Back in the City

It has been an interesting couple of days getting my head around spending more time back in London - not just working out how I am going to run and manage the business in France but also getting used to life back in the capital again.

For the past year I have rarely spent more than a few days at a time here and so didn't really need to get that involved - the purpose of each of those trips was to see Debrah and help her with any everyday issues and admin as necessary.

But now that I know I am going to be here more often I have been looking at things differently - what do I like about London, what am I going to have to tolerate and what will just piss me off? Inevitably it is a mix of all three.

Yesterday, I had arranged to meet an old work colleague for lunch and a very good friend for a drink in the evening.

The first thing that struck me was how much I hated the train and tube journey into the West End. I have done it daily for 25 years and just accepted it as part of life - I tolerated it and was immune to it - it was a necessity. Now that I am used to just walking somewhere or jumping in the car and being there in five or ten minutes without any delays, I found that even standing on the platform waiting for the train a great irritation and the journey itself extremely dull - it all felt like wasted time.

Carl was ten minutes late, which is nothing, but had to leave 35 minutes later because of a 2.00pm meeting. That wasn't lunch. That was barely a catch-up and certainly not worth travelling into Central London for on it's own. I can tell I am going to miss the civilised two hours that everyone takes in France - two hours that actually gives you time to eat and relax and talk if you are meeting someone.

But then the day got better. I miss the big sprawling bookshops like Waterstones and Borders, so it was great to be able to spend an hour browsing - there are bookshops in France of course but all the books are in French - there is also Amazon, who are great, but it's just not the same as the tactile browsing of shelves.

Whilst heading south from Oxford Street, I dropped into Bentley's restaurant, ostensibly to make a reservation for Debrah and me for Saturday lunchtime, but after my non-lunch, the bar looked too inviting and I was a bit hungry. Ten minutes later I was discussing the relative merits of Maldon Rock v Bouzigues oysters and Muscadet v Picpoul de Pinet, sat in the comfortable surroundings of a top London bar, just me and the barman - I felt like a character in an old Hollywood movie. You don't get that level of sophistication outside of big cities and certainly not in Carcassonne and I couldn't have had that conversation either because the French dismiss anything non-French or even non-regional French as complete rubbish. I am very much looking forward to going back tomorrow with Debrah.

Debrah has been working with the National Gallery as a client for a while now and as a result of a corporate membership she has access to tickets for events - so it was that I was able to visit the fantastic Picasso exhibition in the Sainsbury Wing. It was wonderful. I then took a stroll through the rest of the gallery and marvelled at the fantastic collection of masterpieces, each instantly recognisable, that adorn the walls - all free and on the doorstep and taken for granted and ignored by most Londoners - I certainly did for all those years.

As I emerged onto Trafalgar Square, with Nelson's Column soaring up in front of me and Big Ben beyond at the end of Whitehall, I thought about what a fabulous city London is and how much it has to offer. I think my time away helps me to appreciate it so much more. I just need to work out how to make the most of the good and ignore the bad.

Time for a change

I'm back in London and, more importantly, with Debrah. We have much to sort out and it's just very difficult to do it when we are sat in different countries.

Debrah has been offered a fantastic opportunity with the design agency that she has been working with for the past couple of years - an opportunity that is too good to turn down - so naturally she hasn't.

However, it means that she will have much less flexibility and, therefore, will not be able to fly out to France every weekend. It was too much for her to continue doing so anyway - so this is a natural extension of a process of change that was already in motion.

If we are to see each other at all then I need to spend a lot more time in the UK which means that we need to completely change the way that we run the business in France - it will have to be a lot less hands-on from my side, so that is what we are now putting in place for the foreseeable future.

I have already arranged for local friends and contacts to manage the suites when I'm not there over the course of these two weeks - if anyone wants to come at short notice - so things are already moving along.

It had to change anyway. We have been frustrated in our attempts to expand the business and it doesn't generate enough for the two of us as it stands - so we need to look at it another way and this has helped focus us on how we are going to do that.

Loose wire

Last weekend the plug sockets above the kitchen worktop just suddenly stopped working. I was making breakfast for the guests at the time and had just boiled some water in the kettle - no problem - and then turned the toaster on and there was no power. Very odd.

