You'd never know that it's Winter

December 2023: Good News, Good Deeds and plenty of Good Cheer

 

The last calendar image brings you a bonus. Not one but two trips to Egypt. 

 

 

In January 1987 I spotted a bargain long weekend in Cairo in the travel agent's window so MaryKate and I seized the opportunity to have some exoticism in the sunshine and off we went. A visit to the Museum, the Citadel, Giza pyramids and the Sphinx on horseback, the Sakkara stepped pyramid, Khan al - Kalili souk and of course we also checked out some bars and restaurants, trying Ful medames for the first time.

 

 

By way of a pat on the back for starting up the Ra's Gharib plant on time against expectations in 1989, Total offered the team an all expenses paid cruise on the Nile. For us it also included 3 nights in the Cairo Meridien, my flights from Glasgowto Cairo. Merci Total for such a treat. Outstanding sights, great experience, faultless organisation that brought a touch of luxury and a far cry from work and everyday life.

 

1.12.23:

 

First the good news; a routine MRI came back clear of any nasties and I did Wordle in 1 for the first time! According to reddit that's a 1: 150,000 chance. I also won a prize of electronic kitchen scales, a silicone loaf pan, a bottle of avocaat and of sour cherry liquer, chocolate lined wafer dessert cups and some recipes, in the Téléthon raffle. Coals and Newcastle spring to mind but have to admit, winning was nice.

 

Good deeds were centred primarily around the annual Téléthon fundraiser. For pleasure there was a 2.5km walk around the village starting and ending at the Mairie for which there was an entry fee of 3€ or more if you wished. Lovely to see families and adults of all ages and stages participating in a non competitive event and there was coffee and mini croissants at the end. Less pleasurable was helping out serving tea and cakes on the Saturday afternoon. Along with drawing the raffle, the main event was to be a cascade of dominoes which had taken ages to set up by a young man from the next village who is a national champion. Sods law and all that, didn't someone bump into the finished structure and send them flying in all directions five minutes before the "pièce de résistance". The young man kept his cool and we all clapped extra long and hard to make up for the disappointment.

Closer to home, I fed Nicole's cat of 17 years over the Christmas period; she sleeps most of the day. Kept my fingers croseed that nothing untoward would happen; what would I have done with the 

body!!

And so to the cheer which was plentiful. Morning coffees and afternoon teas here, there and every where but the only place there was a log fire to add to the cheer, was here in the village. JJ cried off coming to the "meet the artist" coffee and sweet things afternoon at Michel & Sandrine's to showcase the work of Jean Hellemans. It was very colourful but not a fit for me. Felt awkward at first as there were so few of us and I was way out of my comfort zone but luckly, I managed to join in the conversation before too long. It made up for me missing this month's vernissage in the village.

 

Meals chez Jacques, Anna & Gérard and Jean & Françoise. I did dinner here for Jacques and an apéritif dinatoire for Jean's birthday.

 

There were restaurants, too (when aren't there?) . . . Le V.I.P. in Perpignan with Nicole, Les Trabucayres in the Commune by way of a thank you for hosting the Germans, Les Abeilles with JJ, Daniel and Maud, Cal la Francisqueta in Llers with Nicole, Patrick and Martine and La Source with Pat in Céret. 

Came across this fabulous house in Perpignan as Nicole and I were walking back to get our bus. How I'd love to visit and have a tisane with Monsieur Poirot!

 Christmas, of course, brought its own cheer. A "Secret Santa" evening in the café and the Christmas market with a choir after which there was a samba band that heralded fireworks at the recreation ground. 

 

As usual, there was the pensioners' Christmas box, decorations in the village and I made a last minute Christmas cake on 22nd which was delish; I should know, I ate a good part of it! No more Delia for me. This was every bit as good and it cooked in 1h30! 

 

Martine came round to mine on Christmas Eve for fizz, foie gras, smoked salmon and other canapés; not a peanut or olive to be seen! 

Linde came for an apéritif on Christmas morning before I went over to Ann and Terry's for lunch of Beef Wellington etc, etc.

Boxing Day which doesn't exist here and is a work day, I spent on my own, the highlight of which was lunch in the sun on the terrace and a piece of Christmas cake at tea time.

