My wife Kelly and I booked this cruise to Hawaii some 18 months prior to the
sailing. We took an E1 class stateroom, an outside stateroom with balcony on
10 deck starboard side. The ship was to depart at 5pm, we flew via United
Airlines from San Fransisco and arrived at 1:30pm. The taxi to the ship
terminal in downtown San Diego took but 10 minutes and cost (with tip) 15
USD.
Upon arriving at the cruise terminal the cab driver removed our three bags
and placed them on the pavement beside the car. From that moment on the
departure "proceedure" became a confusing and poorly executed mess. In a
line we trundled toward an apparent area where something related to getting
the bags on large carts was happening in a halting and haphazard fashion.
Finally what appeared to be a cruseline employee hoisted our bags onto a
waiting cart and we departed to the terminal building to check-in.
The check-in process took about 20 minutes, the usual security checks of our
carry-on bags and whatever was in our pockets plus (of course) in enevitable
shoe removal and xray. Now onto the ramp and up into the Serenade of The
Seas.
Once aboard we were directed toward the #@!@!#@ elevators, these damnable
things NEVER performed as elevators are supposed to in regard to stopping at
floors with lighted up/down buttons. Who designed this system?! We waited
and waited along with a growing crowd as elevator after elevator, sometimes
full, most times NOT, went past.
Our cabin (#1500) was far forward on the 10 deck starboard. It was a quite
nice space, about 170 sq ft. with a sliding door to the balcony with it's
magnificent panoramic view. This was the first time we ever had such a room
on any cruise we have taken and it made the room seem larger and brighter
than the inside cabins we have had before. Well worth the added cost in my
opinion. Storage room in the closet was adequate for our needs except that
our larger bag could not be stowed in the closet and instead had to be left
at the foot of the double bed. We shortly met our room steward with his
kindly manner and big smile. The room was always cleaned when we expected
and because of my wife's illness he had to work around the oxygen
concentrator given to us by the hospital staff onboard at times.
This is a large ship, at 90000 tons she holds about 2300 people though it
never seemed crowded no matter where we were. The public areas are quite
large and the expansive windows allow magnificent views out over the ocean.
The Centrum is a large attrium midship that with it's glass, large modernist
sculpture and elevators was the central interior feature of the ship.
A dance floor with bandstand on the 4 deck was always full and with other
public areas about the circumfrence the music was easy to listen to no
matter where you were.
The Library was a small area with many bookshelves filled with both
hardbound and softbound books numbering perhaps 1000. Not a major effort like that of the Cunard Lines QE2 or even the library of the old New Amsterdam of Holland
America Lines.
We did not use the pools so cannot comment on that area of the ship.
The Windjammer was on 11 deck and was the ship's informal dining venue.
Large and with the same expanse of glass it was quite inviting. Breakfast,
lunch and dinner were available with a large selection of entries,
sandwiches, cold cuts, salads and deserts. Large platters were the manner
of serving oneself and though the hub bub of many people (the place was
popular!) there was more than enough space to move around the islands of
food. While we did take a few meals (mainly breakfast and when Kelly was ill
it was convienent for me) we preferred to eat in the Reflections Main Dining
Room on Deck 4. Overall I would grade this dining room as 6 on a scale of 10
as many entree items sat too long and became lukewarm and rather uninviting
looking, smaller amounts available would have solved this problem easily.
Also you should try to get there before near the end of the time of closure
of the facility as this will improve the quality of your experience, less
people and more and hotter food will be available.
The Reflections Dining Room was a magnificent space with large cloth
surrounded pillars and white table cloths stretching out for a hundred feet
in all directions. It quickly became our favorite of the entire cruise as
our table-mates and wait staff were exceptonal people by any measure! Almost
immediately we became fast friends and enjoyed telling tales of our lives
and families and our activities both on the ship and on the shore. The food
was abundant and of very good quality (8 out of 10 I'd rate it) throughout
the entire cruise with a special night set aside for the lobster feed
(Wonderful!). Our Waiter Cesar was exceptional in his good humor, bright
and ready smile and continuous helpful, can-do attitude.
He and his assistant MADE the dining experience for us! They were 10 out of
10!
Two other dining venues, Chops Grill and Portofino were used by out
table-mates but not us. I would say that they had mixed reviews for those
that I either overheard or talked to, food was very good (7 - 8 out of 10
perhaps) but some service flaws were apparent.
Deck areas were virtually spotless throughout the ship, that and the 4 acres
(Yes!) of glass made the ship feel light and airy as well. Distances
to/from some facilies can be troublesome for those wheelchair bound cruisers
or the elderly. Handrails are well placed throughout.
I mentioned earlier "kelly's illness". On Friday and Saturday after we had
arrived at the islands we both came down with a mild illness resembling a
cold. Sniffles, itchy, watery eyes and irregular coughs. We discounted the
symptoms and thought ourselves lucky as there were quite a few empty spots
in the Reflections Dining room in the last few days and we had but these
mild symptoms to deal with. Sunday morning she was running a slight fever
and wanted only to sleep and we watched Honolulu thru our balcony door. My
condition improved but hers did not, with periods of sleeping growing longer
and longer. We had dinner via Room Service's rather limited menu and I told
her we'd be visiting the ship's hospital the next morning. I was still
hopeful she'd improve and we could visit Honolulu the next day (Sunday).
In the morning...the motion told me that we were at sea NOT at the dock at
Honolulu! The schedule had included 2 days there but because of the Hilo
Iron Man competions the ship's schedule had changed. We were on the way back
to San Diego this particular Monday morning.
We dressed and I took her directly to the Medical Clinic on 2 Deck forward.
After filling out a three page document with her ID and pertinent medical
information she was taken into the facility, it was 9:15am, Monday morning. At 10:45 I asked if I could see her, the head nurse took me to her bed, she looked pale and drawn and was hooked up to an IV, oxygen and a nebulizer was delivering Ambuterol to help her breathe. Shortly the doctor summonded me to his office, showed me the x-rays and told me that she was very ill with pnuemonia in both lungs. I was shocked,
additionally so as he said they had discussed turning the ship around AGAIN
(more about that later) to evacuate her by helicopter IF she didn't improve
very soon. We retired to our stateroom to allow the Cipro to do it's good
work. We returned at 5pm for a second treatment and she was looking and
acting better even then. The staff was MORE than helpful, very skilled and
communicative through the entire illness. Kelly has since improved and has
a appointment with our physician at Kiaser tomorrow.
I cannot thank or praise the staff of the ship's medical clinic enough, they
saved Kelly's life in front of my very eyes with their quick and accurate
diagnosis and proactive actions. Our emergency care nurse was equally
impressed with the actions taken by the ships medical staff. A 10 out of 10
performance, hurray!
Monday, October 22, 2007
Friday, September 21, 2007
Off we go! Goodbye Paradise...hello Dulles?!
Ohhhh we really DID IT this time. Ann and Raj took us first to Bourges to stay the night at the Berry Hotel across from the train station. At first I doubted this choice of nights rest as in my little mind a hotel next to a train station is a formula for disaster...winess the Termeni train station in Rome or, not so far away, the train station in San Fransisco. I'm thinking of course of the BUS station in SF but still...alas I was wrong. The Berry Hotel was a FINE choice, across the street from the gare itself and with a nice bar underneigth, clean rooms, crisp sheets a good shower..what's to not like? Nice dinner with Ann and Raj at a very nice Chinese restaurant in Bourges, everything was wonderful but the Thai Rice stood out. Then back to have a couple of beers at the hotel then off to beddy bye with the Kats.
In the morning we collected the cats in their carriers, packed up and off we went to the gare for the train to Paris Austerlitz. Nice ride, found many commuters to Orleans. Once in Paris, to the all too familiar Austerlitz to a taxi and off to the airport CDG. Terminal 1 porte 25...United Air Lines in all it's glory. Long confusing lines behind pillars of the awful CDG, another line for the fast ticketting person who then directed us to the REAL ticket counter because we had the two KATS yet to be paid for as excess baggage. "Excess Baggage" Furr-Rr_Ee purred, "well I'll be". MeeeeeOW! So after that hour was done we went up the long ramp walkway to the upper level and #5 concourse. I stopped and had a coffee at a kiosk while Kelly took in the Duty Free shopping opportunity. Atleast we were free of the two humongous bags and ONLY had the two Kats, two carry ons apiece to deal with...6 bags! Off to D1...it must have been a MILE at least. One very LONG walk with the bags unevenly divided between us...me with 4 and Kelly with two. (It was only fair). The plane, a newish Boeing 777 with the overhead luggage racks that don't close easily or on any stewardesses tiptoes. Bad design still exists. A young man helped every stewardess (as best he could) manage the damned bin doors.
Up, up and away! To Dulles International in Washington DC on the first leg of our flight...even though all literature we had indicated this was a DIRECT flight...only the NUMBER was "direct"...it stopped at Dulles anyway and continued as another and different airplane altogether at Dulles. United lies about your reservations AND the flights themselves. They had informed me two days before that we didn't have reservations on this flight and couldn't guarentee that we would even sit togther...THIS after reserving the flight for ALL 4 of us (MeeeeOW!) in November of 2006! Jezzz, did they forget? I dunno but it's not a nice way to treat a long time customer that's for sure. Yes we DID sit together, albeit in the center aisle and couldn't easily get up to walk about and stretch our ancient legs as we were blocked on both sides by sleeping fellow fliers, grrrrrr. Air France is sounding like a better way to go, believe me. At least when they say it's a DIRECT flight they really mean it! Dulles was a DISASTER, a train wreck disguised as an airport. Off to be tortured by foriegners disguised as Americans! Thru customs after a mile walk thru various buildings not clearly marked. Then Passport control, then pick up your baggage, add it to the 6 others you are handling, now in the mile long queue to drop the bags off at another location to be X-rayed AGAIN, pull out the Kats to carry them thru the metal detector outside of their all cloth carriers no less. Then re-dress and fasten shoews and belts, put cats back into carriers and find the damned airplane. It is an old girl, a 767 that has seen better days and better passengers too. The cabin crew was excellent however, serving water and soft drinks and pushing the sandwiches as best they could. We arrived a few minutes early in SFO after a bumpy ride all the way across this great nation of ours. Ted took us home to crash and we arrived almost exactly 24 hrs after we left Bourges. The Kats released started to nose around trying to figure out where they were and where the food was almost immediately. We stared at the piles of mail awaiting openning. Such fun we have.
In the morning we collected the cats in their carriers, packed up and off we went to the gare for the train to Paris Austerlitz. Nice ride, found many commuters to Orleans. Once in Paris, to the all too familiar Austerlitz to a taxi and off to the airport CDG. Terminal 1 porte 25...United Air Lines in all it's glory. Long confusing lines behind pillars of the awful CDG, another line for the fast ticketting person who then directed us to the REAL ticket counter because we had the two KATS yet to be paid for as excess baggage. "Excess Baggage" Furr-Rr_Ee purred, "well I'll be". MeeeeeOW! So after that hour was done we went up the long ramp walkway to the upper level and #5 concourse. I stopped and had a coffee at a kiosk while Kelly took in the Duty Free shopping opportunity. Atleast we were free of the two humongous bags and ONLY had the two Kats, two carry ons apiece to deal with...6 bags! Off to D1...it must have been a MILE at least. One very LONG walk with the bags unevenly divided between us...me with 4 and Kelly with two. (It was only fair). The plane, a newish Boeing 777 with the overhead luggage racks that don't close easily or on any stewardesses tiptoes. Bad design still exists. A young man helped every stewardess (as best he could) manage the damned bin doors.
Up, up and away! To Dulles International in Washington DC on the first leg of our flight...even though all literature we had indicated this was a DIRECT flight...only the NUMBER was "direct"...it stopped at Dulles anyway and continued as another and different airplane altogether at Dulles. United lies about your reservations AND the flights themselves. They had informed me two days before that we didn't have reservations on this flight and couldn't guarentee that we would even sit togther...THIS after reserving the flight for ALL 4 of us (MeeeeOW!) in November of 2006! Jezzz, did they forget? I dunno but it's not a nice way to treat a long time customer that's for sure. Yes we DID sit together, albeit in the center aisle and couldn't easily get up to walk about and stretch our ancient legs as we were blocked on both sides by sleeping fellow fliers, grrrrrr. Air France is sounding like a better way to go, believe me. At least when they say it's a DIRECT flight they really mean it! Dulles was a DISASTER, a train wreck disguised as an airport. Off to be tortured by foriegners disguised as Americans! Thru customs after a mile walk thru various buildings not clearly marked. Then Passport control, then pick up your baggage, add it to the 6 others you are handling, now in the mile long queue to drop the bags off at another location to be X-rayed AGAIN, pull out the Kats to carry them thru the metal detector outside of their all cloth carriers no less. Then re-dress and fasten shoews and belts, put cats back into carriers and find the damned airplane. It is an old girl, a 767 that has seen better days and better passengers too. The cabin crew was excellent however, serving water and soft drinks and pushing the sandwiches as best they could. We arrived a few minutes early in SFO after a bumpy ride all the way across this great nation of ours. Ted took us home to crash and we arrived almost exactly 24 hrs after we left Bourges. The Kats released started to nose around trying to figure out where they were and where the food was almost immediately. We stared at the piles of mail awaiting openning. Such fun we have.
Monday, September 17, 2007
Tick-Tock, Friends and Fine Chilli
The days seem to be winding off now like film off a reel, much left to do, little left to accomplish, friends to say goodbye to in this most social of Paradises. Got a call to come to dinner Monday night at 6:30 at Phillip's redone pile-of-rocks, we hadn't seen him in a while and he invited Raj and Ann and two other friends Mimie and Dan whom we had not yet met. The tour of the house was wonderful, Phillip has done beautiful work throughout and all of it his own handiwork. Refinished walls and exposed beams everywhere, the house NEVER looked better! Bravo! He showed me the PROPER color of a sweat soldered copper fitting, not black like my own! Rounds of tequila all around as we chatted away like budgies in a cage. The weather tried to cooperate but couldn't hold back quite long enough and before sun down it rained only a while. Dinner was terrific! We had salsa pigau (sic), a coarsely chopped salsa, very fresh and wonderful, good ol' french chips, his own flour tortillas, avocado dip, a catsup, a large bowl of basmati rice as fluffy as it could be and the piece du resistance, the chili, a hearty, thick and thoroughly flavorful one as well! It was great! I ate three helpings in all! Phillip did a wonderful job all around, I told him "I'd pay for that!" the finest compliment you can get in local and friendly gastronomy. Chatter went on and on for hours like it always does, so many subjects so little time. We had poached pears and vanilla ice cream for desert, gads...sooo good, so good. What a cook! This little corner of France has so many good cooks it's quite amazing, it is cooking for the love of it as well which is the best reason. We got home at 1:30 this morning, burp! Thank you Phillip for a wonderful night with good friends and great food!
Today will be more cleaning up at the little house and the same here, I've yet to drain down the chaffage (heating plumbing system) but will, clean out the car and sort out our reservations for ourselves and The Kats. Since it's UAL operated thru Lufthansa it will be an interesting adventure I'm sure.
Off to the coffee machine.
Today will be more cleaning up at the little house and the same here, I've yet to drain down the chaffage (heating plumbing system) but will, clean out the car and sort out our reservations for ourselves and The Kats. Since it's UAL operated thru Lufthansa it will be an interesting adventure I'm sure.
Off to the coffee machine.
