A Day At The Races

Now I’m not a great fan of being at the races but I do like the spectacle of a horse coming from the back of the field and working its way through the crowd and pushing its nose over the line in first place. Years ago, I even had the luxury of a box at Kempton once or twice but preferred to have a glass of champers in the confines of the hospitality area and watch the race on the telly, so when I was invited to a day at the races, I was none too keen.

But I was relieved, this was not an invitation to the circular track at Cagnes where the horses trot rather than run and the last horse is served up the next day as the Plat du Jour, this was my friend Gerry inviting me to his house in the village to watch Channel 4 racing but with a twist – we’d bet on the outcome of each race.

We met in the Bar des Sport for a nice lunch beforehand and then it was a quick walk to his house just off the village square - only about 100 yards.

Gerry is an ‘old’ amateur jockey and every Saturday he is to be found in a corner of either the Bar des Sports or the Midi studying the form.

Now being a competitive Scot who cheats at tiddlywinks, the thought of betting and probably losing against an ‘old’ jockey who no doubt had an inside track (pun intended) on who was going to win each race did not fill me with whatever you're supposed to be filled with when you know you'll just be opening your wallet and pouring money out!   

Whatever, after lunch we sat in his lounge with a glass of rosé and just as I was admiring the amazing views, the architecture and the quails eggs Leslie put out for nibbles, Gerry announced it was time for the first race – and a euro was demanded.

Racing with a View

Now, I have to say that at 6am that morning I was studying the form (am I competitive or what?), looking up the Racing Post on the internet to see what was due to win and what the odds were but when it came time to choose my runner, I reverted to type and chose the nicest silks worn by the jockeys combined with the name of the horse, unless ……… there was a grey horse running in which case, that was my choice.

To cut a long, sad story short, there were eight races shown on telly and despite the advantage of having my iPad tell me which horses were destined for the dog food factory after running, I still did not manage to pick a single winner. Indeed, the winner of the combined bet, three euros unless there was a rollover, wasn’t necessarily the winner, just the horse which managed it into the top three – and I didn’t manage a single one. Indeed, by the end of the afternoon, I was sick of the TV commentator mentioning my horses in terms of, ‘pulled up’, ‘oh – there’s a faller’ and ‘that horse shouldn’t be in this field’. Was I depressed?

Being a ‘numbers man’ by trade or a statistician as most folk would call it, I couldn’t work it out – there were three of us betting and by the law of averages, I should have won at least two races, sorry two pots, but I didn’t – Gerry and Leslie cleaned me out!

Needless to say, they are not being invited to my place on a reciprocal visit. I am such a bad loser. But their house is gorgeous and has amazing views.

Venice In Peril

Venice is always in peril and has been for centuries. I suspect many reading this will have been to Venice, one of the most amazing places on earth and a must for the romantics but with the ever-rising lagoon and some of the buildings suffering from their wooden piles disintegrating, it can only be a matter of time before there is a major flood or a collapsed building and serious damage happens.

I first visited Venice in 1982. I was lucky enough to attend an IBM Sales Convention there and despite the reservations about spending four days with your sales mates in a place not particularly known for its wild nightlife, it turned out to be an amazing trip, one which has remained with me all these years and one which drew me back to Venice several times over the following years.

The Lido with Venice in the background 

With the IBM trip being so long ago, some of my memories are hazy. How did we get to the Lido where we (all 500 of us) were staying in fancy hotels? Which fancy hotel did I stay in? Where was the convention centre where we had to attend various ‘business sessions’ so that IBM could claim the trip was a legitimate business expense? How did we get to and from the main part of Venice on the small ferry boats without anyone falling in the lagoon?

The one thing I did/do remember though was entering the convention centre on the first afternoon and hearing the most amazing atmospheric music. On stage was a small orchestra, the players dressed in Venetian period costumes, complete with masks and filling the vast hall with music which was totally in tune with the Venice we’ve all read about in books and seen in films. It was absolutely stunning – so stunning in fact that as soon as I returned to the UK, I went straight into my local music store and ordered the CD – Venice in Peril by Rondo Veneziano.

So why am I writing about this now?

A couple of weeks ago, I decided that now I am down in the ‘jungle’ slashing and burning, it would pass the time quicker if I had some music on my iPhone and so over a period of a couple of days I transferred my whole CD collection into iTunes and thereafter onto my iPad and my iPhone. It was only after I’d removed and copied all my CDs that I found a long lost CD lying without a cover at the back of the CD rack – yup – Rondo Veneziano’s Venice in Peril. I’ve been playing it ever since.

Now, I know that it will not be everyone’s cup of tea but if you had been walking into that convention hall on the Lido with a misty Venice a few miles across the lagoon looking like it had a limited lifespan, you too might have been affected like I was.

Not everything was quite so romantic on that trip I hasten to add. Apparently, the IBM ‘cash man’, a faceless, nameless guy who traveled with a case full of £250,000 cash in local currency to ‘sort out’ local difficulties was in demand all over Venice as group dinners went unpaid, bars were drunk dry and police fines were racked up at an alarming rate.

The supporting act at IBM’s gala dinner, his name shall not be revealed, (the main performer was Gloria Gaynor – ‘I Will Survive) who had been invited to a drink in our room was last seen coming out of the bathroom with white powder all over his nose, being chased by his wife and convinced that one of our sales guys was Marvin Hagler, the newly crowned World Middleweight Boxing Champion.

Fun days indeed.

If you wish to hear Rondo Veneziano, click on the link below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-up4s2Ktmko

The Bushcutter Saga

The first thing to say is that we’re having unseasonably warm weather. It’s normally quite mild in October but not this warm! I can usually remember the last time I swam in the pool the previous year and it’s usually mid-September when the night chill cools the water down to a painful 18 degrees but this year, the water temperature is staying stubbornly above 20 so it’s a delight to plunge into the pool after some gardening or log cutting.

The numerous visitors this year have benefited from the pleasant summer we’ve had and by ‘pleasant’ I mean that it does not get much hotter than 85 degrees (or 29c) although when my family came out in June, the gauge topped 107 degrees (42c) which is pretty hot by anyone’s standards.   But by and large, it’s been a lovely summer.