 

idn't fancy the New Year's Eve bash in the village hall so I was happy to accept Gérard & Anna's invitation to join them. I was on apéros . . . 

• Nigella's Poinsettia Cocktail which looked very festive with the sprig of rosemary garnish

• Beetroot and Goat's Cheese Cream Verrines

• Smoked Salmon Toasts

• Delia's Cheese and Sesame & Poppy Seed Twists

It was an international table where French, English, Catalan and Spanish were spoken between the six of us (+ Nicole, Alvaro and Mercedes), lots of laughs, plenty to drink and more than enough to eat (foie gras, duck, chestnuts, sautéed ceps and potatoes, cheese and fruit salad). In bed for 3h45.

December's Notes of Nature:

And there was the most spectacular sunset. One evening I missed the bus back to the village. But as they say ... every cloud has a silver lining or in this case, a red and golden one. I witnessed a fabulous sunset while I was waiting for the next bus. 

 

 

 Awesome!

 

Weather:

1st Dec: 12° ; 31st 16°. Reached 22° with a damping of rain. storage heater went on on 3rd. Never so late

May is here already!

1.5.22

 

Will Summer be a-coming in, too?

 Well, the neighbours' cats seem to think so! They at least treated the public holiday with respect.

To think that I avoid household chores where ever possible and for some odd reason I chose Sunday (day of rest), 1st May (workers' holiday - not even papers are published today) to break the mould by scrubbing the floor. No, your eyes are not deceiving you. Went to up to Jeanne's for tea. No walk as we'd planned; she had a sore back. Sat out in the garden which was pleasant. And to think rain had been forecast. Perhaps tomorrow.

Weather: 23°, sunny 

5.5.22:

Haven't done anything much during the intervening days apart for a meal at the bar with "Les Anglaises"; as usual a sedate affair. Did Wordle in 2 one day and failed miserably the next day! Well, "homer" for me is a proper name or a job done on the side for money under the table.  Amercanisms don't figure in my vocab. Also had a couple of coffee dates, sent off my completed tax return (phew!) and thanks to Daniel, I now have a back up gas bottle. 

 And Jean, Françoise and JJ came for an apéritif chez moi.

6.5.22:

 

This evening's vernissage was not very well attended. Shame as a number of the artists from the South Catalunya group had made the effort to attend. One couple had come from near Barcelona. Only got "talking" to them at the endbut despite having language difficulties we exchanged addresses. Joan played and sang in Catalan, Jacques strummed Che Guevara helped out by Anita and Manuel on vocals during the time that Joan oiled his throat and instead of there being three of us for dinner, there were six. The councillor responsible for culture, one of the artists, a French artist/writer living in Llança and one of the Mairie staff joined Anita, myself and Jacques our host.  What a lively, interesting evening we had; discussing and laughing till we cried. And yes, it was a late one.

Weather: 21°, sunshine, some cloud and very strong wind

8.5.22: Just in time

Another public holiday and while I didn't do any housework this time, I had to change the gas bottle which ran out while I was cooking lunch; not a fun job. Otherwise, it was a pretty lazy day; went to the ceremony (end of 2WW) only to find that I'd got the time wrong and the parade was on its way back to the Mairie as I arrived in the square. Didn't feel it was right to just go for the apéritif. There's no photo but there are already endless "patrotic ceremonies" already on the site so you haven't missed anything. Had a coffee then a quick walk around the vide grenier organised by the tennis club and spent the afternoon reading in the sunshine.

Weather: 25°, sunny with some cloud later

9.5.22: 

After a layoff of 3 weeks, oldies gym was back on so I had a good excuse not to tackle the treadmill. My goodness we found a whole lot of thigh muscles we didn't know existed. Felt I merited some time sitting in the sun with my latest book, "Daughters of Mars" by Thomas Keneally set during the 1st WW charting the experiences of Australian nurses. 

After that it was round to Linde's for this month's meeting of the Soup Club. The fish soup was delicious and eaten on her roof top terrace in the evening sunshine yet another pleasure. JJ was invited this time but managed to sidestep the idea that he could host the next one with a chilled soup. Came across Jacques, Suzette and Yves, a friend from Montpellier, on my way home and was invited to join them for a cuppa before a relatively early night. This 7 hours sleep thing is sinking in.