Tuesday, September 11, 2007
Great Friends and Coming Goodbyes
Ah, we've almost finished this 6 month stint in the field of our dreams. It has been a fortuitous one for sure, meeting new friends, Ann and Raj and Phillip and Maggie though the latter two are neigh invisible they still remain our friends.
This last Sunday we ventured on an invite to Ann and Raj's pavilion to enjoy a lunch cum dinner that filled us up so that we didn't eat on Monday! She said some while back that "I'm not a cook", well...for being such she sure puts on a show! Maybe it's Raj but I don't think so, I just think she was being modest. I am NOT so inclined these days, I do the grocery shopping, and the cooking and Kelly helps prep and does her saladerie and d'orderves and a course of her own. The entrie is up to me. Raj does SOMETHING, but it's hidden and secretive. She made a wonderful de-constructed salad platter with leaf lettuce, bell peppers, carrots and other crunchy veges and a nice vinaigrette as an opener...it was almost a dinner of it's own! The a cheese course (of course, it's France!) of 5 cheeses, a goat, a cheddar,
two blues and a creamy French "smeller" that was delicious. Then we babbled on like we do for several hours while taking in the Sunday sunshine. They are more like brother and sister to us than good friends, we talk of our dreams, our tribulations, our piles of rocks, our kids, France and the future like we've known each other since birth. It is a most wonderful relationship. The closest we have in France, that's for sure! About 7 we sat down once again to dinner this time, a lovely roti of porc with twice cooked potatoes, delicious it was, every bit. She is earning her Moons that's for sure! I would have gladly paid for this meal! Dessert was of two varieties, her Creme Brulle, lovely, light and soooo delicious and my rather ordinary (but large with many apples of an unknown variety, 7 to be exact) apple tart. Then booze to finish, a nice scotch and an ancient 35yr PLUS Arminiac...so fine but with a high proof to match. A lovely Sunday afternoon and evening in a wonderful setting with the best of friends, Life does not get better t
This last Sunday we ventured on an invite to Ann and Raj's pavilion to enjoy a lunch cum dinner that filled us up so that we didn't eat on Monday! She said some while back that "I'm not a cook", well...for being such she sure puts on a show! Maybe it's Raj but I don't think so, I just think she was being modest. I am NOT so inclined these days, I do the grocery shopping, and the cooking and Kelly helps prep and does her saladerie and d'orderves and a course of her own. The entrie is up to me. Raj does SOMETHING, but it's hidden and secretive. She made a wonderful de-constructed salad platter with leaf lettuce, bell peppers, carrots and other crunchy veges and a nice vinaigrette as an opener...it was almost a dinner of it's own! The a cheese course (of course, it's France!) of 5 cheeses, a goat, a cheddar,
two blues and a creamy French "smeller" that was delicious. Then we babbled on like we do for several hours while taking in the Sunday sunshine. They are more like brother and sister to us than good friends, we talk of our dreams, our tribulations, our piles of rocks, our kids, France and the future like we've known each other since birth. It is a most wonderful relationship. The closest we have in France, that's for sure! About 7 we sat down once again to dinner this time, a lovely roti of porc with twice cooked potatoes, delicious it was, every bit. She is earning her Moons that's for sure! I would have gladly paid for this meal! Dessert was of two varieties, her Creme Brulle, lovely, light and soooo delicious and my rather ordinary (but large with many apples of an unknown variety, 7 to be exact) apple tart. Then booze to finish, a nice scotch and an ancient 35yr PLUS Arminiac...so fine but with a high proof to match. A lovely Sunday afternoon and evening in a wonderful setting with the best of friends, Life does not get better t
Friday, August 31, 2007
HORNETS! Call the Fire Company!
And that's exactly what we did. Some two weeks ago (maybe 3) the next door neighbor lady came to our door about 1730 in an excited state and pointed to the edge of the house. I followed her in my bare feet as she gazed upwards to a large black/brown mass on the side of our abode near the chimney. I understood her one word of anglaise "Hornets!", I stared with her for a few minutes while she excitedly explained what I was to do about it...none of which I understood. (Ah the convienent language barrier) So back into the house I went and explained it all to Kelly who paid as much attention to the matter as I did...live and let live is a basic motto about this place. Interest peaked the day before yesterday when about 8pm a single LARGE (key word here) yellow and black HORNET made itself known buzzing about the chandelier in the upstairs landing. Then there were two, then 3. Audrey went into a STATE, locking herself into the guest room and climbing in her bed nest shrouded with the mosquito net...no help from her! Kelly continued to peck away at her laptop and I just stared at the monsters as they seemed to be working up a plan by being at the same spot at the same time about the base of the lamp. A plan was laid to call the fire company the next morning (yesterday) via Mary at the tourist office. They said they'd come for a payment of 50 Euros and that they would call before showing up. When they would come was not mentioned. This morning a nice fireman showed up at our door setting the time for the removal of the offending hornet's nest at 1730. All according to plan. The day proceeded with us making preparations for our guest for dinner tonight. Beef and cabbage soup, sweet and sour Rabbit with black pepper polenta, zuchinni quiche, lemon icecream. Just after our guest for the evening arrived a loud roar of a large diesel truck was heard and there appeared across the street a hook and ladder truck of the modern-type with the in-line hydralic lift ladder and basket. Our hornet's nest's demise was at hand. And a 8 person squad of fire-persons set up a road blockade, intoduced each other to us at the door and with great efficiency set up the truck and suited up in a blue anti-hornet outfit, climbed into the basket atop the truck and set off to reach and attack the nesting hornets where they lived, inside the walls of 35 Rue Marechal Joffre. Spray flew in great clouds and hornets buzzed about in a frenzied attack on the fire persons, including one next to me a hundred feet away from the house! They were insulted to say the least and weren't going down without a fight. Soon the outside action was complete, the long arm of the ladder retracted, the man out of the blue suit and soon a cadre of anti-hornet experts were tromping through our house headed for the attic (granier) to find and extract the rest of the nest. After a few minutes another fireman came down holding a plastic bag and showed us the contents, a HUGE nest filled with grubs and demised hornets. Amazing! Hundreds would have been born very shortly, much to our possible pain. They packed up all thier gear and after a signing ceremony including handshakes in all directions, much "mercies" in evidence they took thier leave. Whewww, that chapter was over, now onto dinner...
Tuesday, August 28, 2007
Dinner for Seven
Tonight at 7pm, dinner for 7, us included. Audrey arrived last week for her 12 day stay with us. She is amazingly helpful in all manner of things, quick runs to the store to get last minute loaves of bread and the all-important potatoes, vacuuming the guest room where she is staying, general straightening out of the mess that this house becomes after such an event as tonight. We have Will and Dawn, a Scottish couple who real really DO owe a dinner, it's been two years! The last trip over the pond we didn't accomplish the deed for some reason or the other and barely had any formal dinners for either ex-pats or our French friends. This time has been different and we have had 4 dinners so far but no French friends, tonight that all changes, the French are coming, the french are coming! I'm cooking a braised pork roast with apricot/onion coolis, carrots with orange and thyme, roast potatoes as the main course. The pork roast has been marinating in onion, salt, sugar and white white since 1 am last night. It will be braised in the marinade with the addition of apricot conserve, it'll take about 2 hrs to get up to 150 degrees (my current target temp for French pork) then I'll let it rest for about 20 minutes to allow the juices to redistribute. this won't be much of a problem as the thing is braising anyway. Kelly is doing a compressa of fresh (our own!) tomatos, buffalo mozerella, and parma ham as a first. The wine will be a white, Poully Fume. Cheese course of french cheeses, a blue, a hard cheese and a goat and another white wine a Quincy (fabulous local white). A green salad with olive oil and basalmic vinegar followed by desert, Peach ice cream with sliced peaches. Liquorosas to follow from our amazing liquor cabinet (the talk of Lignieres we hear!)(Oh those Americans!)
Sunday, August 19, 2007
Like a jungle in Paradise
Off to the ZOO at Doue La Fontaine south of the Loire River in the western Loire Valley. It's a zoo buried in an old quarry, many levels, tunnels, creeks and waterfalls. Beautiful life-like enclosures for all manner of animals from all over the world. It is my favorite zoo. So we invited Ann and Raj to join us on my B-Day to wander there using thier Tom Tom GPS device to help us navigate our way thru the twisting turning little backroads that lead one there. The day was beautiful, cool and while overcast with a slight breeze to keep us fresh, it was wonderful. We ate lunch first on a level above the giraffes. Steak and frites for all of us of varying levels of doneness. We took copious pictures of the giraffes and zebra that inhabit that particular enclosure. Afterwards we began our trip through the zoo, bats in the bat cave, lions, tigers, monkeys, rhinos, storks, herons and all manner of other birds. Blue parrots, bears then about 2 pm we came across our favorites, the vultures. Favorites? Yes! They are fantastic! Their stride is eccentric, a little jump followed by a waddling hop repeated again and again. A dance. Then the food arrived, horse ribs...a couple of racks, oh my...they went wild. Screaming, jumping,
chasing one another and posing. Wow, what a sight they are. We watched them for better than an hour and a half. More to come on this one...after the break.
chasing one another and posing. Wow, what a sight they are. We watched them for better than an hour and a half. More to come on this one...after the break.
Thursday, August 16, 2007
MY @@!#$$ Nikon Died
Shit! Yes, le camera ce mort..."lens error" when first turned on. I feel blind. I cannot see thru my camera anymore, like I lost the eye of the cyclopse and am now falling into the abyss. I first didn't believe it, how could this high tech all metal wonder the Nikon Coolpix S10 be so very sick. The message "lens error" was indicated in the manual as needing the services of a Nikon approved service center. I changed the battery. I changed the SD memory card. I removed and reinserted the battery a thousand times. I froze the camera. I heated it up. Wirrrrr and then "lens error". Shit. So now to replace it. I only want IT, I bought accessories, a lens cap, 2 spare batteries and several SD cards. Shit. So onto eBay to find how few people will or CAN ship to France from the US of A. Too difficult I guess. Too risky for a perpetually scared public. Oh well. I MUST have another. After reading about "lens error" I've discovered that many other cameras Nikon, Olympus, Canon etc. etc. there MUST be a thousand makes and more models than you can shake a stick at. I only WANT this one. Heck.
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Off to an auction this afternoon with Raj and Ann...should be great fun poking around and gawking at stuff.
H
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Off to an auction this afternoon with Raj and Ann...should be great fun poking around and gawking at stuff.
H
Sunday, July 29, 2007
A Berrichon Kitchen
I have been busy. Very busy. Painting a faux tile floor over the old grey concrete that coverred 1/2 the kitchen floor. Then plumbed in the first water line that ever graced the room itself, be it a kitchen or not. Then built a berrichon-like 6 legged table to set the big double ceramic sink on (tres cher...very expensive!) then plumbed in the 10 liter hot water heater in the old abandonned sink location beside the window. Plumbed in the sink and new drain outlet thru the old rock wall.
All of this AND builtin the cooktop on a table and installed the propper gas setup to let it function on propane, it being from California and only known to run on Natural gas. It's all been wonderful to do and fun to see the results but it has been non stop work for the last three plus weeks. I defrosted the freezer this morning and we went to the brocante in St. Aout (Sant-too) before the horse races this afternoon with our Brit friends. They have fixed a picnic and we are taking three bottles of the finest 85 cent sparkling wine to wash it all down with. The day is overcast with occassional blue patches to give hope for a ray of sunshine in this perpetual spring. Zuchinni are popping out of the now huge Zucco plants, I try to keep inventory so we don't get deluged with uneaten ones that grow ever bigger each second. My toatoes have fared poorly, first it was the wilt which decimated nearly every plant thanks to the overly wet days and nights. Then the fruit sits there green and refuses to ripen even a little bit. They won't be worth eating raw ever but maybe I can coax them into a sauce that'll be ok. We will see.
The noisy neighbors kept up the weed whipping all yesterday afternoon, so if it isn't that damned noisemaker it's the son and his damnable motorbike racing too and from down th narrow streets of our village. Where's a slightly drunken tractor operator when you need one?
All of this AND builtin the cooktop on a table and installed the propper gas setup to let it function on propane, it being from California and only known to run on Natural gas. It's all been wonderful to do and fun to see the results but it has been non stop work for the last three plus weeks. I defrosted the freezer this morning and we went to the brocante in St. Aout (Sant-too) before the horse races this afternoon with our Brit friends. They have fixed a picnic and we are taking three bottles of the finest 85 cent sparkling wine to wash it all down with. The day is overcast with occassional blue patches to give hope for a ray of sunshine in this perpetual spring. Zuchinni are popping out of the now huge Zucco plants, I try to keep inventory so we don't get deluged with uneaten ones that grow ever bigger each second. My toatoes have fared poorly, first it was the wilt which decimated nearly every plant thanks to the overly wet days and nights. Then the fruit sits there green and refuses to ripen even a little bit. They won't be worth eating raw ever but maybe I can coax them into a sauce that'll be ok. We will see.
The noisy neighbors kept up the weed whipping all yesterday afternoon, so if it isn't that damned noisemaker it's the son and his damnable motorbike racing too and from down th narrow streets of our village. Where's a slightly drunken tractor operator when you need one?
Monday, July 09, 2007
Two Summer Days in Paradise
The ceiling was the item of opportunity today, Kim said he'd more than happily help and that he would call in the morning Monday. That he did at about 10:15 and announced he was bound with his mum to the market in Lignieres, did we need anything.
No was the answer, what I needed was HIM...ceiling disposal is a major task, hard work, dirty and difficult. I gathered a rake, two shovels, a hoe and a 15lb breaker bar for the task. The ceiling was, in my estimation, barely hanging on to the lath so would take little in the way of urging to break loose and fall to the ground. I started at about 10am and had half of it off and onto the floor an hour later, about the time Kim arrived. I really welcomed his help, the dust, the grit in the eyes were all difficult to deal with. He tore into the remaing parts like a demon possessed, wow! The lath, plaster, horsehair and ages of dirt and seed...SEED! Yes, seed, sveral hundred pounds of either wheat or oat seed, sans bag to help ID it, but yes, SEED! Down it all fell, oh what a mess. Within an hour we were deep into the dirty, gritty mess and looked just like it despite out eye protection googles, ther face masks and helmets. What amess. Only one broken window and I did that myself.
One slip. Gasp! I coughed up crap for an hour afterwards even though we wore masks.
The beams are now exposed, 6X6 roughly, oak, old oak, whole limbs. Some rot but not bad. Tomorrow I'll pressure wash them to rid us of the dirt and grit as well as the spider webs. In a few days I'll seal them witha poison product that kills the beetles that infest them most of the time. Then comes the tiling and painting.
Goodnight all,
H
No was the answer, what I needed was HIM...ceiling disposal is a major task, hard work, dirty and difficult. I gathered a rake, two shovels, a hoe and a 15lb breaker bar for the task. The ceiling was, in my estimation, barely hanging on to the lath so would take little in the way of urging to break loose and fall to the ground. I started at about 10am and had half of it off and onto the floor an hour later, about the time Kim arrived. I really welcomed his help, the dust, the grit in the eyes were all difficult to deal with. He tore into the remaing parts like a demon possessed, wow! The lath, plaster, horsehair and ages of dirt and seed...SEED! Yes, seed, sveral hundred pounds of either wheat or oat seed, sans bag to help ID it, but yes, SEED! Down it all fell, oh what a mess. Within an hour we were deep into the dirty, gritty mess and looked just like it despite out eye protection googles, ther face masks and helmets. What amess. Only one broken window and I did that myself.
