Talking to friends a few weeks ago, it transpired that they are afficionados of whisky; this was enough to prompt Nick to suggest that they come round to celebrate Burns’ night with us.

I set to the task of finding haggis that could be posted here; not a difficult job, there are several companies who supply it in tins. The postage was the same for one, two or three tins; it would have been daft only to buy one, so a week later our three tins, each containing 1.2kg of haggis, arrived. I’d seen turnips on the market, but never swede and didn’t know where to start looking, until, at Nellie’s one day, Hervé arrived home from buying wine, with several swedes! I talked him out of one of them and found out which wine producer doubles up as a farm shop, before heading straight there to buy more. They can’t be very popular; they were ridiculously cheap!

As the whisky loving friends can’t join us till February and we had haggis (and neeps) to spare, we invited Kieran, Alice and her parents to celebrate Burns’ night with us on Saturday. Nick researched the menu; oysters then  mussel and sweetcorn chowder, followed by haggis, tatties and neeps. We sneaked in a nod to French cuisine in the form of a salad and cheese course, then finished with a raspberry cranachan, served with whisky flavoured crème fraiche. All served, obviously with a variety of whiskies.

It went down so well that I suspect the menu will be identical next time.

Le meilleur connu poet ecossais, Rabbie Burns a vecu dans la 18eme siecle; tous les ans les Ecossais, aussi que des gens d’ailleurs, celebrent son anniversaire en mangeant du haggis (panse de brebis farci), des tatties (pommes de terre) et des neeps (navets jaunes), servi, bien sur, avec beaucoup de whisky.

En parlant avec des amis il ya quelques semaines, on a appris qu’ils sont fans de whisky; ce fut suffisant pour inciter Nick suggérer qu’ils viennent chez nous pour célébrer la nuit de Rabbie Burns avec nous.
Je me mis à la tâche de trouver du haggis qui pourraient être envoyé ici; pas une tâche difficile, il y a plusieurs entreprises qui l’approvisionnent en boîtes. Les frais de poste sont le même pour un, deux ou trois boîtes; il aurait été stupide que d’en acheter un, donc une semaine plus tard, nos trois boîtes, chaq’une contenant 1,2 kg de haggis, sont arrivées. Je n’avais jamais vu des neeps au marché, et je ne savais pas par où commencer à chercher, jusqu’à ce que, un jour chez Nellie, Hervé est arrivé à la maison apres avait acheté du vin, avec plusieurs neeps! Je lui ai demandé de l’un d’eux et ai découvert quel producteur de vin se double d’une boutique de la ferme, avant de me diriger tout droit là pour en acheter plus. Ils ne doivent pas être très populaire; le prix etait tellement bas!
Comme les amis qui aiment le whisky ne peuvent pas se joindre à nous juqu’à février et nous avions du haggis (et neeps) en quantité, nous avons invité Kieran, Alice et ses parents pour célébrer la nuit de Burns avec nous le samedi. Nick a choisi le menu; des huîtres. potage de moules  et du maïs doux, suivie par Haggis, tatties et neeps. Nous avons furtivement donné un clin d’œil à la cuisine française sous la forme de salade et de fromage, puis un cranachan de framboise, servi avec de la crème fraîche aromatisé avec du whisky. Le tout servi, évidemment avec une variété de whiskies.
Tout et allé si bien que je soupçonne que le menu la prochaine fois sera identique.

After 74 days of enforced inactivity, well, if not inactivity exactly, then no work on the house, it was time to get started again. Back in October we’d been making good progress on the tiling and didn’t have much still to do when Nick had his accident, so there still wasn’t much to do this week.

Nick’s able to carry boxes of tiles and cut tiles, leaving me to do the rest, but as we had mostly edges to do, so lots of cutting, it worked well. After 3 days I’m delighted to report that we’ve finished the upstairs tiling. Next week we’ll start the grouting and put down the tiles in the entrance hall downstairs, not done yet as it requires a different type of sticky.

Après 74 jours d’inactivité forcée, bien, sinon exactement inactivité, mais rien comme travail de bricolage, il était temps de commencer à nouveau. En Octobre, nous avions fait des progrès sur le carrelage et il ne restait pas beaucoup à faire lorsque Nick a eu son accident, donc il n’y avait pas beaucoup à faire cette semaine.

