Cleaning toilets

It has been a changeover day, which translates into a day of domestic duties. Ironing, cleaning and changing beds - getting both suites ready for their next guests and cleaned and prepped for the man from the Mairie tomorrow.

It seems strange to think that all that education and the exam stress of years ago and twenty five years working as a professional Finance Director and a Commercial Director and here I am cleaning five toilets in a day, on my hands and knees cleaning bathroom floors, polishing furniture, re-attaching shower curtains that have come loose, ironing sheets and towels, and vacuuming everything in sight. Life certainly takes some unexpected turns.

Whilst I did mind doing those tasks in London. after working all hours and then having to spend my so called free time doing chores, I don't mind so much now, doing them here, because I am doing them for the good of our new life, our business, our future. Whether I will feel the same in a years time is another point altogether - we'll see whether it has become a chore again - let's hope not.

Domesticity apart, it has been a pretty quiet day here. I even managed to get a lie in this morning - not having to make breakfast for anyone but myself. I will make the most of it - from Thursday morning onwards I will be making breakfast for someone for 10 days in a row - because we have someone staying in one of the suites every night for the next week and a half - which is just brilliant, of course.

I really am not complaining at all.

Apart again

The Apartment suddenly seems to be very large and very empty. The guests left at lunchtime and Debrah flew back to London this afternoon.

Debrah has been here for 10 days - the longer the period we are together, the harder it is to say goodbye, even though she will be back on Friday.

We had dinner with our guests, Anais and KarlHeinz, last night. They are both absolutely lovely and it has been a pleasure having them stay here for the last five days. Before I took them to the station to get their train to Paris, I took them out on a little drive around the town and the Cite so that Anais could get some more photographs for her article on Carcassonne. The article is due to appear in the best-selling womans magazine in Austria, Weinerin, in June, which may well elicit a flood of Austrian enquiries, except that it's not that straightforward to get here from Vienna - oh well. we'll see.

Fortunately, after all the cold, wet and windy weather of the last few weeks, the sun came out yesterday which made for a jolly market and lifted everyone's spirits and allowed for some better photography.

We had a coffee in the square with the lovely lady that owns one of our favourite shops in Carcassonne, Esprit de Sel. I bought a beautiful leather bag from the shop for Debrah's birthday a couple of years ago and we use it every Saturday in the market for our vegetable shopping. I still don't know this lady's name which is ridiculous because she always has time for a chat and she now has our cards displayed in her shop - and after mentioning it to Anais, she went in and took some shots in there as well.

We also went in and apologised to the guys at La Roulotte for turning up so late the night before that they had shut - obviously no other customers. We didn't need to do that but I am glad we did because it looks like a nice little place and somewhere we could send our guests down to and the owner there now has our cards as well.

The glorious spring sunshine and warmth tempted us out in the car in search of a waterfall in the Montagne Noire. We had heard rumour of it but not found it, and then Debrah found a reference to it on a Dutch travel site. It turned out to be in a village (5 houses) buried deep in the woods, that we had in fact driven through before without ever realising what was there - and what a spectacular sight it was - a smallish but swollen Spring river cascading over a 100m drop onto the rocks below.

Despite the warm sunshine, there were still pockets of snow in the shady ditches and hollows and the view of the Pyrenees was spectacular as we headed back down the mountain via Cuxac and Brousses.

The next guests don't arrive until Wednesday which gives me a couple of days to get the two suites straight again and re-stock the cupboards - I made a start straight away this afternoon when I got back from dropping Debrah at the airport.

Have exchanged messages this evening with Debrah and she seems to be particularly unhappy at being back in London which, of course, makes me feel pretty miserable too. The rain has returned with a vengeance as well this evening - so an early night I think and a fresh start tomorrow.

More new contacts

Everyday seems to bring new opportunities. Some arrive by pure chance and some are part of a momentum that, I hope, is building about the business.

This afternoon, I went down to see Pierre at his shop and give him some of our postcards to hand out to people if appropriate. I was stood chatting to him when the man in charge of regenerating the bastide town came along - and so I was introduced and now I have an appointment with him on Tuesday next so that he can view the apartments and tell me how he can help me and the benefits of being involved with the 'Mairie' and the association of businesses in the bastide. I am sure there must be benefits of being involved - not least there is a benefit of being seen to be involved and part of the system rather than trying to operate independently.

A few weeks ago I met a woman, Nathalie, who had sent me an email telling me how lovely our apartments were. I replied, she visited and subsequently invited us for an 'apero' at her house.

We really didn't know what to expect. What we had was a fabulous evening, in a beautifully designed and decorated house, with her very dishy (Debrah's words) husband, Fabien and her friends Xavier and Charlotte, who both work for the Hotel de la Cite. Nathalie is a cook who has had several cookbooks published in France, and is also a designer, which was evident from her lovely residence. She has two dogs called Ralph and Stella - both names after fashion designers - you can work it out for yourself.

