Friday, January 27, 2006
Thursday 26 January 2006
It has been good to be back here again at Saint-Denis and to enjoy what N calls being a Parisian animal, more so than I had thought, as I was so keen to get on with all that needs doing at La Neuve-Lyre, but I am beginning to realise how complicated living in two places at once can be, and trying not to have the wrong thing in the wrong place. For example, when we left on Friday afternoon it was raining so I took my rain hat with me; it is now quite dry but very cold and I have not got a warm hat here. However, it is good to be able to sit on the sofa after dinner (and sometimes after lunch, as well) and catch up with TV news. We do now have a TV at LNL but no aerial as yet, and there is a video/DVD machine on order which should arrive next week. I have done Pilates exercises twice with my new Christmas DVD since arriving here on Friday.
On Saturday I had my eyebrows shaped at the beauty salon round the corner, having efficiently phoned from LNL and made an appointment. They are rather thinner than usual, so I hope that either I will get used to them, or that they will grow back. Or possibly both. In the afternoon we took the 255 bus to the Marché aux Puces (Flea Market) at Saint-Ouen, where we spent a lot of time looking at Italian marble-topped tables similar to the ones coming from Soliera, and N was pleased to see that in most cases the prices were sufficiently high to make it more than worth paying to have them delivered to Normandy. We also looked at gilt-framed mirrors suitable for the chimney breast in the salon (golden yellow walls and white panelling) and found one that was just right which N bought to celebrate having sold Soliera. It is rectangular and upright; square corners at the bottom and rounded ones at the top, with a fairly plain frame. We were told it was 19th century, which suits the house (circa 1854) and had to carry it home on the bus, as that was part of the deal (not the bus, just not having it delivered…)
The main reason for coming back to Saint-Denis when we did was an invitation on Sunday to N's friend Odile, at Seine-Port, south of Paris. I had met her only once, and not seen her house, which was unusual and interesting; part of a larger house, with beams in the attic; (not as good as ours, N said) a living room that had once been a conservatory, and a wild wooded garden. N had said she had a large old dog, but there was also a 4 month-old white kitten – as yet unnamed – rushing about in and out of the house and garden. We had been invited to eat Galette des Rois - a rather movable feast – along with half a dozen other friends and neighbours, who reminded me very much of Cambridge Muesli Belt inhabitants, all discussing wayward teenage children and exhibitions. We took a couple of bottles of our very local cider, which was much appreciated. An interesting young Russian woman, wearing a dress covered with coloured pom-poms, had brought an electric samovar and some excellent tea – Lipton's Russian Earl Grey. I would like to have discussed with her the significance of tea drinking in War and Peace, but there was no opportunity. N took the chance to continue his search for a portrait artist, and found a few more leads to follow.
The drive back took a very long time, longer than coming back from LNL, but very interesting as we came right through the centre of Paris and down the Boulevard Saint Michel; a good thing to do when you are not in Paris very often.
Since then I have caught up with washing and shopping, revisiting my usual haunts at the local boulangerie, vegetable store and Carrefour, where I bought more reduced bed linen. There are many sales, some described as Nouvelles Démarques (new reductions) In many ways it has not been easy moving into a new house at this time of year, and was certainly not what I had hoped when Ainsworth Street first went on the market, but it has to be said that January is a good time for buying household items, including a great part of my new kitchen, which was reduced by 10%. As I accidentally left War and Peace at LNL I have been reading La Porte Etroite by Gide, as N keeps referring to the little door at the end of the garden there as la porte étroite, and am enjoying it very much, especially after finding the story was set in Normandy. N played string quartets on both Tuesday and Wednesday mornings and has been twice to visit various archives in connection with his history of Les Ursulines. On Tuesday afternoon I set off to Montmartre in search of cut price toile de jouy curtain material for the dining room; the tan I saw before Christmas was no longer there but I found some very good black and white. I also got little lace panels for the small windows in the three bathrooms plus rods to hang them on. I had been glad to hear on Sunday that Odile bought the material for her (vast) curtains at the same place - Le Marché Saint Pierre - and pleased to think that I had discovered it for myself. Unlike Saint-Denis or LNL it was full of confident, purposeful women of about my own age, some from far-off suburbs, all knowing exactly what they were looking for.
For reasons far too complicated to go into here, the second pair of Ainsworth Street curtains needs the tab tops sewing back on, and the Montmartre curtain shop was not big on haberdashery, so that made a nice excuse to revisit Bon Marché on Wednesday. I hesitated before taking the same route as with M & C last November – walking from the Gare du Nord to the Gare de l'Est and getting the 39 bus – as it took a long time, but then decided it was good to take a bus through central Paris and the Louvre and across the river on a sunny Wednesday morning just because you can, and was pleased I had. It was bitterly cold and the puddles were still covered in ice. I got my tape and thread and spent some time in the linens sale buying napkins and pot holders, and then went next door to La Grande Epicerie where I was very pleased to find Lipton's Russian Earl Grey tea! and to get a nice smoked salmon sandwich that I ate in the little garden next to the metro – the first picnic of the year. It was slightly warmer by then and still very sunny; the first time I have sat in the sun since Lerici and Nice.
What I was really looking for was large curtain tie-backs with tassels, something I've not dealt with before, and often very expensive. I remembered there was a curtain shop opposite the Epicerie, and managed to find white tassels there for the bedroom, and then took the metro to the Grands Magasins and bought some in beige and gold for the salon at Galeries Lafayette. I also went past the white porcelain shop in the Boulevard Haussmann and found a jam pot for the greengage jam. By the time I got home (by RER) I was quite exhausted, but pleased to think that I didn't have to go back to Cambridge and the office the next day, as often used to be the case after such shopping trips.
N was busy writing up research when I got back, so along with my Russian tea I put my feet up and watched the video of the 1990 film Madame Bovary, which I wanted to re-see since having become better acquainted with Normandy, and was pleased to see familiar houses, streets and countryside, not to mention a fireplace, staircase and doors like mine. After dinner we got caught up in watching a programme about Hollywood's treatment of the Holocaust, including quite dreadful things like documentaries sponsored by gas appliances. It spent some time on Schindler's List, but other holocaust films I had seen (La Vita è bella, Europa Europa) were omitted as they were not made in Hollywood.
Friday 27 January 2006
There has not been much music to catch up with this week - apart from the very important Mozart anniversary today of course - so it was a pity when I set out yesterday evening for my first visit to the local chorale in several weeks, to meet two ladies coming back the other way who told me it was cancelled as David (le chef) was ill. I was hoping I might have found out about the next concert.
Yesterday afternoon I checked my phone messages at LNL - an excellent system - and found one from the mattress shop telling me it was ready for collection so called and arranged it for Saturday afternoon. There were also two other local calls where no message had been left, but I was able to note the numbers, so will try to identify them when I get back and have paperwork to hand; we are waiting to hear from so many people regarding things which need doing.
On the way back to Normandy this afternoon we plan to call in at the local branch of a store called Leroy Merlin which has an excellent lighting department. First however it will take some time to load the car with recent shopping, the mirror, two oleander plants and items of leftover food, not to mention our bags. I think I shall be posted outside on the pavement with the luggage while N goes to fetch the car, still in its temporary home in the municipal car park.
It has been good to be back here again at Saint-Denis and to enjoy what N calls being a Parisian animal, more so than I had thought, as I was so keen to get on with all that needs doing at La Neuve-Lyre, but I am beginning to realise how complicated living in two places at once can be, and trying not to have the wrong thing in the wrong place. For example, when we left on Friday afternoon it was raining so I took my rain hat with me; it is now quite dry but very cold and I have not got a warm hat here. However, it is good to be able to sit on the sofa after dinner (and sometimes after lunch, as well) and catch up with TV news. We do now have a TV at LNL but no aerial as yet, and there is a video/DVD machine on order which should arrive next week. I have done Pilates exercises twice with my new Christmas DVD since arriving here on Friday.
On Saturday I had my eyebrows shaped at the beauty salon round the corner, having efficiently phoned from LNL and made an appointment. They are rather thinner than usual, so I hope that either I will get used to them, or that they will grow back. Or possibly both. In the afternoon we took the 255 bus to the Marché aux Puces (Flea Market) at Saint-Ouen, where we spent a lot of time looking at Italian marble-topped tables similar to the ones coming from Soliera, and N was pleased to see that in most cases the prices were sufficiently high to make it more than worth paying to have them delivered to Normandy. We also looked at gilt-framed mirrors suitable for the chimney breast in the salon (golden yellow walls and white panelling) and found one that was just right which N bought to celebrate having sold Soliera. It is rectangular and upright; square corners at the bottom and rounded ones at the top, with a fairly plain frame. We were told it was 19th century, which suits the house (circa 1854) and had to carry it home on the bus, as that was part of the deal (not the bus, just not having it delivered…)
The main reason for coming back to Saint-Denis when we did was an invitation on Sunday to N's friend Odile, at Seine-Port, south of Paris. I had met her only once, and not seen her house, which was unusual and interesting; part of a larger house, with beams in the attic; (not as good as ours, N said) a living room that had once been a conservatory, and a wild wooded garden. N had said she had a large old dog, but there was also a 4 month-old white kitten – as yet unnamed – rushing about in and out of the house and garden. We had been invited to eat Galette des Rois - a rather movable feast – along with half a dozen other friends and neighbours, who reminded me very much of Cambridge Muesli Belt inhabitants, all discussing wayward teenage children and exhibitions. We took a couple of bottles of our very local cider, which was much appreciated. An interesting young Russian woman, wearing a dress covered with coloured pom-poms, had brought an electric samovar and some excellent tea – Lipton's Russian Earl Grey. I would like to have discussed with her the significance of tea drinking in War and Peace, but there was no opportunity. N took the chance to continue his search for a portrait artist, and found a few more leads to follow.
The drive back took a very long time, longer than coming back from LNL, but very interesting as we came right through the centre of Paris and down the Boulevard Saint Michel; a good thing to do when you are not in Paris very often.
Since then I have caught up with washing and shopping, revisiting my usual haunts at the local boulangerie, vegetable store and Carrefour, where I bought more reduced bed linen. There are many sales, some described as Nouvelles Démarques (new reductions) In many ways it has not been easy moving into a new house at this time of year, and was certainly not what I had hoped when Ainsworth Street first went on the market, but it has to be said that January is a good time for buying household items, including a great part of my new kitchen, which was reduced by 10%. As I accidentally left War and Peace at LNL I have been reading La Porte Etroite by Gide, as N keeps referring to the little door at the end of the garden there as la porte étroite, and am enjoying it very much, especially after finding the story was set in Normandy. N played string quartets on both Tuesday and Wednesday mornings and has been twice to visit various archives in connection with his history of Les Ursulines. On Tuesday afternoon I set off to Montmartre in search of cut price toile de jouy curtain material for the dining room; the tan I saw before Christmas was no longer there but I found some very good black and white. I also got little lace panels for the small windows in the three bathrooms plus rods to hang them on. I had been glad to hear on Sunday that Odile bought the material for her (vast) curtains at the same place - Le Marché Saint Pierre - and pleased to think that I had discovered it for myself. Unlike Saint-Denis or LNL it was full of confident, purposeful women of about my own age, some from far-off suburbs, all knowing exactly what they were looking for.
For reasons far too complicated to go into here, the second pair of Ainsworth Street curtains needs the tab tops sewing back on, and the Montmartre curtain shop was not big on haberdashery, so that made a nice excuse to revisit Bon Marché on Wednesday. I hesitated before taking the same route as with M & C last November – walking from the Gare du Nord to the Gare de l'Est and getting the 39 bus – as it took a long time, but then decided it was good to take a bus through central Paris and the Louvre and across the river on a sunny Wednesday morning just because you can, and was pleased I had. It was bitterly cold and the puddles were still covered in ice. I got my tape and thread and spent some time in the linens sale buying napkins and pot holders, and then went next door to La Grande Epicerie where I was very pleased to find Lipton's Russian Earl Grey tea! and to get a nice smoked salmon sandwich that I ate in the little garden next to the metro – the first picnic of the year. It was slightly warmer by then and still very sunny; the first time I have sat in the sun since Lerici and Nice.
What I was really looking for was large curtain tie-backs with tassels, something I've not dealt with before, and often very expensive. I remembered there was a curtain shop opposite the Epicerie, and managed to find white tassels there for the bedroom, and then took the metro to the Grands Magasins and bought some in beige and gold for the salon at Galeries Lafayette. I also went past the white porcelain shop in the Boulevard Haussmann and found a jam pot for the greengage jam. By the time I got home (by RER) I was quite exhausted, but pleased to think that I didn't have to go back to Cambridge and the office the next day, as often used to be the case after such shopping trips.
N was busy writing up research when I got back, so along with my Russian tea I put my feet up and watched the video of the 1990 film Madame Bovary, which I wanted to re-see since having become better acquainted with Normandy, and was pleased to see familiar houses, streets and countryside, not to mention a fireplace, staircase and doors like mine. After dinner we got caught up in watching a programme about Hollywood's treatment of the Holocaust, including quite dreadful things like documentaries sponsored by gas appliances. It spent some time on Schindler's List, but other holocaust films I had seen (La Vita è bella, Europa Europa) were omitted as they were not made in Hollywood.
Friday 27 January 2006
There has not been much music to catch up with this week - apart from the very important Mozart anniversary today of course - so it was a pity when I set out yesterday evening for my first visit to the local chorale in several weeks, to meet two ladies coming back the other way who told me it was cancelled as David (le chef) was ill. I was hoping I might have found out about the next concert.
Yesterday afternoon I checked my phone messages at LNL - an excellent system - and found one from the mattress shop telling me it was ready for collection so called and arranged it for Saturday afternoon. There were also two other local calls where no message had been left, but I was able to note the numbers, so will try to identify them when I get back and have paperwork to hand; we are waiting to hear from so many people regarding things which need doing.
On the way back to Normandy this afternoon we plan to call in at the local branch of a store called Leroy Merlin which has an excellent lighting department. First however it will take some time to load the car with recent shopping, the mirror, two oleander plants and items of leftover food, not to mention our bags. I think I shall be posted outside on the pavement with the luggage while N goes to fetch the car, still in its temporary home in the municipal car park.
Tuesday, January 24, 2006
Tuesday 17 – Friday 20 January 2006
I am writing this from the new computer in the new house! N has managed to set it all up, bless him; it will be a while before I can get it onto the internet and Blog, but it's a start.
