goats – Page 2 – derrickjknight

Hay Ho

This morning Aaron of A.P. Maintenance completed his preparation of the Rose Garden for winter that is still being kept at bay.

A week or so back he gave the shrub roses a good haircut. Today he laid our two year old compost around their bases.

Clumps of bright yellow bidens, like these at the foot of our sculpture, Florence;

Little irises, heucheras, lamium, and geraniums;

a fig flowering in the Palm Bed;

and this clematis on the Westbrook Arbour, all speak of the season’s confusion.

This morning I helped Elizabeth load her car with belongings to take to her Pilley house. This afternoon Jackie and I followed this up by unloading them for her. We then continued on a forest drive.

The lake that has been mostly dry during the summer once more bears ripples and reflections.

Bustling goats in a field alongside Jordans Lane competed in a dodgem race for first bite at the bundles of hay clutched under their speeding keeper’s left arm.

On an open space beside Bull Hill a group of stumpy little ponies chomped on their own food.

From here we sped off to Mudeford, arriving just in time for sunset. While I was taking these shots

I was unaware that Jackie was adding her own sequence, featuring me among the silhouettes.

Preening swans,

one with an entourage of gulls, completed the picture.

Elizabeth returned in the evening and we all dined on Jackie’s splendidly hot chilli con carne and toothsome savoury rice. My sister drank Hop House Lager; my wife drank Hoegaarden; and I finished the Merlot

A Cock-Fight

CLICK ON IMAGES TO ENLARGE. REPEAT IF REQUIRED.

On another hot day with a glorious cloudless blue sky, Jackie and I spent the morning shopping for birthday presents for Shelly and for Poppy.

First stop was Otter Nurseries where we bought a couple of skimmias for Jackie’s sister,

and two interesting new bronzed rudbeckias for ourselves. There are plenty of buds on these latter plants for the Head Gardener to bring to perfection in a very short time.

We felt rather sad at the emptiness of such a large, splendidly stocked, outlet on such a day. This was a clear indication that the seasons are changing.

Sammy Miller’s Motorcycle Museum in Bashley Common Road was the next venue. This, we thought, was a suitable establishment at which to find girlie items for Shelly and for our granddaughter.

You may well be surprised at this, if you don’t know that the outbuildings of the museum contain a number of shops attractive to tourists. Whilst I wandered around outside, Jackie bought a pastel blue quartz necklace for her sister, and another item suitable for a one-year old.

There were many motorcycles parked in their dedicated area. This one is alongside one of the antique petrol pumps that line the walls.

Snacks and drinks were being enjoyed in the shopping precinct which was generously supplied with garden ornaments including this milk cart;

a farm cart;

and various items of farm machinery;

more of which was distributed among the animals on the borders of the site.

A paddle of ducks welcomes cool shade and a running stream

There are basking goats, two of which really stink like their cheese.

Chickens seem oblivious to this.

A vociferous rooster crows continuously.

Leaving his lady-love in the shade of his shed,

a plumage plumped turkey

made his sedate and purposeful way along the front of the pen.

Coming to a halt at a wire window he silently confronted the occupant.

‘Fight. Fight. Fight’, cried the rooster, summoning the chicken audience

as the confrontation continued.

A farmhand explained the situation. Earlier this morning, there had, indeed, been a cock-fight over the hen. That is why the unfortunate challenger was penned up. These creatures are capable of inflicting serious damage in their duels.

This evening we dined at The Raj in Old Milton. My main course was Chingri Bullet with giant prawns that must surely have been indulged with Jackie’s plant food. Jackie’s was chicken sag. We shared special fried rice, a paratha, and an onion bahji; and both drank Kingfisher.

Preparing For Visitors

Travelling into the first streaks of dawn this morning, the usual commuter traffic sped along Christchurch Road in the direction of Lymington;

whilst in our garden the aged gazebo has flecked the clematis Cirrhosa purpurascens with rusty freckles

The proprietor of Fagan’s menswear shop in New Milton has occasionally fitted me from her parents’ outlet, Hunt’s, for big and tall men, in Boscombe. As regular readers will know, the last jacket she produced wasn’t quite big enough. Jackie therefore drove me to Boscombe, where, clearly one of Hunt’s smaller customers, I was able to buy two jackets and order a suit.