The nice, but not too hot weather meant I was able to get the debrusailleuse out and attack the brambles which were threatening to take over, but as usual my Stihl Bushcutter  wouldn’t work when required. This meant another run-in with the shop who sold it – it had already been returned twice not long after I bought it last May.

Those who have long memories will recall that my last bushcutter was left out in the rain and the surly mechanic had said that it was water damaged and unrepairable. Nothing is unrepairable so I assumed he meant that it was uneconomic to repair it so I bit the bullet and shelled out a not inconsiderable £600 for a new machine having been given a £200 allowance against my ‘unusable’ Stihl. Stupidly, I forgot to see if the ‘unrepairable’ bushcutter was on sale the next time I passed the mechanic’s shop.

Now Stihls are probably the Rolls Royce of bushcutters, well at least the Range Rover of bushcutters, so they should be pretty rugged and in theory should start every time – but not this one. I did everything by the manual and even bought their special Stihl petrol/oil mixture, which at £20 a gallon is an extravagance which appalled me.

Even this liquid gold being poured into its tank didn’t do the trick so I piled the Stihl into the jeep and drove down to the shop which is a large garden centre/farm supplies business on the edge of Vence.

I took the machine to the cash desk and said it wasn’t working but was still under guarantee.

Taking it round to the mechanic’s shop as I’d been asked, I was ready for my annual lesson in the worst that France can throw at you in terms of ‘customer service’. The guy is so surly he makes Guy and Kitty look like gregarious angels but onward I marched and stopped at his desk where he was working on another customer’s machine. I didn’t expect him to look up and acknowledge me (he never does) and surprise, surprise, he didn’t, so I stood and waited and waited. After about 5 minutes and becoming increasingly impatient, I interrupted his work. The other customer who obviously knows the mechanic better than I did stood back as if amazed at my impertinence.

‘Yes’ was the reply.

‘My Stihl isn’t starting. It’s only a year old and has never started properly. This is the third time in a year it’s been back here’. And then I added, ‘and I buy that expensive petrol you suggested and it’s still not starting.’

He tried a couple of pulls of the starter string and said I should come back in a couple of days, which I did.

‘It’s water damaged’ he said. Using a mixture of French and English, I informed him that this was complete bollocks as it had been in the garage for the last 4 months and was working when I put it away.

Surprised by my tenacity, or maybe it was the emphasis I applied to the word ‘bollocks’, he said, ‘Oh, ok then – leave it with me and I’ll see what I can do’.

There then followed a bit of a saga with new parts being ordered and him eventually repairing it a few weeks later and then phoning me to pick up the Stihl which I did.

As I was driving past him on my way out of the store car park, he jumped out in front of the car forcing me stop and shouted, ‘you must pay, you must pay’.

I went to the cash desk and explained that my Stihl was under guarantee and I wouldn’t be paying a penny, sorry, cent, whereupon the mechanic grabbed my machine, ran to his workshop and locked the bushcutter in a storeroom.

With an air of Gallic one-upmanship creasing his face, he pointed to the locked room and attempted what I can only say was the sort of rubbish we English spout when we try and get a bit above ourselves with French – ‘your machine is hostage until you pay’.

I just laughed and started to walk away but was thinking as I did so that they were the winners. I might have my pride but they had my Stihl.

The stand off lasted another week and then I returned to the store to find they had apparently contacted the manufacturers and they had agreed that the guarantee should cover the work.

As I triumphantly walked out of the store with my bushcutter, I vowed never again to buy anything from them – until the following week when I had to crawl back and buy a new blade for my Stihl, only available from Gamm Vert !

Life Can Be Grim

We had a very windy night a few days ago and as usual, the next morning I ventured outside to see what damage had been done. I hadn’t heard any crashing of candle glasses on the terrace nor the sun loungers being thrown into the pool nor the sun umbrellas being ripped apart, but the new rear (plastic) window which I had fitted to my Alfa a few days previously had been blown in – obviously I hadn’t fixed it to the hood properly. It’s a very fiddly job and I was not looking forward to doing it again.

I started the Alfa to move it to a cooler spot (we’re still having unseasonably warm weather here) and there was a terrible clanking noise and the battery gave out. My immediate thought was that it sounded a very expensive noise. Could it be that the timing belt had finally given way and perished – if so, it was a 1200 euro repair or worse!

I put the battery on charge and went to lie down, or rather, check my bank balance.

Trying to access my online bank, it appeared that the internet connection was down. Could this be something to do with the new, all embracing package I’d just ordered from Orange (France Telecom)?

Just then the kids came in and as usual they were straight onto the internet, or so they thought.

‘It’s down”, I said. ‘I’ll call them tomorrow’.

After several minutes of moaning and groaning and a realization that even Tom’ll Fix It couldn’t fix it, they headed for the TV, switched it on and there was a clicking sound – no picture, just a clicking sound.

Now, kids can be a real pain sometimes but never more so than when there’s no entertainment in the house.

‘Go for a swim’, I said, but that was met with incredulous stares.

‘Read a book’, I suggested but that was met with even more incredulity.

‘We’ll just watch it in your bedroom’, was the reply and off they trooped to mess up my bed.

The next day I called Orange and spoke to a very nice lady called Florence who worked in Nantes (thankfully not Bangalore !). She ran a few tests and said it was serious. ‘Ah, I see you’ve just ordered one of our new packages’, she said. ‘They’re great value for money’ and then added, ‘when they work’ !  ‘I’ll get an engineer to call’, she said.

I was dreading the return of the ‘kids from hell’ from school so I decided to look at the TV which has had this fault intermittently for the last year or so but no matter that I tried all my previous tricks to get it working, it stayed resolutely blank – it just kept clicking.

No Alfa. No internet. No TV. It couldn’t get any worse, could it? Life was indeed grim.

The third day arrived. I was up at the crack of dawn. Technology wouldn’t beat me.