Nick est capable pour transporter des cartons de carreaux et de les couper, me laissant faire le reste, mais la plupart qui restait a faire etait des bords, donc beaucoup de coupe: cela a bien fonctionné. Après 3 jours, je suis ravi d’annoncer que nous avons terminé le carrelage à l’étage. La semaine prochaine, nous allons commencer faire les joints et de faire le carrelage dans l‘entrée en bas, pas encore fait car il nécessite un type de collant différent.

Last Friday was a glorious day, unseasonally warm and sunny and Nick decided it was time to get back on his bike. We only did a short ride and he’s since raised his handlebars a little, to make his shoulder more comfortable, but it’s a start. On Wednesday we got out again, a slightly longer ride, and happened to meet up with the club on their way home; they were all very pleased to see him out on two wheels again.

It was an early start on Sunday, making quiche, cole slaw and a pudding, wrapping potatoes and laying a fire for later on. It was the cycle club AGM; somewhat tedious, as they read out the names of everyone who’s done every ride throughout the year amongst other things; I think most people only go for the subsidised meal afterwards.

There was some interest this year, though, as our Departement, the Gers, is hosting a week long FFCT (federation Francaise de cyclotourisme) cycling festival in Auch in July. A bigwig from the FFCT was at the AGM, to promote the event and, of course, to find volunteers to help. I seem to have landed myself the job of English translator for the opening ceremony and point of contact for any anglophile participants. It should be good fun and we’ll have a guaranteed parking place for the camping car; who could ask for more?!

From the AGM it was time to nip home, light the fire, put the potatoes underneath it and go back to Nogaro for the New Year concert; an orchestra from Fleurance, made up of players from 9 years old to 75. It was very good, a light hearted sort of evening, with plenty of humour thrown in; when it finished, some friends came back to ours for dinner. A busy sort of day, but very enjoyable.

A very happy new year to anyone reading this, to whom I haven’t already sent our good wishes.
We spent Christmas with our family in Harrogate; in spite of the dreadful weather and the devastation in towns and villages all around, we had a lovely Christmas. Nick managed to walk a bit without his stick and Izzy and I had a very enjoyable, pre-floods day, Christmas shopping in York. I borrowed a guitar and played with the choir at the Christmas eve mass; it was just like old times. We caught up with a few friends, but the time passed all too quickly and we were soon heading home, delighted, it must be said, to arrive in Bordeaux in warm sunshine and drive home on almost empty roads.
On New Year’s Eve some friends, Daniel and Maria, had invited us to join them in Viella, a village surrounded by vineyards, not far from here.
Every year the village holds a big festival for the new year, with a dinner that’s booked up months in advance. We weren’t eating, but went in the afternoon to look at the demonstrations of ancient crafts; spinning, vine grafting and corn cob stripping, amongst others. There’s wine tasting and a food market too and numerous artists selling their wares. At 5pm everyone headed to the church, where there was a piece of theatre being staged; we didn’t get in, but thinking it only lasted a short time, waited in the porch outside. Two hours later, it was finally over and the next part of the evening ready to begin.
Everybody, and there must have been over a thousand people, was given a wax wrapped torch and we processed through the streets of Viella, guided by huge candles on either side of the path, to a vineyard, where the last of the grapes for the Pacherenc wine were awaiting harvest. It was a still, clear night, and the vineyard looked beautiful, lit by big candles and a couple of bonfires. As we poured in, they were serving mulled wine and handing out secateurs and big plastic boxes. We cut the last of the “noble rot” grapes into the boxes; with so many helpers, it was done very quickly.
From there, we went back to Daniel and Maria’s for a delicious, Spanish themed dinner and didn’t get home till 3am. A great night, followed by the news the next day, that our photos were on the front page of a local newspaper.

Une très bonne année à tout le monde qui lire ceci, à qui je n’ai pas déjà envoyé nos meilleurs voeux.