This town, now a suburb of Bournemouth, still boasts a fine, sandy beach. As it was a fine, springlike, morning we diverted to the beach.

Benches on the clifftop were occupied by basking companions.

A long zigzagged path led down to the beach. Leaving Jackie on a bench conveniently situated halfway down, I continued to investigate. I walked along to the pier, back up a similar path to the top, and through Bournemouth Rotary Club’s sponsored garden to our parking spot.

On the way down I was intrigued by a collection of inactive heavy plant on the sandy beach. This, I learned, was an effort to reclaim the sand for the summer’s visitors.

I noticed that there was a useful gap in the row of beach huts where a woman slowly pushing a buggy would eventually appear. After waiting for what seemed an age, I got the shot, but the inevitable happened. Masquerading as the proverbial bus, a gentleman emerged from the opposite direction.

I then met a couple ascending the slope. They told me what was happening, and why there was no current activity. Progress on the project is governed by the tides, so the men worked from 10 p.m. last night until 7 o’clock this morning, and would resume at 2 p.m. During this stage they will refurbish the groynes (no, Mr. WordPress, not groins). When that is complete, dredging of sand from beneath the waves will commence. It is expected that enough sand to reach the level of the promenade will be shifted by the month of May. The structure in the distance is the pier.

I was quite lucky to make this photograph. I turned off the camera in order to retract the lens, poked it through the wire mesh you see on the right, turned it on again, and pointed it hopefully at my intended subject. I only needed to straighten the final image a little bit.

It wasn’t long before I discovered that this ingenuity had been unnecessary (It was my Dad’s favourite joke to get me to spell it – as in ‘unnecessary, spell it’ – we always found it necessary to humour him).

Eventually, you see, the barrier came to an end, and it was possible to walk round to the machines;

to delight in the rust colour and textures of the smooth-worn grabbers,

and the weathering of the pointed timber piles.

The occasional beach hut, along the stretch leading to the pier, was being opened up.

The steep, scrub-laden, bank between these huts and the zigzag path was being cleared by a pair of goats.

I was most impressed by the final spring-cleaning effort. This cheerful pair were scrubbing the railings on the path up by Honeycombe Beach.

Water was collected in buckets from a tap further up the slope.

Local Chinese takeaway set meals for two always last us two days. This evening was our second helping of yesterday’s, with which Jackie drank Hoegaarden and I made further inroads into the malbec.

An Inspirational Visit

Accompanied by a couple of friends we lunched on excellent fish and chips at The Trusty Servant. I drank a pint of Doom Bar. After our meal we attended Minstead Lodge where Noura met us for a tour of this huge building, probably a Victorian reproduction of an earlier manor house.

It was Noura’s day off, because the establishment, apart from the residential students and some staff, is closed at weekends. However, she came in from her home in Ringwood to accommodate us. Her husband and two year old daughter also gave generously of their time and wandered around with us. What was once a family home was bought with a generous legacy and turned into a Training Project for people with learning disabilities. Martin, whom I’d met soon after we arrived in Minstead, had set up and directed the place for twenty five years, until recently moving to a liaison role with Furzey Gardens.

I had had no idea what a thriving community it is, or how extensive the house and grounds are, so found the visit most informative and spiritually uplifting. One of our guides was a gentleman in transitional accommodation before a move to independent living in Totton. A delightful and courteous young man, he took pride in showing us round, telling us what the various activities were, and, I suspect, pulling Noura’s leg. He was clear that he would continue to come and work here after he had moved. After twenty years in residence I am sure he would need that continuity. His special area of expertise was feeding and caring for the animals. We were shown horses, donkeys, and goats all of which answered his call. The geese were less interested, possibly because their feeder passed us on his way to their field as we came away from it. Noura’s daughter was particularly fascinated by the chickens, and clutched a couple of what looked like pigeon feathers she had found earlier. Those preparing for independence in this way live on the upper floor of their current building. Our guides seemed very willing to give us all the time we needed, in taking us through the communal rooms and the gardens.

