More bin news

The weather has been too nice to spend time blog writing. Today winter has descended again though, so the shorts and sun cream have been put away for now and I am writing a few blog entries.
Just sitting around in the garden outside my tumbledown shed, I have been studying whilst keeping an eye on my parking area. Ah, the number of people who have slowed down, spotted me and set off again to park elsewhere. I have also been asked directions several time by passing motorists and pedestrians. Perhaps I should be charging for my services.
The main reason that I have been down the bottom of the garden is to keep an eye on my bin.
Last week I heard a strange noise. I looked out of my window and spotted a 20 something young lady who was suspiciously near to my wheelie bin, heading back up the road. Some time later I saw her putting her arm round my fence, lifting my bin lid and putting a bag of rubbish in. I was a bit busy at the time, but about ten minutes later, I made a coffee and set off downstairs to sit in my garden to intercept her if she should use my bin again.
I was just too late again and spotting me, she set off up the road at a brisk pace. Always one to lift the lid on a story, I opened my bin to find it two thirds full of black bags, containing clothes, cushions etc. I also noted that she had added an electric radiator to my neighbour’s crap heap but against my wall.
I dragged my bin away from the area near the pavement, and settled down on a chair to wait, should she return with more stuff. I rehearsed phrases like, this bin is on my property and is for the use of me and my tenants, take your shite and put it somewhere else please.
She did not return, (I was waiting for hours) but I noted that the house on the bend had a pile of stuff under its open windows.
Meanwhile the lady from the tip next door, had set off for the shops, spotted the radiator and had whisked it into her house.
If only wheelie bins were made of metal, you could wire them up to the mains….

Manifestation

No, gentle reader, not a case of an infestation of men but a demonstration during a day of national strike action. Pronounced “Manny-fest-ass-eon”. A useful French word to get to know, as is the word for a strike, which is greve, pronounced “grev” and would rhyme with Kev if anyone is moved to express themselves poetically. If you see these words in the French press, note the dates and don’t make any travel plans for those days.
I got to French class reasonably early as I was planning to march shoulder to epaule with the citizenry. The gathering time was 10am outside the post office in the centre of town. I added in European slack time and assembled at 10.30am.

Nothing much happened until just after 11am when someone started their speech, and went, well. On a bit. After 45 minutes the assembled throng began to shuffle along, waving their banners, throwing fire crackers, sounding air klaxons. I think they were going to march on the Prefecture via some circuitous route.
There were 10,000 people in the square. This is close to the entire population of the town, but people had travelled from neighbouring towns and villages to attend. Traffic flow into and out of town was controlled by the boys in blue and was mostly at a standstill.
I took some photos from the post office steps and then decided to climb up to the castle to get more of a bird’s eye view.

The weather was probably in the 70’s by now, but I was prepared to sacrifice my comfort for the greater good.
I reached the castle entrance gates, which were closed, with a notice stating that the castle would be closed all morning due to industrial action…… Bugger!
Bee Boy’s parents have been here for about a week now. They seem to spend all day away. Presumably out mending bees or whatever bee-keepers do. Today however, Mrs B stayed “home” and did the washing and did them a midday meal. She must be fed up with the field work.

Grace notes plus the ending that I missed off last night

Tomorrow the French workers will be on the streets protesting about unemployment the rising cost of living etc so the town will be chocca. I am trying to make up my mind whether to go to French “class” or put on my Tolpuddle Martyrs tee-shirt and join them for a bit of a demonstrate. I could do a bit of both.
I went to see my mobilisation vers emploi advisor today. I know it’s only been a week, but she could not fit me in next week. My task had been to try and get a meeting with DM, to see if she could get me on the tourism course. I went along last Thursday and the main desk gave me a number to phone early this week to see if I could contact her. Her secretary was not there either.
I explained the sorry tale and my advisor rang DM.’s contact number. This time there was a message to say that the office was unexpectedly closed until 11 April. Lord knows what is going on there, but I am less than impressed. If there is a problem, they should contact attention seekers such as myself, out of politeness and to avoid us wasting our time….
I don’t have any homework to do before our next mobilisation meeting on….. April 1st.
Now an update for my mate Grace. Choir continues to be a frustrating nightmare. We are further back now, than we were by the end of last week. There are still 2 pieces of the Messe that we have not even tackled yet.
We have not sung with the soloists or musical accompaniment and the public performances are in June this year.
We do have an all day Sunday practice coming up in a week or so’s time, but there will be another 2 week school break somewhere too.
There is one Tenor who sings so loudly that the rest of us needn’t turn up at all. It would not be too bad if his voice blended in, but regardless of ppp, or forte, he just belts it out. Allegedly he often hits a wrong note, dragging us along with him, and he also likes to speed up the tempo regardless of the conductor’s timing. He’s like a snowball rolling down a steep hill.
There are quite a few faces who seem to feel that they only need to attend one practice in 3 or 4. This would not really be acceptable in any club that I have belonged to in my many long years.
So we scratch and scrape along.
At the end of the practice 10.45pm, there are always announcements. These are usually about musical events being held in local halls of villages that no one has ever heard of. Tonight’s list was a list with a twist. Our choir master said that he had an announcement to make. It was, he said, not about the choir or music, but something to do with his private life.
Ah! I thought, he is going to tell us that he is gay.
He wanted to tell us that he was “amoureux” (in love).
This got a round of timed clapping and cheers.
I thought to myself, This could get a bit embarrassing.
He continued saying that it was someone in the choir.
Pin drop time. Everybody looking round to see if they could spot who it was. Were they there tonight?
The lucky lady is an alti named Patricia.
More loud applause.
Isn’t it just typical when you are trying to make a quick getaway home.
I asked the lady in front of me (because the choir master speaks so quietly) is he getting married? Oh no, she said, he just wanted to tell us that he was in love,- shrugging her shoulders slightly.
Could it be Andrew Lloyd Webber and Sarah Brightman all over again? Of course when they fall out she will have to leave the choir. I wonder if he was the hunter or the hunted?
Ah my intuition never lets me down!