I finished the breakfasts by moving the toaster and kettle and juicer to other sockets, which was incredibly inconvenient, and then took the coverplates off the sockets to see if I could find the problem. It was a loose connection - or so I thought. I re-connected, put everything back together and it worked again. I was relieved that it hadn't been a bigger issue but concerned that it should happen at all.

Some of the original bits of wiring that we had done when we first started the renovation were put in by a French based English electrician. Three years on from that and it's clear that she wasn't very good - there have been nothing but problems with the electrics that she installed - from sockets not working to reversed / mixed up phases on the fusebox. Loose connections in old wood/lathe walls are not good news because they are a major fire risk.

So imagine my surprise and my despair when, yesterday morning as I was preparing a client breakfast, the same circuit stopped working again. It was indeed deja-vu - I had just boiled the kettle and then when I turned on the toaster - nothing - spooky.

I spent at least two hours yesterday trying to work out why it wasn't working - two hours when I didn't get to do the jobs that were planned - and then another hour today, before finally I had to resort to calling Chris and asking him to come and help me.

We eventually traced the problem - and that took another hour - and it wasn't good news. We had discovered that there was power coming from the fusebox but there was no power at the socket - there had to be a connector somewhere in-between. When we finally traced it to a junction box up near the ceiling of the utility room, we found a burnt out/melted connector that can only have been caused by a loose connection.

Once we cut it out and replaced it the circuit was restored, but the big concern was the danger that it posed and whether there are any other loose fittings lurking in the network of cables fitted by that useless electrician. The only solution is to go through each and every circuit and check every connection - which is going to be very tedious - but rather that than risk a fire.

On a very different and very sad note, I have to report that the one and only remaining cutting from last years geraniums has passed away. I did everything I knew to keep it going and in fact it had become a bit of a symbolic undertaking - I hope it isn't a bad omen that it's gone.

Not together

I took a couple of one night bookings last weekend. I don't usually do one night stays because it's just too much work for one person but in these straightened times you can't be choosy and I was here anyway with other clients - so these bookings just filled in the gaps.

There were a couple of firsts for 42rvh over the weekend. The group of Aussies that came on Sunday had three babies with them and then one of them managed to take the room key away with her when they left - so that will have to be posted back to me. Good job I have spares. As for the babies, they were no trouble at all.

Meanwhile, Debrah has a new commission to design a wedding for one of Anna's clients up at the chateau - so flew into Bergerac to spend the weekend with Anna working on the brief and I took the opportunity of no clients for two days to drive up and meet her at the airport and spend the night at the chateau with her - we haven't seen each other for two weeks and as ever that is two weeks too long.

Sadly, I could only stay one night because I have new clients arriving early tomorrow and the room still needed prepping - so I am now back in Carcassonne after my mad dash up and back in the most filthy driving conditions imaginable on both legs of the journey - pouring rain and near zero visibility at times - not helped by one of my windscreen wipers deciding this was a good time to start falling apart.

Actually it wasn't a great get-together because the big issue in our lives - namely spending too much time in different countries - is causing us both problems and we are taking it out on each other - which is just stupid but sometimes you can't help yourself and it just happens.

Thank heavens we will both be in London from the start of next week and we can spend some much needed time together.

Rugby weekend

The Celt was packed from end to end on both Friday night and last night for two very intense games of rugby being shown on the big screen.

On Friday we had France v Wales. The Irish in the bar were very much torn in their loyalties - being fellow Celts they were drawn towards supporting Wales but a French victory would be better for Ireland's chances in the tournament. There appeared to be no Welsh supporters but there was a large and raucous contingent of locals here in the heartland of French rugby.

Me. I was born within 100 yards of the Welsh border, just outside Chester (they were still yards, not metres, when I was born)- but crucially on the English side. I also lived in South Wales for a year or so as a 7 year old kid and learnt the Welsh National Anthem at school. Despite the Welsh being the best team by a mile back then, I was born in England and was always an England supporter - so naturally, on Friday night I was very much on the side of the home French fans.

I'm not anti-Welsh - it's just that a French victory was better for England's chances - and after all it is my adopted second home. It was close, but the French did their part of the equation by sneaking a win.

Now I thought there were more English people down here in the Languedoc, but it turns out that there a lot of British people, who are mostly Scottish, Welsh or Irish and not one of them, nor any self-respecting Frenchman, was going to support England for whatever historical reason.

So it was that there were four England fans and about 150 Irish / Irish sympathisers / anti-English fans to watch the Ireland v England game on Saturday evening. At least the Southern Hemisphere contingent, Chris and Lesa, sat on the fence.

