Bertie's busy, and me too

This morning I went downstairs to take Bertie his food. We bought a new brand recently and he doesn't seem to like it as much as the old brand. This new food is Whiskas brand, and the other was the supermarket brand, SuperU. Go figure.

Anyway, I went into the garage and saw what I thought was a pile of leaves on the floor. Narrow, pointy leaves, a dozen or more of them, all pulled apart except for one bunch. Does this cat like bay leaves, I wondered. I'm drying some in the garage. I reached down to pick the leaves up and realized they were dark gray feathers! Bertie obviously caught a bird yesterday. He must have eaten it.

Pictures of the vineyard yesterday morning, in the fog —
a study in straight lines

We've been seeing flocks of titbirds — des mésanges — around the house these last few days, and they have feathers like that. We feed the tits by putting out boules de graisse on the balcony railing and bird seed in feeders out front. Maybe that's not doing the tits a favor these days.

The crews are going through the rows of vines taking out
and replacing broken and rotting support posts right now.

According to weather reports, yesterday was going to be dry and sunny, or at least partly sunny. It was nothing of the sort. A thick fog rolled in and stayed all day. We never saw the first ray of sunshine. This is typical northern France weather in late fall and winter. A high pressure moves over us, and it traps fog at ground level. It's thick and gloomy. It was chilly too, though not what you'd call cold. We had a fire in the woodstove in the afternoon.

One vigneron is busy pruning his vines and
burning the clippings in this home-made contraption.

The fog discouraged me from doing any yard work. Everything is still too wet out there. It would take several days of dry sunny weather to take the squish out of the ground, and make the leaves rakeable and burnable.

My first thought when I write a blog post goes to all the people I know who toy with the idea, or at least a dream, of one day buying or renting a house in France and coming to live here. I know quite a few. Consider the weather, I say to everybody, especially if you want to live out in the country, where it's affordable. If you move to Paris or another big city, the weather probably doesn't matter so much. There's plenty to do indoors. But plan on spending a lot of money.

Grapes still hang on some vines.
These are up against a stone wall.

I know British and American expats who live here in the Loire Valley part-time. Part-time means spending the winter elsewhere. Key West. Boston. Los Angeles. Tahiti. The Sahara. Au soleil. French people who have always lived here and don't have the luxury of a winter residence in a sunny clime tell me it is very important to have an occupation, an activity, a hobby to get you through the winter.

If you are retired, such a wintertime occupation is indispensable. As an American, you don't have to right to work in France. You can start your own business if you know how and have a good idea. You can try to find a way to do work from afar for an American employer. You can write a novel. You can renovate your house.

This blog is one of my occupations, of course. Cooking is another. Reading. Watching films on TV (going out to the movies isn't much of an option out here in the country). Gardening, which is a euphemism for a lot of dirty, cold yard work in the wintertime, if you are up to doing it.

Walking with the dog in the vineyard, rain or shine,
is another wintertime occupation.

I just read and enjoyed a 30-year-old book of essays by a man named Noel Perrin, who left New York City to become an amateur farmer in Vermont. It's called First Person Rural. Thanks to Chrissou for bringing it when she visited. I could really identify with much of what Mr. Perrin had to say about life in the country vs. life in the big city.

Today the forecast calls for another band of windy rain to blow in off the ocean. This afternoon, I'll be in the kitchen, working on making something good to eat. Quenelles de volaille, it's called — poultry dumplings. The human equivalent of Bertie's bird, I guess. More about that later.