How not to save money!

I think I mentioned before that the year started off pretty well from a walking point of view. I'd gotten a few walks in but then it tailed off a bit with the bad weather. So the other day, as it was cold but sunny, I drove to the lake at Passy for a walk (NB while I love this walk I really need to challenge myself more as this is a totally flat walk)! Just before you turn off for the lake there is a large store called The Mountain Store so I thought I would drop in there as I needed to buy a sleeping bag. One of our family Christmas gifts is a long weekend where we need a sleeping bag. Thing is, I'd given both mine away about six months ago to the homeless shelter but now of course I need a sleeping bag. So I stopped in and got my sleeping bag, plus a new jacket (I obviously need a jacket which corresponds to every 1° change in temperature), plus a couple of tops and a new bathroom scale. The one I have at the moment was frankly cheap tat and I'm pretty sure I can change my weight by about 10 lbs depending on where I place it! I have a weakness for sports stores, forever trying to find just the right top/jacket that is waterproof/windproof but not too heavy. Anyway I came out of there having spent what to me is a small fortune and with a set of scales that does me no favours at all!!!!! So now I'm pissed and while it's not exactly a 1 January resolution I've finally realized I need to do something about my excess weight (I probably could do with losing about 30 lbs at this point). When I got home I spent an hour cleaning and preparing stuff for the next day when Jen called and asked me if I could keep Elynn as she had picked up Charlie's lurgy and was now sick too. I'd had Charlie last Wednesday and then spent the next week coughing and spluttering too so I'm hoping that's it for this winter! I guess the moral of the story is don't procrastinate because if you think you'll do a task/walk "later", something always seems to come along and bugger up the best laid plans!

When I went down to St. Pierre on Monday for yoga they were sitting in fog, which was really weird because just driving the few km back to my place we were bathed in bright sunshine. Geneva sits in a basin and is often in fog and yet if you go just a few hundred metres higher up you can get out into the sunshine (one of the benefits of going up in the mountains I guess). At the end of every yoga session we do a 10 minute relaxation and she "wakes everyone up" at the end with different kinds of sounds - often windchimey sounds. Well this time she used a handpan and the sound coming from it was so beautiful I thought how wonderful it would be to wake up to that every day, rather than the bzzzz, bzzzz, bzzzz of an alarm clock. I wasn't the only one who found it delightful but when I saw that they go for around €100++++ I thought better of it or I'll be eating bread and gruel before I know it! The handpan she used had a hole in the top of it and one of the men commented how it would make a great dish to serve fondue. Ha ha, a typical Savoyard comment!

Handpan!

Sewing was cancelled on Monday night though as the heating had conked out in the entire building, which also meant that the library and the daycare in the same building had to be closed. I'm always the one sweating cobs at sewing and to think that the one time I might have been comfortable with my penguin blood, they had to go and close the bloody place!

I had to go into town on Thursday (which is market day) so stopped by the cheap stall-holder for fruit and veg and yet again came away with a ton of stuff for just €20 (which is an absolute steal and it's decent quality stuff). However I realize that if I'm going to keep going to this guy I need to use it quickly or freeze it, so I rummaged around in my basement for the vacuum sealer I'd bought ages ago and bingo, I hope I'll get to make better use of these deals in the future! That being said, earlier this week there was a knock at my door and it turned out that market traders had come down from Normandy and were trying to sell their fruit and veg down here. Now I've seen these people before and while some people say they're just casing the houses to see which are occupied, I have bought stuff from them in the past so maybe there are the bad mixed in with the good. That being said, while we obviously can't grow everything around here because of the altitude/temperatures, I just can't fathom buying potatoes that come from 800 km away! We do get sellers coming up from Italy to sell their stuff but then most of that is coming up from the south of Italy and is harder to find here, whereas potatoes - not so much!

I spoke to my sister at the weekend and she told me they'd just booked a long weekend in Venice in February (for Carnaval)! They had this trip on offer with our local bus company but (a) I've been to Venice before and while it is indeed beautiful it will be very very crowded, and (b) they do Carnaval here too so nah, I'll give that one a miss (although I'm pretty sure it would probably have been fully booked the day after the catalogue came out anyway). This is the sister that just got back from a long weekend in Prague and while I have also been there I was just 15 at the time (on our way to what is now the Ukraine with the school) so I only have vague memories of it. She told me about all the high end shops in Wenceslas Square where you have to wait to be invited in (they do that in Geneva too) and while she obviously couldn't afford it anyway she would go if she had that kind of money. I guess that's the difference between me and her then, because I wouldn't be interested in those kinds of goods even if I had that kind of money - they just don't float my boat! Still, it's probably a moot point anyway, right!

The French just carried out their latest census and while the initial paperwork was dropped off in the mailbox, a lady came round to each individual house to give out a code to access the census online. I happened to mention to her that I had no idea what the surface area of my home is and had just guessed the first time I filled out the paperwork. She told me that she lived in the same model home and that I had over-estimated by about 100 squatre metres. Ha, the census people probably thought my upstairs bedroom flew off in the last storm. Then today I got to vote in my very first French election. As soon as I got my citizenship I went into town to get a passport and then stopped in at the Mairie in my village to get my name on the electoral list. But then about 10 days ago I got an email to say that my request hadn't gone through, giving several reasons, one of which might be that I'd accessed the portal more than once. I was just about to head back off to the Mairie to get it sorted out when my electoral card came through the mail. So I walked into the village this afternoon and got to vote in my very first legislative elections. It was tough though because while I have a favourite party I didn't know anything about the candidate, but then the young mayor of Jordan and Jen's little town was also on the list and everyone speaks extremely highly of him as a dynamic and engaged young man. Given that he represents my second favourite party I voted for him. If there's a run off we get to go back again next Sunday but I'm crossing my fingers that he wins first time around. It's exciting stuff isn't it - and could only be bettered, in my opinion, by a snap general election in the UK. Fingers crossed!

