Happy Xmas Everyone

To all my readers and fellow bloggers …. I hope you all have a wonderful Xmas and a terrific 2009. I hope you all get a chance to spend quality time with your families and friends. 2008 was a good year for me – I hope it was for you also.

What Xmas means to me……

1.  Opening the first present on Xmas Eve and then looking forward to opening the rest on Xmas morning.

2.  Getting a roaring log fire on even though it might be sunny outside – it makes the house seem more welcoming

3.  Putting Mariah Carey’s Xmas DVD on and dancing round the house.

4.  Fighting with J to see who will cook the turkey.

5.  Watching any videos/dvds which the kids got for Xmas.

6.  Giving the cats and Shadow their Xmas presents – they seem to know what’s happening.

7.  Having friends over for a drink or two or three.

8.  Having a really good bottle of red wine with lunch.

9.  Phoning my family and friends – especially my sons and my brother.

10.    Turkey sandwiches on Xmas Day evening in front of the telly.

11.  Watching some of the Xmas specials on TV.

 And finally. Thinking of those who are less fortunate than ourselves and to whom Xmas is just another day.

Oh Brother

Us bloggers stick together you know. We have to. We’re all quiet little wallflowers who wouldn’t say ‘boo’ to a goose and therefore we write our postings to get our messages and thoughts out without fear of anybody taking issue with us in person.

But then of course we sometimes meet our readers and we get it – full in the face. ‘Crap’, ‘Boring’, ‘Too Long’, ‘Too personal’ …….and these are the comments I can put in print! But I don’t care. I really don’t. The blogs are for me (to keep me cerebrally active) and for my family so they can see what I’m up to without having to resort to daily phone calls, but even then, my family can be cruel. My eldest son, Stephen, is very complimentary, says it is one of the first things he does each day (reads my blog – good job he works for his mother !) and then you have my brother who says it is ‘absolute *****’ but as he’s only just learnt to read, I suppose his comments are only to be expected.

I was reading yesterday’s posting of a fellow blogger, Allison,  (I use the word ‘fellow’ in a literal sense as she’s quite a delightful girl judging by her picture and her postings) who was both celebrating and moaning about the festive seasonal visit of her brother Pat who, crime of crimes, ate all the left-over Pizza which made me think of my brother Robert.

Only last night, as the whole family sat on the sofa in front of a roaring log fire watching Mama Mia and singing along with the words, J said, ‘Ohhhhh I wish Robert could be with us this Xmas’. ‘What prompted this outpouring of family longing was his slushy, pink, feminine looking Xmas card which had arrived earlier in the day, addressed to ‘Mrs T Cupples’, and which made only a passing reference to the other members of the family including myself – his only brother!  As J bemoaned the news that her relatively new brother-in-law would not be visiting this Xmas, I celebrated the fact by manipulating my misshapen knuckle which unfortunately was broken into several pieces when my fist accidentally hit his head quite a few years ago! I also thought of the scar on his temple which is the exact replica of a Hornby Dublo curved section of railway track which I threw at him one day and which, most unfortunately, stuck in his skull! I can still see that section of model railway track arcing through the air and sticking in his head – ha!

But don’t think this is a one-way-street. He’s had plenty of opportunities to get his own back, the most recent being when we went for a haircut the morning after we’d had a ‘boys night out’ in Paisley (see post of 18^th Oct). Needless to say, and given that we’d only crawled into bed about 3am,, arriving at the hair salon at 9am was a bit ambitious….but we made it. I knew Robert had told the girl who owned the salon that I was his brother but that was that. We arrived and the owner immediately came up to me and said in a very slow speaking voice, ‘oh… you …. must ….. be … Thomas. It’s …. sooooooo ….. nice to meet you Thomas. Here – we have a lovely big leather armchair over here. Would you like to sit in that nice big chair Thomas?’

Now I was still pretty well-oiled from the night before but even I could work out that something wasn’t quite right here. The owner continued, ‘now be a good boy Thomas and sit here whilst I get you a drink. Would you like a nice glass of lemonade?’ Lemonade ? Lemonade ? What happened to the mug of coffee I was told to expect, but I let it go and accepted my lemonade. She continued…..’now Robert says you like your hair nice and short Thomas. You sit here, nice and still and we’ll give you a nice short haircut. That’s a good boy.

I was now thinking something was amiss but as I was still inebriated, I let it go. No point in embarrassing myself. Then the clippers came right up the back of my head and right over the top. Although a bit blurry in the mirror, I could see a follicle massacre taking place here, but again I was too hung over to bother. Anyway, the haircut (???) ended and I was helped out of the chair. The owner said I had been a ‘very good boy’ and I could come back sometime and she’d make sure I’d get the big leather chair again. I was still thinking about this stupid infantile language she was using but put it down to the fact that we were in a rather outlying bit of Glasgow where in-breeding is the norm, but I mentioned it to my brother as we left the salon.

He laughed uncontrollably and said he’d told the owner that his brother (me !!!) had been in an institution since the age of five, had had a terrible illness which gave him a mental age of seven years old and that he knew very little of what was going on around him. Everything which had happened for the last 30 minutes fell perfectly into place. Touché.    