The first thing was the Alfa. It had now been on charge for two days. I disconnected the charger, put the key into the barrel, turned it and the car sprang into life, sounding just as sweet as she ever did. Result!

Next – the rear window. Now, I’ve taken the window of the Alfa out so often that I could probably do it in my sleep but it’s still an incredibly difficult job but today the screws came out easily, I didn’t cut myself on the metal edge of the window frame and the zip, which can be more difficult to undo than one of those on J’s evening dresses, undid easily.

Into the garage and 30 minutes later and some new extra strong staples bought the day previously which sank through the 4mm PVC like the proverbial hot knife through butter, and the new window looked stronger than ever.

It even went back in like a dream. One job done – two to go.

I called Orange again. Of course, there was no chance I would get Florence but got some guy in Paris called Claude. He did some more tests, confirmed it was serious but gave me the good news that my line had been ‘upgraded’ from a 700k download speed to 15mb. ‘That’s great’, I said, ‘but it’s no use without a connection’. I sensed a Gallic shrug at some nondescript warehouse in Paris. 

He then must have read his script and sympathized but not before I suggested re-installing the router. ‘That’s not the problem’, he countered, ‘it’s this new package you’ve bought – it just doesn’t work.’

I thought of my years in BT and how I would have dreaded a BT call centre operator (sorry, technical service assistant executive……) saying that to a customer. The French were honest if nothing else.

As soon as he got off the line, I reinstalled the router and hey presto, despite his advice, the connection burst into life with a 13mb download speed. Things were indeed looking up. Life was not so grim after all.

Next – the TV. Once again, I tried all the previous remedies – switching it off and on rapidly, switching it on with the remote, and finally, bashing it. Nothing worked. That’ll teach me for buying an ex-display model which had probably been on for eons without a break.

I decided to call the repair shop, despite the new super-duper faster Google telling me that it wasn’t usually economic to repair LCD TVs. No phone line – dead as a dodo! Great internet connection – no phone line – amazing!

Life is indeed grim !

Driven Indoors By A Fly

In a rare fit of enthusiasm for outdoor work I bounded out of bed at 8am and headed own into the garage, got all dressed up in my strimming gear (long sleeve shirt, jeans, Wellington boots, full body harness and hard hat and visor), pulled the starter string of my industrial sized machine and as usual, it didn’t start. This has happened now for a few days and I should have known better than to try and start it after getting ‘dressed up’ because after about twenty pulls of the string, I was soaking in sweat and physically exhausted.

Cursing it as if it was capable of hearing and understanding me, I got into lighter clothing  and decided to try something a little less energetic – cutting the brambles and bushes which grow down the lane leading to the house.  Unlike most plants which tend to grow upwards, these things bizarrely  grow outwards and if left to their own devices, grow far enough out into the lane to scrape down the sides of passing cars. I’m not too worried about the post van or even J’s Honda (it would be physically impossible to spot another scratch on it anyway), but the thought of a bit of unkempt vegetation scraping Tan and Angie’s newish Tiguan would be a disaster – Tan’s planning a party if it gets to be 1 year old and hasn’t been scratched – unheard of in France – a 1 year old car without a scratch that is.

Secateurs in hand, gloves on, garden waste bin in tow, I headed down the lane to the bit where I stopped last week and started cutting. It must’ve been 85+ degrees and it wasn’t long before I started dripping with sweat, or is perspiration a more acceptable word?

Then the buzzing. I could hear it but I couldn’t see it but I knew what it was – the dreaded horse fly (Tabannus Linnaeus). Flown in from some distant field, miles away, seduced by my sweat glands no doubt.

Usually in May, horse flies by the dozen come into the house and then bizarrely land on the windows ……….. and die! But not this year. We’ve only had a few although Tan and Angie have had quite a lot.  But outside, they’re everywhere, drowning out even the shrillest magpie with their buzzing.

I tried to ignore it, but every second or so I could see this black ‘thing’ flash past my eyes and then it all went silent and that’s when you get worried. Where has it landed? On my neck or arm?

Then the pain on my ankle as it sunk its jaws into my flesh and if you think I’m being a bit mamby-pamby or overly melodramatic, read this excerpt from Wikipedia:

The bite from a large specimen is painful. Most short tongued species of horse flies use their knife-like mandibles to rip and/or slice flesh apart. Flies with longer proboscides bite more like a mosquito, their stylet-like mouthparts piercing the host's skin like needles.

That was it as far as I was concerned. Finished for the day and it was only 10.30am !

A Momentous Moment

Well some of you may not think so but when your French neighbour speaks to you for the first time since you arrived twelve years ago, it’s bound to be an important event.

But first an update.

We’ve had loads of visitors this year, one is still here and some have still to arrive so it’s been a busy season.  It was a beautiful summer until a couple of weeks ago when the weather suddenly got really hot, hitting 100 degrees (or 37 C) for the last ten days. It’s been too hot to do anything meaningful outside which is a nuisance and sleeping at night is almost impossible. You either sleep on top of the sheets and let the mossies have a feast (despite the burners) or you put the fan on which has a double benefit of blowing the mossies away and keeps you cool, but have you ever tried to fall asleep in a gale?

And then today, the weather cooled a bit, down to a more manageable 85 degrees and so I got my chainsaw out and started cutting a pile of wood which has been a blot on the landscape for quite a few months.

As I was taking one barrowful of wood to my stack I heard someone calling ‘Monsieur, Monsiur’ and as I looked up I could see it was my neighbour, an old lady, probably in her nineties, standing at our boundary fence and calling me over.

I was astonished as she has never spoken to me, despite us both working on our terraces, in the twelve years I’ve been here.

Her late husband, Pierre, was the old guy who used to both instruct and annoy me. He would tell me what trees to plant, what fertilizer to buy and how to cut back my bushes, and on other occasions he would go berserk when the red boundary markers (the holy grail to French people apparently) disappeared under weeds! I never knew what sort of mood he’d be in so contact was infrequent.

And then he disappeared. He didn’t appear on the terraces for months and I thought they’d simply returned to their Parisian home but I learnt a few months later that he had died.