There are a number of finely crafted wooden tables and chairs made, seamlessly, out of single enormous trees. These were made by a local craftsman as payment in kind for professional services rendered by the owner. One held crib figures, behind which, clearly recently having descended from the chimney to the open fireplace in one of the panelled reception rooms, could be glimpsed a diminutive Father Christmas. Others stood by window seats from which views down the valley and across the forest could be enjoyed. The kitchen garden was impressive, and plants were on sale outside the reception area.

The link with Furzey Gardens and the Chelsea Garden was evident on the walls in the form of superb reportage paintings in the style of those decorating the sister project. We were told by staff member Andy that each resident and staff member of the Lodge made one of the stained glass leaves woven into the walls of the thatched building that features in the winner of Chelsea gold.

After our lunch a light supper of cheese on toast and apple pie and custard sufficed for our evening sustenance.

A Beguiling Smile

I had my first extended conversation with the local roadsweeper this morning. It was mostly about the weather, but that still counts. We are to have rain, which had already begun, on and off over the weekend. But it is needed for the fields. This was more successful than my attempted contribution to the discussion in the Post Office about a young lad who had just skidded off his scooter outside. Like the boy, my words fell on stony ground. He got up unscathed. I departed in disarray.

The delivery of loft insulation materials did not happen yesterday ‘because the driver is on holiday’. It is now arranged for next Wednesday, the day before I leave. Preparatory work will continue on Monday.

In the rain, I walked along the Pomport Road and up the route around the field I still call the donkey’s. At most corner junctions in Sigoules there are bright floral displays which brightened up the grey atmosphere. Yellow crocuses burst forth in clumps in the gardens and along the grassy banks by the side of the road. Some months ago I watched roofers working on what I take to be a barn conversion. Their work now forms an attractive patchwork quilt.

My assinine friend has not been in residence for some time now, and at first I thought the field empty. Two goats, however, still occupied the top corner. One hung its head, but the other clambered from beneath the tree that had sheltered the donkey back in April, stuck its nose through the wire fence, and gave me a beguiling bearded smile.

Le Code Bar, post-summer, is now closed on Sundays, and not serving food on Saturdays. Today being Saturday I was saved disappointment by Fred, who, although in sole charge of the bar, vanished into the kitchen and produced roast duck, chips, and salad. He needn’t have worried that the duck might be too dry.

Holly’s Beauty

Light rain began to fall just as I left home to repeat the walk I had taken with Matthew and Oddie on 7th. This precipitation was to take the form of intermittent showers for the first three quarters of an hour or so. During the few periods when the sun pierced the grey cloud cover, the hedgerows, now counting convulvulus among their constituents, glistened with the raindrops. Not having the excuse of Mat’s ageing little terrier to call Jackie to collect me from the bottle bank, I had to walk the final stretch up Running Hill as well.

Once I had emerged from the forest at Little Chef I was alongside the A31 for a short time. I passed that building, the Travelodge, the Esso garage and various houses which are found roughly at the area where the signs to Stoney Cross bring the hopeful traveller.

What is now a major East/West dual carriageway has very little in the way of pedestrian thoroughfares. The derelict footpath from just past the Esso garage to Forest Road betrays the fact that ordinary people without cars once trod this way. Now it is only people like me who venture along it. A row of hardy hollyhocks, having escaped to the central reservation, clung to the thin soil as passing vehicles did their best to create enough turbulence to tear them up.

I exchanged waves with a woman working in a garden not far from a tall, isolated, house called Rufuston that seems to have its own Royal Mail collection box. The name must come from the nearby Rufus Stone (see post of 19th November last year). As I reached this house I paused to photograph it. The woman tentatively, with a quizzical look, approached me from my left. She wondered why I was taking photographs. It seemed a reasonable question really, especially as it was her house whose image I had just pocketed. My explanation of what I was up to must have reassured her, for we parted pleasantly and she expressed the wish that the weather would stay fine for the rest of my walk.