One slip. Gasp! I coughed up crap for an hour afterwards even though we wore masks.
The beams are now exposed, 6X6 roughly, oak, old oak, whole limbs. Some rot but not bad. Tomorrow I'll pressure wash them to rid us of the dirt and grit as well as the spider webs. In a few days I'll seal them witha poison product that kills the beetles that infest them most of the time. Then comes the tiling and painting.
Goodnight all,
H
Wednesday, July 04, 2007
Wake up and get to work! It's Paradise!
A "Day Off" around these parts means travelling across the French countryside to either Bourges or Chateauroux and buying yards and yards of cloth OR/AND walking miles (literally) in a HUGE Hardware, Lighting, Painting Supply, Tile, Lumberyard Superstore (Hyper-Magazine here) to find something for this huge old house of ours.
All of which means MORE work (of course) doing something (painting, tiling, wallpapering, climbing up and down and LOOKING, sweeping, cleaning) with whatever was purchased. It is the same for both of us, our travels are about our work, our purchases are about our work, our existance is about our work and our WORK is this lovely old pile of rocks.
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There is no summer this year, no canicule (hot days), just clouds, wind, rain and the occassional ray of sun to remind us that our nearest star is still out there beaming along with it's magical warm light. Temps above 75 degrees (24 Centigrade)
are rare, infact MOST days are in the 60's and nights in the 50's this Summer. Brrrrr. But we are Californians, where the price of electricity is TWICE that of France (13.5 cents/kilowatt hr. vs 7) that to air-condition our home there costs about 10 dollars (7 Euros) per DAY! And summer there can include (and DOES) DAYS OVER 90 or 100 degrees. Here we put on sweatshirts and sweaters and go back to painting or tiling or whatever else is on the menu for the day's activities. Oh progress is being made, remember back to the old GE (General Electric) ads when Ronald Reagan said "Progress is our most important project!" That's how we feel, little is completed BUT we are working all the time towards that common goal...thus we are Progressing. Amen. Summer or not we are having a good time with all of this, wheres my sweatshirt? In the laundry no doubt.
All of which means MORE work (of course) doing something (painting, tiling, wallpapering, climbing up and down and LOOKING, sweeping, cleaning) with whatever was purchased. It is the same for both of us, our travels are about our work, our purchases are about our work, our existance is about our work and our WORK is this lovely old pile of rocks.
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There is no summer this year, no canicule (hot days), just clouds, wind, rain and the occassional ray of sun to remind us that our nearest star is still out there beaming along with it's magical warm light. Temps above 75 degrees (24 Centigrade)
are rare, infact MOST days are in the 60's and nights in the 50's this Summer. Brrrrr. But we are Californians, where the price of electricity is TWICE that of France (13.5 cents/kilowatt hr. vs 7) that to air-condition our home there costs about 10 dollars (7 Euros) per DAY! And summer there can include (and DOES) DAYS OVER 90 or 100 degrees. Here we put on sweatshirts and sweaters and go back to painting or tiling or whatever else is on the menu for the day's activities. Oh progress is being made, remember back to the old GE (General Electric) ads when Ronald Reagan said "Progress is our most important project!" That's how we feel, little is completed BUT we are working all the time towards that common goal...thus we are Progressing. Amen. Summer or not we are having a good time with all of this, wheres my sweatshirt? In the laundry no doubt.
Sunday, July 01, 2007
The Examination Room Transformed
We have been working since last Sunday on the exam room. In a previous life it was a bedroom for a child whom we now know as a fellow 60+ yr old ex-teacher in Lignieres.
She came to the house and explained the layout for us. Her father had died when she was but 6 yrs old outside on the street somehow. She had her bedroom in the later day examination room. It was blue wallpaper then as well...along with the two doors to nowhere on either side of the central doorway. We removed all traces of the blue nightmare. In it's place a much lighter treatment of trois wallpaper (covering earlier damage and uneven character of the horsehair plaster wall). Kelly said "We'll knock this out in a few hours Monday...as we were stripping the wallpaper last Sunday). Not exactly. The pipes for the radiator and the 10 cm for the upstairs potty and cold water pipe for the sink interviened. It took hours to do each corner of the room what with the damnable pipes and the doors to nowhere, we didn't finish the papering until this morning...Sunday morning, a week later. We finished by papering each door panel, matching the pattern side to side and top to bottom. It looks good but boy, what a bunch of work it was! Now we get to tile the remaining areas around the sink with fine Italian 5X5 (inch) beige tile. It'll be pretty and a damned sight better than the awful, depressing blue mess we started with.
Goodbye for now,
H
She came to the house and explained the layout for us. Her father had died when she was but 6 yrs old outside on the street somehow. She had her bedroom in the later day examination room. It was blue wallpaper then as well...along with the two doors to nowhere on either side of the central doorway. We removed all traces of the blue nightmare. In it's place a much lighter treatment of trois wallpaper (covering earlier damage and uneven character of the horsehair plaster wall). Kelly said "We'll knock this out in a few hours Monday...as we were stripping the wallpaper last Sunday). Not exactly. The pipes for the radiator and the 10 cm for the upstairs potty and cold water pipe for the sink interviened. It took hours to do each corner of the room what with the damnable pipes and the doors to nowhere, we didn't finish the papering until this morning...Sunday morning, a week later. We finished by papering each door panel, matching the pattern side to side and top to bottom. It looks good but boy, what a bunch of work it was! Now we get to tile the remaining areas around the sink with fine Italian 5X5 (inch) beige tile. It'll be pretty and a damned sight better than the awful, depressing blue mess we started with.
Goodbye for now,
H
Friday, June 22, 2007
Murs, Plafonds, Sols in Paradise
Let's say you want to hang a painting in your new house somewhere in the USA, Canada
or other "modern" countries. You examine the painting for the type of hanger it requires, say it's a simple ^^^^^ metal piece expecting a small nail head to retain it at some spot on your beautiful wall. You obtain a nail that HAS a head of sufficient length to engage the material the wall is made (say dry wall...er plasterboard or lath and plaster) of or use a stud finder or magnetic device
to find a wooden stud at a close enough location to where you want the painting exhibited to nail to. Then you pound in the nail leaving enough length to engage the hanger device or wire on the back of the painting. Easy enough huh? You could even go another step and use a small molly (plastic/metal) to install a small screw into for that deluxe job. That's there...where you ARE or WERE once. I live HERE, my house is HERE and the walls involved are HERE too. They are of two broad types, not even distantly related to each other, 2 - 3 feet thick od either SOLID limestone/marble cut from a quarry or from some castle, castle wall, fallen down barn or house or whatever. It is NOT hollow, it is SOLID, VERY solid. Sometimes this type is coverred over with a layer of lime and horsehair, applied up to an inch thick to fill irregularities in the pierres (stones), this type is quite old and therefore fragile at times, very fragile. Regular quicklime plaster is used as well when they ran out of horses. Often the ceilings are the horsehair variety installed over a lath-like assemblage...but that's ceilings, we are stuck at the wall painting hanging business right now, why did you try to distract me? Another type of wall is
stone and mud/sand coverred with crepie...lime mixed with sand. It can also find itself coverred with the horsehair mix or plaster. No matter...any attempt to NAIL into the stone wall under the horsehair stuff will result in a bent nail, fractured horsehair/plaster and a damaged thumb. You must either relocate the offending nail to a less solid place (like your skull) or grab a hammer drill, drill a 1/4" hole using a carbide tipped drill, install a molly of plastic or metal then screw in a nice screw. In the stone/mud wall with horsehair covering you can do a similar thing with a chance that you might actually find a spot in the mud that is hard enough that a molly with be able to be glued to the hole, left to cure, then screwed into.
Mollys rule here. Then there's the roman brick wall with horsehair/plaster or just plaster...you know it because it rains red dust when you try to drill the molly's hole and hit a brick that is in mid self-destruction, you see these roman bricks can be damned near glass-like or simply MUD that was never fired in a kiln at all or for a time not to exceed 10 minutes. It could be dried horse shit for all it matters because no molly made will be glued or otherwise attached to this crap. It falls apart if touched. Solution? Move the molly's location and try, try again, maybe this new one will have a half-hard one to fasten to. Then there are the famous HOLLOW brick walls...the brick is actually hollow...it's lightweight so eacy to assemble upstairs somewhere and is THIN...like 2 inches thin. That's the hint you needed. Small molly's CAN be attached, nails do NOT work unless they are very small and won't hold your painting. The problem here is that when you drill for a moilly to this the drill drills right thru the hollow brick to the hollow place inside and strikes nothing. The thickness may or may not be thick enough to set in a molly at all...now you wisely go to the spring loaded molly for hollow walls and do that knowing it is a one time shot at getting the depth right and you cannot remove the molly to adjust it in anyway once it has been insewrted into the wall or the little sping wing thingie will drop to the inside of the hollow brick never to be seen again, get another molly. Those with wood walls, I applaud your good common sense.
or other "modern" countries. You examine the painting for the type of hanger it requires, say it's a simple ^^^^^ metal piece expecting a small nail head to retain it at some spot on your beautiful wall. You obtain a nail that HAS a head of sufficient length to engage the material the wall is made (say dry wall...er plasterboard or lath and plaster) of or use a stud finder or magnetic device
to find a wooden stud at a close enough location to where you want the painting exhibited to nail to. Then you pound in the nail leaving enough length to engage the hanger device or wire on the back of the painting. Easy enough huh? You could even go another step and use a small molly (plastic/metal) to install a small screw into for that deluxe job. That's there...where you ARE or WERE once. I live HERE, my house is HERE and the walls involved are HERE too. They are of two broad types, not even distantly related to each other, 2 - 3 feet thick od either SOLID limestone/marble cut from a quarry or from some castle, castle wall, fallen down barn or house or whatever. It is NOT hollow, it is SOLID, VERY solid. Sometimes this type is coverred over with a layer of lime and horsehair, applied up to an inch thick to fill irregularities in the pierres (stones), this type is quite old and therefore fragile at times, very fragile. Regular quicklime plaster is used as well when they ran out of horses. Often the ceilings are the horsehair variety installed over a lath-like assemblage...but that's ceilings, we are stuck at the wall painting hanging business right now, why did you try to distract me? Another type of wall is
stone and mud/sand coverred with crepie...lime mixed with sand. It can also find itself coverred with the horsehair mix or plaster. No matter...any attempt to NAIL into the stone wall under the horsehair stuff will result in a bent nail, fractured horsehair/plaster and a damaged thumb. You must either relocate the offending nail to a less solid place (like your skull) or grab a hammer drill, drill a 1/4" hole using a carbide tipped drill, install a molly of plastic or metal then screw in a nice screw. In the stone/mud wall with horsehair covering you can do a similar thing with a chance that you might actually find a spot in the mud that is hard enough that a molly with be able to be glued to the hole, left to cure, then screwed into.
Mollys rule here. Then there's the roman brick wall with horsehair/plaster or just plaster...you know it because it rains red dust when you try to drill the molly's hole and hit a brick that is in mid self-destruction, you see these roman bricks can be damned near glass-like or simply MUD that was never fired in a kiln at all or for a time not to exceed 10 minutes. It could be dried horse shit for all it matters because no molly made will be glued or otherwise attached to this crap. It falls apart if touched. Solution? Move the molly's location and try, try again, maybe this new one will have a half-hard one to fasten to. Then there are the famous HOLLOW brick walls...the brick is actually hollow...it's lightweight so eacy to assemble upstairs somewhere and is THIN...like 2 inches thin. That's the hint you needed. Small molly's CAN be attached, nails do NOT work unless they are very small and won't hold your painting. The problem here is that when you drill for a moilly to this the drill drills right thru the hollow brick to the hollow place inside and strikes nothing. The thickness may or may not be thick enough to set in a molly at all...now you wisely go to the spring loaded molly for hollow walls and do that knowing it is a one time shot at getting the depth right and you cannot remove the molly to adjust it in anyway once it has been insewrted into the wall or the little sping wing thingie will drop to the inside of the hollow brick never to be seen again, get another molly. Those with wood walls, I applaud your good common sense.
Monday, June 18, 2007
Postman Pat Delivers to Paradise!
Background, Pierre has a truck. We won an EKTORP Ikea sofa on eBay.FR which resided in (near) Paris). The other day, Friday, we stopped at the boulangerie in Le Chatelet for the usual pastry fix on the way to the junk store in Montlucon. As I sat in the idling Avensis, along comes our brand new friend Pierre. He sees me, I roll down the window and shake hands, "how are you!" In a moments chat re what we are doing in HIS village the conversation turns to acquiring a truck big enough to stuff a sofa into. How? I dunno but it worked at the time, he indicates HIS truck parked across the street "Postman Pat". I ask if we might borrow it and he said "sure", our day was made! How to get an IKEA EKTORP sofa from Paris to Lignieres was becoming quite a problem, as neither of us possessed a VL license that allows us to rent such a vehicle in France. So now we have a truck (ex mail truck!) available, after the less thsn satisfactory visit to the Mountlucon junk store (we bought NOTHING) we made our way via the Leader Price grocery outlet and Brico store back home. We emailed the owner of the EKTORP (where does IKEA get these names?!) and made a date for yesterday (Sunday) at 2pm to pick up the object. So up at 7 to prep, remove couch A from spot A, move to spot B after removing sofa B to Spot C. Now to obtain EKTORP D which is 200 miles north of us at Spot D. So off we go thru the streets of Lignieres, out to the countryside to seekout the desired truck "Postman Pat" at Pierre's own pile of rocks. There she/he was, sitting on the edge of the road as red as a Royal Mail truck ever was.
Pierre, it's proud owner, wiggled the keys gleefully at us over the fence. He ran us thru a few cautions and notations, "The doors are tough to open", "use the key and jerk the handle at the same time to open the rear door", "This is the key for the fuel cap" and so on. After a short tour of his pile of rocks and all the wonderful work he has done to it by HIMSELF no less, we were OFF! Turn the key, watch the glow plug light go out, turn further, Varoooom! She fires right off.
We pull away as Pierre watched anxiously...with good reason! You see this Royal Mail vehicle is RIGHT HAND DRIVE! And I am an American. Not an easy fit for sure. But I have done this before in both England and Scotland so it's sort of...kina...familiar. Stick has 5 speeds forward with the top one a true overdrive for cruising on flat ground, 4th is normal high gear. 1st gear you could use to pull up tree stumps. Thru the little hamlet we go out thru the forest and 15 minutes later we pull up to the A71 entrance at St. Amand. Grab a toll ticket and the gate goes up and we pull away to accelerate for the next few minutes up to our crusing speed of 55 mph in top gear. Not bad. We settle in for the long drive ahead of us under a cloudy sky with rays of sunshine lighting the road ahead, certainly a good omen. Mile after mile roll by, at first a joy as we can see above the roadside fences and bushes to the views beyond...and they are magnificent! The French countryside is ablaze with spring colors, the reds of poppies, the blue of foxglove,
the yellow of colza and dandilion. Spectacular! We stop for an espresso at one of the many Air du this or that that they have scattered along the major motorways throughout France. Makes for a pleasant stop to walk about, shop for Products Regional featured at almost every one (candies, clothing, ceramics, cookies, the ever present wines) and an ice cream (A Magnum bar...YUM! Cappucino is my favorite, Kelly likes the Dark Chocolate one) then out to ride Pat another hundred miles or so and stop once again, this time for a coke and a pre-packaged sandwich. Not great but filling, it's a motto when driving on the motorway. Pat does well, she/he cruises and stays firmly in a straight line once in a while, Kelly endlessly monitors my slow drift towards the white line on HER side...the passenger side, it's my Left Hand Drive theory at work. We drift towards that with which we are familiar, the white line on the left side...I want it closer, and closer. She is the better of us at this game in these circumstances as she is mostly the passenger when we are here and so sees the white line differently.