It's been a very eventful week. We arrived here again last Monday 9th in the hired van; N went to fetch it at 8.30 in the morning and managed to get it into the front gate of Les Ursulines despite rush hour traffic and an ambulance collecting one of our neighbours. After loading all the pieces of the bedroom suite from the cellar and my clothes and numerous other boxes and N's garden tools from the apartment, we set off at about 11, N by this time having decided he quite liked driving vans. I enjoyed it too; the view was much better than from the car. (I kept feeling that at some stage I should break in to a chorus of My Old Man Said Follow the Van, but couldn't quite find the right moment…)
We unloaded all the items into the garage and after lunch set about dusting down the pieces of bed and bedside tables ready to assemble them for the night. (The tables hadn't been taken apart, but were still very dusty.) I treated them all with a marvellous product called Popote, which cleaned, got rid of mould and dust and stained all in one go, and N painted the metal spring base with anti-rust treatment. Once set up in the bedroom it all looked very good and just fitted in along the wall, with the tables either side. This is a bed by instalments, as we have not yet got a suitable mattress - although has now been ordered and paid for and will take 2 or 3 weeks to arrive as it's unusually wide. So currently we have the Ainsworth Street mattress on the frame, with about six inches of ledge each side. I have got all the bedding apart from the quilt, but it is all waiting for the mattress to arrive, and meanwhile we are sleeping under Ainsworth Street sheets and blankets; very cosy.
N left on Tuesday afternoon to take the van back to Paris, and came back by car on Friday afternoon. The first thing I did was to finish empting the five or six boxes of china taking up space in the dining room; all packed so well back in September that it took ages. I had discovered by this time that the dishwasher was working well, so was able to put the dustier items in, and since then have happily got back into the rhythm of having a dishwasher; it will be a surprise once I get back to Saint-Denis! It was lovely to see familiar pieces and one or two things I had completely forgotten about, and to arrange them all on the dresser again, and in a useful corner cupboard. The dining room seemed so much bigger once the boxes had gone, and I quickly fetched another cupboard from the salon.
Being here on my own would have been better with a television, I think. I was exhausted after all this unpacking but the only highlight of my evening was dinner listening to the 6 o’clock news on Radio 4 (at 7 o’clock) followed by half an hour of comedy; all this once I had discovered my small transistor radio one of the boxes of china. We had brought my radio/tape/CD player from Paris but have disappointingly failed to get any known radio station without hissing. After much trying, we have decided Radio Classique is unobtainable here; I have settled for that in Paris and France Musique in Normandy. (N says it is known as Radio Blah Blah because of more talking than music, but I find it an acceptable alternative to BBC Radio 3.)
Anyway, that first night on my own I was suddenly woken by a fierce thud, and lay there with my eyes tight shut trying to work out what it could be. When I opened them I saw that the left-hand shutter had blown open against the wall, and decided to leave it like that as even in the dark I can see the outline of the huge fir tree outside, higher than the house. The shutters and bedroom French windows (onto the balcony) are in a rather fragile state, so it is better to have them like this - one permanently open and the other permanently shut, to avoid moving them about too much.
The next day - Wednesday - I was expecting Monsieur A and his electrician at 1.30, so decided the priority for the morning was to go to the hairdresser. This proved very successful; I think the proprietress is well placed to observe all that goes on in the village (see blog entry for September) from her vantage point on the square, and both she and the younger woman who did my hair were very interested in why I had come to live in La Neuve-Lyre, and the fact that I had lived in France before, and anything else they could find out about me. I was very pleased with the cut, and especially enjoyed the shampooing - literally washing away the cobwebs - and felt much better afterwards. It cost more than in Saint-Denis, but on studying the bill found I had been charged 7 euros for mousse, which I think I could dispense with next time.
Nobody turned up at 1.30; so I rang at about 4 and M. A said they would come the next day at 8.30. I continued emptying as many boxes as I could in the kitchen and study, and went to bed early (after the same exciting evening) so as to be up washed, breakfasted and dressed by 8.30 the next morning, when it was still pitch black and opened the garage doors by torch light.
When he came, M. A said that they would see to the dangerous switches and sockets first, and at my request check the washing machine, but that the heating would be tomorrow. The electrician was called Emmanuel and did his job well, going off a couple of times to fetch things, and said we would meet again when he came back to do the rest. I was amazed at my increasing ability to discuss matters electrical in French.
Once he had left I realised with joy that I could use the washing machine but had no clothes horse on which to dry anything, so set off for the Quincaillerie not sure what I was asking for, but at least sure that it was not a cheval à vêtements. I managed to buy, carry home and assemble a very large clothes airer, having decided that it would be necessary for drying sheets in winter. The next day when I washed curtains that had been in store I used the washing line, in the garden between two trees, and added another of my own, feeling sure that there must be some Girl Guide knots I had once learned that would have been just the job had I not forgotten them.
On Friday morning I expected M. A and his heating & plumbing technician at the crack of dawn and when no-one turned up rang and was told I had mal compris and he would be in touch once he had the new timer. We have since compiled and sent him a letter drafting the other things that still need doing. I revisited the fruit & veg man on the market to stock up for the weekend, and got some very good home-made jam (made by Madame, he said) reines claudes – greengages – which I think the WI would have given 10 out of 10 for taste and 0 out of 10 for presentation, in a sort of old pickle jar with a scruffy label on the lid, but really good to eat. Needs decanting, I think. I have since been again and complimented Madame, and bought some more. I also went to the newspaper shop for the first time and got another house magazine; War and Peace wasn't always very relaxing, especially the parts about military strategy.
I had fully intended to ask Marie-Antoinette round while I was on my own, but I always seemed to be waiting for someone to arrive, and every time I met her in the street she said not to bother and I must be very busy, but I am sure she must be intrigued. At least the dining room is the most complete and very cosy; only waiting for curtains and some plates to be mounted on one wall.
It was quite fun expecting N in time for dinner, quite like old times! It was very sunny on Friday afternoon, and I cleaned several windows and unpacked CDs and listened to a few echoing thought the half-empty salon and it began to feel like my house. I had got rid of boxes everywhere except the study and grande pièce, and the place looked a little more civilised. The other thing I wanted to finish was the assembling of my IKEA computer desk, but got stuck at a point where two pairs of hands were needed, so we finished it together on Friday evening. When N arrived he brought a combination microwave and oven with him, like the one at Saint-Denis, to keep us going until the real oven is fitted. It seems complicated and we haven't had a great deal of time to study the instructions, but I have managed to grill the cheese and breadcrumbed top of some endives au gratin, and we have heated a potato dish from the traiteur.
On Saturday morning we set off for Bernay, about 20 kilometres to the North, for a variety of things which I was quite sure would not all get done that day. In the event we ended up going several times during the week, and got to know the journey well; almost deserted winding country lanes, a few scattered villages, alternating woods and open fields containing a few wet cows and the odd muddy sheep and horse.
By the time we arrived in Bernay on Saturday it was lunch time and the shops were closed, so we had crèpes and cider again in the little restaurant where we had eaten in September. While searching for the France Telecom shop we found a larger and more interesting part of the town, including a DIY store called Monsieur Bricolage that we have since visited several times, (where I saw my clothes airer at a much higher price!) and a little street full of antique shops (one interestingly named "Passé Simple") where we enjoyed browsing but did not buy anything.
One of the main reasons for going to Bernay was to see Lapeyre, the kitchen and bathroom fitting store that we had explored at Clichy before Christmas. In all it took four visits over the course of a week to sort this out; the first time it was closed for lunch, the second too crowded, the third I enquired and was told one must make an appointment and come back with measurements and details; and the fourth time I actually made it, and it took over an hour and a half. I had always been quite sure I wanted the ground floor bathroom re-done; it is currently a very shabby loo with basin and bidet and needs to be made into a shower room for guests. The kitchen I had recently decided need re-fitting after much thought and discussion with N; at first I had felt perhaps it might be OK with the cupboard doors repainted and a few repaired, but eventually decided I'd better get it done while I had the money and the energy, and now am very excited about it and looking forward to it.
I had spent all the morning measuring and making detailed scale plans -and wishing I had O level technical drawing – and also typed and printed out some details and ideas on my new computer and took along some of the "before" photos we had taken when we visited in October.
My consultant was called Nicolas and looked about fifteen but certainly knew his stuff, and planned it all out on the computer using my information: floor plans, 3D images and detailed costs and estimates. The kitchen was the simpler of the two, as everything will be more or less in the same place as now; I will keep the dishwasher, gas hob and sink, and my own washer/drier that I've just brought, but have ordered a new built-in oven and a (stainless steel!) fridge. The cupboard doors and drawer fronts will be light wood, with stainless steel handles, which will I hope go well with the white walls and work tops, grey floor tiles and the little red wall tiles on the sink wall. Red curtains are planned too, possibly red and white check.
The bathroom took longer as it took ages to find a way of fitting loo, basin and shower (no room for small bath, as I'd hoped) into such a tiny space, taking into account door, window and radiator, elbow room at the basin, and as N so quaintly put it, room to pull one's trousers up. A layout was finally found however, including a small shower cubicle and a nice square basin (with a drawer!) suspended on the wall. All this however depends on the visit of the "artisan" who will come to the house and check everything, including whether or not I can keep the sink and hob. The final estimate for the bathroom was over 3000 euros and for the kitchen over 4000; N seemed to think these were very reasonable, and I kept feeling that they wouldn't sound so bad in pounds. I have since accepted the estimates with a deposit cheque, and await further developments.
A lot of Sunday afternoon we spent in assembling the large Italian wardrobe in our bedroom. Fortunately there was a lot of space to do so, but no instructions whatsoever - it had been taken to pieces by the removal/storage company five years ago – so there was a lot of guesswork involved, and it was very heavy, solid pine. The most difficult part was trying to hang one of the three doors; over and over again we tried and each time any two hinges would slide into place, but never the third. After going away to have some tea (always a good ploy) and liberally applying oil to the hinges, it at last worked. We then had to get it into place and fortunately found that it just fitted in the chosen alcove, barely clearing the wall lights which will have to be removed in any case, and just clearing a sort of proscenium arch on the ceiling. The three doors are not hanging correctly however; we think several pieces have warped while in the cellar and have not fitted together with right angles. But it looks very impressive. Unfortunately it doesn't have any clothes hanging in it yet, as the rails need (buying and) replacing.
Tuesday was a very busy day when a great variety of different things happened. We were up early as on Monday afternoon we had found a leak in the cistern in our bathroom, and each time it flushed it kept on filling and spraying water over the wall and floor. We knew Mr A was busy, so N had contacted another plumber from our list, a Monsieur L, who came as promised just after 8 on Tuesday morning, with what looked like his brother. They sorted the problem quickly and effectively; N said he wished he could find plumbers like that at Saint-Denis. We had the impression they were carpenters too, so N asked them about the broken bed frame (from Ainsworth Street) and they recommended a colleague; a Monsieur P, out on the road to Rugles, indicated by a red sign. We were about to set off for Bernay (again) in the opposite direction, and it was still before 9 o'clock, so put the two broken pieces in the back of the car and went off in the direction of Rugles, looking for the red sign. Noting happened for several kilometres, and we were just about to give up and go back when we saw it, and went down several little lanes across fields, following several more red signs until we eventually arrived at a large workshop.
Monsieur P made me think of a jovial woodwork master, with twinkling eyes over his spectacles; said it should be no problem to make an equivalent bed piece, and handed me a giant pencil to write my name, address & phone number all along the broken piece. He said he would be in touch when it was ready, and N asked it he could give us an estimate for repairing shutters, to which he gladly agreed. His workshop was full of excellent works in progress, and as we left we were thinking of lots of other things we could ask him to do for us.
That day in Bernay we managed to get the modem for the PC from the France Telecom shop, and asked them to set up the connection, which we hadn't realised was needed before. (It was the same with voicemail on the phone; as N says, nobody tells you these things – it wouldn't work until France Telecom had been phoned – much waiting on the line – and finally set it up.) Also a visit to a shop called Casa, which I knew from its branch near the Gare St Lazare; N bought three large cushions for his study up in the attic, and I bought two doormats. At Monsieur Bricolage we found gilt curtain poles and ends for the two windows in the salon, and various products for getting rid of moss in the garden, a particular problem in Normandy, it seems.
We were home in time for lunch, after which N checked his phone messages at Saint-Denis and found one from the Italian agent saying that an offer had been made for the apartment in Soliera! He called and confirmed details, and more progress has since been made; the final signature will probably be at the beginning of March, but there will be a preliminary one – as with the purchase at La Neuve-Lyre - when N goes to pack up and see off the Italian furniture to be transported by the firm Traslochi Lunigiana, which has now been confirmed for 7 February. My rôle in all this is to stay at La Neuve-Lyre and welcome Traslochi and all the furniture, in Italian. As you might imagine, all this gave us great food for thought, but it has turned out well that the sale comes just as we are transporting furniture, as we can bring back more than we might have done. It also means I won't have to buy a new large quilt for our bed, as we can use the one that was there, which originally went with the bed.
The final event of Tuesday was my first yoga class. When last in Saint-Denis I had sent an e-mail to the address I had found at the boulangerie for classes at La Vieille Lyre, about a kilometre away. N picked up the reply when he came back and read it to me over the phone; the classes were now somewhere different. So I phoned, and as I had suspected the teacher was English and called Christine; she said the classes could well go back to La Vieille Lyre eventually, but meanwhile she would find someone to give me a lift. Naturally she asked whether I had done yoga before, and we had a chat about exercise in general. I then received a call from someone called Jacqueline who said she would pick me up outside my house at 7.10 on Tuesday, and to wear "un jogging" and bring a blanket to lie on.
In the event both she and her husband (Jean-Christophe) came and it turned out that they formed half the class; apart from Christine there were only two other women, which explains why she was so keen for me to join! The class was in an infant school in a village miles way, down the road to Rugles; it seemed light years since I had gone down the road that morning looking for the carpenter. Christine – as J-C had said – was 'gentille comme tout", the first thing she said to me after we had introduced ourselves in English, was "I want your coat!" my long brown waxed one; I said it was very practical for Normandy weather.
The class was an interesting experience; not only the first one I had ever done in French, which wasn't really a problem apart from a few obscure terms which took a second or two to work out, and which Christine sometimes whispered to me in English, but it was the first time I have done a class with no music and my eyes shut all the while. It was not warm either; I am used to pleasantly heated dance studios, not chilly schools and must wear more clothes next time. Some of the movements reminded me of Pilates, but most were completely different and I felt well stretched, if cold. Christine said they were a sort of little family; I was "tu" straight away and at the end she kissed me on both cheeks along with everybody else. I explained that I wouldn't be available next Tuesday (back in Paris) and J-C & J said they would phone before picking me up the week after. Nothing said about fees; but think I will go for the à la carte option; set rate for any 15 classes.