Oh Deer Oh Deer

When we moved into our previous house next door, about ten years ago, we, or rather I (as I am the jardinerie – gardener), immediately started putting in plants to soften the landscape of what was otherwise a neglected former holiday home. The garden centres did a roaring trade as I bought all manner of bushes and trees, most of which turned out to be unsuitable for a sun-drenched, south-facing garden. Even Mediterranean garden books did not help me with the correct choices as they were quite generalistic and probably assumed we all had automatic watering systems. One day forgetting to water the plants and a shrivelled, dried-up mess resulted. It was quite dispiriting but gradually, and after spending more than I care to estimate, I worked out where certain plants should be placed and greenery started to grow and spread in all the right directions. After planting the terraces, I bought the final two pieces of the horticultural jigsaw for the front of the house – two large terracotta pots with magnificent hydrangeas in them. I looked at them from the upper terraces before I finished for the night, happy with the final part of what had been six months hard work.

The next morning, as I went to the garage I passed my hydrangeas and gave them another admiring glance. Quel horreur – there were just two mangled stumps. Every leaf and flower had gone. J immediately stated that the culprits were deer. They roam wild in the hills behind our house and although you rarely see them, the hunters wouldn’t spend so much time shooting up there if it wasn’t worth their while. I was pretty annoyed, more with the wasted expenditure than anything else but reckoned it was a small price to pay to live in an area where you get deer coming to the front door – at 2am!

Ten years pass without any more of my plants being used as sustenance and then this year, I embarked on a major gardening exercise for the new house. A couple of thousand euros worth of bushes and trees in an attempt to turn a new modern, provencal style house into something more Mediterranean with Cyprus and Mimosa trees, Oleanders and various all-year flowering bushes. Work done, I looked forward to next summer when the greenery would have established itself and the scars of last year’s building works would be well hidden.

And then this morning, I looked out of my office window and couldn’t see the mimosa tree I had planted on the second terrace. It had gone. I just couldn’t understand it. I went to investigate and there was the tell-tale sign of a deer taking a liking to the bark of my tree. Branches and leaves had been ripped off systematically and discarded and then the bark had been stripped off almost as if the creature had used a giant potato peeler. That was bad enough but as I wandered back across the parking area I came across my favourite, and most expensive by a mile, Cyprus tree, totally shredded in the middle of it’s trunk. I was livid for all of about ten minutes until I remembered coming across a couple of deer in the lane a few months ago, totally magnificent as they looked at me for a few seconds before charging off into the undergrowth and back up into the hills.

They were living here long before I was – it’s their place – not mine.

  

A Rather Sociable Weekend

Well I have to say that I was glad when Sunday night arrived and I was able to catch up with my sleep after a rather sociable and over-indulgent weekend.

It started on Friday lunchtime with the South of France BT Xmas Lunch. Much planning had gone into the venue for this annual extravaganza. Should we go down to Mougins, the gastronomic capital of the area with fabulous restaurants on every corner? Should we hit Monaco and try the 3-star Michelin restaurant of Alain Ducasse ? We could even bomb down to Cannes to try the Martinez or Nice to lunch in the Negresco. In the end, we went to Grasse for a curry.

What a gastronomic comedown. I suppose it (the curry) was ok-ish. Not bad for a curry created in France but not a patch on the one I had the previous Tuesday in London but then again, London has more curry restaurants than Bombay (or Mumbai as it’s now called), so it’s curry creations should be good. Much wine accompanied the meal and as I was being driven there and back by my mate Ashley, I rather over-imbibed. No problem, I had the rest of Friday to recover.

Later on that evening as I lay slumped on the sofa trying to work out how to work the TV remote, the phone went. J had popped next door to see the neighbours, Tan and Angie and this was Angie on the blower saying that Tan and J were having a love-in and that she was feeling left out. I stumbled the 20 yards to their house to find Tan and J mutually complementing each other on their respective weight loss programmes (about 30 kilos between them) and comparing the gaps between their waists and their trousers. It was pathetic. Angie, who is pregnant and putting on weight and who probably felt a bit left out of this mutual celebration,  poured me the first of several large glasses of wine, produced some pizza and a good night was had by all. I think!  

Saturday morning was rather hazy. My head, not the weather. There was nothing for it but to get my logging tools out and cut up a few tree trunks. This exercise sorted me out and got me ready for Saturday night’s party at Mike and Lesley’s. Their place is only about 3 minutes away and as soon as we arrived, yet more white wine found its way into my hands. Mike, the host, explained that the first glass would be served by him but after that, it was every man for himself – just what I wanted to hear. There was quite an eclectic mix of people there, most of whom I knew and I managed to beat all expectations and behave myself until about 1am when I started to ‘accost’ my good friend, the Reverend Anne Naylor. I noticed that as I attempted to make her less saintly she didn’t exactly run away! J dragged me off but unfortunately got me another glass of wine which only served to cause more mayhem as I decided that the hostess could do with her armpits being cleaned with baby wipes which was probably ok until I started to eat them and hang them on the Xmas tree. Needless to say that on Sunday morning I had totally forgotten the escapades of the previous evening but couldn’t work out what the strange taste in my mouth was!

