Michael O Leary goes into a pub in Dublin.
“I’ll have a pint of Guinness Please” he says.
“That’ll be one Euro” says the barman.
“One Euro, that is amazingly cheap” says Mr O Leary.
“Would you be wanting a glass with that ?” said the barman.

(with thanks to Eugene)

I am going to make you work out the title yourselves,

I knew they were going to give a Chopin Recital on our tiny rouelle, Del Catet, as part of the local arts festival.
They arrived three days ago and created a little concrete plinth for the piano.
(things are not done by halves here)

I was watching for the moment and was delighted when this van pulled up outside our house and disgourged a piano at the top of the Del Catet.
I knew I was going to be disappointed out of a “Right said Fred” moment when I saw that it was carried on a little caterpiller called a Pianoplan, this was possibly designed for getting Grand Pianos down stone rouelle steps.

The Pianist and I watched them as they rolled it down the steps.
“Tis the pity of God ” I said to him in French ” That you didn’t take up the concert flute or the trumpet ”
He laughed, insincerely.

No sooner was it upright in the bottom but he began to practice.
A truly magical moment as the walls captured and magnified the sound and threw it up into the Place del Eglise

Soon enough the crowds started to gather.

Eventually there was a sizeable audience.

The pianist, who was called Francois-Michel Rignol, played beautifully.
First the standard Chopin waltzes and then some absolutely marvellous sonatas.

Magic.

Got a text from my brother David today reminding me that it was on this day twenty years ago that our Dad died.
I had forgotten.

But what is extrordinary is that it was also on this day, but last year, that Síle’s Dad died .
They share an anniversary even though it is nineteen years apart.

My Father , who was christened Walter but always went by the name of John, was born in 1915 and died in 1990 at the (what I now think of as) tender age of 75.

Síle’s Dad, Con, was born in 1911 and so would have reached his century if he could have lasted until next Spring.

Both of them would have loved it here in France.

The Arts festival of the local villages is just about to happen again this year.
It is called Les Nuits de la Terrasse et del Catet it is this year offering two unmissable events.

As the little Ruelle/Steps, Rue del Catet goes just by the side of our house we cannot miss Sundays performance there.
The steps are covered with cushions for the occasion and it becomes a little mini-amphitheatre.
This years performance at the bottom of the steps will be a recital of Chopin on the piano. (Only in France…….)

The other must-go-to is a production of The Barber of Seville in the local Big House, Domaine d’Asties.
This is not the opera but the original play by Beaumarchais on which Rosinni based his opera.
Wanting to go and to understand it I ordered the Beaumarchais play in translation from Amazon, it came complete in one volume with its sequel, The Marriage of Figaro, the very same one on which Mozart based his wonderful opera.
I read the two of them with great attention, particularly Act Five of The Marriage which has always remained a mystery to me despite many performances attended.

I now think I know what happens, it involves so many mistaken identities that at one stage the Count kisses his page Cherubino, mistaking him for Suzanna.
But it is OK folks, there is no trace of homoeroticism here, Cherubino is always played by a woman.

What Mozart does leave out is a long soliloquy by Figaro near the end of the play.

It has one piece in it which is entirely prophetic of events of recent years.
Figaro is giving an account of how he came down in the world and ended a barber.
At one time, he tells us, he wrote a play:

Alas I might as well have put a stone around my neck ! I fudge up a play about the manners of the seraglio, a Spanish author could, I imagined, attack Mahomet without scruple, but, immediately, some envoy complains that some of my lines offend the Sublime Porte, Persia, Tunis and Morocco.
Behold my play scuppered by a set of Mahommedan princes who habitually beat a tattoo on our shoulders to the tune of “Down with the Christian dogs “

Beaumarchais wrote these words about 230 years ago.

plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose

Laurier- Rose (Oleander)

Plumbago

Solanacée (Solanum)

Hibiscus

On Wednesday last, Bastille Day I found Síle at the TV watching the march past of the various French armies down the Champs Elysees in Paris.

They were the usual , super disciplined groups of spit and polish troops, marching in exact time like a huge dancing chorus in a Busby Berkley movie.

Then marching to a different drum, a much slower one, came the Sapper Unit (Les Sapeurs) of the French Foreign Legion.