Nous avons passé Noël avec notre famille à Harrogate; En dépit de la météo épouvantable et la dévastation dans les villes et villages tout autour, nous avons eu une belle Noël. Nick a réussi à marcher un peu sans sa canne et Izzy et moi avions une très agréable jour, pré-inondations, shopping à York. J’ai emprunté une guitare et ai joué avec le chœur à la messe de la veille de Noël; il était comme autrefois. Nous avons rattrapé avec quelques amis, mais le temps a passé trop vite vite et nous nous dirigions vers la maison, heureux, il faut le dire, pour arriver à Bordeaux en chaud soleil et  conduire à la maison sur les routes presque vides.

Le soir du réveillon du Nouvel An quelques amis, Daniel et Maria, nous avait invités à se joindre à eux à Viella, un village entouré de vignes, non loin d’ici

Il y a chaque année une grande fête pour la nouvelle année, avec un dîner qui est réservé des mois à l’avance. Nous n’y mangeions pas, mais nous sommes allés dans l’après-midi à regarder les démonstrations de métiers anciens; filature, le greffage de la vigne et épis de maïs décapage, entre autres. Il y a dégustation de vin et un marché gourmand aussi, et nombreux artistes vendent leurs marchandises. À 17 heures tout le monde se dirigea vers l’église, où il y avait une pièce de théâtre mise en scène; on n’est pas allé, mais pensant qu’il ne dura que peu de temps, attendaient à l’extérieur sous le porche. Deux heures plus tard, il était enfin terminée et la prochaine partie de la soirée prêt à commencer.

Tout le monde, et il doit avoir été plus d’un millier de personnes, a été equipé avec une torche de cire et nous avons marché par les rues de Viella, guidée par des bougies énormes des deux côtés de la voie, vers un vignoble, où le dernier des raisins pour le Pacherenc attendaient la récolte. c’etait une nuit claire, et le vignoble était beau, éclairée par des bougies et des bons feux. Lorsque nous sommes arrivés, on a  servi du vin chaud et distribué des sécateurs et de grandes boîtes en plastique. Nous avons coupé le dernier de la “pourriture noble” raisins dans les boîtes; avec autant d’assistants, il a été fait très rapidement.

De là, nous sommes retournés chez Daniel et Maria pour un délicieux,  dîner à thème espagnol et ne pas rentrer à la maison jusqu’à 3h du matin. Une belle soirée, suivie par les nouvelles le lendemain, que nos photos  etaient à la première page d’un journal local.

With clear, sunny days and temperatures in the mid 20s, it hardly feels like Christmas. It’s only rained once this month, in fact I think it’s only rained once since Nick had his accident on November 1st and the garden’s so dry that I’ve even had to water it!

The citrus trees are tucked up, cosy and warm, in their greenhouse, the scent is fantastic in there, and several limes had fallen, so we picked anything else that looked and felt ripe – 2kg of limes and lemons. Not having anything else to do (well, I can dream), we decided to turn them into marmalade: yesterday evening was spent squeezing and chopping and today we cooked it. It took both our big pans, the arrière cuisine smelt wonderful and we ended up with 15 jars. It doesn’t look like the bought variety, as our limes were mostly quite yellow in colour, so it hasn’t got that lovely greenish tinge, but it tastes wonderful.

On that happy note, I’ll take this opportunity to wish anybody and everybody who’s reading this a very happy Christmas and much happiness in 2016.

Avec des jours clairs et ensoleillés et des températures  de 20-24ºC, il se sent à peine comme Noël. Il n’a pas plu depuis longtemps, en fait, je pense qu’il  n’a qu’une fois depuis Nick a eu son accident le 1er Novembre et le jardin est tellement sec que je dois l’arroser!

Les arbres d’agrumes sont retroussé et chaud, dans leur petite serre, le parfum est fantastique là-dedans, et plusieurs citrons verts étaient tombés, donc nous avons recolté quelques autres qui avait l’air et sentait mûr – 2kg de limes et des citrons. N’ayant rien autre à faire (enfin, je peux rêver), nous avons décidé de les transformer en marmelade: hier soir a été dépensé hacher et presser et aujourd’hui nous l’avons cuisiné. Il a fallu nos deux grandes casseroles, l’arrière cuisine sentait merveilleux et nous sommes retrouvés avec 15 pots. Il ne ressemble pas à la variété acheté, comme nos citrons verts étaient pour la plupart de couleur jaune, de sorte qu’il n’a pas la belle teinte verdâtre, mais il a un goût merveilleux.

