Yes, this entry is long overdue but at least I have the excuse that I’ve been hard at work. Picking up where Will left off, we had a quiet Friday after Lud and Kike left us which was good because we ended up having a very large weekend of London-esque proportions. Besides us, the other party to the party were Lee and Richard, new friends who live over in Villebois la Valette in the Charante. They are friends of our new friend Barry and they came to our housewarming back in May but since we were entertaining at the time, we didn’t get to spend much time with them.
I spent the afternoon preparing the meal and I have to say, I was really well organised compared to normal. We started with drinks and nibbles so skipped having a starter and went right to the main which was crispy chicken thighs with garlic and lemon served with a couscous salad that contained onions and cherry toms from the garden. This was served with green beans and spinach, also from the garden, sauteed in garlic and butter. We then had the usual selection of cheese followed by dessert, a chocolate fondant, a new one for me. The recipe came from the garçons Demailly, the two sons of the people from whom we purchased the cats that they made when they visited us last year. Thankfully, it’s easy to prepare which is good since I we didn’t get around to having it until nearly midnight and by that time, I was a little less than sober.
Lee and Richard are from Lancaster in the north of England and they’ve just moved here permanently a few months ago although they’ve owned their place for a couple of years. They own lots of property in England, some of which they sold to buy the place here. They’re in a similar situation to us in that they don’t really have a source of income although they’re both very resourceful so I’m sure they’ll land on their feet. Richard used to manage a paint store and there is a big demand for English paint out here since the French stuff tends to be very watery and hence requires many coats. Apparently, a guy Richard knows came over here and started selling paint at markets etc but got a visit late one night from some large men strongly discouraging him from continuing to do so. Who knew paint could be such a contentious business.
Anyway, our guests arrived around 7pm and we started with a round of vodkas, then a few more and then some wine. Later in the evening we had whiskey but largely, we drank wine to the tune of seven bottles worth. As you do when getting to know new friends, we ended up staying up nearly until dawn and eventually passed out around 6. We all awoke around midday and let’s just say that we weren’t feeling our fresh best. So after feeling miserable for about an hour, we decided that there was nothing left for it but to move back onto the vodka. There was almost none left but there was still beer, wine and a splash of rum so we made do with that. I made way too much food the night before so there were plenty of leftovers for lunch that day. Richard took a nap in the afternoon and eventually joined us again around 8pm when I made a fry-up for us all. The boys eventually left us around 10 that night, capping off one of our biggest weekends since moving out here.
Will and I were both a bit slow on Monday but I managed to get back to work and that’s what I did for most of last week. I’m happy to report that I delivered the bulk of the project to the client yesterday evening so I now have a few days to relax before they get back to me with bugs and changes. Will was a bit of a loose end since he no longer had driving theory with which to occupy himself so he read “A Week in December” by Sebastian Faulks and thoroughly enjoyed it.
We had a couple of other social events during the week, the first one Thursday which was Bastille Day. We didn’t really celebrate it and instead, dined over at Sharon’s along with two retired English couples. The first, Pete and Sally are friends of Mike and Jean and we’d met them once before when we went to collect the 3 piece suite that they’d had in storage at their place. The other couple was Peter and Margaret and although they live in Badaillac for part of the year, this was the first time we’d actually met them. We were interested to learn that Peter is an avid reader of the Frog Blog (Hi Peter) and he actually stumbled upon it sometime last year when googling “Badaillac”. It was slightly odd to meet someone who knew much more about us than we did about him but I guess it’s not much different to meeting friends of friends/parents where the same thing often occurs.
The meal itself was wonderful and I’m being slightly boastful here since I did the cooking (bbq’ing to be exact). I made some chicken pieces with a spice rub but the rest was all Sharon, including pork chops coated in apple and ginger, sausages and jumbo shrimp, also with a spicy sauce. In addition, Sharon prepared three salads: her delicious potato salad, a green salad with tomatoes and basil and the last was a melange of various proteins inclucing bacon, camembert, two types of beans, spinach leaves and dates. It was different but very tasty and she sent us home with leftovers that we enjoyed for the next two nights. The evening itself was very pleasant although there was a fair amount of banter between the Petes and their spouses, mostly men vs women type stuff (driving, snoring, forgetfulness etc.). The alcohol consumption ranged from none to heavy where I fell on the light end of the spectrum since I had to drive home.
Apart from the social events, there only other thing to mention is that we’ve finally had some rain. Largely, it’s been cool, cloudy and humid but despite this, we often just get a fine mist rather than any significant precipitation. Thankfully, that’s changed in the last few days and we’ve now had enough rain to make the garden happy but still not tons. On that note, it’s meant to be cool (low 20’s / 70’s) and cloudy/rainy for the next week so perhaps this is a case of being careful what you wish for. We’re drowning in tomatoes, the courgettes are starting to come fast and furious but that’s largely it for now. I’m not holding out much hope for the corn although we may get some squash if the rain continues.
As usual, I’ve rambled on long enough so I’m going to stop now. A bientot 