Midi Matters

This section's articles

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  FUR AND FEATHERS

  Monday 1 March 2004, by Patricia

  I do have a kind of sympathy with the rebellious creatures of Animal Farm. Four legs good, yes. Two legs bad? Well, not always. Six legs - or more? Lemme outta here!

  I was prepared for spiders, of course, when we moved into our Midi home. But nobody told me about scorpions. Scorpions are things you get in Africa, aren’t they? Great black things a foot long (...)

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  The Good Ol’ Boys

  Wednesday 1 October 2003, by Patricia

  Every village has them. The good ol’ boys who congregate in the village square or in the bar, gossiping and swapping tall tales and passing comment on the world as it goes by. Our village is no exception.

  Good Ol’ Boys We are particularly blessed in good ol’ boys. There must be 10 or more to be seen of a morning, whiling away the time till midday, when Madame calls them in for lunch. It’s always (...)

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  HAVING THE BUILDERS IN

  Monday 21 July 2003, by Patricia

  

  Getting Plastered

  Reliable builders are hard to find, but.......

  There is a sickness that afflicts those of us who dwell in the Midi. It is rarely fatal, although sufferers tend to become suicidal. We have almost all contracted it at some time or other. It is known as Having the Builders In.

  As sufferers go, we are perhaps the luckiest: we have Reliable Builders. That means that if they promise faithfully to get the job done they will probably do so. In their own time, true. After (...)

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  LIKE YOU WOULD

  Monday 14 July 2003, by Patricia

  If it is possible for two people to buy a house by accident and at the same time by predestination, then we were those two people.

  A Vendre A house in Southern france for sale. If it is possible for two people to buy a house by accident and at the same time by predestination, then we were those two people. When I first (...)

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  Confessions of a Vendange Virgin

  Friday 27 June 2003, by Patricia

  

  When you have reached the age of fiftysomething, spent a good part of your year in the south of France and have never picked a grape in anger, you begin to wonder what you have missed. So when Antoine, a local friend with a couple of tiny vineyards, hinted that he could do with some vendangeurs for a day or two’s work - unpaid, but well fed - I found myself volunteering.

  Himself was not impressed, but I pointed out reasonably that this was an experience we owed it to ourselves to experience. And anyway, I had volunteered, so that was that. As the day drew near (...)