The View

We have a view!  I may have said this before but outside our bedroom window is a very small balcony.  Not large enough for lounging or breakfasting, it’s where we feed the birds.  When we first bought the house there was also a good view of the fields beyond.  But in the past year or so this has been obscured by the branches of an encroaching tree.  We’ve been undecided about having it lopped – in spite of our gaining a view of the fields and the night sky - would the birds still visit if they had no convenient branch to launch themselves from?  But then the tree grew a bit more and began tapping its branches on the roof.  Some of it had to go.  A splendid young couple arrived from near Thiviers the other day in a tree lopping van pulling a trailer.  And the job is now done.  The tree still stands but it has lost its power to block the view or harm the roof.  And the birds are still visiting.

I stood on my balcony in the evening air pretending to be Juliet.  “Close those windows,” called Romeo from below, “You'll let the moths in”.

Monday was my birthday and I was taken for a splendid lunch in Perigueux to a restaurant with a shaded garden, Le Clos St Front.  Our first visit, you eat in the garden on fine days under a canopy of green leaves. 

A bit like Jack Sprat and his wife, Mike is catholic with his wine drinking but  prefers red in the main, whilst I usually stick to white.  So if we’re having a splendid lunch, we opt for half a bottle of each.  And my half bottle of Sancerre was so beautifully golden and so delicious that it made me feel like never drinking any of the usual stuff again.  If I change my drinking habits I could forego the frequent glass or two of table wine or AOC over dinner and save all wine drinking for treats  – once a week, or even once a fortnight and then sit down with a half bottle of something expensive and divine.       

 

For Blighters Everywhere

I haven’t written anything here for ages, so this is a quick catch up.

I have just returned from my yearly fortnight in Scarborough sluicing out student property between lets.  Brenda Durham –small, kind, cheerful and packs a mean cleaning punch -  came with me.  For which I’m very grateful. 

In between sluicing we walked, ate curries and fish and chips and discovered real ale.  I’ve always been a wine woman but now wish you could get Copper Dragon Golden Pippin in France.  The Golden Pippin pub – the Leeds Arms had a report on the wall of how a Victorian landlord of the pub had had acid thrown at him by a vengeful lover.  She was heard to say, “Take that, you blighter,” as she did it.   

 

There were also various modern warnings and instructions scattered about - possibly influenced by the acid thrower’s spirit - warnings to blighters everywhere.

 

   

   

Scarborough is still an eccentric place.  There’s band music most days in the open air by the Spa.  Pensioners pay to sit in deck chairs and listen.  I don’t understand where all these people are coming from.  They must have been relatively young in the 60s! 

 

I too am a pensioner but have no wish to sit in a deckchair by Scarborough Spa.  A friend of mine once tried to sit in a deck chair out of season when he thought there was nothing going on.  A man came up to him and said, “It’s 50p if you want the organ to start”.  What’s to say?

One afternoon we took a trip a few miles up the coast to Ravenscar.  George III was kept at Raven Hall in his mad periods by a doctor who had written permission to beat the king if he gave trouble, or behaved like a blighter.  Raven Hall is now a hotel and we sat with tea and cake and gaped at the view.

 

 

It’s good to be back home, though, and the dog is ecstatic to be taking long walks out again.  And the countryside is still beautiful.

 

Yesterday Mike and I went shopping in Grand Frais in Perigueux, my favourite vegetable shop in the world.  The French are wonderful at  displaying fruit and veg.  



Even though some of their foreign product names are a trifle eccentric.

 

 

I may buy these as Christmas gifts for friends.  "Take that, you blighters," I will say.