Tuesday, October 24, 2006
Monday 16 October 2006
We had a beautiful drive back to Paris last Tuesday; lovely sunshine and trees and fields all looking beautiful in their autumn colours. Apart from playing quartets, N also managed to get the car serviced and almost got himself serviced - ‘flu vaccine from the pharmacie - but the doctor was away to that will have to wait for next time. I got some shoes repaired (a lengthy process at LNL) and visited the new branch of Tati recently opened in Saint-Denis, and bought a skirt for 11 euros 99 (about £7!) I received my local cinema membership ticket, but there was nothing worth seeing at the right times during this visit.
I did however go to the Chorale on Thursday evening, the first time I have seen them all since the end of May. After the usual voice exercises we sang a very catchy African song that they had learned before; Marie-Christine who seemed pleased to see me and sat down next to me, said she thought it was Swahili. I couldn’t believe that after half an hour I was singing it as though I had known it for ever! Most of the other pieces we sang (and maybe that one too - who knows?) were Christmas songs, some of them old regional French carols, and were very beautiful, including the German carol from last year. I recognised « O little town of Bethlehem » in the pile of music, and looked forward to singing something familiar, but it was a completely unknown tune. After singing it through couple of times, and hearing a variety of pronunciations, our chef (who up to then had given no sign of noticing I was there) asked if I would read the words out loud so that they could all see what they were aiming at. This I did very loudly, slowly and clearly, after which there was much gasping in amazement, laughter and applause, especially from some new members who hadn’t seen me before. The chef gave them a brief explanation of what the words meant; think I shall make a translation and take it along next time, which will be in a fortnight. In answer to my questions Marie-Christine said that only the one concert was planned before Christmas, and that the date hadn’t been fixed yet. As we left she said she had to hurry home and practise a violin part for an orchestra rehearsal; I hadn’t known she was a string player and told her N played the viola; she said viola players were always hard to find. All this was particularly relevant as N had just received a list of musicians in the Paris area looking for other musicians - almost like a dating agency - all saying what they were looking for and what they could offer, where they lived and - most interestingly - their dates of birth.
The most constructive thing achieved during the visit was the re-stuffing of the sofa cushions. This sofa was bought from Heal’s in London almost twenty years ago, and had lived all its life in Cambridge before going into store with Abels and then coming to Normandy, so the cushion covers must have been a bit surprised to find themselves travelling on the Paris metro in a carrier bag. I phoned the workshop on Wednesday morning and learned that if I took them in that afternoon we could fetch them on Friday. This meant that we left the apartment after an early lunch (now having to walk with all our luggage to the municipal car park in Saint-Denis) and drove to the rue Faubourg Saint-Antoine near Bastille, and parked in a little yard a few doors down. N stayed with the car while I went to fetch the cushions, which were looking huge and fat and marvellous, and much cleaner! And difficult to have got home on the metro. There then followed a long and exciting drive right though the centre of Paris and out to the west in the direction of Normandy; part of the time to the accompaniment of the final movement of Beethoven’s choral symphony on the radio. In all we must have been in the car between four and five hours, and only just got back to La Neuve-Lyre in time for my 5.30 hair appointment. Fortunately I remembered I was going to take along photos of the garden to show the hairdresser as almost straight away she asked if I had brought them. Once the hair had been cut (a little shorter than usual) both stylists had a good look at the photos, and seemed very interested and knowledgeable about gardens.
Home again, I enjoyed putting the newly stuffed cushions on the sofa - the difference is amazing; sofa about four inches higher - and enjoyed less putting the old saggy feather cushions in dustbin bags in the garage; happily our night-time raiders are smart enough to realise there is nothing to eat inside and have not bitten through them. N is so impressed with the new cushions that he is thinking of having the Saint-Denis ones stuffed too, so we may be returning to the rue Faubourg Saint-Antoine a few more times yet.