After two nights of decadence, there was only one thing for it. I needed to cleanse my soul so I went to church with J. You’ll all be pleased to hear that I refused the communion wine!!!!      

The picture is of J who couldn't last the pace either. Sunday morning - she didn't even take her clothes off from the night before!

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!

Money, Money, Money

Inevitably, when I tell people that I am retired, they immediately ask what I do with myself and then ask if I miss anything about work. I don’t mess about when answering the first. I don’t say that I’ve taken up oil painting, getting involved in the local dog’s home or running for the local council – I simply say what I do, which is a bit of gardening, reading the papers on the internet and losing money on the stock exchange. Nothing special there. It’s what I want to do.

Similarly, when answering the question about what I miss with relation to my old job, I don’t pontificate on missing the intellectual stimulus of major contract negotiations (which I don’t) or the buzz I got when a new project started (which I don’t). Nope – what I miss from corporate life is having a good old booze-up with my mates, Steve and Dee, after a particularly busy day and…..the monthly pay cheque.

As Xmas approaches and present lists seem to appear from nowhere, each one with more and more expensive designer items on it, I look at my bank balance and shudder. I took a conscious decision last year that as my pension is paid in Sterling, I would not mess about with monthly transfers, I’d bite the bullet, take a decision on the exchange rate and transfer a whole year’s money in one go. That money then has to be sufficient, no matter what.

It was a good plan at the time and although I am pretty good at managing my finances and I do believe in keeping a little contingency stashed away, the ‘extraordinary’ costs which just appear from left field almost defy belief. It must’ve been different this time last year and I suspect it was because I was still benefiting from a bonus I received from BT which I didn’t know I was due. Alas – those days are long gone. The only bonus I get these days is if Angie next door feeds Shadow and I don’t have to buy any dog food!

So let’s look at the sort of thing which just arrives and which costs a fortune.

The wedding. Ah yes the wedding. My wedding or should I say, my wife’s wedding? Despite stringent budgeting and cost control one just cannot legislate for one’s youngest son taking a €400 bottle of spirits from the drinks trolley in the hotel and disappearing with it.

Then there was the ‘honeymoon’ in Florida and New York which ran pretty true to budget until we discovered the ‘outlet malls’ in Sarasota and the Apple Shop in New York. Major damage was done to the credit card which fortunately meant a sterling hit rather than a run on my Euros.

A huge and unexpected hit was a €2,500 bill for taxes which I simply did not think would arrive this year. Along with a huge uplift in our other taxes, it completely screwed my budgeting for the latter part of the year.

Then, having been relatively healthy for years, I suddenly managed to suffer some medical problems which cost me an arm and a leg (get it ?) and although I have a French Health Card, the bills just mount up.

J wanted her eyes lasered. I didn’t see that one coming (get it ?). Major expense.

Then the cat died. How it costs more to treat a dying cat than a living being I don’t know but it does. The bill nearly killed me (get it?).

The home PC was knackered. It’s being fixed and will cost more to repair than buying a new one. I would just have dumped it but it has loads of pictures on it which we need to retrieve. New technology costs less and less each year but the repairs cost more and more.

So, when people ask me what I miss, the monthly pay cheque has a lot to say for itself. That reassuring ‘thud’ as the electronic pay slip hits your inbox is something I miss dreadfully. Especially at this time of year. Ho Ho Ho !

    

Wind and Sails

I was thinking about proverbs today. You know – a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush. The sun shines on the righteous. The cat who’s got the cream etc etc etc.

I was wondering where they came from and who first thought them up and then I discovered a web site which gives the origins so my wondering goes on no more. But then I got to thinking about an old mate of mine (Jeff Thomson - if you read this please get in touch) who made up his own sayings which were absolutely hilarious. Unfortunately they are too rude, even for this blog, so I’ll have to chuckle without sharing them with you…..but they invariably included dockers, badgers, witches breasts and the like so I’m sure you get the idea.

The reason for the proverbs occupying the few brain cells I have left was that I went into my bank today determined to tell them in no uncertain manner just what a bunch of robbing bandits they are, when….the wind was taken completely out of my sails  …..although I have since learned that that saying is an idiom, not a proverb  – whatever.

Going back a bit in time, I opened an account with the local village bank in Tourrettes. Some ten years ago actually. In all that time, they’ve never given me too many problems except for the fact that I object to their small monthly charges which they appear to levy for the privilege of keeping my money (and investing it for their profit) and providing me with a bank card. They gave me a loan when I wanted one and over the ten years, I think I’ve only had one or two small problems.

And then last year we decided to open another account for and with my eldest son. Just a plain vanilla, ordinary current account with a cheque book and a card. No problem. A few testimonials, a few signatures and we were up and running.

As he is registered at my address, his statements come here and as it’s my money which goes into the account I take a passing interest in what state his account is in….just in case there any problems.