At the bottom of the hill that leads from The Splash to the Furzey Gardens junction, Tim was digging mud out of the ditch that leads to his farm. This trench joins a pipe that runs under the road. Like the ditch, the pipe was full of soggy earth. Tim was working to clear as much as he could from the ditch and the underground pipe. I have before wondered whether there was a machine to carry out this task. If there is, Tim wasn’t aware of it as he plied his garden fork. Although the farm is his, he said the land on which the road lies belongs to the manor, the owners of which, in his view are responsible for the clearance. Apparently in the old days there was a villager with a technical title Tim couldn’t remember, whose job it was to keep the ditches clear. Tim also told me that the two goats and few sheep on his little farm are what might be called rescue animals. The goats were found abandoned as kids some fourteen years ago near Godshill; the sheep were ailing as lambs and bottle-fed in the same haven. I joked that if I found any stray creature in the forest I would know where to bring it.

This afternoon was spent once again grappling with security problems with BT e-mail accounts. Firstly I received one of those hijacking missives purporting to come from someone in urgent need of money. Because the whole e-mail address of the sender is taken over by these evil scammers, any reply never reaches the alleged originator. It goes to the crooks. This happened to Louisa a year or so ago. Chris and Frances were said to have been mugged in Rome where the Embassy was unhelpful. Chris was visiting our mother in West End at the time. These messages are instantly recognisable firstly because anyone in such dire need would use the telephone, and secondly because the English is so appalling. Neither Louisa nor Chris would write so badly. The whole business is a dreadful headache for the true account holder, because it affects everyone in their address book. All contacts are lost.

As I was contemplating the plight of my brother and sister-in-law I received an e-mail allegedly from Yahoo! Customer Care which seemed to me to be equally spurious and contained the usual booby-trapped ‘Click here’ message. It had not even been put into the Spam folder by BTYahoo! mail. I smelt a rat and phoned BT. When I finally got to an agent he said he didn’t deal with such technical matters and consequently put me in a queue for technical help. It took some time before I got a person, who didn’t know whether this latest message was Spam or not. After I read it out two or three times, pointing out the errors and where it didn’t seem to make sense, she decided it was more likely than not to be a scam. She advised me to put it into the Spam folder and send it to abuseadbt. I asked if that was all one word and we managed between us to establish that it wasn’t. The ad bit was the symbol @. When I asked how I was now to have any faith in BT security she told me that she herself had been unable to receive messages for six months because she had been hacked and her password rejected, until suddenly it was accepted again. This failed to reassure me.

I had opted to take part in a telephone survey after the call. It consisted of a triple choice questionnaire, 1 for good, 2 for bad, 3 for unsure; followed by an opportunity to make recorded comments about why I had scored it as I did. I took the opportunity. In the midst of this, despite the repetition of how important and helpful my views would be, I must have run out of time, for I was cut off in full flow. It was a machine that conducted the survey. I don’t think it was programmed to register when it has interrupted the customer and call them back to offer more time. Either that or I upset it when I mentioned that a difference in accents of spoken English makes for a certain difficulty in communication.

I am not convinced of the security of my e-mail account. I cannot understand how the survey as performed can be of benefit to anyone. BT, if you read this, I am open to all attempts at reassurance on either matter.

Of all the different varieties of fuchsia Jackie has been growing in her pots, the one the blooms of which she has most eagerly awaited is named ‘Holly’s beauty’ (otherwise known to her as Orlaith). This has come into its own today.

This evening we dined on Jackie’s chilli con carne and pilau rice. My drink was Chilano cabernet sauvignon 2011 and Jackie’s was Hoegaarden.

A Precarious Career

Horses and carriages are not an unusual sight in the lanes of Minstead. As I walked down toward Football Green this morning, a horse pulling an old carriage containing two gentlemen trotted towards me directly into the sun, which glinted from the windscreens of the convoy of cars keeping pace with it. Like any other considerate road user, the animal nodded acknowledgement to the driver of a New Forest Council drain clearing vehicle I had seen operating further up the road.

