Tuesday, July 26, 2016

Free spending.


Through the sunflower fields down to the stream. The morning air fresh. Sophie finds a piece of pizza crust that someones thrown out of a car window. Angus notices it has two pronounced bite marks in it. Before he can say '' Sophie ! Leave it alone ! " the pizza crust has disappeared. Sophie exudes happiness at this fortuitous culinary discovery.


The Regional Village Fleuri Committee are coming from Toulouse on Friday to judge whether our little bit of paradise deserves a rosette and the title of ''one of the most beautiful villages of France ". Some villages get one rosette, a limited number two and a green fingered few, three. The village used to get two rosettes in this annual competition but following 'the scandal' it entered a lengthy rosette free period.

We know little about 'the scandal' but from what Madame Bay has told us in unguarded moments it related to the misappropriation of the gardening committees funds, a dinner in Toulouse, expensive wine and 'women'. The
word 'women' is said in a judgment laden French way that suggests they were Scarlet Jezebels. All of this happened before we arrived. Today's gardening committee has an average age of eighty . Their free spending,womanizing, predecessors were presumably younger .


Our Way home from the bakers is blocked by the two noisy little dogs that belong to the woman in the cottage at the crossroads. ' Belong ' is perhaps too strong a word to describe the relationship these road guarding pooches have with her. They seem blissfully unaware of danger and refuse to move from the middle of the tarmac. This necessitates driving very very slowly past them. The PONs howl.


Bob spends much of his morning on the stump seat watching passing traffic.


'The Font' heads back to London. Due to the State of Emergency Schengen passport free travel has been suspended. Everyone boarding an aircraft now has to go through passport checks. Despite the sixfold increase in travellers the number of passport booths remains unchanged. Today a third,ie two of them, are staffed. Fifty minutes to the airport in the car. Ten minutes through security. An hour and a half in the non airconditioned passport line. Thankfully, the plane is twenty minutes late coming in. For once the air traffic controllers aren't on strike.


This mornings French news leads with this : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O-5zNLiubrY




12 comments:

WFT Nobby said...

I wouldn't be so sure about some of those eighty year olds. They sound like a pretty sprightly bunch to me.

Molly the Airedale said...

Wow! The Sunflower fields are just beyond stunning!

Kari said...

Wonderful speech in its entirety. An amazing woman.
Now this Trump person's wife , who has shown herself to be cut from the same ethical fiber as he, has her next speech already written for her.

Swan said...

The sunflowers are so amazing!

MrsDuncanMahogany said...

Beautiful capture of the sunflower fields!

Anonymous said...

Could it be that these octogenarians are the very self same that "misappropriated" the funds all those years ago? For a place with just 67 souls, your village seems to have more than it's fair share of excitement.
Beautiful sunflowers.
Coppa's girl - blogger is playing up

BaileyBobSouthernDog said...

Oh how I howled, with laughter, at the second part of your comment! It was a wonderful speech, without ever mentioning the "trump person's" name!

BaileyBobSouthernDog said...

After looking at your first two pictures, I think the flower committee can stay in Tolouse. We believe your little village is the most beautiful in all of France!

Unknown said...

You live in Paradise, I would never tire of the views you have. How lucky you are.

Unknown said...

The little road guarding dogs appear quite willing to stand their ground. They have bright faces or are they trying to look fierce?

Bob is most appealing on his stump seat.

Emm said...

I notice that Bob's stump seat has a storage compartment underneath. Perhaps that's where the PONs stash their stuffed critters from time to time?

Bella Roxy & Macdui said...

Love those glorious sunflowers...
Air travel used to be fun and part of the adventure. Now it's a pain.