Xavier was very interested in our apartments from a professional point of view - he is in charge of marketing up at the Hotel. It may prove to be a useful contact if he considers us a suitable venue for overflow guests when they are fully booked - let's hope so.

Debrah's i-phone proved to be a hit with Nathalie and her daughter - I feel an imminent purchase coming on round there. They were all really lovely and we had a fabulous time - so much so that we stayed longer than we intended and were too late for our restaurant booking at La Roulotte - when we got there they had closed and gone home, which made us feel very guilty and left us wondering where we were going to eat. We ended up having a run-of-the-mill steak and chips at La Magnac, which wasn't what we had been expecting at all.

When we got home I had an email exclaiming 'I met your wife on a plane!'. I wasn't quite sure what to think at first, but it turned out to be a lady lawyer who commutes to London on a regular basis who had exchanged details with Debrah and was just getting in touch - sounds a bit mad but that's ok. She seemed happy to push business our way too.

Please keep it coming everyone.

Work Avoidance

I am guilty of 'work avoidance' according to Debrah. Not in relation to our business here in France, but for my London job, which I am going to let go for a lot of complicated reasons, but mostly because they need someone more hands on more often and I need to be in France more than England these days to look after my guests in the suites.

'Work Avoidance' means thinking of, and doing, fairly mundane jobs, that could in all fairness wait for a bit, instead of knuckling down and doing the jobs that you don't want to face up to but which other people in a snowy and colder and much more time pressured location are champing at the bit for you get to them as a matter of urgency - i.e., my London job

So, although I got up at 7am and started tweaking the financial forecasts that were much anticipated in old London town, I easily got distracted by a breakfast tray prepared by Debrah and then needing to prepare breakfast for our guests and then needing to pop out to the market for some supplies and then going over to Bob's workshop to get a replacement battery for my watch and then going upstairs to help Denis get connected to the internet via his new livebox and then talking to Gary, who dropped by whilst I was with Denis, about his new business idea.

As it happens I sent off all the revised forecasts to those that needed them in London (standby for a torrent of further questions, I think) and still managed to fit in all my work avoidance jobs as well. I'm not the only one engaged in this practice though - Debrah warned me that she had to do some work whilst she was here this week. Has she looked at it? - no.

During this morning's avoidance we dropped into the Musee de Fine Arts to have a look at the current exhibition which was billed as a bit risque. A talented artist no doubt, obsessed with sex - definitely - art or pornography?, a good question. Entertaining it was. Technically brilliant it was. Enjoyable or inspiring? - I'm not so sure it was either for me - there is a very fine line between art and pornography and for me this just crept into the art category, but only just. The important thing though is that people are able to see it and make up their own minds about it.

Bob wouldn't let me pay for putting a new battery in my watch, which is fabulous as a friend but rubbish as a businessman. Why do people insist on giving away their time for free? - I was more than happy to pay for the battery and I don't understand his logic - yes, we are friends, but this is his living. I felt slightly better after advising him to buy his Stansted Express tickets on the plane, rather than on the train, because of a Ryanair discount - he and his partner, Catharine, are going to London for a long weekend starting on Saturday.

Having gone through the trauma of trying to get my 'livebox' connected some two years ago, I was more than happy to help Denis get over that hurdle with the benefit of my experience of these things. Hell, it took me about two months and the assistance of a french speaking Irish lady to make my connection work - and it still has it's moments - so. naturally, I didn't promise the world. It turned out that I did all that I could do - I set the livebox up and and I got Denis' Mac to talk to the livebox. Everything was set for a rapid and immediate internet connection other than somebody at France Telecom getting the correct paperwork and getting off their 'cul' to connect Denis' phone number to a broadband connection. About 7 days, I reckon, for that to happen - and only because we are in the middle of town! - otherwise about two months.

I keep my fingers crossed and pray to the god of internet connection, not to mention electricity, on a nightly basis.

It's good to have faith in these dark times.

Power on, Water off

My new guests are from Vienna. I collected them from the train station, in the pouring rain, yesterday evening. They had set out at 4am and flown to Paris before getting the train to Carcassonne - so they were a bit tired and a bit hungry when they got here.

They seem like a very sweet couple. She works for a magazine called Weinerin, which translates as Viennese woman, and is writing an article about Carcassonne for the magazine, which we will hopefully be featured in as the place to stay when in town. He is an architect. The company he works for does a lot of work designing prisons - well somebody has to, I guess - and he was told by his colleagues that the prison here in Carcassonne is very highly regarded by those in the prison design business and that he might take a look out of interest. Let's just hope he doesn't get locked up for acting a bit suspiciously outside a prison - I can just hear him saying "Honestly, officer, these photographs are just for my work" as he is bundled into the back of a car by a couple of burly 'gendarmes'.

