Pongy plums and precious pieces

Is it just me or has June been a ‘blink and you miss it’ kind of month? One minute we’re wearing woolies and the next, we’re already past the summer equinox. And if last week was anything to go by, it’s getting hot around here. Mind you we did have a cracking thunderstorm yesterday and I mean, cracking. The lightning was so loud even I jumped out of my chair and most of the woofers shot indoors as if someone had fired at them. I say most as Sherman pootled in after the rush wondering what all the fuss was about – probably too busy searching for hedgehog paw prints, he’s obsessed by the spiny species. and has the battle scars to prove it. There are an unusually high number of them around at the moment, I think a combination of May’s wet weather and the abundance of stinking, rooten plums lying waste under their trees might have something to do with it. Over the last couple of weeks, I must have picked over 10 kilos of the little red fruit and that’s just from one tree and only about a quarter cleared so far. Denis wants to make plum wine which judging by the freezer collection should keep us going until Doomsday and the garden has already got the fermenting process underway.

I for one, will not be indulging as I’m taking a break from alcoholic fruits for a bit. Between all the parties and dinner dates, I have been indulging a little too much so apart from the odd ‘lite’ beer which brother Simon refers to as ‘flaky’, I’m being a good girl. And now that we have finished the petanque area, a nice sit-down after work in the shade of the mini-pavilion with a cold brew is just the ticket. I started making the cushion covers for the seating yesterday, something that required a lesson from Mumo as to how the sewing machine worked – I haven’t used one since I was a teenager and that got me thrown out of Home Economics (yes kids, we really did learn things like that back in the day). Still, my first attempt wasn’t that bad although the finished product does have the circumference of a badly fried egg instead of a donut. At least my finished armchair looks better than how it started out and as usual, just as with the woofers, I have become a failed fosterer again. I just can’t bring myself to sell it so now it has joined the rest of my mis-matched furniture up in the apartment. I’ve begun re-upholstering another abandoned acquisition downstairs which of course will no doubt end up upstairs.

It’s just as well that this particular parlour piece will be the last for a while as I really have to start clearing up a bit before the family onslaught next month. The workshop still has a bits of wrought iron bench de-rusting in one corner and a dismantled mobylette in the other – the latter waiting for some very hard to find motor bits. Then there is the half-finished outdoor kitchen to complete and a bit of radiator painting in the newly-painted room at the top of the main house. With any luck, brother Moth will get out of Kenya safely tonight after the recent uprising there and arrive for his birthday on Thursday. I might have some special news to share with him by then but still staying schtum for now.

Speaking of birthdays, I just want to say a quick thank-you to those who messaged me on Thursday. Whilst I don’t see the 27th as his birthday anymore, to me Tony will always be a far too young 56, it’s heartwarming to know you all think of him too. I’m not sure he’d be thrilled about Liverpool being below Arsenal in the standings at present but he’d be happy his friends remember him each year. I really wish he was down here instead of up there, he really really liked plums…

“Gardeners, I think, dream bigger dreams than emperors.” (Mary Cantwell)

Chews and Hues

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, anyone who thinks sharing your life with 8 dogs is a blissful existence doesn’t know my woofers. One of them has munched through my phone charger cable. I can rule out Simi, she only gets out of bed for food and since Yogi Bear only has three teeth, I doubt he’s capable of chewing through anything. Coco Loco wouldn’t either, far too dangerous for his sensitive soul and as for Arry, he’d have eaten the whole thing including the plug it was attached to. That leaves four although Mo rarely goes into my bedroom and Neo prefers human legs to electrical outlets so the most likely culprit is either Alice or Sherman. But since I don’t have a handy DNA kit lying about, I’ll have to wait until tomorrow to buy another charger – Denis did his best to find one I could borrow to no avail, gone are the days when one cable fitted all, modern times hmm. Naturally, the only person I know with the same make and model of my phone is Callum and of course, I can’t call him obviously and even if someone could, he’s off line working on a farm somewhere in South Australia.

