SURVIVE FRANCE

New Year, New You!

2012-01-09T07:26:00.000-08:00

We all know that this is the time of year when we're probably carrying a few surplus pounds from the Christmas excesses....

So we are delighted to bring you, entirely free of charge, the ultimate SFN New Year, New You 6 Week Diet, Detox and Fitness Plan! Follow this diet and workout regime and we GUARANTEE you will lose weight, tone up and improve your stamina levels!

The first step is to break your leg. I KNOW this sounds drastic but trust me, it is a key part of the plan. If you can't bear to break your own leg, get a friend or family member to do it for you. But do make sure you have appropriate health cover in place before starting. We wouldn't want you caught with a large bill now would we?

Once your leg has been broken and you are in plaster, you will be pretty immobile for at least the first ten days. This is the Intensive Attack stage when you will burn fat from sheer misery and pain. You will be on fairly strong painkillers (if you've got any sense) and these will make you so dozy, you simply forget to eat. Simple huh?

You will also no longer be able to drink. Even if you fancy mixing the painkillers with a few cocktails, being pissed in charge of a pair of crutches simply DOES NOT WORK. Trust me. So just think of all those calories you will be saving!

From week two onwards, any hunger cravings are easy to deal with by remembering that anything you do eat or drink, will eventually, necessitate a trip to the toilet. As this entails hobbling there on said crutches and then attempting NOT to fall into the loo whilst balanced on one leg, it is both a deterrent and a good physical workout. Clench those leg muscles!!

You might have seen other diets suggesting that you stick messages on the fridge door saying things like Do You Really Need To Open Me?, I'm Not Going To Give In! I Don't Want Another Slice Of Cake and so on. Here at SFN Towers, we have a far more effective solution. Dig the floor out to a depth of 80 cm and then control access to the kitchen via three breeze blocks. Only those who have been on crutches for several weeks will be able to manage this type of obstacle so any snack cravings are easily overcome!

Obviously diet alone is not enough. You need to improve fitness levels too and trust me, crutches will help. Operating them is a full body work out and you'll find you have arms like Madonna in no time. Make sure you also exercise buttock and stomach muscles. The easiest way to do this is to attempt to go up and down the stairs, at least twice a day, on your backside with one leg stuck out in front of you. Excellent for those abs!

We hope you enjoy the plan, do let us know how you get on and Happy Hopping!!

'Tis the season to be jolly - or not....

2012-01-04T04:52:00.000-08:00

I'd planned to write an amusing second part to my last post. One where I would regale you with amusing tales of fighting through the crowds to source the finest fresh produce for our Christmas feast. Alas, it was not to be.

We decided to take the kids to the ski slopes on the 24th. The idea was that those that wanted to could ski and those that didn't, could go sledging and chuck snowballs around. The skiers duly buggered off and the rest of us went walking. A good time was had by all until after lunch, when we decided to go sledging.

It was still going well until I decided to get on the sledge with Tilly. Even then, it might have been ok had my youngest daughter not decided to do 'extreme' sledging and go as fast as possible. The inevitable happened. We hit the safety barrier, which did admittedly prevent me from going over the edge of the mountain, Bridget Jones style, but unfortunately meant my leg went one way and the rest of me another.

Result - one broken mummy.

So I'm typing from the sofa with my leg encased in plaster. On the days when I'm working, the long suffering Mr.H has to chauffeur me from A to B, make me sandwiches and make sure I have my hat, scarf and gloves to hand. It all feels a bit like being five again.

Still, I did get out of cooking over Christmas and New Year. The downside was that I also got out of drinking. You simply cannot be pissed in charge of a pair of crutches. Trust me, it does not work.

So when I write a feature entitled "Your Christmas Countdown - Ten Top Tips For a Stress Free Holiday" - I will of course be emphasising the following:

Do Not Go Skiing

Make Sure You Don't Plan To Do Last Minute Food Shopping On The 24th As You May Be In Hospital

The Same Goes For Buying Champagne Glasses - Bubbly Can Lose Its Sparkle When Served In Chipped Tumblers

and finally

Choose Your Houseguests Carefully - luckily mine were stars and happy to do a ten day stint of cooking, laundry and housework - it could have been far worse!

Christmas In France - Part 1 -Tis the season to be jolly.....

2011-12-17T05:58:00.000-08:00

Given the weather today, this post ought to be re-titled, "Tis the season to huddle by the fire and refuse to venture outside" - and whilst this is fine for the cats, who are doing just that, it won't help me finish my Christmas shopping.

This year I am, even by my disorganised standards, going for a new world record in Catharine Fails To Get Christmas Under Control. Not a single card has been written or sent, I'm missing various presents for various people and I haven't even thought about what we are going to eat.

I really do not want to have to go out looking for Christmas gifts on a Saturday when the shops will be full of people panic buying foie gras, reserving oysters and stockpiling their own body weight in traditional French Christmas food, but given the week ahead, needs must.

I am working on Monday, helping friends move house on Tuesday, have various meetings on Wednesday and doing the airport run on Thursday, this leaves me Friday. Christmas Eve is out in terms of shopping; due to yet another planning failure on my part. It is the small son's birthday and trailing round the shops is not his idea of birthday fun. His sister's birthday is on the 26th December so I should by now, have sourced cards, presents and birthday cakes. And of course, I haven't.

The only option is to scoot out this afternoon and belt round the local supermarket and hope that some of their idee cadeau stickers will inspire me. The stickers always crack me up. They seem to be applied completely randomly. You see them on toiletry gift sets, hairdryers and over-sized boxes of chocolates. That I get, but a net for your swimming pool? I would have thought that if you have a pool, you can probably afford to buy a net and besides, would you really want the leaves to build up until December when some kindly Aunt provided you with one? And how the hell would you gift wrap it?

Still, it could be worth buying a net or a broom, simply for the amusement value provided by watching the school kids who are inside the supermarket on 'wrapping' detail, struggling to gift wrap the thing. The kids are usually (allegedly) collecting money for their school trip. I know the kids who are 'wrapping' in our local store and the only trips they are interested in are of the hallucinogenic kind.

But gift wrapping in stores is a long-held French tradition and a great time saver. Unless you happen to be in the queue behind the lady who has bought multiple, fragile items and wants them all wrapped beautifully and separately. And you just want to pay and get out of there because your packet of A4 paper is not a cadeau. You just require it for your printer. Urgently.

It also makes your own attempts at wrapping look rubbish in comparison. And it makes buying wrapping paper very expensive. People do so little of their own wrapping that shops charge a premium for tiny rolls of paper. I thought I had struck lucky the other day when I found a 7m roll with a swirly gold pattern at a reasonable price. When I got it home I discovered that the swirly gold pattern only covered a tiny proportion of the roll. The rest was see through and it was actually designed for wrapping floral bouquets. As Max is getting Lego not lilies, this is a bit of an issue. Kind of spoils it when you can see your presents through the wrapping paper. And not really the kind of thing Santa would do.

So I'm going to go for it, brave the thunder and the hail, run to the shops, buy a random selection of bizarre items, get them wrapped by the surly adolescents, come home, pour myself an extremely large drink and refuse to panic about the Christmas Menu. Until at least the 23rd...

How was your morning?

2011-12-16T02:36:00.000-08:00

Mine went something like this:

5.30 - alarm goes off. Feel slightly resentful, pissed off and like I haven't had quite enough sleep. No change there then.

5.35 - Get up, stagger downstairs, poke fire and go to let the puppy out.
Puppy decides that outside is dark and scary and thus it would be better if I went with her. Put wellies and coat on over pyjamas and stagger outside.
Puppy decides that it is still too dark and scary to do a wee unless I take her for a walk up the garden.
I decide that I need tea in order to do this so we return to the house. Puppy promptly wees on the floor.

5.45 - Have shower and realise that I look somewhat raddled. Hastily apply a good dollop of Ultra Lifting Serum. Emerge from bathroom and find puppy has nearly chewed through the 5 litre box of red that is on the bottom shelf. Remove wine box, milk cartons and two bottles of washing up liquid that are also on the bottom shelf. Place out of puppy's reach. Wash hands and smear face and neck with Daily Smoothing and Firming Creme.

6 am - Begin attempting to wake children.

6.05 - Continue attempting to wake children.

6.10 - Repeat at five minute intervals.

6.20 - Shout at children.

6.25 - Hear scrabbling, discover puppy is digging up floor and has got as far as the insulation. Cover up all evidence with six pack of fizzy water and decide to face the wrath of Mr. H later.
Apply Brightening Eye Cream to bags under eyes.

6.40 - Referee at breakfast table. Children arguing over who gets last croissant. Croissants had been bought as a treat in an attempt to be Nice Mummy. Resolve not to do so again, shout at children and me it clear that I am Bad, Evil Mummy.

6.50 - Take puppy outside for another wee whilst simultaneously massaging Instant Miracle Day Cream into face and neck, before locking self in bathroom and attempting to blow dry hair. Emerge when I hear yelling and assume that the croissant debate has become physical. Discover that the yelling is being done by Mr. H who has found the puppy chewing on the water pipe. Hastily erect barricade involving two metal boxes and a gas bottle in front of water pipe before puppy can continue and flood the house.

7am - Realise that hair has been left damp for too long and I now look like a spaniel who has been in the river. Give up on hair and instead apply Detoxing Tinted Moisturiser. Find a random tube of Calming and Soothing All Day Long cream. Am tempted to try it on toast.

7.05 - Yell at eldest and youngest children to put coats and shoes on.

7.10 - Leave house, insert children into car, collect neighbour's child, drop two off at the bus stop and take youngest to the garderie.

7.30 - Return home and mainline caffeine.

7.40 - Realise it is too wet for middle child to walk to bus stop so take her too.

7.45 - Go to work. Phew!

Shabby Chic

2011-12-01T06:29:00.001-08:00

When I sold my semi-detached in the UK, the agents described it as "boasting" a French Farmhouse Style Kitchen. Even at the time this made me snigger. I was fully aware that the style was more Aspirational Surrey Housewife.

We had the ubiquitous Belfast sink, the hand-made pine cupboards, the beech worktops, the copper saucepans, a quantity of Le Creuset cookware, a load of Emma Bridgewater style crockery and of course, the 'flagstone effect' floor.

Nearly a decade later and having lived in more than a few (real) French farmhouses, I am perfectly placed to bring you the Ultimate Guide To Creating An Authentic French Country Look.

So here is my ten point plan and style guide....

1. First of all forget about the units. A real French Farmhouse Kitchen (or FFK for short) contains only a sink, a cooker, a table, a couple of badly installed shelves and some sort of old cupboard / come sideboard / come wardrobe. Having cleared the room of all but these items, you can turn your attention to the next issue - lighting.

2. Forget about down-lighters / up-lighters / task lighting or any other such trendy terms. What you need here is a single bulb dangling in the middle of the room. This has one great advantage; you will never notice just how filthy the place is. However, you can go for an even more traditional look and install a couple of florescent tubes. Make sure that one of the bulbs is permanently, nearly, about to go for that really authentic 'flickering' light effect.

3. Flooring is always an important part of any makeover. Hopefully your FFK will have those small, (public toilet style) square tiles in shades of grey, brown and black. Don't worry about the odd missing one - or that fact that they come up by the handful when you hoover - that's just part of the charm!

4. If not, you'll need to come up with another authentic design solution. I'm still working on this.

5. Next the sink. No trendy plain white, ceramic butlers sinks here - head off to the nearest DIY store and pick up a brown number. You will also be able to get a matching brown mixer tap. Luckily these are still being manufactured along with green bathroom suites. I have even seen a 'cammo' effect toilet. Ideal for the downstairs cloakroom in a household where Monsieur likes to faire la chasse.

6. There are only really two choices when choosing a cooker, wood or gas. A wood fired stove will keep you chained in front of it day and night, desperately trying to stoke it with enough of the local forest to make yourself a cup of tea. Equally, there is no substitute for that authentic French lifestyle moment when you realise you have run out of gas again, it is Sunday evening, there is nowhere to buy gas within 300 miles and the potatoes are only half cooked. Do make sure you install the gas bottles somewhere outside; they only ever need changing in a hailstorm and again, this is all part of the experience.

7. The table. You probably have something that is made of pine and quite tasteful. Chop it up, put it in the new wood fired cooker and find yourself a 1970's monstrosity. The table should ideally have metal legs and a red or yellow abstract pattern on the top. If the top is not hideous enough, you can buy plastic table coverings by the yard at any local supermarket.

8. Now for the shelves and cupboard! Ideally you will have inherited some from the previous owners. If not any troc, vide-grenier or the like will produce something that really ought to be chopped up for firewood but will look just oh so perfect in your new FFK. Make sure you line the shelves with some sticky-back plastic, preferably in a floral design. If you are really going for it, cut some scallop shaped trim as well!

9. Now the room is really taking shape - you just need to add the finishing touches. Mail order catalogues (the kind you get through the door featuring grey haired women wearing see through plastic rain bonnets) are a great help. You'll be able to find beaded fly curtains, clocks with kittens on the hands which 'mieow' on the hour, plus apero sets which promise to 'amaze and amuse' your guests. We are sure they will.

10. And last but not least, hang the fly papers!

2011-11-07T02:51:00.001-08:00

2011-11-07T00:24:00.000-08:00

Yes folks, the world's worst blogger is back again. I really don't know what I do with my time. Note to self - must stop lying on the sofa, painting toe nails and drinking gin of an afternoon. Anyone would think I was working, running a household and attempting to discipline three (slightly out of control), children. Oh yes and run a network.
Talking of the network, yet again we've had someone purporting to 'hate' Survive France. This I find slightly bizarre. I can understand those who haven't yet visited the site, being initially bemused by the name, but hatred?
The SF network is a community of over 3000 people. How can you hate an entire sector of society? That's like saying "I hate Buddhists" or I hate black people" - weird.
We called the network 'Survive France' for numerous reasons, most of which, most of, our members get. Above all it is, wait for it, tongue in cheek. Yes we might bang on about crap customer service, Ryan Air and missing Marmite, but most of us do know that we are actually only across the channel, and not in downtown Baghdad. Repeated missives from the RSI may be incredibly annoying but not quite as life threatening as incoming mortar fire.
On the upside, the name does act as a firewall. Those that don't 'get' it, generally don't sign up. And trust me, this is a good thing. There are more than enough nice, interesting people in the world. I for one don't want to be surrounded by unpleasant, negative, judgmental morons in either my real or virtual life.

2011-10-10T00:11:00.000-07:00

At ten past six this morning I found myself wringing out Mr. H's string vests. They had been soaking in a bucket of bleach (due to his penchant for dribbling pizza down his front) and it all felt very 1930's housewife.

Actually a lot of my lifestyle is very 1930's housewife. This is what happens when you try to 'live the dream' without quite enough cash to make it happen. Or maybe it is just rural France? I'm sure that if we lived in a city, I wouldn't spend my time making sure that we had a ready supply of candles in case of power cuts, or getting up at half five to light the fire before the kids come down in the mornings.

Aah yes, the fire. Or more to the point, the wood. Every summer as we sit outside, sipping a glass of chilled white wine, we forget the horrors of "faireing" le bois. It's a bit like childbirth. Instead we enthuse away about how warm, cost effective and environmentally friendly our heating system is. After all, how many people are lucky enough to have their own supply of wood? Come the autumn, we light the stove and spend Day 1 basking in the glow of a real fire. Day 2 sees me getting a bit pissed off with the amount of ash and dust around the place. By Day 3, the novelty is wearing thin and by Day 4, I am sick and tired of tripping over the two dogs and three cats who have draped themselves all over the sitting room floor and are snoring happily.

Then comes the horror of yet more chopping, splitting and stacking as we realise that we have already consumed a weeks worth of wood and that what's left won't see us through until the weekend. By the time we have hauled in enough wood to last for another week, we are dripping with sweat, the house seems far too hot and we resort to opening the windows - poor man's air conditioning and slightly counter productive.

So this year we will be doing things differently. I have found a nice man who will deliver wood that is ready chopped and split. It comes on a pallet, wrapped in plastic and all we have to do is carry it inside. Bliss. Now all I need to do is stop Mr. H from dribbling pizza down his front. And persuade the dogs that sleeping in their baskets will not result in instant frostbite. Success is unlikely on both counts.

Advertising for Idiots or "la pub pour les nuls"

2011-09-26T06:49:00.000-07:00

Until we launched the SF network, I knew nothing about advertising. I mean zero, zilch, nada. Really absolutely nothing. This was in spite of having previously worked in Marketing. Mind you, that was back in the days when client details were stored in card indexes and the only person with a PC which 'did' graphics was the 'designer' and my, how we used to spend hours staring at her screen saver. It moved and everything.

Since then I've moved on a bit. And since SFN really took off, I've had to hit the ground running. Whilst I'm no expert, I've learnt a fair bit along the way and I thought it would be useful to share my findings with my less, ahem, technologically aware friends...

Setting up any new business is hard and getting a small business off the ground in France with all the attendant complications, is harder still. Clearly your business needs to advertise but the last thing you need is to waste your hard earned cash.

So what do you need to be aware of?Obviously you are going to make sure that the site is geared towards the kind of people you want to target. You also need to check that those people are actually visiting the site. Don't take the site owner's word for it, because, wait for it, people tell lies. Sad but true. In the same way that any reputable breeder will show you the puppy with its mother, so too will any honest site owner be more than happy to show you their stats. And if they aren't, that should ring alarm bells. You can check out SFN stats here and if you are interested in advertising with us, you can do so here.

Be very wary of any claims such as "We are in the top 1% on Google". You probably already know of all the sites that are. Think Viamichelin, Natwest, SNCF, Sony etc. These sites are highly unlikely to be offering you discounted advertising for your dog food import business for the next six months....

Equally, stay clear of any client testimonials which say things like "We couldn't believe it when we googled ourselves and found we were number 1!" Well yes, if you google your own company with the correct web address you will be. This doesn't mean anyone searching for you without that correct address is going to find you. That is quite different...

Then you need to watch out for so-called social media experts. Ten years ago customer service assistants called Clive, crossed the channel and reinvented themselves as general builders. This was because they needed something to do and they had once installed a deck and exterior lighting at their sister's house in Bracknell. (Apologies in advance to anyone reading this, called Clive, who is a registered builder and from Bracknell.) These days Clive and their ilk are all transforming themselves upon arrival in France, into web designers and social media experts. The phenomena is such that I suspect that there is a special room on the cross channel ferries where you can go and get yourself teleported, Dr. Who style, into a whole new career.

If you want help in this area, go with someone like Nikki Pilkington - who has a track record and knows what they are doing. Nikki is well worth following on FB or Twitter and always has some useful insights to offer.

Ok, so there is a whole lot more than this to be said on the subject and hopefully, this post will trigger some useful debate, but the main point I wanted to make is Caveat Emptor or Buyer Beware!

Six months on....

2011-06-10T02:08:00.000-07:00

As my last post was about "le gastro" and as it is now, ahem, six months on, you could be forgiven for imagining that the entire famille Higginson had succumbed to this season's version of the Black Death. Happily this was not the case and I have merely been aiming for the much coveted award of "World's Worst Blogger"; as no such award has been forthcoming, I have given myself a kick up the bum and started blogging again.
I do have an excuse in the shape of the network which becomes busier by the day and takes up a huge amount of time. The children also seem to become ever more demanding as they get older. Long gone are the (blissful) days of dispatching them to bed by 8 and collapsing with a glass of wine. These days it's all about taxi services, their social lives and going to bed earlier than them. And I'm sure it's only going to get worse. In fact, last night I found myself drinking cocoa. Not hot chocolate but cocoa. We've also recently bought a windbreak so I'm definitely en route for middle age. Slippers have long been a part of my life and we're not talking cool, designer slippers here either. Just the warmest and cheapest that the local supermarket can provide. Anyone living in an un-renovated house in rural France will relate to the slipper wearing. Any aversions to looking like an old granny fly are swiftly put aside when there is a howling gale blowing around your ankles. I'll let you know when I get a pipe.