Weather: 24°, sunny 

10.5.22:

 Artisitic spiders have been at work in the village

Weather: 26°, sunny 

11.5.22: 

Lunch at JJ's. Martine cooked the steak, JJ opened a couple of tins of green beans, I brought strawberries and cream and laid the table. I wish I could be so laid back!

Back home I followed my newly established habit: papers, puzzles, book sitting in the sun over a pot of tea. 

Weather: 27° and getting hotter, sunny 

12.5.22: 

 Jacques, JJ and Suzette joined me for an aperitif on the terrace before heading over to the restaurant to celebrate Jacques’ birthday. Delicious as usual.

As if we hadn't eaten enough, a number of us joined Jacques on his roof top terrace for a BBQ and a lot of cava. Another late night!

Weather: 28°, sunny

14.5.22:

 Fountain, friends and sunshine are just the thing to raise spirits. A simple stress free way to spent a Saturday morning.

Weather: 29°, sunny

15.5.22:

Plants are flourishing, too.

Weather: 29°, sunny 

Here's Hoping for a Better Year

Happy New Year! 

 

 

Peace, Health and Happiness to Family, Friends and anyone visiting Chitchat!  

Spent a good, cosy evening with Martine. We kept going until 1h30 with tasty food and more than a few bubbles seeing the New Year in twice;  first at midnight in France and then at midnight in UK. Went to bed feeling self righteous as I even cleared up before going to bed! A good start to 2022, n'est-ce pas? 

 1st - 7th:

New Year, new resolve and the search for a new format to make Chitchat more chat than catalogue. No guarantees though. Every month will feature my friend James's calendar which I receive every year and I'll try to give you more of a flavour of life. 

With no tradition of sales or important sporting events, (just the occasional dip in the sea), New Year's Day  was a quiet time. The weather was fabulous and with an afternoon tea that fell through, I took myself for a walk up the back track, as I call it. Sat in the sun and started to read "The Promise" which I'd received for Christmas. Champagne, foie gras and chocolate on my return started the year with a bit of self indulgence.

As the week progressed continues to dominate the news President Macron is planning to try and force people into being vaccinated. Both here and in  UK the new Omnicrom variant is rolling through both populations with more deaths. Also continuing in Uk are more blood boiling revelations about Government chronism and sleaze which leak out daily. And of course, Prince Andrew is trying to wriggle out of the law suit being brought against him. In the village, the Maire has cancelled the usual presentation of his New Year wishes normally involving a long speech followed by drinks and nibbles in front of the population. He has opted instead for a video taking just a couple of minutes and was a sorry lackluster affair. But there's more to life than politics, n'est-ce pas?

Went to the café for coffee a couple of times; once with Nany and Martine and the other with Françoise. Also had coffee and Swedish traditional biscuits at  Monica's and two days running had two British couples for Christmas cake and cava. Delia never fails to deliver.

The 6th was the Epiphany so the few decorations that I had scattered around were packed away and lunch at Jacques' inevitably involved a "Galette des Rois" (a frangipane flaky pastry tart). This one was without  a ceramic charm in it; maybe Dominique felt we were too grown up to go through the ritual of finding it and wearing a golden paper crown. What a spoilsport!

Apart from the oldies gym, the walk and two treadmill sessions, exercise has been sadly lacking and only one night did I get myself to bed before midnight. Oh, and I've not tried any new recipes either as I had hoped. Better be better organised next week. However, I'm still reading the papers and doing some puzzles. To the online ones that I already do, I've now added "Wordle", the latest craze. Six attempts to find a five letter word. Letters come up green if the letter is right and in the right place; amber if the letter is right but in the wrong place and grey if it's completely wrong. It's a fun and frustrating challenge. Luckily you can only play once a day. 

 https://www.powerlanguage.co.uk/wordle/ 

 

Weather: Started the week with 22° but by the end, with the onset of the Tramontane wind it dropped to 10°.

