once more unto the breach . . .

As I was about to attack the washing up AGAIN yesterday after an Ezra cooking episode, I remembered this wonderful scene from Withnail and I. Richard E Grant saying, 'I feel unusual' must be one of my favorite cinema moments.

Flights of fancy

I just came across this as I was searching for a picture of something this morning in our rambling photo archives. I don't think I have blogged it before. As a person who is totally in awe of cloud formations, I remember this almost struck me to the ground in the car park at Carrefour supermarket in Banyuls. Winged figure from a giant black Rolls Royce, or an angel leaving the earth.

dad and brothers

A rare event: Mark with both his sons. Ollie is stopping on his way to Portugal for a couple of weeks. Expert fire juggler, we are hoping he might perform in Limoux. . . if the police don't get too excited. Ezra is very pleased: at last someone to play poker with.

Somewhere in the suburbs of Toulouse . . .

Ha, serves me right for being rude about Ikea. I went there, as I was collecting a friend from Blagnac with the intention of buying a small amount of bedlinen, a couple of towels and a frying pan. Arrived well in advance of opening time and joined crowd of other sad folks panting with anticipation at the red barrier rope thing to keep us out until the declared hour. See pic. The barrier was lifted and we all zipped through the maze upstairs, didn't have a coffee as the place was under reconstruction, and ended up in the 'market place bit downstairs. Got a trolly as I could feel that odd excitement enveloping me, the urge to buy non-needed plastic items. Oo look washing up brushes at one euro each, lets get ten. There was an air of sheep-like bewilderment, people pushing trolleys up and down, trying to find stuff to buy. Ikea was having a major re-fit, but had failed to tell anyone on the way in. Or perhaps it was all an evil plan to make one think about re-designing one's kitchen in the wake of non-purchasing disappointment. Bastards. Anyway I left without so much as a flannel.

However . . .I did discover 'Babou' next door. Terrible emporium stuffed with more rubbish than Amazon's returns department. For the price of one poshish duvet cover I got: three cushions, four pillow cases, four towels, three (rather nice) mugs, four plates, socks for Ezra, a bath mat, a huge bag with a picture of one of the Queens bingo friends on it, I love this! (see pic)and nearly a pair of sequined Union Jack shorts, (thank God not.) I dread to think of the environmental impact of such a shop on all levels, but is the cuboid blue and yellow shopping cathedral really any better. . .

Our trip out . . .

Yes! a miserable wet day. Ezra had been waiting for ages for such a day to visit Castelnaudary. Unlike most people who might want to look at a sunset, some beautiful rolling pastoral hills or an ancient monument; he wanted to revisit an old ? factory in aforementioned town.

Here are some happy snaps from our lovely day. We even sat in the car in the rain with a thermos of tea to heighten the pleasure.

I was rather pleased with the images of a seated horned figure, and the rusted pink number. This is appearing twice in this post, not that it is so great, but I can't find out how to remove it having loaded it twice by mistake.

We also saw two boats going through the lock system: amazing series of 'water steps' I think there were four seperate gates.

Took a different route back home and discovered a new landscape of grassy hillocks and views onto the black mountains.

All in all a super trip out.

Saturday 19th May Musée Petiet Limoux

YES, culture is live and kicking in Limoux, at least for one eve . . .

Easy care garden

We went for a vague wander around a bit of unexplored (to us) Limoux today.

Saw this super-low maintenance garden. Red gnomes, chickens and pots with plastic flowers . . .? I was hoping the owners of the house might see me and ask me in. Perhaps their house was full of grass and rose bushes.

Elderflower Olderboy

Gosh another year has gone . . . somewhere. Think I blogged about Elderflower cordial before, but so what. A great way to celebrate spring, by making free stuff to drink. Well, free elderflower - sugar from Leader Price.

Ezra then went on to make strawberry soda: strawberries and sugar in a bowl overnight, then pour fizzy water onto the beautiful jewel-red juice. Mmmm, good with ice unless weather is like today in which case perhaps with custard.
Going back a step to 'Leader price,' much as I hate super markets, I must admit L.P is almost a pleasure: There are only ever two people shopping in there; they have a small but good choice of stuff and they don't keep moving it around. There's no canned music, no annoying announcements and the staff are friendly. The whole thing takes about ten minutes and you don't end up buying a wilting tree, three for the price of two canned pigs trotters, or a nasty set of bedlinen by accident - as there isn't any.

oooohhhhh!!

Quick fix of something beautiful (film and song) after 'blog triste.' The scream at the end . . .goosebumps.

What if . . .

It was one of those days yesterday. Maybe it's just being menopausal or a few of my mother's genes leaking out . . . the 'supposing that mountain were to fall on us' ones.