We have managed to avoid the electricity going off today - I'm still not sure if we need another increase in the power rating or there is a fault in the system somewhere - there appears to be no logic to when the power trips off. So power OK but when we got back from lunch the water was off! The workmen arrived early this morning and started digging up the road just up the hill from 42rvh - it looked like they were putting in a new water pipe to number 43. Just after midday it was clear that not all was well as litres of water were running down the street and a man was poking a stick into a flooded hole - someone had obviously drilled through the main (perhaps the bloke with the stick) and everyone else had made themselves scarce either because they didn't want to be associated with it or because it was lunch time and even though it was an emergency it could wait until 2pm - that's the price you have to pay for civilisation.

Fortunately, we went out for lunch today so didn't need the water and our guests were also out by then and didn't even realise it had been off. We went for lunch with Denis and his lady friend, Grainne, fresh off the flight from Dublin - I'm not sure she appreciated being whisked off straight from the airport in her travel clothes and without warning!

We had been meaning to try Domaine Gayda for a while and finally got round to doing so today. It is out in the countryside towards Limoux - a big wine estate run by one of the major players in the local wine trade, a modern building housing a restaurant, a wine shop and the vats, which are open to view as you climb the stairs to the restaurant - all very clean and comfortable and a lovely place for a spot of lunch, even when the weather is a bit foul as it was today. The big log fire and friendly ambience made it very welcoming.

Small world that it is, the maitre'd turned out to have worked in Ireland for quite a while and knew a lot of the places that Denis and Grainne knew well. He was also very interested in our apartments here in town - Debrah showed him some of her fabulous photos on the wonder that is her i-phone and he took some cards off me and we took some brochures off him. Hopefully we can push some business in both directions. Lunch and networking equals time well spent.

We would have stayed a bit longer and visited the wine shop, but I had an appointment with Amelie for my next French lesson, so we had to head back to Carcassonne. On the way back, Amelie called to say she was ill and couldn't make it - my French might suffer as a result but my credit card was spared the shop which at the moment is a good thing.

This evening, we helped our Austrian friends find a restaurant and then settled down on the sofa to watch a very soporific football match between England and France. I hope the state visit to Britain of President Sarkozy has a bit more meaning and passion about it than this evening's tame affair - I'm not sure it will - I understand he's been told to get in line and act with more decorum as the office of President demands. Act in a reserved manner and don't show your emotions - hmmm, how very British that sounds!

A free afternoon and evening

Our weekend guests left today - one by taxi to Toulouse and then Madrid and then New York, the others as planned back to London Stansted. I think it is fair to say they are the first guests that we haven't really connected with - they seemed very happy with everything and left a complimentary word or two in our visitors book and we shared a entertaining dinner together last night - but there was something not quite there, for them and us, I think.

All of which is normal, of course - we are providing a service to them and they are paying guests - not everyone who visits here is going to become a best friend and this is all part of our learning process as we get this business going.

After they had gone, I did a rapid clear out of the Apartment, put the washing machine and dishwasher on and then relaxed in the knowledge that I had 24 hours before the next guests arrive. I still have to clean and remake the Apartment before tomorrow afternoon but it can wait until the morning.

With our sudden freedom from service, Debrah and I decided to get some fresh air and went out for a drive into the bleak blustery, snow-capped, wet countryside - what a rubbish Easter it has been from a weather point of view. We did get to see our, by now, expected and obligatory, bird of prey viewing. I stopped the car next to a field out near Laure-Minervois and we watched some sort of hawk, I think, completely static in mid-air intently watching the ground, controlling it's position with consummate skill by either flapping it's wings vigorously or by just gliding on the spot. It was a very windy day which made it all the more impressive and compulsive to watch. Who would have thought that we would have become obsessed with the birds of prey in the region.

We have two TV's and DVD players here - but they are in the two suites for the benefit of the guests, and when both suites are full we are too busy to think about the fact that we can't use them - we can always watch something on our computers anyway. With no guests here this evening, we took the opportunity to settle onto the Studio sofa and watch a couple of films on our new big telly. I can't remember the last time I watched two movies back to back, but from now on I shall look forward to and appreciate the 'no guest' evenings all the more.

Bizarre goings on

This weekend's guests haven't had the best of Languedoc weather - cold, wind, rain and even a hint of snow today. At least they had the dvd player to fall back on, and interestingly chose a couple of quite bloodthirsty epics to settle down with over the last couple of days. Gentle questioning this evening revealed that the raw courage of the Spartans in '300' was more appreciated than the Old Norse animation of 'Beowulf'. Maybe it was wandering around the medieval Cite that made them hanker for the good old days of spears and swords and general slaughter using hand crafted metal weapons in close order combat.

