Uncertain days ahead

What a difference fourteen days makes to my world.  Who would have ever thought that the UK would be leaving the European Union?  For me, it was unthinkable and having done my postal vote I felt confident that the Remain side would win.  I felt physically sick on Friday, 24 June when I woke up to the seven o'clock BBC Breakfast News to hear the very sad and misguided result.  We have, of course, a couple of years of uncertainty until we find what effects it might have on those of us who live in Europe with the rules that applied while Britain was a member of the EU.  Financially it could be difficult for many British immigrants in Europe if pensions are frozen at current rates, if our medical situation changes and if the exchange rate goes against us.  I am still hoping that Article 50 will not be invoked and that we will not leave.  The lies told by the Leave campaign and believed by vulnerable people, were so enormous and serious that the referendum result should be declared void.

I have completed, in pencil so far, the forms for me to apply to become a French citizen. A friend, Nicky, who is also doing this is coming to lunch this week to discuss all the details so we know what we're up to with the documents we have to provide.

The Workaway I picked up when I took the boys back to Roscoff turned out to be a lazy, swearing and shouty person and I felt very threatened by him.  Two days after he arrived I took him to the train station to leave, I had already had to say I would call the police if his aggressive and frightening behaviour continued.  I have never had a bad experience like this and hope that I don't again.  My next Workaways are two French girls arriving later this month - I look forward to meeting them.

The weather was not kind during the last half of June.  Everything in both the veggie patch and garden has grown like mad because of the rain and the warmth in spite of very little sun except for in the late afternoon and evening.  

Some of the roses growing on the pergola have really suffered in the rain with the blossoms looking very tatty even before they are fully open, but on the whole the garden seems to have enjoyed the regular natural watering.

My chick, Annie, continues to thrive and spends her day between the terrace and the house and her nights in the garden hen house, which she hates and is always first out of the pophole when it's opened in the morning.

She likes to sit on the top edge of the laptop screen and peck at the cursor as I move it. It must look like a fly to her I think.  Whenever I swat a fly I knock it from the swat onto the floor and she rushes over immediately for a small protein snack.

My current book club book is The Rosie Project by Graeme Simsion - I am just over half way through the 327 pages and am thoroughly enjoying it.  

I usually do all my reading in the garden while lying in the sunshine, so it has been difficult to get enough hours in so far.  Hopefully July will provide better reading possibilities with seriously sunshiny weather.

The second book I have to complete before the group meeting is All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr.  The story takes place during the second world war and is mostly located in Brittany.

I have employed a great worker to do the more skilled tasks which most Workaways might not be able to tackle successfully.  Dan came for two days last week and cleared up several outstanding items on the To Do List.  He's returning on Monday to establish what is wrong with my leaking chimneys and hopefully to resolve the problems.  

My Land Rover - safely back home again having been to Garage Barrington at La Cheze and

got through it's CT (MOT equivalent) last week so that's another two years sorted, under the French system.  I completely forgot that the registration document had to be presented with the vehicle, so found myself driving nearly an hour back home and then back again to collect it before the booked time for the test.  I took the opportunity of being much further east of where I live to visit a friend, Colin, who I hadn't seen for a while.  We had a pizza and a coffee inside as the weather was not being kind.

Yesterday afternoon I visited, with other members of Gardeners in Brittany, a Facebook group, a garden in Gouarec.  The weather was kinder than it has been and at least it didn't rain while we were there.

I didn't take many photos of the garden but seem to have taken some of the buildings there and of members of our group.


















We hope to do more visits in the future to other gardens in Brittany.  There don't seem to be many open gardens in my department, 22, but I'm not far from departments 29 and 56 so we have a fairly wide range to wander in. 

No gardening here as it's been drizzling all day.  I bought two plants at the garden yesterday but they'll have to wait until the sun comes out before they find their homes in the earth here.  

Three things I like:

1.   Picking my veggies which are now growing up on the field.
2.   Meeting new like-minded people.
3.   Watching Annie getting bigger and stronger.

Midsummer's day is approaching fast in St André

It's been a busy fortnight.  

I had a colonoscopy on 3 June and was given the all-clear for anal cancer.  Dr le Bihan did find a polyp much, much further up and removed it for testing.  Initial testing is good news and he doesn't expect that will change with more detailed analysis.  I may not have to have another colonoscopy for 2-3 years.  I never have any bad effects from the colonoscopy but the anaesthetist did have trouble inserting the drip needle and having tried inside my elbow and the back of my hand finally made it into a vein on the inside of my wrist.  I was pretty fed up with all the poking around in each insertion and was very glad when he finally had success.  Needless to say I am so pleased with the results of the examination and feel I have been treated very well and have been very lucky.

My little chick, named Annie, as in little orphan Annie, has thrived.  She spends her time between the house, garden and the garden hen house at night.  The latter is a trauma for her and she hides behind the nesting box so she can't be bullied by the others.  With a change of allegiance, she has spent quite a bit of time on Matthew's lap while he's been here this week.

Matthew, Brett and Sean came over for just 3-4 days.  The weather wasn't very kind, they were a week later than usual and if they'd come last week it would have been much better.  However, they still managed to sit in the garden most of the time, use the hot tub and we had a BBQ on their last night.  They mended some fencing, pruned the fast growing vines bits and cleaned and set up the swimming pool and hot tub.  I drove them back to Roscoff today and picked up my new Workaway who had come in on the boat on which they were going back to Plymouth.   

I went back for a second x-ray on my left wrist.  Luckily it wasn't broken after all.  The weakness and pain is because the joint is arthritic and the trauma has caused inflammation.  i continue to wear the splinty thing, which really helps, and hope it will soon be much better.