Another week another gastro

2011-01-08T03:42:00.000-08:00

So the holidays are over and it is back to school. This means that once more, the Higginson household is at the mercy of all the various bugs that are circulating throughout the country. I’d never had many stomach upsets until I moved to France. The French like to blame the water quality but I have my doubts. After all, we live in Dax not downtown Dakar. I think it has more to do with the French attitude to personal hygiene. They love to talk about ‘l’hygiene de la vie,’ but seem less keen to put any of the suggested measures into practice.
Their attitude to washing is at best, ambivalent. This is the country that brought you the 48 hour deodorant, and the self-deodorising shirt, after all. Yet, in the smallest pharmacy in the smallest village, there will be a huge display of products devoted to washing your ‘bits.’ There is even a new product geared specifically towards girls under ten. The manufacturers suggest that after your daughter has been on a swing or played in a sandpit, any self respecting maman should scoop up said child, remove them to the nearest toilet and wash their bits. Given the state of most public French toilets, I would have thought that you’d be more likely to catch the Black Death than find running water to wash in, but hey, if an expert has suggested this as a course of action, it must be the right thing to do. Go round any French supermarket and along with the piped in smells of fresh baguette, you will also catch the unmistakable whiff of unwashed farmer. Yum. And it’s not just the older generation. My 19 year old next door neighbour never leaves the house without full hair and make up but she often, to put it bluntly, smells. Personally I would go lighter on the slap and a bit heavier on the soap and water.
The water is probably key. Maybe years of metering have left the French reluctant to use it for anything other than essentials - washing the cow and making calvados. In any case, most French school toilets are sadly lacking on the soap and water front. Even the kids orthodontist, has a toilet for the patients to use, complete with no sink. I only hope the orthodontist himself has separate facilities. As we all know, small children are walking germ factories, so putting a loo with no basin in an environment where they are very likely to shove the fingers in their mouths to check out their new braces, seems utterly nuts. But hey, I’m a British mum and I have never dragged my kids off the swings to wash their bits, so what would I know?
So this winter, we will be doing what we can to combat le gastro. I will fill my hip flask with calvados and keep it about my person. It doubles up as smelling salts (to overcome the whiff of unwashed farmer) and acts as an instant hand sanitiser.

Christmas - A la Francais ou tres British - you choose.....

2010-12-24T12:47:00.001-08:00

Yes folks, it’s that time of the year again….The season of goodwill towards all men, except of course, your French neighbours and their incessantly barking hunting dogs. So with another year gone by, just how “Frenchified” have you become? Are you clinging to your “Britishness” with increasing desperation? Are you still hoping to integrate or have you given up and gone native? Take our Christmas quiz and find out!

1. When do you put your Christmas decorations up?
A) Around the middle of December and they are always down by Twelfth night.
B) The entire house is covered with flashing lights and abseiling Santa’s hang from the first floor windows by December 1st. They are taken down at some point before Easter.
C) You’re still stabbing yourself on holly leaves for the home made door wreath but the hanging Santa has been up for some weeks now.

2. On Christmas Eve, you will be:
A) Putting out mince pies and sherry for Santa and sprinkling ‘reindeer food’ (oats) on the lawn.
B) Heading for the in-laws where there will be a sit down meal for 18 and praying that Uncle Louis won’t get his false teeth stuck in the buche again this year.
C) Having an apero with the neighbours at the “Chien et Canard”, before heading to the Carols by Candlelight service (in aid of a local cat charity) and returning to stuff the kids stockings.

3. Which of the following best describes your household on Christmas day?
A) Dad will be making smoked salmon and scrambled eggs (served with croissants - bien sur!), whilst Mum makes a special Christmas breakfast for all the pets, including the guinea pigs, before cooking Christmas lunch.
B) You’ll be trying to deal with your six year twin old nephews (their mother is sensibly still in bed) Jean-Philipe and Jean-Paul. They ate their combined body weight in chocolate the night before and are now using their new archery set to fire at your toddler. You are also worried about their older brother Jean-Marc who has been given a crossbow. And has disappeared.
C) Having stayed at the “Chien et Canard” a little too long (and missed most of the Carol service as a result), you then drank a bottle of champers whilst filling the stockings. As a result, the children are all complaining that ‘Father Christmas brought me the wrong things’, so you resort to a hair of the dog.

4. For Christmas day, you are going to eat:
A) Turkey and all the trimmings, followed by Christmas pudding, Christmas cake and a large box of Quality street. All of which will have been delivered by a UK shopping delivery service.
B) You are never going to eat again. Apart from the hangover, the volume of foie gras consumed the night before, means that you will need to chain smoke until mid-February to stand any chance of regaining your usual weight.
C) Oysters, a goose (organic of course) served with sprouts and roast parsnips. Followed by a buche au chocolat - which will turn out to be the single most disgusting thing you have ever eaten. Apart of course, from the Andouillette you were once served in a local restaurant, which looked exactly like a penis.

5. On Boxing day, you will be:
A) Going for a brisk walk, before coming home to turkey sandwiches.
B) Unchaining the three hunting dogs for their annual run. They will then (very sensibly) use the opportunity to stretch their legs properly and disappear until mid-February.
C) Plan to take the children to fly their new kites, realise the house is surrounded by men with shotguns and spend the afternoon on Facebook instead.

Your score:
Mostly A’s - Either you haven’t been in France for very long or you are determined to retain your British spirit. Jolly well done you!
Mostly B’s - It sounds like you have gone native. There is no known cure for this, so you might as well embrace your inner Frog and sneer at the rest of the world.
Mostly C’s - You are making a valiant effort to integrate whilst retaining your national identity. Just make sure you don’t go too far and start taking Johnny Hallyday seriously.

Snug as a bug

2010-12-22T03:51:00.000-08:00

After our ‘set-building’ exploits of last week, home improvements have carried on at a pace in the Higginson household. The sitting room has been transformed and given what interior designers might term, ‘A warm and cosy log cabin feel’ theme. Yes, we have brought most of the stock of firewood inside and used it to decorate the room. We got sick of lugging it inside on a daily basis, and stacked across all the most draughty areas, it acts as an extra layer of insulation. Charming and effective. There is the slight problem of the abundance of insect life that now slithers out of the wood piles, but as we haven’t yet found a hibernating snake, I’m not too worried. It was also a useful trick for dealing with teenage tantrums. They’d spent Saturday morning squabbling so a few hours spent lugging wood in, soon knocked that on the head. There’s only so many times you can ‘accidentally’ swipe your sibling with a log before it gets boring and you decide that teamwork is the better option.
Heating your home with wood is all very well. Yes, it’s ‘green’ and yes, log fires are delightful, but it’s incredibly hard work. You have to chop it, stack it, move it and resign yourself to the fact that your house will be permanently coated in a fine layer of dust until the spring. Going out and leaving the stove is a trauma. You need to ensure that the fire is going at exactly the optimum temperature if you want to stand any chance of returning to a house that is even vaguely warm. And being the first one up in the morning is dire. At 6 am every day, I find myself raking embers and feeling like a Victorian scullery maid. Oh for the days of gas fired central heating!
Washing has become an endurance sport. The bathroom is so cold that undressing is an exercise in self-discipline. On the upside, the days of the teenage girls lingering in there for hours are gone. They’ve got showering down to a five minute art and if there was a ‘Taking your clothes off as fast as possible’ category in the Olympics, our kids would win. The same goes for using the loo, which is effectively outside. It’s not the kind of place where you retreat with the Sunday papers. It’s also directly visible from the road, so as you emerge, you get to wave ‘Hello’ at the neighbours. Nice. Still, as I always tell the kids, living like this is ‘Character Forming.’ This worked when they were smaller and less inclined to answer back but these days, they just look at me witheringly. And then threaten to include the worst excesses of family life in their memoirs. Writing about them has become a poisoned chalice. They are now only too aware of the power of the press and I am nervously awaiting the day when I open a newspaper to find that one of them is writing a column entitled ‘Living with Mother’ - no doubt I will be portrayed as some slightly demented ex-pat, who ruined their childhood by insisting they spend every weekend carrying logs inside.

Gum boots and Heels

2010-12-13T00:55:00.001-08:00

It’s been a relatively calm week in the Higginson household. Only one car broke down. Only three extra teenagers were found asleep in various corners of the house on Friday night. The pony didn’t escape and eat the neighbours hanging baskets. I didn’t get summoned to school to discuss anyone’s behaviour and I only received two demands for payment from officious French government departments. I even managed to get a fair amount of work done. All in all, things were swinging along pretty well, until I suddenly realised that having offered to be a case study for a fellow journalist, the paper in question was going to require photos. Now being married to a photographer, you would imagine that this is not a huge issue, but when the paper in question requests a ‘Nice looking background’ and you live in the “Hovel from Hell,” this can be a little tricky.
As it has been raining for about six weeks, there was no way that we could rely on the sun shining and doing the “I’m living the dream in France” shot. If you took any pictures in our garden at the moment, the result would be more of a “I’m really interested in WW1 and have recreated my own trenches” shot. Most of the interior of the house would be perfect if you were shooting a feature on squalid living conditions in former Soviet states, But it doesn’t really cut it as a nice backdrop. So we did the only thing possible and built a backdrop. We selected one end of the main room and Mr. H spent the weekend building a stud wall and and plaster-boarding. A few coats of paint later and with the addition of a newly built bookshelf, a rug and a suitably French enamel sign, we had our backdrop.
Then there remained the slight problem of my outfit. The request was for a smart frock and heels. Does anyone renovating a property in France wear heels? I think I last wore a pair about three years ago for my brother’s wedding and even then, I had to borrow them from a friend. Unfortunately most of my friends in these parts are also renovating houses or run farms, therefore gum boots or clogs tend to be the footwear of choice. Even if I wanted to buy a pair, that would prove tricky. Boutique French shoe shops are full of highly desirable designer efforts, with price tags to match. The out of town shopping mall type stores, only seem to cater for small children or prostitutes. I have never yet found anything I would consider wearing in one of these shops. Last winter, I searched in vain for a pair of boots that didn’t make me look like Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman. In the end I gave up and wore wellies. As I write the hunt is still on for an acceptable pair of heels. I have a 48 hour window to find a pair, so at the moment, wellies and a lot of work in photo-shop is looking like the best option.

Class struggles at Lycee

2010-12-05T04:10:00.000-08:00

There’s been a lot of talk about lycee reform in the last few months, but for us, the biggest change has been having to get out of bed at some unearthly hour. Since the eldest started lycee last September, I’m no longer able to roll out of bed and drive the youngest to school, still wearing my PJ’s, in time for an 8.45 start. I now get up at 5.45 as we all have to be out of the house by ten past seven. The eldest gets on the bus at twenty past whilst poor old Max gets dumped in the garderie. His ‘school’ day ends nearly twelve hours later when I collect him and his sister at 6.45 p.m.. So I’m pretty unsympathetic to his teacher’s demands for homework to be completed on top of that. So too is the nice motherly lady who runs the garderie. She also thinks that the kids shouldn’t be getting that quantity of homework so she makes sure they do it there. As this isn’t part of her job description, I am hugely appreciative and will be giving her a large bottle of something alcoholic at the end of term. I should imagine she will need it by them. I know I will.

A team of inspectors arrived at Daisy’s lycee last week to interview a select group of students, to ask them what they thought about the reforms and how they were working. I use the word select as the students were handpicked by the headmaster. I think he wanted kids who were capable of stringing a sentence together. Daisy was inordinately pleased to be one of the eight out of 2500, who were chosen to meet the inspectors. Then her younger sister pointed out that at this particular lycee, there are only around 30 kids taking the Bac and the rest are training to become bakers, hairdressers or members of the rugby section. These figures are not entirely accurate but Tilly had made her point and Daisy was suitably squashed.

One of the biggest changes this year has been the introduction of “Accompagnement Personalisee” - designed to help students before they fall behind. There’s no syllabus and none of the staff know what they are meant to be doing so they are all using their initiative.....Daisy’s French teacher is teaching the kids about the French press. It transpired that no one in the class except my swotty daughter, knew which papers were left or right wing. Equally, the teacher had no idea that English language papers are published in France, so next week the class will be studying a copy of French Week. In History, the teacher is discussing how much time should be spent of homework and how much on Facebook. The maths teacher is showing the literary section kids how to use the overcomplicated and hugely expensive, graphics calculator that they will never need to use again after this year, whilst the physics teacher is teaching French grammar. I doubt any of this is exactly what Mr. Sarkozy had in mind when he thought this one up.
I asked Daisy how the inspectors reacted to this information and she said they took it all in their stride, until they heard that the English teacher was using the extra time to teach her class about eyesight. In French of course.

The culturally excluded family

2010-11-28T03:50:00.001-08:00

I’ve been accused of many things over the years, but being dense has never been one of them. Until now that is. It turns out that according to Mme. Laborde, the eldest daughter’s SES teacher or ‘prof de science economique et sociale,’ as a family we are ‘culturally dense.’ This is because we do not own a television and households without a television, apparently have a higher level of cultural density. Not having a television wasn’t ever a conscious decision on our part. I was never one of those middle class mothers who preferred to do cutting and sticking with their offspring. On the contrary, mine were plonked in front of C Beebies as soon as they could focus on the screen. And I don’t honestly think it has done them any harm. The eight year old started reading Suskind’s ‘Perfume’ a few weeks back. He abandoned it after three chapters, declaring that it was too adult for him but not before he’d asked me if his teenage cousin was a young virgin. I said that I really didn’t know and that it was rather a personal question. Mind you, given the teenager in question and his level of personal hygiene, I should think it is quite likely. I can’t imagine many girls want to kiss boys who have to be reminded on a daily basis to clean their teeth.

Getting rid of the television just happened. Our last home was a rented property perched on an exposed hilltop. When the wind got up, everything that wasn’t bolted to the ground blew away. The first few weeks saw us lose a succession of compost bins, plastic ride on tractors and rotary washing lines, all of which ended up in the neighbouring fields. The satellite dish was another casualty until James opted for an installation system that could have survived an earthquake. When we left, the landlord asked to buy the dish for the next tenant and it seemed easier than dismantling James’ handiwork. As our new abode is the renovation project from hell, complete with minor subsidence and major damp, installing a TV never seemed like a priority and a year on, we’ve all got used to life without it. Makes for a far more productive existence too. After all, if you can’t spend the mornings watching Jeremy Kyle, it does mean that you have to find something else to do.

And in the case of the kids, this means reading. They all have their noses permanently buried in a book and something Daisy was reading recently, referred to the difference between an opera and an operetta. She was the one child in her class to know this which only served to confirm Mme. Laborde’s high opinion of us and our cultural density. Should Mme. Laborde ever turn up chez nous, I’m sure she would be sorely disappointed to see that we don’t spend our time playing the violin and painting landscapes. We’re more likely to be found digging drains and pouring concrete.

Don't mention the C word...

2010-11-20T08:17:00.000-08:00

We don’t like the C word in this house. And by that I don’t mean the four letter version, although we don’t like that much either. No, I’m talking about the C word that is more usually associated with reindeer and sleighs. And simply because it always causes arguments. Coming from a family where my mother would ritually threaten to “Cancel Christmas” every year - (she never did to be fair) - I’ve ended up as someone who loves the entire shebang. Carol concerts give me a lump in the throat and small children in nativity plays make me cry. I would happily have the tree up and all the animals wearing tinsel by December 1st. Mr. H is more your “Bah humbug” kind of guy, so every year we have a stand off about what is going to happen and when.

He argues the case for environmental concerns and over consumption of disposable items. In other words, no cards are to be sent or presents bought. I simply ignore him. Which obviously, is not great for marital harmony. But this year, even I have realised that we will have to spend carefully - we simply haven’t got the cash to do otherwise, so no comedy Breton condoms (they really do exist) in the teenagers Christmas stockings. Besides, as I mentioned the other week, the French tax payer is already keeping the teens adequately supplied with contraceptive devices.

So this year we have compromised and agreed that we are going to make presents for each other. Now this is okay for Mr. H who is quite handy with the plane and the lathe (biblical Christmas reference fully intended) but for yours truly - there’s no chance. I am about the least creative soul on the planet. I always recall my first mother in law, asking which crafts and hobbies I enjoyed. “Do you sew Catharine? Make pottery? Knit? Paint? Weave? Play any instruments?” By the time she’d run through the whole gamut of possible leisure activities, with an increasing note of desperation in her voice and realised that I didn’t even ‘bake,’ the death knell had already sounded on our relationship. So I have absolutely no idea, whatsoever, as to what I could produce that anyone might possibly want to receive.

I will probably resort to tokens. These are a staple feature in our household. The idea being, you issue the token and then hope the bearer either loses it, or never gets round to redeeming it. I’ve been doing this for years. I got the idea from my parents who gave me one as a pony mad twelve year old. It said, “This token entitles the bearer to a 14.2h bay gelding.” I was over the moon until I read the typed disclaimer at the bottom - “This item is currently out of stock but the token can be redeemed for a new pair of jeans instead.” They thought it was hilarious. I have remained traumatised but my therapist says I can deal with this by doing the same to my own kids.

At some point the kids might find all their tokens, cash them in and I will be forced to spend an entire fortnight visiting Roman villas, taking them ice-skating and buying seven guinea pigs. In the meantime, I’m just going to give Mr. H a token promising “Not to put tinsel around all the cats collars before December 15th” - yeah right....

Will you be my friend? Let's get married....

2010-11-15T23:23:00.000-08:00

In a household full of teenagers, there is rarely more than five minutes when one of them isn’t on Facebook. The preferred activity is hacking into each other’s profiles and updating the status to something that is seriously uncool. And when they are not doing that, they are busy changing profile names to reflect their latest passions. In the last few weeks, my youngest daughter has changed hers several times. She has been called Tilly Valesca (real names) Whitney Genelle and is now Tilly Valesca Darko. The Genelle is the best friend’s surname and Whitney sounds like a good name for someone who is BSP. Being “BSP” or Blonde, Stupid and Popular is a running joke with her older cousin Charlie (who is also BSP) and who has as a result, changed his Facebook name to Zack Sawyer. Tilly is ‘married’ to her best friend Agathe (who has now renamed herself and adopted Tilly’s surname), and apparently, has five siblings and a 28 day old son. You can imagine the confusion this caused when I tried to set up a family group on Facebook, so that all the ‘real’ family members could stay in touch.

It was much simpler when they were smaller and only wanted to go online to feed and water their virtual pets. Tilly had hundreds of virtual guinea pigs and cared for them beautifully until one year, she got real ones for Christmas. The virtual ones were then left to die. Unfortunately, the same can’t be said for her older sister’s email address. She had used this to sign up to the site. Four years on and Daisy is still muttering about the amount of ‘guinea pig’ generated spam, she receives as a result of Tilly omitting to tick the ‘please don’t pass my address on’ box.

Back in those days, we were still worried about stranger danger and insisted that the computer was in the sitting room and that they were only ‘friends’ with people they physically knew. This meant that we had to listen to lots of dreadful music clips that they were busy posting on their ‘sky rock’ blogs, along with a lot of boring explanations about who was who. Having a sky rock blog or two, was the epitome of cool a couple of years ago. Daisy had about five, all of which are probably still live and using up valuable resources as they are stored in some data centre somewhere. Shocking really.

Interestingly, it was blogging that led to the acquisition of a pen-friend. For the last two years, her and this girl have sent each other letters on an almost weekly basis. They are always hand written and the envelopes beautifully decorated. I was initially suspicious that the pen-friend might be, a 47 year old lorry driver masquerading as a teenage girl but I’ve come to the conclusion that 47 year old lorry drivers don’t generally have a ready supply of glitter and heart shaped stickers in the back of their cabs.

Besides, I would almost feel sorry for anyone who tried to ‘groom’ my two. They are scarily IT literate and think nothing of checking out people’s backgrounds in an MI5 type manner. And if they did find anything untoward, I suspect they would react much like the girl in the film, Hard Candy. You can see why I am scared to ask them to do the washing up....

Who said the French have no entrepreneurial spirit?

2010-11-07T04:42:00.000-08:00

Somehow we have got through half term without me murdering anyone. This was quite some achievement. The plan was for James and I to be in the UK, scoffing fish and chips whilst stockpiling cheddar and Twiglets. We booked my parents to look after the youngest two and were planning to leave the big ones home alone to deal with the animals and generally keep the home fires burning. Strikes and a diesel shortage put paid to our carefully laid plans. So my child free break turned into ten days of us all lurking round the house. For the first week we didn’t really dare go anywhere in case we used up the diesel and couldn’t get any more. Never mind, I thought, lots of healthy walks and pony riding instead. But no, both girls managed to fall off said pony and ended up too stiff to walk, let alone ride. I put my back out and we thus became the house of cripples.

The teenage nephew removed himself from the equation by getting a job. And a proper one at that - complete with paperwork and pay slips. No mean feat for an English teenager with limited French. However, it has meant that he’s been putting in incredibly long hours - he clocked up 78 this week - so I’m quite glad we didn’t leave him in charge of the daughter and the animals. He’s absolutely brain dead from the effort involved in speaking and working in a foreign language and I’m sure we would have returned to the dogs being fed hay in the kitchen and the horses unhappily munching on a bag of Bonio.