The hills and the doorway

A dull (weather-wise) Sunday, until mid afternoon when I heard footsteps clumping up the stairs. I was thinking, who wants to complain about what? As the knock on the door sounded. I opened the door and it was hyperactive man and one of his daughters. He asked if it was possible to get a cup of coffee, so I set about making him a cup and getting a blackcurrant juice for his
daughter. The daughter (probably about 12 years old) is learning French, but as usual it was almost impossible to get an English word out of a young lady who is timide. Hyperman went on to tell me about a heating system that I could install for the whole house to heat all the flats. It would only cost me 7 thousand euros and I would be able to put up the rents, as they would no longer be paying separate heating bills. I would even get money back from the government or doing it…. As I am only looking for 2 radiators for my flat and for the unoccupied little studio on the ground floor, one and perhaps a heated towel rail or wall mounted wall heater for its shower / toilet room, this is rather ambitious…. And costly.
Coffee drunk, we went down to the little studio and he poked about a bit and measured the window with a view for a double glazed unit to replace the existing one.
Then it was down the garden path to the small outbuilding with imminent tumbledown status.

This would take him 2 or three days to complete, once the existing one is dismantled. He described the shape of the building. I reminded him that I wanted a window as well… and a door. “A door?” he said, shocked. Yes, I said I would need to get into it. “But a door will be expensive, he said…
So it is still a mystery how he thought I would get my lawnmower in and out for example with no door. Perhaps he thinks I just want an opening, with no security for the contents.
Hyperactive man is returning with costings etc and perhaps a ventilation expert sometime this weekend.
Monday and it was time to take S back to the airport for her flight home. For the first time I got there and back without going off piste accidentally. The view of the snow-capped Midi Pyrenees as I drove back home, was pretty spectacular. For once the mountain chain was not capped in mist, so it was interesting to see where the peaks ended and the sky began, for the first time.
It was time to keep busy, so when I reached home I gave the grass its first cut, and swept and washed the main stairs of the house. I now have to get used to living on my own again for a while.

Another fine Mas

Driving through the tunnel was interesting. People were walking in the gloom, there were zebra crossings, a vehicle came towards me right on the white line. It must literally be murder during the summer months.
Out into the sunshine again, round a bend or so, then the straight road down to the town of Mas D’Azil.
There is a car park right in the centre of the town, and at this time of year it was quite peaceful.

The streets have great numbers of columbage houses. Many properties appear to be empty, having been workshop premises at one time.

We strolled along the almost deserted streets and found some public toilets. All that running water……
Many properties had their windows open and it was possible to see inside, without pressing noses against the windows.

In many houses the thing to do with the ground floor, is just to pile it full of lots of old furniture and other household items, and I mean pile. I don’t know if this means that the upper floors are minimalist zen centres of calm, but I suspect not.
There were several bench seats outside, and these were the preserve of ladies of more advanced years, keeping their beady eyes on comings and goings.

This town would be a very pleasant place to live, but as I say, in summer it must be one big traffic jam.
There were many interesting features to pick out. We found one stone carving
Numbered number 8, so we missed at least another 7 numbered featured.

On the way out of town I spotted this old petrol pump, still in situ so I stopped and took a photo.

On the very outskirts of town near to a College, we spotted the Tourist information Centre. How useful is that?

How many years in a zilion?

