...et Saint-Aignan s'éveille. Le soleil ne s'est pas encore levé. Nous avons rendez-vous en ville et nous allons quitter la maison dans quelques minutes. A suivre...
At 8:00 a.m., we are back at home, the first part of our mission accomplished. It's a busy day. More tomorrow.
12 August 2012
11 August 2012
Heureusement...
...qu'il y a le mois d'août. Thank goodness for August, in other words. See the map below for today's weather forecast in France. The weather has been beautiful for a while now. Fairly hot afternoons and pleasant evenings. Cool in the morning, so that our natural air-conditioning is working. The natural AC involves opening all the windows and doors early in the day to let the cool air into the house.
We said good-bye to the porteuse de pain — the bread lady — a couple of minutes ago. It was the "see you later" kind of au revoir. She's going on vacation for two weeks starting today. Her parting words, when we wished her a good vacation, were: Et bon courage à vous ! We aren't quite sure how to interpret that. We will have to scramble to keep ourselves in bread for the next 15 jours.
At seven a.m. Callie went crazy barking. It was a montgolfière — a hot-air ballon. When they fly over, dogs all around the area bark wildly. And the dogs get advance warning of the approach — they can hear the whoosh of the gas burner heating the air in the balloon long before we hear it. It always takes us a minute or two to figure out what the panic is about, especially if we are lying in bed half-awake.
The French weather map for Saturday, 11 August 2012
We said good-bye to the porteuse de pain — the bread lady — a couple of minutes ago. It was the "see you later" kind of au revoir. She's going on vacation for two weeks starting today. Her parting words, when we wished her a good vacation, were: Et bon courage à vous ! We aren't quite sure how to interpret that. We will have to scramble to keep ourselves in bread for the next 15 jours.
Today's temperatures. 30ºC = 86ºF.
At seven a.m. Callie went crazy barking. It was a montgolfière — a hot-air ballon. When they fly over, dogs all around the area bark wildly. And the dogs get advance warning of the approach — they can hear the whoosh of the gas burner heating the air in the balloon long before we hear it. It always takes us a minute or two to figure out what the panic is about, especially if we are lying in bed half-awake.
Au gré des vents = drifting in the wind
Yesterday morning I got some more gardening done. I tilled up a little plot of loose soil where we will plant carrots and long white radishes this weekend. It was my final tilling chore until late autumn, when we'll clean up the vegetable garden and get it ready to over-winter.
10 August 2012
Summer evenings
Yesterday we had some friends over for apéritifs. It was a beautiful day and a splendid evening. S. and F. are Dutch and have a house in Saint-Aignan where they spend summers. They both speak English (do all Dutch people speak English?), and S. speaks perfect French as well. Their daughter C., who lives in England, is visiting, and she we here too. The last time we'd seen her was three or four years ago. We know them because of this blog.
Walt made little melon balls that he stuck on toothpicks with a little piece of jambon cru (prosciutto), and I made something really exotic: tuna salad. I also made some cornmeal crackers to spread it on. We had all that with some white wine from the Domaine de la Renaudie, which meant we were drinking wine made from the grapes that grow in the vineyard out back.
After our friends left, Walt and I sat out on the terrace for another two or three hours, watching the stars come out and the bats swoop around. Actually, I never saw a bat, but Walt swore he saw them. I don't doubt it because we see them often at nightfall in summer. But you have to be quick, and maybe I wasn't...
What I did see, and Walt too, was a very big satellite pass by overhead. It was the international space station, and it was a fast-moving, very bright spot of light — much bigger than an airplane or any star. We saw several airplanes fly over too — you can tell they're airplanes because their light blinks on an off — and we saw at least one other satellite go over. Many stars twinkled.
In past summers, we've spent numerous evenings on the terrace , but this year we haven't had so much warm weather or so many clear skies. Yesterday afternoon, it was fairly hot out, but late in the afternoon there was a nice breeze. The breeze died down as nightfall approached, but there were no mosquitoes or other insects of any kind to force us to retreat into the house. Maybe the bats were eating them all.