We served them dinner this evening - a lovely piece of slow cooked roast lamb, it is Easter Day after all, asparagus to start and cheese and chocolate pudding, naturally, to follow. I think I am going to have to be careful - all this cooking and eating with guests, combined with the end of the renovation work and manual labour, could have a big impact on my waistline I need to get my bicycle out more often - maybe when it's less cold and windy though.

Last night I went out for a drink with Denis, who has a flat upstairs from me, and his daughter and niece, who are over for the weekend, and Gary. Due to some misinformation we all met in the wrong bar to listen to the live Irish band - the reason for going out - and by the time we got to the right bar, it was all over. Well, the band was over, but the bar was absolutely rocking with a lot of very very short women.!! I'm not sure that I understand why the average French woman is quite so vertically challenged, when the average height of people all over Europe is going up. Last night I felt like I was a giant, which didn't stop one middle aged woman grabbing me round the neck and suggesting something, fortunately incomprehensible, in my ear, much to the amusement of the Irish contingent. I don't know what she wanted but I have a pretty good idea, so made myself scarce with the smokers outside so as to remove myself from her temptation.

When I told Debrah about it she was mildly amused by the whole thing on the surface but clearly slightly piqued at the cheek of the French woman approaching somebody else's husband. "If you see her, can you point her out to me", was the slightly sinister offhand remark that gave Debrah's true feelings away - and I don't blame her - I would feel the same if the tables were turned.

The only other event of note was Denis and Gary doing a impromptu version of 'riverdance' in the street outside the bar. I don't know why it happened or what triggered it, but it was very funny and ever so surreal.

Car fun

My fabulous Audi cabriolet has been playing up for a while now. It has an electrical problem that causes the battery to run down and I have noticed that it has been getting worse recently, lasting just two days after I have charged it up. Finally, this week it seems to have given up altogether - the battery won't charge any more and so I couldn't start the car.

This was a bit of an issue as I had guests here that needing dropping off at the airport and a wife due to arrive on the same flight. As luck would have it, my good friend Denis, who owns an appartment on the second floor of the building, had arrived from Ireland the day before. His car sits outside next to mine while he's not here and he generously suggested that I use his car to do the airport run. What a lovely man.

Only trouble was, my car was blocking the exit through the archway and had to be moved out of the way. So it was that my neighbour and paying guest were putting their backs into pushing a very heavy Audi with no power steering as I frantically hauled on the steering wheel trying to manouevre enough space to get the other car past.

There is even less room in the back of a Peugeot 306 coupe than there is in an Audi cabriolet, so one of my guests had to sit squashed up and a bit sideways in the back for the short drive up to the airport, poor thing. Having dropped them off, I shot round to the battery shop and got a replacement for the Audi and then went back to collect Debrah from the airport - who was somewhat surprised by the change in transportation.

The problems didn't stop there though. We still needed a number of things for the suites, and with new guests arriving the next day for both suites we could no longer get away with moving stuff from one to the other.

One requirement was another television - we duly bought quite a large screen version that was on offer and then realised that it wouldn't go in the car without the roof down. It was then that we discovered that there seemed to be a fault with the roof mechanism on Denis' car - it wouldn't work. We tried every which way to get the box in the car, but in the end we were forced to concede defeat and had to take the TV out of it's packing in the middle of the Leclerc car park and put the TV, the polystyrene and the cardboard box into the car separately. What a palaver!

Expectation

We have had such a run of bookings that I feel slightly disappointed that I haven't taken a booking today. My expectations have been built by the volume of enquiries and some of the very short timescale bookings that have happened over the last week. I don't want to appear greedy, but we've still got some dates in April and May to fill - where are you? - come on, it's fabulous here.

That's what the first few comments in our visitors book say and who am I to argue with a paying guest. Everyone has been very kind with their comments and I aim to keep it that way. My chocolate fondant pudding seems to have come in for particular praise and, according to Debrah, is set to become a bit of an institution at this establishment, which is rather exciting. The spare leftover pudding which has gone a bit fudge-like when it is cold seems to be a real hit when produced on a breakfast tray the morning after.

My current guests have eaten so well over the last couple of days that they decided to take the bikes out for a gentle cycle alongside the Canal du Midi this afternoon - it was, after all, a glorious Spring day of azure blue skies and, with the first signs of new growth on the trees, it must have been extremely beautiful along the towpath - it is at any time of the year. It's so easy just to keep pedaling, forgetting that every metre in one direction has to be done in the opposite direction, into the wind, on the way back - I think they will sleep well tonight, and be doubly determined to go to the gym when they get home, for a couple of weeks at least (judging by my success with post holiday good intentions)

I wish I had been able to get out of the apartment more this week, myself - the weather has been good and I have been feeling a bit frustrated trying to sort some problems. The supplier of our toiletries was supposed to deliver on Monday but phoned to say the address must be wrong because there wasn't a hotel there - well, actually it was the suppliers delivery company who messed up by assuming they were looking for a hotel rather than private apartments. So I have had to stay in, in case they turned up, whilst chasing the German supplier and the French delivery company for a re-delivery date (which was eventually confirmed earlier today as being tomorrow - so I will have to stay in tomorrow as well.