From Football Green I took the road through the grounds of Minstead Lodge training project, where Dave had told me I would see goats that he and Gladys had seen as kids. That is when the goats were in their infancy, not my friends. I did indeed see the goats, and geese, and donkeys.

Leaving these grounds and turning right down Seamans Lane I again took the Suters Cottage route across the forest. Walking under the dead tree I had photographed yesterday, I was rewarded with a sight of some of the wonderfully weird shapes these fallen trunks metamorphose into. A fox and a rhino, perhaps?

Keeping straight across the wilderness I eventually emerged a little further up Running Hill. It is very clear that the forest across the road from our Lower Drive does actually link with Shave Wood. I had once asked a woman returning with her dog: ‘Does that lead anywhere?’. She had said it didn’t. Well, I suppose if all you do is park your car on the forest verge and let your dog out for an euphemistic walk, you wouldn’t know, would you?

Today I finished reading my friend Michael Kindred’s autobiographical work, ‘Once Upon a Game’, being a description of his ‘precarious career as a games inventor’. For two reasons I am mightily relieved that I can wholeheartedly recommend this entertaining book. The first is because Michael is a very good long-standing friend and, in the world of cryptic crosswords, colleague. The second is that I feature as one of his collaborators.

Michael’s capacity to entertain is at least twofold in this piece. The first strand of this talent is in his descriptions of the process of creativity from the, sometimes failing, germ of an idea to the shop shelves. I found his story of how the very successful board game ‘Bewitched’ came into being fascinating and provoking of much admiration. Without giving too much away I can record that his observation of a discarded but saved ‘just in case’ magnet from a kitchen cupboard door mechanism, led to an idea for the game that produced a surprise element that immediately captivated the minds of the Waddington assessors.

For those who are intrigued by the actual mechanics of the games; how these developed; the intricacies of the processes of playing; and the rules, there is a different kind of entertainment. I have to confess that my brain doesn’t easily grasp such concepts, so I did skip some sections. If you have a mind like Maggie and Mike’s rather brilliant daughter Cathy, I can assure you that you will be too gripped to skip anything. Super-intelligence is not however necessary for enjoyment of these sections, for Michael does have the ability to make them simple, which benefitted the children at the Southwell primary school where he played a once-weekly play-testing session. I am sure the visits of Mr. Kindred were most popular. The expertise in working with groups, of both Michael and his wife Maggie, was put to good use in the production of the very popular ‘Once Upon a Group’, the first book to come out of the 4M stable.

Just as our work on cryptic crosswords and related books involved Michael and me bouncing ideas off each other, so the games creation involved a similar relationship with the late Malcolm Goldsmith. My friend and I shared much fun, as did he with Malcolm.

The light-hearted nature of this professional autobiography does not conceal the nerve-wracking aspects of the author’s chosen career. Creativity is an intensely personal process which, as he says, needs the reinforcement of appreciation and acceptance by others. To persevere in the face of the inevitable disappointments requires great courage and resilience. The need to make a living from the products, and their likely short-lived nature, puts timescales on the work which create considerable pressure. The inventor can never rest on his laurels. New ideas must always be forthcoming. The classics such as Scrabble and Monopoly were produced in a different era. I don’t know about Monopoly, but Scrabble was developed as a family game having the benefit of many years’ play-testing before it reached the public. As Michael states, the support of a good wife is also rather helpful. A daughter who loves games is equally a considerable asset.

The book can be obtained from www.kindredgamesandbooks.co.uk

Jackie produced perfectly cooked lamb chops and crisp vegetables for our evening meal with which I opened Campo Dorado rioja 2012 that Matthew had brought from the Upper Dicker Village Shop.

Counting My Blessings

Yesterday’s landscapes were invisible this morning, shrouded in drizzle as I went on a shopping trip with Maggie and Mike.

