Everything except the photos!

We're still waiting for the photographer's pictures of the wedding - more exactly, we're waiting for him to finish the web site that he will then forward on to the kids so that we can make up our own albums/choose our favourites. Can't be long now though can it! Anyway, back to the visit from my family. On the morning of the wedding we had a wander around the market in our little town followed by a drink in a local café. I also wanted to buy flowers as it was my neighbour's daughter's 40th birthday and I wanted Jordan and Jen to present them to her at the wedding. This was the neighbour who took care of Jordan when I went back to work after my maternity leave. She only ever babysat one kid - him (was he that awful that she couldn't face any more? Nah. She loved him - and still does). So Jordan was deliciously spoilt by a lady (and her husband) who treated him like the third child that she had wanted but never had. He also got to grow up with her kids as though they were an older brother and sister and they are still close to this day. Anyway, after the market we got changed and headed off to the château and oh, was it ever pretty! It's a lovely spot anyway, but all the more so all done up in its finery - I'll post more pictures when I get the photographer's photos, which are obviously much better than my iPhone pix!

The kids looked absolutely stunning of course - by gosh they scrub up well - but we got the shock of our lives when we saw Jordan - because he had had his long hair all cut off! His hair was so long he could sit on it; he used to wear it up in a "man bun", which I kinda liked, but nah, he decided he wanted to go with something different and got it all cut off the day before. Jen's grandfather led the service and it was really sweet, with Jen struggling on valiantly saying some of her vows in English. She did really well - and didn't blub until after she had gotten through it (at which point my family cheered her!). Very thoughtfully, the caterers were handing out ice cold water bottles, including during the ceremony, as it was so hot! Then they had what they call a "vin d'honneur" which is what the French do to invite a wider group of people to have a drink with them but who would not normally be invited to the sit-down meal. There was a lovely selection of snacks and cocktails out on the terrace with, what I am told, was a pretty strong gin and orange mix, champagne, beer and non-alcoholic drinks, all the while with a saxophone player playing in the background and the photographer's drone flying overhead taking pictures. Really neat huh!

A few hours later we went indoors for what turned out to be an excellent meal accompanied by delicious wine, all chosen by the kids. They really excelled themselves to be honest as everything was perfect. After the main course the saxophone player starting playing a few bars of different songs and each table had to try to "name that song". We were at a serious disadvantage here as many of the songs were French but we had a lot of fun anyway. At the end he played "the most difficult song of all" and started playing "Happy birthday to you", at which point Jordan picked up the birthday card I had had everyone sign, I handed him the bunch of roses and he went up to Mathilde, the neighbours' daughter, and wished her a happy birthday - at which point she promptly burst out crying! Great eh!

Mathilde - at 40!

Then there was music and dancing which went on until 3 a.m. (the cut-off point for music). We managed to last until 1 a.m. but after that we decided to leave it to the youngsters. I was pretty hyped up and couldn't get to sleep anyway, so it was no surprise that I heard my oldest son and four others coming in the back door at 5 a.m. going "shhhh, don't make a noise", followed by creak, creak, creak as they tiptoed up my noisy stairs. They tried really hard not to make a noise but that's pretty much impossible in my place.  I had made up five more beds/mattresses for them to crash on, although I swear I have no idea who one of those kids was (I just hope my son did and that they hadn't picked up a "stray" on the way over). It was ok with my ex too, which was a relief. As I have been sorting/decluttering a load of his stuff from my basement I found a leather-bound bible that a previous girlfriend had had engraved for him (one of the gfs after our divorce but before the latest gf - hard to keep track of sometimes isn't it!) and I handed that to him at the wedding and he surprised me with a photo of our son that he had had blown up and made into a picture for me - so it was all very civilized in the end. Thank god for that!!! It really was a perfect end to a perfect day!

This and that!

Well things have finally calmed down now after all the excitement of the wedding and I seem to have (almost) come to a full stop. Some days I really need to give myself a good kick up the behind to get anything done, but that may be because of the heat. After the god-awful heat of a couple of weeks ago it cooled down a little last week but I understand the mercury is set to rise again this week and we're looking at 100°+ by Wednesday. Yuck!

