Remember

When I see postcards like this one I always ask myself ‘Where did the survivors go?’. Lens was occupied at the beginning of the war in 1914. Only half of the population survived the war and then there was the Spanish flu…

Was this little boy standing on top of the ruins of his school? Let’s not forget the millions of civilians whose lives were never the same again.

There were moments of hope

Some ideas are better than others

I’ve got my Igoogle set up so that when I click the icon for Mozilla it’s all there. All decorated (Elena Suprun) just like home. The latest widget I’ve acquired is the Writers Idea Bank; every time you refresh the page, 5 more crazy ideas pop up. Great for blogging too!

This morning it asked me to imagine kissing someone twice my age. That would mean someone of 108. Needless to say, I refreshed the page.

A very good start to the week

This has been a true week of Gifts of Prosperity if ever there was one. In the post on Monday came a nice cheque refunding me for over-payments to the social security last year. Next came a knock at the door. I’ve recently translated a CV and letter for a neighbour applying for a job with a foreign company. My neighbour presented me with a very posh platter of expensive sweets/candies; marzipan fruits, stuffed dates jellies...

I’ve written recently about buying some albums of postcards back in September, they came from a château. Yesterday the present owner of the Grandmother’s château contacted us. He’s very kindly sent me some of the history of the family from before our postcards were sent. Our postcards have brought to light a daughter he didn’t know about. I’ll try to compile as much as I know so far to help him , unfortunatel, I'm going to have to try to write in french:( . This is exactly the kind of thing I love about my postcards, real live history. For example; in the summer I gave Dom a catalogue from one of the auctions we went to because it contained a quote from a letter George Sand sent to a friend. Only the people who have seen the catalogue would have seen that quote. Our expert is a mine of little details, we learn a lot from him.

I’m looking forward to seeing what happens next!

The main news of the week is, of course, that Debbie has now had her surgery and is doing well.

Not here, there or anywhere

I overslept this morning. I don’t think that I’ve ever done that before. Rob had got up earlier and came to see why I wasn’t moving around. I sprang out of bed and don’t seem to have managed to get my body and mind synchronised again all day.

It’s the end of October and it’s as warm outside as in and the lizard was out on the kitchen windowsill at lunchtime. Very strange, he should be asleep.

Health matters

Yesterday evening I was very shocked by a report shown here on French TV ; I think that the journalists told us that they had been to Virginia and visited a hospital or clinic. It was early morning and lots of people were waiting outside. They were waiting to take part in a lottery to see who would get treatment that day. These people weren’t the poorest, these were people who had lost their jobs and their health cover or they just couldn’t afford it. One woman was asked what was wrong with her; I could tell immediately from her face and neck. She needed hormones for her thyroid. That really struck home with me. I was undiagnosed for two or three years and I remember how much better I felt when my treatment was sorted out. Goodness know what happens to your body if you are treated for a while and then not.

The reporters 'forgot' to mention that in France, Médicines Sans Frontièrs looks after the people who have slipped outside the system. I had a friend who did some voluntary nursing for a while and she was very, very shocked that even in a ‘well to do’ town like La Rochelle there were so many people in need.

Now I know that I’m really old. This morning in the post I received a bulky pink envelope with no indication of the company which sent it. In the past this meant samples of disposable nappies /diapers, baby food, beauty products (posh cotton wool discs) and sanitary products. Well, I’ve discovered that I’ve been promoted to the ‘leaky ladies’ list. Perhaps I should book that shampoo and set at the hairdressers today – what about a lavender rinse?

Yoyos

When I was young I loved playing around with yoyos. I was never very good at it, but that was probably because I could only afford a cheap plastic one. In more recent years all three of my children have enjoyed yoyos and they were certainly more sophisticated than the ones I played with. I seem to remember one which lit up; needless to say mum had goes too.

I’m very tempted to start yo-yoing again now that I’ve discovered the existence of Yoyo Shop UK. You can buy yoyos online to your hearts content from beginners to pros, all colours and designs…. You can even by Tom Kuhn yoyos. You may well ask what or who is Tom Kuhn? Tom Kuhn is a dentist from San Francisco who makes amazing wooden yoyos. These are items of beauty as well as fun to use. You can’t get them from anywhere else in the U.K.