As always, we first visited Mike’s favourite D.I.Y. outlet on the industrial estate outside Bergerac. Maggie and I stayed in the car and put the world to rights while Mike drew a padlock for the shop assistant because he didn’t know the word for it. We went on to LeClerc, the amazing French superstore which has just about everything. My friends bought some ground nutmeg whilst I added to my DVD collection. I would have needed half a day to have explored their complete stock.

Over coffee in the vast emporium Mike spoke of a towering pillar of smoke they had seen on their last visit. It was a paint factory being completely destroyed by fire. His instinct had been to get as far away as possible from the explosions and falling ash. I, on the other hand…….. Sometime in the mid-sixties, from Amity Grove in Raynes Park, we had seen something similar. I got in the car and sped towards it. Nearing Colliers Wood, where an earlier paint factory had gone up, traffic came to a complete standstill. Everyone else in South London was smitten with the same curiosity. Tins of paint had cascaded into the surrounding built-up area.

On my return to rue St. Jacques, Saufiene, still with no car, having been driven over on a non-work day by a friend, called in with the paperwork and a date for the detailed measurement of my home improvements.

The rain having cleared up and the clouds begun to disperse, I took a walk. I rounded the murky, swollen, waters of the fishing lake where the terrain was soggy enough to have been at home in England. The surrounding, normally dry, gully had become a torrent. Beyond the lake I followed the chalky stone path up the hill and along the top of the field the donkey shares with his goats. He tracked me as usual and, accompanied by a pack of dogs in the garden of one of the new houses opposite, let out a cacophany of sound. The rock concert planned for the bar tonight would no doubt have been enhanced by it. There were also sheep on this upper level. I was able to separate them from the goats. Reaching the crossroads at the top, I remembered the last time I had climbed up there, with Jackie in 2010, just before I was given a replacement hip. Then, I had been barely able to descend. This time I counted my blessings. I continued along the track, following a sign to Mautain. The downward stretch had become the bed of a clear stream cleaning the white stone. At the quagmire at the bottom my way was barred by an announcement from the town hall. I retraced my steps.

Last night in Le Code Bar I had felt honour bound to consume as much as I could of the food Maggie and Mike had been unable to manage. This was especially so when Frederick brought us an extra portion of duck, and, in response to my friends’ protestations that they could eat no more, patting me on the shoulder, said ‘this boy will help you out, I’m sure’. Consequently I didn’t need a meal today.

A Rant

Today was what David calls ‘the big tidy up day’, so there was no walkabout.

This morning I finished Dennis Wheatley’s ‘Vendetta in Spain’. With a good grasp of history and a fine attention to detail, Wheatley tells a rollicking good story. Set in the first decade of the twentieth century, this novel was, even when published in 1961, described as historical. This got me reflecting on what is history? For a child of the last century, born in 1942, it was initially strange to think of this book as such. When Louisa, born in 1982, once asked me who Winston Churchill was, I was quite surprised. Then I considered my own ignorance about the First World War; my lack of knowledge of the ministers and personalities involved. I was even vague about Douglas Haig. and I had been born far closer to that event than she had to the second conflagration. Then, I remember Churchill’s funeral. How we experience time changes as we age. When I write of the ’70s, ’80s, and ’90s, it seems like yesterday, yet must be remote history to my grandchildren. As the days go by, I feel I have all the time in the world, yet the reality is that mine are numbered. Six months in a child’s life seems an age. To a septuagenarian it is nothing.

My house in Sigoules was built in the eighteenth century, from solid stone. Exposed beams are from barges which struggled down the Dordogne loaded with produce. Since they could not be taken back up the raging torrents, the vessels were broken up and used for building. I understand the crews then walked back to their starting points and began again with newly built craft. Now enormous refrigerated vehicles bring regular fresh produce to Carrefour and Le Code Bar. I can fly to Bergerac from Southampton in the same length of time as it took me to commute from Newark to Kings Cross.