And then the charges started. €3 a month for this. €2.94 a month for that (apparently normal) and then I spotted a quarterly debit of €9.20. This was for the privilege of taking the bank’s magazine called the Dossier Familial, which arrives in the post box, is never removed from its plastic wrapper and goes straight into the fire.

I thought this was a complete waste of money, so went into the Vence branch, said I was representing my son and could they stop this magazine and the associated charge. ‘No problem’, the lady said and that was that…or so I thought. This was 3 months ago and four weeks later, the magazine turns up again. I looked at his statement and there it was – another debit of €9.20. Another few weeks pass before I get the chance to go into my local village bank but when I eventually do so, as usual, there’s a new face behind the counter. A youngish guy who was very sympathetic, took down the details and said he’d do what he could. I said this was not good enough – I wanted it stopped. He then gave a reply which floored me. He said that even as an employee of the bank, he kept getting the pesky magazine and he had trouble stopping the €9.20 debit too! Anyway, I left hoping that he’d fix it.

And then yesterday – yup, you’ve guessed it – another magazine and another €9.20 debit. And so it was today that I stomped into my village branch determined to sort out these bankers. I practised my French relentlessly. Looked up the word for ‘refund’ and sorted out a sentence which would leave them in no doubt how utterly pissed off I was. I walked briskly up to the counter and was about to let rip when ….there she was, a vision of absolute beauty. Young, stunningly dressed with a sweater hanging off of her gorgeous shoulders (both of them). Blonde hair and a smile which would have melted Greenland. I muttered that I was sorry to trouble her and it wasn’t a big problem and could she possibly help me with a little issue and I’d be terribly grateful etc etc etc.

The wind was taken completely out of my sails. Wot a wazzock!

 

Rendition – It’s Extraordinary

J and I watched a film the other night. Nothing unusual in that? Well there was actually. I was already watching the football on my PC and our movie tastes are at opposite ends of the spectrum, but after the first few minutes I was hooked and decided the football could take a back seat. Although it was an English game, the transmission was coming from Russia, Iraq and finally England in ten minute chunks, so it was rather difficult to follow anyway. And so I settled down to watch the film.

Let’s put me in the frame. Let’s imagine my name is Khan. Although I’ve worked in the UK for over 20 years I was actually born in Egypt and I obviously have a middle-eastern appearance. I’m flying out to the US on business for BT (my employer). My wife has dropped me off at the airport and knows she’ll get a call when I get to the office or my hotel……..but after 3 days no call. She contacts the airline who confirm I was on board. An in-flight credit-card transaction shows that I must have been on the flight but there is no trace of me. What my wife does not know is that the American CIA intercepted me at JFK, put me onto a ‘private’ flight to Egypt where, when I arrive in handcuffs and blindfolded, I am treated as a suspected terrorist because there’s a mobile phone record which shows that a known terrorist group has called my number.

I protest that there are millions of Khans and that I’m always getting wrong-number calls but it does no good. My job as a senior researcher into electro-chemical transmissions gives me the profile of a bomber and so I am tortured until near death.

In this case, the guy was rescued, but at the end of the film J was quite disturbed by it and even more so when I told her that this sort of thing goes on all the time. Indeed only a year or so ago, there was a furore in the UK when some of these CIA ‘extraordinary rendition’ flights were stopping in the UK to refuel before carrying on to some country where torture is something of the norm.

And all because the unfortunate guy got a call from a terrorist group by mistake. It’s easily done – wrong calls or texts I mean. In these days of pay-as-you-go mobile phones, did you ever think what happens to the number after you’ve finished using it? After a period of time, it’s given to someone else. I’ve had texts sent to me for the person who had the phone number before. So all you need is the ‘right’ job, have the ‘right’ background and appearance but the wrong phone number and you too could end up being tortured in some Egyptian basement.

Of course, no government acknowledges that these renditions actually take place but the EEC council believes that over the last few years, 100 EU citizens have been ‘renditioned’ to places where they can be tortured. Places which do not recognise the Geneva convention.

So beware. If you start getting dodgy phone calls or texts – well I was going to say ‘run’, but it wouldn’t do any good. They’d get you.

It’s a long URL but it’ll get you to the story of the film.

http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?imgurl=http://www.criticsrant.com/Images/criticsrant_com/Movie_Rendition/rendition_xlg.jpg&imgrefurl=http://www.criticsrant.com/archive/2007/10/21/RENDITION-A-Wild-Ride-With-A-Bumpy-Ending.aspx&usg=__2JdAVEd10zvKkOq1ufn_JmRDD98=&h=1186&w=800&sz=801&hl=en&start=1&sig2=Uc94Nq3TSaz-Q9bkUW0p0Q&tbnid=9ta_wuiXM_OTcM:&tbnh=150&tbnw=101&ei=U0k-ScDcEpygQfPnueMP&prev=/images%3Fq%3Drendition%26hl%3Den%26sa%3DG

The Great Debate

Nope, it’s not about President Sarkozy’s diminutive stature which the French ridicule almost as much as we do. The fact that he wears Cuban heels with high insoles is not the problem. The problem is that he married a 6ft ex-model who has to wear flat shoes when she would look great in high heels. That’s the crime.

