I believe the word 'Rage' comes
from the French word 'Orage' - meaning storm - and boy have we ever just had
one of those. For 2 days, 80 kph winds raged through the district, fetching
down trees, cutting off our power and generally causing havoc. So, perhaps this
was not the best day to start lambing, but you can't hold back nature, as 3
little creatures dropped to the deck, only to be half blown away into the
neighbour's field. We would have housed them in our polytunnel only it too has
headed off towards the Atlantic, never to be seen again.
Anyway, for now, the sun is
shining this week here at Chauffour and yesterday we ate both lunch and dinner
al-fresco, the latter in front of the flickering chiminia in the Valentine's
moonlight. Being ever the romantic, I prepared a delightful meal using local
French ingredients such as snails, tripe and other delicacies. However, to my
dismay, after 1000 years of dining on anything they fancy, it appears that the
French are no longer allowed to eat frogs' legs. This is not strictly true as you
can buy 'farmed' ones in the supermarket, but you are no longer permitted to
pop out with your torch and catch your own and then chuck them in the pan with
a bulb of garlic and a knob of butter, should you so wish. So let me get this
straight, you are allowed to send you rabid dogs into our local wood and flush
out the wild boar, let the hounds rip it to pieces, and then sit around and get
drunk while your dog goes off to hunt my sheep? But crawling around in the
undergrowth to collect a few of those noisy blighters that keep us awake all
night with their croaking? Non, monsieur, c'est interdit. Usual madness prevails.
You may recall earlier this month
we were away skiing in the Alps. As suspected, for the first couple of days my
knees were to up to the job but it was also nice to have some down time,
catching up with friends over a few gluhweins. We even managed to hold a Burns
Supper up the mountain, courtesy of Scottish friends staying with us and a
haggis I shot earlier this winter.
However, later in the week I succumbed to yet another cold, my 4th in as
many months, and it sure did pee me off. Until last autumn I hadn’t had a cold
for 2 years, so am unsure why 'le gripe' seems to be digging its claws into me
this year. Are colds like buses, all coming along at once? Will this be my last
one for another 2 years? Or should I just hit the drink harder, doctor? Anyway,
my absence from the ski slopes was no real issue as something else was also
absent for the duration, that of snow itself. It did arrive eventually though
on the morning we were due to leave, making our descent back down the mountain
something of an arduous task. Having omitted to purchase the obligatory
tyre-chains, thankfully we have just replaced our 4x4 and the new one has some
very smart gadgetry called hill-descent mode, which basically appoints a robot
to take the controls and drive us down the impossibly icy road. Sadly they
haven’t invented 'pub-return' mode so it could do the same on a frosty Friday
night whilst I have a kip in the back seat! Land-Rover, I hope you are working
on it!
On the subject of drink, my wife
and I are quite proud to announce that we achieved a sustained measure of
sobriety for the last few weeks, by laying off the sauce completely. It did get
punctuated once though on the day that England beat Wales at rugby. Excuses
such as that are surely forgiven? Yes, thought so.
Right, as spring is starting to
rear is furrowed brow, it's time to get the clean-up operation underway and at
least retrieve some of our furniture from the swimming pool, along with enough
leaves to build a giant compost heap ready to underpin the seed potatoes. Then there are pruning, digging, fencing and
other back-breaking jobs to hopefully avoid. The rest of this month is to be
spent catching up with writing, as I have 3 projects on the go and another in
the pipeline. Hopefully, after nearly a year with the publishers, my last book,
'Calling Papa Charlie' should be on the shelves in the next week or two. Also
my TV drama screenplay, entitled 'The Hole', is currently under review by
someone at the good old BBC. Based around the Foot and Mouth crisis in 2001, it
tells a pretty emotional tale from personal experience, although it may be a
little too politically sensitive to be aired on mainstream channel. Fingers, toes and eyes crossed that they like
it!
