Frankly, I’m exhausted. Too many late nights either writing or partying into the wee hours have done me in, those days of being able to function on less than 8 hours sleep are long gone. And it’s not just the lack of shut-eye, the scorching temperatures have a tendency to make one feel drained of any remaining energy – except to drag your body onto the nearest shaded sun lounger. Thankfully there isn’t a lot left to do as far as the grounds are concerned, Lionel and Denis will finish the last bits this week I am assured which is just as well as the bloody pool decided that my life had been stress-free for a little too long.
I woke up on Tuesday morning and did the usual thing of letting the woofers out and opening the balcony shutters. I’m not a morning person as you know until I’ve had my coffee so the sound of Sherman barking hysterically in the garden wasn’t exactly welcomed. Normally I would have just shouted at him to shut up but a) Sherbs rarely barks unless there is a dog passing the gate and b) I know my woofers ‘language’ and this wasn’t because there was an intruder on the property. Bleary-eyed I stepped outside to see what had got my little man so wound up only to see him standing on the wooden deck looking down at a half-empty pool. I shot down the stairs and having roped Rene in to help, rolled off the cover only to find less than a metre of water remaining. I called Denis first who of course, shot over within a couple of minutes and then Roy who promised to come as soon as he could. Louise, my neighbour, had heard Sherman’s shrieking so rushed over in her dressing gown. A large puddle had formed between the pool and the poolhouse but nothing anywhere else, or at least I thought (it had in fact made its way down to the road below us) but we couldn’t trace the leak. With Denis digging out the puddle with his bare hands, Roy and Nick who happened to be constructing our new bathroom downstairs checked all the fittings and pipes under the pool but to no avail. We couldn’t find anything amiss so one of us had to get in the pool and of course, that would be me (I was the only one dressed for the occasion). It didn’t take long for us to find it – a toe-sized hole in the liner in one of the corners, right at the bottom. How it got there, we will never know but I can now consider myself an expert in patching up such things. Who knew you can buy special glue that works under water? Despite a close call involving my finger and it being stuck down there, said hole is now covered with four pool patches and two layers of liner all held together with the contents of three packets of glue. And we now have a full pool again much to Arry’s joy.
As I mentioned, I have been socialising rather a lot. I seemed to have joined the party village of Aude judging by the last couple of days what with the regular Friday night down at Le Bistro and the re-opening of what will become the Saturday night soiree down at the allotment. Well, it’s not your average-sized allotment, more of a small farm sized area where Abraham, a gorgeous Rastafarian with the biggest smile, grows fruit and vegetables and raises pigs. Tables and chairs made of logs and huge branches make up the ‘restaurant’ where your taste buds can be tingled with freshly picked and barbeque’d vegetables all washed down with lashings of beer and great conversation. Considering the night before I had been downing copious amounts of wine and whizzing around the dancefloor with Patricia, Denis sister, last night’s affair was a welcome relief for my stomach and my feet.
Speaking of growing food, I made a discovery earlier in the week. It appears that two of my citrus trees on the balcony have been mixing with each other a little too closely. One of the lime trees is starting to produce lemons as well and the lemon tree has produce half and halfs in the shape of ripe but green fruit. Any recipe ideas?….
“Live in each season as it passes, breathe the air, drink the drink, taste the fruit” (Henry David Thoreau)
Widow plus woofs 