It’s not about the credit crunch either. France keeps its problems pretty close to its chest. We (aaaagh – we ???) don’t shout about it like Gordon Brown does in a vain attempt to lift his flagging stature as a statesman. OK, the housing market has slowed, but that’s mainly the Brits who see their pound losing value by the day and who are waiting to get €1.40 to the pound before they come back into the market.

Nope – it’s about the ‘yellow vest’.

France, it seems to me, passes laws on a whim. A couple of years ago they passed a law which said everyone with a pool had to have a fence around it. If you didn’t do it you could face a fine of up to €40,000 by the secret police, so everybody (except me) went out and bought a fence. Despite the fact that there were no real specifications about the fence you needed, multiple firms managed to sell hundreds of thousands of fences to the unsuspecting, attempting-to-be-law-abiding public. A few years later the specs came out and yes, most of those who bought a fence had to change them because they weren’t up to spec! Good ol France !

Then, this year we had the ‘yellow vest law’ where each vehicle had to have a yellow, reflective vest and a red warning triangle in the vehicle. The vest had to be kept inside the car (or truck or whatever) so that, in the event of a breakdown, you had to put on your vest before you got out in order to place your warning triangle 30 metres behind the car. On the face of it, a good, sensible law but one I suspect which had more to do with the French economy getting a €250 million boost overnight than any attempt at motoring safety. It’s all very well being protected by a bright yellow vest when you break down but what about the idiots who travel so close to you that you think you’ve got a trailer attached? They don’t do anything to stop that. I’ve now devised my own method of sorting out these idiots. In daylight, I gradually slow down until I’m almost at a stop and it really gets up their gallic noses. In darkness, I simply switch out my lights and imagine the panic which goes through the idiot’s mind as the car he (or she) is trailing simply disappears – dangerous but hilarious! 

So- the big debate. It’s about the fact that thousands upon thousands of yellow-vest drivers now put their vest on the spare seat like you would hang a jacket on it to stop it getting creased. It doesn’t really bother me – I just think they’re stupid but this is what the debate is about. It was even brought up in the Time’s French Correspondent’s blog the other day. There are numerous on-line forums protesting about the practice. It’s a big talking point.

I reckon, for those who do it, it’s a way to try and prevent the police pulling you over for a check to see if you’ve got a jacket, the rationale being that if the Police see one hanging over the passenger seat, they are less likely to stop you and ‘do’ you for having bald tyres or no MOT.  But I’m sure reverse logic applies here. If I was a Policeman and I saw some pratt with a yellow vest showing, I’d simply assume that there was something wrong with the car and I’d pull them over.

It’s almost as hilarious as the law in California where if you have a passenger in the car you can use special lanes which are less congested, and so each Californian went out and bought a blow-up dummy to try and convince the highway patrol that there were two people in the car. Being California, of course, there was no shortage of retailers selling blow up men or women!

And so I have my vest, tucked away in the underseat compartment and my triangle in the boot. J says however, that some of my sweaters and shirts mean that I have no need of a bright, yellow vest! Bah humbug!     

Murder, Mystery, Intrigue and €500m

We were invited to lunch yesterday at a friend’s house which overlooks the bay in Villefranche and no, it isn't the house in the picture. It was a lovely sunny day and the view from the terrace was spectacular, overlooking the prime real estate area of Cap Ferrat. I’d passed Cap Ferrat in a taxi some 28 years ago as a brand new, bushy-tailed and ever-so-enthusiastic salesman for IBM and I thought, without knowing anything about the area that it was definitely a place I would buy a house if I could ever afford it. I didn't know it then, but it is THE place to have a house on the Riviera.

Much  of the talk on the terrace was about a large property, surrounded by acres of land which stood in the distance, almost acting as a gateway to the Cap. Even from our vantage point a couple of miles away you could see the manicured lawns and lines of Cyprus trees, but it was the vast extent of the grounds which defied belief. Our hosts told us that the house had recently beeen sold (true) and that it was Bill Gates who had sold it (untrue). Here is the real story of Villa Leopolda.

Until recently, the house (it’s almost a crime to call it a ‘house’) was in the hands of the Safra family who have provided one of the most intriguing stories on the Riviera for the last 10 years.

Edmond Safra, of Lebanese Jewish origins, along with his father, founded a number of banks. It’s strange to think of individuals owning banks, it’s normally corporations, but the Safras opened banks in Switzerland, Brazil and the US, where, at one stage their bank was number three in the New York area behind Citi and Chase. So they were worth quite a few bob.

By the mid 80’s, Edmond Safra had taken over the reigns from his father and was now king pin and living in Monaco and worth some €2.5b. Monaco was just right for the Safras as the principality is virtually crime free (well visible crime) and you don’t pay taxes. It is a highly secure environment with cameras everywhere and so Edmond Safra and his wife, Lily, lived in safe splendour in their hugely expensive apartment block. Edmond developed Parkinson's disease and had eight nurses and several other servants at his beck and call, looking after his every need, however, on Dec 3^rd 1999 a fire broke out and Edmond died in the blaze. One of the nurses, a Ted Maher, was charged with starting the fire and a lengthy legal battle started. It took 3 years for him to come to trial and eventually he confessed. It was dubbed as ‘the trial of the century’ and there are still stories about the trial being ‘fixed’ and the dubious nature of Maher’s confession. In any event, Mrs Safra became an extraordinarily wealthy widow with a fortune now estimated at some €3b.