Sur cette note heureuse, je vais profiter de cette occasion pour souhaiter à tout le monde qui lit mon blog un très joyeux Noël et beaucoup de bonheur en 2016.

I don’t understand how someone as active as Nick normally is can remain as positive and cheerful as he has, when his movement is as restricted as it’s been for the last 6 weeks. But somehow he’s managed it and recently we had reason to celebrate when he managed the stairs for the first time since November 1st.

I don’t do anything like the same amount of exercise as Nick, but if I’m deprived of it, I soon start to feel very low; 2 weeks and I’m climbing the walls, 3 weeks and I just want to curl up and die. So after nearly 6 weeks of nothing more than a quick walk to the supermarket while Nick’s at the physio, things were getting desperate; I really needed a bike ride.

Nick has recently bought me a new bike; a road bike, but with clearances for slightly knobbly tyres. I’ll take it when we go off in the camper, it should be ideal for trips around town or along cycle tracks, being less highly strung than my others. Obviously it needed trying out; Nick fitted the saddle we’d bought the previous day and canibalised another bike for pedals; the right pedal went in fine, but the left one was a struggle, being extremely tight. At last it was 95% in; that would do, commented Nick; at least I wouldn’t lose a pedal.

The bike was great, comfortable and responsive, and it was a glorious day, so I ended up riding a bit further than I’d planned; after 15km, and heading for home, I felt so good, giving it my all up a hill, one, two, one, two, when suddenly, one…… nothing; no push, in fact, nothing at all! My right foot was floating about in the air – the “good” pedal had come off! I stopped; the pedal was still attached to my shoe and wanted to stay there. I couldn’t walk home in that shoe without damaging the pedal, but didn’t much fancy the walk in just my sock either. Much wrenching and pulling ensued and eventually the pedal separated from the shoe, so I set off to walk the remaining 7km. I let Nick know I’d be a bit late home; I didn’t really mind; it was as lovely a day for a walk as for a ride, after all, with clear views of the Pyrenees, resplendant under the first snow of the winter. But about 3km from home a car pulled up; some friends had called in, heard of my plight and had come to rescue me.

Je ne comprends pas comment quelqu’un aussi actif que Nick peut rester positif et optimiste, quand son mouvement est aussi limité que ça a été pour les six dernières semaines. Mais de toute façon il le fait et récemment, nous avons eu raison de célébrer quand il est monté les escaliers pour la première fois depuis le 1er Novembre.

Je ne fais pas du tout la même quantité d’exercice que Nick, mais si je suis privé de tout cela, je commence vite à me sentir très basse; 2 semaines et je deviens melancholique, trois semaines et je veux mourir.  Donc après six semaines de rien de plus que quelques minutes à pied au supermarché tandis Nick à la physio, les choses devenaient désespérée; j’avais vraiment besoin d’une rando au vélo.

 Nick m’a acheté récemment un nouveau vélo; un vélo de route, mais avec des espaces pour les pneus légèrement noueux. Je vais le prendre quand nous partons dans le camping-car, il devrait être idéal pour des excursions autour de la ville ou le long des pistes cyclables, étant moins nerveux que mes autres. Évidemment, il fallait l’essayer; Nick a posé la selle que nous avions acheté la veille et il a cannibalisé un autre vélo pour des pédales; la pedale droite etait facile à faire, mais le gauche était  extrêmement serré. Enfin, il était de 95% en; ça serait bien, a commenté Nick; au moins, je ne perdrais pas une pédale.