The moon over the vines on a recent morning
Walt made little melon balls that he stuck on toothpicks with a little piece of jambon cru (prosciutto), and I made something really exotic: tuna salad. I also made some cornmeal crackers to spread it on. We had all that with some white wine from the Domaine de la Renaudie, which meant we were drinking wine made from the grapes that grow in the vineyard out back.
That same moon
After our friends left, Walt and I sat out on the terrace for another two or three hours, watching the stars come out and the bats swoop around. Actually, I never saw a bat, but Walt swore he saw them. I don't doubt it because we see them often at nightfall in summer. But you have to be quick, and maybe I wasn't...
Tiny pink flowers at the edge of the woods
What I did see, and Walt too, was a very big satellite pass by overhead. It was the international space station, and it was a fast-moving, very bright spot of light — much bigger than an airplane or any star. We saw several airplanes fly over too — you can tell they're airplanes because their light blinks on an off — and we saw at least one other satellite go over. Many stars twinkled.
Seed pods, I guess
In past summers, we've spent numerous evenings on the terrace , but this year we haven't had so much warm weather or so many clear skies. Yesterday afternoon, it was fairly hot out, but late in the afternoon there was a nice breeze. The breeze died down as nightfall approached, but there were no mosquitoes or other insects of any kind to force us to retreat into the house. Maybe the bats were eating them all.
09 August 2012
The drive-by butcher
Walt blogged about our newest rural service yesterday — it's a local butcher who comes around in his market truck once a week, on Tuesdays. He honks his horn, and one of us goes out to buy something. Monsieur Céran is a boucher/charcutier, which means he sells beef, chicken, veal, lamb, and pork, including cured pork products like sausages, pâtés, ham... well everything. Local specialites and standard French items.
His truck is a refrigerated market vehicle. One side panel of the truck goes up kind of like a garage door, revealing a display counter full of tempting items. His prices are comparable to regular shop or supermarket prices. And the quality looks to be excellent. Everything we've bought so far has been really good.
As Walt wrote yesterday, one of the big advantages of buying from an itinerant vendor is that you don't have to drive to his shop, of course, and you also don't have to wait in line while other customers are waited on. When we went to the Céran shop in Thésée a week or 10 days ago, we waited at least 15 minutes while others ordered large quantities of meats, some of which had to be cut and trimmed to order.
This is how it works in a culture where it isn't assumed that everybody owns and drives a car. The fact is, however, that nowadays, most people do drive — I wrote yesterday about the traffic jams in Saint-Aignan caused by high attendance at the Beauval zoo south of town, and Keir, our neighbor to the east, has confirmed it in a comment. I think we'll be buying things from Monsieur Céran every week to encourage him to keep coming by, just as we buy bread (good baguette tradition, it is too) every time the bread lady drives up and toots her horn.
His truck is a refrigerated market vehicle. One side panel of the truck goes up kind of like a garage door, revealing a display counter full of tempting items. His prices are comparable to regular shop or supermarket prices. And the quality looks to be excellent. Everything we've bought so far has been really good.
Thésée-la-Romaine is a village across and down the river
from us, about 5 miles.
from us, about 5 miles.
As Walt wrote yesterday, one of the big advantages of buying from an itinerant vendor is that you don't have to drive to his shop, of course, and you also don't have to wait in line while other customers are waited on. When we went to the Céran shop in Thésée a week or 10 days ago, we waited at least 15 minutes while others ordered large quantities of meats, some of which had to be cut and trimmed to order.
This is how it works in a culture where it isn't assumed that everybody owns and drives a car. The fact is, however, that nowadays, most people do drive — I wrote yesterday about the traffic jams in Saint-Aignan caused by high attendance at the Beauval zoo south of town, and Keir, our neighbor to the east, has confirmed it in a comment. I think we'll be buying things from Monsieur Céran every week to encourage him to keep coming by, just as we buy bread (good baguette tradition, it is too) every time the bread lady drives up and toots her horn.
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