As Halloween festivities abound this evening this is an early blog. Still no one has offered to take over the Friday slot - can you believe it. Niall, if you’re reading, I think you may well be the man for the job. I shall await an email….!

The pumpkin (courtesy of Judith and Ian) has been sculpted and adorned with some plastic Mr Potato head type accessories sent by my mum from Tescos – which spared the yearly disappointment which always results from my pathetic artistic endeavors, and a pumpkin pie is in the making.

Alfie and punky accountant are at Gouhaut again today. They came back at lunchtime and proudly announced that they had finished painting the first bedroom. Matt phoned after lunch, having arrived there to check out the work, to tell me that they had used about 15litres of Dulux Valentine on a room just over 3 x 3m with a sloping ceiling…..

Holiday tomorrow, which means nothing given that it’s Saturday – except that the shops if open at all will be shut by midday. Matt has also decided to ‘attrape la grippe’ – catch flu or something similar – handily coinciding as it will with his cooking night on Saturday. The lengths that man will go to are astounding.

No headway has been made in plot progression for the Gibson Les Paul video competition. The only constants so far are the Diamond Skull mask and the dog playing an agent of the devil. Not hugely engrossing as it stands but I’m sure after a couple of glasses of wine…..

Right, I have to go the ghouls have arrived.

Well, although not exactly a deluge, it did snow this morning which still counts. So 1 to us, 0 to the unbelievers….you know who you are…Kevin…..amongst others.

Alfie and punky accountant managed to rouse themselves this morning at 8am, despite the freezing weather, and went to work at Gouhaut on the promise that we’ll pay for them to stay somewhere with proper beds at the weekends. Punky, who was painting, really enjoyed himself. He’d never done anything like it before but enjoyed the time to think, apparently…which felt like a small triumph. It also meant that he didn’t have to feel bad about asking for fag money. Tonight we all win.

Etienne, Louis and I went off this morning to buy a birthday present for Mathilde, a school friend whose house they were going to in the afternoon. As it was advertised (by phone the day before) as a party, we all assumed that it was her birthday and ended up buying a ‘memorable’ piece of jewellery which Etienne thought she’d like. As it turned out it wasn’t her birthday at all - which probably explains why her mother looked so confused when we turned up with a gift wrapped box and Etienne’s electric guitar and amp (at the request of friends). That left the whole afternoon free to (instead of doing the admin. or whatever else I should have been doing) trying to download Halloween sound effects for the video we’re trying to do. Being creative it seems isn’t as easy as people make out, even with the internet and without the kids. My piece de la resistance today was making a mask of Damian Hirst’s Diamond skull (with added glitter effects) for Matt to wear in his role as ‘the devil’. Here, too, the dog puts his own slant on the role of Mephistopheles.

Firstly this week I have to offer abject apologies for my blog omission last week. In my defence I can only say that we were still in London and a tad busy loading the van (mostly with baked beans it would seem) and preparing for the long trundle back down to the Limousin. Other than that I guess I can only offer early onset dementia and associated forgetfulness as a supporting mitigation. I dont suppose my aimless drivel was particularly missed although Roz has raised the bar considerably with her last two stand in offerings so I’d best try to make this vaguely interesting and relevant to life this side of the pond.

Our drive down was in glorious sunshine. and the sight of the beautiful rolling countryside of the Creuse and Haute Vienne that greeted us twelve hours after leaving was very welcome. Having spent three weeks entirely surrounded by concrete and leaden skies my spirit lifted and I was reminded again of the benefits of our disjointed but delicious lifestyle.

We were both completely fatigued the next morning and the prospect of unloading the van was one which was averted at each opportunity. Inevitably the desire to look at our new toys ( in my case a new chop saw, a mortice machine and a set of router cutters and in Roz’s, the last three editions of Heat) overcame our reluctance and soon the house was littered with bags, boxes,bacon, tea bags (4200) , Red Leicester and Chedder (8kg) and tins of beans (176). We also managed to find space in the van for our three piece suite ( even though its only a two piece) which we have been seperated from for nearly four years now, so to have that back in our house is a momentus occassion.We also loaded into the van our Judith’s long awaited range cooker which she was ever so excited about getting. I think a dinner invitation is just around the corner.