Towards the end of the week, after the plans for the new bathroom, N set about renovating its ceiling, which had been left with bare beams after some previous attempts at restoration. This involved brushing down the beams and treating them with a foul-smelling anti-woodworm product; my part in it was cleaning all the mess which fell down over everything twice, and washing his shirt immediately; as he says, it will certainly never be attacked by woodworm. He also got rid of all the flaking paint in the kitchen, ready for repainting it white and I swept all that up too. His other main activity (apart from several bonfires in the garden) has been the ongoing removal of nasty lino very firmly stuck to tiles on the back hall floor; involving soaking in acetone and much scraping, which has given him blisters and a cough. He has also given a final off-white coat of paint to the newly-repaired panelling in the salon, which looks very good indeed. A cleaner and more pleasant event was the hanging of the first curtains at the French windows in the salon; even though they are not level – nothing in the house is – the difference is amazing.
His room up in the larger of the two attics, under the beams, is now beginning to look a little more inhabited. He ordered a large radio to be delivered to the house and we took the Ainsworth Street single divan bed up from the floor below to form a sort of day bed, with the afore-mentioned cushions and a brown furry bedspread which had been in various lofts of mine for years, originally bought in Paris in 1974. (I have since taken it to be cleaned; there are no dry cleaners in the village, but the paper shop takes items in and sends them off.)
The other useful discovery at the end of the week on one of our final trips to Bernay was a large garden centre called Vive le Jardin! full of very useful things and a very friendly black cat N wanted to bring home, and also a lovely clean spacious well stocked branch of the supermarket Intermarché, quite the best one we have seen in Normandy.
The last activity I finished on Friday morning, before we set off back to Paris in the afternoon, was the first coat of red paint on a nice sturdy little wooden stool I found in one of the outhouses, which I have already been using to stand and sit on in the kitchen, in the hope that it will be really dry ready for the second coat next week when we get back.
I am writing this from the new computer in the new house! N has managed to set it all up, bless him; it will be a while before I can get it onto the internet and Blog, but it's a start.
It's been a very eventful week. We arrived here again last Monday 9th in the hired van; N went to fetch it at 8.30 in the morning and managed to get it into the front gate of Les Ursulines despite rush hour traffic and an ambulance collecting one of our neighbours. After loading all the pieces of the bedroom suite from the cellar and my clothes and numerous other boxes and N's garden tools from the apartment, we set off at about 11, N by this time having decided he quite liked driving vans. I enjoyed it too; the view was much better than from the car. (I kept feeling that at some stage I should break in to a chorus of My Old Man Said Follow the Van, but couldn't quite find the right moment…)
We unloaded all the items into the garage and after lunch set about dusting down the pieces of bed and bedside tables ready to assemble them for the night. (The tables hadn't been taken apart, but were still very dusty.) I treated them all with a marvellous product called Popote, which cleaned, got rid of mould and dust and stained all in one go, and N painted the metal spring base with anti-rust treatment. Once set up in the bedroom it all looked very good and just fitted in along the wall, with the tables either side. This is a bed by instalments, as we have not yet got a suitable mattress - although has now been ordered and paid for and will take 2 or 3 weeks to arrive as it's unusually wide. So currently we have the Ainsworth Street mattress on the frame, with about six inches of ledge each side. I have got all the bedding apart from the quilt, but it is all waiting for the mattress to arrive, and meanwhile we are sleeping under Ainsworth Street sheets and blankets; very cosy.
N left on Tuesday afternoon to take the van back to Paris, and came back by car on Friday afternoon. The first thing I did was to finish empting the five or six boxes of china taking up space in the dining room; all packed so well back in September that it took ages. I had discovered by this time that the dishwasher was working well, so was able to put the dustier items in, and since then have happily got back into the rhythm of having a dishwasher; it will be a surprise once I get back to Saint-Denis! It was lovely to see familiar pieces and one or two things I had completely forgotten about, and to arrange them all on the dresser again, and in a useful corner cupboard. The dining room seemed so much bigger once the boxes had gone, and I quickly fetched another cupboard from the salon.
Being here on my own would have been better with a television, I think. I was exhausted after all this unpacking but the only highlight of my evening was dinner listening to the 6 o’clock news on Radio 4 (at 7 o’clock) followed by half an hour of comedy; all this once I had discovered my small transistor radio one of the boxes of china. We had brought my radio/tape/CD player from Paris but have disappointingly failed to get any known radio station without hissing. After much trying, we have decided Radio Classique is unobtainable here; I have settled for that in Paris and France Musique in Normandy. (N says it is known as Radio Blah Blah because of more talking than music, but I find it an acceptable alternative to BBC Radio 3.)
Anyway, that first night on my own I was suddenly woken by a fierce thud, and lay there with my eyes tight shut trying to work out what it could be. When I opened them I saw that the left-hand shutter had blown open against the wall, and decided to leave it like that as even in the dark I can see the outline of the huge fir tree outside, higher than the house. The shutters and bedroom French windows (onto the balcony) are in a rather fragile state, so it is better to have them like this - one permanently open and the other permanently shut, to avoid moving them about too much.
The next day - Wednesday - I was expecting Monsieur A and his electrician at 1.30, so decided the priority for the morning was to go to the hairdresser. This proved very successful; I think the proprietress is well placed to observe all that goes on in the village (see blog entry for September) from her vantage point on the square, and both she and the younger woman who did my hair were very interested in why I had come to live in La Neuve-Lyre, and the fact that I had lived in France before, and anything else they could find out about me. I was very pleased with the cut, and especially enjoyed the shampooing - literally washing away the cobwebs - and felt much better afterwards. It cost more than in Saint-Denis, but on studying the bill found I had been charged 7 euros for mousse, which I think I could dispense with next time.
Nobody turned up at 1.30; so I rang at about 4 and M. A said they would come the next day at 8.30. I continued emptying as many boxes as I could in the kitchen and study, and went to bed early (after the same exciting evening) so as to be up washed, breakfasted and dressed by 8.30 the next morning, when it was still pitch black and opened the garage doors by torch light.
When he came, M. A said that they would see to the dangerous switches and sockets first, and at my request check the washing machine, but that the heating would be tomorrow. The electrician was called Emmanuel and did his job well, going off a couple of times to fetch things, and said we would meet again when he came back to do the rest. I was amazed at my increasing ability to discuss matters electrical in French.
Once he had left I realised with joy that I could use the washing machine but had no clothes horse on which to dry anything, so set off for the Quincaillerie not sure what I was asking for, but at least sure that it was not a cheval à vêtements. I managed to buy, carry home and assemble a very large clothes airer, having decided that it would be necessary for drying sheets in winter. The next day when I washed curtains that had been in store I used the washing line, in the garden between two trees, and added another of my own, feeling sure that there must be some Girl Guide knots I had once learned that would have been just the job had I not forgotten them.
On Friday morning I expected M. A and his heating & plumbing technician at the crack of dawn and when no-one turned up rang and was told I had mal compris and he would be in touch once he had the new timer. We have since compiled and sent him a letter drafting the other things that still need doing. I revisited the fruit & veg man on the market to stock up for the weekend, and got some very good home-made jam (made by Madame, he said) reines claudes – greengages – which I think the WI would have given 10 out of 10 for taste and 0 out of 10 for presentation, in a sort of old pickle jar with a scruffy label on the lid, but really good to eat. Needs decanting, I think. I have since been again and complimented Madame, and bought some more. I also went to the newspaper shop for the first time and got another house magazine; War and Peace wasn't always very relaxing, especially the parts about military strategy.
I had fully intended to ask Marie-Antoinette round while I was on my own, but I always seemed to be waiting for someone to arrive, and every time I met her in the street she said not to bother and I must be very busy, but I am sure she must be intrigued. At least the dining room is the most complete and very cosy; only waiting for curtains and some plates to be mounted on one wall.
It was quite fun expecting N in time for dinner, quite like old times! It was very sunny on Friday afternoon, and I cleaned several windows and unpacked CDs and listened to a few echoing thought the half-empty salon and it began to feel like my house. I had got rid of boxes everywhere except the study and grande pièce, and the place looked a little more civilised. The other thing I wanted to finish was the assembling of my IKEA computer desk, but got stuck at a point where two pairs of hands were needed, so we finished it together on Friday evening. When N arrived he brought a combination microwave and oven with him, like the one at Saint-Denis, to keep us going until the real oven is fitted. It seems complicated and we haven't had a great deal of time to study the instructions, but I have managed to grill the cheese and breadcrumbed top of some endives au gratin, and we have heated a potato dish from the traiteur.
On Saturday morning we set off for Bernay, about 20 kilometres to the North, for a variety of things which I was quite sure would not all get done that day. In the event we ended up going several times during the week, and got to know the journey well; almost deserted winding country lanes, a few scattered villages, alternating woods and open fields containing a few wet cows and the odd muddy sheep and horse.
By the time we arrived in Bernay on Saturday it was lunch time and the shops were closed, so we had crèpes and cider again in the little restaurant where we had eaten in September. While searching for the France Telecom shop we found a larger and more interesting part of the town, including a DIY store called Monsieur Bricolage that we have since visited several times, (where I saw my clothes airer at a much higher price!) and a little street full of antique shops (one interestingly named "Passé Simple") where we enjoyed browsing but did not buy anything.
One of the main reasons for going to Bernay was to see Lapeyre, the kitchen and bathroom fitting store that we had explored at Clichy before Christmas. In all it took four visits over the course of a week to sort this out; the first time it was closed for lunch, the second too crowded, the third I enquired and was told one must make an appointment and come back with measurements and details; and the fourth time I actually made it, and it took over an hour and a half. I had always been quite sure I wanted the ground floor bathroom re-done; it is currently a very shabby loo with basin and bidet and needs to be made into a shower room for guests. The kitchen I had recently decided need re-fitting after much thought and discussion with N; at first I had felt perhaps it might be OK with the cupboard doors repainted and a few repaired, but eventually decided I'd better get it done while I had the money and the energy, and now am very excited about it and looking forward to it.
I had spent all the morning measuring and making detailed scale plans -and wishing I had O level technical drawing – and also typed and printed out some details and ideas on my new computer and took along some of the "before" photos we had taken when we visited in October.
My consultant was called Nicolas and looked about fifteen but certainly knew his stuff, and planned it all out on the computer using my information: floor plans, 3D images and detailed costs and estimates. The kitchen was the simpler of the two, as everything will be more or less in the same place as now; I will keep the dishwasher, gas hob and sink, and my own washer/drier that I've just brought, but have ordered a new built-in oven and a (stainless steel!) fridge. The cupboard doors and drawer fronts will be light wood, with stainless steel handles, which will I hope go well with the white walls and work tops, grey floor tiles and the little red wall tiles on the sink wall. Red curtains are planned too, possibly red and white check.
The bathroom took longer as it took ages to find a way of fitting loo, basin and shower (no room for small bath, as I'd hoped) into such a tiny space, taking into account door, window and radiator, elbow room at the basin, and as N so quaintly put it, room to pull one's trousers up. A layout was finally found however, including a small shower cubicle and a nice square basin (with a drawer!) suspended on the wall. All this however depends on the visit of the "artisan" who will come to the house and check everything, including whether or not I can keep the sink and hob. The final estimate for the bathroom was over 3000 euros and for the kitchen over 4000; N seemed to think these were very reasonable, and I kept feeling that they wouldn't sound so bad in pounds. I have since accepted the estimates with a deposit cheque, and await further developments.
A lot of Sunday afternoon we spent in assembling the large Italian wardrobe in our bedroom. Fortunately there was a lot of space to do so, but no instructions whatsoever - it had been taken to pieces by the removal/storage company five years ago – so there was a lot of guesswork involved, and it was very heavy, solid pine. The most difficult part was trying to hang one of the three doors; over and over again we tried and each time any two hinges would slide into place, but never the third. After going away to have some tea (always a good ploy) and liberally applying oil to the hinges, it at last worked. We then had to get it into place and fortunately found that it just fitted in the chosen alcove, barely clearing the wall lights which will have to be removed in any case, and just clearing a sort of proscenium arch on the ceiling. The three doors are not hanging correctly however; we think several pieces have warped while in the cellar and have not fitted together with right angles. But it looks very impressive. Unfortunately it doesn't have any clothes hanging in it yet, as the rails need (buying and) replacing.
Tuesday was a very busy day when a great variety of different things happened. We were up early as on Monday afternoon we had found a leak in the cistern in our bathroom, and each time it flushed it kept on filling and spraying water over the wall and floor. We knew Mr A was busy, so N had contacted another plumber from our list, a Monsieur L, who came as promised just after 8 on Tuesday morning, with what looked like his brother. They sorted the problem quickly and effectively; N said he wished he could find plumbers like that at Saint-Denis. We had the impression they were carpenters too, so N asked them about the broken bed frame (from Ainsworth Street) and they recommended a colleague; a Monsieur P, out on the road to Rugles, indicated by a red sign. We were about to set off for Bernay (again) in the opposite direction, and it was still before 9 o'clock, so put the two broken pieces in the back of the car and went off in the direction of Rugles, looking for the red sign. Noting happened for several kilometres, and we were just about to give up and go back when we saw it, and went down several little lanes across fields, following several more red signs until we eventually arrived at a large workshop.
Monsieur P made me think of a jovial woodwork master, with twinkling eyes over his spectacles; said it should be no problem to make an equivalent bed piece, and handed me a giant pencil to write my name, address & phone number all along the broken piece. He said he would be in touch when it was ready, and N asked it he could give us an estimate for repairing shutters, to which he gladly agreed. His workshop was full of excellent works in progress, and as we left we were thinking of lots of other things we could ask him to do for us.
That day in Bernay we managed to get the modem for the PC from the France Telecom shop, and asked them to set up the connection, which we hadn't realised was needed before. (It was the same with voicemail on the phone; as N says, nobody tells you these things – it wouldn't work until France Telecom had been phoned – much waiting on the line – and finally set it up.) Also a visit to a shop called Casa, which I knew from its branch near the Gare St Lazare; N bought three large cushions for his study up in the attic, and I bought two doormats. At Monsieur Bricolage we found gilt curtain poles and ends for the two windows in the salon, and various products for getting rid of moss in the garden, a particular problem in Normandy, it seems.