I gave a dozen eggs to a Breton neighbour who had two broody hens but no cockerel.  He came round this afternoon to say that six successfully hatched this morning and he was really pleased with the mixture of birds, two black, a brown, a ginger, a grey and a white chick.  He also said that his little terrier dog had killed his fourth fox this morning which he'd cornered in an outbuilding.  Although I love foxes, I don't want them near my hen fields - mixed feelings about it.

There have been lots of interesting insect visitors to the garden.  First of all this moth who was on the outside of the house early one morning

Then a very large black bee which Annie had unfortunately wounded mortally.  I later identified it as a carpenter bee.  

Here are bees in my neighbour's garden on the buddleia - I wonder if they're my bees  who've flown down from the field.

See the pollen on her legs.

I also found a drowned bee beetle, never seen one before, in the small terrace pond.

The hawthorn blossom has been particularly beautiful.  The white is next to my bee area and the pink is in the lane immediately below my furthest driveway.

Here is Claude sitting in my large flower bed.  He has been up and down the lane with me every day when I walk to the field.

I love the colour of this osteospernum in my garden and of the riot of colour in my neighbour's patch.

These are containers planted up last year which have burst into life without any help from me except pruning.

I love this time of year, the gardening is burgeoning with blooms and the polytunnel and outside raised beds have almost no soil visible now.  The strawberries and the salad leaves have been great, as have the rhubarb and herbs.  I now have green tomatoes and chillis which will soon be changing colour as they ripen.

Hard to believe it is almost midsummer's day and we will then be heading back to winter!

Three things I like:

1.  Having the boys to stay here in St André.

2.  Popping a sun-warmed strawberry or two, or more, into my mouth straight from the plants.

3.  Hearing that two of my friends are on the way to becoming non-smokers.

June and lots of things have been happening

In spite of the lack of alcohol consumption, I have fallen twice since my last posting and am a little handicapped at  the moment.  The first time was just over a week ago when I got off my chair on the terrace and caught my flipflop in a leg of the stool and took a tumble.  There wasn't much space to fall into and as well as grazing my toes on my right foot, thumping my right knee  to a lovely bruise and bump and twisting my left foot, it seems from the pain in my right upper chest that I may have cracked a couple of ribs.  I am trying hard not to do sharp intakes of breath which are painful.  

Apparently, not content with this fall, I then tried climbing over a fence on the field to open a gate which had been wrongly closed.  I caught my trousers on the top of the fence and after friends has disentangled me I then fell backwards down the grassy slope trying to save myself by extending my left arm.  The pain from my wrist was something I never want to experience again.  After seeing my GP, piggy-backing on appointment a friend had, she wrote a letter for the hospital as she was sure it was broken.  We spent hours at the hospital waiting around in various departments.  The x-ray showed no fracture but apparently a fractured scaphoid bone doesn't necessarily show up for about ten days.  A splint type support, very effective, was applied to my wrist and a prescription for an icepack and painkillers were given, together with a letter for an x-ray after ten days had passed.

  

I can't believe how much I, as a right-handed person, depend upon my left hand.  Opening a toothpaste tube, a cat food can, grinding pepper and salt, cutting bread, hanging laundry on the line - everything seems to rely on the fact that we have two hands.  As I write, I have no pain from my wrist unless I do something with it, so that is an improvement - I am having to type with one hand though.  End of moan!

Apparently, France has more roundabouts than any other European country.  I love the way the Bretons do their roundabouts. This is one in Carhaix where they have a well-known music festival each year - Les Vielles Charrues - I love it!

My neighbours are very interested in life in the village ..

Other neighbours have goats tethered around to keep the grass and brambles in check. This is Blanchette with one of her three babies.

They're very nervous and won't be stroked.

Everything is taking off in the polytunnel now and I have been eating strawberries most days.  Here is a giant one amongst the normal sized.  I have learned to put the developing fruit on upturned plant trays to stop the slugs getting to them.

I found the one Indian Runner duck I have on the field unable to stand at all and had to bring her down to the kitchen for a while.  I kept her first in a cat carrier and then in a dog carrier.  This prevented her from trying to use her legs.  After  4-5 days of enforced rest she recovered and is now back on the field and pond again.

It has been a month for bird problems.  Two hens who had been fighting over sitting on some eggs finally hatched a chick who they both chaperone everywhere - very funny watching their attentiveness.

Unfortunately, when a second chick hatched they attacked it and I had to bring it down to be with me in the house.  She is named Annie (orphan Annie) and spends the night in a brooder in the kitchen but the daytime finds her either sitting on my shoulders or following me around in the garden and house.  She is very sweet and has totally imprinted on me as her Mum.

The three cats, Claude, Purrdy and Grace are afraid of her which is amusing but good news for her.   Hopefully in a month or so I will be able to put her in with the garden hens without her being mortally wounded.  

Here is Purrdy feeling like I often do.

Lots of lovely blooms in the garden and the village at the moment 

SuperU, my local supermarket, had a quarter of their fish counter devoted to spider crabs when I visited last week.  They are sold live, but I asked if they could cook one for me as they were so large I didn't have a pan big enough at home.  I collected it the following day and dressed it .  I had it mixed with piment paste and Hellman's mayo - heaven!

And lastly, my grandson, nine years old and his first real haircut - he's going to break a few hearts further down the line.

Three things I like:

1. Finally getting the strimming done on the field by my latest Workaway, from Switzerland.

2.  Getting the confirmatory all clear for cancer after my colonoscopy on Friday.

3.  Sunbathing in the beautiful Brittany sunshine and getting the first layer of tan!