Today is beautiful. We have enjoyed simple pleasures such as trudging across the frosty grass to let the chickens out and watching four large jets of warm air billow out of the horses noses as they wait expectantly for their feed. I chased Tess around the garden in my dressing gown which in other environments may have had the neighbours wishing me locked up for the night, but no such problem here. I can air my idiosychronicies here with abandon. My only mild concern is that our mate Martin may whizz past in his van and that guy doesnt miss anything. Once he has something to report he is amazingly diligent in his distribution.

Talking of Martin, Roz got him to come down and install a velux for us while I was away which has been a great motivator as that means I can (but probably wont any time soon) get on with building the partition walls for the en-suite and then putting the loo in. It is imperative really considering we have both sets of parents coming for Xmas. Im hoping I may be able to get another window in soon so we can actually see where we are upstairs. I have tried eating carrots but that just isnt helping with this degree of darkness.

At the weekend we collected about 7 kg of chestnuts and had them processed at nearby Dournazac, home of the annual chestnut fete. It is a really good fete but so incredibly busy that it was difficult to enjoy it this year. Instead we came home and made chestnut soup which is absolutely delicious. I can see it being a regular in our house, particularly as the freezer is now full of chestnuts! At the fete we met our local wine merchant selling chestnut beer which I tried. It really was very good. He told us to visit his shop in the village which we will do later today as he has a wine tasting session….this could end up very messily.

Today we are making way for the first of the large old beams that will carry the first floor. They are pretty heavy but I think we should be able to manage between Roz and I. If not we can always recruit Dennis, the worlds most willing and available vounteer. Friends are brilliant aren’t they. This is also an exciting event for us as it means we will be able to link the first floor together and access the entire floor without the need of a ladder. Little things eh?

As predicted but three days ago Alfie’s return, with Alexandre – the punk accountant?!§! - has already reached it’s nadir. This doesn’t bode well given the prevailing weather conditions and the fact that they, and another friend who has been staying next door too since Friday, have no money.
Matt has tried to find jobs for them to do but we don’t have any spare cash either and it seems that Alfie is keeping the other two in food and fags and will be for the next 10 days, which should be interesting to watch.

I bought them food and beer for the week this morning ( so that I could make sure they were getting something with a vitamin in it) and in return asked Alfs if they would move the delivery of wood into the garage. Not a huge task for young three men in their prime, you’d have thought. Punky accountant didn’t even bother to make an appearance – presumably not wanting to get his clothes ripped.

Ten minutes after they’d finished Alf turns up to ask if he can borrow Matt’s van to go into Firbeix and buy fags as he has no petrol in his car. No was the obviously answer to that and he went off in a huff saying that he’ll be phoning then when he breaks down. I don’t think he can see anything wrong in asking to use our petrol to ferry his friends around on a fag run.

I took over half of our apple crumble last night and this morning found that not one of them had even had a spoonful. They will pay….

In other news – the school holidays have started! It already feels as if they’ve been off for atleast a week and that despite the fact that Etienne was out from 8.45am until 6.30pm on Saturday doing a football tournoi in Limoges and both he and Louis spent the afternoon at a friend’s house yesterday afternoon.
We have been trying to think of an idea for a video to submit for a competition so that Etienne can try and win a Gibson Les Paul Goldtop ( signed by non other than Slash himself) which he has been saving up to buy for the last year. It’s not as easy as it first sounded. Instead we seem to be spending much of the time playing ridiculous games to pass the time. Herewith a photo of Matt and Louis at the kitchen table has now been taken over for ping pong purposes.

We almost forgot last night that the clocks were going back. Its always a source of excitement when you remember that you are eligible for an extra hour in bed. I say eligible because I’ve chosen not to spend my hour in bed this year. I’ve decided that is a waste of a perfectly good hour and I’m going to ‘pocket’ mine and use it throughout the week.

