from London

Heres our Pete in front of a mural he's done in Portobello Road - another star in our midst!

If you use facebook, take a look at Protobello Road Arts Project for lots more images. Sock-blowing.

From Gloucestershire....

...I was standing by the River Wye thinking deep thoughts when Roy rang on my mobile, with a French journalist wanting to talk to artists of our parts. What he said was fairly shocking, actually completely surprising;  so naturally I gave him Kat's number:)

Here is the article. Being tolerably alert I note that they are mentioning no names so I wont either.
 
http://www.ladepeche.fr/article/2015/01/23/2034877-couple-audois-soupconne-avoir-maquille-meurtre-suicide.html

Whatever next.

Still absent

Still in Blighty and today I trotted out to see Adrain and Maggie Hailer, whom I know many Esperazanais knew and liked. It is no secret that Adrain has been desperately ill and alas, still is. He and Maggie are taking on the drugs company that crippled him; yesterday the Mail wrote a piece about him which explains the situation clearly. Heres the link -

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2915009/Ex-priest-volunteered-blood-drug-trial-sues-pharmaceutical-firm-1million-suffering-catastrophic-brain-damage.htmlhttp://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2915009/Ex-priest-volunteered-blood-drug-trial-sues-pharmaceutical-firm-1million-suffering-catastrophic-brain-damage.html

They send love and wanted to know how things are in our little paradise -so do I!
Despite meeting many old friends here, being overwhelmed by culture and having a deal of fun, I'm a little homesick.

Not at home -

 That I'm not in Esperaza is clear from todays pix - here are Frank and Liz who lived amounst us for a few years before returning to grandchildren and the manipulative dog Ben - lovely to see them in their new home on the south coast.

They send love to all.

We shared a bit of wine and a bit of food and a lot of gossip :)

 Here is an occasional Esperaza visitor and dear old friend Peter Tyler, sitting under one of my paintings from 1983 -we have all aged gracefully since then. For some reason I have no picture of Vera, his wife - it wouldn't download-

We saw the expo Naked in the de la Warr pavilion in Bexhill. Very good indeed. Small, but perfectly formed.


And here is Penny, with whom I spent a lovely day which included the Chapman Brothers exhibition in Hastings. Brilliant.

The journey to Blighty was fraught on account of the thick fog. Bob heroically drove in no visibility for many hours. We arrived at the boat in time to board and got to London in the early hours of the morning - Ive been travelling ever since, getting spoilt by my friends and generally feeling that it was worth the effort. Thanks to all :) And great sadness to France over the Charlie Hebdo massacre. Everyone here very distressed.

post-fete life

 

Bob and I  kicked off the day in the Patisserie cafe which though  relatively new in Esperaza has performed wonders - good cheap coffee and tea (Tetleys, for a wonder) brilliant pastries and cakes and chocolates and buscuits all made on site by the sweet couple that run it. Sitting in the window it is possible to see the world pass by - our little commune is creaking back into life.

Thence to St Hilaire for lunch at the house of our friend Lizzie - en route passing the imposing abbey. Lunch was wonderful and a selction of well-chosen wines kept me grinning through the afternoon :)

 

The real news here is the letter most of us have got from the President of the Communauté de communes Pyrénées Audoisese. Each household is being taxed 195 euros for waste management, that is, dustbin emptying and dump control. Do we not pay tax d'habitation for this, I hear you cry?

My choir had warned me, their token foriegner, that this was going to happen. They had urged me not to pay as they said that it was an error made by the department in the sums it did when they joined forces with other communes. It was their mistake, we should not have to pay for it. Then when the bills arrived I heard other gossip; that this was a scam enacted on the English. I went straight to the font of all knowledge, Andree, who said we were all mad, we had not paid last year and this is to make up for it. Pay it now, she says.

Which begs the question of what taxe d'hab. is for...