The terraces were kept in check by a young man and although I never saw the lady, I occasionally saw washing hanging on the line strung between a couple of trees higher up the hillside.

And then today – contact !

My Cyprus Tree - Growing Again

I wandered over and said hello. She started off by speaking very quickly in French and I had to stop her as I couldn’t understand what she was saying – it was something about trees. And then she staggered me by speaking in English, albeit very bad English. For years I had been trying to build bridges with Old Pierre by inviting him down for an aperitif (the French have aperitifs – not drinks !) but he always refused saying his wife would not come which I took to mean, she didn’t speak a word of English and would find it difficult to socialise, and here she was, trying to explain in her faltering English, a problem she had about trees.

When I finally figured out the subject matter, trees, I was able to speak to her in French and discovered that she was asking me to cut my Mimosa tree once the branches started overhanging her land as they might fall on their electric fence.

I laughed and told her a couple of stories about Old Pierre.

When I first recovered the upper terraces from a jungle state they’d been in for several years and started planting trees, Old Pierre would be hanging over his fence shaking his head. ‘You can’t plant those – those are palm trees’, he would cry. ‘You shouldn’t plant that tree there’, and ‘that tree (the Mimosa tree) is too close to my boundary fence but ok you can leave it.’

And then when a large stag came onto the land and decided to decimate my trees including a Cyprus tree I had bought the week previously for 150 euros (I was gutted !) Old Pierre was straight down to the gardening shop to buy and install an electric, deer proof, fence around his land. My misfortune had been the first evidence of deer starting to come down from the hills and he was not about to let his fruit trees become their dessert.

He did gloat a bit, hanging over the fence and telling me that none of the affected trees would survive, specifically the Mimosa which had been reduced to a stump.

The Mimosa

I laughed as I told the old lady about Pierre’s prognosis of my trees and how she was now asking me to keep an eye on the Mimosa as it was growing vigorously.

We exchanged stories about the deer, our fruit trees and that the deer had just eaten every single pear I had whilst leaving every quince on the branches. And then, as she wandered off, I promised to keep my eye on the Mimosa, thinking that, given its size, it would be several years before it posed any problems to her deer fence.      

The original blog posting about the deer can be found here:

http://tomsfrenchblog.blogspot.com/2008/12/oh-deer-oh-deer.html

The Palm Tree Pierre Hated

And my original blog when Pierre died:

http://tomsfrenchblog.blogspot.com/2010/10/old-pierre-is-dead-rip.html

The Anal Banker ..... and I said, Banker

J’s been managing a villa not far from where we live for a London couple. During the winter, her main responsibility was to arrange maintenance and make sure the house was prepared for the summer letting months, but when those summer letting months arrived and the first guests moved in, J kindly went on holiday leaving me to handle the variety of requests and complaints from the ‘guests’.

The first set of guests were lovely and quite patient despite the fact that the electric gates to the drive failed intermittently leaving their cars impounded, usually and frustratingly when the guests were dashing off to the airport.

Those guests left after two weeks and despite the gate problem, they left behind very generous and extremely positive comments about both the villa and Bea, the lady who cleans the villa every week.

Then the second set of ‘guests’ arrived and I kid you not, within ten seconds of contact with them, I knew they’d be trouble.

The first contact was a phone call on Sunday afternoon saying they couldn’t find the villa. I explained the general location, the number and a description of the villa stating that they ‘couldn’t possibly miss the bright blue/lilac shutters’. Then the first complaint – the road numbers were not concurrent – how could they ‘possibly find a villa when the street numbers were not concurrent?’

I explained that house numbers in France (certainly down here) are a measurement of how far a house is from the last road junction, e.g. the villa’s street number was 55 and therefore it was 55 metres from the last junction. ‘Don’t tell me that – my husband’s French you know’, screeched this woman, then adding, ‘the numbers are not concurrent, the numbers are not concurrent.’

Now far be it from me to lecture someone on English so I refrained from explaining how the definition of ‘concurrent’ couldn’t possibly be applied to house numbers and that she possibly meant ‘consecutive’. 

Anyway – I let it drop, told them I’d look up the villa on Google Street View and Google Earth for a better description of how to get to it and they should call me back in a few minutes. They never did – I reckon they finally spotted the bright lilac shutters which can be spotted a mile away.

All was quiet until Monday morning when I got a call from ‘James’, saying the villa was filthy and what was I going to do about it. I stated that the cleaner had been in for seven hours on the Friday after the previous guests had left and it couldn’t possibly be filthy but I would call round to see what his complaint was.

Now this rather quick capitulation on my part must have confused him and it was obvious that he desperately wanted to berate me on the phone for a longer period of time and so he continued despite my repeated statement that I would call round. On and on he went until I told him that I had heard enough and would be putting the phone down. On and on went the diatribe and I put the phone down – mid sentence.

I called round to the villa about an hour later and was ‘greeted’ by James who was quite pleasant. I didn’t want to waste time, after all this was not my job, and I immediately asked him to show me the problems he’d encountered.

The first room on the ‘filthy tour’ was the kitchen.

‘Look at that’, James said as he pointed out the waste paper bin. ‘Yes, what’s wrong with it’, I replied. ‘It’s all dusty’, he whined. Now, the bin was a dark blue colour and the lid had a mottled paint finish so I had to get down on my knees to spot the dust. And yes, there was dust on the lid, but it couldn’t be seen unless you were on your knees.

‘And there’s a mark in the cupboard’, he said, opening the door. I looked in the cupboard and couldn’t see a mark but I nodded and asked him what was next. ‘The cooker hood – it’s disgusting’, he stated. I went over to the cooker hood and I have to say, if my cooker hood had been as immaculately clean as this one was, I’d have been delighted. ‘Exactly where is it dirty’, I asked. He pushed in a button and a fleck of dust fell out of the recess. ‘Aaah – see’, it’s filthy. I can’t stay in a place like this’, he complained.