Say I’m running ten minutes late on the way to work I could use a bit there to recover the time.Or…..If I stay up watching some late night documentary like “Dogs with jobs” or “When Pets go bad” on Discovery and that documentary is not particularly good, then the Phrase I would normally employ would be “theres half an hour of my life that I’ll never get back”. However, with my extra hour  I really could get that half an hour back. I cant believe I haven’t thought of this before. Genius.

I’ve offered to buy Mels hour from her but she said she wants to keep it for when she’s getting ready for the Christening that we’re going to this afternoon. It always takes her an age to get ready for something like this and she has decided to fritter her whole hour on it, which I think is just wasteful, particularly during a recession.

George the Prozac pooch, is using his hour to watch squirrels in the Garden. They are everywhere at the moment, gathering food for the winter ahead and this morning they are unbelievably busy. I wonder if they hadn’t realised that clocks have gone back and if the startling realisation has spurred them into frenzied action. Whatever, George is none too keen and he wants to use his hour to fend them off. You can tell by the movement of his head and the 10,000 yard stare in his eyes that he is thinking about what he would do to them if he got hold of one. I’m not a massive squirrel fan (Squirrelist??) but it make me shudder to imagine the carnage.

This afternoon we’re attending a Hindu Christening. I’m not sure exactly what the format is for this type of thing but I’m certainly looking forward to finding out what occurs. I’ve been told that I might have to wear a turban which I think might be a wind up. Mel said that she wouldn’t be able to contain herself and has promised a photograph on this blog if that is the case. I am though, really looking forward to the social afterwards and am saving my appetite for the anticipated spread of Indian fare. If its really good I may spend some of my hour there………

The weather reports from France contrast sharply with the early winter that we’re experiencing right now. I travelled to London on Thursday sans coat and was made to regret that decision the moment I stepped off the train. People with 25 layers on were leaning into the wind and staring at me like I was some kind of crazed northerner, like the ones you see on TV at football matches, bare-chested, twirling their shirts around their heads whilst Arctic winds blow snow around their nether regions. I was the business equivalent in my flimsy inadequate suit.

Given Helens newly revealed weather forecasting skills and her outlook for the weeks/months ahead, I shall make sure that I’m not so poorly prepared for our festive France jaunt and may even make a trip to one of the few remaining  shops that haven’t closed due to the recession. In fact, I could visit one of the Ski Wear shops which are proving very popular, with queues of people outside who have all realised that it would be cheaper to walk around the house in Sallopettes, Snoods and Ski jackets rather than turn the heating on.

I have, this week, been investigating the music of the Scandinavian archipelago (resounding cries of “oh good” echo across the verdant hills of the Limousin countryside) and as an extra special treat, three songs for your musical delight today. First up, Christian Kjellvander, a Swedish singer songwriter with an alt country leaning and his song ‘When the Mourning Comes’, followed by Thomas Dybdahl, a Norwegian, with Cecilia and finally Echo is Your Love, a thrashy band from Helsinki, with ‘Song for Sea Scouts’…there’s something I like about the Finns and their love of metal, drinking and untimely suicide. Having said that, the only Finn I know is a chap who used to work for me who was six foot five and looked like a male model except he could speak seven languages.…bastard.

Every time I go in to EcoMarché in the village (which is a lot, especially whilst my brother in law is staying) they ask for my loyalty card. Four years now I have been handing it over and it struck me this week that I have never seen any bill reduction, coupons , cash back or vouchers of any kind. So I asked the girl at the checkout to explain it to me and it turns out to be a microcosm of French society. You don’t get any cash back but you can get reductions on certain items but only on certain days of the week but on a special day each week (which seems to change at the whim of the gods) you get double reduction on the same items BUT each week the items change. To discover the new items you consult a lavishly produced colour booklet, printed each week but this week the book was the book for last week as copies of this week’s book had run out, I queried the logic of this and she looked at me as if I was a rapist.

Apart from that thrilling interchange it has been another fairly quiet week of glorious sunshine (mostly). I spent a day at a friend’s house chopping and splitting wood with Craig (the aforementioned brother in law) which he had given me in exchange for helping him to clear it out of his overgrown woodlands and I have spent quite a bit of time preparing a presentation for Ercol, a furniture company in the UK who we are trying to entice in to the web of guile and intrigue that is the exciting world of DrawBox (henceforth known as DwarfBox). The exciting animation below will be part of this effort.