I did manage to shift into gear a little last week though and decided to go in to work on Wednesday to use the gym and then meet up with my friend for a drink and to give him his birthday presents. I showered and washed my hair before leaving home and tried using what was tantamount to quick-setting cement as a hair spray to try to keep my hair somewhat decent looking but after a work-out in the gym followed by a cold shower I still ended up looking like this!

Cartoon by Shutterstock

I give up! Seriously! My hair isn't even that curly but it always ends up looking like I just stuck my finger in the electric socket! In fact, the day before the wedding I had just gotten out of the shower and plugged in the hairdryer when the bloody electricity went off (again) - my brother-in-law just burst out laughing as you should have seen my hair. I ended up having to put on a headband and go for the au naturel look, but I was praying it wouldn't happen again before the wedding. At least give me a chance to look semi-decent during the ceremony! Oh, and we're still waiting for the photographer to get back with the wedding photos so I will write more about that when I get them, although those that I have seen are beautiful. He actually took fabulous aerial photos with a drone too - neat huh!

Anyway, I met up with my friend and gave him a book for his birthday as he is as avid a reader as I am (probably more so in fact). But, I also gave him a rubik's cube, which is probably driving him to distraction even as I write!! Or he may have thrown it out the window by now - we'll see I guess.

And talking of reading, after I retired I found, sadly, that I wasn't reading as much - unlike when I worked and had 90 minutes each day on the bus to read. This saddened me because I have always loved to read but I'm glad to say that I now seem to have mastered the art of sitting on my back terrace in the shade and ploughing my way through a good book again. I have so many books sitting looking at me waiting to be read, so I'm glad I have started up again. On another note, having discovered some 20 year old cookery magazines stuffed away in the basement while decluttering, I have also decided that I am going to try at least one new recipe a week from now on. The down side of being alone means that I have no-one to cook for other than myself, but the upside is that I get to cook (and eat leftovers) just 3-4 times a week so I really enjoy it. The other day I made a Moroccan cucumber salad that had icing sugar (powdered sugar) in it but meh. Not so great! I then made a lovely (again Moroccan - it was a feature in that particular 20-year-old magazine) aubergine (eggplant) dish that had tons of garlic in it, as well as cumin and chilies. Lovely! So I guess it's a good thing I live on my own as the amount of garlic in that recipe definitely kept the vampires away!

Oh and guess what? Ya can't guess? Well I suppose I'll have to tell you then! When I weighed myself this morning I had actually lost 14 lbs (one stone) from my highest weight, although probably about 10 lbs since I retired and all that without trying! Now I'm quite aware that I can go up and down 3-4 lbs overnight anyway, but this is the first time I have got anywhere near that figure. I weigh myself in stones/lbs (14lbs in a stone) because it means more to me and, as I told my friend, the numbers go down quicker in lbs than kg! To which she replied that they also go up quicker in lbs!! Damn, I wish I hadn't told her now! I have tried various online weight loss programmes over the years but I honestly can't be bothered to stick with them (read "I don't like being told what to do"). I also loathe all these 0% items - particularly 0% yoghurt as I feel I can just taste the chemicals in them. So I recently decided "sod it" and went back to buying full fat Greek yoghurt (with honey - yumm) and just going with whatever I fancied and the bloody weight is coming off (albeit slowly). I know, losing a pound a month isn't exactly gonna get me on "The Biggest Loser" is it, but I'm happy with that. Oddly enough, I have never been a big eater but put on 16 kg (35 lbs) with the menopause. I know this because I weighed 66 kg when my dad died and within a few years had raced up to over 80! I think it was the speed at which it went on that shocked me more than anything - but, sadly ladies, I'm not alone am I! So why does it seem to be coming off now when I'm nowhere near as active as I was when I was working? The only thing I can think is that when I was at work I ate breakfast because "I had to eat breakfast", and then lunch "because it was 1 p.m." and then dinner because I "had to eat when I got home". Now, not so much! I don't eat by the clock any more because I have more time - well that's the only thing I can put it down to - but long may it last!