I can't stay in all day though, because I need to take my guests to the airport and collect Debrah off the same flight - hurrah - I have missed her since Saturday and am really looking forward to spending some time with her in France, if only those guests will give us some peace.

Statistics

One of the features of my new computer is it's built in webcam, which means when I speak to Debrah of an evening on the wonder that is Skype, she gets to watch me. As Debrahs machine isn't as new she doesn't have the same techno bits and bobs - meaning I still look at her lovely smiley picture rather than seeing her sat in bed on the phone to me. Well, lucky her, getting to see my big nose and shiny forehead in the rather unflattering picture that the webcam generates.

The downside (for me) is that she can see every gulp of red wine taken and is no doubt compiling a gulp-per-minute analysis and chart to be used in evidence against me at some future date. I can just see the little lines being added up on a pad next to her with a satisfying diagonal one through the others every time I reach my fifth gulp. Actually, I'll probably be saved the chart as Debrah isn't at all statistically-minded, but it won't save me from the conclusions!

My guests managed to imbibe a fair bit last night. They went for the canapes and cocktails plus their dinner option all in the same first evening here - and being on holiday any normal reservations disappeared. So we went from fizz to white and then red and then dessert and back to red. "I think I drank a bit too much last night", he muttered this morning as I cheerily handed them their breakfast tray. 'You're on holiday', I thought - don't worry about it.

They are a nice couple - getting married soon - aahhh. They only enquired last Friday and here they are. I am still amazed at how well it all seems to be going. I have taken 8 bookings in the last week and the majority are still within the next two months - most of the summer period is still available and if that gets full too then it will all have been far more successful than I could have hoped - but I don't want to get ahead of myself, so let's put those feet firmly back on the ground.

Mind you, I had my first direct enquiry from the USA today so we have now gone intercontinental in our reach, which is just brilliant. An inspection of the stats on my web counter revealed that the enquiry came from Dallas, Texas - now that is a bit big brotherish, isn't it. You see, sadly, I am indeed quite happy to compile charts of statistics!

Guests

When the announcement came over the tannoy I started to worry a little bit. It was Saturday morning and I had guests arriving that evening - I had been in London for a week and their suite wasn't yet ready for them. The announcement informed the waiting passengers that the inbound plane for our flight was due to land at the time it was due to take off - an impossibility without the aid of time transport. We were going to be late.

My guests were clients of Lesa and would be spending the day looking at property in the region - I hoped they might take longer than expected to give me some extra time to get things ready for them and get down to the shops for some provisions. As it turned out that is exactly what happened and by late afternoon, after a mad dash around town and a rapid cleaning/bed making hustle, I was able to breathe a sigh of relief.

Very impressively, he managed to reverse his Mercedes Coupe straight through the archway with no hesitation - they had been in the car all day and he probably just wanted to park up and get out. This was to be our first family staying here - our suites are really designed for couples so this meant some furniture moving and re-arranging to fit an extra bed into the Studio. We wouldn't normally accept reservations from families but the the weekend was free and it was a favour for Lesa, who has been unrelenting in her promotion of our suites.

What has been really interesting for me so far is the real diversity of our guests, their backgrounds and why they are here with us in Carcassonne. I guess I expected a lot of the same sort of, perhaps, London based people enjoying a carefree weekend break but that is probably a failing of my own imagination - why should it be so? Indeed the opposite seems to be the case, with a real diversity of people (albeit only a few so far) visiting and booking for the next few months. I am really looking forward to meeting them all.

This weekend's guests already live in France but are now looking for a change of place and pace. They have two young girls who are fast growing up and they think that the Charente will be a bit rural for them as they turn into teenagers - Carcassonne is hardly London or Paris, but the town and the region does have a lot to offer so I will be very interested to see if they make the move down here.

I have breakfast to do in the morning and new guests arriving tomorrow afternoon - so I better get myself off to bed. I'm very enjoying this whole new experience though.

Too much work, not enough money

So much to do and only one week in London to do it all. I always think that five full working days will be plenty of time but the hours just seem to disappear and the list of jobs gets longer rather than shorter as the week goes on.

If it was just work for my London job then I might get it all done, but even then that's not guaranteed - and we are going through another/ongoing difficult funding period and fees to Directors are the last thing to be paid which is causing financial difficulties just as we are trying to get the business in France off the ground.

I thought that I would be able to dovetail my two work lives, but the bookings are going so well that it looks increasingly difficult that I can continue to do both because it is going to be increasingly hard to get back to London as often as the business there will need. If I have to make a choice, it would have to be our own business not somebody else's. After all, this is our future.