At this point, I was beginning to think this was a joke J had set up to fill my lonely week with a bit of ‘off-the-wall humour’ but no, he dragged me out onto the terrace and said, ‘look behind the shutters, there are cobwebs’. Now, in the South of France with shutters being closed each evening, and the propensity for spiders to look for a nice sheltered place, you are bound to get cobwebs, indeed, you would think something was wrong if you didn’t, but this hadn’t registered with this guy. ‘I had to brush behind the bedroom shutters last night – I couldn’t go to sleep with that mess outside the bedroom window’, he said.

‘OK – what’s next’, I asked.

‘Well there’s a dustball in the lounge’, and sure enough one of those little balls of fluff was nestling happily in the corner of the lounge. By this stage I was getting a bit fed up and I looked closely at the dustball and queried mockingly whether he thought the hairs were animal or human. ‘They’re definitely human’, he said. ‘Yes – I thought they looked a bit wiry and curly’, I answered. It didn’t register.

‘Next’, I asked.

‘Well, just look at this’, he said, pulling the sofa cushions apart to show me some dust which had gathered in the deepest recess. ‘I can’t possibly sit on that’, he moaned.

I was diligently noting all of these things down as we moved outside to the pool terraces. Pulling back a jasmine bush, he pointed to some leaves on the tiles. ‘Look’, he said. ‘Yes – so what? Bushes do lose leaves’, I said. ‘And the pool, it’s got some leaves in it’, he complained. ‘The pool man calls twice a week, I’m sure he’ll scoop them out for you the next time he calls’, I said, biting my lip and not telling him he was an anal twat.

‘And then there’s this’, he proudly said pointing to the BBQ.

Fearing the worst (we all know what BBQ’s get like), I opened the dome and it was utterly immaculate inside. Clean as the day it had been purchased.

‘What’s the problem’, I asked. ‘It’s filthy’, he said. ‘Look at that grease mark.’ Sure enough, on the panel beside the grill, there was a small grease mark. ‘That’s not a problem’, I stated. ‘A quick wipe with a cloth and it’ll be gone.’

‘OK’  he said. ‘I am not staying in this filthy place. I have paid a lot of money (which he had) to stay here and it’s filthy. What are you going to do about it?’

Now, by this stage I reckoned James’s head was so far up his own backside that when he spoke there was a sound of farting and whilst I had been diligent and reasonably calm, I now felt I had to tell him some home truths. ‘This place is not filthy’, I said. ‘OK, there a few things which need attention and I’ll get Bea to come in this afternoon and fix them, but the place definitely isn’t filthy’, I repeated.

And then the response which proves that you can take the boy out of Glasgow and indeed take Glasgow out of the boy………’well with your accent, you obviously have lower cleanliness standards than I have’, he said. ‘I think the place is filthy’, he continued.

At that point, I put my pen and paper down and was just about to punch his lights out when I thought of Fred and Hilda back in London receiving a lawsuit from some very expensively hired solicitors whilst I languished in a French jail. And so I just laughed.

‘You’re laughing at me’, he whined. ‘You think this is all a joke don’t you.’

I repeated my mantra that the house was definitely not filthy but I would get Bea round that afternoon, but he wasn’t finished. ‘If you can stop laughing, come with me’, he ordered. I followed him back upstairs.

‘Do you know when I opened the safe, I spotted that the batteries were just about to start leaking and do you know what happens when batteries leak’, he asked. ‘I have no idea’, I lied.

‘Well, they make an awful mess and could actually lock the safe with my things inside. Anyway, I’ve changed them’. ‘Congratulations’, I said. ‘Well done.’ He didn’t even spot the sarcasm !

‘So – come back into the kitchen – there’s another cobweb I want to show you. I forgot it earlier’, he said.

At that point, I’m afraid I lost it and started laughing again which upset him even more. I’d had enough. As I walked out of the front door, he followed me and said,’ I’m important you know. I have serious connections in this part of the world. I can get things to happen.’

I turned to face him. ‘So who are your connections then James. Tell me who your connections are’, I said quite close to his face thinking that whoever his connections were, unlike some of mine they probably didn’t carry baseball bats.

‘Well I know the deputy mayor of St Paul – well he was deputy mayor five years ago’, he said, completely destroying any semblance of credibility he may have had. ‘I can do things here’, he continued. ‘I will get this villa closed down, I’ll call the police and the tax authorities and I’ll even start damaging it. I can damage this villa you know.’

By this time, I’d climbed into my car laughing hysterically and was starting the engine. James was standing in front of the car in a vain attempt to stop me leaving.

‘James – I would suggest you move away’, I said. ‘Go and enjoy your holiday and stop being silly.’ ‘Silly? Who’s being silly’, he whined as I drove off just missing him.

  

Blood Money

My Body's Not Bad for a 60 year old

Now my body’s not too bad for a sixty year old. I don’t mean the shape which seems a bit top heavy, but its condition. I’ve had a few problems some of which were hereditary (Hay Fever, Asthma) and some which were self inflicted (smashed knee (skiing) and bad ear (swimming in a polluted Med)). But in general terms I’ve been remarkably lucky, considering I was born in a part of Glasgow which has the lowest male expectancy in Europe – all of 57 years!

In the 12 years I’ve lived out here, apart from a couple of emergencies, I’ve only been to the doctor’s about three times, preferring to let nature take its course which it invariably does, but last week was different.

It started on Saturday night when I leant over in bed and there was a pain under my ribcage. The following morning, I could hardly move but seemed to recall that I’d had a similar problem a couple of years previously and that it had ‘fixed itself’ within a day or so and I resolved, once again, to let nature take its course.

On Sunday night however, I was in agony, so much so that my caring wife moved down into the Studio so she could get a decent night’s sleep but she did give me some Ibuprofen for the pain before she disappeared.

Still convinced that my pain was temporary I researched the internet and came to the conclusion that my symptoms (stomach spasms, pain in the ribcage, indigestion etc) meant that I had Acid Reflux or GERD ( Gastroesophageal reflux disease). Strangely, I was quite heartened by this and by Tuesday night, after refusing J’s offer of a trip to the doctor, I was improving and had 1 glass of wine with dinner – my appetite hadn’t been affected!