And going off on a totally different tangent, yesterday I decided to stop and take pictures of remodeling work being done by one of my new neighbours and thought my old neighbour who used to live in that house (15? 20?) years ago might like to see what they have done to it. (Hi Marilyn!). I must have looked like some weird pervert in a flasher mac jumping out from behind the bushes taking pictures of this house but … Anyway, the divorced dad that lives there now has taken out the garage and a lot of the garden to make an independent studio for his disabled son. The son is very seriously physically disabled (he has a huge mobility scooter) but not, apparently, mentally disabled. I believe he also has a job. But dad has been working on this studio for quite some time now so I decided to send pictures to Marilyn!

Which then got me chatting away to Marilyn on What'sApp for about 40 minutes. It's always lovely to have a good old chinwag! Marilyn is American (and also now French) and after losing her lovely husband three years ago she left the US to be with her son who is working in Cork, Ireland. Turns out Mathieu just got engaged so they are busy looking for a wedding venue in the Czech  Republic - exciting times huh! I have no idea how we got on the subject (do women ever know how they jump from one subject to another?!) but she said something about Ireland being a dump! Say what? Well that wasn't what she meant. What she meant was that Ireland actually seems to be the dumping ground for all the crap make-up the Kardashians can't sell in the US (you know, like the dollar bin at Walmart), and so many young Irish girls are buying this cheap, marked-down make-up and slapping it all over their faces and it looks horrible! Their beautiful, pale, freckle-faced Irish skin was not made to be smothered with Kardashian-colouring make-up. So it would seem that the Kardashian brand is maybe not quite as successful as they would have you believe! Who wudda thunk!

And going off on yet another tangent, I bumped into an old (divorced from my friend) neighbour yesterday who I hadn't seen for about a year - and I got the shock of my life! He has cirrhosis and he didn't recognize me after living next door to me for 30 years! When I explained that I used to live next door to him and that we would take each others kids on holiday he still didn't recognize me! So I said, "you know my ex, P, the American" and it either clicked or he pretended it had! My goodness, he was in a state. Now while I have compassion for him for his current health problems (and there is a very sad back story too) I never actually liked him - his ex-wife yes, but not him! He was born and bred around here (in Haute Savoie) and used to say things like "I'm a real Savoyard and the rest of you are just a bunch of pigs"! Nice eh! I think in reality he was very jealous of people working in Switzerland and earning good money - but if that was the case why didn't he look for work in Switzerland. My ex's skank that he ran off with also made comments about how "lucky" we (my ex, me and my son) were to be working in Switzerland so ex told her to start looking - which she did, and she got a job. But, you know, sometimes it's easier to just sit around and complain about how everyone "has it better" rather than try getting off your backside occasionally. Heck, that's how I got my job in Switzerland - I started applying - as I knew I didn't want to stay in the UK. Anyway, when he realized that I was now divorced he asked me to stop in and see him for a coffee "sometime" - I may or may not do so because, as I say, I never did like him and don't need to be cosying up to a man who has never been anything but a loud-mouthed trouble-maker but … who knows! It sure was a shock though when he didn't even recognize me after 30 years as his neighbour! Sad really!

And I see that WTO chief, Roberto Azevêdo, has put Boris straight on a few of his claims on "trade matters"! Apparently Boris has been spouting that in the event of a no-deal Brexit, the UK could use an old clause called GATT 24 to continue to enjoy tariff-free trade with the EU. Err, or not, as it would seem. As Mr. Azevêdo pointed out, GATT 24 is not applicable in this case. Seems Boris just spouts out whatever springs to mind and sees what sticks. Now who does that remind you of? Just like the £350 million a week that was going to get pumped into the NHS eh Boris?

