False Pretences

I spent yesterday evening wandering around Bergerac looking for a place to eat and wondering where all of the English people had come from. There were noisy families with kids on all of the café terraces, couples aimlessly pushing buggies around the old town, old biddies collapsed on stone benches, young couples looking at restaurant menus and beer bellies queuing for baguette sandwiches. Then it dawned on me: low cost flights from Stansted to Bergerac. Ryanair has a lot to answer for.

I wonder how many hits the last couple of sentences will lead to. I feel a little guilty about the Google search that seems to bring most people to this site. It is "w*ords per m*inute t*est". I've added the asterisks so as not to disappoint even more budding secretaries. I imagine their dismay when they end up on this drivelling blog site instead of the efficient gauge of dactylographical skills they were looking for. Needless to say, they don't hang around for long.

On the drivel front, it seems that the academic year has started. The children have just finished their FIRST week of nursery which has been a great success ie. we managed to get them there on time every day. No seriously, they both had a great time and no tears. I went into work for the FIRST time to prepare for my FIRST class on Monday morning (almost tears). I've done my FIRST interpreting job since the holiday, hence the unfettered visit to Bergerac. And I've made my FIRST list of resolutions for the new year. Bring it on, I'm ready.

Category: google hits

Disorientation

Have you noticed that more and more blog sites recognise who you are and greet you with cosy messages in the side bar?
"Welcome Ashley Megral, You can help the marketing drive/ war effort / eliminate poverty, click here to donate."
The other day I clicked on a blog that not only knew my name but also told me how I could meet other singles in Pessac-sur-Dordogne.
Pessac-sur-Dordogne? I have no idea where that is, probably not very far from here because I'm quite near Pessac and I'm not too far from the Dordogne (river and département). I'm sure the village must exist.... Oh, okay then hold on and I'll google it. .............
Just as I thought. Village about 75km from here with a population of 475. ( I suspect that most single people in Pessac-sur-Dordogne are octogenarians and certainly nothing like the fictitious, nubile young things in the photographs I was invited to click on, but that's another issue.)
My question is: how did the blog get the idea that that is where I live? My computer is obviously sending out the wrong message, and the wrong longitude and latitude to boot. To check this, I went to someone else's sitemeter and looked for myself. Yup, the rest of the blogging world thinks I live in a village I had never heard of until yesterday. Can anyone tell me how to rectify this? Is this info set by my ISP or by me?
If you'd like to know whether or not your computer is disoriented too, click on the N° of visitors in my sidebar, then click on details and then click on the first in the list (that should be you).


"You can help Category: longitude and latitude

The end is nigh.

Monkey boy, originally uploaded by Lezzles.

This is our last weekend of relative freedom. The children go back to nursery school, or in E's case start nursery school, next week. I don't think I'm ready.

How on earth will we manage to get two comatose bodies up washed and dressed at 7H30 when they wake up naturally at 9H30? I can't find the indelible pen I need to write their names in their clothes. I haven't bought anything to give them for their mid-morning snack - what they call their goüter and what kids in Scotland call (used to call?) their playpiece.

My own Mum was pretty health conscious for her time and our playpiece was often a couple of digestive bisuits or a piece of bread spread with some Dairylea cheese, or maybe a shiny apple. My brother and I ate these wholesome offerings surreptitiously in a corner while our luckier classmates scoffed packets of crips and curly wurlies (remember them?) washed down with cremola foam. So now, for my own children, I try to go for the healthy, but not conspiciously healthy, snack - not an easy task.

In France, nursery school is called "La Maternelle", undoubtedly because getting little children there in a presentable state is so much work and worry for their mummies.

Secret reading

Conversation at the park.

S: Did you do any reading over the summer?
Me: Yes, loads.
[My mind goes completely blank and I can't remember the titles or authors of any of the many books I've read over the past couple of months. All I can remember is the title of a book I vaguely remember reading last year]
Me: I read "Le Secret" by that author, you know...... it's the story of a Jewish boy growing up during the war, and there's a secret in his past.
[I realise that I can't remember a single thing about the plot or the characters in "Le Secret"].
Me: Maybe the author's name was Levy. Not Marc Levy but another Levy.
S: Maybe.
Silence.
S. returns to reading the latest Le Clézio.

The book I was grasping for is actually entitled "Un Secret" and it was written by Philippe Grimbert. I thoroughly recommend it but I have no recollection of why, as unfortunately although Amazon.fr was able to provide the title and author, it doesn't provide a synopsis that might similarly jog my memory.

