A momentous week at Les Petites Rivieres

After our late arrival back from Paris, it was a reluctant early start this morning ready for the builders at 8am. But I must have had a hunch, as Willy announced in sign language that today was the day they were cutting through the opening from the new kitchen to the living room. In a flash I had raided the linen cupboard for sheets and towels to shroud the living room furniture, as the boys prepared the protective plastic shield from floor to ceiling to reduce the spread of the dust and propped the beams ready for the stone wall removal.

Then they pulled out the large drill and made the breakthrough. It went without a hitch and by lunchtime all the large white Charente stonework in the opening had been removed- voila, we have a doorway. On Tuesday the formwork went up for the manual concrete pour to level the sides of the opening and prepare it for the plaque (plasterboard) to be fitted.

No sign of the builders for the rest of the week except briefly to remove the formwork late one afternoon. But we were busy on a mission to replace the cracked timber toilet seat in the downstairs bathroom. We'd brought the replacement seat and in theory it was a 10 minute job.....except there was a problem which turned 10 minutes into 48hrs as we struggled to release/hacksaw and drill out the second wing nut and bolt holding the old seat on. Finally with additional bigger tooth hacksaw blades and sharper metal drill bits there was victory, but not without a lot of swearing and cursing.

We ventured into the market on Wednesday and experienced the 'school strike' at St Jean D’Angeley, which has made the international news for several days now with some fairly dramatic outcomes, burning buses, injured children and the like. Our local protest was well overseen by a large contingent of gendarmes, blue flashing lights and senior school children marching with placards backwards and forwards across the pedestrian crossing. The strikes were driven by the students seeking better classroom conditions, more teachers, and better resources. News reports describe a severe lack of teachers for some grades, and those on sick leave not being replaced. In France the right to strike is a French tradition, learned from a young age.

And speaking of traditions, I'm sure I've mentioned the hunting notices on most of the fields and woodlands around us. Well it turns out that mid September is the start of the hunting season so we are frequently alerted to gun fire at various times of the day and its not too far from home. We're still not sure what the target is, pigeons, foxes, quail or perhaps deer, but a large deer was leaping across the top paddock one Sunday morning and looked quite spectacular.Read more