Drama

With no guests in the studio suite we are taking full advantage of the big TV and we are loving a mini-series.

When Debrah was last here we sat through the first ten episodes of the Tudors and we bought the second series in HMV at Stansted on the way out here last Sunday - and have already sat through the next ten episodes - all the way up to the separation of Anne Boleyn's head from her body.

I do miss a good BBC historical costume drama out here in France and I have to say that I much prefer to watch a series straight through in one go (or over three days) than have to make sure I am at home at the same hour on the same day over a ten week period if I was watching it in the UK on the telly.

Where is series three? What are we going to watch tomorrow?

I suppose we are going to have to work our way through the five film box set of Audrey Hepburn movies that was reduced by 75% at the airport - not quite the same level of blood, guts, sex and religious zeal though, I suspect.

Just in case you get the wrong idea, it is not all lounging about on the sofa with remote control in hand - oh no, I have been busy with odd jobs here and there that have needed doing for some time. The repair work to the damaged wall in the apartment en-suite bathroom was finally finished today with a last sanding and a paint touch-up and the tile cutter made an unexpected appearance from it's basement home as I finally got around to finishing the step in our spare bedroom.

That job will take a few days to complete but the tiles have been cut to size and are ready to go. This is one of those jobs that has been waiting for over a year to be finished, not because I didn't want to do it but because it was never top of the list of jobs to be done.

It will be good to finally finish it, but I suspect there will be some heartache along the way before then - even today it nearly all went wrong - I needed three tiles for the job and we had four spare tiles left over from the renovation works and I messed up on one of the tile cuts - I might have panicked or lost my temper in the past but not any more because these jobs now hold no fear for me - I know I can I do it.

Surprisingly, it wasn't the work that I shunned to watch Henry VIII. It was the Champions League football that is now available for viewing in the newly opened 'Celt' Irish bar. Patrick has finally finished the build and the bar is open, although typically I missed the opening night party last week whilst I was in London.

After Anne's head fell off I popped down there for an hour to say hello to Gary on the door and Susan behind the bar and to Patrick and to wish them all well - it was great to see a good crowd in there - even Jean-Jacques, one of the waiters from Bar Felix, seems to have already become a regular which is a good sign - if the French locals adopt the bar it is bound to succeed.

The old Irish bar, O'Sheridans, has also re-opened under it's new management - when I walked past this evening there were only three people inside and the place looked very dead - let's hope it stays that way.

I didn't stay long and I'm glad that I didn't - if I had I would have missed the big argument between Brigitte and the young tenant who lives above our living room. It sounded as if they were shouting down the corridor at each other and then Brigitte rang the doorbell - she was visibly upset.

It transpires that said tenant has been keeping her awake at night with music and loud friends in his room. He also continues to bring his motorbike into the building when he has been expressly asked not to do so because of damage to the fabulous stone on the ground floor. It is a problem that needs to be dealt with as soon as possible - if my French was better I would speak with him directly and I may well have to do so at some point, but in the meantime we have a meeting of the co-proprietors scheduled for next week and we will try to find an amicable solution - hopefully one that involves him moving out!!

The last thing we need is for this develop into our own real life mini-drama.

Painful to behold

Debrah has gone back to London today and I am following her tomorrow - it has been a traumatic weekend with hospital visits and tears and tooth pain and it needs to be resolved immediately.

It would have been much better if I had been able to go back with Debrah today but there were good reasons for not doing so - a check-in at Maison Juliette that I promised to do, and at short notice, it would have been difficult to find someone else to do it, and a conversation I needed to have with Brigitte about plans for 42rvh. I will find someone else for the check-out and will take Debrah straight to the dental clinic tomorrow evening when I get back to London.

The weekend had started well - we were enjoying some bonus time together after the midweek missed flight and now desperately need to get hold of the second season of the Tudors.

On Friday lunchtime we visited a chic new lunchspot in town - an extension of the excellent delicatessen, La Ferme. It had a fabulous wine tasting/dispensing machine which every home should have and an excellent policy of selling all the wines from the shop at retail price plus €10 which is significantly less than a restaurant mark-up. The food however was a bit pricey, though delicious. It was full last Friday but then they had only just opened the day before - it will be interesting to see how it does and is certainly somewhere to send guests.

Naturally on Saturday we took in the market in the morning and even though we didn't need very much it is always such a pleasure in Autumn sunshine, a welcome relief after the rain all week. There was also a new event in town this weekend - the 'Festival des Saveurs', featuring food and drink artisans from all over the region, cookery demonstrations from the top chefs in town and of course, plenty to sample and taste and indeed buy.

Later that day, we had a visit from a representative of a travel website that would really like to list us - it seems interesting and would open up a new market for us as the site is centred on Spain and has very much a Mediterranean clientele.

It was after this visit that all hell broke loose and Debrah's tooth pain finally got beyond her pain threshold, although there had been signs earlier. It was a combination of finishing the course of antibiotics and no doubt the abcess just getting worse. An evening visit to the emergency unit at the Polyclinique Montreal, the local hospital, was the only way to try and get something a bit stronger to help Debrah sleep and get through the pain until she and I get to London to deal with it.

They were very helpful at the hospital but, because there was no dentist on duty, they wouldn't prescribe any more antibiotics. We could have gone back today but two hospital visits in two days would probably have tipped Debrah over the edge and I needed to get her back to the UK as calmly as possible.

This might all sound a bit extreme but phobias are not easy to understand because they are so unique to the individual - and we all have them, even if we don't admit it or don't yet know it!

All in all, the whole weekend was a bit stressful and very tiring - and I'm not the one with toothache, so I can't begin to think how Debrah feels - hopefully tomorrow we start the process of resolving the whole painful mess.