Category: books

Alter Ego

If ...when...I change the url of this blog I'm going to call myself Ashely Megral. Why? Because it's an anagram of my real name. If you'd like to create your own nom de plume, pop over to Jean Véronis' Technologies du Langage: Récré: Générez vos noms de plume. On second thoughts, maybe Hally Greesam is more me, or should that be less me? What about Sheryl Lagame then?

Another nifty thing to do with Flickr

magazine-image, originally uploaded by Lezzles.

Make your own Magazine Cover

PS. I lied about the "to do" list. I can do that because I am still on holiday.

Category: fun tools

Done, doing, to do.

My brain is still in holiday mode so you're not going to get anything more than a glorified list for this post (who am I kidding, my brain is always in holiday mode). Okay then, maybe two glorified lists.

Things I forgot to tell you I'd done on holiday:
1. Went to Gretna Green for the very first time - a bit like Las Vegas but with pipers and tartan and without the fun.
2. Happened upon the Gala Day in Gatehouse of Fleet and listened to a one-man band play some rocking Proclaimers, Status Quo etc. covers
3. Went to Edinburgh for the day ON MY OWN to consult a 19th Century manuscript for a paper I'm giving in October. Phoned the library the day before to make sure it would be open and they didn't need advance notice for the MS. No problem on either count said the wee man who answered. Arrived at the library around 12H30 the next day to discover that the librarian was just leaving: she only works mornings and yes, you do need to give advance notice to consult MSs. It felt just like being back in France.
4. Spent the rest of the day wandering around Edinburgh through Fringe acts handing out fliers (am I getting old or are they getting more puerile?), saw the Scottish Parliament for the first time and was impressed. Popped into the gift shop at Holyrood Palace and was nauseated by the array of oh-so-tasteful royal memorabilia with names like "The Clarence House Collection". Walked up the Royal Mile and past the High Church of St Giles
5. Watched the TV coverage of Robin Cook's funeral in St Giles two days later. Another good one gone.

Things I've done since we got back:
1. Been to Ikea twice. Once to buy a new "princess" bed for E. and once for the obligatory taking back and waiting in long queue to change the bit that was the wrong size.
2. Had a "family menu" in MacDonald’s. That's a Big Mac meal for Daddy, a salad and a diet coke for Mummy, and two Happy meals for the children. Have you ever felt demographically bog standard?
3. Shivered on the beach at Sanguinet: it turned out to be not such a beautiful day.
4. Caught up on a lot of blogs and left several comments. Why isn't there a blog tool for following comments one has left elsewhere?
5. Had friends round to dinner and made Thai chicken in coconut sauce.
6. Cut back drastically on alcohol consumption in a desperate bid to shake off the 4kg (yes 4kg) I put on over the holidays. Have also foregone all chocolate.
7. Took Z. to the ENT specialist who now recommends surgically inserting permanent grommets for his chronic glue ear. He's only four but has already had three minor ops for the same thing over the past 18 months. The only problem is that the permanent grommets have to be surgically removed in 2/3 years' time and that there is a 20% risk of the ear drum not healing spontaneously after this. What a dilemma. I kind of lost faith in the ENT man when, in the next breath, he recommended a 3-week stay in a health spa in the Pyrenees as also being very effective (this just after he had re-explained that it's basically an anatomical problem involving immature Eustachian tubes not working properly). Oh yes, and he's not only the specialist, he's the surgeon too and he picks up the cheque after each operation. Paradoxically, despite living in a country with reputedly the world's best public health care system but I think we're going to do what the cash-strapped NHS recommends — watchful waiting.
8. Watched the Magic Roundabout on DVD with the children. When I was wee, I lived on an island in the Inner Hebrides where we only got one TV channel (BBC1) and it was all snowy and in black and white. One of my favourite programmes then was the Magic Roundabout with Dougal, Zebedee, Dylan and all their little puppet friends whose threads you could clearly see even through the interference. Well even in those conditions, I can honestly say that the old version was a thousand times better than this new digital travesty. The characters all look as if they've had face lifts and the actual content beggars belief, with three characters coming back from the dead and skeletons with purple laser eyes being blasted to smithereens. Perfect nightmare material. (And the French names aren't nearly as nice as the English a names, Dougal is Pollux, Florence is Margot, Dylan is Floppy and Ermentrude is something I can't even remember and certainly a lot less apt than Ermentrude)
9. Went to the town hall with several official papers to sign the children up for the nursery school canteen and after-school "garderie". E. starts nursery on 30th August. Another milestone.