One of the assets she ‘picked up’ was Villa Leopolda, which is the house we stared at from our friend’s terrace. It is probably the best property on the whole of the Riviera and if money was no object (and you like that sort of thing – see picture at top), it’s just the sort of pad you’d go for…….as a wealthy Russian did in August of this year. Although there are rumours to the contrary, he reputedly slapped €500m cash on the table and poor old Mrs Safra had no option but to take the money and run. Now the villa is probably worth no more than maybe €100m, or at a stretch €150m, but these Russians just don’t want any of those nasty little gazumpers coming in and spoiling their deal and so the ‘rather generous’ offer was made and accepted, which made Villa Leopolda the most expensive 'house' on the planet.

The thing is – nobody had ever heard of this Russian. Well nobody down here. He wasn’t in the papers. He didn’t own a football club. He was just a nobody with the odd €500m to spare.

And Mrs Safra? Well she’s probably sitting in one of her other properties hoping another ‘generous’ Russian, with more money than sense will turn up at the door with another wad of dosh.

http://www.overseaspropertymall.com/regions/european-property/french-property/is-villa-leopolda-the-most-expensive-home-ever/

No Blog Today

Sung to the tune of the Herman Hermit’s song – No Milk Today

 No Blog Today, I’m afraid I’ve gone away

My body’s being changed, my willy rearranged

The doctors all agree, that as I cannot pee

They need to use a knife, to end my trouble and strife

 

How could they know just what this posting means

The end of my hopes, the end of all my dreams

How could they know, the phallus there had been

Behind the door, where my love reigned supreme

 

No blog today, it wasn't always so

The writing came its way, I’d do it night and day

 

But all that’s left is a stump, red and bloody

A crying shame when I get back home to you

Becomes all limp when I think of you only

Just  too sore to screw

 

No blog today, it wasn't always so

The writing came its way, I’d do it night and day

As music played, the faster did we dance 

We felt it both at once, the end of our romance 

 

No Blog today, the surgeon’s got his way

I’m down here at St Jean, being operated upon

The nurses stop and stare, my predicament aware

They laugh and smirk with glee, but at least I’ll be able to pee

 

No blog today, it wasn't always so

The writing came its way, I’d do it night and day

 

But all that’s left is a stump red and bloody

A crying shame when I get back home to you

Becomes all limp when I think of you only

Just  too sore to screw

 

The original can be found here……..

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ClQepFF-Sr0

Lucy Is Dead

I’m crying my eyes out. Lucy died not more than ten minutes ago, put to rest by a very sympathetic vet, called out at 11pm to see to our sickly cat. It turned out that she had been poisoned, most probably by accident, and as she was in extreme pain and with only a 10%-20% of surviving, we, (Guy, Julie and myself) decided that she had suffered enough. I have just left Guy cuddling his beloved cat wrapped in the orange pashmina to which she had taken a liking over the last few days of her life. Bijou and Shadow are sniffing around aware that something terrible has happened.

As I wrote a few days ago, Lucy had come back to visit us after Tan and Angie had gone off to England. This is normal for Lucy. As soon as Tan and Angie leave on one of their frequent trips, Lucy comes round looking for food and then settles on the sofa with one eye on Coco and the other on Bijou. This time she stayed for only a couple of days and then left on one of her sojourns. Three days later, during which it had rained and rained and rained and rained, and as I was working outside the house, I heard Lucy’s plaintive meow high up in the terraces. It was a miracle that I saw her hidden amongst the autumn leaves of the bushes and trees which populate the terracing which is so common in Provence.  Despite calling her, to which she normally responds by bounding down the steep terracing, she stayed put, crying plaintively. I knew something was wrong. When I reached her, it was obvious that she had damaged her left front paw and as I carried her down the slopes, she looked up at me with gratitude in her olive eyes.

We looked at her paw, gave her plenty of fish to eat and milk to drink and she seemed fine although the paw was still giving trouble a few days later. Whilst cuddling her, I also discovered a lump on her breast. That was it. J took her down to the vets and she was given an anti-inflammatory injection to ward off any infection and was scheduled for an operation to remove the lump.

And then yesterday she didn’t eat anything. Overnight she slept on the bed and stayed there all morning. At lunch time today I tried to tempt her with some tuna but although she tried, she just couldn’t eat anything.

At about 5pm she started to get listless and floppy. She wanted her own space. No more cuddles. At 6pm she started to look for cool, dark spaces. I knew then that Lucy was dying. Her sister, Camille had sought the cave in which to die sitting on her haunches and Lucy’s posture was exactly the same as Camille’s position when found.

We tried to leave her to rest but both Guy and I could not just sit there and do nothing. We both lay on the floor stroking her head and saying how much we loved her.

