This and that!

It's been a quiet weekend and I have to say I've really appreciated it, after having the roofing guys here all week. They've finished laying the insulation but one guy is coming back tomorrow to finish up the sealant on the part of my roof that they missed. It was an easy mistake to make as they thought it was part of my neighbour's roof, so tomorrow, hopefully, will be their last day here. While I was chatting to them I mentioned that in amongst the old insulation that they were stripping off I saw what looked like little clusters of yellow grapes. Yellow because they were covered in insulation, but small clusters the size of grapes or olives. They told me it was bats and they come across them quite often! Eeek! I had a wasps' nest removed from my roof many years ago and I personally set a burgeoning hornets' nest on fire more than once, but I never thought of bats, although why not? There are plenty round here in the evenings.

My friend drove over on Friday and it was so good to see him. It's the first time I've seen him since around February/March. We went to eat at the one-and-only restaurant (one-and-only anything to be honest) in the village and had a really nice time together. I love that restaurant because the view over the mountains from their terrace is just fabulous and it brings back lovely memories of going skiing with our neighbours when the kids were little and then stopping in at La Fertire for a fondue afterwards! They were happy days!

Later that evening there was a knock at my door and my neighbour handed me a piece of paper saying that they had decided to hold our homeowners' association AGM in the middle of the island on Friday night. Philippe is the President of our association (because no-one else wanted to do it) but I'm not sure he was ever up to it from a technology stand point because he'd printed off his convening email and was walking round handing out paper copies of it! I know they're looking for a new treasurer as the lady who has had that responsibility is selling up so I might volunteer, just to show willing. I doubt there's actually anything to do as we're not an active association and I'm not exactly over-worked as it is!

And can you believe it was a year on 4 July since Jordan and Jen had their wedding do! Crikey, hasn't time flown!

Jordan and Jen

I wasn't able to get over and see André this past week as I've been busy with workmen, but I sent him a message and asked how things were going. He told me that he and Lily had been to see an advisor who can guide them through a do-it-yourself divorce since there is no common property and no children. So, as sad as I am for them, it looks like the divorce is going ahead. I went into town yesterday as I wanted to pick up a couple of things and while I was there I thought "why don't I start putting together a start-up package for him for when he moves into his own place"? You know, things like cleaning materials, washing powder and stuff like that. I pick up extras for the food bank every week anyway so starting up another store for André won't change much for me. I'm not talking about furniture because obviously André will want to chose that for himself. I had my own place in Geneva when I met my husband and when we married and moved back to the States I remember spending an absolute fortune just on stuff to get us set up in our own home. My furniture was shipped from Switzerland but just setting ourselves up with the basics was extremely costly!

Eat your heart out Dave because the Tour de France is actually coming to this area starting next week and should be in our local town on 16 July, if I remember right. I'm sure it'll be heaving so I'll try to wander down on foot and get some pictures for you!

This is at the Plâteau de Glières, just up the road from here.
"74" is this region of France - Haute Savoie

I'm invited over to my neighbour's later this evening for an apéro so I'd better start thinking about getting cleaned up. But talking of "cleaning up", I've just spent quite some time going through my blog "favourites" and deleting as many as possible - people whose blogs I meant to read and never got round to it. People who've stopped blogging or maybe just people whose blogs I've moved on from. One thing I did notice though is that the bloody advertising on some of those blogs drives me insane. If you have to click on three different adverts just to be able to read someone's post well I guess that's no longer a blog for me!

And finally, whichever way the US elections go in November I'm sure my American friends out there will be delighted to learn that Kanye West has "decided to throw his hat in the ring" for 2024! Can you image Kanye as POTUS and Kimmie as FLOTUS - and they said it could never get worse than Trump!