Mind you, that’s teenagers full stop. One moment they are highly articulate, responsible young adults, ready to take on a productive role in society and the next minute, they are sprawled on the sofa unable to do anything but grunt. And should you dare comment on this, they will either start screaming and burst into tears (female), or grunt and leave the room (male). In other words, practising full on adult behaviour.

It doesn’t help that they are being allowed / pushed / coerced by society into growing up so quickly. I was quite shocked to discover that the 13 year olds at Daughter Number Two’s school are being given free condoms. In the main, the kids aren’t using them but are stockpiling them for their older siblings. And this year the condoms aren’t the usual bog standard issue, but ribbed, textured, coloured and even flavoured. The increase in product quality seems to be going down a treat (pun fully intended) and apparently there is a permanent queue outside the nurse’s office. I asked the daughter what all these 13 year olds said, when requesting their contraceptive supplies and apparently, there is a stock phrase. You simply tell the nurse that you “want to go a bit further” and she hands them over. Those who are feeling really brave, say they “might want to do it more than once” and are given bulk supplies; I should imagine they are selling the condoms on - I just hope they have registered with the appropriate ‘caisse’ and are not working on the black.....

Strange encounters in the woods..

2010-10-31T04:05:00.000-07:00

When we lived in our previous house, it was an eight mile round trip to our nearest supermarket but driving through the forest, means I could shave nearly three miles off. The track was passable in all but the very worst weather but was full of ruts and pot holes. So I very rarely met other traffic. Although there was one famous occasion when we came across a shagging couple, much to the kids delight.

Another time, I decided to take a different short cut through the same stretch of woodland. I left as dusk was falling and set off home. The forest is quite spooky, even on a sunny day and for some reason, as I turned off the main track and went deeper into the woods, I felt a bit uneasy. I put this down to driving along an unfamiliar track in rapidly fading light. I’d also been reading my daughters collection of vampire novels all weekend. Despite telling myself firmly, not to be so silly, I still felt the need to lock the car doors.

When a man appeared two minutes later, pointing a gun, apparently at me, I nearly shat myself. He was dressed from head to toe in camouflage clothing. This meant that he was more likely to be a hunter than a demented survivalist psychopath, but even so I was slightly freaked out.

He looked surprised too. Maybe he wasn’t expecting some house wife to come tearing past in her Land Rover in the dark. Maybe the local commune had asked him to patrol the area and look out for fornicating couples. Maybe he was hunting small furry animals. But in any case, is it really sensible for hunters to be wandering around the woods in the dark, armed with a potentially lethal weapon?

During last week’s strikes, there was a huge increase in the amount of gunfire coming from the woods behind our house. There was no way I was going to walk the dogs or take the kids out riding. One afternoon we heard what sounded like semi-automatic fire. I can’t even begin to imagine what you might be shooting at, to need a weapon like that. But I suppose it makes hitting the target slightly easier. And given how French men love to spend their Sunday mornings wandering around the countryside, terrifying passing cats, before returning home half pissed and empty handed, it’s probably surprising that there isn’t more machine gun fire to be heard. At least that way, they would be able to triumphantly hand over a corpse and ask their long suffering spouse to cook it for dinner.

One, two, three, four, what are we fighting for?

2010-10-22T01:41:00.000-07:00

So the students took to the streets again this week. Yawn. Half of them had no idea what they were protesting about and were just happy to have a day off. Sunny weather helped and at my daughter’s lycee, they all sat around happily in the sunshine, swapping fags with the teachers and making regular forays to the nearby supermarket for booze and Nutella, essential items for any self respecting student protester. The hardcore protesters took it more seriously. They tended to be the members of the jeunes-socialistes but they too required Nutella butties and alco-pops, to get them through the day.
We live alongside a busy road and noticed that there was far less traffic on the roads this week. From our point of view, this was ‘A Good Thing’. Much less of a good thing was the vast increase in gunshots, in the woods behind the house. Obviously this protest wasn’t so much about striking and taking to the streets as having a day off and taking to the woods to ‘faire la chasse.’ I hope that there is some sort of wildlife bush telegraph so that the rabbits are notified of any future strikes and can retreat to their burrows for the day.
I can’t see the point of protesting about raising the retirement age in any case. After all, its not like we all drop dead at the age of 65 anymore. Society has evolved and healthcare has improved. No one feels the need to have twelve children to ensure that at least a couple of them reach adulthood and I don’t see anyone protesting about that. But the French have never been keen on change (give or take the odd revolution) so any form of modernisation is always greeted with suspicion and apathy.
It’s a bit like the lycee reforms themselves. As my daughter pointed out, they are all great initiatives from the student’s perspectives - extra assistance for students who are struggling and new courses. It’s the staff who are complaining. Probably because they might actually have to get to grips with a new syllabus on their numerous bank holidays, rather than take to the woods and shoot small furry animals.
Mind you, we now look like fully paid up members of the hunting brigade ourselves. The camouflage clothing doesn’t help but James has gone and painted his Land Rover defender in Nato green. It was going to be sold and being very elderly, many of the body panels were different colours. A paint job was a good way to increase the sale price and Nato green was the cheapest colour. He also added a load of military type stickers as stickers are a sure fire winner with the French off-roading brigade. Changed circumstances mean that we are now keeping the thing so when we get in the ‘family car’ for a trip to the shops, it looks like we are planning to invade a small country. God only knows what the neighbours must think.

Caught Red Handed

2010-10-16T02:06:00.000-07:00

Red has been a dominant colour in this household lately. Last week we had the Basque fete wear wedding - red and white clothing was de-rigeur - and this week, I have mainly been making tomato puree. And tomato soup. And tomato coulis. And just about anything else you can think of associated with tomatoes.

This is because I belong to an AMAP, where once a week, I toddle off and get a box of veg, direct from the guy who has grown it. So far it has been fine. We’ve had a summer where our weekly boxes have been overflowing with green beans, salad leaves, leeks, new potatoes, peppers, aubergines and just about anything else nice you can think of. I suspect it is going to be a lot less fun by mid February when I am trying and failing to devise new and interesting things to do with turnips. And the children flatly refuse to eat any more sprouts.

Its been quite interesting meeting and observing the other group members too. There’s one woman who’s a dead ringer for Blackadder’s puritan aunt - the one who appeared in the episode where Percy and Baldrick discover a turnip shaped like a “thingy.” Every week she laughs uproariously at any vegetables that are shaped like “thingy’s” and this week, when she discovered a carrot, that came complete with two testicular shaped lumps, she could hardly contain herself. There was much excitement this week too at the arrival of the first squashes of the season. Because obviously, you can, “faire la soupe avec ca” - yes, well you can also do lots of other things with them too, but hey, the French are nothing if not conservative when it comes to cookery.

The farmer quite likes me - simply because when I request extra veg, I don’t ask for “400g of leeks, but not too thick” - I’m more your “Ten kilos of spuds please” type of girl. So when I spotted that this week, he had crates and crates of very slightly mushy tomatoes, I sensed the opportunity for a bit of a deal and came home with 20 kilos worth. He even threw some in for free, much to the annoyance of the very chic lady who always asks the per kilo price of anything that is available in addition to the weekly box. I think that is verging on the rude. The guy has been out in all weathers growing the stuff, he’s probably had to wee round the edge of his fields to keep the foxes away (or whatever else you have to do when you grow stuff organically), he’s dug it up, put it in his van and turned up, only to be asked “‘les onions, ils sont combien”? I mean really, how much is an onion likely to cost...

So I then had to do something with the bloody things. All was going well until I had to manage the ‘get the sauce from the pan into freezer bags’ stage. By the time I had finished, the kitchen looked like the set from a vampire movie and I looked like most of the vampire cast had dropped by to feed off me. Still, I can recommend tomato and basil sauce as both a hand and facial skin care product and once you have washed it out of your hair, you will find your hair is left shiny and with a smell of summer herbs.

Dress to impress

2010-10-10T06:28:00.000-07:00

Since we moved to France, my dress sense has gone steadily downhill. It always strikes me as kind of bizarre, that whilst France is the home of haute-couture, it is also the country where the outfit of choice for rural womankind is a flowery overall (worn with gum boots) and the male equivalent is heavy duty navy blue trousers, held up with baler twine and topped off with a beret. If you are not yet old enough to carry off this look, the fashion choices are limited. There are a range of out of town warehouse type stores. These sell garments where the women’s wear features large quantities of black lace and ruffles (ideal outfits for the off duty hooker) and the men’s shirts crackle with static as they contain more nylon than an Easy Care Bedding set from the 70’s. Nice.

The preferred dress code chez nous is camouflage. The husband and nephew like old army surplus trousers. Cheap, comfortable, soft, fairly indestructible and ideal for wearing whilst renovating properties, as any concrete stains just add to the ‘desert cammo’ effect. Small son likes camouflage clothing too; he is still of an age where he plans to be a soldier when he grows up. The girls have several cammo items too for various reasons - I’m not really sure how this fits with their usual sartorial look but who am I to argue? I also own a pair, simply because they turned up in Emmaus (my preferred pret a porter outlet where everything is a euro) and, they fit perfectly.

This means that we have to be very careful not to all wear our camouflage clothing at the same time. Especially out in public. It has happened before now and I imagine that we look like one of those American families from the hills who have fifteen children, marry their cousins and are awaiting the Second Coming. Or Armageddon. I once invited someone for lunch and as she walked through the door, realised to my horror that all six of us were wearing black T-shirts and camouflage trousers. She probably expected James to tell the kids to go outside and shoot the lunch before cooking it.

So when we were invited to a wedding, my heart sank. The thought of finding clean, presentable clothing for all six of us, without looking like gangsters or mad survivalists, was daunting to say the least. Thankfully, the hosts had specified that the guests should wear ‘fete’ wear. In south west France, this means red and white clothing, along with a red scarf - foulard - all of which is easily and cheaply available at any supermarket throughout fete season. The only problem was, we are now well and truly out of fete season and there wasn’t a pair of white trousers to be bought in the whole of south west France. Frantic borrowing and an emergency trip to Emmaus sorted the problem and voila - we went to the ball!

Vive la rentree

2010-09-14T01:55:00.000-07:00

Another school year has started and we’ve got off to a flying start. I’ve only had to drive the eldest to lycee on eight out of ten possible occasions. This was due to bus drivers striking in support of teachers (Monday), bus drivers striking about pension reform (Tuesday), the vie scolaire (school office) being unable to inform us of the bus timetable (Wednesday) and the daughter oversleeping (Thursday). On Friday it all worked out and she took the by now, mythical bus. However, to get her to the bus stop in time, small son has to be dropped at the garderie at 7.25 am and collected at 6.45 pm. This is rather a long day for an eight year old so you would think that his teacher would cut the kids, many of whom have older siblings and undergo the same routine, some slack. But hey, this is France where the teacher is always right and the children are just there to be scolded, humiliated and bullied.

The small son arrived home after the first day with the usual mound of paperwork to be filled in and completed, in triplicate. Why they can’t keep this stuff on file defeats me. Every year it’s the same; I have to write the same phone numbers and addresses on multiple pieces of paper, all of which go back to the same school office. The French addiction to paperwork beggars belief. The rest of the world is busy scanning, emailing and recording information online. The French are doing their bit to keep Lever arch files in business.

So I filled it all in on the Thursday evening, popped it in his folder as requested and was rather pissed off when he returned in floods of tears on Friday. He’d been told off because it wasn’t there.... And obviously he must have lost it or forgotten to bring it in because, after all, the teacher is always right.

I wrote a note which went back to school with him on Monday, ‘explaining’ that the paperwork must have been mislaid at school as I had personally placed it in the folder. I’ve heard no more, so I presume the fairies must have returned it to the school secretary....

Mme La Maitresse wreaked her revenge by punishing the small son on Tuesday. He was kept in at playtime for ‘messy’ work. He’s an eight year old boy, doing a twelve hour day for goodness sake! He needs to spend time running around pretending to be a fighter jet. In any case, more play and less copying by rote, wouldn’t do him or the rest of the class, any harm - countries where kids start school significantly later, get significantly better results. But hey, this is France and Mme La Maitresse is always right......

Visitors (from hell...)

2010-08-01T23:18:00.001-07:00

Oh yes, it's that time of the year again, when someone you were at school with twenty years ago and haven't spoken to since, finds you on face book and announces that they are going to drop in on their way to Italy as "We will be passing close by". As they live in Kent and you now live in Brittany, you find their proposed route slightly odd and when, after three days, they show no sign of leaving and point out that you need to go shopping as "We are out of wine and the fridge is looking a bit empty", you realise that they were in fact, just after a free holiday. You also realise why you haven't spoken to them for the last twenty years....

Visitors from hell season is now in full swing and whilst there are some who are more than welcome, (they tend to arrive bearing Marmite and Yorkshire T bags and spend their time being generally helpful and appreciative), there are others who are rather less welcome. Like most people who have been here a while, by now we've weeded out those visitors that we never want to see again, but to get to this happy stage, we've had to experience some real classics. There was the couple who came for a long weekend, got us to collect them from the airport ( a three hour round trip) and didn't so much as offer to pay for the tolls, let alone the diesel. They suggested a day out in the mountains and when it came to lunchtime, slithered off to get something to eat so that they didn't need to offer to pay for our lunch. For the rest of their stay, they sat on the sofa drinking themselves stupid. At our expense - obviously. I think that was probably the cheapest mini-break they had ever taken.

Then there was the family of four who invited themselves to stay with us one half term. I'd already told them that our children would be at school, the weather would be chilly and there would be very little to do. Basically, I did everything bar say 'No you can't come.' Of course, they ignored me, saying that they would spend their days on the beach, after all we live in the south of France and it never rains...

Obviously they then spent the week complaining about their holiday being rubbish, implying that it was our fault and saying that they wouldn't have come if they'd known I wasn't going to organise 'things' for them to do. God knows what they expected to do in rural France in October. Lotto? Force feeding geese? Tractor maintenance? The mind boggles.

I could go on but I'm sure there are others with even worse tales to tell......But never fear, the summer will soon be over and the freeloaders just a distant memory. So distant that when you get a phone call in February, from a long lost school friend, who suggests stopping off en-route to Italy, it will seem like something to look forward to.

Everybody needs good neighbours...

2010-06-30T00:52:00.001-07:00

There has been a fair bit of discussion on the network lately about neighbours and it has inspired me to share some of our experiences.

When we first moved to France, we lived in a small hamlet in Brittany. There were six houses including ours. Four were inhabited by pensioners of 80 plus. Three of these were siblings who hadn’t spoken to each other for the last 42 years, following a dispute over the sale of the fourth house. Needless to say, there wasn’t a whole lot of neighbourly activity going on. The remaining house was inhabited by a lovely couple, Monique and Michel. They were related to the warring three and were delighted when we arrived to dilute the atmosphere. They became surrogate grandparents to our three and Monique would save the milk from the prize cow (it had the highest fat content) for Max’s bottle. I howled when we left and despite being at the other end of the country, seven years later, we are still in touch.

We then moved to a series of isolated properties and as a result of their isolation, didn’t really have any real contact with our neighbours. There simply weren’t any. At this point, I made one of my worst decisions ever and decided we should try village life. I thought it would be good for us to interact more and that it would improve our French. So we dived in and bought a huge Maison de Maitre. The house was fantastic, the only problem was that we had bought in the village that time forgot. When I told my (French) friends, the reaction was unanimous, “Where? Oh my God! You do know what that place is like don’t you?”

It turned out that the entire village population was either over 80, mad or alcoholic. Or all three. Living there was like being an extra on the set of ‘Night of the Living Dead;” processions of people staggered past the door, weaving from side to side with glazed expressions in a zombie like manner at any hour of day and night. As our house fronted the street, they would inevitably bang on the door to shout “Bonjour Voisin” before continuing on their way. We took to closing all the shutters, day and night and hiding out in the back half of the house.

Even this didn’t deter our nearest neighbours who would happily ignore the firmly closed shutters if they needed us to ‘help’ them out. On one famous occasion, we caved in at ten ‘o’ clock at night after persistent banging on the side gate. They wanted James to ‘come quickly’....Fearing the worst and feeling guilty for having ignored them for the last hour, he dashed round to find Monsieur sitting cackling in the corner wearing nothing but his underpants and Madame waiting for James to remove the lid from her pressure cooker. She had forgotten how it worked and Monsieurs dinner was inside.

We moved on.

Now we are back in a hamlet and have lovely neighbours. All sane, around our age, helpful and there when you need them but not ’curieux’ as they say in French. I’ve come to the conclusion that neighbours need to be just close enough to be neighbours but not close enough to annoy you. What have everyone else’s experiences been? Is my theory right do you think? Or does it depend on the personalities involved?

Tagged!

2010-06-27T23:04:00.001-07:00

A while back, I was tagged by French Leave and then clean forgot about it so, here it is.

1. What will you be doing while the football world cup is on?

Yesterday I sat outside enjoying the sunshine and some female company whilst the males sat inside, whooping and hollering. I should imagine that this trend will continue...

What picks you up when you're down?

My husband.

3. Indian or China...we're talking tea here, not economics...

Indian in the morning. China at 4pm.

4. What do you value most about blogging?

Hmm. This is a tricky one. Probably when people tell me that I have made them laugh.

5. What can't you bring yourself to throw out of your wardrobe?

Lots of things but happily my daughters are now the same size so I can lend them stuff rather than having to be ruthless and get rid of it.

6. Would you rather someone didn't ask your views on controversial issues?

Only where my youngest brother is concerned as it always results in a row.

7. Do you recommend people..and then wish you hadn't?

Nope!

8. Do you own up to reading light novels, or hide them under the cushions if visitors arrive?

I will read anything and everything and am quite happy to admit to it.

9. Content with your own company or gregarious?

Very content with my own company. Perhaps too much so.

10. One thing which would noticeably improve your life.

Money. Apart from that, I have just about everything I could want....

Now, I'm supposed to pass this on to five other bloggers, which I will do in due course. But I also thought as there are so many SF members who blog - it would be nice to start an SF tag. So as I don’t want to exclude anyone, I’m inviting you all to play......here goes! Feel free to share as much or as little detail as you wish......

What was the last thing you bought?

When were you last overcome with laughter?

3.Favourite meal?

Dog or cat?

Did you vote in the General election?

What are you reading?

What makes you cry?

What would you change if you could?

What is the most stupid thing you have ever done?

10. How would you like to be remembered?

Ten things I wish I'd known before moving to France...

2010-06-10T01:06:00.000-07:00

So in no particular order, here are my personal top ten. Feel free to add your own...

1. Dealing with the RSI is a complete and utter nightmare and likely to drive you to drink.

2. Venturing outside if you are blonde and live south of the Loire, without wearing factor 50 sunscreen, will result in thread veins all over your cheeks. As you will now look like the local wino, you may want to admit defeat at this point and hit the bottle before dealing with the RSI.

3. Ducklings 'imprint' on their (human) mums. This means that if you hand rear them in the sitting room, they will think that they should live in the house, with you, for evermore.

4. Never try the andouillette. There's a limit when attempting to embrace a culture and its cuisine.

5. Be prepared for your teenagers to suggest they see a 'psychologue' - all their friends will, whether they need one or not. If they do mention this, knock it on the head by telling them that they are British and should be displaying some stiff upper lip.

6. You will get stopped randomly by the police on a more frequent basis that if you were of ethnic extraction and carrying a backpack on the London Underground. Hopefully they won't shoot you.

7. Nothing can prepare you for the horror of French customer service. There isn't any.

8. If you have a wood burning stove, your life will revolve around buying, chopping, stacking and carting wood inside for six months of the year. Your house will be covered in a fine layer of ash throughout the year.

9. You will develop sudden and weird cravings for foods that you would have turned your nose up back at in the days when they were readily available in the local shop - salad cream, sandwich spread, Branston pickle.....

10. Over to you....?

And the award goes to...

2010-06-09T06:32:00.000-07:00

Well its not actually me and the award in question is the much coveted 'World's Worst Blogger' which I am going to hand on to my friend and co-blogger Yummy Mammy as she is far, far worse than me. Mind you, the tales of her disastrous love life make for good reading when she does get around to posting.

But I have been a neglectful blogger as of late and when I stopped to think about why, two main reasons stood out. Firstly, since we started the network I've lost any anonymity I might have had and secondly (again since we started the network) I seem to have far less need to vent. Interesting...