And finally, an "old lady blooper". Well not so much an old lady blooper but something I saw on Very British Problems on FB. True story - three elderly gents were having a pint in the pub when one of them was suddenly taken ill and an ambulance was called. When someone asked if it was serious, one of his drinking buddies said "it must have been, he didn't finish his Guinness"! I hope the old gent was ok, but I loved the comment too!

People watching!

I know New Year's has come and gone, but I still can't believe we're already two weeks into January - and how many broken resolutions already? I don't actually make resolutions but always have some vague thoughts about "getting outside more" and decluttering, and while I did indeed get three walks in in the first week, not a lot has happened since then. Mind you, while it was very sunny it was bitterly cold (even by my standards) so I hopped onto Amazon and bought myself hand and foot warmers so that I'll have no excuse in the future. I stayed in on New Year's Eve, fell asleep and then woke up at 11.50 just in time to watch the fireworks from my balcony and see the blue lights on top of Cou (the mountain to the left in my header picture). It was a lovely crisp, clear night, the fireworks lasted about 30 minutes and then, just like that, it was all over!

I've mentioned before that I tend to live in what was once a bedroom on the first floor which we turned into a kinda lounge/TV room (even though I haven't turned my TV on for four years now). Anyhoo, I was sitting reading when I happened to glance up and a paraglider whizzed straight past my window! They do jump off Cou at the back of the house but I've never seen them in front of the house before and was wondering where he was going to land. I suspect he'd either lost control a bit (I doubt it) or maybe some lucky lady further into the village was going to be receiving a large box of chocolates from some James Bond type very shortly!

I sent my friend a message last Tuesday to say that I was going down to the GAL offices (our favourite travel agent) to book a couple of trips before they filled up. So we dashed off there together and wouldn't you know it, the trip to Sardinia in April had filled up the day after the presentation, as had the three dates for the Swiss railway tours. Damn, I guess next time we'll know to move faster. We did get ourselves booked on the December trip to the Châteaux de la Loire, plus about four other one or two-day trips, and I booked myself on a five day trip to Lake Garda as I understand it's beautiful. What with already having a trip to Spain booked for September and still being on a waiting list for Sardinia, it's not looking like India is on the books - well not for this year at least. Shame!

Talking of Lake Garda, I understand ol' gorgeous George (Clooney) has a house there (maybe we'll get an invite for a cup of tea). And I see that he and Amal have recently been granted French citizenship! That's weird because the French have recently made the French exam more difficult, the "citizenship" exam more complex, have stated that the majority of your income should be earned in France, but that the five-year minimum residency still holds. I wonder how George fitted all that in, what with his super busy acting career and all! Oh yeah, of course, he's loaded! Apparently the reason they got citizenship was because they made France look "more enticing"! If only I'd thought of that!

The other night I was watching a Youtube video by someone reacting to a person I find extremely crass and vulgar and could never watch personally, but can occasionally stomach an abridged version of her vlogs by someone else of what is her car crash life. Anyhoo, I swear she was driving along listening to music and raging about how she hated this kind of music and "couldn't bear to hear people singing in Acapulco"! It made me laugh so much that I got to thinking about all the other "old lady bloopers" so I might throw one in here and there in my next few posts as I think of them!

And finally I think I'm just about getting caught up with all the work I've had to do for the old fogies club. What I thought was going to be just a Tuesday afternoon thing turns out to be a whole lot more work than that. They had their AGM in November, which meant the Committee showing up on the Thursday afternoon to set out 140-ish place settings for the meal to go with it. Then Christmas lunch (same thing, show up on Thursday and get it all ready for the next day). Then we had the Three Kings on January 9th, so much of the same (buying the food/drinks/galettes for 140-ish peope) then clearing it all away and taking down the Christmas decorations - so all in all it's been a busy time of year, although it should calm down a little from now on!

The galette des rois!

Anyway on Tuesday it was to be a normal weekly card game afternoon, except being the beginning of the new year we had everyone lining up pay their yearly subscriptions. So think almost 180 people coming at you from all directions to hand over their cheques and pick up their membership cards! It was chaos as I obviously don't know most of the names. So that's when Martine starts hissing at me that no, Mr. and Mrs. Ravoire should not be given a joint card because even though they're married they hate each other and there's no way they would accept a joint card. Then "Claudine" announced that she had separated from "Serge" (who is apparently an alcoholic) and that we were to find out her new address and forward her card there (they would both appear to be nearly 80). Then there's the older guy who grew up my village and always comes over to give me a hug and "do you know the Blandin family (no), well how about the Ducrets up at the farm (no). Oh they now live in the house that used to be painted blue!!! Again, no! Anyway I like him enough but Martine told me never to play cards with him (I don't play anyway) because he cheats and whatever happens during the card game, his score is always 160! So as the games were winding down we edged over to where his team was counting their scores and guess how much he scored. Go on, I bet you can't guess! Yep, he scored 160! As I said in my heading, I've always enjoyed people watching, so this club might just be right up my alley - but 160 my arse!