While still at Saint-Denis N took a phone call from the Palmers to say that they wouldn’t be able to come for the weekend after all; not a complete surprise as there had been a possibility of a meeting being rescheduled. He sent an e-mail to Odile (as she had been coming in order to meet them) and she replied that she would cancel too, as she had family coming. The other event we had been trying to arrange - a lunch party at Saint-Denis at the end of the month for the same group of Emeritus Professors we had lunch with at the Sorbonne in June - was going equally badly; almost all refusals. We are beginning to wonder what is wrong with our hospitality skills! Fortunately, N says, we are doing better in Barcelona; a colleague he emailed to see if she would like to meet us for lunch replied immediately saying she would be delighted.
So this meant that we had a large amount of bean stew in the freezer, both spare room beds made up and no guests, but more importantly, that we were now able go to the concert in the village church on Saturday evening. It was a little like the concert I took part in last October with the Saint-Denis chorale, in fact two of the pieces were the same, but there were also several solo items. The singers were all pupils of a local Austrian singing teacher who had moved into the village in 2005 (like us!) whom the Deputy Mayor had mentioned when he had visited us in the summer. He came over to speak to us as we took our seats, said he remembered that I sang, and that he would put me in contact with her, but nothing has happened so far. It was interesting sitting inside the church; the pews had little doors on them with bolts on the inside, and we sat behind our neighbour Annick, but there was no-one else I recognised. There were two English items on the programme (both by Purcell) with a few strange pronunciations, and it occurred to me that I might be of use to them too. The Austrian teacher sometimes spends time away in Paris as we do, so there wouldn’t be a question of missing regular rehearsals, and as N said, if it meant taking singing lessons, that might be quite interesting too. I have since met the Deputy Mayor in the village, and he has shaken my hand and asked me how I was, but as he was with someone else I didn’t raise the question of contact. I shall do so next time. (I am also on « bonjour » terms with the blacksmith, the lady from the traiteur and the hairdresser, as well as neighbours, so think I am making progress.) On the way home from the concert - at about 8 o’clock - there were no street lights at all at our end of the street; we had noticed this from inside before, and it made getting home very difficult, we wished we had left on the light over the front door. Am pleased to report they have now been fixed. It was only the second time we have been out after dark here, the first was the Chopin evening; and this was the first evening we have left by the front door instead of via the garage.
With no weekend guests and no shutter deadlines to meet we felt strangely relaxed, and on Sunday finally got round to having a look at the blinds bought on the previous visit to Paris, which had just been sitting waiting in the verandah. The fabric concertina blind - for the door from the back hall to the verandah - was easily fixed and works very well apart from needing a hook to wind the spare cord. The roller blind for the window over the kitchen sink completely foxed us though, and seemed quite unlike other roller blinds I have bought from John Lewis in the past and had no trouble at all fixing. After wasting much of the afternoon, N suggested the only thing to do was to take it back to Leroy Merlin when next in Paris and tell them it was faulty. I would be happier about this if I still had the receipt. Watch this space.
Thursday 19 October 2006
On Monday afternoon it was sunny and we spent quite a while working in the garden; N mowed the lawns for what we hope is the last time this year, and I watered plants and decided not to plant the four red cyclamen I’d got at the local market that morning as the busy lizzies in the urns weren’t quite over yet. We also picked what apples we could reach from the tree, and put them on the table in the verandah. I also reflected that it was a year since we’d visited the house for only the second time, and taken pictures; it had been misty then sunny that day too, and the virginia creeper on the front railing red in the photos.
The two things I had been planning to do once the weekend guests had left were making the apple chutney and taking my bicycle to the local shop and finding out why the pump was not working. (I had been on the point of doing the latter a couple of weeks ago, when suddenly required to start putting masking tape round all the upstairs windows.) I had been slowly amassing the ingredients for the chutney and needed crystallized ginger again, as for the marrow jam, which meant a trip on the bus to L’Aigle market on Tuesday morning. I took the opportunity of visiting the charity shop too, as while putting away summer clothes found several things I could happily give away. This time I had a good look round inside - there was an English couple buying a coat! - and bought some almost new vintage Tupperware from the 1970’s, it’s amazing what you can find. The staff seemed very keen when I said I could bring in some clothes. Have to work out the best way to do this. Apart from the ginger, and other crystallized fruits, I bought some of the excellent smoked haddock we had before, some local mushrooms, ham, bouchées à la reine (large vol au vents) and knickers. The market was changing with the season - chestnuts which made me think of our trip to Italy this time last year, and stalls selling woolly scarves and gloves.