We were home in time for lunch, after which N checked his phone messages at Saint-Denis and found one from the Italian agent saying that an offer had been made for the apartment in Soliera! He called and confirmed details, and more progress has since been made; the final signature will probably be at the beginning of March, but there will be a preliminary one – as with the purchase at La Neuve-Lyre - when N goes to pack up and see off the Italian furniture to be transported by the firm Traslochi Lunigiana, which has now been confirmed for 7 February. My rôle in all this is to stay at La Neuve-Lyre and welcome Traslochi and all the furniture, in Italian. As you might imagine, all this gave us great food for thought, but it has turned out well that the sale comes just as we are transporting furniture, as we can bring back more than we might have done. It also means I won't have to buy a new large quilt for our bed, as we can use the one that was there, which originally went with the bed.
The final event of Tuesday was my first yoga class. When last in Saint-Denis I had sent an e-mail to the address I had found at the boulangerie for classes at La Vieille Lyre, about a kilometre away. N picked up the reply when he came back and read it to me over the phone; the classes were now somewhere different. So I phoned, and as I had suspected the teacher was English and called Christine; she said the classes could well go back to La Vieille Lyre eventually, but meanwhile she would find someone to give me a lift. Naturally she asked whether I had done yoga before, and we had a chat about exercise in general. I then received a call from someone called Jacqueline who said she would pick me up outside my house at 7.10 on Tuesday, and to wear "un jogging" and bring a blanket to lie on.
In the event both she and her husband (Jean-Christophe) came and it turned out that they formed half the class; apart from Christine there were only two other women, which explains why she was so keen for me to join! The class was in an infant school in a village miles way, down the road to Rugles; it seemed light years since I had gone down the road that morning looking for the carpenter. Christine – as J-C had said – was 'gentille comme tout", the first thing she said to me after we had introduced ourselves in English, was "I want your coat!" my long brown waxed one; I said it was very practical for Normandy weather.
The class was an interesting experience; not only the first one I had ever done in French, which wasn't really a problem apart from a few obscure terms which took a second or two to work out, and which Christine sometimes whispered to me in English, but it was the first time I have done a class with no music and my eyes shut all the while. It was not warm either; I am used to pleasantly heated dance studios, not chilly schools and must wear more clothes next time. Some of the movements reminded me of Pilates, but most were completely different and I felt well stretched, if cold. Christine said they were a sort of little family; I was "tu" straight away and at the end she kissed me on both cheeks along with everybody else. I explained that I wouldn't be available next Tuesday (back in Paris) and J-C & J said they would phone before picking me up the week after. Nothing said about fees; but think I will go for the à la carte option; set rate for any 15 classes.
Towards the end of the week, after the plans for the new bathroom, N set about renovating its ceiling, which had been left with bare beams after some previous attempts at restoration. This involved brushing down the beams and treating them with a foul-smelling anti-woodworm product; my part in it was cleaning all the mess which fell down over everything twice, and washing his shirt immediately; as he says, it will certainly never be attacked by woodworm. He also got rid of all the flaking paint in the kitchen, ready for repainting it white and I swept all that up too. His other main activity (apart from several bonfires in the garden) has been the ongoing removal of nasty lino very firmly stuck to tiles on the back hall floor; involving soaking in acetone and much scraping, which has given him blisters and a cough. He has also given a final off-white coat of paint to the newly-repaired panelling in the salon, which looks very good indeed. A cleaner and more pleasant event was the hanging of the first curtains at the French windows in the salon; even though they are not level – nothing in the house is – the difference is amazing.
His room up in the larger of the two attics, under the beams, is now beginning to look a little more inhabited. He ordered a large radio to be delivered to the house and we took the Ainsworth Street single divan bed up from the floor below to form a sort of day bed, with the afore-mentioned cushions and a brown furry bedspread which had been in various lofts of mine for years, originally bought in Paris in 1974. (I have since taken it to be cleaned; there are no dry cleaners in the village, but the paper shop takes items in and sends them off.)
The other useful discovery at the end of the week on one of our final trips to Bernay was a large garden centre called Vive le Jardin! full of very useful things and a very friendly black cat N wanted to bring home, and also a lovely clean spacious well stocked branch of the supermarket Intermarché, quite the best one we have seen in Normandy.
The last activity I finished on Friday morning, before we set off back to Paris in the afternoon, was the first coat of red paint on a nice sturdy little wooden stool I found in one of the outhouses, which I have already been using to stand and sit on in the kitchen, in the hope that it will be really dry ready for the second coat next week when we get back.
Sunday, January 08, 2006
Sunday January 1 2006
I think we must have done something to offend the god of bathroom lights. After the failure with the fluorescent tube at La Neuve-Lyre, two of the three little bulbs at the top of the bathroom unit here at Saint-Denis unaccountably went dead earlier in the week, and it took N a good deal of time and two visits to BHV (where it was originally bought) plus another to Castorama to manage to fit new bulbs and get them working again.
I went with him the first of these visits on Friday afternoon, by train in very cold snowy weather. The snow was blowing horizontally into our faces as we waited on the platform, and we imagined that in central Paris it would be drier but no, even the pavements of the Rue de Rivoli were covered in wet slush, and N nearly slipped several times – I was glad I was wearing my snow boots with non-slip soles. Apart from the bathroom department we also looked at curtain poles and fittings, all very expensive, and at a bedding sale, as I wanted to find plain white pillowcases to go with the sets I'd got from IKEA. Also very expensive; I thought not for the first time that BHV is a very expensive shop. By the time we got back the snow had become very small pieces of hail which stung our faces, and we were very glad to dry out and sit on the sofa with tea and cake and watch another of N's Christmas present DVDs – Lord Peter Wimsey in Strong Poison. We have also watched a DVD of Holst's The Planets, complete with various pieces of film and graphics, and parts of BBC's Coast.
Between now and Christmas we have re-watched Porterhouse Blue in several sessions too; N's college is in the process of electing a new master and at one time he was receiving post to do with the election nearly every day, so when I caught sight of the video (which I gave him several years ago) on a shelf, thought we should watch it again in tribute, as it were. This has resulted in some new catchphrases; N often replies to questions with: "I wouldn't know about that, sir" and I would like to adopt "Exemplum habemus!" if only I could remember it when relevant.
Since Friday the weather has improved considerably – from 2 degrees to 8 – and we are continuing to enjoy relaxing here until next Wednesday when we set off for Normandy as early as we can, and start working hard there again. We did very little in the way of New Year celebrations; staying in as restaurant prices rise sharply for 31 December, and there were forecasts of riots like those in November. In the event we went to bed early and celebrated today by watching the New Year's Day concert from Vienna on television with a glass of sparkling white wine in hand, followed by a festive lunch. In the afternoon we watched a video of Cabaret, which I hadn't seen since it first came out in 1972, at the Arts in Cambridge.
Monday 2 January 2006
This morning we went down to the cellar again to dust and clean all the pieces of furniture to go in the van next Monday – two wardrobes, two bedside tables and a double bed. It doesn't sound very much but there are an awful lot of pieces! It also involved dropping down a flex from the first floor so that we could attach a lamp to see what we were doing.
N received a phone call from a string-playing colleague with an invitation for next Saturday – including me – as it will involve a sort of party and food as well as the music; at the moment we don't know exactly where apart from north of Paris, and we have to take a quiche. (N is practising the Schubert quintet in readiness as we write) A nice prospect though, especially as we will have come back from La Neuve-Lyre ready to load the van; it will be a good break and change of scene. When I asked whether this quintet was the Trout, N said cryptically that this was the Schubert Quintet and that the other was the Trout Quintet. It reminded me of a programme I once heard on Radio 3, taking this nomenclature to extremes asking whether a piano trio should be played with three pianos, the Trout Quintet by five trout and the Archduke Trio by three Archdukes. But I digress……
I have taken down all the Christmas cards and what few decorations there were; my little tree from Madeleine and its accessories and the few free decorations from Yves Rocher have all gone in a large shoe box ready for Christmas decorations on a much grander scale next year, I hope.
Tuesday 3 January 2006
Yesterday evening after the news we found ourselves watching the film Lawrence of Arabia which suddenly came on after the news. Neither of us had seen it before and it was so gripping that we had to keep on watching it till well after midnight. Today I am packing ready for an early start to La Neuve-Lyre tomorrow, and am glad that the weather is much better than this time last week; in some parts of Normandy no lorries were allowed on the roads!
Saturday 7 January 2006
I have now moved into my house in La Neuve-Lyre, and yet another stage in this long process has been completed, although it is far from over.
We made good time on Wednesday morning, and arrived just after 10 in light rain; no sign of Abels van – although we had told them we probably wouldn’t get there till 10.45 - only to discover that the water had been cut off. I went straight over the road to see my new neighbour, who eventually answered the door in her dressing gown, to ask for the name and phone number of the water company. She efficiently found it on a bill in her desk, and seemed ready to chat; I discovered her name was Marie-Antoinette (royalist parents?) that she had been recently widowed and had two grown-up daughter and 5 year old twin granddaughters. I said I would invite her round soon, as there were lots of things I wanted to ask about (buses, shops, hairdresser etc) and managed to tear myself away just as the van pulled up outside. I directed it round the back, went in to tell N this and about the water, then phoned while he ushered in the removal men. The man at the water company took all my details, and then said politely that he wouldn't be able to get the water turned on that day, as it didn't count as an emergency, but as the setting up of a new contract! but ought to be on again between 8 and 9 the next day. N went to get shopping which included lots of bottled water; I took the removal men Neil and Richard on a tour of the house, and they set to work bringing things through the garage and up the garden. It was very strange seeing things that were so familiar that I hadn't seen for so long, in this new setting; especially some I had complete forgotten about. Meanwhile, N got on with plastering the panels in the salon, occasionally calling out to me to direct some furniture. I began unpacking a few boxes, when it wasn't clear where they should go. At one stage it was raining hard, and the furniture came in covered in blankets, and the back hall floor got very wet.
It was all finished just after 1.00, and we all sat down on chairs and the sofa which had just arrived and had tea and coffee (with bottled water) and pains à chocolat thoughtfully bought by N. I searched hard in the boxes for two extra mugs; in the end found two tea cups. Before leaving they kindly stuck back the foot of the dining room table which had fallen off, and helped lift a very heavy table left by Mme V from the garage to the studio, and replaced the washing machine she had left with mine, although as there was no water this could not be properly checked.
When they had gone we had lunch: baguette, salads and pâté bought by N from the traiteur. Apart from just wandering round looking at everything, my main priority was finding bedding and making up a bed (or rather mattress) for the night. I also would have liked to clean the bathroom, difficult with no water, but made some attempt at the washbasin.
We continued clearing and emptying and moving boxes, and trying to lessen the chaos until it seemed to be time to stop for dinner. There were three choices; eat the rest of the cold things left over from lunch, or go and get a tin of soup to have with them, or go out and find something to eat in a bar. N said he hadn't got where he was today by going out into bars, and anyway we were all dirty, so I went and got a tin of lobster soup, and a bottle of local cider. (We have an excellent gas hob; no oven as Mme V took it with her; we plan to get a combination microwave oven; but not yet) I found a saucepan but no soup plates; we only had flat plates that we had brought with us, so had to eat soup from a small casserole. I kept thinking of the advert which used to precede Coronation Street, where the newly moved-in couple drink tea from a bowl and a vase; believe me, it happens. During the evening both daughters rang to see how things were going, very comforting and showed that the new number and the old green phone were working. More trouble trying to find mugs after dinner; in the end I found some Peter Rabbit mugs which were rather small. As there was no water no washing up could be done, in theory no problem as there was a plentiful supply of crockery if only I could have found what I was looking for in all the boxes!
We got ready for bed, with water from the kettle for washing and from a bottle for cleaning teeth. The bedding was certainly not damp but very cold, and N was still busy trying to sort out the heating system and somehow managed to turn it off, so at one stage in the middle of the night we were absolutely freezing; the temperature was certainly well below freezing outside. We woke early; N got the heating going again and made tea and coffee in some breakfast cups I had conveniently found the night before.
I hoped if I put off getting up long enough the water would be back on again, but no, washed etc as previous night and ate croissants N had bought the day before. The water man arrived at about 10.15; the tap was on the pavement but he rang the bell and explained what he was doing and showed N the meter and tap to turn off if necessary. It was wonderful to be able to wash hands in hot water, not to mention finally flushing both loos.
We went out to the Quincaillerie, N with the broken timer from the heating system, which they were unable to help with, but I managed to buy two plugs for the sink; there was by now a mountain of washing up and plenty of hot water, all I need was to be able to keep it in the sink! They gave us the name of someone for the heating, and we decided to try the radio & TV shop further down to see if they could help with any electrical work.
The shop seemed dowdy, abandoned and quite deserted and after we had called out and waited a few minutes a woman appeared; she said they were no longer able to do any electrical work any and was unable to answer most of N's questions, going off several times to ask her ill husband next door. In the end N said could she just let us have a few plugs (our adaptors were very temperamental) even that was not simple; she said she only knew the price in francs, and had to go and ask her husband the price in euros.
We got salad and bread for lunch as before, and decided we really had to find an electrician that afternoon, so looked up in the phone book the name we had been given, and set off for La Vieille-Lyre and eventually found the man in a huge hangar of a place, with posters claiming to carry out electrical work, plumbing, carpentry, heating, shutters and much more. We were lucky to find Monsieur A in his office, and he said he would come with us straight away to have a look round the house and give us an estimate.
He came all round the house and outbuildings with us and made notes; agreed the most urgent things were the plugs and switches hanging off the walls, but also agreed to check everything and make it safe, get a new timer for the heating system, tidy up all extraneous trailing wires and eventually to get all the lighting in the outbuildings working again. He looked at the bathroom strip light and said the unit itself needed replacing, and at my request said he would check the washing machine. When he had gone we both felt we had found a very useful person indeed! I will ring on Monday afternoon to arrange a time for him (or his minions) to start on Tuesday. All this had taken a good part of the afternoon when we could have been doing other things, but we both agreed it was an important thing to have achieved. We bought pesto and spaghetti for dinner; fortunately I had just unpacked the sieve for draining it. We found a different kind of cider – much more local, the same postcode as ours! I had managed to clean the bath and used it, and we slept much better, as the house was warmer.