I think that is partly due to having 'met' so many nice, kind, interesting and funny people. And I have been hugely impressed by the generosity members have shown, in terms of the time they are prepared to take to help others. Makes me feel quite warm and fluffy inside.

So I will be back to blogging on a regular basis and I promise not to be too warm and fluffy.

Now I need to crack on with running my media empire, chasing the bloody ducks out of the kitchen (they are inside again and if the husband returns before I remove them, they are liable to end up as crispy fried ducks) and preparing the kids tea (tinned alpha betti spaghetti, turkey twislers, served with blue fizzy drinks and a Raspberry Mivvy for dessert. That's the fruit bit.) so I shall see you all later once I've had my 5pm bottle of rose. Ah - la vie est belle.....

The Apprentice - Vide Grenier style

2010-05-18T01:21:00.000-07:00

When the rain eventually stopped, we ventured forth, found another vide-grenier and unloaded a whole load of utter crap on unsuspecting French punters. We managed to clear 230€ which was no mean feat, as the average selling price was 1€. It was also pretty impressive when compared to the people who had a stall to our left (total for the day 8€) and the people to our right (total for the day - no euros). I suspect this was due to our aggressive pricing and Anglo Saxon sales tactics. After all, we Brits do know about 'le marketing'....

The French are very reluctant to ask for prices at car boot sales. I suspect this is because things are generally so over priced that it is hard to keep you face straight. Typical prices included a child's bike - new list price 85€ - being sold second hand, complete with damaged paintwork for the bargain price of 70€. Guarantee not included.

I especially liked the revolting fold away sofa bed. This was in a state such that the dogs would have wrinkled their noses if invited to sleep on it. Yours for only 250€.

Our problem is that our prices are so low, the French are suspicious. So we go for a sell, sell, sell approach. I'd borrowed a couple of extra kids for the day itself. This meant my sales team was eight strong. I parked the WC (complete with cistern) that we were selling, in front of the stall, sat one child on it and got them to hold the 'Everything Must go' placard. Another couple were stationed at either end of the stall with more placards and the rest were told to create a buzz around the stall and accost any passing trade. When they slacked off, I got all Alan Sugar like on them and reminded them 'they were here to sell!'

It was funny watching the neighbouring stall holders. During the course of the day, their expressions went from shocked to amused to quietly impressed. I was quite impressed with the kids too. I think car boot sales and the like are a great way for kids to learn about just how hard it is to earn money. And about how important it is to re-use and recycle stuff.

Voodoo dolls and packing crates

2010-05-09T07:02:00.000-07:00

Sunday afternoon in ex-pat land and we’re still ‘Living the dream’...We’d planned to do a car boot sale today in a desperate attempt to fill the family coffers and allow us to proceed with the next stage of the renovation project from hell. So yesterday saw us loading most of our household contents into the transit. Its amazing what you don’t really need...

We’d just finished when the heavens opened and the torrential rain, which now seems to be a fixed part of life in south west France, started. Several hours later, even I had to admit that there was no way that we’d be going to the vide-grenier today.

So we’re spending another soggy Sunday in rural squalor. In a desperate attempt to be seen as ‘good’ parents for once (I’m permanently worried about what our offspring are going to write in their memoirs) we took the small son out for a bike ride this morning. In the space of twenty minutes, I discovered that he has less road sense than a goat, braking is an alien concept when you’re under ten and that rain makes you really, really wet. We retreated back home sharpish.

The excursion resulted in another load of wet, muddy clothing for the washing machine. I seem to spend my life playing Mrs Tiggywinkle, with armloads of wet laundry steaming by the fire. Even if we could afford a tumble dryer, the electricity supply couldn’t cope with it, so I have rigged up a highly complicated and effective drying system which involves constant attention but guaranties speedy results. Although the washing can become rather crispy if left unattended....

Meanwhile the girls and their friend who is here for the weekend are making voodoo dolls. I’ve always wanted creative children but I’d imagined them stitching away at patchwork quilts rather than trying to wreak destruction on the Latin teacher. Still, they take after their mother when it comes to sewing, so I’m not too concerned about the Latin teachers well being. These are less like dolls and more like shapeless bundles of rags.

We ran out of firewood a couple of days back. When we ordered the winters supply, we’d assumed that we wouldn’t still be lighting fires in May...The husband has refused to buy any more so he is burning packing crates to keep us warm. Apparently if you shut the fire down, this works well and they don’t burn too fast. Hmm. Remind me to mention that handy tip next time I’m writing a feature entitled ‘Heating your home with balsa wood.’

Still on the upside, we’re now nit free. This is a relief to one and all. The return of the nits sparked some fond family memories of previous infestations. The kids favourite was the time we were out of anti-nit products, so the husband ‘water-boarded’ himself in an attempt to drown the beasts. This was surprisingly effective but probably not the best method for dealing with nits on your children. Especially if the kids have access to a phone and know the number for ‘Allo Enfance.’

My favourite was the time the small son had returned home from school one Friday with a note, announcing the arrival of ‘les poux’ and exhorting us to ‘faire le necessaire.’ As it so happened, SS got his hair cut that weekend by our ex-SAS buddy, Bruno. I had the clippers out when he came round and Bruno insisted on taking over, airily telling me that, “In the regiment, I used to cut all the guys hair.” The small son looked like a squaddie by the time Bruno had finished so when I took him into school on Monday, I thought I’d make a joke. ‘Look,’ I said, pointing at the small son, ‘I’ve done the necessary as you asked in the note.’ ‘Oh Madame’ gasped his teacher, ‘ I meant that you should use some special shampoo.’

Never too old for nits

2010-05-03T06:02:00.000-07:00

By Sunday afternoon I'd had enough of the holidays and more than enough of my delightful children. As they were all quarreling vaguely, I kicked them outside to 'do' the animals. Doing the animals involves not just feeding and watering the numerous beasties but also grooming, brushing and general titivating. As all the animals, from the elderly spaniel to the cats and ducks, enjoy being brushed, this activity can take all afternoon. And, once the children are outside, they tend to stop squabbling and get on with it. In any case, I can't hear them which is the main point of the exercise.

So there I was curled up on the sofa, enjoying a rare moment of calm when the eldest burst through the door in a state of near hysteria, shouting, 'Mum, Mum, come quick, its Frizz'.

Now Daisy is nearly 15 and Frizz is the pony. Being nearly 15, Daisy is prone to bursts of hysteria and she is what I would term 'A Neurotic Horse Owner', forever worrying about her beloved pony. I'm more inclined towards the school of benign neglect myself, for both children and animals. And come to that housework.

But this seemed serious. Daisy was nearly in tears and white as a sheet. I rushed outside fearing the worst, only to find Frizz calmly munching on a hay-net and the small son hopping about nearby holding something in his hand.

'Mum, Frizz has got .....NITS', he announced with great pride whilst unclenching his fist and showing me Exhibit A - a large, fat nit. 'Its true Mum, Frizz has got nits' sobbed Daisy.

'Don't be ridiculous, it probably dropped out of your hair'.

At this, Daisy snorted 'Aw Muum' and gave me The Look. All mothers of teenage daughters will be familiar with The Look.

If not, imagine that you are a small insignificant pile of dog poo that has just said something really, really stupid to a higher life force. The higher life force cannot even be bothered to reply to such a menial pile of matter and just responds by shooting you a withering look.

The 'Aw Mum' bit translates as "I am like, totally way, too old and like, totally way too cool to like get nits. You loser."

Obviously close examination revealed that the pony did not have nits (funny that) and that the child did have nits. Ha!

As luck would have it, only the day before I'd unpacked a few more boxes and found some Spanish nit killing lotion. So as long as these are not racist French nits, who refuse to respond to Spanish chemicals, we should all be ok.

That evening the teenage nephew - Mr. C - returned home after being out all weekend. He dashed into the bathroom for a shower. Such behaviour is totally out of character so my Mama radar went into overdrive....Had he already heard of our infestation? Was he trying to wash away evidence? Girls? Drugs?

It turns out that he just hadn't had a shower since the previous.....Wednesday - which even he considered a bit much. I think next weekend I think I should add him to the list of animals to be brushed.

Living the (Marxist) dream

2010-04-18T23:06:00.000-07:00

My previous post revealed that the teenage nephew is currently refusing to wear underpants as he perceives the wearing of underwear to be a capitalist action. This provoked a fair few comments, namely of the rather bemused, 'Eerm, why?' type. So in fairness to my readers, I felt compelled to question him further.

I collared Mr. C whilst he was doing the washing up and am happy to share the following statement.

"Its like so materialistic. People just like, have all this stuff and wear all this stuff. That they like don't need. And the planet is dying."

So there you have it. Personally, I think it is a load of bollocks (no pun intended) and he has also gone vegetarian and wants to save the whales - enough said. Still I suppose its good for his sperm count - if not my washing pile. I didn't mention this as Mr. C was already looking uncomfortable with the subject so I left him to finish the washing up.

My theory is that he's doing the classic teenage thing of rejecting his upbringing which he considers 'bourgeois'. Class war rules dontcha know! I'm sure if M&S brought out a range of 'Urban Warfare Boxers in Three Shades of Cammo complete with picture of Che Guevara' on the front, he'd be first in line for a multi pack.

Until now he's lived in an environment where his dirty laundry has been collected from his bedroom floor or his en-suite bathroom, washed, ironed and returned complete with a fresh pack of Calvin Klein Y fronts. So easy to reject what you've always had...Now he's living with us in the people's republic of Bordenave (our house which is, quite frankly, a hovel), the environment is more 'up-market squat' - graffiti on the walls, limited hot water and one loo. Unlike a proper squat however, the loo is clean and three meals a day arrive on the table, as if by magic. In other words, teenage heaven. Add to this, the fact that I hail from a long line of placard waving lefties and Mr. C is now firmly convinced that he is living in an anarchist commune.

I don't have the heart to shatter his illusions and tell him that I cannot wait for the house to be finished, would love to be rich and secretly yearn for shag pile carpets, electric curtains and a TV that rises up from the end of the bed.......

Living with teenagers

2010-04-13T00:30:00.000-07:00

In the days before my offspring had reached their teenage years, I used to read the infamous 'Living with teenagers' column and think to myself, 'Ha! My children will never be like that'. Well 'Ha bloody Ha' is all I can say to that thought now. Admittedly they are not quite as rude and don't swear quite so much, but other than they, they are becoming horribly similar.

It doesn't help that we've inherited a spare teenage nephew so we're now up to three. And the husband and I are feeling decidedly outnumbered. This also means that there are now six of us sharing a bathroom. The mornings see the girls spending at least an hour in there before they emerge, immaculate, to face the rigours of a day at school. Hair is done, eyebrows tweezed, nails manicured and subtle make up carefully applied. The husband and I meanwhile, are lucky if we manage to get in there for long enough to clean our teeth. The small son is not really a problem; I just chase him into the bathroom once a day and scrub him from head to toe. The teenage nephew requires the same treatment but it seems rather inappropriate so I resort to snarling, 'Go and clean your teeth. NOW.' It doesn't help that he refuses to wear underpants. He sees this as being anti-capitalist. I see it as being rather gross. And it seems doubly ironic as I have only just got the small son to a stage where if he dresses himself, he actually remembers to put his own underpants on.

The girls are both now the same size as me and have taken to wearing my clothes. This means that finding anything that is both clean and that I want to wear, has become a daily challenge. I've taken to storing my clothes in the office as all under 18's are banned from there. Given the bathroom situation, I also tend to get dressed in there. However there are no curtains so I am forced to do this in the dark or risk scaring 'les voisins' opposite.

The amount of food they get through is unbelievable. The weekly shop now requires at least two able bodied people. And a suitcase full of cash. And despite the mountains of food that come into the house, there is still never anything left in the fridge. The washing machine is on day and night and the family car should be renamed 'the taxi'.

All of this isn't anything new, as parents of teenagers everywhere will testify. So I shouldn't moan especially as ours are (sometimes) helpful, funny and appreciative. And at least they all still want to be cuddled....

Help! I've become a competitive Mummy!

2010-03-25T01:44:00.000-07:00

So its finally happened. After years of smugly assuming that pushy parents had little else in their lives and were generally the devil incarnate, I find myself becoming a competitive Mummy. Up till now I've sneered at people who obsess about their kids education. Our three have always been sent to the nearest school and as long as the school hasn't had a reputation for (overt) drug dealing, I haven't worried. I've always maintained that if kids are surrounded by books and are encouraged to stick their nose in one for hours on end, they'll turn out all right. I still think this is true but now 'Le system' is forcing me to reconsider.

Last week the eldest and I went to an open day at a Lycee with an international section. These sections are few and far between and I have to say, I was impressed. Very impressed. So was the daughter whose mission in life is now to get herself a place there and surround herself with people who are interested in things other than the price of sheep. Unfortunately a lot of other ex-pat parents and children also seemed to think the same way and as a result, there's a huge demand for limited places.

Now the daughter, although very bright has never really applied herself and has a frankly, rubbish 'moyen'. As the dreaded moyen will be taken into consideration and count against her, once I realised this, I found myself swinging into action. Before you could say 'Helicopter Parent', I had a friend re-writing the motivation letter. The daughter used her initiative and canvassed all her teachers, persuading them to give her a cracking write up. She even managed to get some parts of previous terms reports re-written 'to better reflect her true potential' . I do love this aspect of France, everyone knows there are rules and how they can be bent. I can't imagine that happening in the UK and can you imagine the furore if it did? I found myself swopping English conversational classes for her off spring with the Maths teacher who'll be providing private tuition. She has to take an entrance exam and whether all this extra effort will prove enough, only time will tell.

If nothing else, its been a salutary lesson for me. I promise I am now going to stop being a competitive Mummy again but first, I have to finish her Latin homework and complete a 3D model of an iron age settlement for her younger sisters history project....

Job Opportunity in Potiers

2010-03-18T00:59:00.000-07:00

Jobintree.com : un job dans votre branche
www.jobintree.com

INTERPRETE / TRADUCTEUR (H/F)
Offre 578715

Date de publication : 17/03/2010
Annonceur : Adecco
Lieu : Poitiers (86)
Contrat : Intérim
Salaire : n.c

Description du poste :

ADECCO RECRUTE POUR UN DE SES CLIENTS :
- UN INTERPRETRE H/F POUR LA JOURNEE DU 22 MARS 2010 : ACCOMPAGNEMENT DE VISITEURS DANS LA VILLE DE POITIERS. VOUS ETES BILINGUE ANGLAIS ET POSSEDEZ DES CONNAISSANCES SUR LE PATRIMOINE DE POITIERS, MERCI DE NOUS ENVOYER VOTRE CV.

A Walk In The Park

2010-03-06T00:44:00.000-08:00

I'm having a couple of days R&R in the Alps. Sounds wonderful and I'm sure you're all assuming I'm curled up by a log fire, with a glass of something warming, after a hard day on the piste.

Well needless to say (this is me we're talking about), its not quite like that. For starters, Himself is hard at work (my suspicions of him whiling away hours in the local bar were quite unfounded), so I have been providing support services in the form of clean underpants and cheese sarnies. There's no snow down here in the valley and very little sunshine either. The driving wind makes stepping outside, even for a second, unpleasant to say the least, so a combination of workload and weather has meant the only time I've been out, has been for a trip to the local supermarket. And as Himself had to drive me (the brakes on the van are failing), I was starting to feel like an Eastern European housewife.

Yesterday there was a break in the incessant wind and the sun came out. I decided that I would get some benefit from my 'break' (ha ha) and get out there, fill my lungs with clean alpine air and admire some stunning alpine scenery.

I took the 17 year old with me, on the grounds that I didn't have a dog to hand and that it would Do Him Good. He doesn't really do walking but ambled along happily enough for the first half an hour. We spotted a lake in the valley below and decided to head down towards it. All was still very pleasant, the sun was shining and the birds were singing. When we reached the lake, we discovered it was actually a hydro electric plant and that we couldn't get anywhere near it. So the plan of strolling round the shore went out of the window. This was the point when I started to grasp the basic flaw about walking in the Alps. There are bloody hills everywhere. We'd been walking downhill for an hour so retracing our steps would have meant a horrendous slog uphill.

Then I spotted a footpath alongside the river, with a sign indicating that if we followed the trail for 1h40, we'd get to a nearby village. Having persuaded the 17 year old that walking on the flat was a better plan than retracing our steps, we set off. The trail may well have taken that time - if you were a member of an elite military unit and were just back from a weeks advanced fitness training. After two hours, we were covered in scratches, bruises and had aching limbs from all the rocky uphill sections. Obviously it didn't follow the river bank but instead took us on a track that would have been fine, if you were a goat.

It was getting colder and the sun was going down. We were still in some bit of forest, we'd lost the main path and of course, we had nothing to eat or drink. What we did have was my new super whizzy Iphone complete with maps, a compass and all sorts. Did I remember to use it? Of course not.

By some miracle, we eventually emerged in someone's garden and having nervously skirted round the chained up guard dog, we staggered onto a road. At this point I did remember the phone and called Himself, who set off to find us. Obviously I managed to give him totally wrong directions so the 17 year old and I, were left standing shivering at the roadside for some time. The husband is still laughing himself stupid at my complete and utter inability to use any piece of technology and keeps making jokes about applications called 'I lost' and 'I stupid' and the 17 year old is highly unlikely to ever agree to come for a walk again.

World's Worst blogger

2010-03-02T05:26:00.000-08:00

Okay I'm holding my hands up and admitting to being the worst blogger, in the world, ever. Not only do I rarely (if ever) add any whizzy, little gismos, let alone do all the things that good bloggers are meant to do, but as of late, I don't seem to be even able to get round to writing anything. I'd like to come up with some really good excuses but the only thing I can come up with is that I'm utterly crap. And disorganised. And rather busy.

So what is it that keeps me from the keyboard? Well to give you, dear readers, an idea, I thought I would share a typical days events with you. I'm on my own at the moment as Himself is elsewhere. Allegedly he is installing kitchens, but as this is in a ski resort, I suspect he is more likely to be whizzing down a slope or propping up a bar, surrounded by lovelies. I'm here with the kids. Bitter, moi? Mais non....

By 7.30 this morning, I'd lit the fires, fed the kids, walked the dogs and let the ducks out. One of the ducks is in solitary at the moment as she keeps trying to rape and kill another smaller female. Only I could end up with ducks that could easily get a part on Prisoner Cell Block H. So until I find someone who is prepared to dispatch 'Fucky Ducky' - (they didn't cover murdering lesbian ducks at finishing school) - she has to be locked up away from the others overnight.

When I got outside to hang the first load of the day out, I noticed the electric fencing flapping in the wind. Never a good sign. Further investigation revealed that the local deer population had been playing 'French skipping', in and out of the lower two strands and that various posts were down. The pony had worked out an escape route and had a wicked glint in her eye as she knew she was about two steps and five minutes from freedom. And the neighbour's juicy, green lawn.

So I had to move the nags into the next field and repair the fencing - all before breakfast. And of course, this never happens, apart from when Himself isn't here. Grrr. Then the internet wouldn't work. Again. This happens on a regular basis but I usually just yell for technical support to come and it is sorted within minutes. As technical support is up a mountain, I was without any connection for a few hours until I could get hold of him. Double Grrr. Then I went to get the next load of washing out of the machine and it seems to have decided that it no longer wishes to operate the spin part of the cycle. Triple Grrr. Then just as I was about to leave for the airport to collect someone, I get a text to say that the flight is delayed. Instead of a civilised afternoon spin out, I will now need to load the car with assorted children this evening (who will all be horrible as they will be tired and hungry) and hit motorway rush hour traffic. And the car will probably decide to break down too.

So whilst I fully intend to keep you up to speed with the next installment of 'Life in a Landaise Hovel', if it takes me a while to put finger to keyboard, please make allowances. I will probably be busy strangling a duck with some electric fencing. Or tethering a pony in the middle of the garden with a modem cable. Or just drowning my sorrows.

For ladeeez everywhere

2010-01-25T13:36:00.000-08:00

Subject: FW: Urgent Health Advice for Women

Do you have feelings of inadequacy?

Do you suffer from shyness?

Do you sometimes wish you were more assertive?

If you answered yes to any of these questions, ask your doctor or pharmacist about Sauvignon Blanc.

Sauvignon Blanc is the safe, natural way to feel better and more confident about yourself and your actions. It can help ease you out of your shyness and let you tell the world that you're ready and willing to do just about anything.

You will notice the benefits of Sauvignon Blanc almost immediately and, with a regimen of regular doses, you can overcome any obstacles that prevent you from living the life you want to live. Shyness and awkwardness will be a thing of the past and you will discover many talents you never knew you had.

