And the heat goes
on... Shades of 2003 – except now there is some shade, deep within the
house in the darkened 'master bedroom'.
Hotter than July.
We're now on red alert in the Lot – along with the other departments in
south-west France – so there's no more watering allowed. We've been quite liderally scraping the bottom of
the barrels. With no more water in the rain butts to scoop out with our
watering cans, we can remove them from their plinths, slosh out the sludge at
the bottom and turn them up to dry out, ready for the next inundation. If it
comes. There was rain forecast at the weekend, but an overcast morning soon
turned into a sunny day. So... we must watch the garden along with the
surrounding vegetation die off and hope that it will come back in milder
climes.
This is the kind of summer that makes you question your
wisdom in setting out camp so far south. Surely we'd have been better off in
Brittany, where the winds off the Atlantic make for changeable and more
tolerable conditions. But my wife's not having it. If we are ever to move to
the seaside, it must be somewhere near Sete on the Mediterranean, because the
sea is warmer. But so is the ambient temperature, isn't it? No, I won't stand
for that. If global warming makes up its mind to subject us to hotter and drier
rather than milder and wetter summers, I think Scandinavia's the place.
Besides, it's an enlightened society. Generally speaking. Nice people, the
Danes, the Swedes and the Norwegians. Even the Finns – if it weren't for the endemic
alcoholism and a cuisine that's reputedly based around potatoes and porridge. I
might have got it wrong.
Anyway, it hasn't happened yet. Climactic and financial
meltdowns are still just shapes looming on the horizon. For the moment, we've
been focusing on keeping cool and inducting the new arrivals. It hardly seems
possible that Otis and his half-brother Mingus arrived just over a week ago to complete
Team Sampson once more. It seems like at least a fortnight that we've been
watching them tumble around like kittens are given to do. Daphne has fallen for
young Mingus in a big way and we have to keep a close watch lest she try to
drag him around by his ear. The Daughter gets a little stressed by it all and
we try to reassure her that they will work out their own rules. After all, her
mother's old dog, Max, used to carry his favourite kitten around in his mouth.
 |
| Mingus (left) and Otis (right) |
They came to us via our first friends in France. Régine
ran the bar/restaurant in a nearby village, while Bernard worked for France
Telecom pre-privatisation. They took us under their collective wing and did
more than anyone to ensure that the new arrivals from far-off Sheffield
survived the first few difficult years among the hill people of the Corrèze.
Régine had to give up cooking due to a rare and debilitating illness, but she
re-invented herself as a cookery writer – to find regional fame and, if not
fortune, then a modest income to supplement Bernard's retirement pension.
Having moved to Marcillac on the edge of the Haute
Corrèze, they journeyed significantly down to Brive the weekend before last to
deliver the kittens to my lady's cabinet
and check out our currently vacant apartment for their delightful daughter,
Charlotte, who lived for a time in Southampton with friends of my sister's
children and who learnt impeccable English and a wider perspective on life.
They liked the apartment and we love their two kittens.
Otis and Mingus seem to have adapted very quickly to life
in a comparatively luxurious animal-loving home. And why wouldn't they? All the
love they can manage, all the water they can drink, all the food they can eat
and all the litter they need to scrape and scatter for me to empty in some
brambly corner where Daphne can't get to the... No, I won't even go there.
Disgusting things, dogs.
Watching all three animals sleep through the worst of the
afternoon heat makes you realise that they – and we – were never meant to
contend with such temperatures as we've been witnessing this July. These are
Spanish temperatures. Moroccan, even. Down in those parts, they sensibly take
siestas. We, alas, come from a different culture. Spurred on by the good old
Protestant work ethic, I have tried to soldier on at the computer. But I may as
well have retreated to my bed, given what I have managed to achieve. You can't
think straight, let alone create. Heat like this saps the will to live and it
doesn't surprise me that so many of our older citizens have given up the ghost.
One compensation of mid July is normally the British
Open. But our digibox that converts the satellite signals into images gave up
the ghost and we had to await the visit of Satellite Stu on Wednesday
afternoon. He put things right. Typically it expired at a time when there were
three excellent films to record on Film Four. And at a time when I normally
allow myself a few hours on the sofa to watch the gentle, sedate events on the
golf course. It's St. Andrews this year, too. The filthy weather mocked our parched
and ailing landscape, but provided one of the most exciting competitions for
years. Alas, it was won by an American and not a European.
However, I did manage a round of golf one Monday morning
on a new course that a passionate fan of the game has created out of old
farmland, presumably with the money he must have made from selling his
business. My friend and fellow Packers fan, John from Madison, Wisconsin, took
me there and lent me his new-generation clubs. And because John is getting a
little too old for dragging a bag of clubs around on foot, we got to hire one
of those electric buggies, which was almost as much fun as riding a dodgem car.
It was my first round of golf in 12 years and I didn't
disgrace myself. Not altogether, anyway. I hit a few shots sweetly and sunk a
long putt and, despite the searing heat, it was a lot of fun. At one point,
teeing off on the fourth hole, another buggy came racing towards us. It was the
owner, bearing two cups of black coffee on a tray. Most of it had spilled on
the tray, but I very much appreciated the gesture. Nor would he let us pay for
our slopped coffees, because it was the quatorze
juillet. Only in France, eh?
As we arrived at the green for which we were aiming, we
chanced upon a pair of hoopoes. It's seemingly weeks since I last saw or heard
one of these exotic birds. They flew off towards the surrounding woods on our
approach. Like I am, they're probably looking forward to the end of this month.
Normally, I do not welcome August, since it augurs the end of summer, but lower
temperatures are forecast. If only it would rain.
Rain, rain,
rain/Beautiful rain...
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