It was very clear this morning, as I walked the postbox loop, why Running Hill is named after the streams that run down it. Yesterday’s rain continued in abundance, although the wind has eased.
The raindrops that kept ‘falling on my head’, were not just those that came directly from the skies. Have you ever noticed that when you walk under trees those drips whose descent is interrupted hit you and your clothing with a much louder plop? This is because they slide down the branches gathering bulk on the way, and are veritable droplets by the time they reach you. My raincoat was again hung over the bath to dry.
In October 1981 Jessica, Sam, and I spent a fortnight in the holiday home of friends of Jessica’s friend Sue Sproston in Cabrieres in the south of France. 
Photographs taken on that holiday are in the next set of random black and white negatives I identified and worked on today.
Like all French houses, especially in the south, attractive shutters kept out the heat of the sun, but that didn’t stop a young woman basking on the stone steps to her house. I remember the steep climb back up from the baker’s in the morning after we had shopped for baguettes and croissants. This was my first French holiday.
The stone garden walls intrigued me, as did abandoned vehicles behind them. Dappled light lent enchantment everywhere, especially when flashing through the treelined avenues along which we drove in the Renault 4. My train journey up to London, on a bright day, has the same strobe-like effect.
It is perhaps fitting that the tiled rooftops fascinated me so much, given that we were to discover that they occasionally leaked. One evening the clear blue sky suddenly darkened. Deep indigo replaced the brighter colour as clouds filled the firmament. Violent lightning rent the air and lit up the rooms in the wake of rumbling bouts of thunder. The raindrops that followed made this morning’s drips seem quite insignificant. They fairly hammered incessantly on the roof and skylights, finding their way through the many cracks and crevices. The house was soon filled with buckets, bowls, pans, and any other containers that could be found, all rapidly filled with first spattering, then splashing, rain.
We learned in the morning, when the day was as bright as that in the pictures above, that the storm was the worst in local memory. The owners of the house had thought it fairly safe to leave the roof to the last of the refurbishments necessary for their holiday home. I am, of course, now accustomed to such storms in Sigoules.
With our own lesser rain still descending this evening we dined on delicious prawn risotto (recipe) and green beans, followed by scrumptious apple crumble and custard. We both drank Cimarosa zinfandel rose 2012, which Jackie enjoyed and I found rather too scented.
Tag: thunderstorm
Conkers
Yesterday afternoon Saufiene visited with his brother-in-law, an humidity expert. He confirmed Saufien’s judgement that an humidifier is need in the cellar and that, fortunately, the water extraction pump just needs a new filter. The humidifier will mediate the inside and outside temperatures.
In the evening and through the night a spectacular thunderstorm cleared the air. Somewhat. It is still warm and muggy here. A gentle rustling soon developed into a cascade of stair rods splashing off the garden surfaces; dripping off the bracketed outside light, and every other projection, 
especially the roof tiles; a deafening clattering on the landing skylight; and a trickling into the fireplace. We had established a couple of days ago that the persistent damp patch in the sitting room is the result of there being no cover on the chimney.
I have heard that supermarket carrier bags disintegrate after five years, and are thus biodegradable. Shreds of white material at the foot of the bin in the shower room are evidence of this. The bag lining the inside has not been changed since being inserted in 2009, although the contents have, of course, occasionally been decanted.
Passing through the empty market square on the way to Carrefour this morning I noticed that the horse chestnut tree was laden with fruit, their shells splitting, soon to release lovely brown conkers to hit the ground beneath. 
In my childhood, had that tree been on Wimbledon Common, there would have been very few conkers on the tree and empty shells and an array of sticks on the ground. The throwing sticks were taken to the trees by countless boys, including Chris and me, over the years. We would chuck them at the nuts that looked ready to fall, thus aiding their release. Whoever threw the stick that brought some down, a mad dash ensued for the spoils bouncing off the grass. I read some years ago about an English head teacher who had banned the game of conkers from her school playground, on the grounds of Health and Safety. Given that the object was to smash the other child’s conker with yours, and that would result in flying bits; and maybe some children wouldn’t have the sense to keep their knuckles out of the way, I suppose she had a point. But it did rather sadden me. I don’t know what current UK policy is.
I have never seen French children playing this game, and judging by the number of fallen fruit left to the mercy of the wheels of vehicles in the car park, I suspect they may not know it.
Although it was to return with a vengeance in the late afternoon, the rain desisted after lunch. This was fortunate because, having fed on a four egg, onion and tomato omelette that looked more like a heap of colourful building rubble which would have graced the Tate Modern, supplemented by a slice of Carrefour pizza, I had a bit of a clean up. Beginning by washing the filthy mop which I could then stick out of the kitchen window to dry, I made the ground floor habitable. The task was hampered somewhat by the need to search for the dustpan which I eventually found protruding from a bucket of dirty water in the attic.
As I sit outside the bar entering this post, I am grateful to my friends who manage it for leaving the awning up. I simply hear the spattering of the deluge, and the cracking of falling conkers on the canvas above me. Given that Fred knows this is what I do on a Sunday to make use of the Wifi, I wondered whether he had left the shelter up for my benefit.