May is bank holiday month in France, some of which are always on the same date, and others change depending on Easter. Last week had two holidays, one on Tuesday and Thursday, which means they “fait le pont” and also take off Mon, Wed and Fri. We often work on French holidays since most of clients are English / American, but we managed to enjoy a bit of downtime last week.
This is mainly because work has calmed down a wee bit, at least for me. I finished my last big project the previous week, and now have a number of small, less urgent things. Will, on the other hand, had two new designs to do and I’m proud to say he knocked em both out of the park. The first is for a gite in Normandy (previous owned by Mike and Jean who used to live here), and the second is for our Welsh escort madame. Both customers were thrilled with their new design, and it means Will’s got a lot to keep him busy.
The weather was decent for most of last week, and we spent some time outside, reading (me) and playing guitar (Will). Our first social event was Wed night when we had a Mexican cook-off chez Sophie et Dom. Our next soiree for Milhac Loisirs is in two weeks, with a Mexican themed meal. We decided the menu the previous week, but not the recipes themselves, so Sophie and I each made the entire menu, and the guests compared and voted on their preferred version. The menu is magaritas, chips, salsa and guac for apero, mixed salad for entree, beef tacos and chicken fajitas with rice and all the trimmings, and pineapple upside down cake for dessert.
We each made enough for 8 people, and with only 6 people eating, there were mountains of food. I purposely didn’t make my dishes too spicy, so there were a bit bland, but still definitely Mexican. Sophie used the same ingredients, and came up with radically different dishes that were all delicious, but could hardly be described as Mexican. In the end, we decided which version of what to make, sometimes deciding to do both versions, and we left with a load of leftovers.
We had planned to take it easy the next night, but got a call around 7:30 from Benoit asking where we were. We had provisionally scheduled a meal at their place when they were here last, but he never confirmed. We mustered fairly quickly and headed over to their place where the apero was in full swing at his mom’s place next door. Along with the usual crowd, mainly family, was Jenny who we hadn’t seen in ages. She’s been working very hard, even more than usual, and a lot of her time is being taken up dealing with horse flu. Dinner that night was white asparagus, followed by confit de canard and roasted potatoes, then cheese, salad and dessert, which was a giant “royale” from Fred. We headed back to B&Vs for an unneeded nightcap, and then returned home and passed out.
The weather was still good on Friday, with temps in the low 20’s and I should have mowed the lawn. Instead, we enjoyed the weather and hung-out in front of the house, just taking it easy. We stayed in that night, but went out the following night to Emmanuel and Olivier’s for a Eurovision party. Neither of us are big fans, and although we’d both attended parties in the past, it had been well over 15 years since either of us had done so. E & O live about 45 min away in the Charante, so we decided to stay the night and showed up with vodka, and chicken tortilla wraps. There were 12 of us in all, mainly retired couples who live nearby, some of whom we’d met at a previous party. They put on a massive spread, starting with fois gras on homemade bread, salmon ceviche “tacos” served on endive leaves, and homemade pizza. We also had a velloute of asparagus in there somewhere before moving on to a variety of desserts. We managed to watch the entire show, which lasted till just before 1am, then hung out a bit before crashing around 2:30. We were both up around 8:30 and headed home before our hosts awoke.
In other news, I have an appointment today with the anesthesiologist for my hernia surgery in two weeks. There is also the ongoing saga of my glasses. Although they remade my computer glasses, the right eye is still not quite right and although I’ve gotten used to it, I still need them replaced. So I called around for an appointment with an opthamologist, and the wait times varied from 9 months to 2 years! Instead, I broke down and called the one I saw here before, and she agreed to see me at the end of the month. I ordered a second pair of glasses when I was in MN, but they took some time to make, so Mom kindly agreed to have them packed and shipped. In order to be insured, I had to pay for special packing, and declare the correct value on the customs form. So when they arrived, I had to pay French VAT on them, and with fees, this came to €127! The only silver lining is that the eyeglasses shop in MN agreed to give me a full refund on the wonky lenses, so at least that covers the cost of the taxes.
And on that note, I’d better get to work.