Tomorrow you get the to-do list.

Category: minutiae

Beginning of the end?

Oh no, I've just received my first spam comment (see last post). Help! Does anyone have any solutions?

On a brighter note, it's a beautiful day here and we're off to the beach.

Category: spam

Flowers

There's a lot of Great Willow Herb in the Scottish countryside. But there are some more delicate wild flowers too. What's this one called, I wonder?



Category: flowers

Dumfries and Galloway

Castle loch
Originally uploaded by Lezzles.

10 things we did on holiday in Dumfries and Galloway



1. Fed the ducks (and geese and swans) on the lochs in and around Lochmaben
2. Visited Caerlaverock Castle — great for aspiring knights
3. Spent time with family
4. Went to Dumfries Agricultural Show
5. Saw the Monet Exhibition in Kirkudbright
6. Discoverd Wigtown, Scotland's book village
7. Ate (a lot, thanks to Mum)
8. Relaxed (a lot, thanks to Mum)
9. Filmed the children, took tons of photos. (See more at Scotland Aug 2005 - a photoset on Flickr)
10. Did a bit of shopping (got a nifty suede jacket)


So now it's home to "auld claes and porridge". While we were on holiday I read in the Scotsman that research show the beneficial effects of a holiday have worn off withing 24 hours of coming home.

Home

Thistle
Originally uploaded by Lezzles.

Just back from Scotland. We had a wonderful time. Sunny Scottish weather (yes, yes) and lots of fresh air. More soon.

Photos not taken

Back from ten dozy days in the Dordogne. I forgot to take the recharger for the camera battery but here are some of the photos I might have shown you:

A ruby red bottle of Pécharmant on the table of a little restuarant in Périgueux.

Magret brochettes on the barbecue.

Masses of basil and some purslane in the vegetable garden at Périgord Evasion

A gaggle of butterflies on various buddleia bushes dotted around the garden at Pomerède.

Z wobbling as he learns to ride his red bike with no stabilizers.

My legs in a horizontal position as I lie reading on the famous swing (more on the books in a later post perhaps).

Green walnuts as far as the eye can see.

And various conviviality pictures of people raising glasses and chatting during dinner.

The children running around outside in the moonlight.

Meanwhile....... We returned to the house expecting to find all work finished so we were somewhat surprised to discover that the rewiring is still at the evisceration stage upstairs, we have no hot water and the windows seem to be in the right places but some of them are unsealed. Here we go again.

Category: holidays

Ecrire sa biographie quotidienne

The Kenneth White books arrive. I open one at random and read this:

C'est dimanche, le vingt et quelque chose octobre, et je suis en exil, et j'écris un livre. Il n'y a que cela à faire en exil. C'est, du moins, ma conclusion. Le rêve, l'amour, le monde spirituel ne m'inspirent pas, ni comme réalités ni comme possibilités. La seule façon de rester en vie est d'écrire sa biographie quotidienne. Au sens large, le plus large possible.
De détail en détail nous atteindrons — la fin.
(Kenneth White, "A la Lisière du monde" in Les Lettres Nouvelles, janvier - février 1965.)

Category: literature

Desultory Notes

Weather :— a little close but temperatures definitely bearable (25°C ish)

What I'm doing :— last day at work for several weeks —tying up loose ends.

Thinking about:— a good place for lunch with my man P. (Le Casse Museau perhaps?)

Still to do: — Go to bank to sign document I forgot to sign yesterday to get lolly to pay for new windows.

People in my house: — two electricians and a family of window fitters (Portugeuse).

What the children are doing :— Probably sleeping because they were up to high jinx until very late last night. It's their last full day at the childminder's house.

Last thing I listened to on my Ipod : Took the tram to work and listened to Ben Curtis's podcast "Notes From Spain". Very atmospheric. makes me wish I was going to Spain for the holidays.

Last thing I bought: A couple of books by Kenneth White on Ebay : they haven't arrived yet. Kenneth White is a Scottish poet who lives in Brittany. Wanted to show you photos but Safari crashes every time I try to upload them.

Other Ebay news : Last week sold an expensive toy that E has grown out of for......... 1€. Once I had paid the Paypal commission etc. I actually made a loss. Brother tells me he is trying to flog some Bank of Scotland £5 notes featuring Jack Nicklaus.