On Friday we only had until 3 in the afternoon as we wanted to avoid the weekend rush hour traffic back into Paris. The first thing I did was to unpack and set up my new phone, as I wanted to be able to receive messages while we were away and called Caroline to get her to phone back to test the tone, and to leave a message over the weekend. N was ready to paint the panelling, so I put masking tape all round, (our usual double act) then set off further than before, as far as the post office, very small and friendly. When I came out I saw a fruit & veg stall in the market place, and the lady at the traiteur said it was there on Fridays and the full market on Mondays. N finished the painting, which looked very good, and managed to have a bonfire in the vegetable garden, and I finally got the IKEA kitchen table assembled, with its full complement of legs. There was a lot of screwdrivering involved and I had blisters on my hand to prove it, but am very pleased with it and its position under the window, and with all the kitchen boxes I unpacked to make room for it. I was especially glad to see my steamer again and other favourite utensils, and didn’t really want to leave as felt I was just beginning to make some headway!
It was good to be back in Saint-Denis again though, and in a proper bed, and to wear clean clothes to go out on Saturday afternoon to the musical gathering we had been invited to, which was in a village called Lilliviers, about 30 minutes back down the road we had taken on Friday. Apart from the music, the house was very interesting to look at – I feel I can look at French country houses with a different eye now! – very comfortable and full of beams, lamps, furniture, pictures and a large fireplace. Our hostess reminded me of a latter-day Madame Verdurin (apologies to non Proust experts) excitedly calling on various guests to perform, singing solos herself, wearing a skirt which appeared to be made from a carpet, and possessing a mild non-musical husband ("Voici mon mari, qui ne joue rien") who kept the champagne and food going admirably.
There were piano solos, duets, the afore-mentioned singing, a tenor, then string trios, a clarinet and N's famous Schubert quintet - not a great success due to the weakness of the second violin - about a dozen performers in all, and all items alternated with more excellent food and drink. There were also several other non playing members of the "audience", and I was pleased to find I recognised most of the pieces, and just enjoyed sinking in to a sofa and listening to all that was going on. N was asked to play a trio (piano, violin & viola) which he didn't know, but which turned out very well – three songs by Glinka - no-one else seemed to have heard of them either, but all agreed they were very fine. It was after this that our hostess asked me for our names & address, so that she could invite us again in future; apparently they meet four times a year. N was especially taken with the playing of a cellist with a nice non-playing wife, and a lady violinist. So perhaps there may be more opportunities soon. I felt it was the sort of event we could enjoy hosting at La Neuve-Lyre; N agreed but said it was too far from Paris and that guests would have to be accommodated for the night.
I think we must have done something to offend the god of bathroom lights. After the failure with the fluorescent tube at La Neuve-Lyre, two of the three little bulbs at the top of the bathroom unit here at Saint-Denis unaccountably went dead earlier in the week, and it took N a good deal of time and two visits to BHV (where it was originally bought) plus another to Castorama to manage to fit new bulbs and get them working again.
I went with him the first of these visits on Friday afternoon, by train in very cold snowy weather. The snow was blowing horizontally into our faces as we waited on the platform, and we imagined that in central Paris it would be drier but no, even the pavements of the Rue de Rivoli were covered in wet slush, and N nearly slipped several times – I was glad I was wearing my snow boots with non-slip soles. Apart from the bathroom department we also looked at curtain poles and fittings, all very expensive, and at a bedding sale, as I wanted to find plain white pillowcases to go with the sets I'd got from IKEA. Also very expensive; I thought not for the first time that BHV is a very expensive shop. By the time we got back the snow had become very small pieces of hail which stung our faces, and we were very glad to dry out and sit on the sofa with tea and cake and watch another of N's Christmas present DVDs – Lord Peter Wimsey in Strong Poison. We have also watched a DVD of Holst's The Planets, complete with various pieces of film and graphics, and parts of BBC's Coast.
Between now and Christmas we have re-watched Porterhouse Blue in several sessions too; N's college is in the process of electing a new master and at one time he was receiving post to do with the election nearly every day, so when I caught sight of the video (which I gave him several years ago) on a shelf, thought we should watch it again in tribute, as it were. This has resulted in some new catchphrases; N often replies to questions with: "I wouldn't know about that, sir" and I would like to adopt "Exemplum habemus!" if only I could remember it when relevant.
Since Friday the weather has improved considerably – from 2 degrees to 8 – and we are continuing to enjoy relaxing here until next Wednesday when we set off for Normandy as early as we can, and start working hard there again. We did very little in the way of New Year celebrations; staying in as restaurant prices rise sharply for 31 December, and there were forecasts of riots like those in November. In the event we went to bed early and celebrated today by watching the New Year's Day concert from Vienna on television with a glass of sparkling white wine in hand, followed by a festive lunch. In the afternoon we watched a video of Cabaret, which I hadn't seen since it first came out in 1972, at the Arts in Cambridge.
Monday 2 January 2006
This morning we went down to the cellar again to dust and clean all the pieces of furniture to go in the van next Monday – two wardrobes, two bedside tables and a double bed. It doesn't sound very much but there are an awful lot of pieces! It also involved dropping down a flex from the first floor so that we could attach a lamp to see what we were doing.
N received a phone call from a string-playing colleague with an invitation for next Saturday – including me – as it will involve a sort of party and food as well as the music; at the moment we don't know exactly where apart from north of Paris, and we have to take a quiche. (N is practising the Schubert quintet in readiness as we write) A nice prospect though, especially as we will have come back from La Neuve-Lyre ready to load the van; it will be a good break and change of scene. When I asked whether this quintet was the Trout, N said cryptically that this was the Schubert Quintet and that the other was the Trout Quintet. It reminded me of a programme I once heard on Radio 3, taking this nomenclature to extremes asking whether a piano trio should be played with three pianos, the Trout Quintet by five trout and the Archduke Trio by three Archdukes. But I digress……
I have taken down all the Christmas cards and what few decorations there were; my little tree from Madeleine and its accessories and the few free decorations from Yves Rocher have all gone in a large shoe box ready for Christmas decorations on a much grander scale next year, I hope.
Tuesday 3 January 2006
Yesterday evening after the news we found ourselves watching the film Lawrence of Arabia which suddenly came on after the news. Neither of us had seen it before and it was so gripping that we had to keep on watching it till well after midnight. Today I am packing ready for an early start to La Neuve-Lyre tomorrow, and am glad that the weather is much better than this time last week; in some parts of Normandy no lorries were allowed on the roads!
Saturday 7 January 2006
I have now moved into my house in La Neuve-Lyre, and yet another stage in this long process has been completed, although it is far from over.
We made good time on Wednesday morning, and arrived just after 10 in light rain; no sign of Abels van – although we had told them we probably wouldn’t get there till 10.45 - only to discover that the water had been cut off. I went straight over the road to see my new neighbour, who eventually answered the door in her dressing gown, to ask for the name and phone number of the water company. She efficiently found it on a bill in her desk, and seemed ready to chat; I discovered her name was Marie-Antoinette (royalist parents?) that she had been recently widowed and had two grown-up daughter and 5 year old twin granddaughters. I said I would invite her round soon, as there were lots of things I wanted to ask about (buses, shops, hairdresser etc) and managed to tear myself away just as the van pulled up outside. I directed it round the back, went in to tell N this and about the water, then phoned while he ushered in the removal men. The man at the water company took all my details, and then said politely that he wouldn't be able to get the water turned on that day, as it didn't count as an emergency, but as the setting up of a new contract! but ought to be on again between 8 and 9 the next day. N went to get shopping which included lots of bottled water; I took the removal men Neil and Richard on a tour of the house, and they set to work bringing things through the garage and up the garden. It was very strange seeing things that were so familiar that I hadn't seen for so long, in this new setting; especially some I had complete forgotten about. Meanwhile, N got on with plastering the panels in the salon, occasionally calling out to me to direct some furniture. I began unpacking a few boxes, when it wasn't clear where they should go. At one stage it was raining hard, and the furniture came in covered in blankets, and the back hall floor got very wet.
It was all finished just after 1.00, and we all sat down on chairs and the sofa which had just arrived and had tea and coffee (with bottled water) and pains à chocolat thoughtfully bought by N. I searched hard in the boxes for two extra mugs; in the end found two tea cups. Before leaving they kindly stuck back the foot of the dining room table which had fallen off, and helped lift a very heavy table left by Mme V from the garage to the studio, and replaced the washing machine she had left with mine, although as there was no water this could not be properly checked.
When they had gone we had lunch: baguette, salads and pâté bought by N from the traiteur. Apart from just wandering round looking at everything, my main priority was finding bedding and making up a bed (or rather mattress) for the night. I also would have liked to clean the bathroom, difficult with no water, but made some attempt at the washbasin.
We continued clearing and emptying and moving boxes, and trying to lessen the chaos until it seemed to be time to stop for dinner. There were three choices; eat the rest of the cold things left over from lunch, or go and get a tin of soup to have with them, or go out and find something to eat in a bar. N said he hadn't got where he was today by going out into bars, and anyway we were all dirty, so I went and got a tin of lobster soup, and a bottle of local cider. (We have an excellent gas hob; no oven as Mme V took it with her; we plan to get a combination microwave oven; but not yet) I found a saucepan but no soup plates; we only had flat plates that we had brought with us, so had to eat soup from a small casserole. I kept thinking of the advert which used to precede Coronation Street, where the newly moved-in couple drink tea from a bowl and a vase; believe me, it happens. During the evening both daughters rang to see how things were going, very comforting and showed that the new number and the old green phone were working. More trouble trying to find mugs after dinner; in the end I found some Peter Rabbit mugs which were rather small. As there was no water no washing up could be done, in theory no problem as there was a plentiful supply of crockery if only I could have found what I was looking for in all the boxes!
We got ready for bed, with water from the kettle for washing and from a bottle for cleaning teeth. The bedding was certainly not damp but very cold, and N was still busy trying to sort out the heating system and somehow managed to turn it off, so at one stage in the middle of the night we were absolutely freezing; the temperature was certainly well below freezing outside. We woke early; N got the heating going again and made tea and coffee in some breakfast cups I had conveniently found the night before.
I hoped if I put off getting up long enough the water would be back on again, but no, washed etc as previous night and ate croissants N had bought the day before. The water man arrived at about 10.15; the tap was on the pavement but he rang the bell and explained what he was doing and showed N the meter and tap to turn off if necessary. It was wonderful to be able to wash hands in hot water, not to mention finally flushing both loos.
We went out to the Quincaillerie, N with the broken timer from the heating system, which they were unable to help with, but I managed to buy two plugs for the sink; there was by now a mountain of washing up and plenty of hot water, all I need was to be able to keep it in the sink! They gave us the name of someone for the heating, and we decided to try the radio & TV shop further down to see if they could help with any electrical work.
The shop seemed dowdy, abandoned and quite deserted and after we had called out and waited a few minutes a woman appeared; she said they were no longer able to do any electrical work any and was unable to answer most of N's questions, going off several times to ask her ill husband next door. In the end N said could she just let us have a few plugs (our adaptors were very temperamental) even that was not simple; she said she only knew the price in francs, and had to go and ask her husband the price in euros.
We got salad and bread for lunch as before, and decided we really had to find an electrician that afternoon, so looked up in the phone book the name we had been given, and set off for La Vieille-Lyre and eventually found the man in a huge hangar of a place, with posters claiming to carry out electrical work, plumbing, carpentry, heating, shutters and much more. We were lucky to find Monsieur A in his office, and he said he would come with us straight away to have a look round the house and give us an estimate.
He came all round the house and outbuildings with us and made notes; agreed the most urgent things were the plugs and switches hanging off the walls, but also agreed to check everything and make it safe, get a new timer for the heating system, tidy up all extraneous trailing wires and eventually to get all the lighting in the outbuildings working again. He looked at the bathroom strip light and said the unit itself needed replacing, and at my request said he would check the washing machine. When he had gone we both felt we had found a very useful person indeed! I will ring on Monday afternoon to arrange a time for him (or his minions) to start on Tuesday. All this had taken a good part of the afternoon when we could have been doing other things, but we both agreed it was an important thing to have achieved. We bought pesto and spaghetti for dinner; fortunately I had just unpacked the sieve for draining it. We found a different kind of cider – much more local, the same postcode as ours! I had managed to clean the bath and used it, and we slept much better, as the house was warmer.
On Friday we only had until 3 in the afternoon as we wanted to avoid the weekend rush hour traffic back into Paris. The first thing I did was to unpack and set up my new phone, as I wanted to be able to receive messages while we were away and called Caroline to get her to phone back to test the tone, and to leave a message over the weekend. N was ready to paint the panelling, so I put masking tape all round, (our usual double act) then set off further than before, as far as the post office, very small and friendly. When I came out I saw a fruit & veg stall in the market place, and the lady at the traiteur said it was there on Fridays and the full market on Mondays. N finished the painting, which looked very good, and managed to have a bonfire in the vegetable garden, and I finally got the IKEA kitchen table assembled, with its full complement of legs. There was a lot of screwdrivering involved and I had blisters on my hand to prove it, but am very pleased with it and its position under the window, and with all the kitchen boxes I unpacked to make room for it. I was especially glad to see my steamer again and other favourite utensils, and didn’t really want to leave as felt I was just beginning to make some headway!
It was good to be back in Saint-Denis again though, and in a proper bed, and to wear clean clothes to go out on Saturday afternoon to the musical gathering we had been invited to, which was in a village called Lilliviers, about 30 minutes back down the road we had taken on Friday. Apart from the music, the house was very interesting to look at – I feel I can look at French country houses with a different eye now! – very comfortable and full of beams, lamps, furniture, pictures and a large fireplace. Our hostess reminded me of a latter-day Madame Verdurin (apologies to non Proust experts) excitedly calling on various guests to perform, singing solos herself, wearing a skirt which appeared to be made from a carpet, and possessing a mild non-musical husband ("Voici mon mari, qui ne joue rien") who kept the champagne and food going admirably.
There were piano solos, duets, the afore-mentioned singing, a tenor, then string trios, a clarinet and N's famous Schubert quintet - not a great success due to the weakness of the second violin - about a dozen performers in all, and all items alternated with more excellent food and drink. There were also several other non playing members of the "audience", and I was pleased to find I recognised most of the pieces, and just enjoyed sinking in to a sofa and listening to all that was going on. N was asked to play a trio (piano, violin & viola) which he didn't know, but which turned out very well – three songs by Glinka - no-one else seemed to have heard of them either, but all agreed they were very fine. It was after this that our hostess asked me for our names & address, so that she could invite us again in future; apparently they meet four times a year. N was especially taken with the playing of a cellist with a nice non-playing wife, and a lady violinist. So perhaps there may be more opportunities soon. I felt it was the sort of event we could enjoy hosting at La Neuve-Lyre; N agreed but said it was too far from Paris and that guests would have to be accommodated for the night.