After lunch I took my bicycle and the pump round to the shop next to the supermarket and explained the problem as best I could with fairly limited bicycle vocabulary and the lady said she would have a look at it, and I should come back the next day. I said I missed seeing her tabby cat asleep in the shop window; she said she had two of them, but they changed their sleeping places often. (She also has a cage of canaries in the shop, and at least one dog barking at the back……)
The apple chutney was a great success. Apart from the seven pounds of apples and the crystallized ginger it contained garlic, cider vinegar, sultanas and lots of dark brown sugar. I had no idea how long it would take, but it wasn’t finished until nearly dinner time, and filled about twelve pots of varying sizes. We have already sampled it several times!
Back at the bicycle shop the next day, it transpired that both my tyres were very perished and needed replacing, it wasn’t surprising that they failed to pump up, she said. I wondered if it was as a result of being in store. Anyway, she suggested new tyres; which needed ordering as they weren’t a regular size (!) and it was agreed that I should go back again on Friday, she hoped that would be all right. (A change from Cambridge, where one is lucky to find someone with time to do any bicycle repairs at all.) I asked whether I could bring the child’s bicycle that was left in the garage and which N thought we ought to have fixed in case Charlotte wanted to use it when she next came, and the bicycle lady said yes, bring it along.
Monday 23 October 2006
Have since been back to the cycle shop one more time; no luck with tyres as they are very unusual size, but after trying two dealers with no luck, she was trying a third. Will check again tomorrow. I left the little bike which she said should be no problem. And the birds in the shop are not canaries, they are small grey and yellow parrots.
Since finishing the painting of the shutters N has spent much of his time working on the Lexique (his French/English dictionary of house buying terms that we are revising for re-publication.) This is easier now that he has his own computer in the attic study, and we are no longer sharing the one in my ground floor room. All the French/English and English/French terms have now been typed, together with an ever-increasing list of abbreviations, and lists of French départements and motorways. We have now begun checking whether other words/expressions found in recent publications are included; mostly they are, which is good. While at the computer we have also printed and sent a lunch/dinner invitation to Monsieur and Madame P, for mid-November.
On Friday afternoon we visited a permanent Antique and Brocante warehouse between Verneuil and L‘Aigle, which we have seen advertised many times in « Maisons Normandes ». As well as a barn full of rather scruffy bits and pieces and lots of outdoor stuff - garden chairs and tables, concrete urns, gates, statues and so on - there was a large showroom on two floors crammed full of furniture, china, pictures, mirrors, glasses, lamps, and several pieces which seemed to have come from shops or restaurants rather than houses. It took long time to see everything; N was looking at small cupboards which would fit in the dining room at Saint-Denis in the gap left by the Italian trolley. There were one or two beautiful gilt mirrors much cheaper than the one over our fireplace here that he bought in Paris at the Flea Market, and we began to wonder if Normandy prices were on the whole cheaper than Paris. In the end he came away with a small key cupboard (which he later decided was cracked and warped) and I bought a wonderful bell to hang in the hall to summon him to meals - surmounted by a Norman cow - and a brown glazed vase, like the cream one I bought new for the bedroom flowers, but at a third of the price.
Yesterday and today we have at last had a visitor; Bill, a former colleague from Cambridge arrived yesterday afternoon and left after lunch today, on his way up from the south to catch the boat at Le Havre. It was a good excuse to light our first fire of the season, and the house was filled with the smell of wood smoke, sometimes a bit too much. We couldn’t feed him up as much as we would have liked, as he was on a strict diet (no Norman cream, apple cake, wine or Camembert) but fortunately he was very partial to apple compôte, bean stew and leek & potato soup. We enjoyed giving him a tour of the house and grounds, and this morning a little trip round the village and market.
Tomorrow we will be leaving Normandy for about two weeks; back to Saint-Denis for N to attend a colloquium, the lunch for Emeritus Professors (of which there may well be only one) the Chorale, a quick visit from Claire, Dan and Catherine L, and then our three-day trip to Barcelona.