Nonetheless, I NEED correcting else someone is going to find themselves in a BIG squeeze. Onward to the outskirts of Paris, the Mappy.FR maps and destination instructions are terrific and within a short while we find outselves on the exact exit we needed. Off the freeway now onto a city boulevard, down a hill, thru a couple of lights and there it is!
Into the parking lot of a moderate rise apartment building, like many others in the outskirts of many cities across the globe, this one is different...it holds our EKTORP sofa. Entrance 7, Level 4...up we go!
Knock! Knock! A young man opens the door looking like he just woke up...it's 2pm in the afternoon. He indicates that Robert is "en le jardin" (In the garden) and waves as though it is around the corner.
Down the stairs we go and out into the parking lot and to the left we go amid screams and yells of little kids in a nice blue pool surrounded by trees. Robert approaches all smiles and shakes my hand "Bonjour!" I say, "je suis Howard", I say. He speaks english very well and leads me back up the stairs to his apartment. There she is, the EKTORP, all tan and comfortable looking. He bags up the cushions and gets his little girls (10-11 yrs old) to take them downstairs. He and I lift the sofa and thru hook and crook carry it to the staircase after removing it's feet so it will fit thru the doorway. Down we go, thru the stairwell, little by little, working out the difficulties as they occur. Down finally at ground level, laughing and tired, I go to Pat, start her up and drive to the entrance. We load the cushions and the sofa in a few minutes, it fits easily in the large space of the van, making our life easier. We say goodbye to Robert and his ever so sweet and useful moviestar daughters. Out we go all waves and celebrations to find ourway back to the freeway. A view of the Eifel Tower greets us along with the highrise skylike of a BIG CITY, the ONLY big city I know of near where we have been is PARIS, oh my...a slight goof has befallen us.
The next exit allows us to turn about and get back in the right direction. Off we go headed home. Terrific! Then...it begins to rain. It pours, the heavens open, I switch on the windshielf wipers and spray some fluid to remove the dried on bugs and guts. The rain continues, hour after hour. We stop for another coke about Orleans, we change drivers, climb back in Pat and run on south til the clouds thin, the rains turn to mist then cease altogether about Bourges where we stop to fill Pat with gazoil once again in preparation to turn her back over to her owner in about an hour. I drive her home, unload the EKTORP and her cushions, then drive back to Pierre's place to hand over the keys and take our Toyota on home to crash. Pierre is all giggles and happy as a clam seeing his beloved "Postman Pat" back in one piece. He offers us a frozen pizza and we go for it for the company and to STOP in this most busy of days. We chat for a couple of hours about France, our life in the villages and the future of mankind. We leave about 9:30, arrive at home about 15 minutes later. We button up the house and head up to sleep the day off. What a day it was! 445 miles altogether, 8 hrs on the road as well. "Postman Pat" was a wonder! Thanks Pierre! Dinner for you and your wife when she arrives from Wales!
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Pierre, it's proud owner, wiggled the keys gleefully at us over the fence. He ran us thru a few cautions and notations, "The doors are tough to open", "use the key and jerk the handle at the same time to open the rear door", "This is the key for the fuel cap" and so on. After a short tour of his pile of rocks and all the wonderful work he has done to it by HIMSELF no less, we were OFF! Turn the key, watch the glow plug light go out, turn further, Varoooom! She fires right off.
We pull away as Pierre watched anxiously...with good reason! You see this Royal Mail vehicle is RIGHT HAND DRIVE! And I am an American. Not an easy fit for sure. But I have done this before in both England and Scotland so it's sort of...kina...familiar. Stick has 5 speeds forward with the top one a true overdrive for cruising on flat ground, 4th is normal high gear. 1st gear you could use to pull up tree stumps. Thru the little hamlet we go out thru the forest and 15 minutes later we pull up to the A71 entrance at St. Amand. Grab a toll ticket and the gate goes up and we pull away to accelerate for the next few minutes up to our crusing speed of 55 mph in top gear. Not bad. We settle in for the long drive ahead of us under a cloudy sky with rays of sunshine lighting the road ahead, certainly a good omen. Mile after mile roll by, at first a joy as we can see above the roadside fences and bushes to the views beyond...and they are magnificent! The French countryside is ablaze with spring colors, the reds of poppies, the blue of foxglove,
the yellow of colza and dandilion. Spectacular! We stop for an espresso at one of the many Air du this or that that they have scattered along the major motorways throughout France. Makes for a pleasant stop to walk about, shop for Products Regional featured at almost every one (candies, clothing, ceramics, cookies, the ever present wines) and an ice cream (A Magnum bar...YUM! Cappucino is my favorite, Kelly likes the Dark Chocolate one) then out to ride Pat another hundred miles or so and stop once again, this time for a coke and a pre-packaged sandwich. Not great but filling, it's a motto when driving on the motorway. Pat does well, she/he cruises and stays firmly in a straight line once in a while, Kelly endlessly monitors my slow drift towards the white line on HER side...the passenger side, it's my Left Hand Drive theory at work. We drift towards that with which we are familiar, the white line on the left side...I want it closer, and closer. She is the better of us at this game in these circumstances as she is mostly the passenger when we are here and so sees the white line differently.
Nonetheless, I NEED correcting else someone is going to find themselves in a BIG squeeze. Onward to the outskirts of Paris, the Mappy.FR maps and destination instructions are terrific and within a short while we find outselves on the exact exit we needed. Off the freeway now onto a city boulevard, down a hill, thru a couple of lights and there it is!
Into the parking lot of a moderate rise apartment building, like many others in the outskirts of many cities across the globe, this one is different...it holds our EKTORP sofa. Entrance 7, Level 4...up we go!
Knock! Knock! A young man opens the door looking like he just woke up...it's 2pm in the afternoon. He indicates that Robert is "en le jardin" (In the garden) and waves as though it is around the corner.
Down the stairs we go and out into the parking lot and to the left we go amid screams and yells of little kids in a nice blue pool surrounded by trees. Robert approaches all smiles and shakes my hand "Bonjour!" I say, "je suis Howard", I say. He speaks english very well and leads me back up the stairs to his apartment. There she is, the EKTORP, all tan and comfortable looking. He bags up the cushions and gets his little girls (10-11 yrs old) to take them downstairs. He and I lift the sofa and thru hook and crook carry it to the staircase after removing it's feet so it will fit thru the doorway. Down we go, thru the stairwell, little by little, working out the difficulties as they occur. Down finally at ground level, laughing and tired, I go to Pat, start her up and drive to the entrance. We load the cushions and the sofa in a few minutes, it fits easily in the large space of the van, making our life easier. We say goodbye to Robert and his ever so sweet and useful moviestar daughters. Out we go all waves and celebrations to find ourway back to the freeway. A view of the Eifel Tower greets us along with the highrise skylike of a BIG CITY, the ONLY big city I know of near where we have been is PARIS, oh my...a slight goof has befallen us.
The next exit allows us to turn about and get back in the right direction. Off we go headed home. Terrific! Then...it begins to rain. It pours, the heavens open, I switch on the windshielf wipers and spray some fluid to remove the dried on bugs and guts. The rain continues, hour after hour. We stop for another coke about Orleans, we change drivers, climb back in Pat and run on south til the clouds thin, the rains turn to mist then cease altogether about Bourges where we stop to fill Pat with gazoil once again in preparation to turn her back over to her owner in about an hour. I drive her home, unload the EKTORP and her cushions, then drive back to Pierre's place to hand over the keys and take our Toyota on home to crash. Pierre is all giggles and happy as a clam seeing his beloved "Postman Pat" back in one piece. He offers us a frozen pizza and we go for it for the company and to STOP in this most busy of days. We chat for a couple of hours about France, our life in the villages and the future of mankind. We leave about 9:30, arrive at home about 15 minutes later. We button up the house and head up to sleep the day off. What a day it was! 445 miles altogether, 8 hrs on the road as well. "Postman Pat" was a wonder! Thanks Pierre! Dinner for you and your wife when she arrives from Wales!
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Friday, June 15, 2007
What kind of day is this?
Mostly it was all work, installing the remainder of the curtains in both the upstairs and downstairs windows, painting where it was still needed and sitting in the occasional sunshine. A full day. I decided I wanted another Italian dish for dinner, Eggplant Parmiagiano, riso con limone and Chicken Caccetorri came to mind. I started cooking about 4pm.
Cicken C takes about 2 - 2.5 hrs depending on how efficient you are at cooking the vegies. I start with sauteing the 3 small onions, 1 shallot and the 4 cloves of garlic in 2 tablespoons of olive oil (EVOO). This takes about 10-12 minutes to make the onion/shallot/garlic mix limp.
I added 2 teaspoons of dried oregano to the saute. Then I chopped (1/4" dice) 4 medium tomatoes, added them to the pot then added one 10oz can of tomatoe puree along with 2 cups of a drinkable red wine.
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The chicken breasts or leg/thighs get pan fried in a couple of tablespoons of olive oil til golden brown and done inside...about 15 minutes. Turn them off and add the breasts or leg/thighs to the tomato saute, keep covered with the sauce as it cooks. Cook for 1.5 hrs or the meat separates easily with a fork.
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The Eggplant Parmigiano is dead easy, slice the eggplant diagonally (prettier) then liberally sprinkle each piece with salt. put each slice in a stainless steel bowl and set aside for 20 min. Rinse the bowl full with cool water for 1 minute. Drain, dry between two paper towels, then
grate 1/2 cup of parmigiano regiano into a bowl and dip each piece into the cheese then into a frying pan on medium heat (oil with a bit of EVOO). Flip to the other side using tongs or a fork about 2 minutes. Remove from heat after two more minutes or until golden brown. Plate.
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Mound 1/2 cup rice on each plate, place eggplant slices on the plate and over the top add the chicken pieces and the sauce.
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Serve with a stout red wine, Cote Du Rhone or Burgundy, Merlot or Zinfandel.
Enjoy.
Cicken C takes about 2 - 2.5 hrs depending on how efficient you are at cooking the vegies. I start with sauteing the 3 small onions, 1 shallot and the 4 cloves of garlic in 2 tablespoons of olive oil (EVOO). This takes about 10-12 minutes to make the onion/shallot/garlic mix limp.
I added 2 teaspoons of dried oregano to the saute. Then I chopped (1/4" dice) 4 medium tomatoes, added them to the pot then added one 10oz can of tomatoe puree along with 2 cups of a drinkable red wine.
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The chicken breasts or leg/thighs get pan fried in a couple of tablespoons of olive oil til golden brown and done inside...about 15 minutes. Turn them off and add the breasts or leg/thighs to the tomato saute, keep covered with the sauce as it cooks. Cook for 1.5 hrs or the meat separates easily with a fork.
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The Eggplant Parmigiano is dead easy, slice the eggplant diagonally (prettier) then liberally sprinkle each piece with salt. put each slice in a stainless steel bowl and set aside for 20 min. Rinse the bowl full with cool water for 1 minute. Drain, dry between two paper towels, then
grate 1/2 cup of parmigiano regiano into a bowl and dip each piece into the cheese then into a frying pan on medium heat (oil with a bit of EVOO). Flip to the other side using tongs or a fork about 2 minutes. Remove from heat after two more minutes or until golden brown. Plate.
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Mound 1/2 cup rice on each plate, place eggplant slices on the plate and over the top add the chicken pieces and the sauce.
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Serve with a stout red wine, Cote Du Rhone or Burgundy, Merlot or Zinfandel.
Enjoy.
Thursday, June 14, 2007
Cherry Pickers in Guess Where
Yesterday, a Wednesday, was beautiful in the morning, sunny, warm and no sign of the usual. We decided over the morning espresso to take the day "off" just because. What this really meant was a wild run with a short list thru Bourge's hardware stores for odds and ends, nuts and bolts (really!) and a quick run into Geant to get our (cats!) favorite kind of cat litter, one that works (clumps...imagine.) in the Litter Robot. The level was down and there was none left in the last box. 5 boxes bought. Off to another store to exchange some pillows from the shower room's builtin to one's that more correctly match the setting...black and bigger, beautiful. Then wander off across the countryside northwest of Bourges and returned home at 1pm. So much for the day "off".
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I painted the top of the bathroom and TV room windows for Kelly whose arms couldn't reach far enough. Ugh. Started dinner proceedings about 5:30. Then Bringggg, Bringggg! The phone, our new friends Ann and Raj, Kelly yells from upstairs, "Ann and Raj have asked us to go cherry picking, wanna go?" I found myself saying "sure...I guess", this amidst great chopping of shallots and mincing of garlic for my favorite Ragu "Cantanese (Catania, Sicily) Whore Sauce". It is a delicious and unusual combination that eats very well. Here's the recipe as I do it, other's mileage may vary: Takes about an hour and a half to prepare and cook. Feeds 3 teenage males, serves 4 hungry cherry pickers. 6 normal people will be well fed. Burp!
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fry 6 strips of smoked bacon that have been cut into 1/2" pieces. chop, chop. Until nearly cooked crisp but not quite. LIMP does it.
1 teaspoons salt (MAX)...remember it's going to reduce now by about 1/4 so too much salt is a meal killer. You can always add more at the end of cooking.
In the same pan saute 4 medium shallots cut into thin slices lengthwise.
do this until limp, 5 min or so. DO NOT ALLOW TO BURN!
Add 4 large chopped fine cloves of garlic.
Add 4 carrots 1/4" dice.
Add 2 stalks celery 1/4" slices.
Cook until carrots just soften, about 10 minutes over medium heat.
Add 1 teaspoon hot pepper flakes or 1 dried hot pepper. Be careful.
Add 4 large tomatoes, core then diced, skin, seeds and all.
Add 1 11oz can/box of tomato puree.
Add 8 oz green olives (pitted or unpitted)
Add 2 cups nice red wine, take a sip first, must be good enough to serve guests. Not the Champion 79 cent a plastic bottle stuff, a stout 2.50 bottle of Red Vin Du Pays or a cheap Cote Du Rhone will do nicely.
Now reduce heat to a simmer and cook until the diced tomatoes are reduced to soft pieces and the sauce is nicely thickened, about 1 hour.
At this point one could turn it off, allow to cool then freeze the sauce in smaller batches for future meals for two. Goes wonderfully over chicken, veal and large flakes white fish like cod. Delicious.
To serve, Boil 1.5 lbs Fetucini, bucatini, or liguini til al dente (look at package instructions please), place hearty amount of sauce over top, grate on some parmisiano regiano or Pecorino cheese and get another bottle of red ready, dinner is SERVED!