As ever, there are also a number of other home administration/mundane jobs that need to be done which I don't want to leave Debrah to deal with when I am back in France. One such issue was that, somehow, we had been driving around for nearly a year without any car tax. I know what happened - we changed address, we didn't notify the DVLA and so we didn't get a reminder notice - an easy mistake but one that carries a potential £1,000 fine which was worrying Debrah somewhat. I called the DVLA and it is now all straightened out - a cheque for the back tax and a new tax disc from the Post Office for the next year - would you believe it though, I could only get to the Post Office on the day that the tax increased after the Budget - talk about rubbing salt into the wound.

A few firsts

Friday morning was spent closing up the apartments before my trip back to London for a week. It is always quite a sad event - closing up the shutters and turning off all the water heaters and other electrical items.

In fact one of the shutter support arms broke this week - in the very high winds that accompanied the sudden drop in temperature. The previous weekend I was in shirt sleeves and would have gone out for a drive on Sunday afternoon in the sunshine, if the car had started, and by Tuesday it was back down to freezing point, dumping a metre of snow on the mountains and the wind was howling. The wind resulted in our first bit of structural damage - a support arm on one the shutters in the end apartment clearly couldn't take the strain, was initially bent and finally snapped in two. It was a replacement arm and not one of the original really heavy metal ones - they obviously don't make them as well as they did.

It was a week of firsts. I had my first breakage by a guest - who managed to break the top off the lid of a china coffee pot. Fortunately, it was a clean break and after judicious use of some superglue you can't see the join. I found my first piece of left behind clothing by a guest - nothing embarrassing, just a polo shirt, which I bought back to the UK and will send on from here.
I also had my first journalist visit which went very well and hopefully will result in an article sometime in the press. I also had my first enquiry from a Norwegian, as a result of a new listing on a travel website that Debrah found.

I flew back to London on Friday - a slow journey at every stage - the flight took over two hours because of a very different route from usual - the train took over an hour and was certainly not an express and then North London traffic was all snarled up on a Friday evening, not helped by some idiot who had fired a gun at police up near Manor House - welcome back to the big city.

We had a quiet night in and were up early on Saturday (not with Debrah's approval) to visit Brent Cross shopping centre (sooo many people!) and then watched wall to wall English sport all afternoon (a luxury) before going out for dinner with friends (expensive - by Carcassonne, not London, standards). In fact it has been really lovely to be with Debrah and I am really enjoying being back here - so far - I have to go into the office tomorrow, though.

I visited the Apple store whilst in Brent Cross. My old laptop is three years old and displaying all the characteristics of shutting down permanently any day now - battery doesn't charge any more, CD stuck in the drive etc etc - but it has done sterling work back and forth on a plane every other week for three years. So I bought a new base level MacBook which I can't really afford, but then I can't afford to be without a computer either when I am running a business and managing another business via the internet. Whilst I was buying my new computer, Debrah was wandering about the store calmly bringing up our website on every computer - I believe that is our first bit of underground viral marketing.

It has been a pretty good weekend for the Apartments too, even though I am not there - I have taken four bookings over the last two days, one of which is for the two nights immediately after I return to France on Saturday next - it will be straight back into it when I get back.

Nothing's free

A journalist from the Evening Standard stayed here last night - our first freeloading journo visit. Am I being unkind with that comment? - probably yes and no. Yes, because why should a journalist doing research for an article get everything laid on for free and No, because if we get a mention in her article and get some bookings as a result it was worth it. Both arguments are ethically wrong - everyone staying here in our apartments should pay for their stay and we should not expect major promotion in return for providing a paid for service. As soon as it becomes a 'favour' then an element of 'trust' comes into the equation and that is where it all usually falls down.

I am casting no aspersions on my guest last night - just on the whole system. My guest last night was perfectly affable and lovely and we chatted away over dinner about why and how Debrah and I and had come to live in the Languedoc and start up a completely new business venture that neither of us had any prior experience of, and the difficulties of letting go of London and how much chance and circumstance was involved in the whole thing.

So if we get a mention in the article that she is writing about property in the Languedoc, then that will be great and if she gets her editor to approve an article about design or lifestyle about the apartments or us then even better.

If none of that happens then that's just life or 'C'est la vie' as they say round here and I'd like to say 'woe betide the next journalist that wants a free night' but actually they will be welcomed on the same basis of trust and hope of more publicity. I am so torn between the futility of the media/celebrity age and wanting to become the next best most desirable location in France, which is what we are (editors please note)

In the meantime, after my guest had departed, I set about putting my supposed newly enhanced language skills to the test in sorting out a few housekeeping/admin problems.