We had a beautiful drive back to Paris last Tuesday; lovely sunshine and trees and fields all looking beautiful in their autumn colours. Apart from playing quartets, N also managed to get the car serviced and almost got himself serviced - ‘flu vaccine from the pharmacie - but the doctor was away to that will have to wait for next time. I got some shoes repaired (a lengthy process at LNL) and visited the new branch of Tati recently opened in Saint-Denis, and bought a skirt for 11 euros 99 (about £7!) I received my local cinema membership ticket, but there was nothing worth seeing at the right times during this visit.
I did however go to the Chorale on Thursday evening, the first time I have seen them all since the end of May. After the usual voice exercises we sang a very catchy African song that they had learned before; Marie-Christine who seemed pleased to see me and sat down next to me, said she thought it was Swahili. I couldn’t believe that after half an hour I was singing it as though I had known it for ever! Most of the other pieces we sang (and maybe that one too - who knows?) were Christmas songs, some of them old regional French carols, and were very beautiful, including the German carol from last year. I recognised « O little town of Bethlehem » in the pile of music, and looked forward to singing something familiar, but it was a completely unknown tune. After singing it through couple of times, and hearing a variety of pronunciations, our chef (who up to then had given no sign of noticing I was there) asked if I would read the words out loud so that they could all see what they were aiming at. This I did very loudly, slowly and clearly, after which there was much gasping in amazement, laughter and applause, especially from some new members who hadn’t seen me before. The chef gave them a brief explanation of what the words meant; think I shall make a translation and take it along next time, which will be in a fortnight. In answer to my questions Marie-Christine said that only the one concert was planned before Christmas, and that the date hadn’t been fixed yet. As we left she said she had to hurry home and practise a violin part for an orchestra rehearsal; I hadn’t known she was a string player and told her N played the viola; she said viola players were always hard to find. All this was particularly relevant as N had just received a list of musicians in the Paris area looking for other musicians - almost like a dating agency - all saying what they were looking for and what they could offer, where they lived and - most interestingly - their dates of birth.
The most constructive thing achieved during the visit was the re-stuffing of the sofa cushions. This sofa was bought from Heal’s in London almost twenty years ago, and had lived all its life in Cambridge before going into store with Abels and then coming to Normandy, so the cushion covers must have been a bit surprised to find themselves travelling on the Paris metro in a carrier bag. I phoned the workshop on Wednesday morning and learned that if I took them in that afternoon we could fetch them on Friday. This meant that we left the apartment after an early lunch (now having to walk with all our luggage to the municipal car park in Saint-Denis) and drove to the rue Faubourg Saint-Antoine near Bastille, and parked in a little yard a few doors down. N stayed with the car while I went to fetch the cushions, which were looking huge and fat and marvellous, and much cleaner! And difficult to have got home on the metro. There then followed a long and exciting drive right though the centre of Paris and out to the west in the direction of Normandy; part of the time to the accompaniment of the final movement of Beethoven’s choral symphony on the radio. In all we must have been in the car between four and five hours, and only just got back to La Neuve-Lyre in time for my 5.30 hair appointment. Fortunately I remembered I was going to take along photos of the garden to show the hairdresser as almost straight away she asked if I had brought them. Once the hair had been cut (a little shorter than usual) both stylists had a good look at the photos, and seemed very interested and knowledgeable about gardens.
Home again, I enjoyed putting the newly stuffed cushions on the sofa - the difference is amazing; sofa about four inches higher - and enjoyed less putting the old saggy feather cushions in dustbin bags in the garage; happily our night-time raiders are smart enough to realise there is nothing to eat inside and have not bitten through them. N is so impressed with the new cushions that he is thinking of having the Saint-Denis ones stuffed too, so we may be returning to the rue Faubourg Saint-Antoine a few more times yet.
While still at Saint-Denis N took a phone call from the Palmers to say that they wouldn’t be able to come for the weekend after all; not a complete surprise as there had been a possibility of a meeting being rescheduled. He sent an e-mail to Odile (as she had been coming in order to meet them) and she replied that she would cancel too, as she had family coming. The other event we had been trying to arrange - a lunch party at Saint-Denis at the end of the month for the same group of Emeritus Professors we had lunch with at the Sorbonne in June - was going equally badly; almost all refusals. We are beginning to wonder what is wrong with our hospitality skills! Fortunately, N says, we are doing better in Barcelona; a colleague he emailed to see if she would like to meet us for lunch replied immediately saying she would be delighted.