Stop hiding and start living.

Sauvignon Blanc may not be right for everyone. Women who are pregnant or nursing should not use it. However, women who wouldn't mind nursing or becoming pregnant are encouraged to try it.

Side effects may include dizziness, nausea, vomiting, incarceration, erotic lustfulness, loss of motor control, loss of clothing, loss of money, loss of virginity, delusions of grandeur, table dancing, headache, dehydration, dry mouth, and a desire to sing Karaoke and play all-night rounds of Strip Poker, Truth Or Dare, and Naked Twister.

WARNINGS:
* The consumption of Sauvignon Blanc may make you think you are whispering when you are not.
* The consumption of Sauvignon Blanc may cause you to tell your friends over and over again that you love them.
* The consumption of Sauvignon Blanc may cause you to think you can sing.
* The consumption of Sauvignon Blanc may make you think you can converse enthusiastically with members of the opposite sex without spitting.
* The consumption of Sauvignon Blanc may create the illusion that you are tougher, smarter, faster and better looking than most people.

GALE WARNING

2010-01-23T11:11:00.000-08:00

One year ago tomorrow, hurricane Klaus hit south west France. OK, it wasn't exactly on Katrina scale and it wasn't actually categorised as a hurricane, but for those of us who were affected, it was pretty bloody scary.

I was alone with our youngest child. James was up in Normandy doing some work on my father's property. The two girls were staying overnight with friends. During the night a huge old oak, fell and blocked our drive. The house was isolated and we were stranded. So come Saturday morning, it was just me, Max and his sodding Action Men. If the girls had been there, I could have walked for help. But it was far too dangerous to take a 7 year old outside or leave him and set out on my own. We were stuck.

The electricity went off first, followed by the water. Then the land line. Then the mobile. By late afternoon, light was fading, we were flushing toilets with buckets of rainwater and I was debating whether to have a cup of tea or save the last glass of water to clean our teeth. After a couple of hours playing Lego by candlelight, it was time to go to bed. At 8pm.

24 hours later and I'd had enough. Unwashed, thirsty and totally pissed off, James' arrival bearing a generator, packs of water and bottles of wine (thank God for motorway service stations that sell alcohol), was little short of a miracle. I didn't quite prostrate myself in the drive weeping - but nearly.

Our experience wasn't half as bad as some people's. No one was hurt and having the generator meant we had hot water. A wood burning stove kept us warm. Friends who still had water filled jerry cans for us and the house didn't suffer major damage - just a few missing tiles and leaks.

Last week, the insurers finally paid out on our claim for the stuff that was damaged during the storm. Luckily it was for things that weren't essential to our day to day existence. I dread to think how we would have coped if we'd lost vital stuff and had to wait for nearly a year to be paid.

So, how did the storm affect you? My duck farming neighbour opposite reckons that we are due another one . I hope not....

Short sejour a Londres

2010-01-13T00:24:00.000-08:00

As most of you know, my long silence has been due to my absence. I actually left the squat and went to London for a few days. Work not pleasure but as I was to be child free, I had high hopes of the trip being an exercise in R & R. Huh!

I had everything carefully planned. After my leisurely flight on BA rather than Ryan (bloody) Air, I would be collected by my bestest friend and hairdresser who would give me a complete makeover. This meant I would arrive at the show looking like Capable, Confident Career woman rather than Dragged Through a Hedge woman. A 48 hour shopping window would help with this transformation. Then the other bestest friends would turn up for wine, curry and gossip. Then I would go to the hotel where I could enjoy a few nights sleep without being woken up by children or incontinent elderly dogs wanting to go for a wee at 3 am.

Needless to say, it didn't exactly pan out like this. My BA flight was canceled due to the snow so Ryan (bloody) Air was my only option. The hairdresser got stuck in the snow and I lost my 48 hour shopping and gossip window. A delayed flight, delayed baggage and canceled trains meant that I finally staggered into my hotel room at 10 pm the night before kick off. And yes, I still looked like Dragged Through a Hedge Woman.

Still, I consoled myself with the thought that after four months of no central heating and only basic washing facilities, at least I would be able to enjoy the hotel bathroom. So I ran myself a deep bath and prepared to enjoy washing without shivering. I did notice that the room was cool but assumed that the heating had been turned down; I set the thermostat to scorchio and stripped off. As I launched myself into the bath, the icy water hit me as did the realisation that there was no hot water and the heating was on the blink. So much for my first bath in months.

The next morning there was still no bloody hot water. Having discovered that 'maintenance' hadn't yet arrived, my only option was to boil kettles like a good girl scout. Still I needed to wash to wake myself up as much as anything else.

I'd been kept awake between 3 and 5 am by the goings on in the next door bedroom which resulted in the police turning up and arresting the occupant for assault. He (Man A), had been enjoying a foursome with his girlfriend and her two friends when another bloke tried to join in. As the occupant pointed out to the boys in blue, he'd invited the other chap up to watch but when he wanted to take part, Man A felt that this was 'disrespectin his girlfriend'. Who I swear, was called Inga.

Being an old fashioned type of girl, I tend to think that if you are happy to have group sex and let people watch, you are probably not too concerned about being respected. However Man A disagreed and promptly attacked Man B.

By the time this was all over and Man A had been led away in handcuffs, I was completely awake and unable to get back to sleep.

Still on the upside, the show went well and as the whole of London was wearing bizarre headgear in an attempt to keep warm, 'hat hair' was the norm and my bedraggled locks fitted in a treat.

Bonnes Bloody Fetes

2010-01-01T05:13:00.000-08:00

Well the fetes are all but over and I can look forward to dispatching the kids back to school, tout bloody suite. Forget New Years Eve - I will be quaffing a bottle of champers around 9.05 am on Monday morning and celebrating a bit of peace and quiet.

But in the spirit of Christmas, I would like to wish all my dear and loyal readers, a Very Happy New Year and lots of Wealth, Health and Happiness. As all of these have been in rather short supply, chez nous, during the last twelve months, I am hoping that my fairy godmother will be bringing me bucketfuls of good tidings on a regular basis throughout 2010.

We are now twelve hours into the New Year and so far, so good. This morning the husband managed to unblock all three drains before the drive flooded, after last nights torrential rain. The barn was only slightly under water and the elderly dog (who was looking distinctly suspect last night) is still alive. Our joint parental resolution is to be less irritated by the (idiotic) actions of small son. And so far today, we have more or less succeeded. The small son has not broken anything or ripped any electrical cables or sockets from the walls. Yet.

Whether this run of luck will continue over the next twelve months, remains to be seen. I suspect not and no doubt tomorrow will bring a whole new set of disasters for us to deal with. But hey, we've coped thus far.....

Sex education

2009-12-15T05:18:00.000-08:00

When the eldest came home from school last night, I greeted her with the usual 'had a good day?' question. As the answer is always the same, except for when she can't be bothered to talk and just grunts instead and as I was busy cooking dinner, I must admit I wasn't really listening to the reply.

So it took a few seconds for her response to sink in. When it did, I stopped stirring whatever it was that I was stirring, dropped the wooden spoon and said 'WHAT?'

'Like I said, fine, other than I spent two hours with some woman waving a polystyrene penis wearing a condom, in my face.'

It seemed that yesterday was the day the 3iemes 'did' sex. They had a two hour session of sex education and the subject is now covered. No pun intended. Its a bit late in the day in my opinion, as according to my friend Colette, who works in the local pharmacy and knows these things, most of them are 'doing' sex already.

The daughters account of the session was hilarious and I don't think I can do it justice. For starters they watched a cartoon film about a couple of teens, Jean-Pierre and Lucille, who discussed having sex, had sex and then analysed the whole thing. How very French.

The style was sheer 70's (Joy of Sex) but with added psychedelic overtones. To appeal to the teenage market maybe? By the time JP said to Lucille during the post coital analysis, 'I wanted to touch your vagina...again', my daughter was in hysterics. I'm no teenager but even I know they stopped talking like that in the 1930's - if they ever did.

And the grand finale was a full screen of 52 cartoon cocks of all different shapes and sizes that suddenly all 'stood to attention'. Presumably this was to reassure the boys in the class? Or maybe to imply that there's a different shaped willy for every week of the year. As the daughter was laughing out loud by now, the sex expert who had been shipped in for the mornings session, had her marked down as a troublemaker and moved her to the front row. None of the other kids laughed. After all, this woman was an 'expert' and the French have huge respect for experts.

So my poor daughter had to control her giggles. As she said afterwards, 'I can see the point of showing us how to use condoms. But did she really need to keep hold of it once she finished putting it on? And did she need to wave her arms around quite so much when she talked?

Still as a method of birth control it is probably quite effective. I think the moth-eaten polystyrene penis has put her off sex for the foreseeable future.

Frogs jab kids (against pigs)

2009-12-07T23:40:00.000-08:00

Two out of the three children have now been jabbed for 'la grippe de cochon' and I will be braving the nearest vaccination center tomorrow with number three. The older two were done at school and it was apparently, a bit of a performance. For starters, the surveillants ( who are a sort of cross between classroom assistants and dinner ladies) all got kicked out of their staff room and were dispatched to an unheated portacabin, where they spent the day being mightily pissed off and handing out random punishments to passing teenagers.

The staff room was turned into a temporary vaccination center. This involved lots of screens and curtains for privacy. I'm not really sure why, as they were sticking needles into their arms not their bums but hey, this is France. The screens and curtains meant that the people involved, nurses, teachers and children, kept getting lost. The eldest also pointed out that by the time she had proceeded through the three screens to vaccination central where the deed was to be done, the whole thing had become such a performance that she felt as though she was about to be sent to the gas chambers.
The sight of a huge vat of glowing vaccine did little to reassure her that she was not about to be given a large dose of radiation. Or something equally nasty.

The school secretary (who can't cope with paperwork at the best of times) had been roped in to oversee the administration. She had been given an assistant - a very elderly lady who had been brought out of retirement for the day. Unfortunately no one had thought to check her eyesight which had clearly deteriorated since she last had a job. They became increasingly panic stricken as the queue of children clutching vaccination vouchers and medical records mounted up.

I should imagine that when my two arrived with their records in English, it just about finished these two ladies off. The secretary was heard wailing 'I don't speak English' whilst the other poor dear thumbed through the books trying to find a relevant page. They must have managed in the end as both girls returned home with a vaccination certificate. So yah booh sucks to the swine flu. No doubt they will now spend the entire winter ill with other things instead. I think I should stock the medicine cabinet up pronto.

You know he loves you when....

2009-11-19T23:47:00.000-08:00

Now the rain has stopped, we are busy 'faireing le bois'. To the uninitiated, i.e. those of you who live in houses with central heating, this means frantic chopping and stacking of wood in an attempt to keep warm over the winter months.

Just doing the wood works well enough. After a couple of sweaty hours lugging logs around the garden, there's no need to light the fire; we are quite warm enough. And, there's no way that I'm going to develop bingo wings anytime soon. As the eldest pointed out yesterday whilst pushing a laden wheel barrow through deep mud, 'Jesus Mum, you could open this place as a fat farm. There's no way people would fail to lose weight here'. She has a point.

Never having had our own bit of woodland before, we are rapidly learning about wood. What will burn, what won't, what needs felling...and just how much time it takes.

Still at least it is a cheap form of heating and given our current financial situation, cheap is good in my book. With Christmas approaching, I am desperately racking my brains for present ideas that won't cost a fortune. Last year we (the royal we obviously) spent hours making the most fantastic art deco dolls house for the girls and an enormous Action Man camp for the boy. Action man's camp came complete with watch tower, anti-tank defenses, a sentry post and (hand sewn with love by yours truly) sand-bags. The husband and his ex-SAS buddy got very into the design and creation of this work of art, painting everything in arctic cammo colours and adding Action Man sized bullet holes to the sentry post. I banned them from building an interrogation suite though and convinced them to make a hospital tent instead. The theory being that then the son could develop his nurturing, caring side as well as his small boy blood lust. Ha! What actually happened was that he stole his sisters Bratz doll and left her in the tent to 'do sex' with the Action Men. I can only hope it was consensual.

There is no chance of such home made delights this year. The husband is too busy trying to rebuild the real house. Last night we spent a quality hour together in the dark. I was holding the torch whilst he wielded a pair of snips and cut off the latest piece of dodgy live wiring before the kids could be electrocuted. Who says romance is dead?

Nice weather for Ducks

2009-11-03T23:33:00.000-08:00

We've spent the last few days tying to solve the flooding in the barn issue. I am obviously, using the royal we. Husband has been out there 24 / 7 digging and trenching whilst I lurk by the fire and try to look supportive. And obviously, the digger has chosen precisely this moment, our hour of need, to decide that actually it is A Very Old Digger That Needs To Go To The Sunnydays Retirement Home For Used Plant. So the poor sod has been digging by hand.

After days of torrential rain, the clay soil surrounding the barn has to seen to be believed. You could easily film a WW1 epic there. Odd hot spells during the day have made life even worse. By the end of yesterday, the husband appeared at the door looking like an extra from a film about the building of the Burma railway - gaunt, unshaven, dripping in sweat, wearing shorts and mud-caked boots.

It hasn't helped that he hasn't been sleeping properly either - he has been going out to check on flooding during the nights. Having finally got somewhere with the trenches, I did think we might manage an undisturbed night. Oh no. I woke at 2am to find him clutching a torch and off to check the barn as the rain was coming down harder than ever. When he didn't reappear, I went down to investigate and found him monitoring the second wood burner which was dribbling tar and dispensing smoke throughout the building. He stayed up to monitor the situation and check the children for carbon monoxide poisoning. Although instructed to go back to bed, funnily enough I didn't go back to sleep.....

He finally put the fire out and came back to bed at 4. Just before 5, I woke to terrible screeching. A neighbouring cat had come through the cat flap and our three were launching a counter offensive. This involved much yowling and running round the kitchen worktops knocking things to the floor. Somehow I got back to sleep and was then woken up by my alarm which I had accidentally set, an hour early.

No doubt as we only have one working wood burner for heating now, it will stop raining later today. But it will probably start snowing. Still, the rain has meant that the small stream in the garden has turned into a swamp and at least the ducks are happy.....

Not very politically correct

2009-10-20T06:11:00.001-07:00

Since I stupidly crashed the Land Rover, I have been driving around in a car loaned by our very lovely Swedish friends. This has been a real double whammy. Not only am I mobile again but I get to drive a car on Swedish plates. I smile and wave at speed cameras as I fly past and have accrued a small mountain of parking tickets. I have even been looking forward to getting stopped by the police, so that I can do my world famous impression of a Swedish tourist speaking French. A childhood spent watching the Muppet Show means that I have been forever convinced that all Scandinavian’s speak like the Swedish Chef -’eeergh de birdy cheecken’.

Last week I had to take daughter number two to the orthodontist, again and I was late, again. I am always late and the fearsome orthodontist is always cross with me. So as I screeched into the car park, I was really narked to see that it was completely full. I was even more narked to see that the only places left, were disabled ones. And of course, there were lots of them.

Why is it, that every car park these days, is designed around the principle that all the disabled badge holders within a 200 mile radius, will choose to do their shopping at the same time? The planners also seem to think that they will bring all their disabled cousins, neighbours and friends with them too. In separate vehicles of course. There are always far more disabled places than needed. Its almost as annoying as the fact that there are always more mens toilets than required and never enough for us women. Who, lets face it, cannot easily go in an alleyway and need to go rather more often.

Now I am normally very respectful of disabled parking bays. I remember only too well, when the children were small, how annoyed I used to get with fat salesmen parking their Vauxhall’s in mother and baby spots. However on this day, I was so late that I decided to cast my morals aside and hope for the best. And I realised smugly, with my Swedish number plates, I was hardly likely to get a ticket.

Unfortunately, I parked next to a very grim looking woman. She looked at my car thoroughly before pointedly sticking her disabled badge into place. She then started walking purposefully towards me.

I took the only possible course of action. I leapt out of the car and set off for the dentist at a cracking pace. I did however drag my left leg behind me in a sort of ‘Life of Brian - I’ve had Leprosy’ kind of stage limp.

I also hissed instructions at the daughter to only speak in Swedish. Funnily enough she opted to say nothing at all. It was probably for the best.

BOG POST

2009-10-12T06:21:00.000-07:00

I don't know what it is about moving house, but it always seems to involve plumbing problems. I can't say that we were surprised; we always expected that a septic tank system that could cope with one old lady, would struggle with a family of five. But I really didn't expect the first few days in our new house, to solely revolve around poo.

On day two or three, Husband decided to try and find the drains before it rained again so that this time we could hopefully avoid being flooded. He did find the drains but also found the fosse. The first I heard of this was when he burst into the kitchen and said 'Call the fosse man. NOW. Or there will be shit everywhere.' Sure enough, when I popped my head round the backdoor, I found that liquid poo was about to bubble over the side of the extremely overladen fosse. And all this just yards from the kitchen table. Nice.

So the fosse man came and did a lot of head shaking and 'oh la la' ing. It took ages to empty and disinfect, far longer than normal. Which was relected in the far higher than normal bill.
Then the Husband discovered that the working loo in the bathroom, (which is actually a macerator for those of you who want even more information - so it makes funny random noises as it minces up your poo. This is especially nice as it is just off the kitchen and visible from the dining table), was not connected correctly to the fosse. Having just spent a vast amount of money on his fosse, he then banned the household from doing number two's in it, until such time as he could fix it. Then he went one further and told the girls and I, that we could wee in it but no paper was to be flushed down....

So we were effectively stuck with using the second loo. This is situated in an outbuilding off the kitchen and was only flushable with a bucket of water. The walls looked like something from Miss Havishams dining room and the collection of spiders and other insects would have put a zoo to shame. I pointed out that most courts would acquit me of manslaughter given the circumstances, so Husband toddled off to the nearest shop for a new loo - tout suite.

New loo was in faster than you could say septic tank and the walls were painted too in a variety of paint pot ends. So, you see one room of the house is finished already! There is one slight problem, if you shut the door and you are aged over ten, there is no space for your knees (granny must have been a midget?) but hey, whats a bit of claustrophobia when you have a fully flushing loo.....

Cold Comfort Farm

2009-10-09T02:04:00.000-07:00

Well folks, I’m back! The long silence was because we have finally moved! And of course.... being France, despite having booked a telephone line to be connected from the 17th, when we finally got the keys on the 30th, there was no bloody dial tone.
And therefore no internet. There was no mobile signal anywhere other than at the far end of the garden. Whenever I left the house, I picked up multiple missed calls on the mobile from increasingly desperate friends, family and clients wondering where exactly we had got to. By day two I had resorted to dispatching Husband to McDonalds to upload copy. I think he quite liked it there, at least it was warm.

The house in comparison was cold, damp and covered in black mould. I spent two days scrubbing walls and woodwork with so much bleach that my eyes were streaming. Still, the peach, beige and brown tile medley schemes in the kitchen and bathroom have come up a treat.

I say kitchen but it is really just a room with a sink in it. The sink comes to about half way up my thighs. This is not because I am some supermodel type with legs up to my armpits. It is because the sink was clearly designed either for midget French pensioners, or to keep women suitably servile and in their place, i.e. bent double over the dishes.

The wiring is lethal. Most things are not earthed and the fuse box or rather the box that has the meter and some random wires in, should be an exhibit in the Science Museum. The upstairs wiring sports some 60 year old cotton insulation which is such a fire hazard that Husband has propped a ladder up to the balcony and given the kids Fire Drill lessons. So tomorrow the rewiring starts.

That is of course, if we do not have any other little crises to cope with in the interim. We have been here precisely one week and so far have had the ‘No Hot Water’ episode, followed by the ‘Flooded Barn’ fiasco, then the ‘Emergency Installation of a Wood Burner Before Mum Freezes to Death’ day (did I mention that I have had flu throughout this jolly week? I think it was swine flu but I have been far to busy to go to a doctors. Anyway I haven’t even found out where the nearest doctor is yet). And that is not mentioning the lack of a car; I crashed ours just before we moved. This was really handy as the moving plan centered around the Landy towing the horse-box, laden with all our worldly possessions). Neither have I mentioned the two dogs we have suddenly inherited, who keep making a beeline for the (very busy) road we now live next too. Or the cats, who are traumatised by being chased by the strange dogs and insist on using the house as a giant litter tray. Still, I can’t say I blame them, there’s really not much difference between the indoors and outside. Except outside is a bit cleaner and drier. Still I do have a very, very large new fridge which I can fill with wine. Which always makes life seem a little better - cheers

Something Serious - Save One Mammy

2009-09-17T06:32:00.000-07:00

Seven years ago I moved to France with my three kids and their father. Six years ago we separated. More recently I have been following the trials and tribulations of Yummy Mammy - a mother who just wants to get on with her life. Reading her story has made me so very, very grateful for the way my ex-husband has acted over the last few years.