Well, on Wednesday night I was literally screaming in pain and on Thursday J booked me into the doctor’s and despite the fact that during the day I was virtually OK, I decided to go and see this marvel called Yolandea (Dutch female doctor).

When I eventually found her surgery, I had wandered straight into her consulting room by mistake (luckily it was a male patient – and he wasn’t bending over!), but on entering the waiting room it was all a bit surreal, not only were J and Kitty sitting there but my neighbour Tan also! Talk about a small world!

Anyway, unlike our village doctor, Dr Fang, who over a period of 12 years had never said anything more than ‘wot wong wiv you Misser Evans?’ (long story), Yolandea actually asked me about my family history and my own health record before asking what my symptoms were and then examining me.

Finally, she said that it sounded like I had gall stones and asked that I go for a blood analysis and an ultrasound scan, both of which were booked for Tuesday as Monday was a holiday. All very efficient this French Health Service.

Thankfully - Not my Ultrasound

Now during this period, Shadow had started showing similar symptoms to those he had last year when he was diagnosed as having a Thyroid problem so he was booked into the vet’s.

On the Tuesday I gave my blood sample and later had my ultrasound which fortunately showed that my stomach is as healthy as any other eastern Glaswegian who has a life expectancy of 57 (seriously – it was clear) and then it was onto the vets for Shadow’s blood test.   

Now both Shadow and I are awaiting our blood test results but hear this – the bill for my blood test and full analysis and my ultrasound performed by a specialist, including a full explanation of my insides, totaled 78 euros. Shadow’s blood test was ………. 91 euros! How come?

PS – I got my results back. It says I am overweight, I have to eat more roughage, I have to apply Vaseline to my dry, scabby nose and I need to be de-wormed. Unfortunately, I did all this for the following few days before I realized I’d mistakenly been reading Shadow’s results  and prescribed treatment! 

Drugs ! I Blame Patrice.

It was a few months ago when Patrice my hairdresser nearly cut my throat with his open razor because of my sneezing that he thrust a piece of paper into my hand and said that ‘Aerius’ was a sure fire cure for hay fever.

I wandered into the nearest pharmacy, handed over the bit of paper, said I was on holiday and could I have some Aerius please. The pharmacist shook her head and said ‘not without a prescription’.

J suggested I go to Dr Fang but he hates being told what to prescribe so I passed on that suggestion.

After researching Aerius on the internet and finding that indeed, it is usually only available by prescription, I entered another pharmacy the following day and once again handed over the paper and asked for some Aerius, again explaining that I was on holiday and was really suffering. Once more, there was a shake of the head and a ‘not without a prescription’. I’d also taken Guy’s inhaler along (which I use) and held that out explaining that it was empty and could I have a refill. Inhalers are also only available by prescription, but within seconds I had a new inhaler in my hands, and I wandered out thinking, ‘only in France’.

Undaunted by my Aerius rejections, I sent an e-mail to my neighbour Angie’s mother, who used to run a chain of pharmacies in Florida where she still lives. ‘Could she investigate the availability of Aerius for me and maybe send me some’.

Tina came back to me within hours saying that she would indeed get me some, or Neo-Clarityn which is the same thing, but in the meantime, I found that Aerius was available on-line and said that rather than involve her in the ‘Aerius project’, I would try and get some myself.

It was cheaper to order Neo-Clarityn, so I ordered 60 tablets, pressed the button and a few days later my UK account was debited and I waited. And waited. And waited.

I sent an e-mail to the pharmacy company but there was no reply. I sent another e-mail a few days later and ……… the website had closed down! I mentally accepted that my $50 had disappeared into some scamster’s pocket.

And then, a couple of weeks ago, a rather official looking letter from the French Customs (Douanes) arrived asking me to go to their offices at Nice Airport on a designated day at a designated hour. I knew exactly what they’d got their hands on – my Neo-Clarityn!

Onto the internet once more, I discovered that the importation of drugs into France without a licence is a complete no-no. I kind of suspected this but if you don’t look you don’t get worried! But I did, and I am!

And so yesterday I got on my scooter and headed off to the airport. There were quite a few signs for ‘Douanes Français’ and upon reaching the security post I handed over my letter. My identity card was exchanged for a pass and I was told where to go.

Once inside the complex which was worryingly close to, if not, air-side, I wandered around completely untroubled by the many workers loading and unloading freight and after a few minutes found myself in a decidedly administrative area which didn’t look quite right.

As I was an hour early for my meeting, I had breakfast in what was quite obviously a staff restaurant, read the Nice Matin and then followed the signs for the ‘Chef Douanes’.

At the office, I handed my letter to a woman who shook her head and said I shouldn’t be in that area, it was 'interdit' and I needed to go over to Terminal 1.

Off to T1 I went and handed my letter to the guy who does Vat Reclaims. He suggested as I was still early, I wait 10 minutes. I grabbed a free FT and sat down.  

A few minutes later I was escorted into an office and there sat the fiercest looking  woman I’ve ever seen. Not good news.

She indicated a chair I should sit on and started typing on her computer, never once looking at me and the following conversation took place in French (or Franglais in my case!):

Name?

Tom Cupples.

First name only please?

Tom (she had my ID card so I don’t know why she was asking).

Address?   

I provided it.

Occupation?

Retired.

Do you know it is illegal to import drugs into France?

They’re not drugs – they’re medicine. They’re for my hay fever.

Medicine is drugs. Were you aware?

No (lying).

Where did you order them from?

I told her the web site name.

Is this the first time you ordered drugs on the internet?

Yes.

Good.

Oh no – I forgot, I get my dog’s drugs on the internet.

I didn’t hear that.

I said I order my dog’s drugs on the internet. My vet is ok with it.

I said I didn’t hear it.

Ah O.K. (finally getting the message).

There then followed a 30 minute lecture on the carrying of and importation of ‘drugs’ into France. Then the nasty bit:

There is a penalty.

You mean a fine?

Whatever.

Now I had mentally prepared myself for something approaching €500 and when she said €100 I almost smiled but caught myself just in time.

