Well, there’s a statement I never thought I would make, but it’s true. After a relative heatwave, its a let down to find it so cool, grey and very windy in Mazeroux these days. Still, it is still technically winter so I can’t really complain too much.
The big news this week is that Mum and Dad are finally with furniture. The delivery was due on Monday, but in the end they rang to postpone until first thing the next morning. Although this meant one more night of roughing it, it gave them all day to deal with it all when it showed up. You can see from the photos how it’s really taken shape. The album goes from the day they bought the house, to today.
Next up is getting their TV sorted, which is in progress, and then the phone and internet – but its looking like the latter is going to be a matter of months and not weeks.
I went over on Tuesday morning to help with the delivery then came home for lunch and to do some work. As Matt said in his last entry, the two projects I have going on both took an unfortunate turn at the end of last week. For the vineyard site, it’s a real bugger as the site was shaping up really nicely and would have been a good showcase for our portfolio. Alas, people are idiots. The poor excuse for a website they now want me to build has been relegated to the bottom of my to-do list.
The other project, when I started it, was for a small VW Camper van rental business in Wales. They gave me some text and a few photos, and I got to work on a design based on all that. By the time I sent it to them for review, their business name had changed and they now also had a Bentley and a range rover. After sulking for a couple days, I went back and made the necessary changes to my design so that one’s back on track, although I’m far less pleased with it.
There’s nothing much of note for the rest of the week so I’ll move on to the weekend. On Saturday, Mum & Dad were invited, along with Matt and I, to Marie & Christian’s for dinner. We got there for 7 and had a leisurely aperitif course, with most of the conversation in French, and I think the folks followed well. The meal started with a cold carrot and orange soup which was odd but excellent. Lentils and chorizo was the main (with mum having a veggie version) and it too was very tasty. Dessert was even more so : an apple tart made with vanilla sugar.
Afterwards, we retired to the lounge for the traditional argument phase of the evening, which Marie and I always seem to veer into sooner or later when the drinks flow. The folks wisely decided to call it a night at this point and so we left too, for a film and then bed.
We had band practise the following afternoon, which went considerably better than the week before, but was still a bit dicey in places. Soon after Christian left, we were entertaining again : we’d invited Françoise, Paul, and Sophie and Dom over for a meal. S&D have been really busy and are about to become so again, so this was a rare chance to see them, hence the two-nighter weekend.
Françoise made the aperitifs which were bits of chicken and pistachio in a creamy sauce, served on bread, and some courgette and goats cheese parcels held together with chives. All very yummy. Matt made roast pork and roast potatoes for the main and it was a big hit, and cooked to perfection bien sur. This was followed by a colossal carrot cake that we’ll be working our way through the rest of this week.
As it was a school night, the guests left early and we werent long to bed. And that about brings us up to date !