No mention this week of the US election other than to say, Amy Strozzi, who was formerly ithe make-up artist on the US version of So You Think you Can Dance, was paid, in the first half of this month alone, $22,800 to do Sarah Palin’s make up - I sense a new career in the offing, how hard can it be ?

The only other thing I will say about the election is to mention this nutter woman who alleged she had been attacked by Obama supporters and had a ‘B’ carved on her face. There are many things dubious about this, firstly Obama starts with an ‘A’ and it seems unlikely that an attacker would have carved the letter backwards as if looking in a mirror. Indeed she quickly admitted making up the whole thing. My favourite aspect of the story was one of the comments at the end of the Times’ coverage from an American

“What about the black eye and the other signs of attack? People seem to be ignoring that and only zeroing on the backward B.”
Robin, SJ, USA

Robin – she admitted making it up, that was what the article was about…….in fact, it was a Robin who was whinging about my last US election post….it’s almost certainly the same person.

Last night was dinner chez Matt and Helen, which consisted of a cheeky little beetroot and blue cheese concoction as a reluctant starter and a damned fine beef stew (”fucking nice” - Stew Weekly) and a frangipangifiggy pudding created by my wife. Much merriment and discussion of the ontological characterisation of the fundamental nature of reality….well, much merriment anyway. Matt did tell us about a rare video he made some time ago which managed to fuse his two great loves, big building machines and the expression of his his inner artist through modern interpretative dance. Luckily I have found it.

Friday again already so the blog will be a short one as there are entertaining committments on the horizon and hopefully celebrations as Matt is currently having his meeting with the mairie at Oradour about their request to buy some land at Les Ollieres. It being Friday we also have people round to eat so I’ve got to get cooking.

Alfie turned up a couple of hours ago – replete with new lip piercing and straggly hair on his face which goes by the name of beard.
I’d promised the kids that I would send him to pick them up from school in his car but what with the facial goings on, his friend in 12 hole Dr Martens, Mohican and UK SUBS t shirt and a car the likes of which have rarely been seen this side of Mumbai I thought that I ought to go instead, at the risk of being ostracised rom the community.

Herewith 2 photos of the dashboard and ceiling!

We’ve been telling everyone we’ve met today that it’s going to snow next week and they have shook their heads and scoffed as if we’d gone completely mad. I can’t believe that we are the only people to have consulted the meteo for next week when the kids are on holiday. As our history teacher used to say attack is the best form of defense. Or was it be prepared?
Anyway we can only hope, despite the fact that I hate snow, that it does fall now so that we don’t look ridiculous. Talking of which find herewith a photo of Alfie and Alexandre playing football outside with the kids:

………today.
The internet contract has been terminated.
I went on line and signed up to Orange so now await a ‘Live box Pro’ to replace the ‘E- Neuf’ Box within the next few days.

The plan was to do the cross-over of servers whilst we were in Orange (the place), where we were supposed to be going on Monday for a few days. Having seen the weather forecast though it doesn’t seem such a great idea.
From being consistently between 6-8° warmer down there than in the Limousin it has now decided to snow next week and go down to around 4° for the entire time we were going to be there. Changing, significantly?, in two weeks when the kids go back to school. Apparently it’s going to be the same round here but atleast we have multimedia entertainment facilities on hand – and Archie and George, the kid’s friends, will be over from England which is always the highlight of their year….and what with Halloween and the promised parcel of tacky Halloween fare that my mum’s put in the post it seems churlish not to stay. We’ll see.
Also it has to be said that Alfie being here alone with his girlfriend and best friend is going to mean that if he’s not watched the central heating and fires in both houses will be on continuously, so that we’ll be coming home to no oil or wood.

We’ll have to keep an eye on the meteo as it is often wrong when asked to predict the weather more than a few hours in advance. Matt currently has weather websites on his favourites running into double figures, which he consults daily and believes the most optimistic, but at the moment the future’s not looking bright…..