Sunday January 1 2006
I think we must have done something to offend the god of bathroom lights. After the failure with the fluorescent tube at La Neuve-Lyre, two of the three little bulbs at the top of the bathroom unit here at Saint-Denis unaccountably went dead earlier in the week, and it took N a good deal of time and two visits to BHV (where it was originally bought) plus another to Castorama to manage to fit new bulbs and get them working again.
I went with him the first of these visits on Friday afternoon, by train in very cold snowy weather. The snow was blowing horizontally into our faces as we waited on the platform, and we imagined that in central Paris it would be drier but no, even the pavements of the Rue de Rivoli were covered in wet slush, and N nearly slipped several times – I was glad I was wearing my snow boots with non-slip soles. Apart from the bathroom department we also looked at curtain poles and fittings, all very expensive, and at a bedding sale, as I wanted to find plain white pillowcases to go with the sets I'd got from IKEA. Also very expensive; I thought not for the first time that BHV is a very expensive shop. By the time we got back the snow had become very small pieces of hail which stung our faces, and we were very glad to dry out and sit on the sofa with tea and cake and watch another of N's Christmas present DVDs – Lord Peter Wimsey in Strong Poison. We have also watched a DVD of Holst's The Planets, complete with various pieces of film and graphics, and parts of BBC's Coast.
Between now and Christmas we have re-watched Porterhouse Blue in several sessions too; N's college is in the process of electing a new master and at one time he was receiving post to do with the election nearly every day, so when I caught sight of the video (which I gave him several years ago) on a shelf, thought we should watch it again in tribute, as it were. This has resulted in some new catchphrases; N often replies to questions with: "I wouldn't know about that, sir" and I would like to adopt "Exemplum habemus!" if only I could remember it when relevant.
Since Friday the weather has improved considerably – from 2 degrees to 8 – and we are continuing to enjoy relaxing here until next Wednesday when we set off for Normandy as early as we can, and start working hard there again. We did very little in the way of New Year celebrations; staying in as restaurant prices rise sharply for 31 December, and there were forecasts of riots like those in November. In the event we went to bed early and celebrated today by watching the New Year's Day concert from Vienna on television with a glass of sparkling white wine in hand, followed by a festive lunch. In the afternoon we watched a video of Cabaret, which I hadn't seen since it first came out in 1972, at the Arts in Cambridge.
Monday 2 January 2006
This morning we went down to the cellar again to dust and clean all the pieces of furniture to go in the van next Monday – two wardrobes, two bedside tables and a double bed. It doesn't sound very much but there are an awful lot of pieces! It also involved dropping down a flex from the first floor so that we could attach a lamp to see what we were doing.
N received a phone call from a string-playing colleague with an invitation for next Saturday – including me – as it will involve a sort of party and food as well as the music; at the moment we don't know exactly where apart from north of Paris, and we have to take a quiche. (N is practising the Schubert quintet in readiness as we write) A nice prospect though, especially as we will have come back from La Neuve-Lyre ready to load the van; it will be a good break and change of scene. When I asked whether this quintet was the Trout, N said cryptically that this was the Schubert Quintet and that the other was the Trout Quintet. It reminded me of a programme I once heard on Radio 3, taking this nomenclature to extremes asking whether a piano trio should be played with three pianos, the Trout Quintet by five trout and the Archduke Trio by three Archdukes. But I digress……
I have taken down all the Christmas cards and what few decorations there were; my little tree from Madeleine and its accessories and the few free decorations from Yves Rocher have all gone in a large shoe box ready for Christmas decorations on a much grander scale next year, I hope.
Tuesday 3 January 2006
Yesterday evening after the news we found ourselves watching the film Lawrence of Arabia which suddenly came on after the news. Neither of us had seen it before and it was so gripping that we had to keep on watching it till well after midnight. Today I am packing ready for an early start to La Neuve-Lyre tomorrow, and am glad that the weather is much better than this time last week; in some parts of Normandy no lorries were allowed on the roads!
Saturday 7 January 2006
I have now moved into my house in La Neuve-Lyre, and yet another stage in this long process has been completed, although it is far from over.
We made good time on Wednesday morning, and arrived just after 10 in light rain; no sign of Abels van – although we had told them we probably wouldn’t get there till 10.45 - only to discover that the water had been cut off. I went straight over the road to see my new neighbour, who eventually answered the door in her dressing gown, to ask for the name and phone number of the water company. She efficiently found it on a bill in her desk, and seemed ready to chat; I discovered her name was Marie-Antoinette (royalist parents?) that she had been recently widowed and had two grown-up daughter and 5 year old twin granddaughters. I said I would invite her round soon, as there were lots of things I wanted to ask about (buses, shops, hairdresser etc) and managed to tear myself away just as the van pulled up outside. I directed it round the back, went in to tell N this and about the water, then phoned while he ushered in the removal men. The man at the water company took all my details, and then said politely that he wouldn't be able to get the water turned on that day, as it didn't count as an emergency, but as the setting up of a new contract! but ought to be on again between 8 and 9 the next day. N went to get shopping which included lots of bottled water; I took the removal men Neil and Richard on a tour of the house, and they set to work bringing things through the garage and up the garden. It was very strange seeing things that were so familiar that I hadn't seen for so long, in this new setting; especially some I had complete forgotten about. Meanwhile, N got on with plastering the panels in the salon, occasionally calling out to me to direct some furniture. I began unpacking a few boxes, when it wasn't clear where they should go. At one stage it was raining hard, and the furniture came in covered in blankets, and the back hall floor got very wet.
It was all finished just after 1.00, and we all sat down on chairs and the sofa which had just arrived and had tea and coffee (with bottled water) and pains à chocolat thoughtfully bought by N. I searched hard in the boxes for two extra mugs; in the end found two tea cups. Before leaving they kindly stuck back the foot of the dining room table which had fallen off, and helped lift a very heavy table left by Mme V from the garage to the studio, and replaced the washing machine she had left with mine, although as there was no water this could not be properly checked.
When they had gone we had lunch: baguette, salads and pâté bought by N from the traiteur. Apart from just wandering round looking at everything, my main priority was finding bedding and making up a bed (or rather mattress) for the night. I also would have liked to clean the bathroom, difficult with no water, but made some attempt at the washbasin.
We continued clearing and emptying and moving boxes, and trying to lessen the chaos until it seemed to be time to stop for dinner. There were three choices; eat the rest of the cold things left over from lunch, or go and get a tin of soup to have with them, or go out and find something to eat in a bar. N said he hadn't got where he was today by going out into bars, and anyway we were all dirty, so I went and got a tin of lobster soup, and a bottle of local cider. (We have an excellent gas hob; no oven as Mme V took it with her; we plan to get a combination microwave oven; but not yet) I found a saucepan but no soup plates; we only had flat plates that we had brought with us, so had to eat soup from a small casserole. I kept thinking of the advert which used to precede Coronation Street, where the newly moved-in couple drink tea from a bowl and a vase; believe me, it happens. During the evening both daughters rang to see how things were going, very comforting and showed that the new number and the old green phone were working. More trouble trying to find mugs after dinner; in the end I found some Peter Rabbit mugs which were rather small. As there was no water no washing up could be done, in theory no problem as there was a plentiful supply of crockery if only I could have found what I was looking for in all the boxes!
We got ready for bed, with water from the kettle for washing and from a bottle for cleaning teeth. The bedding was certainly not damp but very cold, and N was still busy trying to sort out the heating system and somehow managed to turn it off, so at one stage in the middle of the night we were absolutely freezing; the temperature was certainly well below freezing outside. We woke early; N got the heating going again and made tea and coffee in some breakfast cups I had conveniently found the night before.
I hoped if I put off getting up long enough the water would be back on again, but no, washed etc as previous night and ate croissants N had bought the day before. The water man arrived at about 10.15; the tap was on the pavement but he rang the bell and explained what he was doing and showed N the meter and tap to turn off if necessary. It was wonderful to be able to wash hands in hot water, not to mention finally flushing both loos.
We went out to the Quincaillerie, N with the broken timer from the heating system, which they were unable to help with, but I managed to buy two plugs for the sink; there was by now a mountain of washing up and plenty of hot water, all I need was to be able to keep it in the sink! They gave us the name of someone for the heating, and we decided to try the radio & TV shop further down to see if they could help with any electrical work.
The shop seemed dowdy, abandoned and quite deserted and after we had called out and waited a few minutes a woman appeared; she said they were no longer able to do any electrical work any and was unable to answer most of N's questions, going off several times to ask her ill husband next door. In the end N said could she just let us have a few plugs (our adaptors were very temperamental) even that was not simple; she said she only knew the price in francs, and had to go and ask her husband the price in euros.
We got salad and bread for lunch as before, and decided we really had to find an electrician that afternoon, so looked up in the phone book the name we had been given, and set off for La Vieille-Lyre and eventually found the man in a huge hangar of a place, with posters claiming to carry out electrical work, plumbing, carpentry, heating, shutters and much more. We were lucky to find Monsieur A in his office, and he said he would come with us straight away to have a look round the house and give us an estimate.
He came all round the house and outbuildings with us and made notes; agreed the most urgent things were the plugs and switches hanging off the walls, but also agreed to check everything and make it safe, get a new timer for the heating system, tidy up all extraneous trailing wires and eventually to get all the lighting in the outbuildings working again. He looked at the bathroom strip light and said the unit itself needed replacing, and at my request said he would check the washing machine. When he had gone we both felt we had found a very useful person indeed! I will ring on Monday afternoon to arrange a time for him (or his minions) to start on Tuesday. All this had taken a good part of the afternoon when we could have been doing other things, but we both agreed it was an important thing to have achieved. We bought pesto and spaghetti for dinner; fortunately I had just unpacked the sieve for draining it. We found a different kind of cider – much more local, the same postcode as ours! I had managed to clean the bath and used it, and we slept much better, as the house was warmer.
On Friday we only had until 3 in the afternoon as we wanted to avoid the weekend rush hour traffic back into Paris. The first thing I did was to unpack and set up my new phone, as I wanted to be able to receive messages while we were away and called Caroline to get her to phone back to test the tone, and to leave a message over the weekend. N was ready to paint the panelling, so I put masking tape all round, (our usual double act) then set off further than before, as far as the post office, very small and friendly. When I came out I saw a fruit & veg stall in the market place, and the lady at the traiteur said it was there on Fridays and the full market on Mondays. N finished the painting, which looked very good, and managed to have a bonfire in the vegetable garden, and I finally got the IKEA kitchen table assembled, with its full complement of legs. There was a lot of screwdrivering involved and I had blisters on my hand to prove it, but am very pleased with it and its position under the window, and with all the kitchen boxes I unpacked to make room for it. I was especially glad to see my steamer again and other favourite utensils, and didn’t really want to leave as felt I was just beginning to make some headway!
It was good to be back in Saint-Denis again though, and in a proper bed, and to wear clean clothes to go out on Saturday afternoon to the musical gathering we had been invited to, which was in a village called Lilliviers, about 30 minutes back down the road we had taken on Friday. Apart from the music, the house was very interesting to look at – I feel I can look at French country houses with a different eye now! – very comfortable and full of beams, lamps, furniture, pictures and a large fireplace. Our hostess reminded me of a latter-day Madame Verdurin (apologies to non Proust experts) excitedly calling on various guests to perform, singing solos herself, wearing a skirt which appeared to be made from a carpet, and possessing a mild non-musical husband ("Voici mon mari, qui ne joue rien") who kept the champagne and food going admirably.
There were piano solos, duets, the afore-mentioned singing, a tenor, then string trios, a clarinet and N's famous Schubert quintet - not a great success due to the weakness of the second violin - about a dozen performers in all, and all items alternated with more excellent food and drink. There were also several other non playing members of the "audience", and I was pleased to find I recognised most of the pieces, and just enjoyed sinking in to a sofa and listening to all that was going on. N was asked to play a trio (piano, violin & viola) which he didn't know, but which turned out very well – three songs by Glinka - no-one else seemed to have heard of them either, but all agreed they were very fine. It was after this that our hostess asked me for our names & address, so that she could invite us again in future; apparently they meet four times a year. N was especially taken with the playing of a cellist with a nice non-playing wife, and a lady violinist. So perhaps there may be more opportunities soon. I felt it was the sort of event we could enjoy hosting at La Neuve-Lyre; N agreed but said it was too far from Paris and that guests would have to be accommodated for the night.
I think we must have done something to offend the god of bathroom lights. After the failure with the fluorescent tube at La Neuve-Lyre, two of the three little bulbs at the top of the bathroom unit here at Saint-Denis unaccountably went dead earlier in the week, and it took N a good deal of time and two visits to BHV (where it was originally bought) plus another to Castorama to manage to fit new bulbs and get them working again.
I went with him the first of these visits on Friday afternoon, by train in very cold snowy weather. The snow was blowing horizontally into our faces as we waited on the platform, and we imagined that in central Paris it would be drier but no, even the pavements of the Rue de Rivoli were covered in wet slush, and N nearly slipped several times – I was glad I was wearing my snow boots with non-slip soles. Apart from the bathroom department we also looked at curtain poles and fittings, all very expensive, and at a bedding sale, as I wanted to find plain white pillowcases to go with the sets I'd got from IKEA. Also very expensive; I thought not for the first time that BHV is a very expensive shop. By the time we got back the snow had become very small pieces of hail which stung our faces, and we were very glad to dry out and sit on the sofa with tea and cake and watch another of N's Christmas present DVDs – Lord Peter Wimsey in Strong Poison. We have also watched a DVD of Holst's The Planets, complete with various pieces of film and graphics, and parts of BBC's Coast.
Between now and Christmas we have re-watched Porterhouse Blue in several sessions too; N's college is in the process of electing a new master and at one time he was receiving post to do with the election nearly every day, so when I caught sight of the video (which I gave him several years ago) on a shelf, thought we should watch it again in tribute, as it were. This has resulted in some new catchphrases; N often replies to questions with: "I wouldn't know about that, sir" and I would like to adopt "Exemplum habemus!" if only I could remember it when relevant.
Since Friday the weather has improved considerably – from 2 degrees to 8 – and we are continuing to enjoy relaxing here until next Wednesday when we set off for Normandy as early as we can, and start working hard there again. We did very little in the way of New Year celebrations; staying in as restaurant prices rise sharply for 31 December, and there were forecasts of riots like those in November. In the event we went to bed early and celebrated today by watching the New Year's Day concert from Vienna on television with a glass of sparkling white wine in hand, followed by a festive lunch. In the afternoon we watched a video of Cabaret, which I hadn't seen since it first came out in 1972, at the Arts in Cambridge.