And finally, (yes finally - I don't half rattle on), I guess we all know where we were when they put a man on the moon don't we. I was 10 years old and in junior school and the teacher dragged a big old TV into the classroom so we could watch the moon landing. Even as young as I was I knew what a momentous and magical event that was! Wow! And wadda ya know! Fifty years ago today they put a man on the moon - and just a couple of days ago I managed to upload my own video onto my blog. So now the sky would really seem to be the limit wouldn't it - to infinity and beyond!

Plâteau d'Agy - please tell me this works!

Again, it's driving me nuts. If this doesn't work I give up. I've just spent the last hour trying to clean out my iCloud drive, put this video on YouTube so I can upload it and remember my Apple ID. Don't think I'm cut out for this stuff!

Think I've finally got it figured!

That is, how to put my own videos on my blog! Only took four years but then I guess I'm slow! It was driving me nuts that I could put other videos on my blog but not my own - I couldn't even take them off Facebook, but it looks like this is working! Hallelujah!

Anyway, back to the plot. The day after my family arrived for the wedding I dropped my sister, brother and brother-in-law in town and picked up my nephew and his partner to take them out to pick up their rental car. While I could get everyone a bed of sorts in my home I couldn't get everyone in my car to go sight-seeing so D and L rented a small car. Trouble is when they say "small" in Europe they mean small - so they ended up getting a dinky little Fiat 500 - which I reckon has a slightly less powerful motor than my sewing machine, but hey, they weren't complaining! I did wonder how they would follow me up some of those mountain passes but believe it or not they made it, even if they had to take it very slowly!

Since we effectively only had the afternoon that day to do touristy stuff I thought I would take them up to the Plâteau d'Agy, which is only about 30 minutes from here and an easy climb for the Fiat! This is the place I had been with my friend and forgot my hiking boots so ended up looking like a right dillon trecking up there in my flip-flops! Had to give up in the end when my flip-flops broke!

When we got to the plateau we decided to have lunch in the lovely little restaurant there which turned out to be really good! After that we set off for a short walk part-way up the mountain to check out how far it was to the top. Turns out it would be around two hours all the way up so we decided to give it a miss as it was getting late, but again, what a pretty spot it is; I don't think I will ever get tired of the sound of cowbells! In fact, my friend mentioned today that we should give it a shot this weekend and go back up there for a hike. As long as the weather isn't too hot I'm up for it!

Since we were part way there we decided to stop for a coffee at the horseshoe gorge ("Fer à Cheval" in French). I had already taken my family there in the past but, again, it's a place that never gets old!

After that it was back home for dinner (which luckily made it through the power outage debacle) and a relatively early night for my family ahead of the wedding the next day - not me though, I never go to bed much before midnight/one o'clock and this was no different - I won't go to sleep anyway so there doesn't seem much point in going earlier. I still made it out of bed by seven though!

On a totally different note, I have slowly been putting together my paperwork to request French citizenship. When I look online it would seem that I have to go through the Préfecture (local authority) in Grenoble, but there was also a note on their website which said that I had to go through Annecy! So I contacted both and asked which was it. Turns out I have to go to Annecy first so that they can make sure my paperwork is in order and then Grenoble will give me an appointment "at some point". But get this, the waiting time just for an appointment in Annecy is minimum 12 months! Holy cr*p! Thank God I have a sense of humour eh!

Being lazy!

Since all my visitors have left I have got the house straightened out, done the shopping and washed and dried 11 sets of bed linen thanks to the wonderful weather we are having. It's a nice feeling to get everything done and I think I am finally learning that it is ok to just sit and do nothing - or sit and read in my case. I got all my running around done today and still had hours to sit and read in my back garden. Total bliss!

Up at the Plateau d'Agy last week

Tomorrow (14th) is Bastille Day here in France so, for the most part, the fireworks are starting off tonight so that everyone can sleep in tomorrow. In fact, they've just started now. My youngest (the newly-wed) just sent me a video of a group of about 12 friends. They had gone up the "Petit Môle" mountain to watch the fireworks. Ah how wonderful it is to be young and enthusiastic!

And Bastille Day is also my friend's birthday so I will see if he is free for a few hours so I can take a birthday present over to him. Life at the moment is very sweet!

The storm that nearly ruined everything!