At least whoever did the crime waited until the best of the weekend was over, it’s been quite a social whirl over the last few days. Friday marked the start of Le Petit Bistrot season, Rouffiac’s weekly village get-together. And since it was the first night so to speak, there was a whole lot of cheek-kissing and “ça va” ‘s as friends re-acquainted themselves after their winter hibernation before sitting down to catch up over a few glasses and partake in a less than light repas of sausage stew. Good for lining the stomach I suppose. The evening would have been almost perfect if it wasn’t for any attempt at conversation being drowned out by an over-excitable and very loud big band musical performance and the absence of our Graham who could probably hear the trumpet player in Scotland. You are missed darling.

With the start of summer just around the corner and the weather finally starting to remember as such, it’s time to hang up the running shoes until the Autumn. As much as I love wheezing up the hills surrounding us, the mornings are now too hot for Alice, Arry and Sherman and my body needs its annual repose but it would be nice if I could use the pool. The less said about that bloody chamber the better although with any luck, it will be fit for purpose in a couple of weeks. I shall keep schtum about that until it happens. Needless to say however, I’m not one for idle pursuits, most of last week has been spent finishing off the top room in the big house – carrying pots of paint and ladders up and down that staircase should be an Olympic activity. The once dingy pink wallpapered bedroom is now a calm, cream brush and roller job – several different shades as I wanted to use up all the nearly-empty tins left in the garage but no-one seems to have notice the subtle changes in hues.

And it’s not just the room at the top looking bright and cheerful, the gardens are looking pretty spectacular at the moment – we can thank miserable wet May for that. Denis and I have also given my terrace a bit of a make-over including repotting my citrus trees and a spot of geranium buying. Mind you, I should have taken more care over my colour choices as the pink that was once up there is now everywhere down here. At least the potager is gorgeously green and full of summer salad additions. It’s just as well I don’t like beetroot. And now that the trees are all in full leaf, the woofers can lounge about in shady nooks to recharge their batteries – a couple are looking a little too lively this morning however…

“Dogs are not our whole life, but they make our lives whole. Unless they eat your shoes, then your life is a little less whole.” (Unknown)

Fruitful labour

With the start of June and temperatures rocketing into the 30s, last week was all about getting out and about. The soiree season has begun. Denis and I had back to back invites which of course we weren’t going to turn down, he fared better than me – by the third night in a row the thought of taking one sip of wine was enough to make my stomach roll and I was exhausted. Partly, I feel down to all those late nights getting the first draft of the Second Book finished but also having to deal with the bloody pool and the top bedroom’s wallpaper. The latter is just about cleared so I can start painting. Still, I thoroughly enjoyed catching up with those friends who have come out of hibernation for the summer and I can never turn down a Saturday night down at Le Jardin.

Speaking of gardens, ours is looking very fruitful. All that rain we had over the last couple of months has done it the world of good. The plum trees are sagging under the weight of yumminess and the ‘grenade‘ (pomegranates) is covered in bloom – a good omen. Then there’s the apricots, apples and figs, I have no idea what to do with all of it since its mostly just Mumo and I here, I’d set up a stall outside the front gate except the woofers’ over-excitement at the prospect of visitors would keep sales at bay. The potager is packed with veggies and salad and my carrots are ready for digging up. I am ridiculously proud of my carrots, it’s the first time I’ve grown them and they actually look like what they are supposed to look like. And as for “Domaine Stewart”, otherwise known as my grapevine, that’s groaning with tiny grapes. Apparently I need about 800 or so to make a bottle of wine – I haven’t counted mine but I doubt there’s enough to fill one of those mini bottles in a hotel fridge.