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So we drove away from my now uncooked sauce towards Ides St. Roche, a small village a bit south of Lignieres to get a tour of their own pile-of-rocks an old mansion in the heart of the quite lovely village. Wonderful rooms with the same no-square-corner approach to building as our pile-of-rocks. Floors to be replaced but SOME...ohhhh, very nice encaustic floors with no damage or cracks apparent in at least three rooms! Beautiful. The kichen has a large fireplace with a beamed ceiling overhead, it will be a fine place to cook. The hall behind is HUGE with a lofty ceiling that is in excess of 15 feet high, what a setting for a dinner party for 40 good friends! The barn was down the street as is a certain practice here in countryside France. A huge ancient thing leaning this way and that, mostly that at least 3 and maybe 4 feet out of kilter. Must have been built with wet wood with the grain accidentally faced the same way...towards the street. Anyway, it stands, and has for a long, long time, several hundreds of years I suppose. Behind it was The Orchard. Led by Raj we waded into the orchard, waist high and higher in noxious weeds and underbrush. We picked cherries and more cherries, amazingly sweet and delicious in this nearly abandoned orchard behind their barn. Several trees were just coverred with ripening cherries ready to burst at the next raindrop. So Ann plucked, Kelly picked, Raj climbed the ladder to locate and sever sevral heavily laden branches and I emptied the branches of the fruit, one for me, gulp, one for the bucket until we had nearly denuded the two trees. We had many pounds of cherries to share between us. Great fun with our new found friends and soulmates. Home to finish dinner and drink a bit of wine. We sat in the Library while I watched over the cooking ragu. We and our fellow cherry pickers ate at 11pm sharp, the latest dinner I have ever prepared. We drank 3 and a half bottles of Red (mostly Cote Du Rhones, a favorite of mine) and had wonderful, laughing conversation until Raj felt the droop of his eyelids and we said goodnight about 1230. We immediately went to bed to awake to guess what? Rain and about 10 lbs of fresh cherries in a bin by the radiator. Now what do I do with these that makes sense?
Hmmmmm
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I painted the top of the bathroom and TV room windows for Kelly whose arms couldn't reach far enough. Ugh. Started dinner proceedings about 5:30. Then Bringggg, Bringggg! The phone, our new friends Ann and Raj, Kelly yells from upstairs, "Ann and Raj have asked us to go cherry picking, wanna go?" I found myself saying "sure...I guess", this amidst great chopping of shallots and mincing of garlic for my favorite Ragu "Cantanese (Catania, Sicily) Whore Sauce". It is a delicious and unusual combination that eats very well. Here's the recipe as I do it, other's mileage may vary: Takes about an hour and a half to prepare and cook. Feeds 3 teenage males, serves 4 hungry cherry pickers. 6 normal people will be well fed. Burp!
---
fry 6 strips of smoked bacon that have been cut into 1/2" pieces. chop, chop. Until nearly cooked crisp but not quite. LIMP does it.
1 teaspoons salt (MAX)...remember it's going to reduce now by about 1/4 so too much salt is a meal killer. You can always add more at the end of cooking.
In the same pan saute 4 medium shallots cut into thin slices lengthwise.
do this until limp, 5 min or so. DO NOT ALLOW TO BURN!
Add 4 large chopped fine cloves of garlic.
Add 4 carrots 1/4" dice.
Add 2 stalks celery 1/4" slices.
Cook until carrots just soften, about 10 minutes over medium heat.
Add 1 teaspoon hot pepper flakes or 1 dried hot pepper. Be careful.
Add 4 large tomatoes, core then diced, skin, seeds and all.
Add 1 11oz can/box of tomato puree.
Add 8 oz green olives (pitted or unpitted)
Add 2 cups nice red wine, take a sip first, must be good enough to serve guests. Not the Champion 79 cent a plastic bottle stuff, a stout 2.50 bottle of Red Vin Du Pays or a cheap Cote Du Rhone will do nicely.
Now reduce heat to a simmer and cook until the diced tomatoes are reduced to soft pieces and the sauce is nicely thickened, about 1 hour.
At this point one could turn it off, allow to cool then freeze the sauce in smaller batches for future meals for two. Goes wonderfully over chicken, veal and large flakes white fish like cod. Delicious.
To serve, Boil 1.5 lbs Fetucini, bucatini, or liguini til al dente (look at package instructions please), place hearty amount of sauce over top, grate on some parmisiano regiano or Pecorino cheese and get another bottle of red ready, dinner is SERVED!
---
So we drove away from my now uncooked sauce towards Ides St. Roche, a small village a bit south of Lignieres to get a tour of their own pile-of-rocks an old mansion in the heart of the quite lovely village. Wonderful rooms with the same no-square-corner approach to building as our pile-of-rocks. Floors to be replaced but SOME...ohhhh, very nice encaustic floors with no damage or cracks apparent in at least three rooms! Beautiful. The kichen has a large fireplace with a beamed ceiling overhead, it will be a fine place to cook. The hall behind is HUGE with a lofty ceiling that is in excess of 15 feet high, what a setting for a dinner party for 40 good friends! The barn was down the street as is a certain practice here in countryside France. A huge ancient thing leaning this way and that, mostly that at least 3 and maybe 4 feet out of kilter. Must have been built with wet wood with the grain accidentally faced the same way...towards the street. Anyway, it stands, and has for a long, long time, several hundreds of years I suppose. Behind it was The Orchard. Led by Raj we waded into the orchard, waist high and higher in noxious weeds and underbrush. We picked cherries and more cherries, amazingly sweet and delicious in this nearly abandoned orchard behind their barn. Several trees were just coverred with ripening cherries ready to burst at the next raindrop. So Ann plucked, Kelly picked, Raj climbed the ladder to locate and sever sevral heavily laden branches and I emptied the branches of the fruit, one for me, gulp, one for the bucket until we had nearly denuded the two trees. We had many pounds of cherries to share between us. Great fun with our new found friends and soulmates. Home to finish dinner and drink a bit of wine. We sat in the Library while I watched over the cooking ragu. We and our fellow cherry pickers ate at 11pm sharp, the latest dinner I have ever prepared. We drank 3 and a half bottles of Red (mostly Cote Du Rhones, a favorite of mine) and had wonderful, laughing conversation until Raj felt the droop of his eyelids and we said goodnight about 1230. We immediately went to bed to awake to guess what? Rain and about 10 lbs of fresh cherries in a bin by the radiator. Now what do I do with these that makes sense?
Hmmmmm
Tuesday, June 12, 2007
Painting The Roses
Yesterday and the day before I spent about an hour and a half first watering down the white exterior satin acrylic paint for the wicker chairs then using a HVLP (like a Wagner only from the UK) spray rig to apply said paint. So fast! The thing really delivers the paint without a ton of overspray to the item being painted. Wicker chairs have 10 thousand cranies and little nooks where any other painting method (short of dipping it!) just doesn't cover. These 4 chairs are quite old and one might just throw them away if one wasn't somewhat crazy about wicker chairs. They just needed some loving attention. I coated the arms and back with exterior white glue to help the rigidity somewhat then powerwashed them last week. I painted then Sunday and Monday. . Overnight it cured sufficiently so this morning I turned them over and painted the underside of everything. Kelly thinks they look great, I do to. We decided NOT to paint the old cobblers bench and instead clean it up, sand it lightly and apply a clear lacquer finish. The next painting project will be the front shutters, all 24 of them, again in white as that is what this house wants. I do it in Sicilian colors if it were my choice but alas, calmer ideas are at hand and she would kill me for even suggesting it. The French would have a fit! This IS The Berry afterall. Staid and non-progressive. Brown is as exciting as colors get here generally. It takes the MAYOR'S permission to change outside colors on a house.
Saturday, June 09, 2007
A Daytrip Away
We decided last night that we needed to go to Evry, 330 Km north towards Paris to the IKEA there to acquire some new curtains and associated frilly things and other misc. items for the house. It was certainly a good idea as we were up til after 12 with our evening guests for a 6 course dinner featuring the same pork stuffed with garlic and fennel that we served last week with a sauce made of blood orange juice, sugar, carrots sliced to serve as a side vegie. The first was a basil/walnut pesto witrh alsacian noodles that looked like bucatini but was egg noodle based. Quite a hit but I think difficult to eat as the noodles were somewhat too thick and were springy. Thus messy and difficult to get a fork full. Italian bucatini or fettucini would be a better choice. A cheese course was stilton, tillamook white cheddar and a delicious soft goat cheese rolled in cracked pepper with toasts brushed with olive oil. I made strawberry ice cream with fresh sliced strawberries over the top, very good. Then we dove into a few of our collection of desert wines. All in all a very nice dinner that came off well as we are fast becoming expert at this art.
The trip to Evry was an easy 3 and a half hours until the last 2 kilometers which made us lost and confused, each roundabout led to another and the signage was terrible as usual. One IKEA sign at the first roundabout was reassuring but French signage is just not adequate to the task at hand. Not enough signs and not enough information either, and more often than not no distances are given. So we wandered about the area, roundabout to roundabout hoping we'd get a hint break and sure enough! A HUGE blue building appeared and it was our IKEA waiting to be assaulted by two Californians in search of bargains for the Grande Maison.
3 hours and three hotdogs later we exited the store with the following:
12 pair of 3 meter long white frilly curtains that the French use as both decoration and to shade a room from excess sun.
1 set of actual curtains of a dark grey velvet for our bedroom.
100 white plastic clothes hangers
4 Wicker Chairs for outside seating.
4 Cushions for same.
Big blackboard for the kitchen.
A lampshade.
2 packages of flourescent light bulbs. (total of 6)
4 plastic cutting boards for the new kitchen someday real-soon-now.
2 cheap knives for same. I LOVE cheap knives! They sharpen up real well with a steel and if you screw them up, like I do ocassionally you haven't wrecked a Sabatier or Trident just a serviceable cheap knife. Throw it away and buy another.
On and on to the tune dah, dah, ta, dahhhhh...545 Euros!
That plus the 45 Euros worth of tolls going and coming AND 35 Euros of diesel fuel for the Toyota...and you have one very expensive day at an IKEA. Gads. Thank goodness they don't have one nearer to us and we only go once every 4 years.
The trip to Evry was an easy 3 and a half hours until the last 2 kilometers which made us lost and confused, each roundabout led to another and the signage was terrible as usual. One IKEA sign at the first roundabout was reassuring but French signage is just not adequate to the task at hand. Not enough signs and not enough information either, and more often than not no distances are given. So we wandered about the area, roundabout to roundabout hoping we'd get a hint break and sure enough! A HUGE blue building appeared and it was our IKEA waiting to be assaulted by two Californians in search of bargains for the Grande Maison.
3 hours and three hotdogs later we exited the store with the following:
12 pair of 3 meter long white frilly curtains that the French use as both decoration and to shade a room from excess sun.
1 set of actual curtains of a dark grey velvet for our bedroom.
100 white plastic clothes hangers
4 Wicker Chairs for outside seating.
4 Cushions for same.
Big blackboard for the kitchen.
A lampshade.
2 packages of flourescent light bulbs. (total of 6)
4 plastic cutting boards for the new kitchen someday real-soon-now.
2 cheap knives for same. I LOVE cheap knives! They sharpen up real well with a steel and if you screw them up, like I do ocassionally you haven't wrecked a Sabatier or Trident just a serviceable cheap knife. Throw it away and buy another.
On and on to the tune dah, dah, ta, dahhhhh...545 Euros!
That plus the 45 Euros worth of tolls going and coming AND 35 Euros of diesel fuel for the Toyota...and you have one very expensive day at an IKEA. Gads. Thank goodness they don't have one nearer to us and we only go once every 4 years.
Thursday, June 07, 2007
A Roof Examination
This is a long story, hopefully I can shorten it and keep the most frustrating portions intact for your enjoyment. We bought the Grande Maison last August...2006, it took until Novemberf to close, delay after delay and the damned problem of money transfers reared their ugly head time and time again. That said...we successfully DID get the money here and thru magic and much French wringing-of-hands the money got into the right hands. The house became ours. We, however weren't destined to open the front door as the new owners until we returned to France in late March. We gathered the keys from the real estate agent and we were IN! The dust hasn't cleared since! About two weeks AFTER we arrived we received an estimate for the replacement of the roof, it's gutters and affiliated attachments, drains, roof slates etc. 19,000 Euros. For what?! A ROOF!? You have GOT to be kidding! They weren't kidding, the roof was failing and indeed was dangerous so we were told, as pieces were falling off of it and could decapitate someone on the sidewalk below! We had NEVER been told by anyone of this condition (s), not the previous owner, her son or the attorney or our real estate agent! No one said a thing! Good grief! It could have collapsed and killed hundreds during a protest parade! But no, it did not collapse and actually doesn't leak much either. Nonetheless a detailed reading of the estimate yeilded 19,000 Euros worth of repairs and replacement. Shit! So at 6pm last night in came a different roofer with his own ideas and his own inspection, he pronounced the back roof of the house "bon" (good) and the front "malvaise" (sick/bad). Now this IS progress! Much shaking of hands and a promise to return with a Euro figure Semaine Prochain...next week. We will see then what another number is. The joys of living here never cease to amaze me. I love Paradise, I think.
Tuesday, June 05, 2007
A beautiful Sunday in Paradise
A Beautiful Sunday today, puffy clouds passing over, in the 70's this afternoon and with The Queen and her Prince coming for dinner tonight at 6. We have several such pairs hereabouts, mostly Brit ex-pats but a few French ones too. We have had several of the British variety to dinner over the years and it's always an enjoyable bash. We like to make formal dinners, 5-6 courses are normal, tonight we will have the following:Cold Potato Soup with Garlic and Parsley as a first course. Pork Roast with fennel and garlic with Orange Cinnamon Carrots and Italian White Bean salad, the second,Cheeses from The US, a Tillamook White Cheddar, Great Britain is represented with a fine Stilton Blue and locally produced creamy Goat Cheese with Garlic. All this on toasts of the local bread. The Third.Raspberry Tart with Chocolate Sauce, the fourth.Dessert Wines from Sicily, Italy and France. A fifth.Espresso, the 6th.Just enoiugh to fill out the entire evening til about midnight given our level of drinking and general bullshitting.The tart is made, the white beans are made, the carrot dish is cooking, the soup is cooling it's heel in the fridge and the Roti (pork roast) is waiting to be skewered on a rod and insewrted into the rotisserie.All is well. The house is as presentable as this particular pile of rocks can be right now with many unfinished rooms. The guests appreciate such a scene as it is one threy themselves are quite familiar with, having an uncompleted 12th century castle as their abode.
Monday, June 04, 2007
Moonday in Paradise, Jour du Grande Marche
Market Day in Lignieres, the Monday 1st in any month is the BIG market, many vendors sprawled along the winding streets and under thge cover of the 14th century open air Hall. Vendors yes but people, no. Rain you see or the threat of same kept people away and vendors closed up early to avoid the rush. A sad market day when this happens but there will be many more. We went to the tourist board to collect MC, she had come in early to go with us to the Marie (City Hall) to sort out who owns the garage next door to us asa we would like to either purchase it or rent it so we could better use our backyard sans car. We learned that it was owned by the same man who runs the little Proxi Market just across the shared alley. So we will go to him and ask someday soon. Then to the bank to deposit a small refund check from an impound account associated with our purchase of the Grande Maison du Bourge. It rained and stopped, rained and stopped. Stoped at the dentists office and sat patiently while she finished up some poor soul's mouth, we got a dual appointment for this Wednesday at 11am. Then abled down the block to buy a loaf of compagne (whole wheat) bread from the corner boulangerie and walked home. Upon our return I noticed that the neighborhood cat has torn up one of the planters I just filled with planting soil and destroyed my seeding (zuchinni seeds) of it, so I stuck 6 inch pieces of wire into it and wet it thouroghly to keep the beast from pooping in it again tonight. Guess I'll have to put some wire cover over them soon. The house is still clean from our weekends labor for the Queen and Prince so we just sat around and watched the intermittant rain and slept like cats.