I received a call later from James Bennet of Azzurri. Azzurri is a company to which O2 allocated my mobile phone management about three years ago now. They apparently ‘manage’ mobile phone accounts. The first I heard of this was a letter from Azzurri, sporting the O2 logo, telling me I would be hearing from one of their representatives. As long as I have been a mobile phone user I have had an O2 business account. I only ever had one previous problem. Oh, yes, the Azzurri intervention was a problem. The earlier one was my discovery from my bank statements that the cost of my mobile phone had rocketed during the last two months. On closer inspection, and after telephoning O2, it transpired that for nine months I had been paying for two mobile phones. One wasn’t mine. Because the first seven amounts had been virtually identical to mine, I had not noticed that there were two entries each month. Obviously the lucky person who hadn’t been being billed got greedy. In fairness, O2 immediately put that right and gave me a refund.

Back to James Bennet and Azzurri. As I needed to be able to send e-mails from France I actually welcomed the initial approach. I was informed that I needed a Blackberry with which I would be able to do this. I have no problem with that. I can. Now. The phone was quickly supplied and the contract signed. Mr. Bennet then seemed to be less communicative. Which was a pity, since I could not access my e-mail account. Neither could I get anything from Azzurri but voicemail messages. I inundated my personal account ‘manager’ with texts, voice- and e-mails. He almost never responded. I made several visits to O2 outlets in London, each taking upwards of an hour of time. Every single, initially confident, O2 consultant failed either to contact Azzurri or to access the account. Not one of them had heard of Azzurri. I always had to provide the contact number. Eventually we were told that Mr. Bennet had not passed the relevant information to the necessary department. At last I gained a promise from him that it would be done within two days. It wasn’t. And his voicemail message had changed. He had gone on holiday and would not be back until I was in France. I managed to reach someone else. He made, and failed to keep, the same promise. Finally, I spoke myself with technicians who were able to solve the problem over the telephone. I can’t remember whether they were in O2 or Azzurri departments. But does it matter? All the information is at home in England.

There followed extensive letters, mostly unanswered, and phone calls to O2 Customer Relations department. When I finally spoke to the manager she informed me that I was bound to Azzurri for two years. You can imagine my response to that. Eventually she agreed to release me from Azzurri. Coincidentally, I received a box of chocolates from O2. One had been sent to each ‘valued customer’ of ten years or more. When I politely suggested that didn’t really fit the bill, she proudly told me it had been her idea. I think she realised I wasn’t impressed. Furthermore, to compensate me for my trouble, I would receive a list of events at the O2 Arena. I could choose any performance for which I would be given two tickets. The list never arrived.

Maybe I had been freed from Azzurri. But if anyone told them, they ignored it. A year ago I received a phone call from a poor chap who had been given the task by Azzurri of contacting all customers to see how satisfied they were with the service. I told him. I finished by saying it wasn’t his fault. Just his bad luck. Now James Bennet calls me. As I can only get a signal on the loo seat upstairs, I did not reach the phone in time and had to listen to a voicemail message from him. ‘It is a little while since we spoke’ and there are possibitilities of a new tariff and a new handset. I calmly walked up to the village square where I can be reasonably sure of an uninterrupted signal. Of course I got his answerphone. I left a fairly firm message. Well, it was firm, and fair. He responded with an e-mail to which, as I had said, I will not reply. I had asked him not to contact me again.

The Code Bar pizza, a quarter carafe of red wine, and chocolate surprise pudding finished the day nicely.

A Welsh Interlude

Fearing the heat, I set off even earlier than yesterday for a walk to Pomport and back. As I began my return journey I could see rainclouds over Sigoules, and very soon the lapis lazuli canopy under which I’d begun my outing had turned into a slate roof. The sweat I’d engendered on the way up had become decidedly cool. Now I feared for the washing I’d left out in the garden. No rain came, and the sun soon re-emerged.

I met the donkey with its goat family mentioned on 8th. June. In order to be more precise in the preceeding sentence, on my return I attempted to ascertain the sex of this creature. Although I swear all I’d done was stand and stare s/he seemed to take exception and started up an horrendous honking until I moved on. Quite fearsome really.

Further up the hill, still lies the memorial described on that same day, although the floral tribute is missing.