Sun shining, washing out on the line, I spent the morning weeding, then planting my 50 gladioli and 50 freesia bulbs.
Lunch over, we set off in the car to go to the garden centre to buy some more plants. However I decided first to go and visit Mas D’Azil, so it we were once again off on the road to St Girons.
Once off the main road, it was the twisty turning roads so beloved of French cyclists and of French motor vehicle drivers. The latter being lovers of the “let’s see how much of the car we can get onto the other side of the road when we corner at speed because we own the road and nothing will be coming towards us” school of driving.
It was the first day of the trout fishing season, so there were a number of cars parked on grass verges beside the rivers. I expect the hunting season is over or something, so the birds and deer can relax and it is the time for fish stocks to be decimated.
We were meandering along when I spotted this ghostly scene to my left.





The church is the Eglise de Reynaude, and there must be a little road winding up the hill linking all the shrines, being the road of the Cross, or chemin de Croix in French. I have not been able to find out much about it, but one website in French
http://www.histariege.com/le_mas_d_azil.htm

It gives a little snippet or two. It may well have been on the pilgrim route to that Compostella place. The most recent church ran out of money when it being built, and the story goes that Rockefeller who happened to be in the vicinity, gave the curate who was having it built, sufficient money to finish it. (Note to any Rockefellers who may be passing my house, just put the cash in my post box, no need to knock).
I will have to return to this unexpected find to explore it another day.
Back into the car and onwards to the Grotte of Mas d’Azil.

Basically the emerald green river flows through the mountain. The river Arize used to be ten times its current volume. It is a world famous prehistoric landmark in the scientific world as it is here that the Azilian culture was studied and defined. In 1887, excavations discovered a new layer of evidence of human habitation dating from between the end of the Magdalenian (30,000BC) and the beginning of the Neolithic. This was the Azilian period 9,500BC
The cave hollowed out under the Plantaurael Mountain range is 420 meters long with an average width of 50 meters. The entrance forms a magnificent arch 65 meters high. Looking up at the ceiling where small black birds were diving and wheeling. There are some pretty big cracks, so I wonder how much longer it will last. There is a windy road which tunnels through the mountain to the right of the vast entrance. The entrance to the caves where they live are round the bend, across the road and to the right.

Just imagine yourself in 9000 BC looking out from the cave at a raging torrent coming towards you. Probably a bit like sitting in the rinse cycle of the washing machine.

Cars can now travel through the mountain and on into the medieval village of Mas D’Azil itself. The road is a relatively new "improvement", replacing a foot traffic tunnel, which was Itself a modern inovation.

Inside the entrance to the main cavern, you can walk alongside the road, cross the road (bloody dangerous if you ask me)l, still it takes the mind off how that much unsupported stone can possibly stay above your head without crashing down. I am sure that the road traffic cannot be doing it any good.
When the caves are open, you can pay to go one one of the trips round the caverns lived in by the Azilians and numerous persecuted people thereafter.Another thing to add to my to-do-list then.

I will give you all a rest now and post the Village of Mas d'Azil visit tomorrow.

Strippin’ and tippin’

My blog of two days ago has obviously had some repercussions. Eighteen years after the “phenomenal success” of The Chippendales, along with some new additions, the boys are back as a new rebranded group, 'Here Come The Boys'. They describe their new show as a musical with muscles. So that’s another of my ideas for income generation whipped out from under my feet.
Unless… How does the stage name “Rigsby’s Rising Damp” sound? Is it good enough to have the audience screaming for more (in disappointment)?

On the 27th April there will be a tribunal to decide if Cloe, the local lass who is currently Miss France, is to be stripped of her title after continued complaints from the runner-up in the regional heat. The problem seems to be that people on the judging panel must have no connection with the contestants. Cloe’s parents are allegedly connected by way of business with 2 people who were on the panel…… Such an easy mistake to have made.

Some of you may remember late last year, when my neighbour dumped a fetid old mattress on the pavement in front of my house. No? Well to recap. I chucked it back onto their property and It festered there for months while further crap was added to it by them. One morning I got a phone call from the Town hall asking if it was my mattress and was I not aware that if I phoned the council they would make a special trip and collect it for free. Well I dobbed my neighbours right in, and the next day all the items had been collected. I suspect that they council never actually spoke to my neighbours (who are Moroccan), because they are bloody well at it again. It is like the Borrowers but in reverse. The tiny Borrowers collected or borrowed other peoples (s)crap and made use of it, whereas the charming folk next door take stuff that was useful once and chuck it out on the pavement or on to my property. Probably unaware that the Borrowers do not actually exist. Madame put some of their old wood that had fallen off their terrace onto my garden, back onto their terrace today.Anyway, this is the evidence of the dumpee having a dump yesterday. I have not photographed the white metal box or cooker that is now in front of my wall