Hallo one and all and welcome to my latest instalment capturing the ups and downs of our life here in France.
Since my last post we have enjoyed a glorious late summer with temperatures in the high 20’s and almost no rain. Storm Callum which flooded parts of South Wales only hit us on Sunday night and that was only strong winds, with no rain to speak of and the temperature held in the 20’s. It’s all a bit gloomier as I write (Wednesday 17th October) but the sun is trying to show itself and its lovely and warm.
Global warming is a real threat, regardless of what Donal Trump and various Tories spout, and weather like this is, in part, proof of that. The report from the IPCC last week made for scary reading and has me wondering if the world has left it too late to pull back from the dangers we now face. I say ‘we’ but in truth I won’t be here long enough to really feel the impact, but my kids and grandkids certainly will.
This is a good article on the IPCC report and well worth the time it will take to read.
Surely the ‘Blue Planet’ has woken most of us up to the dangers that plastic, especially single-use plastic (food wrappers etc.) and thoughtless disposal of all kinds of plastics are posing to marine life. As individuals we can all make a difference, however slight, by refusing to use single-use plastics, properly recycling the stuff and making our voices heard about the use of un-recyclable plastics, especially by supermarkets but the issue goes far wider than individuals or individual national initiatives. The problem is endemic internationally and should be addressed internationally. Third World countries have a right to enjoy better standards of living and their drive for more cars, more electricity and better wages can, and must be understood, but burning more fossil-fuels to achieve these dreams is not a sustainable answer. The World, through the United Nations should, in my humble opinion, make this their priority for the next decade – we don’t have much more than that amount of time to make a difference. Third World countries should be encouraged and helped financially to concentrate on renewable energy and the West should lead by example and maximise the building of renewable energy facilities – watching protesters in Preston standing up to fracking on their TV’s isn’t sending a good message out is it? Well I don’t think so!
Imagine the Sahara desert as a number of enormous solar power farms, linked to an electricity grid stretching south into Africa and North into Europe, providing reliable power, government revenues and all the jobs associated. The same could be built in the USA and Mexico, Australia – anywhere with vast hot wildernesses where the power of the sun could be tapped and collected.
OK, I’ve not turned into a tree-hugging eco-warrior but I do have real concerns about the future of the planet. The greed that has driven us to this precipice needs now to be turned around and forced to redress the balance. Rant over!
So back to life in rural France then – in an earlier post I told you of meeting my French friend Raymond when I was in rehab in le Mont following my operation and new shoulder. Raymond has become a good friend and is always there to help us whenever needed, even looking for things to do for us. One day he noticed an old, partly demolished chimney stack on the back wall of the house – it was originally the flue for a central heating boiler, the people we bought the house off had, for some reason ripped out the central heating and installed electric radiators instead and then started to take down the stack. Obviously they gave it up as a bad job and just left it there, sticking up through the roof and looking like an enormous blot on the landscape. Raymond and I were discussing it and he said he had a friend who would take it down for us and, as ever true to his word, he turned up with 2 buddies, the 3 of them with a joint age of well over 220 years, and guess what – we no longer have said eyesore on the back wall of the house! Robert and Chat worked flat out for 8 hours and had it down, the hole in the roof patched up and tidied away – marvellous fellows I say – both 70+ years of age and working up ladders, on scaffolding and on a high roof. They’re now planning to point the back wall, up under the eaves, as there are a lot of gaps but I’m not so sure as the holes are nesting sites for birds and we currently have 3 pairs of blue tits (I think) that look like they’re taking advantage of the lovely weather and going for it again. We’ll see – more on the wildlife in later posts.
It’s easier getting retired old blokes out to do work than it is through the usual routes – call a firm, give them an idea of what’s wanted and wait for them to come and do you a quote. If they actually bother to come (we have been let down a couple of times) they take ages and then you have to wait for a ‘devis’ or quote. The quote is usually good for 3 months, which isn’t much use as they all seem fully worked up for 12 or even 18 months. We’ve had an architect in to draw up some plans for a terrace all around the house, a small conservatory and patio so that I can get about the place more easily and have a bit more space for some spaz equipment I could do with – a standing frame and a motorised set of pedals to exercise my useless legs, both of which would need setting up and leaving in position. It will be a big investment but do wonders for us both, if for different reasons, but trying to secure decent tradesmen is a real problem. We’ll see how this develops and I’ll keep you posted but I never cease to wonder how much of a killing I could be making, even with my limited building skills, if I were able bodied.
I’m still struggling trying to get the spazmobile registered here in France. The last time I wrote I told how my UK (EU approved) Blue Badge had been refused as evidence of my invalidity and that I had to apply for the French equivalent. Well I applied for the French equivalent and it turned up last Saturday. I say it, I mean ‘they’ – I am now the proud possessor of a ‘Carte Mobilite Inclusion – Invalidite’ and a ‘Carte Mobilite Inclusion – Stationnement’ – the Blue Badge equivalent for the windscreen. My wallet is getting full of French pieces of identity, more than ever needed in the UK, but each brings with it confirmation of certain rights – the CMI – Invalidite for example ensures that me and my helper cannot be denied access or inclusion to anywhere or anything. One of the joys of being in a proud Republique I think, and remind me why UK tax-payers (of which I am still) had to pay for the last round of minor Royal weddings? It’s one thing kow-towing to ‘real’ Royals but when one of them has as much Royal lineage in his blood-vessels as me, it’s a joke. Betty Battenberg and her clan are time served and well past their sell by date as far as I’m concerned. Comments on the back of a stamp please.
