Even more snow

 Like I said in a previous post, a little more snow and it's chaos.                                                     

A couple of photos I took this morning outside our front gate after another snowfall last night.

Let me tell you what happened yesterday.

Mrs "stuff to do" went off early afternoon to do some music teaching and whilst she was out, decided to do a bit of food shopping, in the meantime however it decided to snow a bit, very wet heavy snow that didn't stop, and it had turned very dark by the time the shopping was finished.

The return journey which usually takes a quarter of an hour turned out to be a marathon one and a half hour crawl and stop.

There are some pretty steep hills around us and there are no alternatives to having to go up and down them, so having set off from the shops up one of the heavily wooded roads through the hills she encountered two large trees that had succumbed to the weight of snow and had fallen across the road blocking it completely. Luckily about two cars behind her was a man in a van, who just happened to have a wood saw and both he and his mate started sawing through this 1ft diameter trunk taking it in turns as it turned out that it wasn't a chainsaw but an ordinary wood saw. With eventually one half of the road open she turned off onto our single track road that serves the few houses scattered in the forest, fields and countryside until sliding around rather a lot the car came to a halt, wheels spinning, going nowhere. Up comes her knight in shining armour in the shape of our friend the local farmer's son on his trusty ancient tractor replete with tow rope. After arriving on our drive and unloading we both enjoyed the beef and Guinness stew with dumplings that had been simmering on the woodburner awaiting our attention.

Tree Huggers

 I WANT TO BE A TREE..............

Um.... Ok.

Sunday again

 It was last Sunday afternoon that we had our annual visit from the local "Sapeur and Pompiers". Every year they do the rounds of the village selling their calendars to raise funds for the organisation.

That's the cover obviously for this year.

Whilst you're here, let me explain what a Pompier is. 

Every town in France has what could be loosely described as a fire station that houses the pompiers vehicles and personnel, le Bugue which is our nearest town has about 30 pompier, some full time, some part time and some volunteers. I suppose first and foremost they are firemen, but they are also first responders, they have ambulances, 4x4 vehicles, cars, vans, and of course fire engines, and respond to medical emergencies as well as road traffic accidents. 

THEY ARE LIFE SAVERS.

There are some nice photos in this years calendar, a bit different than normal, so I will upload each months photo for you to have a look at.

Stay safe.

First snow of the year

 Late yesterday evening it started snowing and whilst I was busy making our evening meal there was just enough light left outside for Mrs "stuff to do" to pop out and take a few photos on her, go anywhere, do everything with a few bells and whistles, mobile phone. The results of which are here

Don't ask me why, but Blogger doesn't want to let me put two pictures side by side so we will have to put up with what we have got. (a bit of a pig's ear)

You may or may not be thinking to yourself that it doesn't snow in south west France and generally you would be correct, HOWEVER, it does get cold in winter. We've been here now for over 20 years and we do get snow, not very often, but it is havoc when it happens as we don't seem to have any gritters or snowploughs and everything comes to a slippery grinding halt. The hill in front of our house is steep and bendy and can be impossible for some cars even in the summer.

Temperatures have been down to minus 20degC with our water pipes frozen for days on end, but as an avid gardener that's good as it kills off all the little buggers lurking in the soil. Seasonality is something I embrace whole heartily and I do intend to make it a topic in another post soon. (I bet you can't wait, can you?)

Look after yourselves till next time.

   

More Christmas books

 Seems like I always get a lot of books for Christmas, I'm not complaining, I really do like books, it seems the more I get the happier I become.

These are two that I received this Christmas, the sort of books that you don't have to read cover to cover straight away, but you can delve into when the fancy takes. I keep them handy by the side of my armchair, unlike the book on my bedside table which I turn to every night to read albeit slowly.

I always have a book on the go and it's usually fiction at bedtime and non fiction during the day (creature of habit one might say) I take ages so Mrs stuff to do says, for me to read a book and she is always right of course, it's because what for me makes a book interesting to read is not only the story but just as importantly the manor in which the words are put on the paper, or in the case of my bedtime book, the Kindle, that Mrs stuff to do donated to me a few years ago.

Both the above books are short and divided into bite size chapters, even if you don't fancy the subjects or the authors, they are both mildly amusing and on a cold wet day like today, worth picking up and wasting an hour or two reading.

A big thankyou to those who donated these books to my library.

Just a little thought

 What is it about cloud cuckoo land that makes me want to go and live there.

If you have ever found yourself feeling like that, then get yourself off to the vets.

Physalis

 Went for a little wander around the garden and found this. 

During the afternoon my son's friend arrived in her absolutely awful RED car, but I thought that I could take advantage of the moment and borrowed her to hold the physalis (cape gooseberry) next to the bonnet of the aforementioned RED thing so that I could take a photo.

I put the image into Paint.Net to tone down the RED then put a slight vignette on it, and came up with that, which for 5 minutes work I am quiet happy with.

More about Paint.Net in a later blog post I am sure.