They were wearing harem pants, butchers aprons in leather, leather gloves, carrying axes on their shoulders instead of guns and sporting vast quantities of facial hair.
They were obviously extremely popular as , despite the driving rain, the got the best cheer of all.

Who were they and what did they do and where did they get the name from?

From Wikipedia :

A sapper or combat engineer is an individual soldier who performs a variety of combat engineering duties. Such tasks typically include bridge-building, laying or clearing minefields, demolitions, field defences, and building, road and airfield construction and repair. He is also trained to serve as an infantryman when needed. A modern sapper’s tasks involve facilitating movement and logistics of allied forces and impeding that of enemies.
A sapper, in the sense first used by the Assyrian Army in the early 7th Century BC, was one who excavated trenches under defensive fire to advance a besieging army’s position in relation to the works of an attacked fortification, which was referred to as sapping the enemy fortifications.
Saps were excavated by brigades of trained sappers or instructed troops.

It is interesting to note that despite their not any longer building trenches the modern Fireman in France is called a Sapeur Pompier or a Pumping Sapper

This is our fifth full summer in France, our fourth in Thezan, and we are getting used to deal with- and even enjoy – the high summer temperatures.

Here are a few tips we use to survive.

Copy the natives and sneak off for a siesta in the heat of the day, from 12 to 2.00, this also allows you to have the energy to get up much earlier and do stuff in the early morning cool.

Let yourself sweat , use a deodorant which is not anti-perspirant, sweating is natures air-conditioning and helps us cool down.

Use a fan to cool down, the breeze on our sweaty bodies is marvellously refreshing.

With that end in mind wear as little clothing as is decent and make sure they are materials which absorb sweat like cotton or linen or sports synthetics which wick away sweat.

I am assuming that you will liberally lather yourselves with sun cream to an appropriate factor but you should also pay attention to other areas of skin.

Use a lip salve, the sun can chap the lips like cold does.

If your are a little on the chubby side (like me) make sure and lubricate any areas where you might chafe.

Irish feet used to the protection of socks will crack and dryout when suddenly exposed to the air in sandals, get an appropriate foot cream (men as well as women) and rub in well and liberally.

Drink copious quantities of water, the colder the better.
We also find that some of the carbonated waters have a high natural salt level which is very refreshing in the heat.

If you are renting a house always shut the south facing shutters in the heat of the day.
In fact most of the people in our village shut all the shutters all day for cool.

If you are feeling overcome by the heat take a trip in an air-conditioned car or dawdle over shopping in an air-conditioned department store.

Go to an old mountain village for a wander.
The tall buildings offer shade from the sun and the narrow winding streets channel the breezes refreshingly.

Seek out the shade, picnic under trees and buy yourself an umbrella for the beach.

Forget about sun-bathing, it leads to skin cancers and premature aging, be fashionably pale.

One of the unexpected pleasures of running a B&B in France is the people it puts your way.
Everyone who has stayed seems to have become a friend, some were friends already, most were just people we knew, or knew of, or quite often people who knew people we knew.
We have kinda gotten used to this now and expect anyone who comes our way to enjoy the experience but tonight, and indeed from tonight on, we will have some total strangers coming so this may become a bit more of a challenge.

We got a booking last week for a man for one night, tonight, from a group called The Caravan Quartet, who are playing a gig in the church in the village.
Listen to them here.
Now I will certainly go to the concert and am already trying to suss out how I can buy a CD.

During July and August we have several new faces appearing as well as some welcome old friends and relations-often at the same time.
It is going to be interesting to see how they mix.

At the moment in our garden ants have taken over at least one shrub and there can be seen charging up and down their branches to milk the aphids which they have placed there.
In the meantime a cricket has, for the first time decided to live in our Persian Lilac Tree and is singing along there all day.
Anyone who studied French for Inter Cert knows where this is going.
For the rest of you here is Fontaine’s Fable.

La Cigale et la Fourmi
by Jean de La Fontaine

“You sang, did you? That’s nice. Now dance.”

On This Day….

It is also perhaps significant that the French nation, in gratitude for our leaving our shores for theirs, have made today a national holiday.