We're up early. The PONs have forgotten their incarceration in the k-e-n-n-e-l-s and are keen to get the day started. They are in their enthusiastic soft shoe shuffle mode. The sky, as we head out of the gate, is also enthusiastic. The young garagiste has given up his motor bike ( that near universal girl friend related rite of passage ) and now has a small black Citroen C1 with an noisy engine. He sees us as we head off along the lane, slows down, beeps, waves , then floors the pedal so that we hear the rasp of the exhaust. Angus is impressed. The PONs less so.
Two ladies from the Women's Cooperative show up at ten. The others are laying a concrete floor and won't be here to hang wallpaper until Wednesday.
Bob and Angus go off to buy paint. Sophie and 'The Font' experiment with Gigot en Croute in the kitchen. Sophie is a great fan of Gigot en Croute.
Loic shows up. He's due on Friday but what's a few days amongst friends ? Today he blows leaves and weeds the rose beds. Bob and Sophie enjoy the leaf blowing but soon tire of weeding. They chase invisible things backwards and forwards across the garden. Bob does so silently. Sophie emits intermittent and random ear splitting shrieks of delight.
In the afternoon some men arrive to spray weed killer in the graveyard. They then seal the gates with orange duck tape and put up signs saying that the church grounds are out of of bounds for 24 hours. Bob sits on his stump seat and takes it all in. The workmen spend 45 minutes spraying then have an hour and a bit cigarette break.
Angus observes that East Coast Scottish houses have an outer door and an inner door.
Americans have mesh doors to keep out insects and the French often have little porches but the Scots have a small inner hallway that acts as an airlock to keep out the wind. Just deep enough for the outer door to be opened and then shut before the wind races into the house.
'The Fonts' choice of colour stands out from our neighbours.
Phil, the heavily face ornamented joiner, is still hard at work. This morning he parks his car outside the wee house. As he unpacks his tools he sees a tree which takes his fancy. He send Angus a picture. Phil, who is a Pict like Angus, loves trees, knows all about them and talks to them. He has also found some aged ash at a farm in Perthshire. He describes the colour and the texture and the smell. We agree that he should buy it to make a wardrobe and trays instead of tables on either side of the beds.
10 comments:
All action then in windy East Scotland and in France profonde (apart from the weedkiller sprayer, obviously).
Joiner Phil is a clearly a great find.
Phil sounds like an artist as well as an artisan.
The French name for the little entry like that is a sas. Not common, but not rare either. We added one on, and gained two degrees of warmth in winter in the living room.
Hari OM
Vestibules are very common in most homes built anywhere from the second world war and back. Economics resulted in this architectural commonsense getting left out of most modern builds - though some classer homes are again having it reintroduced. Gotta love a man who loves trees... YAM xx
I love the color of the door! You certainly are surrounded by interesting people. I understand Phil’s love of trees.
Those are very pretty doorways, and Phil the joiner sounds like a treasure.
Any number of houses, especially older ones, in New England have airlock entries for the same reason. They keep the wind out of the houses, and they're a place to stomp snow off your boots.
I grew up in Quebec. The first home my parents owned in Pointe Claire had a vestibule. It was not designed for a mother and her two kids coming in from playing in the snow!! Still it did work for one person.
We had a lovely inner door and outside door in Aberdeen. Very practical. Of course, we'd never seen such a thing in California, Arizona, or Texas. Here in France it would not be a bad idea in the old barn.
Having lived most of my life in houses with this inner and outer front door arrangement in both England and Scotland (including my current house in Aberdeen) it never occurred to me that to have a 'vestibule' (or porch, as I would call it) was in any way unusual! They certainly are convenient for towelling down muddy dogs.
Cheers, Gail.
I think I'd get along well with Phil.
We've got a sas here in the Touraine. We created it because our front door is original and would be difficult to replace, but not a very good fit. Putting in a secondary double glazed door solved the problem easily and cheaply.
Phil sounds fab.
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