Wednesday, May 30, 2007
Paradise Leaks!
Well, days have passed eventfully, with many visits from helpful Bob to fix the leaky sink (failed grout in the wall tile and bad washer in the faucet connection) and help me fire up the century old feul chaffage (oil heater). Lots of idle chatter as we examined and eventually repaired the sink whose mysterious leaking of huge quantities of water onto the kitchen floor had grown boring to say the least. We ate lunch, he left after another hour of story telling and chomping on the fine bread from the new boulangerie in town and great spooning of the beef and cabbage soup Kelly had cooked in the morning. (4 cups Chicken stock, 1 lb stew beef, 4 medium carrots and 1 large cabbage, cook til beef falls apart with a fork, couldn't be easier)
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On Monday it was The Donkey Faire in Lignieres, a HUGE annual event featuring the Black Donkey of the Berry as the main attraction. This is a buying, selling and extensive gawking festival. Many vendors of leather goods (mostly for donkeys but there were huge neck BELLS for husbands and boyfriends), food vendors, the town Cave was open pouring copious amounts of the local red and white. Only one thing blemished this sparkling, slightly drunken occassion...the damned weather! Dark, brooding storm clouds, buckets of cold rain and wind blasting us and the donkeys this way and that, people hiding in groups under any cover trying to stay dry (failing) and warm (failing). What a terrible thing to have happen on this glorious old event. Here are some pictures for you...and a movie too!>
Two old friends, another...
Donkeys under the clouds,
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On Monday it was The Donkey Faire in Lignieres, a HUGE annual event featuring the Black Donkey of the Berry as the main attraction. This is a buying, selling and extensive gawking festival. Many vendors of leather goods (mostly for donkeys but there were huge neck BELLS for husbands and boyfriends), food vendors, the town Cave was open pouring copious amounts of the local red and white. Only one thing blemished this sparkling, slightly drunken occassion...the damned weather! Dark, brooding storm clouds, buckets of cold rain and wind blasting us and the donkeys this way and that, people hiding in groups under any cover trying to stay dry (failing) and warm (failing). What a terrible thing to have happen on this glorious old event. Here are some pictures for you...and a movie too!>
Two old friends, another...
Donkeys under the clouds,
Sunday, May 27, 2007
Brocante (Flea Market!) Day in you-know-where!
Brocante Day in Paradise found us up at 7 or so, coffee, minor cleanup of the small kitchen and then Bvroooom! Off to Chezel-Benoit for #1. Now Chezal has a population that includes various persons afflicted by mental conditions. I've been to three brocantes there and every time the hopital (mental) therein releases a few patients to roam the stalls and gawk with the rest of us. Some just stare in abject silence, some run between tables making utterances that bear little resemblance to speech, others mix well with the crowd and could be taken for you or ME on a slightly bad day...we don't always respond as a more normally sensed human might...a touch alone creates a loud giggle or shout or excessive hand movements (like Italians after Sunday mass). We ambled thru the stalls looking for something magical and needed, nothing, just cold wind and storm clouds above made it a rather miserable experience...along with the few well mannered nut cases
roaming with us. We saw it all and left unsatisfied for the next experience at Nozier near St. Amand Montrond. Only a short distance away it was down the hill from the town proper in what appeared to be a huge campground next to a beautifully dense tract of hardwood forest. Many stalls, lots of junk lying about and the smell of burning merguez sausage wafting by. I queried a vendor pointing to a lovely Henry 2 mirror they had leaning against his car bumper, "Combien S'il vous plait" (how much please), "Une cent euro", came back...wants 100 Euros for it, not bad, man knows his stuff, good...but too expensive for our cheap blood. 25, a buy, 35, sure, 50, maybe, above that...eh, they'll be another someplace, sometime. Well back to the car after another futile brocante session and to home where work (always!) awaits.
roaming with us. We saw it all and left unsatisfied for the next experience at Nozier near St. Amand Montrond. Only a short distance away it was down the hill from the town proper in what appeared to be a huge campground next to a beautifully dense tract of hardwood forest. Many stalls, lots of junk lying about and the smell of burning merguez sausage wafting by. I queried a vendor pointing to a lovely Henry 2 mirror they had leaning against his car bumper, "Combien S'il vous plait" (how much please), "Une cent euro", came back...wants 100 Euros for it, not bad, man knows his stuff, good...but too expensive for our cheap blood. 25, a buy, 35, sure, 50, maybe, above that...eh, they'll be another someplace, sometime. Well back to the car after another futile brocante session and to home where work (always!) awaits.
Saturday, May 26, 2007
Last Night's Debauchery in Paradise
Not exactly debauchery but enough food, wine and booze, to respectfully SUPPORT such an occurance.
We had invited the newest members of our ex-pat community to dinner, Friday at 6. They were Jonny-on-the-spot and showed up exactly at 6. Kelly and I talked with them a short while when BRRRING! Brrrring! went the doorbell, I knew IMMEDIATELY that I had screwed the goose when Bob and Chuck's smiling faces entered the foyer. Aw Jezus...I had told Bob that he and Chuck were invited to dinner NEXT Friday...this Thursday afternoon. Talk about embarrassing moments, I felt like a complete idiot. Bob and I talked and I explained that with a 2 burner hob and facing a 6 course dinner (YES!) that it was just damned difficult to fit in 2 more TONIGHT, then in a fit of pique I said, "no problem, we'll make it work". With that I grabbed the requisite 2 chairs, moved the silverware to accommodate 2 more at the table and set out to slice another tomato and shred more basil from the garden and then plate now 6 appetizers with balsamic vinegar and olive oil. We all shared a delicious Chateaumillant Red in the parlor, the first time that room had b.een used by anyone but us. Talk, talk, talk and we became thoroughly warmed up for t and he dinner to follow. We moved an hour later to the dining room and shortly thereafter the appetiser was gone. More wine, a delicious Reuilly white, then a small pesto plate followed. I excused myself many times to check the progress of this and that and Kelly and I were like a tag team keeping track of the kitchen. With Bob and Chuck there it made for much more lively chat and covered our absences well, it turned out to be a blessing. Then the Chicken Piccata on red pepper/lemon rice and asperagus with roasted peppers were served. Plates exchanged and hauled to the middle room between the new kitchen and the dining room.
A cheese course followed, a sharp Tillamook Cheddar, a spicy English Stilton and a lovely mild goat cheese with thin slices of a white baguette. More white wine, a Quincy white, everybody commented on how absolutely delicious it was with notes of apricot, green berries and grapefruit. I wished I had bought more bottles of it. It is rare and pricy even here a few miles from it's place of origin. MORE to come...
We had invited the newest members of our ex-pat community to dinner, Friday at 6. They were Jonny-on-the-spot and showed up exactly at 6. Kelly and I talked with them a short while when BRRRING! Brrrring! went the doorbell, I knew IMMEDIATELY that I had screwed the goose when Bob and Chuck's smiling faces entered the foyer. Aw Jezus...I had told Bob that he and Chuck were invited to dinner NEXT Friday...this Thursday afternoon. Talk about embarrassing moments, I felt like a complete idiot. Bob and I talked and I explained that with a 2 burner hob and facing a 6 course dinner (YES!) that it was just damned difficult to fit in 2 more TONIGHT, then in a fit of pique I said, "no problem, we'll make it work". With that I grabbed the requisite 2 chairs, moved the silverware to accommodate 2 more at the table and set out to slice another tomato and shred more basil from the garden and then plate now 6 appetizers with balsamic vinegar and olive oil. We all shared a delicious Chateaumillant Red in the parlor, the first time that room had b.een used by anyone but us. Talk, talk, talk and we became thoroughly warmed up for t and he dinner to follow. We moved an hour later to the dining room and shortly thereafter the appetiser was gone. More wine, a delicious Reuilly white, then a small pesto plate followed. I excused myself many times to check the progress of this and that and Kelly and I were like a tag team keeping track of the kitchen. With Bob and Chuck there it made for much more lively chat and covered our absences well, it turned out to be a blessing. Then the Chicken Piccata on red pepper/lemon rice and asperagus with roasted peppers were served. Plates exchanged and hauled to the middle room between the new kitchen and the dining room.
A cheese course followed, a sharp Tillamook Cheddar, a spicy English Stilton and a lovely mild goat cheese with thin slices of a white baguette. More white wine, a Quincy white, everybody commented on how absolutely delicious it was with notes of apricot, green berries and grapefruit. I wished I had bought more bottles of it. It is rare and pricy even here a few miles from it's place of origin. MORE to come...
Friday, May 25, 2007
A Day with Friends
Up with the dawn, read CNN, drink a few cups of espresso to get a charge on...then the doorbell, Brrrring...brrrring it goes. Kelly answers it as I'm vacuuming the upstairs now. I hear a "bonjour" as the front door was openned, a short exchange in French, not Bob yet, then the door closing. "Howard...(she NEVER calls me Howard), come down here...(Jesus, a command too!) sure enough, one of our wayward parcels has just arrived via France Post. Huh? Must be the one that was last to leave the US...mailed on the 22 of March (YES!) full of cast iron objects for the cooktop we brought from the US. Thank the gods! If that hadn't made it to us the new kitchens fine old relic of a cooktop with a built in grill would have been so much scrap iron. Amazing. Is there HOPE we'll see those other two again someday when our travels meet? Time will tell.
Brrrring, brrrring! It's Bob muttering outside the front door, come to help me with the old perenial leak in the bathroom about the shower plumbing. Down for coffee again and the inevitable story or six and opinion pages from the Bob Journal of French Life. We always enjoy these sessions, he is a genuine man's man and has worked his whole life doing an array of jobs too long to list and now has this farm outside Lignieres with all manner of animals. His are, without a doubt, the best eggs on earth and he always a warm smile.
An hour passes then UP and at the dripper in the wall. Solder, torch, flame shield in place and wet matches makes this a less than auspicious beginning of a dramatic repair. MORE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q2lN7juT838
Brrrring, brrrring! It's Bob muttering outside the front door, come to help me with the old perenial leak in the bathroom about the shower plumbing. Down for coffee again and the inevitable story or six and opinion pages from the Bob Journal of French Life. We always enjoy these sessions, he is a genuine man's man and has worked his whole life doing an array of jobs too long to list and now has this farm outside Lignieres with all manner of animals. His are, without a doubt, the best eggs on earth and he always a warm smile.
An hour passes then UP and at the dripper in the wall. Solder, torch, flame shield in place and wet matches makes this a less than auspicious beginning of a dramatic repair. MORE
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q2lN7juT838
Tuesday, May 22, 2007
Warm Day in Para dice!
Well, with THE letter in hand...what letter? The one we got Saturday from EuroPost saying they have a parcel to deliver to us at 10 Rt. St. Amand. Long letter in French that we both understood well enough to figure out that they had something for us and that we we're not there to receive it whenever that was. Some days ago we figured anyway. So we took the letter to the Tourist Board and had our friend there Anna call EuroPost to find out IF they still had them and if they would send them to our new address instead. The result of that call was a statement that they had already returned them to the US! The letter said we had 14 days to retrieve them or notify Europost of where to send them...now they are gone?! Oh boy, stress mounting up. So, not to be held back, we took off for the Europost in Bourges to find our damned shipments(3). The countryside was breathtaking, as always, with whole fields of bright red poppies here and there. Once to the location, no address given, just drove around the Zone Industrial until we saw their signage, we found all windows shaded and all doors closed except one. Walking into the place there was no one at any desk, no sounds except equipment fans and as far as we could see no employees at hand to talk to at all! The place was empty except for us and piles of boxes and a computer system. After a few minutes of shifting our weight from one foot to the other we exited that area and went around front of the building which looked equally closed and deserted, we say Alloooo into the empty spaces with no answer forthcoming. Hmmmmm, what gives here? Should we call the police? Pictures of the purported employees lined the wall but none were to be seen. Sooo we wandered into the room filled with crates and boxes to no ones chagrin at all...a thief could have emptied the place with no notice at all and there we were. Kelly heard some voices, from where? There! In the back room, on a break, the whole crew. Then the papers were out and the lady kindly called the English speaking help line which was no help at all, yes there was a parcel, yes it was sent back at the insistence of the shipper to....to....GERMANY! What?! Why the hell Germany? Maybe it was the tapis (carpets) Kelly bought on eBay and NOT the three long gone parcels we sent from the US back in March. Shit! Who knows, when I talked to the EuroPost person she said that there was 1 parcel, weight unknown, sender unknown. This is nuts! Did the US Postal Service REALLY use these guys for our poor parcels, 1000 pounds of which are now long gone?
Kelly called at 6pm local time, 9am Suisun Time and got to a US Postal Service person...YES, they use Europost, yes, they tried delivery on the 5th and 16th (the letter received Saturday was the first we knew of any delivery attempt), that's all they knew either. Shit! Well Kelly was predictably pissed, as was I, we don't need this news at all. We had so very carefully picked what needed to be shipped and what would come with us on this trip because we knew we were gpoing to move into the big house this time around. We packed it so carefully, evrything just so...in foam, in bubbles, in plastic wrap, inside blankets and comforters and now...where the hell is it? Somewhere between France and the US via Germany for some reason. POE (Port of Entry) perhaps to the EU? How am I to know?
Then off to Brico Depot to buy the ladder of our dreams with a budget of 100 Euros allocated. We found it in the form of a folding ladder that would extend to some 3.5 meters, enough to doi the gutters outside too.
It and 2 smaller companion step stools for Kelly upstairs and downstairs...some plastic angles and covers for the moulier (over the surface channel stuff) for the overhead lamps. The to Mondail Tissues (World Fabric) to check out whatever Kelly needs for the wall covering, curtains etc. project. We went to Carefour to get bread, beer and whatever else. Then home to work on The Mansion!
Oh well, another beautiful, if frustrating, day in Paradise.
Kelly called at 6pm local time, 9am Suisun Time and got to a US Postal Service person...YES, they use Europost, yes, they tried delivery on the 5th and 16th (the letter received Saturday was the first we knew of any delivery attempt), that's all they knew either. Shit! Well Kelly was predictably pissed, as was I, we don't need this news at all. We had so very carefully picked what needed to be shipped and what would come with us on this trip because we knew we were gpoing to move into the big house this time around. We packed it so carefully, evrything just so...in foam, in bubbles, in plastic wrap, inside blankets and comforters and now...where the hell is it? Somewhere between France and the US via Germany for some reason. POE (Port of Entry) perhaps to the EU? How am I to know?
Then off to Brico Depot to buy the ladder of our dreams with a budget of 100 Euros allocated. We found it in the form of a folding ladder that would extend to some 3.5 meters, enough to doi the gutters outside too.
It and 2 smaller companion step stools for Kelly upstairs and downstairs...some plastic angles and covers for the moulier (over the surface channel stuff) for the overhead lamps. The to Mondail Tissues (World Fabric) to check out whatever Kelly needs for the wall covering, curtains etc. project. We went to Carefour to get bread, beer and whatever else. Then home to work on The Mansion!
Oh well, another beautiful, if frustrating, day in Paradise.
