One of life's mysteries

A couple of weeks ago I had to pick up something that I’d ordered online. As our local shop was on holiday I went to the florists in the next village. There was quite a queue, mainly people picking up parcels – not buying flowers. I didn’t mind waiting amongst the flowers and the plants.

Then I realized, I couldn’t smell the scent of a single flower! Is it because they are grown in poly-tunnels or do they just sell flowers with no perfume nowadays?

How do I....?

How do I get a little button so that people can like my posts on Facebook too?  I see that some people have a row of buttons at the bottom of each post.  Where do you get them from?

I'm finding it very difficult to take a selfie with my clever phone.  As I turn the phone around, I can't see where to click.  Sometimes I get a voice telling me that they can't answer that question.  What's that called and how do I really get to it so that I can ask a real question?  My phone is a Nokia Lumia 530.

A busy weekend

Dom and J-M came for the weekend. It’s the first time that they have driven here so on Saturday afternoon they invited me out with them. We went to Brouage which is a fortified village which was once close to the sea. It was a holiday so there were lots of tourists milling a round as there are craft and gift shops and there was a market. It was very pleasant. On the way home we stopped at Rochefort-sur-Mer. I’ve been their several times but only in the shopping streets. We went to see the Corderie royal (where the cordage for French ships was made – a very long building) and the arsenal and wondered around the grounds and other buildings which had been built by the military. It was beautiful, the chestnut trees especially reminded me of England. Both of these were designed at some point by Vauban who seems to have created fortifications in just about every part of France. One of Dom’s old school friends, Q, came with us. He told us a lot about the buildings. His father is an architect so I can imagine Q being shown all of these places as he was growing up. He was a good guide and as he’s spend time in Sweden And Norway has an amazing accent when he speaks English. My voice was disappearing as we were on our way home. I hope I didn’t talk too much.

This evening they’ve driven off and I waved until they went round the corner out of site. It’s quiet and the house seems so empty now. Olivier will be here on Tuesday. The year since last September has gone so quickly.

Dom asks if any of my readers (!) can recommend places to see and things to do in Chicago

Which laptop?

Olivier is trying to choose a laptop. He can afford one after working all summer, but he’s agonising over which one. Most of his friends aren’t too helpful because their parents have paid for theirs, so they don’t see the problem from the same perspective. He doesn’t want one that is too big as he will be travelling with it and taking it to lectures, etc. He doesn’t want a really small one either. He wants to have a coupe of games on it just in case. After sales is important to him after taking his ipod back three times before they gave him a new one.

What kind of laptop did you choose? Why? Are you satisfied with it?

Eyebrows and mystery birds

For the last twelve months or so my eyebrows have been thinning dramatically. I haven’t been near them with tweezers. Around Christmas Dom asked me why I’d plucked them so thin – that’s how bad they are. All I could find on Google was a link with thyroid problems. Well my thyroid hasn’t functioned for nearly 15 years now so they would have dropped out long ago. Has anyone any ideas why this should happen, what I can do to make them come back again?

The mystery birds have set up home in the roof just above the French widows so when I open the shutters first thing in the morning I get a real telling off. The bird that I see, the male I suppose, is about the size of a sparrow, reddish brown with dull orange undertail feathers which he flashes at me in warning. He then sits by the roses and ‘tuts’ at me until I go away. I tried the RSPB’s excellent bird identifier and found nothing. Perhaps he doesn’t visit the UK?

Question of the week
What would you say to someone who leaves the car engine running while he is putting bottles etc. the recycling bins?