Le vélo était superbe, confortable et réactive, et ce fut une belle journée, donc je suis allée un peu plus loin que je l’avais prévu; après 15 km, et se dirigeant vers la maison, je me sentais tellement bien, je poussais le plus dure que je pouvais, un, deux, un, deux, quand tout à coup, l’un …… rien; rien comme puissance, en fait, rien du tout! Mon pied droit  flottait dans l’air – la “bonne” pédale s’etait détachée! Je me suis arrêté; la pédale était encore attaché à ma chaussure et voulait y rester. Je ne pouvais pas rentrer à pied en cette chaussure sans endommager la pédale, mais n’avais pas beaucoup d’envie de marcher en seulement ma chaussette.  J’ai tiré bien la pédale, et finalement je l’ai séparé de la chaussure, donc je pouvais marcher les derniers 7 km. J’ai expliqué à Nick que je serais chez nous un peu en retard; ça ne me dérangeait pas vraiment; il était une aussi belle journée pour une promenade que pour un rando au vélo, après tout, avec une vue dégagée sur les Pyrénées, resplendissante sous la première neige de l’hiver. À environ 3km de la maison, une voiture tiré s’est arretée;  quelques amis etaient venus nous voir, Nick les avait parler de ma situation et ils étaient venus me sauver.

Once upon a time, on the edge of a vineyard in deepest South West France, there lived a middle aged couple. The man had had an accident and was unable to do much for a while, so his wife did her best to tackle the jobs normally done by her husband, as well as those neither of them would normally need to do. She’d perfected the art of dragging the wheelchair in and out of the car and had become fairly proficient at lighting fires, drilling beams and using the electric chainsaw to cut wood, though being unacustomed to such heavy work, she had aches and pains where she hadn’t previously realised she had muscles.

One day, she even found time to prune the blackcurrant bushes, once she’d managed to find them, that is; the weed fairies had visited and the blackcurrant bushes were completely overgrown with grass and weeds, which really needed strimming. Her kindly husband had generously bought her a strimmer of her own a couple of years before; she’d never quite got the hang of starting it, but felt that it couldn’t really be that difficult – could it?

Our brave (OK, stubborn, determined) heroine filled it with fuel, primed the pump, turned the choke on and pulled the cord as hard as she was able; but the bad strimmer fairies had bewitched it and nothing happened. She tried again, and again, and again……… until she felt her arm and shoulder would fall off. So that’s how hard it could be then. When she had no pull left, she gave up in disgust. Why couldn’t they make strimmers (or chainsaws, or hedge trimmers, or any of those other boy-toys for that matter), easy, or even possible to start? Would she really have to resort to cutting the grass with shears?

The following day, a knight in shining armour came riding by, in the shape of Lord Kieran of Dax; he split logs for the fire and stacked them on the terrace, frightened off the bad fairies and showed the woman how to start the strimmer. Then he turned it off and made her do it herself; well, he tried. Once he’d started it several times and it was warmed up, she was able to start it, but that probably won’t help when it’s cold and Lord Kieran’s not around; still, she was able to cut the grass around the blackcurrants, so perhaps they can live happily ever after, for a while at least.

When not performing my duties as housekeeper, sole cook and bottle washer, nurse, physiotherapist, chauffeur, handyperson, hair washer, back scrubber, heaver of wheelchair in and out of car/house and general gofer, I occasionally find time to get out into the garden.

Last week, I had a look at the cabbages I planted a while ago; now, I’m no expert when it comes to gardening, but I do know that cabbage leaves should not look like overwashed, green lace. A closer inspection revealed caterpillars; not just the odd one or two, but hundreds of the striped, hairy things, in all sizes from armies of tiny, thread-like ones, eager to spread out and start chewing at top speed, to fully grown adults, chomping away at my cabbages. Very little remained of some of them, the pests having had their fill already.

I looked up how to deal with them and the only organic means is to pick them off and squash them. UGH!!! I tried, really I did, but even wearing rubber gloves, which made picking them up possible, no way could I bring myself to sqeeze them till they popped. So I left them for a couple of days, during which I’m sure their numbers doubled; till I was watching the nurse changing Nick’s dressing one morning. Each kit used contains two pairs of disposable plastic tweezers, so when she’d gone, I retrieved the tweezers and headed out to the potager; they were perfect, even allowing me to access those caterpillars in hard to reach spots. A quick squish and the beasties are dead – perfect! I now have quite a collection of tweezers, that I’ve put to good use for several days and today I only found 12 caterpillars, so I hope the cabbages might recover in time.

