May News Update

Late again with the monthly update but still busy and still here. We’ve been having fun with the weather over the last month with bright sunshine for about 5 or 6 days, followed by big thunderstorms.

The last one took out all the local telephone lines, fried one of our internal lines and took the telephone company, France Telecom, about 5 days to repair. You wouldn’t believe what they’ve done though. As you walk down the road they have just patched the lines with what looks like domestic cable and made the joints with plastic tape. So you have all these loose ends of wire just hanging in the air. It seems to be working but for how long?

On the continuing saga of broadband, we fixed our internal line quickly and were up and running as soon as the Engineers had done their work. Josianne, our neighbour, also lost her internal telephone lines and had to wait about another week to get the problem fixed. So, while she was waiting we borrowed her ‘Live Box’ broadband unit and connected it to our telephone line, lo and behold it works. So its now back to the France Telecom office to get them to send an engineer out to verify this. Wonder how long that will take.

Our wonderful shed has had another bedroom added, not for people but for our newly acquired chickens. There was a convenient concrete base to build on so they have a nice comfortable hutch, a secure run and we have fenced off part of the vegetable garden to give them space to scratch and dig.

They were only about 18 weeks old when we got them so it will be a few weeks before they settle in and start laying. They have already learnt about putting themselves away at night and it is great to see them come out in the morning and spend the first two or three minutes just running up and down their bit of garden and attempting short flights to exercise their wings.

The cats and Jogi are fascinated by these new arrivals but fortunately they are too big for the cats to take on and Jogi just lets them walk all over him. Looking forward to our first fresh eggs and we’ve taken ‘coq au vin’ off the menu.

Jogi’s puppies are growing up fast and we are pleased to know that they have all been homed without any problem. One is going to Hong Kong and another to Portugal, the rest to the UK, but Jogi is now well represented around the world.

That’s the good news. The tragic news is that our ride-on mower has gone to its final resting place in a blaze of glory. Whilst cutting the grass, Doug noticed that the back of his legs were starting to feel warm and looked down to see a small fire had started around some electrical cables. By the time he had the hose rigged up and was able to get water on it, the petrol tank had melted and things were out of control. Of course the only sensible thing to do was to take photos and wait for it to cool down. Our neighbour, Bernard, then arrived with his tractor and removed the remains from the road side. It is now resting in our field until the scrap man comes in July to take it away for ever.

Other than that we are having a great time. The weather is good, the vegetable are doing well, the garden is looking colourful. Our guests are able to enjoy the smell of home grown flowers in their rooms and the taste of home grown vegetables with their meals.

If you listen to all the health and life style advisors there are, with our healthy food, fresh clean air and the natural spring water that feeds the house, a stay at Chez Jallot should put at least ten years on your life expectancy.