Well, now you’ve had Matt’s round up, I just need to do a recount of my last week, but I can’t be bothered to go into detail, so this will be mercifully brief.
Last week was dominated by an intense heatwave that got underway on Monday and hit its peak on Thursday. I did some work on Monday and had a night in. On Tuesday, I met an Orange technician at the parents’ house. They now have internet and a working landline so are fully connected to the outside world at last. I ate at theirs that evening too, a delicious meal of spicy chicken over rice, followed by cheese, then yoghurt cake with peaches and Cointreau – all prepared by Mum. I stayed for a game of cards then came home.
I was up early on Wednesday so did a shop run in the morning before it got too hot. Mum & Dad are having a dispute with their electricity company over an invoice so I spent some time on the phone that afternoon trying to get it sorted – to no avail thus far.
The heat on Thursday was just unbearable, even indoors. The air felt like it was made of treacle and the slightest effort was draining. But that was the end of it: a storm cleared the air on Friday morning, bringing with it our first rainfall in weeks. And boy did it fall, for two days straight.
I did some gardening on Saturday morning in the drizzle, dealing with a list of things that had been on hold until it cooled down. I then went to Super U for supplies, getting caught in a torrential downpour on my way home.
The rain was very welcome for the garden, but less welcome for Saint Pardoux’s annual Spardos event, which by all accounts was a complete wash-out. I was going to go down anyway, if only to for some food, but I rang Benoit who was down there working and based on his report, decided against it. Instead I called round to their place where Eva, Sam and various members of the Pringault family were chilling out. I supplied the vodka and in return got fed and spent a nice few hours socialising. B&V appeared a little before midnight, exhausted and not in the best of spirits. Apparently, they’d ordered 5 whole pigs for the meal. A little over one was consumed, so there’s a lot of spare pork in St Pardoux at the moment!
The rain stopped on Sunday and it was sunny but lots cooler. I did a little housework and then made what was going to be a mushroom lasagne, until Lucien dropped off 6 large courgettes, at which point it became a courgette and mushroom lasagne. I finished off the housework on Monday and then collected Matt from Anouleme at a little before 8pm. And that’ll do for the round up.