Last major disaster : Trestle table collapsed yesterday evening as we were having dinner. Dinner ended up on floor and red wine splashed across newly painted walls. Glasses broke, children screamed, telephone rang at exactly that moment.

Plans for tomorrow: Drive to P's parents' place in the Dordogne. Allow children to run wild. Lie down on swing for the rest of the week.


Category: misc

Windows

Window
Originally uploaded by Lezzles.

The men are coming on Monday to change every single window in the house. So bye bye old wooden windows that require much banging and pushing and grunting to get open, hello new smooth, double-glazing.

Pantry

Look! Tidy, well-filled shelves in the new kitchen. Now, if only I could organise my paperwork that easily.

Category: kitchen

Smart Alec(ette)

Just as I like to read English-speaking bloggers living abroad, I am attracted to books by English-speaking people living over here. Yes, I read « A Year in Provence » and thought it was patronisingly awful. I much preferred Tim Parks' books about Italy. A couple of summers ago I read two good ones about Tuscany (one with superb recipes none of which I actually tried needless to say). And an excellent one by an English woman living in Cérét. She never actually names the town but it’s quite easy to work out where it is and it’s also quite easy to work out who her temperamental French lover is because he’s a dentist and an artist. (Still don’t get it? You’re obviously not stalker sleuth material. You look up all the dentists in Cérét in the yellow pages, there are only a couple and then you Google their names and find out which one has had exhibitions of modern art. A pointless exercise, I know, but strangely satisfying.)
It’s so easy to be a smart alec when reading the “Year in “Somewhere (preferably little-known) in France” “ books because I’ve go a twenty odd year start on them. In fact, I suspect that’s why I read them; they make me feel clever. Here, then, are a few corrections for Celia Brayfield author of “Deep France: A Writer’s Year in the Béarn”.

• The word “trocante is not a mixture of truc and brocante but of troc and brocante (much more logical)
• Cousteau does not mean strong and burly, costaud does. Jacques Cousteau could not, therefore, be translated as “Jack Burly”
• The presenter of “La Grande Dictée” is not a professor. He’s Bernard Pivot, a t.v. personality

I could go on but it would be tedious. What strikes me is that these mistakes are due to sloppiness, they could have been corrected by ANY French person. But the year in France didn’t seem to include very many of those.

I’m also drawn to books by Scottish women. Imagine my joy then, when I came across a mistake about France in an otherwise excellent book by a Scotswoman; Jennie Erdal’s “Ghosting”. She describes the regular trips she made from Bordeaux airport to the “heart of the Dordogne” and how her heart would lift when she saw the gates bearing the names Château d’Yquem, Château Margaux.* Didn’t she have a map?
But now I feel churlish criticising these people who may not know France as well as I do but who do seem to have a real affection for the place, especially when others, like this creep, hate France and the French so much**.

* For the few of you who don’t live in the Bordeaux area, these châteaux are nowhere near the road to the Dordogne.
** Via Blethers.com - Stuart Mudie's weblog

Category: books about France

Unconscious Mutterings

This is a free association memey thing which "is supposed to help bring forth repressed thoughts and feelings". Give it a go yourself, the words change every week.

1. Do-it-yourself:: hammers, nails, Ian Dury
   
2. Pickpocket:: Walking through a flea market in Paris putting my hand in the pocket of my overcoat (which incidentally I'd bought in an Amsterdam flea market the year before) and finding that someone else's hand was already in there
   
3. Ballet:: tutu
   
4. Resumé:: American job applications
   
5. Phenom:: Place in Thailand? beaches, danger,
   
6. Love/Hate:: tattoes that burly men in England sometimes have on their fingers
   
7. Unusual:: The way a friend described my taste in shoes
   
8. Intense:: A person I know who always takes things very very seriously and gives thoughtful answers to my flippant questions. Slightly irritating
   
9. Interruption:: coitus interruptus also known as "getting off at Haymarket" in Edinburgh
   
10. Not enough:: Food.
    

Category: meme

I need a holiday

Category: schedule

Two Rules

Still thinking about the difficulties of bringing up children and although mu children don't need them quite yet, the following two absolute rules sound about right:

"Never have unprotected sex" [...] "And never, ever get into a car with a driver who's been drinking, including yourself"

Wise words. I read them in Anita Shreve's novel "Light on Snow" this weekend while rocking in a swing in the Dordogne.

Category: parenting