It's A Wrap

Xmas is almost upon us. It seems to have crept up on me this year and it’s very disconcerting.  A couple of weeks ago it was November and everything was under control and now – we’ve only got a few days to go before old Papa Noel climbs down the chimney and finds himself locked inside the wood burner.

Luckily I had a few spare hours in London on Monday morning (thank you BA for getting me there early) and so the normal panic buying of presents which will be unloved and unused, was something of a doddle this year. All I had to do was wander into Waitrose and buy J all the things she craves –  cakes, biscuits and anything covered in chocolate. They tend to be regular shapes too which makes the wrapping of them a little easier – more on this later. And joy of joys, when I got back to rainy old France the job I really hate had been completed – the tree had been  bought and decorated. Great!

There are jobs I don’t mind doing at Xmas and then there’s jobs I hate. I cant really think of any jobs I ‘love’ but putting the tree up definitely falls into the ‘hate’ category. Strangely, I don’t mind taking the tree down after Xmas – weird eh? I don’t mind doing the outside lights either but as that needs ladders, hammers and nails, if I didn’t do it, the exterior of the house would remain dark and dull and not very festive. I also don’t mind doing all the cooking on Xmas day – maybe that’s a man thing. However, almost falling into the ‘hate-tree’ category comes the wrapping of presents. I detest it. I generally leave it to the last minute and then frantically throw some fancy paper round whatever it is that I’ve bought and try and hide it under the other presents under the tree. That’s all well and good until the actual recipient picks up the package, looks at the attempt at wrapping, works out that it was me and then hastily rips off the paper and this is the rub. I spend money on wrapping paper. I spend hours wrapping the presents up using rolls and rolls of sellotape in the process and then the paper is ceremoniously ripped off and thrown on the floor in a matter of seconds. Why bother wrapping?

In France they have a lovely little bit of the buying process. Virtually no matter what it is that you’re purchasing, you just say, ‘Cadeau’ and immediately it is gift wrapped for you with little bows and ribbons. And it’s free. It’s great. Unfortunately, Waitrose had never heard of this little bit of customer service and so J’s choccie biscuits will have to be wrapped by yours truly. Similarly, her bin-bag liners which are a horrible, tubular shape will be wrapped in some sort of amateurish manner as will her wooden spoons. Why wooden spoons? Well, throughout the year they split, get burned or just get all yucky with solidified porridge so they need replacing. This is called thoughtful present buying….but I digress slightly and if J reads this blog she’ll work out what she’s getting this year.

But, in London, I hear somebody in one of the big stores had one of those inspired moments of thought. They would offer a Xmas present wrapping service but they would do it in a less than perfect way so that it looked just like…….a man did it! Male shoppers could then put these presents under their tree and it looked for all the world like they had wrapped them. Brilliant.

    

It's The Skiing Season

Well, the snows have arrived. Thankfully not at our place yet but the white stuff is getting closer and we can now see it from the house (see picture). J has already started talking about getting our gear out and heading up into the hills to throw ourselves down the slopes in our garish clothes which we’d never wear at any other time. It took all my powers of persuasion to talk her out of it yesterday morning – I’m still convalescing after all!

We’re very lucky here in that we can be on the slopes, passes bought and at the top of the first run in about 40 minutes which is one of the reasons I chose this as my place to see out my days. J thinks it had something to do with her – silly girl.

I do admit though that spending a morning taking the rust off of the bottom of the skis and then having a long lunch at one of the two restaurants on the slopes is a great way to start the winter season. The fact that we can also see what sort of day it is before taking the decision is also a great bonus – no skiing in gales or annoying wintry snow for us – it has to be very sunny before we set off.

Once again though I’ll be skiing on very old bits of wood bought in Andorra some 12 years ago. I’m told that the ‘new’ carver skis would make me look even more professional on the slopes and allow me to miss the many trees which line the pistes, a skill at which I’m not very proficient as witnessed by my ruptured cruciate ligament several years ago. 

This accident was a disaster in more ways than one, happening as it did, on the very first run of the first day. J had gone off ahead whilst I foolishly (as it was my first run) headed for the trees which had quite a few challenging runs through them. How the tree jumped out in front of me I’ll never know but a shuddering exchange later, I was writhing in agony on the snow. I managed to crawl out onto the piste and some kindly souls called for the ‘blood wagon’ which arrived about 5 minutes later. I had always fancied travelling in a blood wagon but had never thought through the reasons why I would do so but there I was, having achieved my ambition and hurtling down the slopes with two paramedics trying to break some sort of downhill record. Unfortunately, they had neglected to strap me in properly and on one bend I disappeared out the side of the wagon whilst they continued on their merry way. It was a couple of hundred yards later that they decided the wagon was unusually light and stopped, wondering where their patient had gone.

I was re-strapped in and we got to the bottom of the slopes where a fancy ambulance was waiting, lights flashing. A crowd had gathered to see what sort of horrific injury they could witness and as I was lifted, flat out on a stretcher into the vehicle, the last thing I saw, before the doors were slammed shut was J and our other friends sitting in the open air bar, sipping champagne and totally oblivious to my predicament. I’m sure I saw my mate mouth the words, ‘here – that guy who’s just been loaded into the ambulance looked like Tom’. Indeed it was  and it was the start of a very frustrating week.   

Off To London For Lunch

Apologies to my many avid readers – I’ve been off to London for a couple of days for my traditional Xmas lunch with ‘the boys’. And a very good trip it was too. Perfect travel with no queues or delays. Great crack with my mates and a delicious curry with Steve, my erstwhile colleague from BT, yesterday. And I managed to get the Xmas food shopping completed as well, although just what state the mince pies will be in after the Nice Airport luggage handlers finished with my bags is anyone’s guess.

So – some observations about my trip.

Travelling British Airways instead of Easyjet was like seeing an old friend whom you’ve missed for the last few years. Classy, unfussy and quintessentially British.

London hasn’t changed in a year. Still grey. Still busy. Still vibrant. But a complete dearth of postboxes – I walked about two miles to try and find one on Monday. Their removal the result of the old bombing campaign by the IRA. The conflict is over now – put them back.

The prices - £75 for lunch (including drinks) and £6 for a glass of wine makes me appreciate my local tavern even more where you can have lunch with wine for about £8.

Tube travel – why pay £4 for a single one mile journey when a taxi costs less for the same distance? This was old Red Ken’s (Livingstone) travel policy which Boris needs to put right. On the tube, it’s the same price, £4, whether you travel for one mile or fifteen miles – crazy economics.

There’s not a single British waiter in London. In all the establishments I used on my trip (restaurants, pubs, cafes and hotels), the eastern Europeans held a monopoly. If they all upped sticks and left, London would grind to a halt.

Waitrose (the supermarket) is still the classiest place to shop. Not the cheapest, but by far the classiest. It’s almost a pleasure giving them your money.

The old adage about saving your plane fare if you went to the US on a shopping trip by taking advantage of their low prices and the generous exchange rate is now almost true about the UK. I reckon I probably saved over £100 by buying various items in the UK as opposed to buying the same things in France. Maybe London will be seeing more of me in 2009?

Bargains you just don’t get in France. One packet of sausages for £3. Four packs for £5. More crazy economics.

The rather disgusting conversation at lunch where two of my mates were discussing their recent colonoscopies. Not pleasant.

So that’s about it. Only other things to report are a fire evacuation at the hotel and spotting a celebrity chef sort of person. He didn’t acknowledge me so I just ignored him!