Sunday, July 23, 2017

A French Larkin family.


Cool and overcast. A perfect morning for opening up the shutters and getting rid of the heat inside the house.


Bob lies at the open front door to make sure no c-a-t-s try to sneek inside. He snores gently as he does so.

The eight year old tike ( the one who whistles while rattling the bars on the gate with a stick on his way to school ) and his big brother are up and about early on their rasping little motorbikes. It's probably illegal for them to be out on the public highway at their age and it's certainly illegal for them to be out without helmets but their parents have a care free attitude bordering on nonchalance when it comes to their offspring. Last night we saw the children sitting on their fathers tractor as it made its way along the lane. The three year old twin girls were hanging off the back, laughing hysterically, ruddy cheeked faces covered in mud and straw. The four, five and seven year old boys were sitting precariously on the rear mudguards. All the children seem robustly healthy and deliriously happy. The parents have that French country 'there'll be another where this one came from' attitude to family safety. We think there are seven offspring but as they're constantly in motion it's hard to be any more precise. They are a French version of the Larkin family. Quite how the father makes a living is something of a mystery but the tractor and the goats that roam their garden suggests it may be something vaguely agricultural. He drives a twenty year old Ford Mondeo with lowered suspension , heavily tinted windows and an air horn that plays the first bar of Yankee Doodle.


Pineapple tomatoes make an appearance in the greengrocers ....


... as do an exotic selection of aubergines.


Croissant crumbs at the bakers make up for what has been for the PONs an unexciting morning although Bob has barked at the tike and his brother.


Some thoughts by the philosopher Alain de Botton that made me smile: http://www.thebookoflife.org/the-philosophical-parent/





16 comments:

Yamini MacLean said...

Hari om
Kinda reminds me of my own childhood... without the mondeo and its horn... YAM xx

WFT Nobby said...

Are you going to recommend Alain de Botton to La Famille Larkin?

Angus said...

Perhaps not.

Swan said...

😳 Yikes!

Coppa's girl said...

An unexciting day - surely not? Perhaps today is just a second best day ever?
How confusing - do those pineapple tomatoes taste like tomatoes - or pineapples?

rosedeva said...

Thank you for that article. It really is quite lovely.

Peter Kouwenhoven said...

Another perfect day in paradise...

Virginia said...

Besides being vaguely pineapple coloured, is there a logic to their being called pineapple tomatoes?

Unknown said...

Surely the gentle snoring is a ruse to deceive would-be trespassers.

Emm said...

An air horn that plays "Yankee Doodle"? What's not to like?

Angus said...

Quite right. Why would any one find the first bar of Yankee Doodle played on an air horn 'remarkable' at six in the morning or eleven at night ?

Angus said...

The snoring lures the unwary into a false sense of complacency.

Angus said...

They are very firm and slightly sweet but the link I think is in the colour.

Angus said...

Yes. It is rather gentle and reflective and definitely written by an empty nester who has the time ( and the energy ) to think.

Bella Roxy & Macdui said...

'Perfek'

Beau and Mom said...

Exactly !! Our Boy, Mr Bob is ALWAYS at the Ready.
The Diva is always ready as well in the kitchen.