A feeling as if something sinister was about to happen. Possibly not helped by the cat leaving a headless rat on the doorstep, or the fact that the Greek economy seems about to collapse, thus presenting a million questions about the eurozone and everyone in it.
The day before, the water had been cut off. We had been deprived overnight, a whole few hours, no fresh water - what is the world coming too . . .? Worrying isn't it. Worrying when you start to think about what would happen if the water was really cut off . . . or the electricity or both. No youtube. No tea. Imagine a hospital after a day with no electricity. How quickly would panic set in?
Right, I'm going to stop now and do my mother's accounts which although boring beyond belief will instil some kind of quiet order.

You want to do what . . .!?

 Imagine the music-production meeting: a desert, 50 or so old pianos, three miles of scaffolding, er . . okay. My 'what about the environment hackles' are rising, BUT on the other hand, such a joy to watch . . .wow. I wonder how many takes it took?

Welcome

To my new-look blog. I love the David Lynch curtains, thank you blogger, straight out of Twin Peaks . . . oo-er Bob, he was SCARY. For no reason other than these must be the same curtains, here's a picture of Mark and Peter playing in Missegre. Just wish I could find out how to get blogger to space the words better now . . . Seems to be no way to use paragraphs recently.

Vegetable prophet

I had a dream last night that a humble food item would provide us with great insight into the future of the world.
This morning I put this tomato in the sun to ripen off a bit, and went about the daily tasks wondering, as you do, about whether or not the world will be ending in December and if so whether Bugarach is in fact the place to be. I came back to sacrifice the tomato as part of a salad and found it had managed to lift a portion of itself towards the very direction of the aforementioned mountain.

?

I took this picture of a UFO in a field above our house.
Proof that Alien beings are approaching the earth and will be arriving sometime in December. Interesting to note they are not driving a sleek steel craft, but something resembling a gone-off potato, or a stone with lichen patches. Clever.

May, the new April?

I hold the record for the number of times a human has taken a jumper on and off.
Day of gardening mainly, wearing, alternately, heavy boots, vest top, long sleeved T-shirt, jumper and at one brief point a bikini when I thought yep, 'I'm going to get in the pool- after cleaning it for all these months.' Cold, yes!!!! but boy did I feel glowing afterwards . . . mmm, no, chilled I think is the word.
We went to a vide Grenier this morning and bought nothing at all. This has never happened before; I'm still in shock. I did however manage to photograph something from one of Dali's old holiday homes.

Amazon review wonderment

We did laugh; we did, for about ten minutes after reading a wonderful article from the Guardian online, regarding spoof reviews on Amazon.
Apparently people are reviewing things such as meths, pictures of Paul Ross, and tin foil (as seen on feline here) and giving five stars, thus propelling the normally unregarded products high on to wish lists . . . have a look if you have a mo. Google Paul Ross Amazon for example.

Takes all sorts . . .

Just found these when trying to dump excess photos clogging up our labouring computer.

I remember standing in a Wimborne newsagents for about ten minutes mesmerised by the sheer diversity of mankind's interest - well, interests of us folks in the countries fortunate to have time and money to have interests other than fighting for survival.
I don't suppose people who have to walk twenty kilometers through raging heat to collect fetid water would comprehend a magazine about celebrity lifestyle, or cross-stitch.
Talking of so-called celebs, I was about to take photos of various publications called,'blurred uninteresting images of actually rather unimportant people', when a woman dressed in a blue nylon overall asked what I was doing. I couldn't think of a witty, cutting reply, so bought a sherbet fountain and left.
There must have been about thirty magazines following what the Beckhams are doing, how his hair is, how her waistline is, who is shagging or not shagging who, on what beach, in which favoured part of the globe. Incredible . . . I must admit I do look in them occasionally at the dentists; there is a certain 'road accident-ness' to them. However hard I try not to look - just a glance to see what has in fact happened to David's hair since the last dental visit.
I think sewing and knitting publications were about equal to train spotting, and fishing, possibly more on fishing. Always the same covers though . . . a man in green outfit holding a vast slimy fish, grinning inanely, (the man). Why not a picture of what the fish was like when he (or the wife) had cooked it? Oh, that's another section - seventeen forests worth of paper on cooking, celeb chef, moving onto into kitchen design, lifestyle, house deco magazines - possibly the biggest section. House and Garden, Homes and Gardens, Interiors, your new conservatory, your new kitchen, your new fridge, your new garlic-crusher.
The top shelf, glistening in its plastic wrappers featured a whole other world: 'Hot and Wet' obviously a publication about building your own tropical greenhouse, 'jugs', advice on collecting certain types of porcelain. . . anyway, the shelf was too high up for me to investigate further. What the world needs is 'post-materialism weekly . . . might have to start my own publishing house.