I handed over €100.

OK, so can I have my Neo-Clarityn?

No – they’re confiscated.

Not even a few?

Good day Mr Cupples – as she handed me my receipt. Then, as I was leaving her office, she called me back and handed me 10 tablets. Aaaah!

PS - J has just returned from Dr Fang's (Guy's ill) and handed me a packet of Aerius. They were free!!!!

My wife isn't often wrong but she was right again.

What's Happening at Le Brin ?

It’s been a couple of weeks since my last post but there are no apologies. I’ve been enjoying the solitude and peace whilst my family has been in Kenya doing all sorts of things to help the less fortunate.

Of course, the trip to Kenya was the first visit for Guy and Kitty and whilst Guy appears to have embraced it despite the lack of technology but reveling in his technical ability to ‘fix things’, it also appears that Kitty had a more difficult time adjusting to life without her make-up, her boyfriend, her en-suite bathroom and her four poster bed! Still, she managed to shoot many wonderful photos which will do her well in her quest to get into the local Lycée which specializes in the Arts.

J did send one post to me during her visit apart from those pleading with me to send more money (try ‘Kenyan Kids’ on Facebook) which said she’d been ‘introduced’ to an abandoned baby in a Kenyan maternity hospital and felt that she needed to bring her home but I pointed out that as she visits twice a year and as she seems to find one of these ‘deserving causes’ on each trip, after a few years we’d be inundated with kids! So we’re sponsoring her life in Kenya – a good compromise methinks. Named initially after J, it’s now been decided to call her Lily. Let’s wish Lily a good life.    

So whilst my family have been several thousand miles away I’ve been transitioning the house from winter/spring into summer and ready for the (vast) stream of visitors we have arriving this year.

What does that involve? Cleaning the house terraces and fixing the BBQ (again). Starting the automatic pool cleaning process after its winter shutdown, mowing the (grass) terraces for the first time this year and getting rid of all the gunge which falls from the trees during the spring winds.

Apart from that we’ve been congratulating Shadow on his 13^th birthday (91 or 85 in human years depending on how you calculate it), finding the remains of mice and rats which the cats have dragged in alive and then let go to rot in corners of the house (only discovered when the smell became unbearable!) and generally trying to keep the multitude of vehicles (4 cars and 4 scooters – long story) arranged in such a way that people don’t think we’re rich.

85 or 91 years old ?

The stream of visitors has already started and we’re almost fully booked now until the end of July. During this period, J and the kids will be off to Cyprus for a couple of weeks and despite the fact that I was desperate to accompany them (for J’s sister’s 70^th birthday), J has insisted I stay at home and clean the house ready for the next set of visitors.

That’s about it – apart from me working my socks off, there’s not a lot happening although tonight I did come across what looked like a mountain rescue team just down the road where a German couple have been building a house for the last six years. Maybe she chose an inappropriately expensive kitchen and he's buried his wife in the hills.

Being German, he will of course probably not know that Billy Connolly suggests that if you’re going to do away with the missus, you should bury her with her bottom just sticking out of it so you can use it for something practical.

See his little story here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Slw08b3bHFE

A Prize Idiot

I knew it was April 1^st. Despite most of my days being pretty much the same I had known it was April Fool’s Day when I was up during the night (hay fever) and had read a newspaper article which stated that Sir Alex Ferguson was to become the Life President of the Football Referees Association. But then I went back to bed and when I awoke a few hours later, I had forgotten all about it. It was as I was walking out of the kitchen with a cup of coffee that J said, ‘Oh – did you see that e-mail from Tan (my neighbour)?’

Now I didn't know what it was but I immediately thought that the e-mail was going to say that he was leaving – i.e. moving away.

Tan and Angie have now been next door for four and a half years which is not bad considering they only came up to Tourrettes to see what the house was like. I think they liked it and stayed. They have become great mates and we all get on enormously well – just like one big family, which is just as well as there is only about 30 metres between our two houses!

I opened the e-mail and sure enough, my instinct was correct – Tan and Angie were moving. Here is the e-mail Tan sent:

Hi Tom, Julie,

I have been trying to meet up and have a chat these past few weeks but with me being away it’s been difficult.  The time has arrived for us to depart these shores I’m afraid, I have a job offer I simply cannot refuse.  This has all come about the last couple of weeks, Amadeus Spain, has asked me to join them as the Global Deployment Manager on a permanent basis, I got the official paperwork yesterday.

I will be based in Madrid but we are looking at living outside of the city in a medieval village called Avila, so it will feel like Tourrettes hopefully. This has been a very difficult decision for us but I think its the right move in terms of prospects (now that I am over 40) and career path.  We also really love Spain and hopefully, if we have half the fun out there as we have in your house, it will be worth it.

 Am sure the kids will be ok, well for Violet it will be tough I guess for her to understand what’s happened but they forget quickly, right?

Anyway, just wanted to say you two, (and guy and kitty) have been absolutely wonderful to us, as friends, neighbours and landlords.  We couldn't have imagined it any better to be honest when we first visited the house, and we will always be friends.

I think we need between 4-8 weeks to move, so I hope this notice period is acceptable and gives you enough time to find replacements.

I guess we can talk Saturday once I am back face to face, sorry its over email but wanted to get the ball rolling.

 speak soon

 Tan and Angie

 PS. Angie can also practice her Spanish!

 As my mind had already predicted what the e-mail was going to be about, I immediately sent a reply,

wishing him and Angie all the best in their new life. My response is below – aaah nice eh ?

Hey Tan - you'll do anything to get to the Bernabau won't you ????
We'll be sorry to see you guys go too. It's been great and I don't think we'll ever get another set of neighbours like you. Maybe we could come too ? But, the job sounds great and Spain was always somewhere I wanted to live - we're supposed to get 300 days of sunshine down here (blatant lie) but in Spain, I think it's the real deal.
I'm sure we'll see you over the weekend sometime and we can discuss things.