At about 8pm I told Guy his cat was dying and that he should look after her. At 10pm she was obviously in a huge amount of pain and J called the vet for a house call. He arrived at approx 10.45pm and immediately diagnosed poison.

When the decision was taken to end poor Lucy’s life, I could not bear to watch. I returned after about 5 minutes following an anaesthetising injection and she was still breathing. I could not bear to watch the final stage and as I wandered down the hall in floods of tears, I heard poor Lucy cry out. It was her final sounds.

It Made The News Today….

Some possibly interesting stories from the French media for those in the UK who seem to have to read about death, despair, the weather and Gordon Ramsay’s affairs every day…..

Firstly there is the story about some 3 star Michelin chefs who are giving up their restaurants in order to go back to more simple fare simply because of the pressure of trying to retain those coveted awards. I suppose the only way to go when you have won your 3^rd star is down and so, many of the chefs who create those gastronomic delights in France’s thirty six 3-star restaurants, are wondering whether it’s all worth it, indeed, one poor guy committed suicide a few years ago after his star rating was reduced from three to two. Maybe Michelin should have a 3+ rating or why not a 4 and a 5?

Then there was the story which sums up France’s passion for bureaucracy when it was discovered that by selling things on e-Bay, by law, you have become an ‘enterprise’ and are subject to all sorts of weird and wonderful rules and regulations. Somebody was fined over €3,000 in 2006 for being bold enough to sell some bric-a-brac on e-bay and not declaring themselves as a commercial enterprise. Only in France!

And what about the Greenpeace protest at tuna fishing? What did they do? They dumped dozens of rotting tuna on the doorsteps of the Ministry of Agriculture in Paris to make their point. So where did they get these tuna? Did they buy them at the Paris fish market in which case the market bosses would have called the trawlers and said they’d had a run on Tuna and could they catch some more please!     

Now if the Greenpeace protesters had decided to buy their tuna on a Sunday in order to let them rot for a week then they would have had to change their plans cause in good ol France there’s not too many, if any shops, open on a Sunday – it’s against the law apparently. I always thought that Sunday closing was just the French way of saying, ‘we’ve made enough money during the week thank you and Sunday is for stuffing our faces’. But apparently not. It’s against the law to open on a Sunday as it is to have sales outside the two designated official sales periods. Bizarre.

And then there was the former French politician who was arrested and fined for showing a sign when President Sarkozy’s car passed one day. The sign read, ‘casse-toi pauvre con’, which in most French people’s eyes would mean, ‘get lost you sad git’. Now if everybody who shouted or showed signs or slogans when Gordon Brown’s entourage passed on that long journey between No 10 and the Houses of Parliament (300 yards ??) nobody would be left on the streets of London. They’d all be banged up. The ‘nice’ ending to this story was that the words on that French sign were exactly the same words which Sarkozy used when addressing a French farmer last February!

What about the poor school kids? Not allowed to take any snacks to school to have during the mid-morning break. My kids leave at 7.20am on some mornings and don’t get lunch until 1pm – that’s 5 hours and 40 minutes without food. The actual story highlighted a headmistress who refused to allow kids to eat fruit at ‘playtime’ because of obesity fears! And all the while the kids could see teachers eating in the staffroom. You may not know this, but French schools do not have vending machines or ‘tuck’ shops and the kids are not allowed to take packed lunches. They either go home or have lunch in the school canteen. The headmistress in question was adamant that ‘it is bad for children to eat constantly’. Bet she’s as fat as a barrel!

And finally……..on the 6^th to the 14^th December in Paris is the Salon du Cheval which sounds like it is the horsey equivalent of Crufts. Each year over 1000 horses, ponies and donkeys appear and what do you think happens to all those equine beasts at the end of the show – yup – you guessed it – the French eat them ! Only kidding but I bet next month’s pension that the burger stands in the hall (sorry salon) sell Cheval Burgers. I bet they do. 

Monkey’s Head? – No Sir – It’s A Haggis

I read a report the other day about customs officers opening a rather foul smelling package in Munich airport and discovering a rotting monkey’s head. Now I stopped reading at that point because I had no need, nor wish, to know what someone would do with a rotting monkey’s head. Of course, it could have been a perfectly good, dead monkey’s head before it got caught up in the red tape which is border customs these days and without any knowledge of witchcraft (ok - I live with one) or anti-impotency remedies (I may need one next week!!) I have no idea what it was for. It could, of course, have been sent to some poor soul as a sort of mafia-esque gesture similar to finding a severed and extremely bloody horse’s head snuggled up beside you in bed. No idea.

It’s just a wonder that I haven’t been stopped as I’ve entered Nice airport during the last ten years. I haven’t ‘smuggled’ anything in as revolting as a monkey’s head but I’m sure the old French customs guys would have had a fit if they’d seen some of the British/Sottish foodstuffs secreted in my bag. Some of it, I have to admit, not allowed. Luckily I’ve only ever been stopped once at Nice and this was when I was on the New York flight and had nothing to do with food.

