It’s a glorious sunny day here, about 15 degrees: a welcome relief after the cold snap we had recently where we’ve had the log-burner blazing all day long. It’s due to continue for a while too, allegedly reaching up to 20 degrees by the middle of the week. It’s still cold at night though, so the winter duvet has been broken out.
Since the last entry, we’ve done quite a bit of socialising, and a little work too. The first event was last Friday when we went over to Brantôme to see our new friends, Lisa & Dave. They invited us, and our mutual friends, Pete & Sally, over for an apéritif dinatoire – drinks and lots of finger food. We stayed for a few hours having a nice catch up with them all. We hadn’t seen Pete & Sally for a number of weeks as they’ve been back in the UK. It was the first time we’d seen Lisa & Dave’s place (the one opposite the pizzeria) and it’s very lovely. They’re in the process of doing a lot of work to it and are doing a fine job so far. After a few hours, we said our goodbyes and headed home for an early night as we had big plans for the next night.
This was the “Soirée de Cidre et Châtaignes” in Milhac. Organised by a local association, it is an annual event at which is served (funnily enough) cider and chestnuts, among other things. We’d arranged to go with Bryan and Carol, and also Lee who was home alone in Villebois. They all got to us for an apéritif or 2 beforehand then we made our way down to the salle de fetes in Milhac for about 8.30, where it was all happening. We met up with a few people from Matt’s conversation class, and a group of English folks from St Pardoux, with whom we shared a section of table. Apparently it was much busier last year, but there was still a good 70 or so people there, a mix of French and English.
A tasty meal of confit de poule, chestnuts, cheese and patisseries was served over the course of the evening, and the “cider” and “wine” (both of very dubious quality) flowed well throughout. There was also a raffle, for which we collectively bought a load of tickets and scored 2 prizes: an ice-cube tray that makes duck-shaped cubes, and a tobacco tin with 2 scantily-clad women on it, bearing the legend “Twin Cheeks”. The latter is needless to say not quite to our tastes, but the ice-cube tray will no doubt get lots of use. Afterwards, cheesy disco music came on and Lee, Matt and Carol took to the dancefloor along with around a dozen or so others. Bryan and I demurred and nursed our dodgy beverages instead.
We succeeded in getting the others off the dance floor around midnight or so and we made our way back to Mazeroux, where we said goodnight to B&C then kept the party going at Port 80. We took care of our vodka supply and ended up breaking out the Nintendo Wii for the first time in ages, playing drunken golf, bowling and guitar hero for an unspecified number of hours before passing out. This meant a late and shaky start to Sunday. Matt put together a welcome fry-up for us all and Lee left soon after as he had to clean the house (although I think he actually just crashed and did it early the next day instead, and I don’t blame him). We vegged in front of the TV all day and had a well-needed early night.
That’s it for last weekend, and there’s not much to say about the week either really. Work is slow for me still, although the website for the local equestrian centre is moving along gradually and I have a few other bits just around the corner too. My latest client is an English carpenter/joiner who recently arrived here in France from Belgium, and before that, Holland. We offer cheap “pre-built” websites and he opted for one of these for his business. This means the work is quite easy for me, but very boring. It was also a bit of a learning curve as far as our pricing model for these template sites, which I suppose was a useful thing. He came round on Friday for a meeting to go over a few things, and ended up paying me there and then, even though the site wasn’t finished, so that was a bonus too. Friday was also a curry day at Milhac so we had a nice treat for our meal that evening. Sue, who runs the curry business, asked if we wanted to put cards or flyers in with each curry she drops off – which would be a great way to reach more expats out here. We’ve just ordered some business cards for Port 80 Services, so will give a load to her when they arrive.
I think Matt mentioned in the last entry that our friends Mike & Jean (the ones moving up north) had offered us a wardrobe they no longer needed. Yesterday afternoon, we finally went round to collect it. It’s a huge bit of kit, and a flat-pack, so we originally hoped to lash it to Mike’s trailer and avoid having to dismantle it, but in this we were foiled as it was just too bulky. It took an hour or so to work out how to get it to bits but once we had, we got all the parts into our 2 cars. We stayed for a cuppa and a chat – it was probably the last time we’ll see their old place, and the last time for quite some time that we’ll see them too – and then charged home to get ready for the evening’s activity.
We dumped the wardrobe parts in the spare bedroom and immediately set about preparing dinner. We’d invited our French friend Morgan over as we realised we hadn’t seen him since the Spring. He got to us for 7, by which time we were more or less done with the food prep. We made a yummy meal of curried (homegrown) butternut squash soup to start, then southern-fried chicken in a spicy, cheesy breadcrumb rub and sweet potato chips (also spicy) for the main. This was followed by cheese and then patisseries. It was lots of food, but it was spread out over the course of the evening, with a game of Wii golf thrown in before dessert too. It was nice to catch up with Morgan again, although he isn’t in the best of spirits at the moment: he’s had a few health problems and is single but would rather not be. Still it was a fun night and he stayed with us till around midnight then headed off home. We had a final cleanser afterwards before also calling it a night.
This morning, we turned our attention to the wardrobe, which is now rebuilt and in situ in the guest room. It being so huge, it has revolutionalised our storage situation: suits, duvets, pillows, towels and other miscellaneous items that didn’t have a home are finally out of the way – so a big thanks to Mike and Jean for that! We’ll have been in Port 80 for 2 years in January and there are still lots of odd little bits and pieces that need doing, but ticking each one off is most satisfying. Ok, I think that’s all I have to say for now. Enjoy your respective Sundays and tune in again soon, folks.