dimanche 24 février 2013

Neiging your bets - why worry on a winter weekend?

Oui, c'est de la neige. C'est à dire: Snow. I suppose we had to have a dose of the white stuff sooner or later. Up until now, it's just rained . . . and rained . . . and rained.

Doubtless it's deeply good for the water table and all that, but it does get to be rather a muchness.

Feeling a bit stir crazy on Saturday night, I did venture out as promised to une petite soirée Céltique in the snowy fastness of St Jean de Paracol, a couple of villages up the valley.

Joanne McIver and Christophe Sauniere on pipes and harp respectively were well worth the slither in the dear old Kangoo, complete with obligatory handbrake frozen solid.

I don't know quite how Renault managed this particular eccentricity, but I wish they hadn't. Still, as they say in France: Renault, chaque jour un bruit nouveau, or: Renault, every day another rattle . . .

It was while I was seeking a suitable pic to illustrate white hell in Fa, that I came across this poignant reminder of the golden age when cars were made of Meccano, mercifully free of crap electronics that cost a fortune and don't work.

Otherwise it was a case of indoor entertainment: email, Grauniad website, Facebook, email, Grauniad website, Facebook, email, Grauniad website, Facebook . . . 

Farcebook does however occasionally produce the odd grain of inspiration: I was particularly touched by a short video clip of one Alice Herz-Sommer, 109-year-old Holocaust survivor, who proceeded to tell the world that all life is beautiful. Even more touching was her gigantic smile.

Seeking intellectual stimulus, I hied me unto our beloved hostelry, the café that is called de Fa. Therein, my old mate Dave le Philosophe, his visiting son Joe and myself didst make ourselves suitably comfortable in a quiet corner and beat the Guardian Prize crossword to death.

Spoiler alert: I was particularly chuffed with myself for noticing a sequence of answers: Soup A Collie Fridge Elastic Eggs Peas Halitosis. Gaw bless yer Meerry Pawpins . . .

I went home and wrote a poem. After that nothing happened.