A narrow defeat for the boys in white meant that most of the bar went home happy - and Patrick and Susan will be happy too as the Irish and all celebrated their win. Me, I sneaked off home for an early night, knowing I had an 8am breakfast to do.

Confidence

Thursday morning brought an end to the cooking part of the cooking week. We concentrated on fish and shellfish, a couple of simple salads and we finished off the week long French sourdough experiment.

The bread was good, much better than my last attempt, better texture and taste. We pan fried some red mullet fillets and served with tomato and black olive and finely chopped lettuce. We made classic French lunch salads of lardons and frisee and roquefort, pear and walnut. We sautéed some white fish fillets in noilly prat, lemon, cream and parsley and we finished off with a classic moules mariniere.

Gary used to eat mussels a lot when growing up in Holland but a bad experience had put him off and he hadn't touched them for years, but he said that watching and helping me with the whole process of making the dish - buying, washing, cleaning, sorting, discarding and finally cooking - gave him the confidence to try them again - which I thought was just brilliant and, by itself, made his whole cooking week worth while. As it is also one of his wife's favourite dishes, she should benefit too.

I've had an upset stomach for the past couple of days and I don't know if it was a mussel (probably not) or just an excess of rich food and drink this week (most likely) but I haven't mentioned it to Gary because I really don't want to discourage him now.

The final part of the week was one of VinEcole's excellent wine tastings. The weather at the end of the week was superb and we had the full benefit of a roof down motor out to Gayda, the majestic sweep of the snow-capped Pyrenees glistening in the sun before us and a good bit of fun and laughter and knowledge from an interesting mix of people at the tasting and the usual charm of our hosts, Matthew and Emma.

All in all, I think the week was a success and I hope Gary goes back to the UK armed with the confidence to try things out for himself.

Day three and more

We had a break from the cooking sessions today after spending all day yesterday in the kitchen. Gary hired a car and went off to explore the nearby countryside - and it was a fabulous day to do so, with unbroken blue skies and a mid afternoon high of 20 degrees.

I managed half an hour out in the sunshine - I took a coffee with Brigitte in the square after lunch - but aside from that interlude it was back to domestic chores for me today. I cleaned out the Apartment ready for the weekend guests and brought all the ironing up to date - three full room sets (bedlinen, towels, robes and napery) and several hours over the ironing board.

Whilst it was good to have a break from the cooking, I must admit that I enjoyed yesterday's all day kitchen marathon more than today's domestic necessities.

The all day session started with a visit to Les Halles to buy the meat for the casseroles, which involved a long discussion with M Campacci on the origins of his beef and veal - most of which, sadly, passed over my head because of my inability to comprehend French, especially when spoken with passion and at speed. He was, of course, as charming and polite and helpful as ever and threw in a bit of pork fat for nothing because he was out of beef bones.

When we got back to the kitchen I threw all the 'daube' ingredients into a big bowl with a mass of herbs and a bottle of red and left them to sit whilst we got on with making some soda bread and some french onion soup, which we ate for lunch, with some of the chicken liver pate to follow that we had made on Monday - top lunch that.

In the afternoon, we got the beef casserole going before making a couple of vegetable soups to demonstrate how easy soup is to make and also how the taste can be altered by the addition of various additives at the end, depending on what it needs (salt, pepper, sugar, vinegar, cream, herbs - etc). It inspires me every time I go through that process and Gary was absolutely amazed at the difference a relatively small amount of each ingredient made to the finished taste - which was the intention, so that was good.

We finished with a 'blanquette de veau', a classic french dish of veal in a creamy white sauce. It has no cream in the sauce, so the description is misleading, but allowed me to demonstrate the principles of a classic 'roux' - and the finished product does indeed feel creamy - which is a pretty clever trick. We devoured it all for supper with some rice and bottle of red wine.

Away from the cooking and the ironing, there hasn't really been much time for anything else. Through a friend of a friend who works at the local radio station, I now know some of the acts being lined up for this summer's music festival, which for the first time will feature concerts in the newly refurbished Place Gambetta (Depeche Mode apparently) as well as the usual venue in the Cité ( Lenny Kravitz and Seal) - it's all rumour, of course, but from a very good source - the same source that told me about the new Ryanair routes from Edinburgh and Bournemouth. So I'd put money on it happening.