Howdy blog,

Up here in the Department of Somewhere the August holiday makers have arrived. And whether there is sun, hail, rain, hurricanes or snow, they WILL be outside enjoying themselves. The August bunch who flock to this seaside town are on the whole, from Paris. What this means is that everyone not from Paris blames any and every act of rudeness on the capital’s residents…. And with due cause.

Comments from my children

1.Yesterday we passed a toy shop with such a display layout that once you enter, the only way to make enough space to leave the shop would be with a 4 foot shoe horn and a tub of vaseline OR perhaps a large purchase:

‘Can we go in?’ asks the Lips

‘Oh – well we could if there weren’t 3 buggies, 4 adults and kids already in there. We couldn’t fit in.’

‘Oooh but you said……….. THEY HAVE SUCH FAT BUTTS THAT WE CANT GET IN!!!!’

He said it in English – at least.

2. ‘My daddy lives in England.’

‘Yes, Fatty. And what is your daddy’s name?’

‘Michael Jackson.’

Francais

Im feeling fairly fluent in the local language that day and believe that I can successfully navigate returning books, taking out new ones plus renewing our library membership. Easy?

-Return of the books – done
-Choosing of new books for Fatty, the Prof and Lips – done with ease, surprisingly.
-Checking out new books with an expired membership? Well…

There was some confusion with me hearing prendre or rendre which meant the books got stamped as returns.
Then stamped back out.
‘Your library carte?’
‘Je n’ai pas la carte.’
Her eyes roll up.
‘Je dois to renew our membership.’
‘Votre nom?’
This question actually floors me in it being easy on one hand but complicated on the other – the other being the pronunciation using the French alphabet.
‘Hmm mon mon. Oui. Erm – mon nom? Alors, mon nom est V… Erm…. V … Erm.’
The kids start to slide away from me for shame. Eventually the Prof tells me how to spell my own name and we’re back in business.
Except,
Our membership has expired over two years ago so we have to begin the process from the start.
At this point, the unwilling librarian pulls a fast one on a colleague who happens to come to the desk (as of course, dear reader, there is quite a queue forming behind the English speaking idiot) – she moves away from me to make it look like im not being dealt with and the new librarian? Well she picks up our checked out, checked in, checked out again books and yep – she checks them in as returns.
The first librarian realises her escape from me and allows me to flounder around linguistically as I explain that these are the books I want to prendre and not rendre but I need to renouveler our membership blah blah blah
‘D’accord. Votre nom?’

This evening, in the company of my Beau parents (in laws), I am trying to convince my father in law that I have seen seals on the beach. He refuses to believe me as he has been visiting this beach for over 70 yrs and what Im claiming is to him, nonsense.
‘C’est vrai. Le premier fois that I saw one, I thought it was a labrador swimming in the sea.’
What I said – in French was – ‘… I thought that it was a snowing labradors.’

The fact that I was having a tiny drink of rose out of my tea cup did nothing to improve my credulity. I could also hear my charming husband informing his mother that I drink rose out of a tea cup all day. She believed him.

Boys and boules

Last night we took the boules to the beach for a quick game before bed.
Simple.
We took the dogs too.
We took a constipated fatty.
So we organise who gets which colour boule and someone throws.
Fatty begins to squat.
‘Where are your trousers?’
I see him bending his head to check out his own under carriage whilst Lidl Supermarket dog starts licking her lips.
‘Im doing a poo!’
He then lifts up his bum and shuffles some sand on his deposit then runs mid game to collect the boules including the potential winning shot.
‘FATTY!!!’ Noooooooo.’
Meanwhile, Lidl sees another dog and runs which pulls me backwards onto the sand.
Fatty drops the boules and squats again.
Another dog appears…… Etc etc etc