So this meant that we had a large amount of bean stew in the freezer, both spare room beds made up and no guests, but more importantly, that we were now able go to the concert in the village church on Saturday evening. It was a little like the concert I took part in last October with the Saint-Denis chorale, in fact two of the pieces were the same, but there were also several solo items. The singers were all pupils of a local Austrian singing teacher who had moved into the village in 2005 (like us!) whom the Deputy Mayor had mentioned when he had visited us in the summer. He came over to speak to us as we took our seats, said he remembered that I sang, and that he would put me in contact with her, but nothing has happened so far. It was interesting sitting inside the church; the pews had little doors on them with bolts on the inside, and we sat behind our neighbour Annick, but there was no-one else I recognised. There were two English items on the programme (both by Purcell) with a few strange pronunciations, and it occurred to me that I might be of use to them too. The Austrian teacher sometimes spends time away in Paris as we do, so there wouldn’t be a question of missing regular rehearsals, and as N said, if it meant taking singing lessons, that might be quite interesting too. I have since met the Deputy Mayor in the village, and he has shaken my hand and asked me how I was, but as he was with someone else I didn’t raise the question of contact. I shall do so next time. (I am also on « bonjour » terms with the blacksmith, the lady from the traiteur and the hairdresser, as well as neighbours, so think I am making progress.) On the way home from the concert - at about 8 o’clock - there were no street lights at all at our end of the street; we had noticed this from inside before, and it made getting home very difficult, we wished we had left on the light over the front door. Am pleased to report they have now been fixed. It was only the second time we have been out after dark here, the first was the Chopin evening; and this was the first evening we have left by the front door instead of via the garage.
With no weekend guests and no shutter deadlines to meet we felt strangely relaxed, and on Sunday finally got round to having a look at the blinds bought on the previous visit to Paris, which had just been sitting waiting in the verandah. The fabric concertina blind - for the door from the back hall to the verandah - was easily fixed and works very well apart from needing a hook to wind the spare cord. The roller blind for the window over the kitchen sink completely foxed us though, and seemed quite unlike other roller blinds I have bought from John Lewis in the past and had no trouble at all fixing. After wasting much of the afternoon, N suggested the only thing to do was to take it back to Leroy Merlin when next in Paris and tell them it was faulty. I would be happier about this if I still had the receipt. Watch this space.
Thursday 19 October 2006
On Monday afternoon it was sunny and we spent quite a while working in the garden; N mowed the lawns for what we hope is the last time this year, and I watered plants and decided not to plant the four red cyclamen I’d got at the local market that morning as the busy lizzies in the urns weren’t quite over yet. We also picked what apples we could reach from the tree, and put them on the table in the verandah. I also reflected that it was a year since we’d visited the house for only the second time, and taken pictures; it had been misty then sunny that day too, and the virginia creeper on the front railing red in the photos.
The two things I had been planning to do once the weekend guests had left were making the apple chutney and taking my bicycle to the local shop and finding out why the pump was not working. (I had been on the point of doing the latter a couple of weeks ago, when suddenly required to start putting masking tape round all the upstairs windows.) I had been slowly amassing the ingredients for the chutney and needed crystallized ginger again, as for the marrow jam, which meant a trip on the bus to L’Aigle market on Tuesday morning. I took the opportunity of visiting the charity shop too, as while putting away summer clothes found several things I could happily give away. This time I had a good look round inside - there was an English couple buying a coat! - and bought some almost new vintage Tupperware from the 1970’s, it’s amazing what you can find. The staff seemed very keen when I said I could bring in some clothes. Have to work out the best way to do this. Apart from the ginger, and other crystallized fruits, I bought some of the excellent smoked haddock we had before, some local mushrooms, ham, bouchées à la reine (large vol au vents) and knickers. The market was changing with the season - chestnuts which made me think of our trip to Italy this time last year, and stalls selling woolly scarves and gloves.