Yes, there were moments especially in the early days, when we both behaved badly but overall, we have worked together to ensure that our kids didn’t suffer. This isn’t rocket science - we just put their needs first! We also realised that we needed to move on with our lives in order to be happy (and good) parents. So as well as thinking about the kids, we have supported and respected each other. The result? We have three delightful, happy, secure, confident children, who have a great relationship with both their dad and step-dad. We’ve managed this despite living in different countries and if we can, so can others in the same boat. It hasn’t always been easy and the distances involved means that visits have to be planned and organised with military precision. But we both go out of our way to make things as easy on the other one and the kids, as possible.

Yummy Mammy’s ex is using their small child as a pawn. This is going to have heartbreaking consequences for all concerned, both now and in the future. She has launched a campaign to raise awareness of the issues facing women who have moved abroad and then separate from their partners - if you do nothing else today, please, please check it out here and add your support.

Since the campaign started - check it out here, there has been a lot of powerful and emotional writing about how relationship breakdown combined with emotional manipulation can damage children and parents. It’s just a shame her ex isn’t reading it....

I hope that for the sake of Yummy Mammy and all the other women and children in a similar situation, that Mammy wins her fight to return home and get on with her life. In the meantime, tell your friends, tell your neighbours, tell your colleagues, tell anyone you can think of and lets hope that together we can change things.

Happy Times!

2009-09-11T01:00:00.000-07:00

Well we still haven't got a completion date. On the upside, after much insistence on my part, the notiaire has now asked the bank to release the funds. No doubt they will have to reply in writing and the letter will have to be written on parchment with a quill and ink and sealed with wax. As it apparently takes three days for the funds to arrive (electronic banking anyone?), I imagine a man from Paris will journey down south, leading a donkey carrying paniers of old francs.

In the meantime, the husband continues to do sterling work on the outbuildings at the new property. The plan was to get these watertight for storage of our goods and chattels. However at this rate we will be moving into the barn at the end of the month as it will be a damm sight better than the house. So much for my carefully planned, slow and stress free move. My blood pressure is increasing in direct proportion to the passing days.

I have managed to get a phone line installed though. This might sound like nothing but was no mean feat. France Telecom started from a position of insisting that the property didn't actually exist. I resisted the temptation to accept that they were right and assume that the events of the last few weeks have been nothing but a bad dream. No, I persevered and surprise, surprise, they eventually 'found' the property. How kind of them! And they are going to let me pay them too!

Now I just need to get the electricity supply changed and switch suppliers. I am sure this will only take a couple of months....

Eldest daughter is 14 today which makes me feel very old. And working on a feature about retirement villages doesn't help. If the purchase process continues at this rate, we might as well move directly to such a development ourselves.

But hey ho, I am never one to be defeated (for long) so I am off to find out about renovation grants. As there is currently no heating system (always fun moving into an unheated property when winter is approaching) and the fosse is beyond description, I think we are going to need all the cash we can get. Feel free to send donations. In fact, that is quite a good idea; I keep hearing about people who request donations on blogs and get them. Maybe I should start a 'Keep me in bacon' fund? Or how about 'Distressed ex-pats need flushing loos - donate now' or 'Save my furniture from becoming firewood'?

On second thoughts, maybe not. Knowing my luck I would probably just get sent a whole pile of badly knitted woolly jumpers and helpful suggestions about composting toilets.

On the move

2009-09-07T04:59:00.000-07:00

Well the hot news from chez nous, is that we are moving. Not only have we managed by some miracle to get a mortgage and find a deposit, we also managed to find the one property in south west France that was within our pathetic budget. I know that most sensible people are not buying at the moment, but hey, when were we ever sensible? And besides, the joy of owing our own home again after several years of renting, is simply indescribable.

However, we don't actually own it yet. Despite the completion date being set for late August, the sale....has still not happened .

We have had to resend the formal acceptance to the bank as the first one simply disappeared. This was despite its being sent recorded. The second attempt reached the bank this morning. Now the notire has to write requesting the money...
In the meantime our lovely vendor has buggered off to Normandy to have his kidney removed and refuses point blank to sign a procuration as he wants to be there in person. I am not even thinking about what could go wrong at this stage. He returns at the end of the month so our nice calm move in stages will become a last minute 'out in two days' job. We are also spending 3 hours a day in the car on the school run. The plan was to drop the girls in the morning, work on the house and then collect them but we can't do this as we don't have the bloody keys

Grrr. Is all that one can say...

And yes we are stressed.

Other stressful events this week included taking the kids to a water park, slipping over and cracking a rib. This just goes to show that you should never, ever take your kids for a day out. Far too dangerous.

The next day we managed to lose control of the Land Rover and end up in a field. Which happened to be on a very steep slope. We ground to a halt in a large bramble thicket. Of course I was wearing shorts and flip flops (not ideal 'climbing out of a Land Rover window into a thorn bush' attire). Young son was quite distraught but as he got a ride in a tractor cab thanks to the the recovery team, thought it good fun at the end of the day.

The girls have changed school in anticipation of our move and seem to be doing ok. The set up seems pretty progressive, special light weight books and folders (supplied free!) and laptops. The head worked in Australia for 4 years so is aware of a life outside duck farms. The eldest has made friends with some boy who was selling dope during the maths class and another who stands on the desks during science. Still she is pretty sensible so I refuse to worry. The younger is hanging out with the one girl in her class, no one else likes (who sounds quite interesting as she wants to be a fighter pilot - rare for these parts where child care and duck farming are the career paths of choice) but I am hopeful Basil (the drug dealer) and her older sister will ensure that she does not get picked on too much by the other girls in her class.

If we ever get to move in, youngest son will be changing school too, so no doubt that will bring its own set of problems. In the meantime, I will carry on stuffing things into cardboard boxes. And refrain from packing the ducks until the last minute. Although if they continue to shit all over the garage, they may well get packed sooner rather than later. And it might be a one way journey...

I've gone native!

2009-08-26T23:49:00.000-07:00

Something has happened. I have become French. Well not really French, although getting French nationality is on my 'to do' list. At some point. No, I have realised that my behaviour is becoming increasingly Frenchified. In order to alert others to this phenomena, here are some pointers to look out for.

1. You start to carry a packet of tissues with you - everywhere. This is because if you are lucky enough to find a public toilet that is actually open, you just know that there will be no paper.

2. You dispatch your offspring to stay with Mamie and Pappy for several weeks during the summer. Whether they want to go or not.

3. You are not shocked by video footage of your daughters teacher on You Tube, pissed off his face during the local fetes.

4. You think that an entire village going on the razzle for a four day fete is 'normal'.

5. You start wearing T-shirts with bizarre slogans on the front.

6. You don't find it funny that the LaRedoute (French Marks and Sparks) catalogue also sells vibrators.

7. You can eat a sausage (andouillettte) that looks like a penis without getting the giggles. (Still not there yet on this one, personally).

8. You spend more time with your dermatologist / gynaecologist / masseur than your spouse.

9. You think a tan is vitally important.

10. You think all of the above are completely normal.

As I satisfy nearly all of the above criteria, I think it is time to stop moaning and embrace my inner Frog. In any case, something new and exciting is about to happen chez nous so I will have far less time to moan and much more to report. Watch this space!

Happy Holidays

2009-08-09T22:34:00.000-07:00

What do you get if you take one stressed out woman, who is planning to move house in six weeks time whilst still trying to meet work deadlines, three stroppy kids, one 17 year old surrogate son (interests: guitars and girls), crap weather, numerous visitors and ducks that shit in the garage? My life. The weather is probably a key factor in all this. If the sun was shining, the kids would be at the beach, the 17 year old would be too tired from surfing to be obsessing about girls, the ducks wouldn't be cowering in the garage and the visitors would be out and about. And I would be able to start packing boxes.

As it is, things have become so tense chez nous that the husband has become increasingly despotic. Eldest daughter now refers to him as 'Our Glorious Leader' which I find hilarious and he finds frustrating as deep down, he would love to run the household on North Korean lines. No choices and no dissent. But until that day comes, he is stuck with the stroppy kids and the shitty ducks.

At least the visitors have been ok. In fact they have been more than ok; all our guests have been lovely this year and a delight to have around. This is by no means always the case. It is probably easier if you run a commercial B&B set up, you can place notices around the place saying things like Please Vacate The Shower After Ten Minutes - The Rest Of Us Would Like Some Hot Water or Do Not Enter My Office Without Knocking - Especially When I Am On A Deadline or even The Dishwasher Works - Please Use It. But for those of us who just run a doss house for family and friends in the summer months, its a bit more tricky. So as your hosts will be far too polite to tell you, here are some top tips for anyone planning to descend on their nearest and dearest.

Don't eat their marmite. This is a precious commodity in France.

The same goes for baked beans. With knobs on. These are not a kiddy tea time staple but an adult gourmet treat.

Bring your own tea bags if you want endlesss cups of char. The worst offenders are those people who wave one of your stash of precious PG Tips tea bags at a cup of hot water, remove it within ten seconds and shudder whilst saying 'oh I cannot stand strong tea'. Well don't bloody drink it then. Better still, go and buy yourself some piss weak 'breakfast' tea from a French supermarket.

Do email your hosts with a shopping list before arriving. That way you can bring them something they actually want.

Do take them out for meals. It may seem like they have an idyllic existence on bread, pate and rose but this is probably their staple diet and it can pall a bit, especially during the winter months.

Do go out sometimes and leave them alone. They will spend the time moaning like mad about you and then be racked with guilt when you return with delicacies for dinner. They will be much nicer hosts for the next few days as a result.

Don't begrudge them the set up. You may look at the ageing farmhouse and crystal clear pool with envy but bear in mind that for most of the year, the farmhouse will be freezing cold and the pool full of dead mice and leaves.

Don't tell them how lucky they are. If they are making a success of living in France, luck has nothing to do with it. They will have worked incredibly hard and got off their arses to create a new existence. So you can understand how sometimes, they can become a little tetchy about things like you eating their marmite.....

Binge Drinking Brits

2009-07-21T02:54:00.000-07:00

The French are convinced that the English are slightly mad. That is their honest, unwavering opinion and nothing that you or I do, will ever change that.

And really its not surprising given the number of British expats who are well, odd. And describing them as odd is charitable. Nutters would be a better term. Before you all start jumping up and down and shouting 'I'm not mad', let me share a few pearls of wisdom from a certain Mr Jeremy Clarkson. Jezza wrote a piece some time ago and the general gist was that no one ever wakes up and thinks 'My life is great, my boss is delighted with my performance and is about to promote me, my children are all happy, well adjusted and settled in school. We have loads of friends who live nearby, my house is perfect, I am deeply in love with my wife and have a fantastic sex life. I know, I'll emigrate to New Zealand.'

You can probably see where this is going. So, most of us who are here, are running or have run away from something. At the very least we thought life would be better in La Belle France and that our problems would miraculously disappear. Losing their problems in a haze of alcohol seems to be the solution of choice for most ex-pats. Inhibitions also disappear in direct correlation to the amount of alcohol consumed. This leads to even odder behaviour and the French finding us even stranger. However, you can avoid this by drinking like a Frog. Follow my simple five point plan and you will never stand out when pissed again.

The plan is simple, easy to follow and works!

1. If you are female and invited to an 'apero', only ever accept a small quantity of some disgusting and sickly 'ladies' drink. Dubonnet, Suze and sweet white wine are acceptable. Pernod and whisky are not. Ask for a scotch and your French hosts will be waiting for you to leap on the table, flash your boobs and challenge all males present to an arm wrestling contest.

2. Never drink in public. Except during 'les fetes' when it is quite acceptable to stagger through the streets slurping pastis from a paper cup.

3. It is also acceptable to drink whilst out hunting small furry animals. So if you really need a drink, wear cammo clothing and carry a shotgun. The locals will just assume you are out to 'faire la chasse.' Cunning!

4. When eating, opt for the appropriate coloured wine for each course. This means you are appreciating the food by complimenting it with fine wine. The French see this as not really drinking much as they consider smoking after a meal or when socialising as not 'really' smoking.

5. If all else fails make friends with some of the old boys who start every day by buying a baguette and a litre of rose in a plastic bottle. They may not be the most scintillating of companions but you will look sober in comparison.

Chin chin!

When your pet is your only friend

2009-07-08T03:44:00.000-07:00

One of the problems faced by expats in France is trying to make friends. Sure you will end up with loads of people to say hello to on a daily basis (the French are endlessly intrigued by why the English come here in their droves) and some of these if you are really, really lucky, may become friends, but by and large, making true friends in France is bloody difficult.

Geography is one factor. France is such a vast country that even if you do meet like minded souls, they are likely to live miles away. The days of popping round to see someone for a quick coffee and a good moan are long gone.

Many Brits moving to France opt for the rural idyll. All very well until you realise that the other inhabitants of your tiny hamlet have an average age of 87 and are more interested in varicose veins than vodka. One solution is to move to a region where there is already an established expat community. Surely you will be able to make friends here? Probably not as they are likely to be nutters. Of course, if you are of a nutty disposition yourself, then you might fit in a treat and live happily ever after.

So that leaves the French. Being happily married, I haven't gone out of my way to befriend many passing French men and in any case, they generally don't do inter sex friendships. Not least because they have ferocious wives. French wives are very suspicious of English women. They think we all spend Saturday nights vomiting into kebabs, having sex with strangers and weeing in the street. So you can forget a nice platonic friendship with their husbands.

And what about the women themselves? Your average French woman spends most of her time with her sister in law and a select group of women that she will have known since primary school. She will always be immaculately turned out with perfectly manicured toe nails, a selection of carefully chosen accessories and be wearing 'an outfit'.
You can forget cracking this clique unless the woman in question is a little 'different'. In other words she has probably lived abroad or travelled extensively and is interested in other people and cultures. Unfortunately outside major cities, women like this are a rare breed. But don't be disheartened. Open minded French people do exist and after several years, we have managed to find some. And they are our friends!

If all else fails, numerous pets make good substitutes. Just be careful not to be found talking to them too often. Its tempting; they don't answer back and always agree with you, but it can be the start of the slippery descent into expat madness.

Not like Legoland

2009-07-03T06:42:00.000-07:00

Yesterday I went on a school trip. This is not something I usually do. I don't like small children and my idea of hell, is being stuck with small children that belong to other people. They tend to be worse behaved than my own and you can't shout at them. Although in France it is acceptable to yell at other people's offspring, which does make it slightly more bearable.

This is the third school trip I have done since we came to France six years ago and thinking back there is a pattern to my involvement. Basically year one, feel guilty at being crap Mum and agree to go. Year two, remember how horrendous the whole experience was and avoid like the plague. Year three, fading memories of just how bad it was, means I agree to go. Year four, remember the horror and refuse to go. You get the drift.

The first year we arrived, I gamely signed up hoping to meet some like minded mums. And I did think that it might be fun, remembering school outings in the UK. Ha! We were driven in searing temperatures on a coach (no air con), for what seemed like hours arriving at the picnic spot just before noon. Being France there was no question that the kids might be allowed to play for a bit. No, the hyper kids were forced to sit at picnic benches and eat for a full hour. No one was allowed to get down before the adults were served with coffee. Now I am all for eating, but these cooped up kids had been sitting on a coach for two hours and really did need to run off some energy. Bad behaviour which was really just exuberance, resulted in the teachers screaming at the kids - not pleasant. After we had eaten, I assumed the kids would be allowed to paddle in the lake and fountains. Mais non! And I got a very dirty look from the teacher when I stripped Max (then aged 16 months) of his T shirt and splashed water over him to cool him down. The French attitude is definately 'better heatstroke than dirty clothes'. I remember Tilly (aged 5) crying one day when I picked her up from school. She had fallen over and got her skirt muddy. All the girls in her class told her that she would get smacked (by me) when she got home. They were so unanimous that she became convinced this would actually happen.

Instead after lunch, we were taken on a two mile walk through the forest. This was a really great idea for the small ones, the two and a half year and three year olds. They whined, cried and tripped over. Even better for me pushing Max in a buggy over tree roots. It was so hot that it was almost unberarable even in the forest. It felt more like the Long March than a school trip.

Eventually we arrived at a clearing where two old codgers turned up and in thick Breton accents, that even the other adults struggled to understand, told us about an episode during WWII when a resistance group was ambushed there and killed by the Nazi's. It was interesting - if you were over ten. Unfortunately most of the group wasn't.

After this I stayed away for a while until I went on Max's trip to a petting zoo. This was better but there was still the French insistence on an educational aspect to the day. So once again, after a long coach journey, we were crammed into a darkened room to watch a (crap) video about weaving with goat hair. This time all the group was under five and only interested in tractors or things that moved, so weaving didn't really cut it for them. I spent the entire day taking small boys to the loo, where they managed to piss all over themselves and me.

Anyway, this year the awful memories were sufficiently faded for me to agree to go. Again, it was on one of the hottest days of the year and again, there was an educational aspect. This took the form of being taken on a two hour walk, in the baking heat around the botanical gardens whilst being lectured. The kids then all had to draw a leaf in great detail. The mothers were told very firmly to do the same. I refused and scored nil points with the rather ferocious guide. After lunch (with cider and fags for the mothers), there was a trip on a fishing smack which the kids loved.

But then there was more walking around the harbour and we were supposed to draw a fort. I was in a group with the rebellious teacher who thankfully decided, instead, to let the kids take their shoes and socks off and paddle. It was 3o something in the shade, so within five minutes, all the kids were soaked, splashing each other delightedly. I rolled my shorts up and waded in, starting a major water fight with the boys. It was worth it both to get wet and cool off and to see the other mother's expressions, when I emerged soaking wet. I got the impression that this was not fitting behaviour and combined with my refusal to draw a sodding leaf, should mean that I don't get asked to help next year.

2009-06-24T22:59:00.000-07:00

The summer holidays start tomorrow for the two eldest kids. Yee sodding ha. Officially they were due to finish on the 2nd of July, but in typical French rule bending style, the school sent a letter home last week, to inform us lucky parents that our delightful offspring would be home for the summer a week early. As if I didn't have enough to cope with. Now I will have to suffer an extra week of screaming teenagers. Last week they had friends over and my husband walked into the kitchen (and then straight out again) before referring to the racket they were making as being ' like a tea party for autistic hyenas.' A pretty apt description.

They are at the stage where they are either screaming with laughter or sobbing with pent up rage. I imagine this is to do with the tsumani of hormones that is flooding their systems. I hope it will pass. In the meantime lots of healthy sporty activity seems to help, plus a regular dose of B6. Luckily the weather has finally improved and we have been to the beach after school for the last couple of days for some surfing action. At least there, when they start screaming at each other, I can immerse myself in a book and ignore them.

Youngest son has suddenly become a voracious reader which is excellent news. I do like children that will sit in silence for hours. All three are also able to read in the car so long journeys are now much more bearable. Our record to date is just under three hours with all three silent and engrossed in a book. Given the sheer size of France, long journeys are a part of life so the reading in the car thing is Very Good News. My parents bought him a Puffin Club membership for Christmas and it has been absolutely brilliant. I would highly recommend this to ex-pat families. He loves the monthly magazine and being able to choose a free book every month. There is a good website too and it is a cost effective way of supplying your kids with reading matter. Apart from wanting the kids to continue to read in English, French children's books are just not very good and hugely expensive. As a result very few French children have anything like the number of books that you would find in an English household. It's a shame.

There are however many books on teenage psychology. Maybe I should buy myself one. If nothing else, if it was suitably weighty I could use it as something to throw across the kitchen at them when they misbehave.....

Do petrol pumps do overtime?

2009-06-15T23:21:00.000-07:00

Woo hoo!

Yes folks, we finally have a working internet connection again after ten days, many phone calls to unhelpful call centers and much screaming. In the end, it transpired that one lot of lovely France Telecom repair men had broken our cables whilst mending someone else's. Charming.

So here is a quick update of all that has been happening chez nous.

We survived the various bank holidays that characterise the month of May relatively unscathed. I somehow managed to get everything done, despite the kids effectively being off school for half the month. Not only are there numerous bank holidays, the French also add on other random days either side of the official holidays. They call this to 'faire le pont'; I call it a bloody nusciance. With the kids in both private and public sector schools, the extra days off were often different and trying to work out who, was meant to be at school when, was virtually impossible. So too was working out which supermarkets might possibly be open on any given bank holiday (official or otherwise) Friday or Monday. One particular 'jour ferie' saw me runnning out of diesel so I scooted out to the 24 hour credit card petrol station. It was open but as it was a bank holiday, only between 9am and 7pm.....Maybe petrol pumps faire le pont too?