At the 'Tresor Public' I asked why the standing order that I thought I had set up last year to pay the 'taxe d'habitation' had not not resulted in me paying said tax and thus receiving a bill for tax in arrears plus 10% for late payment. 'Ne marche pas', was about as good as my understanding got - well obviously it didn't march or it would be paid by now. They generously knocked off the 10% surcharge and I handed over a cheque for last year and they assured me that this year is now set up for a monthly payment - we shall see.

At France Telecom, or Orange, as it now seems to be, I queried my internet charges because I thought I was being charged twice for the same thing, but it appears not - the standard charge is just split in two with different rates of TVA (VAT in English - just swap the letters around) being charged on different bits. I shrugged my shoulders and said 'desolee', I don't speak French very well and he shrugged his shoulders and said 'desolee' I can't save you any money.

At EPI, the managing agents for the property, I asked for the accounts for the the current year, nearly over, and the previous year, which I didn't receive. We (some of my neighbours and I) have a plan to fire the managing agents and set up our own 'syndic' and I think we have the voting power to do it between me (the English overlord who owns 50% of the building), Brigitte (the Parisienne outsider and divorcee in the second largest apartment ) and Denis (the charming Irishman). I bet you never thought you'd hear of an Englishman, a Frenchwoman and an Irishman in league together, but that's the case in our bid to reduce the costs which we all consider to be far to high for the service provided.

As ever with a trip into French adminland I ended up paying out lots of money and being slightly confused and none the wiser about what happens next - which just about sums up the municipal elections which seem to have been going on for an age but which come to a head during the next week whilst I will be in London.

I'm not looking forward to London.

I am so looking forward to seeing Debrah and that is all that matters.

Better late than never

I was aware during the night that the wind had picked up a bit - as in it was blowing a gale. I went out quite early to pick up some provisions for dinner and noticed immediately that it was about ten degrees colder than yesterday and another ten degrees colder if you stood in the wind. A car went past covered in snow - clearly it had been cold up in the hills. I ran around town and scooted back home as quick as I could.

On my way back in I checked my post box. It has become a habit of mine to open my post box, situated in the archway underneath the apartments, every time I pass it even though it is usually empty or just full of the local advertising papers, special offers (pork bargains) or local mayoral election manifestos. But today was special because today I received a Christmas card.!

Debrah and I stopped sending Christmas cards on ethical grounds many many years ago and slowly we have stopped receiving them as well, either because other people have taken a similar stance in response to ours or because they have adopted the 'I'm not sending them one if they don't send us one' approach. Either way it means we don't receive many Christmas cards. So it was with great joy and pleasure that I opened our third, and hopefully last, card relating to last Christmas.

It was from Debrah's mum and was correctly addressed and had a stamp on it and everything - so God knows where it has been for the last two months or so - following yonder star no doubt. It had an air mail sticker on it but I could have walked from Kent and still got here quicker. Oh well, in the name of diplomacy and the good old entente cordiale, let's just put it down to the fact that the postal systems in England and France could both be a bit more efficient, without laying blame anywhere.

As ever, from my mother-in-law, the card is very amusing but slightly mad.

Speaking French

I have been having French lessons in a bid to finally try and raise my game here in every day communication. It caused a bit of a stir with Debrah when she saw the names Amelie and Ann dotted all over my diary - but they just happen to be the names of my French teachers. Next month I will try and meet some local girls whose names begin with the letter B !.

Amelie is a qualified teacher and I am paying her for proper lessons. She is very good and is very structured in her teaching. Somehow she speaks in a way that I can understand, and if I can't, she instinctively knows and rephrases what she has said. She is very clear and very precise and very patient and when I am with her I feel as if I can speak French. She has explained the difficult differences in the usage of 'tu' and vous' and also when to use 'savoir' and when to use 'connaitre' and has tested me on the past tense and future tense and tells me that I know it but just need to practice it. 'C'est tres facile pour elle de dire'.

Ann is a friend with whom I have a timeshare agreement - that is to say, we spend half an hour just talking in French and she corrects and helps me and half an hour talking in English and I correct and help her. This has been a less than successful arrangement so far because every time I arrange to meet her something comes up to do with the Apartments or my London job to cut short our arrangement. I suspect she will fire me soon for non-performance, especially as I am going back to London at the end of this week for eight days so won't be able to help her with her English for a while. I hope not, because although she is a little serious, she is a good counterpoint to Amelie's approach because it is less formal and more everyday.

If only it were that easy! Oh No - I live in a region that has a very strong local accent. In fact, this part of France has only really spoken French, as we know it in England, for the past 150 years - prior to that the whole of the south of France spoke Occitan, which is nearer to Catalan than it is to French. In fact French was the language of Northern France, the Capucins, William the Conqueror, Charlemagne etc and has only recently been spoken here in the south and is still regarded with some suspicion in many quarters.