As Charles bears witness, vines are strung out all around Pomport, which is a most attractive village. Walking through it, I was surprised to see an antique Austin car standing in a covered alley beside a house. Wandering inside, I encountered a group of four having their breakfast. They were English. Unfazed by my intrusion, one of the men proudly informed me that he had renovated the vehicle, ‘every nut and bolt’, himself. I should have asked him what model it was, but I expect some of my readers will know. He then opened a garage door and proudly displayed a vintage Vauxhall that he planned to drive back to England next week. I think he was rather pleased someone had taken an interest.

People were playing tennis in the now half-completed Leisure Centre in the valley between Sigoules and Pomport.

Last night and this afternoon I was deeply engrossed in ‘A Welsh Childhood’ by Alice Thomas Ellis. This is a very well produced Mermaid publication enhanced by Patrick Sutherland’s evocative black and white photographs. I imagine my friend Alex Schneideman, himself a first-rate professional, would find these illustrations inspiring. The writer’s descriptions of her childhood, and diversions into Welsh myth and legend, are enthralling.

Given Ann and Don’s nineteen years in N. Wales; the family in whose company I spent last evening; and the many holidays I have enjoyed, and occasionally endured, there, the book, donated by Don, is rather pertinent. It will stay on the coffee table in the sitting room of No. 6.

What I was quite unprepared for was the similarity in style of a well-known writer to that I have been cultivating in my blog. Many of her memories sparked more of mine, for which I may find future space. Today I choose to recount some with which I believe Ms. Ellis may be out of sympathy. Although she loved the thrill and freedom of playing in the hills, she doesn’t seem to have appreciated sport. In this she is not alone, but I make no apologies.

I enjoyed numerous training runs in the hills around Gaeddren, Ann and Don’s Welsh home. (If necessary, correct my spelling, my old friend). Perched on a hill above Cerrigidrudion, this house was an ideal point from which to engage in fell running. Since I used the roads, this wasn’t actually fell running, as I had done in the Lake District, but it felt like it. Watching the changing light as I ran up and down roads cut from this rocky terrain, passing streams and rugged trees sometimes indistinguishable from the granite they clung to, was a truly exhilarating experience. It was on one of these two hour marathons that I felt my only ‘runner’s high’. No pun intended. Please don’t think I could, even on the flat, run a marathon in two hours. Here, I use the word figuratively. A ‘runner’s high’ is a feeling of intoxicated elation, said to come at one’s peak. No further pun intended. Well, I never tried LSD. I did, however, find it useful pre-decimalisation. Pun intended.

When I did seek an even route I ran the complete circuit of Llyn Tegid, known to the English as Lake Bala. Having three times, once in 88 degrees fahrenheit, managed the Bolton marathon, which ends with a six-mile stretch up the aptly named ‘Plodder Lane’, with a vicious climb at the end, I thought I might attempt the North Wales marathon. Imagine my surprise to find it boringly, unrelentingly, flat. Here I will divert, as I once did in the Bolton race. My grandmother, then in her nineties, was seated on a folding chair in order to watch me come past. I left the field, nipped across, kissed her on the head, and quickly rejoined the throng. She seemed somewhat nonplussed, as did a number of other competitors. After all, why would anyone willingly supplement, even by a few feet, a distance of 26 miles 385 yards?

The other day, in Le Code Bar I had met an Eglishman with a Birmigham accent. He had bought a house in Fonroque because he had a French girlfriend. Feeling sure Judith would know him I mentioned him to her. She did. When he turned up for a meal this evening, I saw what had attracted him to France. As they were glancing in my direction I got up from my usual table and approached the couple. I told the gentleman I had a friend who knew him. He didn’t know what I was talking about. He was French. Whoops. Undeterred I told him he had a doppelganger. Since Flaubert’s use of the word is the same as the English one, confirmed by my dictionary, I thought I was on safe ground here. I wasn’t. Fortunately the beautiful woman he was with translated and told me it wasn’t a problem. I slunk back to my duck fillet and chips followed by creme brulee, and found the two glasses of red wine quite comforting.