Monday 2 January 2006
This morning we went down to the cellar again to dust and clean all the pieces of furniture to go in the van next Monday – two wardrobes, two bedside tables and a double bed. It doesn't sound very much but there are an awful lot of pieces! It also involved dropping down a flex from the first floor so that we could attach a lamp to see what we were doing.
N received a phone call from a string-playing colleague with an invitation for next Saturday – including me – as it will involve a sort of party and food as well as the music; at the moment we don't know exactly where apart from north of Paris, and we have to take a quiche. (N is practising the Schubert quintet in readiness as we write) A nice prospect though, especially as we will have come back from La Neuve-Lyre ready to load the van; it will be a good break and change of scene. When I asked whether this quintet was the Trout, N said cryptically that this was the Schubert Quintet and that the other was the Trout Quintet. It reminded me of a programme I once heard on Radio 3, taking this nomenclature to extremes asking whether a piano trio should be played with three pianos, the Trout Quintet by five trout and the Archduke Trio by three Archdukes. But I digress……
I have taken down all the Christmas cards and what few decorations there were; my little tree from Madeleine and its accessories and the few free decorations from Yves Rocher have all gone in a large shoe box ready for Christmas decorations on a much grander scale next year, I hope.
Tuesday 3 January 2006
Yesterday evening after the news we found ourselves watching the film Lawrence of Arabia which suddenly came on after the news. Neither of us had seen it before and it was so gripping that we had to keep on watching it till well after midnight. Today I am packing ready for an early start to La Neuve-Lyre tomorrow, and am glad that the weather is much better than this time last week; in some parts of Normandy no lorries were allowed on the roads!
Saturday 7 January 2006
I have now moved into my house in La Neuve-Lyre, and yet another stage in this long process has been completed, although it is far from over.
We made good time on Wednesday morning, and arrived just after 10 in light rain; no sign of Abels van – although we had told them we probably wouldn’t get there till 10.45 - only to discover that the water had been cut off. I went straight over the road to see my new neighbour, who eventually answered the door in her dressing gown, to ask for the name and phone number of the water company. She efficiently found it on a bill in her desk, and seemed ready to chat; I discovered her name was Marie-Antoinette (royalist parents?) that she had been recently widowed and had two grown-up daughter and 5 year old twin granddaughters. I said I would invite her round soon, as there were lots of things I wanted to ask about (buses, shops, hairdresser etc) and managed to tear myself away just as the van pulled up outside. I directed it round the back, went in to tell N this and about the water, then phoned while he ushered in the removal men. The man at the water company took all my details, and then said politely that he wouldn't be able to get the water turned on that day, as it didn't count as an emergency, but as the setting up of a new contract! but ought to be on again between 8 and 9 the next day. N went to get shopping which included lots of bottled water; I took the removal men Neil and Richard on a tour of the house, and they set to work bringing things through the garage and up the garden. It was very strange seeing things that were so familiar that I hadn't seen for so long, in this new setting; especially some I had complete forgotten about. Meanwhile, N got on with plastering the panels in the salon, occasionally calling out to me to direct some furniture. I began unpacking a few boxes, when it wasn't clear where they should go. At one stage it was raining hard, and the furniture came in covered in blankets, and the back hall floor got very wet.
It was all finished just after 1.00, and we all sat down on chairs and the sofa which had just arrived and had tea and coffee (with bottled water) and pains à chocolat thoughtfully bought by N. I searched hard in the boxes for two extra mugs; in the end found two tea cups. Before leaving they kindly stuck back the foot of the dining room table which had fallen off, and helped lift a very heavy table left by Mme V from the garage to the studio, and replaced the washing machine she had left with mine, although as there was no water this could not be properly checked.
When they had gone we had lunch: baguette, salads and pâté bought by N from the traiteur. Apart from just wandering round looking at everything, my main priority was finding bedding and making up a bed (or rather mattress) for the night. I also would have liked to clean the bathroom, difficult with no water, but made some attempt at the washbasin.
We continued clearing and emptying and moving boxes, and trying to lessen the chaos until it seemed to be time to stop for dinner. There were three choices; eat the rest of the cold things left over from lunch, or go and get a tin of soup to have with them, or go out and find something to eat in a bar. N said he hadn't got where he was today by going out into bars, and anyway we were all dirty, so I went and got a tin of lobster soup, and a bottle of local cider. (We have an excellent gas hob; no oven as Mme V took it with her; we plan to get a combination microwave oven; but not yet) I found a saucepan but no soup plates; we only had flat plates that we had brought with us, so had to eat soup from a small casserole. I kept thinking of the advert which used to precede Coronation Street, where the newly moved-in couple drink tea from a bowl and a vase; believe me, it happens. During the evening both daughters rang to see how things were going, very comforting and showed that the new number and the old green phone were working. More trouble trying to find mugs after dinner; in the end I found some Peter Rabbit mugs which were rather small. As there was no water no washing up could be done, in theory no problem as there was a plentiful supply of crockery if only I could have found what I was looking for in all the boxes!
We got ready for bed, with water from the kettle for washing and from a bottle for cleaning teeth. The bedding was certainly not damp but very cold, and N was still busy trying to sort out the heating system and somehow managed to turn it off, so at one stage in the middle of the night we were absolutely freezing; the temperature was certainly well below freezing outside. We woke early; N got the heating going again and made tea and coffee in some breakfast cups I had conveniently found the night before.
I hoped if I put off getting up long enough the water would be back on again, but no, washed etc as previous night and ate croissants N had bought the day before. The water man arrived at about 10.15; the tap was on the pavement but he rang the bell and explained what he was doing and showed N the meter and tap to turn off if necessary. It was wonderful to be able to wash hands in hot water, not to mention finally flushing both loos.
We went out to the Quincaillerie, N with the broken timer from the heating system, which they were unable to help with, but I managed to buy two plugs for the sink; there was by now a mountain of washing up and plenty of hot water, all I need was to be able to keep it in the sink! They gave us the name of someone for the heating, and we decided to try the radio & TV shop further down to see if they could help with any electrical work.
The shop seemed dowdy, abandoned and quite deserted and after we had called out and waited a few minutes a woman appeared; she said they were no longer able to do any electrical work any and was unable to answer most of N's questions, going off several times to ask her ill husband next door. In the end N said could she just let us have a few plugs (our adaptors were very temperamental) even that was not simple; she said she only knew the price in francs, and had to go and ask her husband the price in euros.
We got salad and bread for lunch as before, and decided we really had to find an electrician that afternoon, so looked up in the phone book the name we had been given, and set off for La Vieille-Lyre and eventually found the man in a huge hangar of a place, with posters claiming to carry out electrical work, plumbing, carpentry, heating, shutters and much more. We were lucky to find Monsieur A in his office, and he said he would come with us straight away to have a look round the house and give us an estimate.
He came all round the house and outbuildings with us and made notes; agreed the most urgent things were the plugs and switches hanging off the walls, but also agreed to check everything and make it safe, get a new timer for the heating system, tidy up all extraneous trailing wires and eventually to get all the lighting in the outbuildings working again. He looked at the bathroom strip light and said the unit itself needed replacing, and at my request said he would check the washing machine. When he had gone we both felt we had found a very useful person indeed! I will ring on Monday afternoon to arrange a time for him (or his minions) to start on Tuesday. All this had taken a good part of the afternoon when we could have been doing other things, but we both agreed it was an important thing to have achieved. We bought pesto and spaghetti for dinner; fortunately I had just unpacked the sieve for draining it. We found a different kind of cider – much more local, the same postcode as ours! I had managed to clean the bath and used it, and we slept much better, as the house was warmer.
On Friday we only had until 3 in the afternoon as we wanted to avoid the weekend rush hour traffic back into Paris. The first thing I did was to unpack and set up my new phone, as I wanted to be able to receive messages while we were away and called Caroline to get her to phone back to test the tone, and to leave a message over the weekend. N was ready to paint the panelling, so I put masking tape all round, (our usual double act) then set off further than before, as far as the post office, very small and friendly. When I came out I saw a fruit & veg stall in the market place, and the lady at the traiteur said it was there on Fridays and the full market on Mondays. N finished the painting, which looked very good, and managed to have a bonfire in the vegetable garden, and I finally got the IKEA kitchen table assembled, with its full complement of legs. There was a lot of screwdrivering involved and I had blisters on my hand to prove it, but am very pleased with it and its position under the window, and with all the kitchen boxes I unpacked to make room for it. I was especially glad to see my steamer again and other favourite utensils, and didn’t really want to leave as felt I was just beginning to make some headway!
It was good to be back in Saint-Denis again though, and in a proper bed, and to wear clean clothes to go out on Saturday afternoon to the musical gathering we had been invited to, which was in a village called Lilliviers, about 30 minutes back down the road we had taken on Friday. Apart from the music, the house was very interesting to look at – I feel I can look at French country houses with a different eye now! – very comfortable and full of beams, lamps, furniture, pictures and a large fireplace. Our hostess reminded me of a latter-day Madame Verdurin (apologies to non Proust experts) excitedly calling on various guests to perform, singing solos herself, wearing a skirt which appeared to be made from a carpet, and possessing a mild non-musical husband ("Voici mon mari, qui ne joue rien") who kept the champagne and food going admirably.
There were piano solos, duets, the afore-mentioned singing, a tenor, then string trios, a clarinet and N's famous Schubert quintet - not a great success due to the weakness of the second violin - about a dozen performers in all, and all items alternated with more excellent food and drink. There were also several other non playing members of the "audience", and I was pleased to find I recognised most of the pieces, and just enjoyed sinking in to a sofa and listening to all that was going on. N was asked to play a trio (piano, violin & viola) which he didn't know, but which turned out very well – three songs by Glinka - no-one else seemed to have heard of them either, but all agreed they were very fine. It was after this that our hostess asked me for our names & address, so that she could invite us again in future; apparently they meet four times a year. N was especially taken with the playing of a cellist with a nice non-playing wife, and a lady violinist. So perhaps there may be more opportunities soon. I felt it was the sort of event we could enjoy hosting at La Neuve-Lyre; N agreed but said it was too far from Paris and that guests would have to be accommodated for the night.
Tuesday, January 03, 2006
Wednesday 28 December 2005
We have since had a good rest, and a warm and relaxing Christmas here at Saint-Denis. Not my first here, as I came last year, but very different as then I arrived as a guest on the 23rd after a very busy autumn at the office; this year I have been here for the build-up, which is altogether more relaxed than in Britain. We went food shopping last Friday for a capon, the obligatory foie gras – last week every second TV advert seemed to be for foie gras – a bûche, prawns, and chocolates, and also managed to find some Brussels sprouts. The best of both English and French Christmas food I think! Also on Friday I had a rapid exchange of e-mails with Abels regarding the delivery of furniture, still scheduled for Wednesday 4 January; they proposed 8 am which is impossible without staying again at the Relais des Amis, (!) but even from there it would be very difficult so early. I was also sent the final invoice by e-mail, and phoned my bank in London to transfer the money, although it will not go till today (28th) and probably not reach Abels until the 30th.
For me the festivities started on Christmas Eve with the radio carol service from Kings, while catching up with some ironing. Cambridge seemed even more remote this year than last. (N was listening from the other room, and made some comments about very English church music) Our réveillon supper consisted of an Italian Buon Natale tablecloth, and the Angel Chimes bought at Bon Marché, canapés, prawn cocktail and the foie gras. Christmas morning started with reading to each other poems from Alice in Wonderland & Through the Looking Glass; this wasn't planned, we were trying to confirm things we half remembered! We opened presents in the morning while the capon was in the oven; some had come by post, some from each other, and there were those M & C had got me when they were here, but N was missing the one from his elder daughter, which had been delayed. I also made phone calls to the family. After lunch (roast capon, stuffing, roast potatoes and carrots, sprouts, gravy, cranberry sauce, excellent red wine and bûche) we watched videos of two Jacques Tati films and laughed a lot, and in the evening recorded the film Le Hussard sur le Toit which I had seen before, and watched it the next afternoon. One of my most useful presents was a new and different Pilates DVD from my sister Issy; more varied, with different length programmes. So far I have done the warm-up programme two mornings running; this could be the basis of a very good New Year resolution! once we get the equipment sorted out at la Neuve-Lyre.
Yesterday we went out in the car (which had spent Christmas safely in the Parking Municipal) to Castorama – a large DIY store – to get all manner of things to take back to La Neuve-Lyre; various types of white paint, brushes, stain, a linen line, cloths, scrapers, carpet cleaner and a product which promises to get old glue off old lino – we shall see! We also went to the supermarket Auchan on the same site, to shop for ingredients for our lunch party today. I bought a phone for the new house in the France Telecom shop next door; we had looked in several and there did not seem to be a great deal of choice, it seemed to be the only one with voicemail which didn't have huge digits. I queued about 40 minutes for this; the whole time N was getting the shopping in the supermarket.
While all this was going on it had started to snow, and by the time we came out it was laying quite thickly; it took N some time to remember where he had parked the car as they now all looked alike! He eventually found it and we drove carefully back to the Saint-Denis car park - where fortunately the car will be under cover - leaving all our DIY purchases and phone ready in the boot. It was bitterly cold by the time we got home with our food shopping, but looked very pretty from the window. According to the radio all of Normandy is under a severe cold weather alert; another very good reason not to try to get to La Neuve-Lyre for 8 in the morning. My personal "plan grand froid" is a dark green cotton cardigan sales bargain from Etam; it is big enough to go on over the top of everything else.
Our lunch party consisted of just one guest, a long-term resident of Les Ursulines who is helping N with his project by providing a good deal of material, references from archives, photocopies and so on. I miss entertaining so enjoyed all the planning and cooking, and she brought a magnificent bouquet of roses – I had forgotten guests sometimes did that! It was also good for us to spend several hours speaking entirely French; another reason for entertaining, if we can find anybody to invite.
Also this morning N's parcel from his daughter finally arrived, including something for me – a black necklace with sparkling stones. This was a nice surprise, and I felt pleased that I was the one who had wrapped all of their parcels, inside and out.
Thursday 29 December 2005
According to radio and TV weather most of France is still under snow and freezing temperatures. There had been no more snow here until late this afternoon when we came out of IKEA; I said it wasn't real snow, as it was melting into rain, N said had it been laid on specially by IKEA then? I managed very easily to change my box of 3 table legs for one containing 4; I had never taken anything back to IKEA before, but it was very quickly done with no trouble. I also bought a long list of other things, including 17 metres of white lacy curtain material at 0.69 euros a metre; even the material shops at Montmartre couldn't beat that! This is for the four windows in the big ground floor room – we keep referring to it as La Grande Pièce, but it will be a mixture of TV room and dining room, and also where the books will go. I bought ready-made white curtains for the main bedroom too, more bedding for the bed, spice shelves and storage jars for the kitchen, bath mats, and two little key cupboards to try and rationalise the vast array of keys. All this is now in the back of the car together with the stuff from Castorama and the new phone, until we set off hopefully next Wednesday. Still no news from Abels; they must be worried about the weather conditions too.