A yoyo might just be the stocking filler you were looking for and the postage is free…. I might just put one on my wish list.

Just another Sunday

I’ve been time travelling today: First I celebrated the 6th birthday of a little girl who was born in 1899. Then I ogled the handsome young cyclists of the Tour de France in 1950. Next I admired the new white cape and ‘Kepi’ worn by the French police men at night from 1949 onwards and then I finished off by watching the Russian troops march through a French town when they joined the First World War effort. Not bad for a quiet Sunday.
How about you?

The joys of being a mother

I try really hard not to be a neurotic mother, but sometimes fate just overwhelms me. On Sunday lunch time Rob told me that a report was coming up on TV about riots in the centre Poitiers! I sat and watched the pictures of the devastation with my stomach churning. Such a quiet, peaceful town, holding a festival. I knew that Dom and J-M would attend something like that on their doorstep. Dom and I managed to converse with each other via our message services. They were fine, but disappointed that the event they were going to attend on Saturday evening had been cancelled.

A gang of around 250 hooded and masked men had passed through the town centre on Saturday afternoon smashing shop windows, letting off smoke bombs and causing damage. Fortunately only one person was injured. From the far left, they were protesting about the building of a new prison. What is shocking, besides the violence of the attack, was the way that the protest had been highly organised.

Olivier had come home for the weekend so I knew that he was safe and sound. Or was he? On Saturday evening he went into town with some friends on their bikes, which they normally do if they know that they will be drinking. I know, bikes can be lethal too when mixed with alcohol. They park them just outside the police station, so that they are well guarded. Somehow he managed to loose his phone. We tried phoning him to see if we could locate it, but the battery was flat. He spent Sunday afternoon organising a new one. Fortunately he was almost at the end of his contract. Thanks to the internet he can pick the new phone up from a shop in Poitiers during the week.

He remembered to take his alarm clock back with him. If he misses lectures he will lose his ‘grant’.

Tuesday

Time to take up the treatment of the veins in my legs again. I really messed up the buses. I looked at the weekend and holiday timetable so I got off one bus only to see the connection disappearing into the distance; I had plenty of time so I walked; it was a lovely hot day. We don’t have many hills around here, just the one I had to walk up to get to the clinic. It was a very hot day by the time I arrived. The doctor told me that her secretary shouldn’t have made any appointments for legs yet, it’s too hot, so she just did a few little veins…

I don’t like waiting for buses, so I usually look at the timetable and walk to the next stop. I though it was a safe option as there wasn’t another bus for 20 minutes at least. The bus was running late and passed me halfway between the twp stops so I had to walk all of the way back again. It was still hot.

I was shattered when I got in. We walk a lot but not usually in the heat.

During the evening I stubbed my toe on the wine rack in the corridor. It’s been there for years, why now? Also I don’t walk around in bare feet anymore as my dad had a toe amputated. I have a very painful and fast turning blue toe. I suppose as long as it’s painful it means it’s ‘okay’

On Friday I’m off for my annual visit to the Swedish chef. That’s a car journey, I just hope it starts….

Wonderful Weekend

I really had the most wonderful weekend. It was my birthday on Saturday. We had to go to Tours for an auction viewing, so going somewhere different was a treat in itself. My heart sank a little as we left the station to look for somewhere to have lunch. All that we could see were fast-food restaurants. Fortunately we found a little brasserie and had a lovely meal. Then we spent an agreeable 2 hours looking at postcards. We went to our expert’s shop(yes the shop front really does look like that and the website doesn’t do it justice). If you ever go to Tours you most look it up in Rue Michelet; A real Aladdin’s cave of treasures. We didn’t have much time to explore the town. The area around the station reminded me of Birmingham, but I’m told there are some historical streets

I was quite happy going home on the train with my book, but we had to wait an hour for a taxi when we got back to La Rochelle. Quite a few drunks, but only a danger to themselves when and if they fell over.

Dom and J-M came for the weekend and so did Olivier in the end. Dom and J-M cooked Sunday lunch, steak in pepper sauce and they made an amazing lemon pie (are you reading this Nicky?) with a crushed Speculoos (little cinnamon biscuits) base. We were glad they all went home so that we could finish it off on Monday evening.

I also had some lovely cards. My sister made me a beautiful card, hand painted with sweet peas on it.