House progress

I couldn't get a photo of the shower progress as it is all covered up for treating the wood against wood worm. The stuff is called xzylothene and is pretty horrible to apply.  

The rest of the old floor has gone. You can see some of the joists need replacing. The new floor is ordered. We need to decide whether to line up the joins in the planks or stagger them. Tricky.

The garden

I cannot BELIEVE that this was beautifully mown and weed free only about 4 weeks ago.

On Monday, I strimmed most the way down the middle then ran out of petrol (Doug was off fixing a fence down the bottom with the two stroke oil so I couldn't fill up - no photo of the fixed fence, but looked an effortful job). I also weeded two beds and mounded up the potatoes so it looks margionally better, but we need to do more and plant lots of things.

Also potted on some melons and put tomatoes in pot outside front door.

Sewing trousers

Completed the trouser sewing course. Was good. Nice people. Trousers came out well. Only slightly worried bum will split when I bend down. They are meant to be short, maybe I should have made them more so, so that was clear!

Wow look at the junk in the background. Must do something about that.

You can see slight buldge at bottom of zip on the left (which is the right of the photo. The back could be slightly higher I think - or something is making th waist band sit a bit funny at the back anyway. Perhaps they could be fractionally more fitted at the top of the leg on the outside. I better made anothr pair straight away while I remember these things.

As I was setting off to work in them this morning Aidan kindly said 'oh my god are you going to trust them at work! Maybe you should take a spare pair in case thy fall apart'. I haven't, but I will sit very carefully.

Another weekend away

This time in San Sebastian (Spain). It was our '21 years together' celebration. We celebrated the bejesus out of it, and it will take some days to recover...

San Sebastian is about 2 hours drive from our house, just in to Spain on the Atlantic coast. We have been there a few times as there is a great hotel that takes the dog, plus the town is chock full of awesome food and there is a beach pretty much in the center of town.

We stopped off in San Jean de Luz on the way to have lunch and a paddle. People asked for more photos of me, so Doug was given the camera several times - and only took one picture of my chest without head.

The weather was perfect. I had seen two forecasts, one saying pouring rain and one saying beaming sun. In the end it was sun with a few showers.

Looking good after 21 years of joyous union. 

Ok so a hotel room is a hotel room but bed was huge and they upgraded us to a suite - which the photo doesn't show. Hilarious replacement of me with dog.

Beach right in town

Come on it's warm!

Not a chance, it is a bit cold and I'm a wimp, my ball and I are out of here.

Oh, ok then. Wait for me!

It was quite warm actually - considering it is only May.

After all that exercise we needed to eat a LOT

 

And drink some (this is a local wine called Txacoli - it is lightly fizzy - the word to describe this type of wine is spritzy apparently). They pour it from a great hight in to the glass and it is very very dry. And they only serve you this much so when you have been in 10 different bars and eaten 10 different things you have not passed out from drinking too much.

Then we ate some more - these are pinxos which is the basque tapas. All amazing, easy to eat far far too much

The one in the middle here is 'boletus mushrooms in a nest', that is a quail egg on top. It doesn't sound very exciting but it is one of the best.

Deserts aren't so common. This one is a basque cheese cake, it can be a bit dry, but when done well like this one, it is creamy and much much nicer than it looks.

You get plenty of excersize having a drink and a couple of pinxos in each place (not really)

During the day we have to take the dog for a lot of swimming and a nice long walk so she is tired out and doesn't make a noise in the hotel while we go out eating and drinking.

This is the other beach in the town. It is more sheltered in a little cove.

Light snack (sorbet - but there was a burger before it) to keep us going until evening and more pinxos.

Random group photo. You can see Doug's knees healing slowly from the lime burn, had to be sure to use lots of sun lotion.

We stopped near Biaritz on the way back

Back home - dog has minor paw injury.

View from home lovely too. The elderflowers are out - must make champagne.

Weekend in Toulouse

It was last weekend, but I have been slow blogging it.

I fly in to Toulouse every Thursday, so we thought a weekend there would be a nice chance for Doug to get some city life as well as saving me the two hour drive each way. I worked from the hotel on Friday and Doug got the train up to join me in the afternoon. A friend took Poppy and another one fed and watered the multitude of pigs, chickens, quails, rabbits and cat.

We went to the Opera on Friday. There is a dedicated opera house and it seeme very popular.

The production was interesting with strippers in the Harem and a random couple who weren't part of the plot but were on stage some of the time either fighting or 'lovin'

The singing was very good as was the orchestra. Isabella (the italian girl of the title) made suspending disbelief and seeing her as super attractive a little difficult due to her immense size but sung well.

Strippers and the fighting couple bowing

On Saturday we hired some bikes (which are like the London 'Boris Bikes')

We had dinner later in the day in the restaurant opposite this lot of bikes.

We had curry in the evening. It didn't really look this green, there were some lights that phased through different colours and I caught them at a bad moment. Wandering around Toulouse, we have discovered loads and loads of Indian restaurants. We need to go back and try more of them!

This street had several, so putting the sign here to remind us for next time.

Cycling around we had a few snacks, all food really good. We went along the river and saw various churches and picturesque streets.

On Sunday the weather was less lovely so we spent even more time eating! We saw a strange sight in the main square of loads of people line dancing in the rain.

Yummy!

We were under shelter but outside watching the strange spectacle!

We had a lovely weekend and only missed the dog a little bit.

Why there are so few photos of me on the blog

Here is an example of what happens when Doug gets put in charge of the camera...

Weeds!

It has been warm and wet for a week or so and both grass and weeds have been growing like CRAZY. Even the proper plants have been growing some!

These paths were mown 10 says ago. The beds were pretty much weed free last weekend. Honestly!

This is strawberries and weeds in the nearest bed and potatoes and weeds in the next bed along (which need mounding up, didn't get done this weekend!)

Peas (and weeds)

Rhubarb - and lettuce to the bottom right

Purple sprouting