Sunday, May 20, 2007
Paradise Revisited
Yesterday I skipped a blog, left for the Horse and Donkey Center outside of Lignieres at 7pm, we possessed tickets to see two acts as part of the L'air du Temps music festival presented by Les Bain-Douche theater of Lignieres. The Horse and Donkey center has many large buildings, some that have been converted to venues for stage and music productions. A huge ancient barn all duded up with stage lighting, lasers and music equipment galore stood before us. My estimate of the crowd was a few under a thousand who had paid the sum of 21 Euros for the privilege of watching Vallerie Leulliot and Florent Marchet last night. What a show! Vallerie was first up and she and her band were wonderful, She sang and played played keyboard and also a bit of guitar with which she is a fine talent. Her music has the rhythm of a reggae beat with soft melancholy lyrics, lovely to look at and easy to listen to she was an instant hit with the audience and with us. Here's a bit from youtube for you to sample of her work.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r98MwMVHnIs
She was followed by the terrific band of Florent Marchet, wonderful complex melodies and a rhythmic rock/jazz melange. He had the audience in his hands. What a show...his went on with 4 encores no less, for 3 solid hours! We got out at 12:30am! What a night of entertainment it was, the audience was so very appreciative and the bands of such high quality, my hat's off to Les Bain-Douche and the city of Lignieres for this fabulous night, one we won't soon forget. Here's the link for Florent's group on youtube.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jfRhmxMjCGs
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Home today after a morning at a brocante full of rusted junk and folk art made from clothespins. I bought two containers of french fries for 3 Euros...delicious! Back we each took up our respective work stations, Kelly on the floor of the middle bedroom, soon to be TV/computer room, and applied the 5th coat of some white paint over the deep green color that was there. I cleaned up the guest room of a few tools and began the lighting project in the potty. This invoved hanging a brass chandlier with 3 lamps by a hook in mid ceiling and running the needed wiring via above wall channeling, that's what you must do here if you want electricity anywhere in one of these old houses with 2 foot thick walls made of mud and stone. It took me about an hour to pull out the old porcelin fixture from the side of the wall and do the channel installation badly (without neat turns and covers) and wire the lamp to the switch. It all works and Kelly is pleased with the result, so am I. Tomorrow is grout the showerroom floor day.
See you later!
Howard
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r98MwMVHnIs
She was followed by the terrific band of Florent Marchet, wonderful complex melodies and a rhythmic rock/jazz melange. He had the audience in his hands. What a show...his went on with 4 encores no less, for 3 solid hours! We got out at 12:30am! What a night of entertainment it was, the audience was so very appreciative and the bands of such high quality, my hat's off to Les Bain-Douche and the city of Lignieres for this fabulous night, one we won't soon forget. Here's the link for Florent's group on youtube.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jfRhmxMjCGs
---
Home today after a morning at a brocante full of rusted junk and folk art made from clothespins. I bought two containers of french fries for 3 Euros...delicious! Back we each took up our respective work stations, Kelly on the floor of the middle bedroom, soon to be TV/computer room, and applied the 5th coat of some white paint over the deep green color that was there. I cleaned up the guest room of a few tools and began the lighting project in the potty. This invoved hanging a brass chandlier with 3 lamps by a hook in mid ceiling and running the needed wiring via above wall channeling, that's what you must do here if you want electricity anywhere in one of these old houses with 2 foot thick walls made of mud and stone. It took me about an hour to pull out the old porcelin fixture from the side of the wall and do the channel installation badly (without neat turns and covers) and wire the lamp to the switch. It all works and Kelly is pleased with the result, so am I. Tomorrow is grout the showerroom floor day.
See you later!
Howard
Friday, May 18, 2007
Paradise huh?
Well most of this day was spent in the shower room, not the bathroom/potty room...no, that's down the hall like in a Paris pension hotel. The object of interest was finishing the crown moulding project. Yes, yes...it's done, not the best job but not too bad either. It looks presentable at least. It still needs another coat of paint as all my handling has made it less than clean looking. Now I get to go on to the next step, creating the shelf for just above the wainscotting. More fun, more strange angles and more painting. I moved the shower enclosure into it's final location and i tlooks good. No leaks at all now, at least when I shower in it, your mileage may differ. Any leak winds up on the ceiling and ultimately onto the floor of the library below on the ground floor.
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I cooked an Indian green curry over basmati rice with blanched broccoli in lemon as the vegetable. I know you are expecting the recipe but frankly, this one is so bloody complicated and full of roasted then ground spices that you will cringe at the very idea of all this work. It IS worth the effort however and you should make the effort at least ONCE to taste what real curry is all about! I don't use curry powder and you shouldn't either, I use the individual spices of Garam Masala, here's a description of them:
from Wikipedia...Garam masala is a blend of ground spices common in the Indian cuisine, whose literal meaning is 'hot (or warm) spice'. There are many variants: most traditional mixes use just cinnamon, roasted cumin, cloves, nutmeg (and/or mace) and green cardamom seed or black cardamom pods. Many commercial mixtures may include more of other less expensive spices and may contain dried red chili peppers, dried garlic, ginger powder, sesame, mustard seeds, turmeric, coriander, bay leaves, cumin, and fennel. While commercial garam masala preparations can be bought ready ground, it does not keep well, and soon loses its aroma. Whole spices, which keep fresh much longer, can be ground when needed using a mortar and pestle or electric coffee grinder.
, roast and then grind them and include 1 can of coconut milk, 4 medium potatoes peeled, chopped coarsely, 2 apples similarly processed without seeds or skin and cooked chicken cubed as the main ingredients. Salt and papper of course to taste, over white rice...basmati is best, 20 minute or more only need apply, let it rest another 10 minutes after cooking off the burner if you want fluffy wonderful rice. I include a few thin slices of lemon and a pinch or two of salt as it cooks. Nice to have the added flavor to your rice.
Before dinner, yes I know it's backwards...anyway...
we went to the little church at the carefour (4 corners) being used as a venue for part of the Bain Douche's Spring Music Festival. The Bain Douche is the old public bath building in town, now converted to a nice theater with italianate modern red seating. The chapel near the carefour is for overflow acts and public performances that are free. It is a tiny church, built in the style of a 15th century miniature cathedral complete with local saints immortalized in stained glass. We became guests of honor when we noticed the producers SUN RECORDS T-shirt and made comment about it, he guessed out origin immediately (How I wonder?) and we were tickets number 1 and 2. We took seats down front when the doors openned. Franck Monnet was the star of the hour and his voice and guitar playing were exceptional. Well worth the price! No joke, he was wonderful and entertaining and musical as he could be. He got two ovations after a 90 minute performance! A little village like ours with a real music scene, amazing!
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I cooked an Indian green curry over basmati rice with blanched broccoli in lemon as the vegetable. I know you are expecting the recipe but frankly, this one is so bloody complicated and full of roasted then ground spices that you will cringe at the very idea of all this work. It IS worth the effort however and you should make the effort at least ONCE to taste what real curry is all about! I don't use curry powder and you shouldn't either, I use the individual spices of Garam Masala, here's a description of them:
from Wikipedia...Garam masala is a blend of ground spices common in the Indian cuisine, whose literal meaning is 'hot (or warm) spice'. There are many variants: most traditional mixes use just cinnamon, roasted cumin, cloves, nutmeg (and/or mace) and green cardamom seed or black cardamom pods. Many commercial mixtures may include more of other less expensive spices and may contain dried red chili peppers, dried garlic, ginger powder, sesame, mustard seeds, turmeric, coriander, bay leaves, cumin, and fennel. While commercial garam masala preparations can be bought ready ground, it does not keep well, and soon loses its aroma. Whole spices, which keep fresh much longer, can be ground when needed using a mortar and pestle or electric coffee grinder.
, roast and then grind them and include 1 can of coconut milk, 4 medium potatoes peeled, chopped coarsely, 2 apples similarly processed without seeds or skin and cooked chicken cubed as the main ingredients. Salt and papper of course to taste, over white rice...basmati is best, 20 minute or more only need apply, let it rest another 10 minutes after cooking off the burner if you want fluffy wonderful rice. I include a few thin slices of lemon and a pinch or two of salt as it cooks. Nice to have the added flavor to your rice.
Before dinner, yes I know it's backwards...anyway...
we went to the little church at the carefour (4 corners) being used as a venue for part of the Bain Douche's Spring Music Festival. The Bain Douche is the old public bath building in town, now converted to a nice theater with italianate modern red seating. The chapel near the carefour is for overflow acts and public performances that are free. It is a tiny church, built in the style of a 15th century miniature cathedral complete with local saints immortalized in stained glass. We became guests of honor when we noticed the producers SUN RECORDS T-shirt and made comment about it, he guessed out origin immediately (How I wonder?) and we were tickets number 1 and 2. We took seats down front when the doors openned. Franck Monnet was the star of the hour and his voice and guitar playing were exceptional. Well worth the price! No joke, he was wonderful and entertaining and musical as he could be. He got two ovations after a 90 minute performance! A little village like ours with a real music scene, amazing!
Wednesday, May 16, 2007
Paradise includes drizzle and wind
Up with the dawn, cat slept beside me all night long as far as I know, shedding hair by the handfuls but WHY? It's miserable outside, the dim light of the pre-dawn shows nothing but clouds as far as the eye can see and, our favorite, heavy drizzle...slop I call it, just slop, is falling. Too wet to work outside to dry to be serious about a work stoppage. Damn! Today WAS to be for a major brocante happening, hunt for smaller fare than before, ancient photos, a painting or two, drawings, a side table. The 17th is Assumption, a Catholic excuse not to work today and instead take all your junk, furnature, rusted parts and inoperative electronic stuff and place it up for sale in a field somewhere. That's the GIVEN in the formula, the UNKNOWNS are but two...the weather, being cold or wet AND will people actually leave the warmth of their houses and come? Well, the weather part is determined, blustery and wet, slop...so we decide to try it anyway KNOWING hardly anything will stop a Brocante from occuring once scheduled. Off to Chateauneuf-Sur-Cher to see what is happening, in town we find the site, a nice man in a bright yellow safety vest is standing in the middle of the street opposite the alley where, at the end, are unbrellas and many parked vans and trucks and a few people visible milling around. We take the next alley across the bridge and park a ways down on the left side in a small parking lot. There are 5 cars therein, we make it 6. We leave the comfort of the warm car, I don a black shopping bag for a hat of sorts and we stroll quickly down the alley, across the brdidge and into the site of the main event. Muddy grass and tarp and umbrella coverred booths dot the field. Stepping around pools of water and with the drizzle coming down almost as rain now we examine booth after booth for valuable wares and wonders of the not so modern world. Touring row upon row seems futile as most things are either sopping wet or covered with enough visqueen (plastic) or dripping tarps to be un-seeable and un-examinable. We walk on. After some 15 minutes of this brutality we take our leave, as we pass a booth, a pile of rusty tools lying in a small bucket of rusty water grabs my eye and I stop to look. It is an apparently handmade, hand forged BOLT that has been made ingeniously into a monkey wrench! It actually WORKS too! Holding the item up to view "Combien, S'il Vous Plait" I ask, the gent replies "Doux Euros", I say "Tres bien" and hand over a two Euro coin "Merci! Merci" I say, and the beauty is mine! Useless but necessary. Now an iron paperweight with a secondary (wrench) and looking at the roughly mashed head, possibly third purpose (hammer) in hand we walk back to the car. Off to the next one which is in Pruniers along the highway to Chateauroux.
The drizzle continues as we near Pruniers, some cars in the marie parking lot but no sellers visible, more cars...but still no umbrellas, no booths, no traffic director person to point the way. This one actually appears to have been cancelled because of the weather! Unusual, we drive along slowly looking for any signs of activity, there is none so off now to Bommiers for the next one, 5 minutes later we pull into a parking spot with 5 cars once again and get out of the car, a loud female voice is calling to the public to
come to the brocante. We obey crossing the bridge over a small stream and l'viola! tables, umbrellas, 4 vendors, a doorway seems crouded nearby and we join the croud seeking warmth and to get away from the wet. Inside it's all crafts, knitting, embroidery, paintings, drawings, stupid bear lamps, handmade jewelery...nothing of real interest to us so off we go, back to the car to the next, final and last brocante of the day in ________________.. Hmmm, at last a vendor with which I have interest, goat cheeses, thimble sized, sprinkled on top of each was small quantity of spice, coarse pepper, cumin, oregano, mint, dried onion...ohhhh these are fine! I ask "Comien, S'il Vous Plait" He says "Doux Euro demi pour veigt-cinq"...cheap, cheap, cheap...10 Euro cents a piece! "Oui!" I say and he carefully plucks each one out of the display and places hem in a little plastic box then bags them. I pay with exact change " l'viola!" he says and I'm off with a ":Merci!". Homeward bound now trying to be dry in mind if not dry in body we reflect on the mornings activity. "What a bust!" Kelly says, "Yep!", I say "but got some goat cheese and a nifty paperweight! for 4 Euros 50...not a bad haul!" She nods in agreement.
>
The drizzle continues as we near Pruniers, some cars in the marie parking lot but no sellers visible, more cars...but still no umbrellas, no booths, no traffic director person to point the way. This one actually appears to have been cancelled because of the weather! Unusual, we drive along slowly looking for any signs of activity, there is none so off now to Bommiers for the next one, 5 minutes later we pull into a parking spot with 5 cars once again and get out of the car, a loud female voice is calling to the public to
come to the brocante. We obey crossing the bridge over a small stream and l'viola! tables, umbrellas, 4 vendors, a doorway seems crouded nearby and we join the croud seeking warmth and to get away from the wet. Inside it's all crafts, knitting, embroidery, paintings, drawings, stupid bear lamps, handmade jewelery...nothing of real interest to us so off we go, back to the car to the next, final and last brocante of the day in ________________.. Hmmm, at last a vendor with which I have interest, goat cheeses, thimble sized, sprinkled on top of each was small quantity of spice, coarse pepper, cumin, oregano, mint, dried onion...ohhhh these are fine! I ask "Comien, S'il Vous Plait" He says "Doux Euro demi pour veigt-cinq"...cheap, cheap, cheap...10 Euro cents a piece! "Oui!" I say and he carefully plucks each one out of the display and places hem in a little plastic box then bags them. I pay with exact change " l'viola!" he says and I'm off with a ":Merci!". Homeward bound now trying to be dry in mind if not dry in body we reflect on the mornings activity. "What a bust!" Kelly says, "Yep!", I say "but got some goat cheese and a nifty paperweight! for 4 Euros 50...not a bad haul!" She nods in agreement.
>
A Wednesday in Near Paradise
Rained and drizzled all night, my newly planted charges are really happy about it. This appears to be a quite wet year when I remember back to last spring, good for plants but somwhat cool and a biut cloudy for my sunny disposition. Made eggs over easy with Chuck's terrific huge fresh eggs deliverred yesterday by Bob just before soup. The oh-so-thin bacon fume is delicious but just a bit too much heat (EDF man showed up at the door to read our electric meter) and poof! It's up in smoke! I ate the ruination and made another batch for Kelly's use. I sliced up a few of the little white potatoes and friend them in sweet butter, all made a wonderful filling breakfast before we spend today painting walls, doors, baseboards and that damnable fibreglass sponge that I've put up on the wall to make it "smooth".
Off to the painting people, off!
The whole day went well, Kelly painted windows and baseboards and doors and I climbed the awful rickedy ladder dozens of times painting the fiberglas mat white and cussing all the while. Hours went by and the job was typical, slow, sloppy and unsatisfying at this stage as there is still the crown moulding to complete and the mini-shelf that will be placed above the wainscotting to dress the room up a bit. The pictures attached show the fiberglass mat in all it's glory, a before and after if-you-will of how it looks. I wiped enough dripped paint off the floor and other newly painted beige surfaces to paint another wall at least! I love painting but this is less than easy due to the wattery nature of the paint itself and my sloppiness.