I logged on to the French Government web-site to upload my CMI’s and guess what? Yep – the file is closed – well at the very least I can’t access the link I need to upload anything! I’ve opened another request, asked them to cross-reference that with my earlier request and am sat here with my fingers crossed. Wish me luck.
Last Saturday was a good day – I went fishing, for the first time in ages but well before my accident. This area of France is often referred to as the land of a thousand lakes because, yeah you guessed it, there are literally thousands of lakes, big and small, all over the place. Both my near neighbours have one in their gardens and I believe Andy, our English neighbour has a couple of other, larger lakes in his ‘portfolio’. My old chum Raymond came round after lunch on Saturday, we loaded up the spazwagon and off I drove to La Villetelle, a little place about 30 minutes’ drive away. It wasn’t easy. Rigging up took longer than I remembered but I tied the hook properly (for those in the know about things piscatorial I tied on a tiny spade ended hook – a 22 – quite an achievement I thought given I’m almost as blind as a bat without my bins on). My right arm hasn’t got the movement needed to cast as I used to do but I persevered and figured it out. I caught 3 small carp and my hook held them so I was well pleased. By the time I got us back I was exhausted but I’d had a fun afternoon and reacquainted myself with the joys of fishing. Oh, and if you were worried about the little fishywishies – they all went back alive and flipping – I use barbless hooks to ensure no damage unhooking them and can say in all honesty that I have never lost a fish, in all the years I’ve fished they’ve all gone back alive.
On Sunday we went down to the Town Hall to see what the local Produce Market had to offer. The Mayor organises a couple of these a year and they are as much a social event as they are an opportunity to buy stuff, mainly local food produce. We are surrounded by farms and there were a few farmers selling vegetables, cheese, juices and preserves all made with their own ingredients. Farm to fork here can be measured in handfuls of metres, suppliers are often literally on your doorstep. The local farmers’ carrots might be all shapes and sizes but they sure as anything taste as fresh as when they were picked that morning – better than anything wrapped in a polythene bag and all looking the same from any supermarket). The Town Hall building isn’t very large but it has what they call a ‘Salle Polyvalent’ – basically a communal hall – and here in Chard Serge (the Mayor) opens it as a communal café once a month to encourage the locals to get together. He did the same on Sunday and Karen and I enjoyed a couple of glasses of wine in the company some of our friends, French and English.
Now Chard is a tiny place, the last census in 2008 shows a population of just 197 but whilst bobbing about the little market and then chatting in the bar I suddenly realised how many people (almost all of a French persuasion I hasten to add) we know and count as friends. It’s heartening to know that we have been fully accepted within our immediate community and that we have people we can call on if ever we need help. Serge, the Mayor, for instance is a lovely man. He knows I’m in a chair so he’s happy to come and call in if ever we need to discuss anything with him – as we are at the moment with regard to our Titre de Sejour (our official residency permit, our right to remain in France and which, it might be of interest to you, arch Brexiteer, ex-Tory Chancellor of the Exchequer and two faced tosser Nigel Lawson has also applied for). We have our Titre de Sejour (see earlier posts) but it expires at the end of November and we are expected to drive to Gueret to renew the card, which is a bit of a challenge for us both. We spoke with Serge about this and he went in to bat for us to see if he could manage it all via post or e-mail. Last week he came over to explain where he was up to for us with the Prefecture. It’s not looking hopeful but he hasn’t given up yet.
We’ve had a few visitors over the summer – Karen’s brother Peter came across with two of his kids, Kira Tie and Joe, and I’ve cooked up a plan with KT if Brexit goes ahead. Both KT and Joe were born in France when their Dad was working for Airbus in Toulouse so both have dual-nationality. I’ve asked KT to get her French passport and then we can start the adoption process – that way I’ll get my own French passport – well not really but that’s how desperate I’m getting about the whole Brexit debacle!
Friends Gill and Phil also came to visit and we enjoyed their company for a week. They’ve been friends of Karen’s for years – I think they met in India – and have always kept in touch. It was good seeing them again and we spent many an evening putting the world to rights over a glass or two.
Our next visitor is niece Annie who is due next week. At 16 she is coming solo from Manchester to Limoges and then catching the bus to Aubusson where we will pick her up. These Lomas / Lomax children are cut from good cloth – niece Nathalie has been to see us a three of times on her own, flying from Stansted to Clermont-Ferrand, twice last year and then last time in early July – and she’s still only 18! They are absolutely unphased at travelling abroad on their own and it will be a shame when Brexit makes European travel that much more difficult and we get to see less of them.
You will have noticed that Brexit remains a topic of great concern to me (and Karen) and I’m planning a long piece about it for the near future but for now can I point you to an article written by John Major, the ex-Tory Prime Minister who had his own battles with the idiot part of the Nazty Party that is the modern Conservative Party – please take the time to read and share this link. I’m no friend of any Tory, they are busy driving the UK to oblivion in an attempt to assuage their greed – but this man speaks a lot of sense.
That’s all for now, take good care of yourselves and I’ll be back soon. Jem