 

31.1.22:

So, here we are at the end of January and my intention to write up Chitchat every week has, as can been seen, fallen by the wayside. Sadly, it's not the only one. Bed before midnight couldn't stand up to various "just one more episode" crime series; haven't cooked a new recipe nor scanned any photos.

I have, however, returned some long overdue invitations.

 

First up were five of the neighbours. As I've decided that six around the table is the most that I can cope with at one time for a sitdown meal I've was able to divided the neighbours into two groups; those who've been vacinated and those who haven't. Avoids people getting hot under the collar.

 

The rest of the neighbours included the young couple who run the restaurant: so, no pressure there!

Lunch with friends from Céret started well with the bag with a bottle of wine in it, giving way. Luckily there was a spare in the fridge. Otherwise, all went well. There were plenty of leftovers  which meant that I was able to invite Jacques the next day. 

Also had Nicole round for a simple apéritif dinatoire.

Needless to say, the scales were weighted on the being invited side. There were several meals (5) at Jacques', one at Gérard and Anna's (neighbours) and at Michel's where I was on appetisers.

Can't claim to have provided the olives or air dried duck slices though. Goodness knows how we managed to keep our hands away while waiting for a couple who were very late arriving. Maybe that's why André is looking a bit fed up!      

An apéritif dinatoire chez Jean and Françoise and an apéritif chez JJ before we went off to Empuriabrave with Dalilia for lunch.

Have you noticed how sunny it's been this month? 

 

Lunch with Michel and Eric after Figueres market was an inside affair in the restaurant as you'll probably have guessed from the photo in the background, that was frequented by Dali.

Talking of whom, despite passing over this plaque embedded in the pavemant in Figueres loads of times, none of us had ever noticed it. Just follow them and you'll arrive at the Dali museum. You may be asking as I did what the insect signifies. Apparently, it's an ant and they march in single file and are therefore easy to follow.

Also went to the restaurant in the village with JJ after Dalila had to call off our trip to Gerona and to the Pablo with Martine and Carmen.

 

Although the treadmill has only seen a small amount of action, I've m&naged to get out and about, too. Walked on three occasions with Jacques going in different directions around the village.

 

 This one took us 1h45 going up and over and back and was all on a quiet back road.

 

This one took us up and down through the retreat and involved mostly tracks.

 

And this one was a bit of both.

 

As well as the trips to Empuriabrava and Figueres, I had a trip to Perpignan with Françoise where to take a break from the shops we had coffee sitting out on the Place de la République. Small things much pleasure.

Having actally written something and not knowing when I'll get back to tapping the keyboard again, I'll do a Sue Grey and post an update to finished later.

Gosh, less than 24 hours later, here I am poised to finish off January. Not that there's anything much to relate ...

 

A trip to the opthalmologist resulted in leaving with a prescription for distance glasses; at least I'll find it easier to read the subtitles on the tv. A day without an internet connection left me frustrated and smoke in the bedroom left me puzzled as I couldn't find where it was coming from. Could only think it was from outside which turned out to be the case. I'd forgotten that the waterboard were testing smoke flow through the pipes. Hadn't expected it to travel so far. It also entailed a water cut which we hadn't been warned about!

Art, film and "literature" were also on the agenda in January. 

There was a Scottish wildlife photo exhibition at the Mairie.

Watched the 2009 film "The Secrets in their Eyes" set in Argentina and apparently superior to the 2015 Nicole Kidman/Julia Roberts/Chitwetel Ejiofor remake round at Jacques and "Passing" which I watched twice chez moi; once with JJ after a quick supper and the other time with Jacques and Geneviève (tea and cake). Both were excellent.

I actually read a real book but there again, I had a vested interest. At long last, I found a copy of this Glasgow crime novel written by one of my previous colleagues. Not only did he borrow people's surnames but he also used some physical descriptions, too. Apparently, some team mates recognised me .... I'm keeping schtum! Published in 1982, it hasn't aged well.

 Have kept up my usual activities of: the weekly oldies gym session, some daily puzzles including Wordle over a cuppa, a bit of knitting, the daily papers, plenty of moaning about Boris and his accolytes, a fair bit of screen time and coffee breaks at one or other of the cafés; usually with Françoise though sometimes on my own. Can't complain .... who knows what next month will bring.