After the painting was done, about 1:30 we adjourned to the little kitchen to make a potato, garlic and onion soup. Here you go! 2 lbs of white or red potatoes peeled and chopped into small pieces to cook rapidly. an entire garlic peeled and chopped coarsely, one onion diced. 3 tablespoons of dried or fresh sage, 2 bay leaves.5 cups of water, 3 tomatos chopped, two tablespoons of olive oil and a 1/2 cup of cream or milk.
First combine the potatoes, garlic, onion and sage with the 5 cups of H20 (water!) in a 2qt pot and bring to a boil, reduce and simmer for 30 minutes until the potatoes are cooked through. At the same time saute the chopped tomatoes in the 2 tablespoons of olive oil until they are cooked and thickened. Nice and simple. Now strain the cooked mixture, save the cooking water!
Using a hand ricer or a food processor or other high speed device that scares the hell out of cats and that mushes stuff up fine...process the cooked potatoes, onions, sage and garlic...pull the bay leaves prior to this else it is a disaster! Combine the processed mixture, the tomatoes and the water and bring back to a boil. Reduce to a simmer and continue until the mixture is smooth and of the proper consistency for your soup. Add the cream or milk and turn off the heat. Add salt to taste. Serve either warm or COLD, delicious!
Off to the painting people, off!
The whole day went well, Kelly painted windows and baseboards and doors and I climbed the awful rickedy ladder dozens of times painting the fiberglas mat white and cussing all the while. Hours went by and the job was typical, slow, sloppy and unsatisfying at this stage as there is still the crown moulding to complete and the mini-shelf that will be placed above the wainscotting to dress the room up a bit. The pictures attached show the fiberglass mat in all it's glory, a before and after if-you-will of how it looks. I wiped enough dripped paint off the floor and other newly painted beige surfaces to paint another wall at least! I love painting but this is less than easy due to the wattery nature of the paint itself and my sloppiness.
After the painting was done, about 1:30 we adjourned to the little kitchen to make a potato, garlic and onion soup. Here you go! 2 lbs of white or red potatoes peeled and chopped into small pieces to cook rapidly. an entire garlic peeled and chopped coarsely, one onion diced. 3 tablespoons of dried or fresh sage, 2 bay leaves.5 cups of water, 3 tomatos chopped, two tablespoons of olive oil and a 1/2 cup of cream or milk.
First combine the potatoes, garlic, onion and sage with the 5 cups of H20 (water!) in a 2qt pot and bring to a boil, reduce and simmer for 30 minutes until the potatoes are cooked through. At the same time saute the chopped tomatoes in the 2 tablespoons of olive oil until they are cooked and thickened. Nice and simple. Now strain the cooked mixture, save the cooking water!
Using a hand ricer or a food processor or other high speed device that scares the hell out of cats and that mushes stuff up fine...process the cooked potatoes, onions, sage and garlic...pull the bay leaves prior to this else it is a disaster! Combine the processed mixture, the tomatoes and the water and bring back to a boil. Reduce to a simmer and continue until the mixture is smooth and of the proper consistency for your soup. Add the cream or milk and turn off the heat. Add salt to taste. Serve either warm or COLD, delicious!
Tuesday, May 15, 2007
Tuesday, a day at home, a day at work.
Retired in France doesn't mean just eating and drinking well and letting the sun rise and set while you relax staring at the birds as they feed from your multiple feeders. It means unexpected visits on days you had hoped to be left alone to work on the damned bathroom some more. Bob (name changed to protect the innocent...US!) rang the doorbell at 11:30. I heard his voice from upstairs on top of the awful rickedy ladder as I was gluing into place the fibreglass mat to create a smooth surface for recieving the paint. Down I went to greet our now guest, recieve the eggs he offered so generously (tried to pay him 3 Euros for them but he refused) and chat about happenings in and around Lignieres, relationships and personal situations that we can't do anything about. I wanted to work on my damned bathroom, not discuss our tiny world's denizens, alas it's what we did for almost two hours. We paused somewhat to partake of my Onion soup, (4 cups chicken stock, 2 cups thinly sliced yellow or white onions, one shallot sliced similarly and sauted til lightly browned on a medium fire, this takes about 30 minutes. Add onions and shallots to the stock, bring to a boil and reduce to simmer another 30 minutes. Salt and pepper to taste. Serve with french bread and butter or do the traditional French thing, cheeses (guyere and Parmisiano Reggiano baked on top of the sliced bread with the soup poured over) added for additional zing. Bob was pleased, we were pleased, I excused myself to get back to my !@@@@! bathroom project/albatross. He excused himself and left shortly thereafter. I went back to work, completed covering the the two remaining walls and went to work on the garden waste pile. I had retrieved the incinerator and various foodstuffs from the little house in the morning and so loaded up the metal can and lit a fire. It took the better part of two hours to elliminate the pile of debris that I had collected over the last nearly two months we've been here. After the fire had diminished to smoke I drove over to Champion, the supermarket here in town, purchsed three more of the large flower pots for my pot garden, 4 more 50 liter bags of potting soil with which to fill the pots and plant nasturtums, parsley, corriander, japanese onions and others. 6 pm came and I quit all the hard labor about the planting and put on my chef's hat. we had purchased crab claws and a live crab yesterday at Auchan in Chateauroux. I put on water to cook the whoile crab and busied myself at cracking the crab claws as a cold addition to Kelly's wonderful mushroom soup that she made yesterday. Delicious meal along with a lettuce, tomatoe, avacado and onion salad dressed with red wine vinegar and olive oil, salt and pepper (for me...as Kelly seldom uses them relying instead on the flavors of the ingrediants to satisfy her taste buds).
Monday, May 14, 2007
Moonday, Lunday, a day of no work.
Up, I made bisquits, not scones...no raisons, no dates no dried fruit, just flour, milk, butter (no lard vegetable or pork) and leavening...baking powder, a teaspoon of salt. This always works, 1.5 cups of flour sifted together with 1.5 rounded teaspoons of baking powder and the salt, then cut in with a cutter or fork the fat...the lard or butter til it has all made up to little lumps, add enough milk to combine the ingrediants, try a cup, add more if needed to form a coarse dough. Powder your hands and the wet dough with flour and form into 1/2" thick (15mm) thick patties about 2" (50 mm) in diameter, place into a baking sheet or skillet...makes about 5 to 7 bisquits. Mine went to hell this morning, laid flat and refused to rise almost at all...browning took almost an hour in the pathetic electric oven I have at my disposal...hard tack, yes hard tack. Crusty, hard outside, soft inside, way over baked brown and dry as desert sand. NOT a good bisquit! The fault? The bloody leavening powder has died! We sent a pound to ourselves before we left California almost two months ago now...alas it is still in transit along with three more boxes of stuff we'll have it some day. Baking powder as we know it has not been found in France, they do not have this tradition I guess and are used to rising bread with various yeasts, I need baking powder for this bisquit baking chore and have none that is fresh. I wait anxiously.
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Then after sufficient coffee espresso) to wake us thoroughly off to Chateauroux to seek our fortunes. Leroy Merlin must wait for the junk store...we have bought LOTS of stuff at this regional TROC de L'ile...like a thrift store/consignment shop in the US...lots of furniture, lamps, mirrors, chairs, tables etc. The one in Chateauroux is excellent in that we almost always find some near hidden, forgotten GEM therein to purchase and pack into our Toyota Avensis. How it always fits remains somewhat mysterious, but it does.
Today it was a set of 6 Henry II wood chairs, a nice oak table with one drawer for the Prep room, 2 small stools that look like kids woodshop projects but very well made of oak weighing about 10lbs (5kg) each and last but not least a nicely made tan leather couch, 6 ft long, not a sleeper really but quite comfortable and nice looking..I laid down on it to let Kelly see how it fit me, planning for the near future snoring session I guess.
We took the stools and two of the six chairs and agreed to have TROC de L'ile deliver the rest this Wednesday between 4:30 and 5 pm. Then off to Babou to find a few 1.49 Euro scissors, flashlights and batteries and who knows what else, all Chinese made but then cheap and worthy of use at the first look.
Then back across Chateauroux to Leroy Merlin for plywood to resubstanciate the wicker chairs seats before someone winds up on the ground! The chairs are wonderfully victorian but worn and fragile, they need paint and cushions and seat plywood to make them last a few years. Kelly moved thru the CASA (CAH-Zah) store finding 40% off bargains, wine glasses and flutes for champagne when that day happens. Then to Auchan for onions, potatoes, beer, coffee beans, oysters, crab and crab legs, vodka for the liqour cabinet, and a few other essentials like chocolate. As we exited the store it began to rain a cold drizzle and dark clouds summoned us homeward towards Lignieres to end our buying spree. It rained all the way home.
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Then after sufficient coffee espresso) to wake us thoroughly off to Chateauroux to seek our fortunes. Leroy Merlin must wait for the junk store...we have bought LOTS of stuff at this regional TROC de L'ile...like a thrift store/consignment shop in the US...lots of furniture, lamps, mirrors, chairs, tables etc. The one in Chateauroux is excellent in that we almost always find some near hidden, forgotten GEM therein to purchase and pack into our Toyota Avensis. How it always fits remains somewhat mysterious, but it does.
Today it was a set of 6 Henry II wood chairs, a nice oak table with one drawer for the Prep room, 2 small stools that look like kids woodshop projects but very well made of oak weighing about 10lbs (5kg) each and last but not least a nicely made tan leather couch, 6 ft long, not a sleeper really but quite comfortable and nice looking..I laid down on it to let Kelly see how it fit me, planning for the near future snoring session I guess.
We took the stools and two of the six chairs and agreed to have TROC de L'ile deliver the rest this Wednesday between 4:30 and 5 pm. Then off to Babou to find a few 1.49 Euro scissors, flashlights and batteries and who knows what else, all Chinese made but then cheap and worthy of use at the first look.
Then back across Chateauroux to Leroy Merlin for plywood to resubstanciate the wicker chairs seats before someone winds up on the ground! The chairs are wonderfully victorian but worn and fragile, they need paint and cushions and seat plywood to make them last a few years. Kelly moved thru the CASA (CAH-Zah) store finding 40% off bargains, wine glasses and flutes for champagne when that day happens. Then to Auchan for onions, potatoes, beer, coffee beans, oysters, crab and crab legs, vodka for the liqour cabinet, and a few other essentials like chocolate. As we exited the store it began to rain a cold drizzle and dark clouds summoned us homeward towards Lignieres to end our buying spree. It rained all the way home.
Sunday, May 13, 2007
Paradise is for the birds
Up at 7am to noisy birdsong from the swallows that are nesting (or trying to) above the windows under the cornice where I can't get to them with a hose. If they weren't so messy I wouldn't care a bit but they do poop and it rains down on the street and sidewalk below making a mess of everything. Flashing CD's seem to be the preferred non-violent method of discouraging them, I have done that in California under our deck but not here...yet. Off we went at 8:30 to the brocante in ORVAL, the outskirts of St. Amand Montrond, a devil to find as we saw only two signs that refered to it and had arrows to tell you which direction. It was largely a chance of dumb luck that we found it at all. Lots of sellers but with little to sell that was of interest to us EXCEPT the plante madam, she had lovely small plants at the typical prices (2 Euros for a seeding) that we've come to expect. I spent 32 Bucks (Euros) buying this's and thats, she was grateful and I admired her careful touch with her charges as she packaged them carefully in small plastic sacks. That was our only purchase at that brocante though we spent a hour and a half there gawking. Then on to Mountlouis for a producer sale...plants, vegies and various cheesemakers and wine producers joined the fray. I bought more plants for my miniature formal garden, most of which I didn't even know the name of. Two Hortensias...for 12 dollars each that were HUGE and would have been 40 bucks back in California. Various sages, some mints, italian parsley and others were bought along with the hortensias. We ran into a few friends hanging out at the Menatou Salon winery booth sipping delicious red, I'm used to and respect the whites from that region but have never had the red, it was light, fruity and delicious, made to drink right away as we were doing. It was a 2005 vintage and worth a buy when I next see it in a grocery store. Home we came to plant the new plants and admire our labors. Kelly is putting on the 2nd and third coats of paint on the bathroom wainscotting that I have installed therein. It's beginning to look like a completed bathroom and WILL once I cover the walls with the fiberglass cloth, she paints it and then I paint and apply the crown mounding. What a job this bathroom has been. May be done by weeks end with luck and diligence.
Saturday, May 12, 2007
Another Day in Paradise
Saturday, May 12, 2007
Cool, no COLD breezes and clouds scudding by this morning led to a sunny and warm afternoon. We drove over to St. Amand Montrond this morning for yet another bricolage (hardware/lumber) shopping trip. This time for electrical outlets to replace the ancient ones that won't allow new plugs to fit and a length (2 meters) of a 1" corner moulding to continue the bathroom remodel and make functional this lengthy project. The shower is in but somehow there is a leak of some small amount around the perimeter of the fiberglass beauty. Everyday I fiddle with either the leveling or apply more silicone sealant to yet another area to try to stave off the inevitable
ceiling drip downstairs in the library...a major flood the first time water was on in the shower led to a major overhaul of the outside margins and the drain itself. French plumbing and my self professed lousy plumbing skills combine to create disaster after wet disaster time and time again. Such fun.
The rest of the day was taken up moving rocks, not just small ones either but some as large as 350 lbs that begged the use of a dolly to do so. I have made the small formal garden almost twice as large by building with stones from our barn an opposing oval with which to create another flower garden in front of our backdoor. It took a couple of hours to move the stones once again...(don't ask...this is the 2nd planned use for them) to the new location, Kelly approved the project and was happy to see it in form and filled with 400 liters of dirt for geraniums which was on sale for 2.90 Euros per 40 liter bag. I bought the ten bags and 4
large flower pots to help hide the concrete facing of the main drain system by the fence in the backyard garden area.
Here are some pics of the new layout last this afternoon. I need a statue don't I? Or a fountain!
Cool, no COLD breezes and clouds scudding by this morning led to a sunny and warm afternoon. We drove over to St. Amand Montrond this morning for yet another bricolage (hardware/lumber) shopping trip. This time for electrical outlets to replace the ancient ones that won't allow new plugs to fit and a length (2 meters) of a 1" corner moulding to continue the bathroom remodel and make functional this lengthy project. The shower is in but somehow there is a leak of some small amount around the perimeter of the fiberglass beauty. Everyday I fiddle with either the leveling or apply more silicone sealant to yet another area to try to stave off the inevitable
ceiling drip downstairs in the library...a major flood the first time water was on in the shower led to a major overhaul of the outside margins and the drain itself. French plumbing and my self professed lousy plumbing skills combine to create disaster after wet disaster time and time again. Such fun.
The rest of the day was taken up moving rocks, not just small ones either but some as large as 350 lbs that begged the use of a dolly to do so. I have made the small formal garden almost twice as large by building with stones from our barn an opposing oval with which to create another flower garden in front of our backdoor. It took a couple of hours to move the stones once again...(don't ask...this is the 2nd planned use for them) to the new location, Kelly approved the project and was happy to see it in form and filled with 400 liters of dirt for geraniums which was on sale for 2.90 Euros per 40 liter bag. I bought the ten bags and 4
large flower pots to help hide the concrete facing of the main drain system by the fence in the backyard garden area.
Here are some pics of the new layout last this afternoon. I need a statue don't I? Or a fountain!
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