Well it certainly is a funny old world (I refer any doubters to the photos of yester eve) and as with all things comedic it’s all in the ……………………………..timing.

I shan’t go into all of the things which have happened in the last couple of weeks. I’ve already listed and had to delete them as it reads like some Faustian pact. Today, however, something very extraordinary happened yet again.

We had gone into Limoges to look at the quality of windows etc for the new build which Dutch Donald wants doing (itself a weird coincidence – but we’ll gloss over that one), when Matt had a call on his mobile from the mairie in Oradour, who want to buy some of the land at Les Ollieres to do a drainage system for the village. It probably doesn’t sound that exciting but it means that if the drainage is put in there we won’t have to put in any septic tanks for the houses,amongst other things, thereby saving 10’s of thousands of euros. Obviously we went to lunch on the back of that piece of good fortune ( cassoulet of mussels, steak and chips, no room for cheese, raspberry bavarois, wine and coffee - 11,30€ and yes it was the restaurant at the Nexon turn off) and when we came home found that the planning permission we’d put in to the same mairie for a house on the land at Les Ollieres had been turned down. Immediately upon reading this it didn’t seem great news and was obviously fate’s way of righting the good fortune of our having a nice lunch…. until we read on and found that the reason is because the land has to be used to put several houses on rather than just one – which is what we wanted to do anyway but thought we’d go for the gradual approach in case the mairie got angsty about too many houses being built.

The only spanner in the timing works is the digger driver who was supposed to be digging out the lake there and was to have started the week before last - when the weather was great…..then it was going to be last week - when the weather was great. Since then we’ve heard nothing at all and the weather isn’t so great now anyway, in fact the word monsoon sprang to mind in the early hours of the morning. I suppose we could just sit back and see if something fortuitous happens but then you remember that luck only happens if you’ve got enough balls in the air and you’re not waiting for it to happen.
Back to Donald’s devis then and revised plans whilst the kids are at ping pong.

Well that’s Alan out of this week’s running but I’m up for beating ‘ Jupitus in a box ‘ and am putting loads of photos onto the blog tonight so that I won’t have to go into the minutiae of how we spent our weekend – which was uneventful at best, bordering on dull. Dull, like everything else in the world, being entirely subjective and a question of degree I have decided to let the photos tell their own tale.

Photo n° 1 is Danny the local farmer, ( whose destiny it is to find me slumped on the road with the dog in tow having had a heart attack) although his eyes are so bad that he’d probably mistake me for road kill and put me in the freezer for xmas.

Photo n° 2 – The spiky business of chestnut picking in Champsac on Saturday morning Every year the parents and children of the local school ( to which Etienne and Louis go) pick the chestnuts at a small orchard in the village and sell them to the chestnut factory in Dournazac down the road – the money paying for the children’s holidays and outings throughout the year. Week 3 next week!

Rest of Photos - The Cochonaille in Champagnac la Riviere about 2 mins down the road which took place yesterday. Roughly translated, if such a translation exists which it probably doesn’t, it was the fete of Porc (pig) and apples. Amongst the sea of unflattering poses at the bench are Craig, Moraig and Kevin who foolishly walked the rambling route from their house in Oradour. I think the faces tell their own tale of how delicious/welcome the sausage sandwiches were after all the effort. Not. On the table is a bottle of apple juice which was being pressed there at the time (see photo). Although delicious…etc etc…. it obviously wasn’t the cider we were after. Apparently all we have to do is keep it in a dark place and the alchemy would take place of itself. As it wasn’t going to happen with the hour, however, it was cold comfort ( see following photo)……..

Sadly I don’t have a photo of the last event which was of Alfie diving off the stage into the crowd at the UK Subs gig he went to on Saturday night up by his college near Alsace somewhere. He went and spoke to the band afterwards and told the lead singer that I used to be a fan. He didn’t tell him that I’d mistaken him for Jimmy Pursey only last week.
Apparently he says hi. All very civilised….then again he is 63! This publicity poster (which I saw at the pig and apple festival, outside the room in which a video of wild boar hunting was playing to a soundtrack of cheesy rom.com.music) is possibly what he now looks like…whatever his name is….