! Another Celtic lady had already bagged `Welsh Dragon`. Capt. Bligh kept order and enforced radio discipline by sheer force of character, and a wicked sense of humour. Bless him, he`s dead long ago but still fondly remembered.
  Today there are almost too many means of keeping in contact but that must be a good thing.  Mustn`t it?


     Bye for now, got to check Facebook for messages...

The Aliens are coming!

  I want to warn today of a mysterious problem of which I have only just become aware. It all started with my  black and white
, knitted Llama Hat.
    I would explain that this item of headgear is very close to my heart and even closer to my head in winter. It is a knitted bobble hat (but with no bobble!) which is seldom off my head in the somewhat chilly Deux Sevres January or February not to say March. We bought it several year ago at a Llama Farm in the Pyrenees. It appears that these mountain animals have hollow fibre hair which means that garments knitted from it are both light and highly insulative. I also find that unlike a woolley hat they don`t make my head itch. A valuable possession you will agree.
    What was my despair a few weeks ago when I found I had lost it. We had gone out that morning to pick up Kim`s new stationary bike, bought from a local lady advertising it for sale on the Net. On entering her house, I stuffed the Hat in my pocket  Having loaded the bike, we called at the Mairie on the way back to chat to Sylvia the Maire`s secretary. Later that morning I realised that my Llama hat was missing, probably fallen from my pocket at one of these two locations.
  Nevertheless, I refused to believe this disaster and carried out a thorough search of all the places I might have put it without result. Kim comforted me by saying we would visit the farm again this summer and buy another one. I have had to content myself in the meantime by wearing an inferior Thinsulate cap.
   You can imagine my astonishment this morning to find the missing hat back on the coat-pegs near the back door, hiding behind one of Kim`s scarfs. I am not fooled, there is absolutely no chance I could have missed it in my search, it was definitely gone, and now it has returned as mysteriously as it went. With Kim in the UK there is no one else in the house I could blame for moving it... The only credible solution I can come up with is that it was abducted by aliens.
   Now I realise that this is not the only evidence of this phenomenon. Take the case of Lilou the black and white cat. She regularly disappears for weeks at a time and is seen no more anywhere in the region. A few days, or even weeks later, she reappears as mysteriously as s he went. I now have come to the conclusion that some strange being is borrowing my possessions, using them for a time and then returning them. It may be significant that both items are black and white. I realise the evidence is scanty, but to me the case is proved.

   Bye for now, going to check my wallet is still there!

Roscoff, gateway to the South?

We must have come through this gateway dozens of times over the years since we bought this house and even before. The Brittany Ferries vessels Quiberon, Bretagne, Armorique and several more have transported us from Plymouth to France Finisterre and deposited us at the ferryport called Bloscon half a kilometer from Roscoff itself. If we were on holiday or in a hurry, we simply cleared Customs/Immigration ( usually by just driving past the manned gateway, nothing like the kerfuffle to get into Britain) turned left at the exit and headed south like swallows towards our small piece of paradise.It was usually in the morning having crossed the Channel during the night. Sometimes we would stop at the terminal for the first croissant of the trip and a cup of real French coffee to wake us up for the eight hour drive to La Mort Limouzin. Sometimes we`d just go but I never fail to feel a lift of my spirits when we arrive in Roscoff, perhaps that is why the place has a hold of my affections.
                                                                                   
  Mind you, the ferry  firm itself has an interesting history. Years ago when Roscoff was a sleepy fishing village, the local market gardeners sold their artichokes, yellow onions  and cabbages in the Paris market. Roads then not being so good, some local entrepreneur realised that England was just as near and began using the local fishing vessels to take fresh veg to Britain. Onions were the veg most appreciated and so the story of Johnny Onions began. The local onion crop was peddled all over coastal Britain tied to the handle-bars of decrepit cycles, the impression being given that Johnny had cycled all the way from France with strings of onions on his bike. In fact, the trade was highly organised with teams of salesmen delivered by old vans to British centres. Later, cargo vessels were chartered to deliver increasing loads of veg to go by train to Covent Garden. Holiday makers asked if perhaps their cars could be transshipped, an old RO RO ferry was bought and the rest is history. Veg still goes but the real profit is in the vehicle cross-channel tourist  trade.

  The town also has had a turbulent past. It has served as a base for corsairs preying on English shipping Of course, fair`s fair and in 1375 the harbour was destroyed by the Earl of Arundel. Defences have been put in place over the years probably with some success though the last thing the Roscoff citizens want nowadays is to discourage their British clients, who have brought some prosperity to the town. The Germans during the Occupation were not so hospitable, and built this casserne which has since been demolished, not an easy task I should imagine.

  What you see today is a charming little town and fishing port, narrow granite streets and a lace-work church spire. Well worth stopping to visit before starting your drive to the South!
  And that`s not to mention the sandy beaches and little off-shore islands. Perhaps I`ll return to this theme another time.
 

  Bye for now got to change the oil and filter on the car.

The traveling Ark

When we are on the road, the dogs usually come too. The boot of the car has been adapted by a home-made barrier so that they can have their own space. Perhaps `space` is not the right word as it is quite small, but the dogs don`t seem to mind. Indeed they seem to look forward to a road trip and picket the door as soon as they detect any packing activity. If we are staying more than a day or two in a location, I have another barrier which can be fixed with the back seats lowered, to allow a more spacious `kennel`. Far from disliking the confinement, they enjoy going to different places. I have had the experience of the dogs, after a long trip back from somewhere, trying to get back in the car after their walk. The cats, now, cannot come. They don`t like car travel and could not be confined in the car!
  If we need to stop en route, we usually use the Formule 1 hotels. They are very reasonably priced, by the room rather than per person as in the UK. Their only disadvantage is that the showers and toilets are not en suite. If you are willing to pay a little more, the Premier Classe,Band B or Quick Palace chains offer this convenience. Most allow you to take a pet in your room at a small supplementary cost but we never do. The dogs would keep us awake and there is always the fear of an `accident`. They sleep quite happily in the car as they have always been accustomed to do. On the right you can see how breakfast time at the Formule 1 is organised for the canine travelers. The humans can dine inside, of course!
   One of the reasons that the dogs don`t complain at their travel arrangements, is that they get more walks in new places, always a treat for dogs. We stop en route every 2 hours, which is good for dogs and humans. When we are staying in the Pyrenees, the dogs have more and varied walks than they experience at home. True, on a trip to Roscoff to put Kim on the ferry, the walks are less exciting, but a dog is an optimist and can always hope!

  Bye for now, off to walk the dogs!