The menagerie continues to thrive with the exception of the one kitten that got (acidentally) mauled by the dog. This was a double blow as it was the only one I had actually found a home for. I am now wondering if the lady will notice if I substitute it for another? In any case, yesterday evening, daughter No 1 phoned to say she had found a very small kitten abandoned at the bus stop and could she bring it home. So yes, we did spend last night feeding it with a syringe until we could persuade mummy cat to let it feed with the others.

I am less enamoured with the ducks after discovering that one of them has taken to shitting inside my plastic Crocs which were left carefully by the back door for swift sorties to the veggie patch. Not so swift when your toes swish around in duck shit, I can tell you.

One of the older cats has taken to going walkabout to the neighbours. This is probably because the farm yard frequently features dead sheep; these are left lying around for days on end for their dogs to snack on. Very bucolic and I guess the cat prefers the taste of gigot d'agneau to the dried cat foot she gets here. I wouldn't mind but she returns covered in grease, stinking of fried eggs and farts and smelling so strongly of fags, that I am sure she has taken up smoking.

Oh and the other morning we found a cow in the garden. This was a new one for us. Living as we do, next door to "The Worlds Worst Farmers', stray sheep are par for the course but the cow was a new one. We tried to herd it back towards the gateway but it ended up jumping the fence. Quite spectacular and all before 8am. How our lives have changed!

Ten Things I Love about France

2009-05-26T09:40:00.001-07:00

I am always complaining about my host country, so I thought today I would redress the balance and list Ten Things I Love about France.

Please feel free to add some of your own...

The wine - It is cheap enough to bath in. Which you may need to do due to the astronomical cost of water.

Petrol stations that sell alcohol - This is most useful on a Sunday afternoon when everywhere else is shut and you are gagging for a pint of white wine.

The school bus service that collects your offspring from the garden gate - Ideal for those mornings after the night before, when you are unfit to operate a moving vehicle.

The political incorrectness that your offspring will experience when they attend school. Only in France would teachers refer to ethnic minorities as being ‘slitty eyed’ and admit to ‘being desperate for a fag.’

Slapping of kids by teachers - Your children will appreciate you so much more when they realise that other adults are liable to slap them too. Plus, you can slap your own kids and other people’s without risking a visit from Social Services.

Marriage at 15 - If despite your best efforts to slap them into submission, your teens remain unruly, you can marry them off early.

Lunch time menus - cheap, plentiful and delicious. Admittedly they tend to feature offal and animals that we think of as pets, but hey, just because something is fluffy and cute doesn’t mean you can’t eat it.

Eating pets - It is perfectly acceptable to buy your kids fluffy ducklings for Easter, cute baby bunnies, gamboling lambs and little chirping chicks. And then eat them. We refer to this as ‘Pet Rotation’. No one gets bored with any particular pet and once they have been eaten, the pets can be replaced with new, cute, baby versions. The guinea pigs are very nervous....

No need to worry about wearing expensive clothes - The dress code is a flowery pinny and gum boots for women and a beret, blue trousers (held up with baler twine) and gum boots for men.

Your GP can prescribe spa treatments - You will need these to cure the rampant athletes foot caused by constantly wearing gum boots. A detox spa cure is also recommended for those of us who have become alcoholics due to the price of wine and the overriding need to drown our sorrows.

Up Tails All

2009-04-23T01:16:00.000-07:00

Easter is thankfully over and the kids will soon be back to school. Hurrah! This year we escaped the worst of the 'egg cess' by making sure the Easter bunny brought only a minimal amount of tooth rotting chocolate and instead, replacing the large egg element of Easter with three cute, fluffy, yellow ducklings.

The kids have been kept enthralled with the ducks and duck bath-time is now a household highlight. The three ducks have been named Roger, Yoko and Seal - as they are all female these are quite 'interesting' names but hey, the ducks seem happy enough. And why wouldn't they be? Their siblings and cousins were no doubt destined for one of the large foie gras farms that surround our house and are currently languishing in an industrial hangar somewhere. These three have ended up in our sitting room (really) because animal hating (yes, really) husband thought they might be too cold outside...

The plan is that the ducks will lay eggs and if not, they will get eaten. I am not entirely convinced that we are going to have the heart to eat them, especially Roger, who was named after my dad, but time will tell. And if nothing else, at only 2€ each, they were a cheap and dental friendly Easter present.

Sperm delivery madam?

2009-03-25T03:09:00.000-07:00

We are firm advocates of buying online. Even before changes in the exchange rates meant that buying British with euros was A Good Idea, we bought nearly everything, other than the weekly shop, from countries other than La Belle France.

Not only are things generally vastly cheaper, even allowing for shipping charges (and this has proved to be the case even for huge items such as a replacement engine for the Land Rover and an enormous trampoline for the children), but should something go wrong, you can - shock, horror, ooh - call Customer Service and someone will actually attempt to resolve the problem.

Note to French readers - yes, in other countries this Does Actually Happen!

And as we get almost daily parcel deliveries, we now know the delivery driver well. So well in fact that we have exchanged mobile numbers in case of our absence. Last week he gave me a guided tour of the contents of his van which included a large canister of frozen stallion sperm. This was really pissing him off as it kept falling over as he went round corners.

Last week we went to buy the OH some new trainers. Having selected the pair of choice in a well known French sports superstore (price 130€), we returned home where he discovered that the RRP in the UK was 90 pounds and that they could be purchased on Ebay (UK needless to say) for 70 pounds including P&P. Enough said.

One day, the French may get their heads round Le Service Apres Vente and stop charging ridiculously uncompetitive prices. Until then, my advice is always to check out online prices, especially for branded goods and see if you can't buy cheaper abroad.

Buying small items has been trickier up until now but there are increasing numbers of companies who offer great ranges of products and whose delivery charges are incredibly reasonable, if not free.

My latest 'find' is www.chemistdirect.co.uk. Their branded toothpaste is cheaper than the French supermarkets own brands. Again, enough said. And having ordered enough anti-inflammatories, pain killers and mouthwash to sustain an entire village, it will be some months before I have to make another time consuming and expensive trip to la pharmacie.

Plus, I won't have to run the gauntlet of Madame la Pharmaciste, who always insists on an Stasi type interrogation before she will sell me so much as a packet of paracetamol.

This is just as well, as husband having received new trainers and started to think about getting fit, has managed to 'do something' to his knee. At present he is hobbling around the house looking like he should be signing up for a SAGA holiday. Personally I think it is just an excuse to avoid going running, but I am not worried, safe in the knowledge that I can always put said trainers on Ebay.fr and make a tidy profit.

2009-03-19T23:55:00.000-07:00

Now the holidays are over and the kids are back at school, life becomes a little easier once again. I do at least, stand a fighting chance, of getting some work done before they return home with constant demands for clean PE kits, replacement whiteboard markers and vast quantities of bread and jam.

From a parent's perspective, there are a lot of great things about French schools. In no particular order these are:
Long days
Free transport
Discipline
No school uniform
And no bloody packed lunches

Having had kids at schools in the UK, the last two are probably my favourites. Being freed from the tyranny of having to provide a nutritionally balanced, socially acceptable, packed meal for three children on a daily basis is marvellous. I mean, what is wrong with a packet of cheese and onion crisps and a can of cherry coke anyway? Surely that is at least 3 of the '5 A Day' fruit and veg that we are constantly exhorted to feed our little darlings? And if you add a jaffa cake for desert, then the orange gloop must count as a fourth?

And as my daughters are allowed to express themselves sartorially between Monday and Friday - (for the current 'look' think Johnny Depp in Pirates of the Caribean but with added bling. Sort of Jack Sparrow goes clubbing) - they don't feel the need to go out at the weekends dressed like Ukrainian prostitutes. Which has got to be a bonus.

But there are real downsides to French education. One of which is that teachers believe they are right. Always. This means that if your child is struggling, they will suggest a trip to the child psychologist rather than reflecting on their teaching methodology. It also means that you question their judgement at your peril.

During the last holidays, middle child asked me for three envelopes. As requests for anything other than items likely to be used to assemble WOMD (weapons of mass destruction) are granted without too much fuss, I handed the envelopes over without further thought.

Then she asked for three stamps. When questioned (I always like to check that they are not co-responding with 47 year old lorry drivers they have met on the internet), it transpired that the holiday art homework was to draw on three envelopes, post two to our home address and one to a fictitious address. This would cost about 2€ per child and struck me as a vast waste of resources, especially considering the fuel that would be used to deliver all these missives to isolated rural homes.

So I decided to take a stand and wrote to the art teacher and the head, politely explaining that my daughter would decorate the envelopes but we would not be posting them. I explained that I had no wish to waste resources and hoped that she would not be marked down as a result. I asked for some clarification as to the reasoning behind the project and pointed out that if three classes of children took part, this was rather a lot of envelopes, stamps and diesel.

Two weeks later, I have had no reply from the head and a curt verbal message from the art teacher to come and see him after school. I don't 'do' being summoned like a naughty 14 year old so I wrote back explaining that I would be happy to meet him and hear his views but we would need to fix a time that was mutually convenient. A meeting has now been scheduled for two weeks time. In the interim, he has retaliated by pinning my letter up in the staff room and turning the content into a piece of artwork, adding drawings and comments such as "art is not free".

Apparently most of the other parents also thought it was a rubbish idea and the staff are all torn between being shocked that someone could criticise one of their number and being supportive as the teacher in question is universally unpopular. And I have scored huge numbers of cool points with the college kids for daring to question 'le prof'.

However, 'le system' will probably have the last laugh. Daughter will no doubt be marked down as a result, her yearly average will be affected and she will end up having to go to a 'technical' lycee (career options include swineherd and abattoir assistant) before embarking on a career in Lidl.

I will keep you posted but remember, try and buck the system at your peril....

Vegetation Nation

2009-03-08T05:03:00.000-07:00

As it has finally stopped raining, the sun has been shining and migrating birds spotted, I decided it was time to faire le jardin. I must have been about right in my timing too, as I suddenly noticed heaps of elderly French men out and about for the first time since last year, wielding rotavators.

The first time I attempted a veggie patch, I was rather overambitious. Having seen numerous enormous French potagers with serid rows of leeks, standing to attention, I thought I would do the same. I had a mad townie fantasy of being able to be entirely self sufficient and feed the family all year round on a range of delicious organic, home grown produce. Ha.

What I didn't realise was that these plots also come complete with Papy, the retired but able bodied grandad who wields the rotavator and deals with les mauvaise herbs (weeds to you and me) and Mamie, the granny, who does the rest. Left alone with just me and my pathetic collection of B&Q garden tools from circa 1990, les mauvaises herbes soon won. I never did see the onions, the potatoes were struck by blight and in the end we put the horses into the garden to deal with the overgrown field which passes as a lawn and let them eat the remnants.

So this year, we have been a bit cleverer. Husband has made me a range of raised beds, all of which have been filled with top quality horse poo and compost. They are almost slug proof and should be easy to weed. A nifty addition of chicken wire should stop them being used as a high rise cat toilet, so all in all, I have great hopes for this summers crop.

I am also only growing the things we all like to eat and in the appropriate quantity. It took nearly two years to finish the first years courgettes. And my mother is still traumatised by excessive bean harvesting.

I suspect that the eventual cost per tomato may be akin to buying the sun dried version from a top London deli, but hey, its all part of the French experience. Now I just need to buy a floral overall from the local market to wear whilst doing the housework and I will be fully integrated. Vive la Good Life!

More bloody Lego

2009-02-22T01:42:00.000-08:00

As the thrill of playing Lego by candlelight is now (thankfully) but a distant memory, I will content myself with giving you a brief round up of the horrors that followed.

Once I ventured outside to check on the damage, I found the trampoline on the drive. This was some feat as it had been weighted down by several enormous boulders. The rotary washing line had followed suit. Roof tiles were raining down from above and a huge old oak had fallen across the drive, effectively barring my escape.
I called the husband expecting some sympathy and got told to "bloody well move the cars before they get damaged". Thanks honey.

As I moved the cars, I realised just what a storm this was. I was being buffeted around the garden and at one point, an especially strong gust, threw me at the fence. I decided that even had the drive been clear, there was no way that I would be going out. So more Lego for me then.

Not being able to leave was a shame as I had been planning to do the weekly shop. And the cupboards were pretty bare so I couldn't even plan an afternoon of comfort food and (Lego-numbing) vodka. Even a cup of tea began to be a rare treat as the day wore on with no water. By mid afternoon we had done most creative activities that do not require power or water and the arrival of a friend who had braved the climatic conditions to return daughter number two, was a huge relief. By now, the phone and mobile networks were down so the first I knew of her arrival was seeing a figure climbing through the branches of the fallen tree.

Husband meanwhile was busy driving home through the devastated Landes. The last leg of the journey should have taken 45 minutes. He spent around three hours evading fallen trees. He eventually made it back bearing vast quantities of bottled water and - thank god for licensed French service stations - wine.

With the supply of candles dwindling, we toddled off to bed. In the normal course of things, I would have assumed that power and water would be back on the following day. But as the OH had seen the extent of the devastation, we realised that restoring power would take some time and decided to stock pile water and candles. This proved wise as we had another 24 hours before any water ran from the tap and another two days before power was restored.

Meanwhile, it had started raining heavily, again. The roof was leaking like a sieve and we spent the day emptying strategically placed buckets. Still, the rainwater did at least come in handy for flushing the loo...

The big storm has now gone down in family history, or at least in my dear husband's words as "another example of the chaos that ensues when I leave you alone". I think he is joking.

Lego by Candlelight

2009-02-12T08:01:00.000-08:00

Yes folks I am back! My long silence has been due to the lack of any internet connection after the storms that hit south west France a couple of weeks ago. Like many others, although France Telecom has not yet been round to repair the line that is looped around trees on our drive or replace the telegraph post which is lurching at a crazy 45% angle, we have managed to re-connect ourselves. Spirit of the blitz and all that. In the meantime, here is the post I was busy writing as the storm hit.

Everything has gone pear shaped this week. It always does when my OH goes away. This week I have been left alone to keep the home fires burning, literally, whilst he went up north to work on my parents property.

Whilst I was busy moaning about being left to cope with assorted kids, four legged friends and day to day crap, he was busy being reminded of how cold and grey, northern France is and just why we moved south to sunshine and warm winds. More of this later.

Anyway, despite being determined to be a capable woman who could face any of the challenges a few days alone, threw her way, I failed dismally.

And it really wasn’t my fault...

The week started off with a suspect looking tyre on my car. The nice man at the local MOT centre, told me it needed dealing with and put some air in, to get me home. Driving Land Rovers, means that buying new tyres is a complicated activity involving internet orders and eventual deliveries. This is a bit of a faff but makes them affordable. So I was going to have to wait for a tyre. And not drive the car in the meantime.

Living in the middle of nowhere, means not driving is not an option.

And I couldn’t drive the OH’s car as it had an issue. Don’t ask me what; I merely recall that it was making a noise like a squashed budgie. And that this, required his friend to come and fix it. Sounds reasonable until I get to the fixing part. I got to stand outside in driving rain and sub-zero temperatures, whilst the friend asked me to pass him things. This was a linguistic challenge as I didn’t know what the tools were called in English, let alone French.

Still the car got fixed and I was mobile once more. If a little cold.

The next day I attempted to withdraw some cash only to be told that I had exceeded my limit and couldn’t have any more for five days. As the OH and his bank card were several hundred miles away, things were beginning to look grim. The children’s money boxes failed to provide a solution (I had raided them the week before) so I resorted to borrowing 20€ from another of the OH’s friends who dropped by.

The next couple of days saw only minor incidents. One involved driving the wrong way round a car park in the dark, having forgotten to put my lights on (in my defence, I did have a car full of over excited teenagers). However, I didn’t hit the oncoming car (he swerved) so that was A Good Thing.

I also didn’t drive all the way home with someone else’s car keys that I had picked up by accident in a shop. I found them in my bag, just before the poor man called the police.

Towards the end of the week, I was beginning to think that I might make it through relatively unscathed. I had only minor injuries sustained by carrying in firewood on a daily basis, plus a couple of burns caused by that thing my husband normally does. I believe it is known as cooking.

Then it all went horribly wrong....

I was feeling kind and let small son sleep in my bed. He has been on my case for weeks to spend the night with him and his Action men as he thinks this would be ‘fun’. Unsurprisingly, I don’t, so I had placated him with the offer of a night in Mummy’s bed.

I wasn’t looking forward to a night of kicking, snoring and farting but what surprised me most was that he kept waking up. And thus waking me up.

Then I realised why. The warm wind which blows here regularly, had become more of a hurricane force wind and was busy ripping tiles from the roof. This made quite a racket and was disturbing small son. So too, did the noise of things blowing around the garden. I was clearly not going to get back to sleep, so I got up and went to make tea only to find that there was no power or water.

Power cuts are a regular feature of life in the French countryside but no water was a new one to me. Assuming that this would be a temporary state of affairs, I boiled fizzy water on the stove, lit candles and told small son, who was by now, fully awake and keen to enjoy some quality candlelit time with his mother, “yes I will play lego with you, but (bloody well) let me have a cup of tea first.”

Gone Native Yet?

2009-01-18T07:32:00.000-08:00

As another year begins, I sit back and reflect on the many things that have happened over the last twelve months. One of these is a further and marked deterioration in my ability to speak English.

Only yesterday I asked my daughter to ‘pass me my portable phone’, a request that was met with teenage sniggers.

Still, not quite as embarrassing as the time I returned to the UK and went to a supermarket. The whole checkout thing was disorientating simply because it was not in French.
Then my husband suddenly asked me to get some cash-back - a concept that simply doesn’t exit here in France. I completely panicked, couldn’t think of the phrase and ended up asking the woman ‘for 50 of your pounds’. I am only thankful that the words ‘finest’ and “English’ (pounds) didn’t somehow also creep in.

If the decline of my native language skills were balanced by an equivalent improvement in my French, the situation might be more tolerable. Instead, I appear destined to speak bad French, with a heavy accent, for evermore. My attitudes are also becoming increasingly more French. The kids let me know this in no uncertain terms with their frequent cries of “aw Mum, don’t be so French!”

I am sure I am not the only ex-pat in France to be affected by this so here is a quiz which will let you test just how French you have become...

How did you spend Christmas Eve?
A) Down the ‘Dog and Duck’ with your mates.
B) Sitting down to a sixteen course meal with all your family including Great Auntie Myrtle who no-one has seen since 1981.
C) Frantically wrapping presents and making sure that there were sherry and mince pies left out for Santa and his reindeer.

How did you do your gift shopping this year?
A) There were lots of BOGOF offers at Boots this year and you managed to find something suitable for just about everyone.
B) You wandered around the shops and found some objects with an ‘idee cadeau’ label stuck to them. As ‘idee cadeau’ ( present idea) stickers can be found on just about everything from condoms to chicken food, your gifts were...erm.. diverse...
C) You shopped online.

What did you eat on Christmas Day?
A) Smoked salmon to start with, then roast turkey with all the trimmings (plus chipolatas), followed by Christmas pudding and brandy butter. Washed down with a box of Quality Street.
B) Oysters.
C)Foie gras, then roast goose and potato gratin, followed by Christmas cake.

On Boxing day, you were:
A) Badly hungover. There was a Boxing Day buffet lunch at a friends where you felt rubbish until you started on the special Christmas punch. At which point all was well with the world again.
B) At work.
C) Out for a healthy walk with the family, then back for a large meal involving copious amounts of food and alcohol.

When did you taking your decorations down?
A) By Twelfth night - bien sur!
B) What do you mean, take them down? The inflatable climbing Santa with a flashing sack will be left attached to the outside of the house until he is removed by high winds in March.
C) When most of the neighbours removed theirs - so around mid January.

By now, a pattern ought to be emerging but if not, here are a few extra questions to help you.

When you go on holiday, you go:
A) Somewhere you have never been before, where you can experience different cultures, food and people.
B) Thirty miles up the road to the holiday home which has been in the family for six generations.
C) Somewhere in France that involves camping and ideally a camper van.

On the beach you:
A) Cover up from head to toe, wear socks with your sandals, slap factor 80 all over yourself and dress the children in swimwear that includes sunscreen.
B) Oil yourself all over in factor 2 (apart from your nipples - which get factor 6), play volleyball and smoke fags.
C) Arrive after the hottest part of the day is over but make sure you bring all that is required for a stay of several hours, chairs, cold box, ping pong bats and numerous children.