Friday 30 December 2005
I have a phone number! A nice lady from France Telecom phoned twice during my breakfast (which was late as I had just been doing the longer part of my new exercise programme) and first of all said she could not find the previous line under Mme V's name. She asked whether it could have been registered in the name of a monsieur, and when she spelled the name I recognised it as one of those I had removed from the mail box. (Oh what secrets are hidden in such data!) She then phoned back about five minutes later with the number. The next important thing was to let Abels know, having heard nothing from them since before Christmas, so I phoned my contact, and she confirmed that the drivers had been told we probably wouldn't arrive before 10.45 am, but that they would arrive earlier. I explained about the weather, and hope it will have improved by next week. We will try to set off shortly after 7, as last time. Hopefully this will be the last time we have to leave early for a set time, and can do the journey in daylight in future.
Sunday January 1 2006
I think we must have done something to offend the god of bathroom lights. After the failure with the fluorescent tube at La Neuve-Lyre, two of the three little bulbs at the top of the bathroom unit here at Saint-Denis unaccountably went dead earlier in the week, and it took N a good deal of time and two visits to BHV (where it was originally bought) plus another to Castorama to manage to fit new bulbs and get them working again.
I went with him the first of these visits on Friday afternoon, by train in very cold snowy weather. The snow was blowing horizontally into our faces as we waited on the platform, and we imagined that in central Paris it would be drier but no, even the pavements of the Rue de Rivoli were covered in wet slush, and N nearly slipped several times – I was glad I was wearing my snow boots with non-slip soles. Apart from the bathroom department we also looked at curtain poles and fittings, all very expensive, and at a bedding sale, as I wanted to find plain white pillowcases to go with the sets I'd got from IKEA. Also very expensive; I thought not for the first time that BHV is a very expensive shop. By the time we got back the snow had become very small pieces of hail which stung our faces, and we were very glad to dry out and sit on the sofa with tea and cake and watch another of N's Christmas present DVDs – Lord Peter Wimsey in Strong Poison. We have also watched a DVD of Holst's The Planets, complete with various pieces of film and graphics, and parts of BBC's Coast.
Between now and Christmas we have re-watched Porterhouse Blue in several sessions too; N's college is in the process of electing a new master and at one time he was receiving post to do with the election nearly every day, so when I caught sight of the video (which I gave him several years ago) on a shelf, thought we should watch it again in tribute, as it were. This has resulted in some new catchphrases; N often replies to questions with: "I wouldn't know about that, sir" and I would like to adopt "Exemplum habemus!" if only I could remember it when relevant.
Since Friday the weather has improved considerably – from 2 degrees to 8 – and we are continuing to enjoy relaxing here until next Wednesday when we set off for Normandy as early as we can, and start working hard there again. We did very little in the way of New Year celebrations; staying in as restaurant prices rise sharply for 31 December, and there were forecasts of riots like those in November. In the event we went to bed early and celebrated today by watching the New Year's Day concert from Vienna on television with a glass of sparkling white wine in hand, followed by a festive lunch. In the afternoon we watched a video of Cabaret, which I hadn't seen since it first came out in 1972, at the Arts in Cambridge.
Monday 2 January 2006
This morning we went down to the cellar again to dust and clean all the pieces of furniture to go in the van next Monday – two wardrobes, two bedside tables and a double bed. It doesn't sound very much but there are an awful lot of pieces! It also involved dropping down a flex from the first floor so that we could attach a lamp to see what we were doing.
N received a phone call from a string-playing colleague with an invitation for next Saturday – including me – as it will involve a sort of party and food as well as the music; at the moment we don't know exactly where apart from northern Paris. (N is practising the Schubert quintet in readiness as we write) A nice prospect though, especially as we will have come back from La Neuve-Lyre ready to load the van; it will be a good break and change of scene. When I asked whether this quintet was the Trout, N said cryptically that this was the Schubert Quintet and that the other was the Trout Quintet. It reminded me of a programme I once heard on Radio 3, taking this nomenclature to extremes asking whether a piano trio should be played with three pianos, the Trout Quintet by five trout and the Archduke Trio by three Archdukes. But I digress……
I have taken down all the Christmas cards and what few decorations there were; my little tree from Madeleine and its accessories and the few free decorations from Yves Rocher have all gone in a large shoe box ready for Christmas decorations on a much grander scale next year, I hope.
Tuesday 3 January 2006
Yesterday evening after the news we found ourselves watching the film Lawrence of Arabia which suddenly came on after the news. Neither of us had seen it before and it was so gripping that we had to keep on watching it till well after midnight. Today I am packing ready for an early start to La Neuve-Lyre tomorrow, and am glad that the weather is much better than this time last week; in some parts of Normandy no lorries were allowed on the roads!
We have since had a good rest, and a warm and relaxing Christmas here at Saint-Denis. Not my first here, as I came last year, but very different as then I arrived as a guest on the 23rd after a very busy autumn at the office; this year I have been here for the build-up, which is altogether more relaxed than in Britain. We went food shopping last Friday for a capon, the obligatory foie gras – last week every second TV advert seemed to be for foie gras – a bûche, prawns, and chocolates, and also managed to find some Brussels sprouts. The best of both English and French Christmas food I think! Also on Friday I had a rapid exchange of e-mails with Abels regarding the delivery of furniture, still scheduled for Wednesday 4 January; they proposed 8 am which is impossible without staying again at the Relais des Amis, (!) but even from there it would be very difficult so early. I was also sent the final invoice by e-mail, and phoned my bank in London to transfer the money, although it will not go till today (28th) and probably not reach Abels until the 30th.
For me the festivities started on Christmas Eve with the radio carol service from Kings, while catching up with some ironing. Cambridge seemed even more remote this year than last. (N was listening from the other room, and made some comments about very English church music) Our réveillon supper consisted of an Italian Buon Natale tablecloth, and the Angel Chimes bought at Bon Marché, canapés, prawn cocktail and the foie gras. Christmas morning started with reading to each other poems from Alice in Wonderland & Through the Looking Glass; this wasn't planned, we were trying to confirm things we half remembered! We opened presents in the morning while the capon was in the oven; some had come by post, some from each other, and there were those M & C had got me when they were here, but N was missing the one from his elder daughter, which had been delayed. I also made phone calls to the family. After lunch (roast capon, stuffing, roast potatoes and carrots, sprouts, gravy, cranberry sauce, excellent red wine and bûche) we watched videos of two Jacques Tati films and laughed a lot, and in the evening recorded the film Le Hussard sur le Toit which I had seen before, and watched it the next afternoon. One of my most useful presents was a new and different Pilates DVD from my sister Issy; more varied, with different length programmes. So far I have done the warm-up programme two mornings running; this could be the basis of a very good New Year resolution! once we get the equipment sorted out at la Neuve-Lyre.
Yesterday we went out in the car (which had spent Christmas safely in the Parking Municipal) to Castorama – a large DIY store – to get all manner of things to take back to La Neuve-Lyre; various types of white paint, brushes, stain, a linen line, cloths, scrapers, carpet cleaner and a product which promises to get old glue off old lino – we shall see! We also went to the supermarket Auchan on the same site, to shop for ingredients for our lunch party today. I bought a phone for the new house in the France Telecom shop next door; we had looked in several and there did not seem to be a great deal of choice, it seemed to be the only one with voicemail which didn't have huge digits. I queued about 40 minutes for this; the whole time N was getting the shopping in the supermarket.
While all this was going on it had started to snow, and by the time we came out it was laying quite thickly; it took N some time to remember where he had parked the car as they now all looked alike! He eventually found it and we drove carefully back to the Saint-Denis car park - where fortunately the car will be under cover - leaving all our DIY purchases and phone ready in the boot. It was bitterly cold by the time we got home with our food shopping, but looked very pretty from the window. According to the radio all of Normandy is under a severe cold weather alert; another very good reason not to try to get to La Neuve-Lyre for 8 in the morning. My personal "plan grand froid" is a dark green cotton cardigan sales bargain from Etam; it is big enough to go on over the top of everything else.
Our lunch party consisted of just one guest, a long-term resident of Les Ursulines who is helping N with his project by providing a good deal of material, references from archives, photocopies and so on. I miss entertaining so enjoyed all the planning and cooking, and she brought a magnificent bouquet of roses – I had forgotten guests sometimes did that! It was also good for us to spend several hours speaking entirely French; another reason for entertaining, if we can find anybody to invite.
Also this morning N's parcel from his daughter finally arrived, including something for me – a black necklace with sparkling stones. This was a nice surprise, and I felt pleased that I was the one who had wrapped all of their parcels, inside and out.
Thursday 29 December 2005
According to radio and TV weather most of France is still under snow and freezing temperatures. There had been no more snow here until late this afternoon when we came out of IKEA; I said it wasn't real snow, as it was melting into rain, N said had it been laid on specially by IKEA then? I managed very easily to change my box of 3 table legs for one containing 4; I had never taken anything back to IKEA before, but it was very quickly done with no trouble. I also bought a long list of other things, including 17 metres of white lacy curtain material at 0.69 euros a metre; even the material shops at Montmartre couldn't beat that! This is for the four windows in the big ground floor room – we keep referring to it as La Grande Pièce, but it will be a mixture of TV room and dining room, and also where the books will go. I bought ready-made white curtains for the main bedroom too, more bedding for the bed, spice shelves and storage jars for the kitchen, bath mats, and two little key cupboards to try and rationalise the vast array of keys. All this is now in the back of the car together with the stuff from Castorama and the new phone, until we set off hopefully next Wednesday. Still no news from Abels; they must be worried about the weather conditions too.
Friday 30 December 2005
I have a phone number! A nice lady from France Telecom phoned twice during my breakfast (which was late as I had just been doing the longer part of my new exercise programme) and first of all said she could not find the previous line under Mme V's name. She asked whether it could have been registered in the name of a monsieur, and when she spelled the name I recognised it as one of those I had removed from the mail box. (Oh what secrets are hidden in such data!) She then phoned back about five minutes later with the number. The next important thing was to let Abels know, having heard nothing from them since before Christmas, so I phoned my contact, and she confirmed that the drivers had been told we probably wouldn't arrive before 10.45 am, but that they would arrive earlier. I explained about the weather, and hope it will have improved by next week. We will try to set off shortly after 7, as last time. Hopefully this will be the last time we have to leave early for a set time, and can do the journey in daylight in future.
Sunday January 1 2006
I think we must have done something to offend the god of bathroom lights. After the failure with the fluorescent tube at La Neuve-Lyre, two of the three little bulbs at the top of the bathroom unit here at Saint-Denis unaccountably went dead earlier in the week, and it took N a good deal of time and two visits to BHV (where it was originally bought) plus another to Castorama to manage to fit new bulbs and get them working again.
I went with him the first of these visits on Friday afternoon, by train in very cold snowy weather. The snow was blowing horizontally into our faces as we waited on the platform, and we imagined that in central Paris it would be drier but no, even the pavements of the Rue de Rivoli were covered in wet slush, and N nearly slipped several times – I was glad I was wearing my snow boots with non-slip soles. Apart from the bathroom department we also looked at curtain poles and fittings, all very expensive, and at a bedding sale, as I wanted to find plain white pillowcases to go with the sets I'd got from IKEA. Also very expensive; I thought not for the first time that BHV is a very expensive shop. By the time we got back the snow had become very small pieces of hail which stung our faces, and we were very glad to dry out and sit on the sofa with tea and cake and watch another of N's Christmas present DVDs – Lord Peter Wimsey in Strong Poison. We have also watched a DVD of Holst's The Planets, complete with various pieces of film and graphics, and parts of BBC's Coast.
Between now and Christmas we have re-watched Porterhouse Blue in several sessions too; N's college is in the process of electing a new master and at one time he was receiving post to do with the election nearly every day, so when I caught sight of the video (which I gave him several years ago) on a shelf, thought we should watch it again in tribute, as it were. This has resulted in some new catchphrases; N often replies to questions with: "I wouldn't know about that, sir" and I would like to adopt "Exemplum habemus!" if only I could remember it when relevant.
Since Friday the weather has improved considerably – from 2 degrees to 8 – and we are continuing to enjoy relaxing here until next Wednesday when we set off for Normandy as early as we can, and start working hard there again. We did very little in the way of New Year celebrations; staying in as restaurant prices rise sharply for 31 December, and there were forecasts of riots like those in November. In the event we went to bed early and celebrated today by watching the New Year's Day concert from Vienna on television with a glass of sparkling white wine in hand, followed by a festive lunch. In the afternoon we watched a video of Cabaret, which I hadn't seen since it first came out in 1972, at the Arts in Cambridge.
Monday 2 January 2006
This morning we went down to the cellar again to dust and clean all the pieces of furniture to go in the van next Monday – two wardrobes, two bedside tables and a double bed. It doesn't sound very much but there are an awful lot of pieces! It also involved dropping down a flex from the first floor so that we could attach a lamp to see what we were doing.
N received a phone call from a string-playing colleague with an invitation for next Saturday – including me – as it will involve a sort of party and food as well as the music; at the moment we don't know exactly where apart from northern Paris. (N is practising the Schubert quintet in readiness as we write) A nice prospect though, especially as we will have come back from La Neuve-Lyre ready to load the van; it will be a good break and change of scene. When I asked whether this quintet was the Trout, N said cryptically that this was the Schubert Quintet and that the other was the Trout Quintet. It reminded me of a programme I once heard on Radio 3, taking this nomenclature to extremes asking whether a piano trio should be played with three pianos, the Trout Quintet by five trout and the Archduke Trio by three Archdukes. But I digress……
I have taken down all the Christmas cards and what few decorations there were; my little tree from Madeleine and its accessories and the few free decorations from Yves Rocher have all gone in a large shoe box ready for Christmas decorations on a much grander scale next year, I hope.
Tuesday 3 January 2006
Yesterday evening after the news we found ourselves watching the film Lawrence of Arabia which suddenly came on after the news. Neither of us had seen it before and it was so gripping that we had to keep on watching it till well after midnight. Today I am packing ready for an early start to La Neuve-Lyre tomorrow, and am glad that the weather is much better than this time last week; in some parts of Normandy no lorries were allowed on the roads!