We went to see the surgeon yesterday; he’s happy with Nick’s progress and said that he no longer needs the “gouttière”, a sort of removeable plaster cast and can soon start to put his foot on the ground, which feels like a glimmer of light at the end of a long, dark tunnel. Nick feels that progress on his shoulder is very slow, but this, apparently, is normal; it’s the joint with the most articulation, so getting full movement back will be a long, slow process.
The physio has a pulley device; Nick pulls the cord on one side, which enables him to lift his bad arm. So I’ve drilled a couple of holes in the beam in the sitting room ceiling, screwed eyelets into them and threaded them with cord; Nick can do the same exercise at home now. It’s shocking to see him unable to lift his arm, but that too is normal at this stage, we gather.
Before all this happened, Nellie and I were asked to sing at a concert in January; normally we have the reassurance of the rest of the band with us, but this time will be a lot more scary. The organiser asked for a photo of us for the flyers, so Nick played the role of photographer today, on his “mobility scooter”. It was a lovely afternoon and Hervé came along with Nellie, quite peeved that I hadn’t yet asked him for help. He was disappointed to find that Kieran is keeping up with the firewood, as he’d arrived with a couple of chainsaws in his van, but I was able to keep him occupied putting in stakes and wires to support the mange tout peas that are growing nicely now, while Nellie and I dug and weeded other parts of the garden, and Nick rode around happily on the mower, delighted to be outdoors in the warm autumn sunshine.
As the sun went down we had aperos by the log fire and Hervé made me promise to call him the next time there’s a task I can’t cope with.

One such task was taken on by Adrian and his brother, Mick. For a couple of weeks I’ve been hearing scrabbling, pattering noises in the space between the kitchen ceiling and my bedroom floor; at first it sounded small, like mice, but last week we had the impression of something enormous, wearing hobnailed boots. I really thought it was a rat, though it could have got into the space, I couldn’t imagine. It was so loud that it woke me at 6 o’clock one morning! I bought sachets of poison and pushed them into any gaps I could find, but the noises continued. I mentioned it to Ade when he was over; he and his brother cut out a square of the floorboards under the bed, where it won’t show, scattered several packs of poison as far as they could and put back the boards, reassuring me that the droppings they found were only those of mice. I haven’t heard anything since, so fingers crossed that they’re gone, or dead, or both.

We really count ourselves very lucky to have such good friends.

The weather this month has been amazing, sunny and 20-30ºC most days; but since yesterday, it’s changed to winter, which was something of a shock to the system. It was the open day at the local wine cave today; frequently the midday meal is held in a marquee outside, but not this year. Instead, tables were set in the big room that houses the armagnac stills, which, because the armagnac is being made at the moment, bubbling away in the stills, was lovely and warm. We were entertained by a band from the Nogaro school of music as workers from the cave served aperos.

The walking club was making the meal this year and they did a fantastic job; garbure (a hearty, mountain soup) was followed by duck hearts and chips then cheese, all washed down with red wine, with apple tart and coffee to finish. Anybody who wanted to was welcome to help themselves to armagnac straight from the still; at 70% alcohol, it nearly blows your head off. Colourless for the time being, it will be diluted to 55% with sterilised water  before being put into oak barrels, which will give it its colour, then left for several years until, the angels having taken their share, the alcohol is at 40%, when it will be bottled.

Apart from going to see the doctor and the physio, this was Nick’s first outing post accident; everybody was delighted to see him out and about and we met one of the pompiers who attended the crash. He told me that, as the pompiers from Eauze had been called as well as those from Nogaro, they were expecting a fatality; he was really pleased to meet Nick again and see him looking well.

It’s not all plain sailing yet, as he fell coming in from riding his “mobility scooter” on Thursday; fortunately the only damage was a badly cut nose, but it knocked his confidence and he’s mostly stayed indoors since. His ankle is also infected now, so he’s on antibiotics, but at least he’s in good spirits and enjoying catching up on some reading. For my part, I’m kept busy enough looking after the invalid, but I have found time to plant some strawberries and onions in the veg plot. I’d love to get the tiling finished in the new house, but up to now haven’t had the time.