Cot in two minds

It took some time to register, but I finally realised that it was my alarm and that it was time to get up and sort breakfasts - it felt as if I'd only gone to bed five minutes earlier.

My plans for a little afternoon nap to boost my energy levels came to nothing as well - just too much to do - so it will be an early night.

Lance and Ellie left this morning. When he asked me to find out how to get to Paris, I initially thought that they were going to stay a couple more days and go to Paris as planned at the weekend - alas for me, they just decided to go to Paris immediately and bin the rest of their tour up the west coast of France - oh well - I'm not complaining because they were good company, brought me a lovely bottle of wine, have promised to send me a bottle of the Absinthe they make back in California, wrote some lovely words in our visitors book and also promised to do the same on tripadvisor - I really couldn't ask for more.

I finally got the car going again - I had to walk up to the motor spares shop on Allee d'Iena for a new fuse for the charger and then wait for a couple of hours for the battery to charge. I was mobile again by mid-afternoon.

After a trip to the supermarket for essential supplies, I ventured into 'New Baby' and 'Baby 9' out of town stores to look for a cot. It must be 18 years since I was in a baby store - so it was all slightly wierd. The strange thing is that nothing seems to have changed - everything still looked the same (blue and pink!), except for the odd French design element.

Being a bit tired and a little bit overpowered by the shop assistants very fast explanations about the key differences of the different cots on offer, I failed to make any sort of decision and, am ashamed to say, I will need to go back again tomorrow with Debrah to come to a purchase conclusion. Meanwhile, I am assured that Pippa is very happy in her nest on the mezzanine of the studio. Bless.

It's all relative

What was to be a fairly relaxed but busyish day, working through various administrative and domestic chores before cooking dinner for my American guests, turned out to be slightly rushed and a bit fraught because of welcome but unexpected guests and a car that wouldn't start.

The text and phonecall with my new Australian guests this morning really concentrated the mind - their room wasn't ready and they had a six month old baby with them.

All year we have been meaning to get a cot of some sort - and strangely enough this coming weekend we have a couple booked who are bringing their infant child and so the purchase of a cot had become an imminent occurence before today's events.

So having said to Denis this morning that he didn't need to move his car, I now needed him to do just that - not to worry, I thought, I'll go to the market first and get the provisions for dinner and then I'll sort the room out - and sure enough, by the time I had finished that, Denis had come back from lunch and moved his car.

I just had enough time to pop out before the new guests were likely to arrive - how wrong I was. I bought a new battery for the Audi at the beginning of the year and since then I haven't had a problem with getting the car going - until today - battery flat - car not going anywhere. To add insult to injury, when I hooked it up to the charger there was no response - so it seems that the charger might need a new fuse or it's broken.

There was a certain irony to all this - the only place to buy a new charger, or a fuse for a charger or a new battery or, indeed, a travel cot is in the industrial and commercial zones (out of town stores). To reach said destinations a car is the ideal mode of transport. You see my predicament.

Added to that was the worst day of weather for about four months - no wonder the Aussies had abandoned their cycling week and sought refuge here.

So with the mattress from the fold-up bed and some sheets and blankets we made a little snug for young Pippa who was as good as gold as the rest of us tucked into a four course dinner this evening.

The conversation was amusing and diverse and as ever with Americans and Australians we ended up discussing roots and ancestry - Anna was proud to be directly descended from one of the first convicts exported to Australia which put her on a par with a descendant of the first settlers who landed in America on the 'Mayflower' - according to Lance from California. In the end we all agreed that we all had some element of Irish ancestry, which was a bit sad to admit - the Irish can't have populated the whole world surely? - we even wondered if Barack O'Bama had any Irish blood.

Ellie was born in Swaziland from parents who worked for the UN and so is American by default, as she didn't see the place until she was five years old, but African by birth and has an African middle name - aren't people's lives fascinating?

If we go back far enough, I guess we are all related.