It’s misty and grey Mazeroux but it’s not really all that cold, I’ll give it that. Despite the mildness, there seem to be a lot of bugs doing the rounds here at the moment but – touch wood – so far we have avoided going down with any. Last week was our first proper « back to work » week, and so we of course capped it off with a large weekend.
Work is steady for both of us, and has now calmed down for Matt who began the week with a busy few days working on a project for a UK client. One of the sites I worked on last year went live last week, for a local caterer, and we’re both now putting the finishing touches on the villa rental site in St Tropez, which should go live this week. Always nice when you can finally send out the invoice and get paid for all your hard work.
And the money’s especially welcome as there have been a few outlays recently. My laptop finally more or less gave up the ghost over the holidays, so I now have a very chic and modern new one that set me back a few pennies. And Matt has finally decided he can take no more of his old and erratic tablet, so has ordered a new one.
On Tuesday, Lucien & Mauricette dropped by to wish us a happy New Year, and to invite us to dinner at theirs on Friday. At first we demurred and insisted they eat at ours, but this was clearly not the right response so we accepted. Mauricette was suffering from a cold, but they stayed and chatted for a while and we learned that they’d gone to the NYE event that took place in Milhac this year (the first one in many years). Apparently it was ok if not brilliant – and the Beaufils both stayed out till 3am!
Our next social interaction was with Jenny, who I went down to see on Thursday to advise her about getting a new laptop. She is taking a photography course with a view to changing careers, as running the equestrian centre solo is grinding her down. I stayed for a little chat afterwards but didn’t want to catch her various bugs: she had both strep throat and an ear infection.
On Friday evening, we had our meal at the Beaufils. By this point, we’d already made plans for the Saturday, so we resolved to go easy on the drinks that night as we often leave theirs quite well-oiled. We arrived to find that Mauricette had shaken off her cold, but only to give it to Lucien, who was in a very sorry state. He skipped the aperitif, but Matt and I partook of the traditional home-made punch. This was served with slices of bread with truffle butter, and some with fish rillettes. This was followed by white asparagus from his garden, served with home-made mayonnaise.
Next came the obligatory potage. The main was deer steak, cooked so rare I didn’t dare go near it, or turkey which was delicious. This was followed by the cheese board, and then dessert: a galette served with a fruit salad. This of course entailed a chartreuse or two. By 10:30 we could see Lucien was really flagging so we bade our goodbyes and came home to watch a film with the cats.
Saturday evening was an altogether later affair. We invited Benoit & Virginie over and along with them came Eva and Sam. Benoit & co took care of the aperitif, and Fred provided the dessert, even though he wasn’t able to attend. It was a v similar aperitif to the previous night, with fish rillettes on slices of bread (and a tapenade for me). We also took care of an impressive amount of vodka. For the main, matt did a repeat of his NYE dish: minced beef eaten taco-style with lettuce leaves. He also made our thai green curry dish to go along with it.
It was lovely to see the guys again as it had been a few weeks since the last time. They’re all mostly well, except Virginie had just gotten over a nasty cold and Eva was in the throes of one that night. After dinner, we played games and kept the merriment going until far too late.
As tends to be the case we were therefore not in the finest of fettle when band practise came around the following afternoon, but we surprised ourselves by not being too bad. And that’s about all that happened.