After lunch I took my bicycle and the pump round to the shop next to the supermarket and explained the problem as best I could with fairly limited bicycle vocabulary and the lady said she would have a look at it, and I should come back the next day. I said I missed seeing her tabby cat asleep in the shop window; she said she had two of them, but they changed their sleeping places often. (She also has a cage of canaries in the shop, and at least one dog barking at the back……)
The apple chutney was a great success. Apart from the seven pounds of apples and the crystallized ginger it contained garlic, cider vinegar, sultanas and lots of dark brown sugar. I had no idea how long it would take, but it wasn’t finished until nearly dinner time, and filled about twelve pots of varying sizes. We have already sampled it several times!
Back at the bicycle shop the next day, it transpired that both my tyres were very perished and needed replacing, it wasn’t surprising that they failed to pump up, she said. I wondered if it was as a result of being in store. Anyway, she suggested new tyres; which needed ordering as they weren’t a regular size (!) and it was agreed that I should go back again on Friday, she hoped that would be all right. (A change from Cambridge, where one is lucky to find someone with time to do any bicycle repairs at all.) I asked whether I could bring the child’s bicycle that was left in the garage and which N thought we ought to have fixed in case Charlotte wanted to use it when she next came, and the bicycle lady said yes, bring it along.
Monday 23 October 2006
Have since been back to the cycle shop one more time; no luck with tyres as they are very unusual size, but after trying two dealers with no luck, she was trying a third. Will check again tomorrow. I left the little bike which she said should be no problem. And the birds in the shop are not canaries, they are small grey and yellow parrots.
Since finishing the painting of the shutters N has spent much of his time working on the Lexique (his French/English dictionary of house buying terms that we are revising for re-publication.) This is easier now that he has his own computer in the attic study, and we are no longer sharing the one in my ground floor room. All the French/English and English/French terms have now been typed, together with an ever-increasing list of abbreviations, and lists of French départements and motorways. We have now begun checking whether other words/expressions found in recent publications are included; mostly they are, which is good. While at the computer we have also printed and sent a lunch/dinner invitation to Monsieur and Madame P, for mid-November.
On Friday afternoon we visited a permanent Antique and Brocante warehouse between Verneuil and L‘Aigle, which we have seen advertised many times in « Maisons Normandes ». As well as a barn full of rather scruffy bits and pieces and lots of outdoor stuff - garden chairs and tables, concrete urns, gates, statues and so on - there was a large showroom on two floors crammed full of furniture, china, pictures, mirrors, glasses, lamps, and several pieces which seemed to have come from shops or restaurants rather than houses. It took long time to see everything; N was looking at small cupboards which would fit in the dining room at Saint-Denis in the gap left by the Italian trolley. There were one or two beautiful gilt mirrors much cheaper than the one over our fireplace here that he bought in Paris at the Flea Market, and we began to wonder if Normandy prices were on the whole cheaper than Paris. In the end he came away with a small key cupboard (which he later decided was cracked and warped) and I bought a wonderful bell to hang in the hall to summon him to meals - surmounted by a Norman cow - and a brown glazed vase, like the cream one I bought new for the bedroom flowers, but at a third of the price.
Yesterday and today we have at last had a visitor; Bill, a former colleague from Cambridge arrived yesterday afternoon and left after lunch today, on his way up from the south to catch the boat at Le Havre. It was a good excuse to light our first fire of the season, and the house was filled with the smell of wood smoke, sometimes a bit too much. We couldn’t feed him up as much as we would have liked, as he was on a strict diet (no Norman cream, apple cake, wine or Camembert) but fortunately he was very partial to apple compôte, bean stew and leek & potato soup. We enjoyed giving him a tour of the house and grounds, and this morning a little trip round the village and market.
Tomorrow we will be leaving Normandy for about two weeks; back to Saint-Denis for N to attend a colloquium, the lunch for Emeritus Professors (of which there may well be only one) the Chorale, a quick visit from Claire, Dan and Catherine L, and then our three-day trip to Barcelona.
# posted by Chez Katherine @ 3:13 AM 