Your ideal Sunday would involve:
A) A cooked breakfast, the Sunday papers and a long pub lunch.
B) Wandering around the woods, dressed from head to toe in camouflage clothing, armed with a shotgun.
C) Chopping and stacking wood before eating lunch. This will be something that you have raised yourself. But served with organic veg!

When it comes to animals, which of the following best describes your pet situation:
A) You have three dogs, two cats, a rescue donkey, several guinea pigs and four chickens (all named). All of your animals go to the vet for regular vaccinations and check-ups (including the chickens).
B) What pets? You have two dogs chained up in the front yard (for hunting) and several rabbits in cages (for lunch).
C) You have a dog and a cat. And you prevent the dog from terrorising the cat.

If you have answered mainly A -
Living in France doesn’t seem to have affected you much. Yet. Maybe you haven’t been here for long enough or maybe you live in the Dordogne? In either case you are still resolutely British!

Mainly B -
You have become as French as the French - bien! Just be careful that you don’t take it to extremes and start listening to Johnny Halliday.

Mainly C - You have integrated well and adopted quite a few aspects of the French lifestyle - keep it up!

Life’s little Luxuries

2009-01-09T09:22:00.000-08:00

Well, Christmas is over and we have all, just about, recovered. We were of course, struck down by the annual bug that always seems to hit when I down tools for the holidays.

This year it was something akin to the Black Death and I spent several days convinced that I was going to die. Husband cooked a fantastic Christmas dinner, that I was unable to eat, before succumbing to the lurgi himself. The kids swiftly followed suit so I was forced to leave my deathbed and attend to the needs of my nearest and dearest. This I did but I have to confess, that sympathy was in short supply.

Middle child was the least affected ( which makes a change as she is usually the most affected, if you get my drift) so she was soon kicked off the sofa to help with the household chores.

Its at times like this, that rural French life on the bread line, really loses its thrall. If indeed, it ever had any.

Collecting eggs from your hens on a sunny summers day is all very lovely. Braving arctic temperatures when you have a raging temperature yourself, to go and shut them up at night is less appealing. Especially as the bloody things haven’t laid an egg for months now.

Gathering round a roaring log fire is lovely. Staggering outside to load up the log basket for the umpteenth time that day, is less than lovely. When you sit by the fire and are finally warm enough, your face takes on the reddened glow of an old wino. Move away from the fire to let your blood vessels recover and the rest of your body starts to freeze.

Deciding to make do and mend because you are ‘downshifting’ is all very well in theory. The practice is a little harder. I can sew up holes in clothes but when the printer needs mending, it is beyond my capabilities. And I really can’t imagine that the man in the printer shop, will be happy to be paid in jars of home made chutney.

And, why do gas bottles only ever run out when it is cold, dark and you are at a key point in the culinary process?

When you are tired, ill, miserable and still having to carry firewood, feed animals and prepare yet another meal from ingredients left in the store-cupboard because you can’t afford to shop until the end of next week, the lack of money really does get to you.

With the current economic climate, I really can’t imagine that our position is going to improve anytime soon. I think I had better spend the first part of 2009 trying to find some form of money making activity of the paid, job type nature. Unfortunately, I suspect rather a lot of French people will also be trying to do this.

And they will probably be better qualified than me. Still, looking on the bright side, being so ill and stressed about money, does mean I have lost shed loads of weight. The bad news is that my jeans are now too big and of course, I can’t afford to buy new ones.

Maybe I should try one of those ads in the back of Private Eye - “Impoverished young woman urgently needs money for clothes” - sort of thing. I suspect any responses might be rather dubious but maybe it is worth a try?

Action Stations

2008-12-15T23:05:00.000-08:00

With only two weeks to go, I thought I would take a break from Christmas shopping to spread some festive cheer. Actually, I am exaggerating, I haven’t started shopping yet.

And given this mornings bank statement, I am not likely to be doing so in the foreseeable future.

Instead, we are all making each other presents. Very laudable but god, I am going to need all my acting skills on Christmas Day, when I open some of the unmitigated crap the kids are creating.

The children (needless to say) are coming out of this well. Small son is getting an Action Man war zone. If it was sold in Toys R Us, it would probably be called Action Man Command and Control, Search and Kill.

It is being made by husband and a friend (ex-special forces) so it has a certain, erm realism, that might not be found in a usual child’s toy. The (real) barbed wire is one element that I am not sure would satisfy trading standards. And, I am not convinced that the interrogation suite is ever so politically correct.

But, I am very impressed with the attention to detail. They have even got the bullet holes in the guard tower to scale...

So the kids are not going to suffer from our lack of cash. It is just myself I am feeling sorry for...
Last night was a particular low point. I was busy sewing sandbags (for Action Man rather than any localised flooding) when middle daughter asked me to help her, make the pin cushion she will be giving me.
I can see the funny side of this, but equally, roll on the day when we can afford some over-priced consumer tat (in other words, things I might actually want).

To cheer me up, older daughter found this.

Christmas Accidents -
3 Brits die each year using their tongues to test a nine-volt battery.

142 Brits were injured in 1999 by failing to remove the pins from new shirts.

58 Brits are injured each year by using sharp knives instead of screwdrivers. (Does this mean they are carving the turkey with screwdrivers?)

31 Brits have died since 1996 watering their Christmas trees whilst the fairy lights were plugged in.

19 Brits have died in the last three years mistaking Christmas decorations for chocolate.

British hospitals reported 4 broken arms last year following cracker-pulling accidents.

543 Brits were admitted to A&E in the last 2 years after trying to open bottles of beer with their teeth.

5 Brits were injured last year involving out-of-control scalextric cars.

And my personal favourite -
18 Brits suffered serious burns in 2000 after trying on a new jumper, with a lit cigarette in their mouth.

But possibly the best of all...
In 2000, 8 Brits were admitted to hospital with fractured skulls. These were incurred whilst throwing up into the toilet.

If anyone has a French version, I would love to see it. In the meantime, I will wait for next years version which will no doubt mention A&E, children and barbed wire.

Suis je boverred

2008-12-03T10:21:00.000-08:00

Eldest daughter came home last week with an arm load of forms to be completed for her ‘stage’ or work experience. I have fond memories of (not) doing work experience aged 15. Looking upon it as an opportunity for a week off school, I told my year head that I would be working at the stables.

As this was the very same stables where I kept my pony, you can probably imagine how I spent my time. The year head threatened to visit. I never did see her; probably as a result of the directions I sent, which involved a number of footpaths, fields and stiles.

Stiles are always a good deterrent for women in skirts.

Eldest daughter had been planning to do pretty much the same, until the meeting this week at school. Off we trotted assuming we could just fill in the forms and inform the school that she would be at home with her parents, learning how to be a self-employed photojournalist.

Obstacle number one was the discovery that the French authorities do not recognise photojournalism as a profession. They consider it simply impossible to do the two things. So bear that in mind, all you war zone reporters out there. You don’t actually exist - at least not according to the French authorities.

And of course, bien sur, neither parent has any ‘diplomes’ to wave around as proof either.

Obstacle number two was the meeting itself. It was so excruciatingly boring that I resorted to sorting out my handbag, filing my nails and writing notes to the friend sitting next to me.

Honestly - anything that needed to be said, could have been said within the first fifteen minutes. Instead we were treated to an hour and a half of general pontification about the benefits of work experience, why the children would be doing it, where they could do it, what would happen at lunch time and what they would not be able to do. Bla bla bla.

Everything was repeated twice, if not three times. Mothers took copious amounts of notes and no-one seemed in any hurry to get home. Mind you, this wasn’t surprising as most of them had clearly dressed up for the occasion and one lady had brought her knitting.

The upshot of all this was the discovery that, the kids would not actually be working (they are too young), just observing. They would be allowed to be placed with other family members if there was no alternative and that local placements were the better option.

And that it was better to ask someone you know, as they are more likely to answer ‘yes’ to the question ‘would you like little Jean-Claude to come and stand around the place, watch you work, do nothing and generally get on your tits for a week? Oh and can you feed him at lunchtimes too please?’

As most people round here work on farms and are also related to each other, January will see a whole lot of bored kids standing round on their relatives farms.
February may well see a flurry of court cases where farmers are accused of burying snotty adolescents in the silage.

The daughter refused to be stopped in her tracks by French officialdom and went off to see her teacher the next day. She pointed out that if she stayed at home, she would be allowed to use the photographic equipment (and might learn something) whereas a ‘professional’ studio would be very unlikely to let her anywhere near it. Then in a stroke of pre-teen genius, she argued that as the vagaries of French law mean her step-father has no legal rights over her, he could not be considered a parent and was thus not a close family member.

Result - one resigned teacher, one happy child and parents who have just realised they will be stuck with the child for a week when she could be at school or standing around on a farm somewhere.

Cold Comfort Farm

2008-11-23T02:29:00.001-08:00

Like everyone else, we are feeling le crunch de credit. And we, like many others have decided not to turn our heating on this winter. The stewards are still out as to whether this will actually be achievable.

In the meantime, the wood burner is going night and day, we have laid rugs everywhere (makes a huge difference) and are all wearing slippers.

Eldest daughter spends most of her time at a friends whose huge house has no heating, save two open fires and is quite used to watching TV wrapped in a duvet.

Middle child doesn’t feel the cold in any case and small son usually wears so many layers of dressing up clothes that he has not yet noticed.

It is only the parents who suffer.

But, I am enjoying the money saving benefits and get a twisted delight from not using the tumble dryer; the washing dries to a crisp by the fire. It is also amazing just what you can cook on the top of a stove. Ours has a little covered area and we are now producing the best pizzas ever.

A palette de porc, one of the nicest cuts of cheap pork, has also been a success. Slow cooked in a casserole dish for around nine hours, this proved a hit with all the family.

I probably sound like a complete masochist and have to confess that I have always yearned to be Laura Ingalls Wilder, ever since I first read the books aged seven. However, the reality is that with our oven out of action for the last ten months, (customer service anyone?), I have had to adapt.

The upshot of all this frugality and pioneer spirit is that I am now totally turned on to the benefits of using wood as a fuel source.

And I am not the only one. Some communes are now bulk ordering wood for their residents along with heating fuel. This means that the buyers benefit from economies of scale and the distributors lives are simplified. Its a no brainer really!

Why not check to see if your commune has such a scheme? And if not suggest setting one up?

If you are on a low income you could also be eligible for a grant to assist with the cost of any fuel-oil purchase made between 01.07.08 and 31.03.09. Ask the local Tresor Public for the form or download it from the gouv.fr site.

Low income families who have a gas heating system may be able to benefit from special tariffs. Check with your local CAF for the income limits as a family of four could save up to 118€. Those getting the CMU will also be able to access reduced price electricity and will be contacted directly by the electricity companies.

And if you don’t qualify? Wear lots of clothes and get a cat to sit on your lap when working at your desk.

Marmite Pizza?

2008-11-20T01:30:00.000-08:00

Today there is a greve - that is a strike to you and I. As a result the secondary teachers are out in force and the majority of classes have been cancelled. I work from home so my friends who go out to work, have dumped a variety of offspring chez nous. Entertaining other peoples children is always an eye opener and never more so than when they are of another nationality.

Cultural differences are always going to be a source of amusement and over the years we have had more than our fair share of moments where the entente has been less than cordiale.

Food is often a factor. Or rather, the bizarre eating habits of Les Anglais, as perceived by the French. One regular sleep over guest now brings her own breakfast. This came about after the famous occasion when I had run out of chocolate covered cereal and nutella for the toast. The conversation went something like this -

Me - “How about some fruit?”
Her - Blank incomprehension, shakes head, thinks, ‘why is this woman offering me dessert?’

Me - “Would you like porridge oats?”
Her - Blank incomprehension, politely refuses, thinks, ‘why is this woman offering me horse feed?’

Me - getting desperate, “ I could do you a fried egg?”
Her - Looks terrified, thinks, ‘ this woman is trying to poison me!’

I gave up. She now arrives with a jar of nutella and strangely enough, a loaf of white sliced, crustless bread, something that couldn’t be more English. But clearly it is ok as her mother brought it in France, therefore it must be edible....

Anyway, we had the last laugh. The bread brought back so many happy memories of kids birthday teas and crustless marmite sarnies - bliss - that the OH and I devoured the lot in bacon butties. Ha.

The French do have an incredible arrogance about food. They maintain that if it is French it is Good and if it is foreign it is Bad. This is why it cracks me up when Raymond Le Blanc starts twaddling on about ‘France and ze fine dining’ on the TV show The Restaurant.

I wholeheartedly agree that French food can be fantastic, especially traditional regional dishes.

But the French also love to take dishes from other cultures, add a touch of arrogant ‘we can do better’ and cock them right up. Go to a Pizzeria and the cheese and tomato options may be edible but the ‘special’ will involve some ghastly confection of honey, nuts, apple, duck and curry sauce.

It is also why I went to an up-market restaurant recently and was nearly poisoned by the dish of the day. It was advertised as a kebab. I imagined some Gordon Ramsay type special - maybe free range lamb, rocket, fantastic sauce and a home made wrap.

The special ingredient turned out to be foie gras, marinated in Sangria. I am all for fusion cooking but this was a step too far. Actually, it was several steps too far.

Bastardising ethnic food like this may explain why the French have such a distrust of eating anything foreign, as generally it is not very nice. It may also explain why French kids will only eat pasta plain. Although sometimes they will add tomato ketchup, if they are feeling particularly cosmopolitan and adventurous.

I had better go and buy some baguettes for lunch. They are always a safe bet served with ham. And nothing else.

Battlefield Communiqués

2008-11-16T07:09:00.000-08:00

As any strategist will know, comms are key in winning the battle. For ex-pats, being able to communicate with the outside world, can mean the difference between sanity and madness. I found this out the hard way when I moved to France and found myself in a rented property with no phone line.

I tried to use the phone box in the village. My over-riding memory is of trying to make myself heard above the gale force winds, desperately feeding coins into the slot and trying to placate small son who was sobbing in his buggy outside. After several days, I gave up and resorted to using my (English) mobile. Yes, I know, stupid. Very stupid. One enormous bill later, I had learnt the error of my ways.

Cut to several years on and our latest move. You would think that by now I would have got French comms down to a fine art. But no, despite requesting the installation of a phone line two weeks beforehand, we were still minus a phone connection for a further fortnight. The reason? France Telecom maintained that the house did not exist.

It is moments like this, that make you want to reach for a desktop mounted rocket launcher and fire it at someone. As this is not possible, we bring you the Survive France guide to comms.....

If you are lucky you will live in a zone where broadband is available.

If you are even luckier you will be in an area that is ‘degroupe’ and you will be able to choose your broadband provider from a variety of suppliers. Use www.dslvalley.com or www.degrouptest.com to check out what is available in your area. However, this only works if you have an existing phone number. For those who don’t, you will need to contact all the main players directly, see if they operate in your area and check out the individual offers. I haven’t yet found a way round this process, so if anyone knows of one?

Some suppliers will take on the whole line installation process for those who do not have an existing line and even pay for it. Bypassing France Telecom like this will save you around 110€. Check out the Alice website www.aliceadsl.fr for details.

If you are unlucky, you won’t be able to get broadband and will have to rely on a dial-up connection. You can either resign yourself to all the frustrations that this brings or start campaigning for broadband in your area. It seems that FT are obliged to act concerning the supply of ADSL if:
- Il y a un minimum de 100 demandes de raccordement
Si il y a au moins 1000 lignes téléphoniques qui dépendent d’un même répartiteur

So if your commune is likely to fulfil either of these two criteria, it might be worth trying to get some local campaign going. Has anyone tried?

If you cannot cope with having a permanently engaged phone, you could install a second line. When we lived in the 47, we resorted to this as both of us were working from home full time. It really, really pissed me off to have to pay two lots of line rental to FT but it was the only solution. Still, I was not as pissed off as a friend who had reluctantly decided to install a second line and then got told by FT that she couldn’t have one as they didn’t have any ‘spare’ lines.

Now that is really unlucky and guaranteed to make you reach for the desktop mounted rocket launcher.

It's the Tabouli Ban

2008-11-11T01:26:00.000-08:00

The news today that food manufacturers Garbit, are recalling thousands of couscous ready meals because “they could go off like a small bomb, wounding consumers or causing damage to kitchens” is probably part of a cunning ploy to keep French womankind barefoot and in the kitchen.

France has long been anti ‘le junk food’, at least in principle. In reality, the French nation is growing ever larger and there is an expanding market for ready meals. These days you can even buy pre-prepared frozen apero type snacks, all carefully designed to make it look like you have spent hours in the kitchen.

Despite this, there is still a culture of making your own and there is a huge degree of competitiveness among French women when it comes to making your own or at least claiming that things are ‘fait ( a la ) maison’. It takes a brave woman to admit that she has not spent hours slaving over the stove.

I overcome this dilemma by making a bizarre selection of home made things every now and again and then, making sure, that all the friends and neighbours get to hear about it.

Actually it is my husband who makes them, but we keep that part quiet as men who wear aprons in France are generally seen as being sexually deviant. Apart of course from people like Raymond Le Blanc. Or maybe he is and that is why he has decamped to Oxfordshire to inflict fine dining on the natives there?

Anyway, by producing a selection of home made items every now and again, no one ever questions the fact that I don’t make my own foie gras and disembowel bunnies on a regular basis. Chutney or Le shutney is a good one. Most French people would find it unpalatable in any case, so even if you make a crap batch, you can get away with handing it out. Ginger beer has also provided much amusement and a couple of raised eyebrows from French mothers who assumed I was feeding the under ten’s some bizarre English alcoholic beverage.

Perhaps the exploding couscous story is designed to make the consumer associate middle eastern food with explosions. After all the French media are notoriously racist and it is not a big leap to imagine them leading with a story that French (food) Good - Ethnic (food) Bad.

In any case, I think it is a lesson to all us ladies to get back in the kitchen. I for one am going to set an example by heading that way right now.

I will be cracking open a bottle and watching my husband whilst he prepares dinner.

Bean me up Sarkozy

2008-11-06T08:21:00.000-08:00

Decent tea bags are a rarity. Well this is a slight lie. You will discover that I lie or rather, exaggerate quite a lot. Actually, more than a lot. All the time would be more truthful. Anyway, you can buy tea bags in France. The problem is that they are either available in French supermarkets in the 'exotic foodstuffs' sections, at an astronomical price or in the numerous 'English' shops that are spreading across France.

Now I have no problem with people opening such stores. Lots of ex-pats do and spend their days writing furious letters to the newspapers, bemoaning the spread of cheddar throughout France and signing off as Disgusted of Dordogne. My problem is simply with the prices. It is not the fault of the shop keepers. They are paying a huge whack in social charges just for the pleasure of being open. Really they ought to be given charitable status and a sodding great EU grant as they are providing aid in the form of Marmite to us distressed gentlefolk. But instead, by the time they have bought their beans, transported them, paid all the necessary dues and put them on a shelf, the beans cost about the same as a kilo of truffles.

Us distressed ex-pats who are trying and failing to eke out a living, cannot afford to feed our off-spring the vegetable equivalent of caviar on toast for tea. The result? An entire generation is now growing up without access to affordable baked beans. This is an outrage and I urge you to write to your MEP now!

I am counting on your support.

Shag in the Woods

2008-11-06T08:02:00.000-08:00

It’s an eight mile round trip to our nearest supermarket but driving through the forest means I can shave nearly three miles off. The track is passable in all but the very worst weather but full of ruts and pot holes. So I very rarely meet other traffic. Although there was one famous occasion when we came across a shagging couple, much to the kids delight.

Last night I left the supermarket as dusk was falling and set off home. The forest is quite spooky even on a sunny day and for some reason as I turned off the main road and into the woods, I felt a bit uneasy. I put this down to having been reading my daughters collection of vampire novels all weekend. Even so, I felt the need to lock the car doors.

When a man appeared two minutes later, pointing a gun, apparently at me, I nearly shat myself. The cammo clothing from head to toe meant that he was more likely to be a hunter than a demented survivalist psychopath but even so I was slightly freaked out.

He looked surprised too. Maybe he wasn’t expecting some house wife to come tearing past in her Land Rover in the dark. Maybe the local commune had asked him to patrol the area and look out for shagging couples. Maybe he was hunting small furry animals. But in any case, is it really sensible for hunters to be wandering around the woods in the dark, armed with a potentially lethal weapon?