So, when the Parisian born chef was here this past weekend, he told me, that on at least two occasions, he had been blatantly ignored to the point of profound rudeness by local traders who immediately recognised him as being Parisian because of his accent - despite him having lived in London for fifteen years. He went into a shop and asked for something, in fluent French, and they ignored him for five minutes before getting round to begrudgingly serving him. Whatever happened 1000 years ago with the Cathars and despite the fact that tax laws are made in Paris, the centre of government and, therefore, hostility - that is still rude behaviour to the extreme.

My upstairs neighbour - Brigitte (you see I already know a 'B') - is also originally from Paris and admits that she was unable to understand the local accent when she first arrived here.

Apparently, it is the same as only ever having heard the Queen's English and suddenly finding yourself in Newcastle or Liverpool. Alors! What chance do I have of being able to speak fluent French, when my own inability, the local dialect, the local prejudice and my own friends are conspiring against me. This evening my friend Pierre called, incognito, asking in very rapid French if I had availability for 3 weeks in July. I was taken in absolutely and failed the test completely - I just floundered - so much for my improved language skills.

Cooking for a Chef

We are up and running. Paying guests have been and gone. I hadn't really realised how nervous I have been about the whole thing. I have been so concerned about getting everything right and making sure that nothing was overlooked or forgotten that I have found it impossible to sit down and write the blog. But tonight I am in a state of rare contentment and happiness, so here I am.

On Sunday morning I was about as nervous as I can ever remember because on Sunday evening I was cooking the included dinner in my guests weekend package. Debrah had been unable to get out this weekend and was in London and one of our guests was a top London restaurant chef - the real deal, classically trained and 15 years experience in Michelin starred restaurants. Oh my God - talk about a test of my home developed cooking skills.

Every possible scenario was constantly going through my head. I doubted my own ability - I knew I'd cooked the dinner plenty of times but decided today was the day it would go wrong. I decided that he might just be non-comital and nice and polite about it but then I reasoned he was French and born in Paris and was more likely to say "I cannot eet zis sheet".

The situation was made more nerve-wracking by the events of Saturday. He said he was going to the market to buy food to cook for his girlfriend that evening. Now the Apartment has a mini-kitchen with a small fridge and two electric hobs but I had never envisaged real cooking taking place there - so I offered him the use of my kitchen and in return he invited me to dinner! This was both an unexpected bonus and a rod for my own back. On the one hand, a paying guest had bought food and wine and was cooking for me in my own home and he was a classically trained chef whom I could watch and ask questions of and be his assistant for the evening. I watched the effortless ease with which he dealt with filleting red mullet and trimming up lamb chops and artichokes. On the other hand, I had to follow this display the next day.

I am glad to say that my kitchen lacked for nothing that he needed. He had even asked for an oyster knife earlier in the day because he had bought oysters for lunch. It seemed to me that they were having an enjoyable stay, which was naturally really pleasing - they seemed relaxed and happy and in love - all of which augured well.

And indeed we had a great Saturday evening, eating his beautifully prepared and presented food and drinking nice wine and chatting about all things good and life in general. When Debrah found out, she was absolutely gutted that she wasn't here this weekend - she so hates missing out on anything and this was missing out big time. He gave us scallops and red mullet and boudin noir to start and lamb chops and brochettes of lambs liver and sweetbreads on a bed of spinach and asparagus for main and a glazed pear with a pistachio and coriander creme fraiche dressing for dessert. It was all delicious, but to be honest, I didn't think the dessert worked as a dish - who the hell do I think I am!

On Sunday, they went out to explore La Cite and I fretted. I tried to take my mind off things by going out for a drive but the car threw a wobbly too and wouldn't start, so I went out on my bike which just made me hot, sweaty and tired. Bolton lost at home to Liverpool which pissed me off and two hours before I needed to, I was prepped and ready to go and couldn't wait to get on with it.

In the end it all went very well but I didn't really relax all evening which meant I probably drank a glass of wine or two too many. Two things stood out - the words 'beautifully cooked' about the asparagus starter and the fact that he finished his chocolate pudding in record time - and this a man who apparently doesn't eat dessert apart from his search for the prefect lemon tart. In between it all he gave me a tip about pulling the lower bone out of a leg of duck confit, and some hints on cooking the potatoes or even a suggestion that it would go really well with lentils - all of which at the time I took as being unhappiness with my food but on reflection, and in view of his comments today, was I think him trying to help me because he had had a good time. Hurrah - what a relief - let the paranoia go!

Most importantly of all, they seemed to have had a really enjoyable stay and will, I think, go back to London as ambassadors for our little place here. Apparently she shed a few tears this morning because she didn't want to go home and he gave me a classic french handshake, hug and kiss on both cheeks when he said goodbye after I dropped them at the airport.

Despite feeling under pressure, which probably isn't a bad thing, the whole weekend couldn't have gone much better - the conviviality was something that we always had in our minds to create because ultimately that's what makes weekends away memorable. Here's hoping it continues in the same vein.