I already had a few ideas for meals while my family were here staying with me but knew I wanted to get myself really organized food-wise so that I would have one less thing to think about during the week. So the weekend before the wedding I wrote down what I planned to cook every day (or most days), plus an idea of what site-seeing we could do. Then on the Monday before everyone arrived I took my detailed shopping list and bought everything I needed, storing it in the fridge and two freezers in my basement. A storm had been predicted for that evening and while I love storms I (and, as it turns out, everyone in the village) got the shock my life when an absolute doozy hit around 9.30 p.m. It was absolutely awful! At one point I thought I should try and close the shutters on my bathroom window "just in case" and the wind nearly ripped my arm off! Seriously, if I hadn't managed to get my hand out of the way it would have been touch and go for my arm! I live at the end of a valley and the storms usually bang around overhead for a while and then rumble on back up the valley, but not this time. I have lived in France for 30 years and I have never seen anything like it. It howled and banged for a good 90 minutes, at which point the electricity went off. Not that that is unusual though, so taking my flashlight and kindle I decided to go to bed and "wait it out".

In the morning I had a look round and most things chez moi were where they were supposed to be buuut trees had been bought down in the village, apparently a few rooves had been blown off and a large tree had bought down an electric pylon (hence the power outage). My neighbour is on the village council and he had been told that the electricity should be back on "around 10 a.m.". Then it was pushed back to "maybe noon" and then ….. who knew! After a few hours I was starting to worry about all the food I had in my freezers and a couple of things I had left in the fridge to prep for Tuesday, so I decided to at least pre-cook the stuff I had in the fridge and pack it into the cooler. But just as I got the gas going under the frying pan the bloody gas ran out!!!! We don't have mains gas in the village so use gas bottles which, in my case, last easily over a year - and the bottle chose this moment to run out!!!! Luckily I always keep a spare bottle in the garage so I ran round to change it but couldn't find the spanner that allows me to loosen the nut and change the bottle. The bloody garage is so full of junk brought about by my "decluttering phase" that I couldn't find anything!

So I ran round to my neighbour's and she came back with me, wrench in hand, to help change the bottle. After much cussing and sweating we got it changed, at which point I picked up the cooler I intended to use to keep the cooked food cold - and the bloody handle broke off, meaning I couldn't get the lid to close properly. Now at this point you either laugh or cry - luckily my neighbour and I just sat down and laughed. It was hot, I was tired and stressed and we just collapsed into fits of giggles! The obvious solution was to run into town and buy a new cooler, along with a few kilos of ice. I guess at least one thing got accomplished that day, although the idea of making a cake for my soon-to-arrive visitors went straight out the window, what with having an electric oven and all and still no electricity! Thankfully my neighbour has a generator and was able to hook up both my and my other neighbour's freezers to his generator so at least the contents were saved thank goodness!

At 4 p.m. I had to drive in to Geneva to pick up my nephew and his partner from the airport and I got stuck in traffic!!! Again, now I know why I gave up work. I bought them back to town, dropped them off and then dashed back to Geneva a couple of hours later to pick up my sister, brother and brother-in-law. Trouble was, their flight was delayed and they had no way of contacting me because my mobile phone charge had run out and I had no way to re-charge it!!  Bloody hell! There was another storm advisory posted on the motorway so I was pretty nervous driving back with black, black clouds hanging over the mountains but we made it back just in time for the next big storm which, thankfully, was nowhere near as bad as the previous one. The electricity finally came back on around 9 p.m. (after a 23-hour power cut) so I was able to get everyone settled in without having to resort to flashlights and candles! But methinks it's finally time to go shopping for that generator I keep putting off, since that storm was surely not a one off! I'm just glad it happened a couple of days ahead of the wedding to enable us all to get back on our feet again! You have to be thankful for small mercies I guess!

Another perfect wedding ...

… although it very nearly wasn't. MASSIVE storm rolled in the day before, taking rooves off houses, downing trees and electric pylons and complete power outage for 23 hours. But more on that later.

Photo by App Art Photography