The week ahead is set to be a few degrees cooler, its currently raining which is no bad thing, so I can get on with all the other projects I’ve ignored so I could write the last paragraphs. For a former London lass who organised her life down to the finest detail, I seem to have an awful lot of jobs half-done lying around the various workspaces. I think the ‘à demain‘ attitude to life down here is finally starting to get under my skin although that isn’t to say I don’t still lose my rag when people don’t show up or ring back when they’re supposed to. Or when my mobile phone decides to turn its screen black for no reason whatsoever – thank Gods for twenty-somethings at soirees to which technology is easier than ABC’s. And boyfriends who hate seeing their other halves in a strop and know whose strings to pull to get things done so I can happily potter around our vast plot of abundance without losing mine. I shall refrain from singing “Summertime” as my voice tends to set the woofers off, they don’t like cats…

“Gardeners, I think, dream bigger dreams than emperors.” (Mary Cantwell)

Close the book and step outside

We had a little celebration at Le Jardin last night – I finally finished the first draft of the Second Book! Obviously there’s a lot of tweaking to do before it is fit to be sent off to the possible publishers but I sent the last four chapters off to Sally editor last night with a note saying ‘take your time, I need a break’ only to write back this morning and ask her not to touch the last one as I decided to change the final paragraph. I was still scrawling ideas after midnight but I think I’ve got it so to speak. And then I can read a book, someone else’s – I can’t when I’m writing, it messes with my head.

It’s been that sort of week, virtually every day having a little ‘hip hip hooray’ . The pool appears to have stopped leaking although with the strong wind of late and occasional blasts of sunshine, there’s always going to be evaporation. I’m not filling it back up yet as no-one gets in until mid-June and it gives the remaining half of its contents a chance to warm up. Then, there’s our bumper crop of spinach in the potager – deliciously crisp greens and in a few days time, carrots. We won’t talk about my tomatoes versus Denis’, they are too pathetic to mention. Speaking of mellow fruitfulness and I don’t mean the burgeoning apricot, apple and plum trees, Sherman the Tank turned 3 years old on Thursday. The not so tiny bundle of puppy fur that Alice delivered in the palm of my hand has grown up into a gorgeously handsome, lovable and bloody big Border Terrier. He’s easily double the size of his mum although that’s never stopped her from giving him a good talking too when he and Arry get too rambunctious. The latter was back at the vets yesterday, the summer scratching has started but this visit came up with a possible cause for his itchies. It’s not enough to be allergic to over 450 different flora, fauna and foods; apparently he can add fungi as well. So we are starting a new treatment which apart from anything else, is much cheaper than the Cytopoint which doesn’t work. Saving a few pennies is enough to say ‘cheers’ to.

I don’t know where May went but hello summer and, if the météo is to be believed, the heat is returning. About flippin’ time. The winter wardrobe has been packed up and shoved under my bed and D and I have been slaving over the garden and courtyard for all to enjoy. We still have the petanque area to complete – up til now it has been too windy to get Graham’s donated marquee up and put gravel underneath it. But the courtyard is all neat and tidy, ready for those apéro evenings to come. TI’ve started undercoating the top bedroom walls in the main house, it’s taken me two weeks to get the several layers of wallpaper off them – whoever invented it was a sadist. I’ll be glad to finish the room, not just because of the endless up and down the hundred and one steps staircase – it’s horribly stuffy in there too. Still, if the fine weather promised is to come, I’d better get on with it – lazy days in the garden beckon.

So roll on summer and a chance to sit back with a book that isn’t mine and not a laptop in sight. Well, I’m sure it will get pulled out of its chamber – there’s always forgotten incidences suddenly scribbled on bits of paper in the middle of the night but with Le Bistrot about to open its doors for the season in a couple of weeks and the usual Saturday chill-out sessions with friends at Le Jardin (the bongo drum set last night had everyone swinging their toes and drumming tables), I’m ready to put the opus to bed for a while and slap on the sunscreen. Hello June…

“In early June the world of leaf and blade and flowers explodes, and every sunset is different.” (John Steinbeck)