Regards
Tom

Once the reply was sent, I immediately switched into T Cupples Commercial and Oraganisation mode. If they left in the next six weeks I could put the house on the holiday rental market and make a bomb – should I make it £2,000 or £2,500 a week? And once October came along and I was rolling in dosh I could put it up for long term rental. Yes – this would all work out splendidly. Now how would I market it? Put it on our friend’s holiday homes website or simply put a notice on Angloinfo? 

I decided to think about that later. Then I thought about all of the furniture which Tan and Angie have bought and which I would have to replace to put the house back on the rental market. I worked my way through each of their rooms in turn, mentally preparing a list of what I would need to buy. I was frustrated in that J had only just been to Ikea down in Toulon – we’d need another trip now.

What else would I need to do? Maybe tidy the garden up a bit and I would certainly have to re-grout the kitchen tiles but that job was scheduled for the end of April anyway.

It was all falling into place. Another cup of coffee was required. As I wandered into the kitchen, J said, ‘Did you see Tan’s e-mail?’ ‘Yeah – bit of a bummer eh. Still, things move on’, I replied.

‘You idiot’, said J. ‘Don’t you know what date it is today.? It’s April Fools Day.’

Well, I could have thrown myself in the pool off of the terrace, hit my head off of the wall, thrown myself under a truck on the main road. None of these actions would have made me feel worse than I felt when J uttered those words.

I just went and sat down and castigated myself for being a total idiot.

After a few minutes, I thought that maybe if Tan and Angie hadn’t realized by my initial reply that I had sussed what was going on, I could carry this little joke on a bit further, so I penned another e-mail below:

Tan - I hope you don't think I have been doing this with undue haste but there's a couple coming to see your house tonight. They've been on at me for months to be alerted when you were leaving and are desperate to get out of their house in Vence.

Could you please make sure the house is clean and tidy for their visit, remove all the kids’ toys from the lounge and move the trampoline so they can see the full extent of the terrace.

They are 99.9% sure of taking the house (they lived in it for a weekend last year when you were away - roadtesting I think it's called) and have asked me to fit a double oven and air-con. The oven will be fitted this weekend but I'd appreciate it if you would refrain from using it - maybe Angie could use the deep-fat fryer?? Sorry about this.

Finally, they have asked for a moving-in date of 27th April which is about 3 weeks away and which is slightly less than you were suggesting but as it'll take you a couple of weeks to get to Madrid you'll probably find it works out ok.

Once again, we'll be sorry to see the back of you - sorry - see you leave. Please make sure you feed the fish so they are in good condition for the new owners.

Regards
Tom

But it didn’t work. Tan’s Reply was unprintable and Angie’s was ‘Speechless’!!

We all got together the following night on Tan’s terrace, sorry MY TERRACE, next door and had a good laugh about it.

The PC is Back ….. and English Mechanics

My regular readers will know that in a fit of extremely unusual extravagance when I was in New York for my honeymoon, I splashed out several hundred dollars on a new PC. Unfortunately, the PC I bought was a top-spec HP Pavillion dv6000 which, unknown to me was a crap piece of kit wrapped up in a very attractive case – shiny piano black, every bell and whistle you can think of and a few you probably haven’t even heard of!

The problem with this particular PC, which I would have known about had I bothered to research it properly, was that it melts, or to be more precise, the graphics board melts and eventually, the problems spread and so it turned out to be.

My Unreliable HP

It’s been down to Wolfgang, our trusty German PC engineer in Antibes a couple of times and last year after a new graphics board was fitted, the motherboard (quite important) gave up and he fitted a new one of these too. This motherboard lasted approximately 6 weeks by which time the warranty of the board was up so last October, the HP went back to Wolfgang and it’s taken this long to fix.

And so yesterday, I got the Beemer out, put the top down and headed off down to Antibes to pick it up. It was a beautiful day and driving my new toy for the first time with the hood down was great.

I got to Wolfgang’s house in just under an hour, picked up the PC and headed back into Antibes to meet a lady, who shall remain nameless and who was handing over some VHS tapes for me to copy to DVD.

When we finally managed to meet up (Antibes centre is a nightmare when you have a car), she handed me the tapes and said one was old home movies and was precious whilst the other was of her wedding. I looked at the wedding tape and said that it didn’t look to be very long. I estimated 25 minutes. ‘Yes’, she said, and that’s about how long the marriage lasted! I didn’t dare ask why she wanted it converted to DVD.

About 20 minutes from home, I had to stop for some groceries and decided to have a sandwich and a glass

Opio ClubMed

of wine in a brasserie attached to the supermarket in a village called Opio, known more for its ClubMed resort than anything else. I ordered a Jambon Cru sandwich. ‘Non monsieur.’ I asked for a fromage sandwich. ‘Non monsieur.’ What about a jambon sandwich? ‘Non monsieur – we don’t have any bread.’ ‘Well there’s a supermarket next door. You could actually get a baguette there’, I suggested. ‘Mais oui’, he said with a surprised look on his face as if I had come up with some startling idea which would transform his business!

It was as I was sitting waiting for the chef to go and get some bread that I noticed a rather noisy table of six guys having lunch. They were tucking into Pesto soup, braised rabbit with piles of vegetables and some sort of tart with cream for dessert. All for 14 euros – not bad!

But it was the ‘formidables’ (very large beers) some of them were drinking which gave the game away – they were English, and further inspection of their clothes told me they were from a local garage not far from the brasserie.

Now this business has been there for quite a few years and specializes in top-of-the-range cars, some costing over €100,000, and they are second hand! Now, contradict me if you like, but if I was spending  €100,000 on a used car, I would go to some fancy garage in Cannes, not a piece of gravel and grass beside a big shed in Opio.

Anyway, the business must thrive as it’s been there for years and it was as I was thinking about who buys their cars that I also wondered if this was some sort of day out for these mechanics as it was obvious that they’d been there for quite a while, and as it was now 2.30pm, they were quite clearly using their outing to embrace the French custom of long lunches.

Then it came time to pay the bill. They tried four credit cards which were all refused and then the waiter said, ‘don’t bother you can pay tomorrow.’

That answered my question.