Nothing, however, delights the mind as much as a loving and loyal friendship.

Cooler this morning. A line of puffy clouds ambling in from the Bay of Biscay. Bob and Angus turn out of the gate and head along the lane that snakes across the top of the ridge. For Angus it's just another morning walk. For Bob it's the most exciting adventure he's ever been on. His tail, held high, describes circles in the air. We stop and look at the horses, the pregnant cows, the two goats in the old widows paddock and the five donkeys in their field by the crossroads. Here the tree line thins out and we feel the snow chilled air blowing down from the mountains. Bob wonders if it's a good idea to eat buttercups. He tries but soon gets bored.

Dog and master sit on the storm drain. Bob leans into me. He has his head tousled and is told, as he is every morning, that this is Bobs country. The family fellow sighs . We wonder what will happen to Obama Care in the Senate. A Kite, the size of an eagle, its long white wings striped black at the ends, surfs the breeze. It hovers six inches above the stalks of wheat. A feat of precision. We watch it for what seems like five minutes but is in fact fifteen. Finally, it pounces on something on the ground and soars skywards with a powerful burst of its wings. 

On our way home we wave at the young garagiste ( who no longer has a motorbike but has graduated, in a male rite of passage, to a small twelve year old Ford with a sporty engine ). He waves and smiles. The Ford has one of those exhausts that rasps like a wannabe Ferrari- auditory testosterone. We wave at the farmer in the old Peugeot van, the perennially late school secretary in her new and exceedingly garish orange metallic FIAT and the woman who brushes the hair of her two lively six year old twins as she drives them to school.

Bob finds something gloriously malodorous in a drainage ditch. This delays our return to The Rickety Old Farmhouse.

Sophie, who has been monitoring the breakfast croissants, is waiting for us. She can't hide her happiness. There may be cod for dinner. That alone makes this - quite possibly - the best day ever.

Just another quiet morning in deepest, deepest France profonde with two irrepressibly happy shaggy companions. Things too small for a diary but too important to go completely unrecorded. As all PON owners know '' Nothing, however, delights the mind as much as a loving and loyal friendship '.


Not sure I like the song but this Icelandic singers voice has a tremulous beauty : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0-7IHOXkiV8