Gosip and idle thoughts

No theme to todays posting.. just odd thoughts and observations on life here.

So here we are coming to the end of another month. The garage is slowly moving forward but weather has held us back a bit. The forecast now is looking more promising so hopefully we can crack on with it and move on to the next job! We still haven't got round to registering the car in France (as the process is fairly complex) and as the insurance runs out soon, and my UK drivers licence needs to be renewed and changed to a French one, then this job is taking on more importance.

Sunday here is the hunting day. Mostly there are one or two hunters out looking for rabbits or hare, but every month or so the whole hunt come out in force to hunt deer. It's a bit of a fiasco and looking at them out there last week I couldn't help remarking to Ian, that for the hunt organiser it must be a bit like organising a day trip for age concern, since the average age of most of the hunting contingent is well past retirement. They are usually driven to their stations in a 4x4 as they are too frail to walk there and mostly they use the gun barrel as a mobility aid. I guess that over the next few years with the old brigade dying off, so will the hunt. There are younger members but most of them suffer from the 21st century disease of too little time and too much work. I have mixed feelings. Having been anti-hunting for years I won't miss the spectacle, but at least here they eat what they kill and respect the wildlife around them, wanting to preserve natural environments so that there are plenty of things for them to shoot. Without the hunt, people would put down poison and adopt other more nasty and dangerous forms of pest control to keep the deer, rabbits and hare, etc from taking over.

Looking at the older population around here, it did strike me that it is very like "last of the summer wine." The older generation still get out and about and get themselves into mischief. One dropped dead last week after shovelling snow. He was well over 80 and I couldn't help but think what a nice way to go! The local accent and patois is also widely used amongst this group. They have names like Combo, Old Scapan and Peter Orange. Old Scapan is a hunter in his 80s who has a wife 20 years his junior. He still drives his tractor around. Peter Orange lives with his wife but they argue a lot and he has made it known that he is looking for another, much younger one. I have yet to identify the Nora Batty character but there are several candidates.

On a completely different note, the first of the three babies expected to be born in the village this year arrived recently. Well, at least I assume it did as the pregnant lady no longer looks pregnant!