We're Having a Heatwave - Monday 4th August

The author in the Magimix circle

Michelle called in this morning to see how our respective heads were feeling after the outing on Saturday night. I think I can honestly say that she had come off worse and it didn’t help that she had to spend the day at the river yesterday, dealing with a very active general public, all of whom wanted to rent canoes and get out onto the water in the hopes of catching a bit of a breeze. I think she had also popped in with apologies for being rather over-enthusiastic about the edict that everyone should speak French on Saturday night. At least I think that’s what she was saying because she was speaking French so I didn’t quite understand her.

Up to a point I can appreciate her view that having been associated with her French brother for the best part of nineteen years, it’s high time that I spoke the language, but then again, three months ago, we had no idea that we would be living in France and the need for speaking French in Miami didn’t really take priority unless we were visiting the Quebec Flea Market.

She also carried the rather worrying news that the big field adjacent to our property has already been measured and mapped out with the possibility of a developer putting four new houses on it. We are secretly hoping that the problems in the mortgage market will slow things down and we will be left in peace, but at least if the worst comes to the worst, we have the garage and a very thick high hedge which will protect our privacy. The French have a clever ruling that no windows can be incorporated in the side of the house that overlooks its neighbour unlike the American system where you can watch every move your neighbour makes from the cradle to the grave.

The heat is intense again today and apparently we are headed for 38 degrees which in old money translates as 100 degrees farenheit. We are informed that this is a record for this time of year, but that these temperatures are not unknown for the summer months.

This time last year, we took a trip from Florida up to Tennessee and came back through Alabama where the temperature in Selma was 110 degrees. We thought that the entire area was completely deserted until we remembered that we were viewing it from the inside of an air conditioned camper van while the poor folks who lived in the low economic region were suffering with nothing much other than a fan and were staying firmly indoors.

I am discovering that although the house seems rather dark, it pays to keep the thick wooden shutters closed on the sunny side, and at night time, we leave all the glass windows open and the shutters closed, and it definitely keeps the house cooler. We still keep the large windows open in the bedroom though, and it is such a joy to wake up each morning and see the sunlight dappling across the courtyard wall, and a mosquito mesh screen on the window ensures that we have no unwanted sleeping companions. The new mattress is a joy to sleep on but very hard to get off in the morning, and we tend to lie in bed with our first cup of coffee laying plans for the day and enjoying the sight of the bright geraniums which fill the garage window.

We sat last night discussing how we will set out the furniture once all our stuff arrives. The floor in the main room is black and white tile, and over the years, the black has become somewhat faded and marked, so I think that a large rug is called for in the seating area, and then some clever placing of the larger items of furniture. We’ll have to juggle the paintings around until we find just the right place for them, and slowly the interior will become home. As the temperature begins to fall and we spend more time inside, I suppose we’ll have to come to a decision regarding television, but for the time being, I have no idea if anywhere outside the Languedoc-Roussillon area still exists.

We’ve already made up one load for the trailer and are frustrated that being Monday, the municipal tip only opens this afternoon by which stage it is going to be incredibly hot out there. Never mind; the joy of seeing the garden being steadily cleared of the piles of dead grass and pruned branches is worth it.

Jean fired up the cultivator this morning and in no time at all, he had created two neat rows into which we can plant some winter vegetables. Apparently Papy was a bit of a demon with the insecticides but in his absence over the past three years, the ground has been allowed to return to an organic state and we will encourage it by feeding it a good meal of horse manure from next door and a whole load of rotted compost. Hopefully we will be producing brussel sprouts the size of tennis balls in time for Christmas, and our cabbages will be the talk of the village.

We are now becoming increasingly impatient for the internet connection to be made, but rather than bite our fingernails and stare at the wall, we walked into the village, purchased the last copy of the Daily Telegraph from the Tabac and bought almost the last baguette from the morning batch at the Boulangerie, and then went for a cheerful stroll around the cemetery looking for the mausoleum that Mamy purchased many years back. The ground here is solid rock so everyone deposits deceased family members in a sort of chest of drawers arrangement above ground. I viewed the cold granite block and felt distinctly unhappy about the prospect of being incarcerated inside, and asked Jean that when my time came, perhaps he could take my little urn up the road next to Pic St Loup and allow my ashes to flutter across the endless vineyards. I know by that stage I really won’t give a darn what happens to me, but I rather like the though that I might make a small impression on a good vintage.

If the temperature today is true, judging by the weather report in the Daily Telegraph, we are hotter than Dubai and Bahrain and only one degree cooler than Marakesh. I couldn’t help feeling a little smug when I saw that the warmest place in England was Maidstone at 72 and it was raining. The talk in the Bureau de Poste this morning was that the heat wave was late but much needed to bring on the ripening of the grapes. Now there’s a conversation that you don’t hear much of in the Post Office in Ipswich.