Now at Nice Airport, the customs people generally sit and read their papers or play Solitaire on their PCs, so humdrum is their daily routine but when the Delta flight arrives from New York, the staff numbers treble, papers are put aside, PCs are switched off and the incoming bags are scrutinised with a zeal which the French generally reserve for looking at their food. It was on one such day when I arrived from New York with a package so big I could not possibly have concealed it. It was a 200 CD player – one of those things like a juke box – stores 200 CDs and plays all your tracks in order, in genre or randomly – a beautiful bit of kit. Anyway, as I surreptitiously tried to disappear into the crowds pouring through the two-person-wide exit, I felt a hand on my shoulder and the request to stop and answer some questions. What was it? Where did I buy it? Had I paid tax? Did I have anything else? And then the question, the answer to which floored him, how much did it cost? ‘$199’, I said. ‘No way’, he replied. ‘Yup’, I said with a slight smirk on my face. He got out his calculator and said it couldn’t possibly be true. ‘I had a receipt’, I said with a self-assured satisfaction that something was amiss – on his side.

As it turned out, I was, once a dollar to Franc/Euro conversion had taken place, well under the limit for imported goods. He simply shook his head in disbelief and waved me onwards.   

But back to foodstuffs. Amazingly, I’ve only ever been stopped on the ‘leaving' leg of a trip. I was stopped at Glasgow when the x-ray machine highlighted two very distinct shapes – so distinct that they started to clear the security area until I looked at the screen and said, ‘they’re not bombs – they’re haggis. Laughter and relief all round as they checked the two round haggis with the distinct little knot on the top which looked for all the world like a round bomb with a fuse.

I was stopped a couple of weeks ago when I was leaving Luton for Nice when the strange solid block on the x-ray made the slightly wary security guys open my case to find a 3 kilo block of Scottish Lorne sausage (subject of a separate blog posting). I had some job trying to prove it was sausage, I tell you.

But the food which I am so glad has never been discovered is the cheese I bring back. The Winchester extra-strong cheddar. The blocks of Red Leicester. The Waitrose white Stilton with cranberries or apricots. I suspect that if I was ever discovered bringing this in, I would be thrown into prison and never heard of again. Importing English Cheese into France – mon Dieu – sacrilege.    

Lost In Space

Did you read about the female astronaut who lost her handbag in space and which can be spotted if you have a powerful telescope? This really proves that women’s handbags are way too large. I mean this thing is whizzing around at 15,000 miles per hour, 250 miles above us and yet is still visible from earth.

Now it takes a special type of woman to lose her handbag in space and sets a whole new standard of incompetence. Leaving it on the roof of the car as you speed out of the supermarket car park just does not seem laughable any more.

Why do they need to be so big anyway? They make mobile phone companies millions every year. I phone the missus all the time and I know that as it’s ringing, she’s frantically rummaging through last year’s supermarket till receipts, sticky sweets which have come out of their wrappers and a mountain of lipsticks which have long since gone out of fashion because nobody wears bright pink anymore and then I get her answering service. She then phones me back, breathless from the effort of pulling half a ton of rubbish out of her bag and so two calls are made rather than one. It’s ridiculous.

I sat in the doctor’s surgery today and watched this young woman with a handbag so big you could have gone food shopping with it. Some people could even have gone camping for the weekend with it, but as she fumbled around inside its cavernous space, I just knew it was her mobile she was after and sure enough I was correct. As she retrieved it from the very bottom of the bag (it was soft leather so I could see movements inside the bag which made it look like a couple of ferrets fighting inside a sack) I had to say I almost applauded the effort she put into it. She was obviously really chuffed at finding her phone so quickly (2 minutes and 25 seconds – I know I’m anal) and looked around for any other admiring female but there was only J and she’s still blind, so not being able to see which arm her handbag might be on, she’s stopped carrying one – albeit temporarily I’m sure. Anyway, as this girl’s glance stopped at me I simply tapped my small gentleman’s purse which is all of about 4 inches square and smirked. I was able to do this without any fear of her blaming my behaviour on English arrogance as most ex-pat males don’t carry ‘purses’ and so she just sat there thinking French males are so, well – up themselves.

Years ago when I was much more immature than I am now, and as a pretty pathetic and infantile joke when there was mixed company in a pub, one of the guys (we used to take it in turns) would simply upturn one of the females in our crowd’s handbag, emptying its contents on the bar for all to see. I have to say there were some really weird things which ended on the bar’s surface and some embarrassing ones too. Red faces all round sometimes.

But for females reading this, our hatred of those ‘fashion accessories’ really comes from the fact that every new dress seems to deserve a new, matching handbag. Every new pair of shoes – ditto. And each one more expensive and expansive than the previous incumbent. They fill up our bits of the wardrobe and they fall out when you open the doors. I dread to think how many dead cows, goats, ponies etc were sacrificed to make something as meaningless as a handbag.

So back to the female astronaut who lost her handbag (sorry toolkit) in space. Don’t be too surprised to hear of a special Space Shuttle mission to retrieve it. If it’s big enough to see from dear old earth, it must present a hazard to passing space ships and needs to be returned to its rightful owner before it does any lasting damage.

Picture is handbag (sorry toolkit) floating off into space.