France, Rod Fleming's World, Page 2

10/05/2024

In France, Everything Shuts at Twelve- (Part Two)

Originally posted 2013-05-23 15:17:59.

“No,” I cried, and summoned up the best of my then limited French, “Cas d’urgence!”

But this made no impression on the battle-axe, who shook her head again, pointed to her watch and mouthed “Quattors heures et demi.” Whatever my emergency was, it would h

ave to wait another 150 minutes.

Aghast as she began to turn away again, and now completely at a loss for words, I was once again reminded of the sheer brilliance of my wife in situations like this. Knowing that she could not hope to plead her case in French, she had slipped over to the car, unstrapped Calum, and now appeared with him in her arms; when she knew she had the dame’s attention, she lowered the towel wrapped around him to show the lad’s bare bottom, and just said one of the few French words she knew by heart, because she needed it so often. “Couches!”

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10/05/2024

In France, Everything Shuts at Twelve- (Part One)

Originally posted 2013-05-17 13:38:11.

One thing the guidebooks never bother to tell you about France is also one of the most important of all that you should know. In fact this piece of information is so important that my imparting it to you, as I am about to do, is worth the price of the book of all this. So perhaps, if you’ve borrowed this from a friend, you should skip to the next chapter right now. (I jest.)

So what is this invaluable knowledge that no-one should travel in France without first having assimilated? Just this:

Everything Shuts At Twelve. For Two Hours. At Least.

That’s it. Outside of the major metropolitan cities like Paris and Lyon, and maybe even Marseilles these days, if you ain’t got whatever it is you were looking for by the time the midi rings, you can forget getting it until two o’clock at the earliest.

Believe me, you will not be in France long before you realise how much this immutable chronology affects life.

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10/05/2024

Damp Walls–How to get them dry

Originally posted 2016-07-30 18:45:38.

In the past walls were rendered and plastered with lime. Lime is a truly wonderful material that can be bent to a whole series of uses, but as a render on stone it is unsurpassed. It ‘breathes’, allowing moisture to escape and suppressing damp walls. This is because it is very porous. So why are there damp walls in so many old houses today?

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10/05/2024

Roofs in France: types of tiles used

Originally posted 2015-01-10 04:46:29.

France is divided, basically, into the north, where tuiles plates were traditional roof covering tiles, and the south, where tuiles romaines are found. There is a line just south of Chalon sur Saone where you can see this change quite clearly, and you know you have officially entered le sud, even though the Mediterranean is still hundreds of miles away. I always stop for a glass of wine in a café when I pass this point. Roofs in the north, with their flat tiles, tend to be steeply pitched, whereas in the south the pitch is much more gentle.

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10/05/2024

Wood in Traditional Building 2: Poplar and Pine

Originally posted 2014-03-12 13:35:43.

Everyone will be familiar with the beautiful poplar trees that make valleys in Burgundy and elsewhere so charming to the eye. Poplar produces straight-grained timber of prodigious length. The wood is soft and easy to cut, and it holds nails very well. It resists splitting firmly because is has an interwoven grain, so it is tricky to plane well; better to use a power plane. But poplar is in any case best kept for rough work.

It has two big disadvantages; it can to warp severely as it dries, so great care must be taken in stacking; and insects just love it. Poplar should never be used unless it is treated or painted, or else the woodworm will have a field day. However, it is reasonably resistant to rot, and as long as it is used with care, is a useful timber. It is cheap and plentiful, light and easy to handle.

Unfortunately, poplar is usually grown individually, in long thin avenues, or as windbreaks along the edges of fields, and more rarely in plantations. Its presence in the beautiful valleys of central France is a great asset visually. However, this causes a problem when it is cut for timber.

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10/05/2024

Wood in Traditional Building 1: Oak

Originally posted 2014-02-18 12:54:42.

Wood is, along with stone and earth, one of the principal materials used in the construction of buildings, and particularly older buildings. The principal varieties used are oak, poplar and beech, known as hardwood in UK. Spruces and pines(softwood in UK) are also much used, especially in new-build. It is important to have some understanding of the nature of wood, its uses in the older house and some sympathy for its virtues as well as its limitations.

Wood is used in a wide variety of applications, and the most important of these are the support structure for floors; the roof timbers and associated work; and the interior finishing timber. Timber is also used in the construction of interior walls and in many areas in the construction of supporting walls.

There are three timbers commonly found in older buildings in France, namely oak, poplar and pine. Other timbers are often found as parts of outhouses and sheds.

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10/05/2024

Croutons and Cheese! French Onion Soup 2

Originally posted 2021-01-08 10:47:24.

Croutons and Cheese: French Onion Soup 2 is the second in Rod Fleming’s hilarious series of memoirs about his life in France. Filled with anecdotes about aviating cats, the Bull in the Back Passage, what to do about ex-pats, transporting the cheese to Scotland, it’s a laugh a minute.

With the lovable and roguish characters you first met in French Onion Soup!, this book will keep you entertained all right, so much you’ll come back for a second read!

Available now in paperback: ISBN: 978-0-9572612-4-2

The stove story

Originally posted 2013-06-25 17:13:05.

Life certainly has an interesting tapestry here in P’tit Moulin. This morning I was awakened at some ungodly hour—well, just before ten actually, but I am semi-nocturnal—by an excessively enthusiastic clangour (good word that) of my front door bell, of which more later.

Well, I threw on a pair of jeans and a T and went to see who had disturbed the peace in this manner, and there on my doorstep was a rather scruffy individual, definitely of the traditional French horny-handed persuasion. Behind him was a truck that looked, to my bleary and unaided vision, even older and more dilapidated than my Isuzu, and that’s saying something.

He must have recognised my absence of recognition. ‘Sir,’ he said (in French of course, I’m just trying to make it easy for you. Do keep up.) ‘Sir, the last time I passed you said you had some scrap.’

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10/05/2024

Bastille Day: Death of a village in France

Originally posted 2017-07-26 21:58:12.

I met Denis Poulot by the old lavoir as I ambled down to the Salle des Fetes. We’ve known each other for 24 years now; we’ve never been especially close but we share a relaxed camaraderie. We paused in our journeys to shake hands and exchange formalities, then carried on. Inevitably, this being Bastille Day, 14 July and we were both going to the ceremonial vin d’honneur, we chatted about Bastille Days past.

Denis drew up and looked into the distance. ‘It’s not the same any more.’

Molinot is a village deep in the Arriere Cote of Burgundy, has been a part of my life since 1993. In those days, the village was famous for the extravagance of its Bastille Day celebrations and people would come from miles away to enjoy them. Indeed, ours was so popular that many villages around had their celebrations on another day, since all the locals were at ours; and of course we reciprocated, making for a thoroughly convivial week.

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10/05/2024

The Horror of the Blocked-Up Window

Originally posted 2013-03-07 02:02:33.

I don’t know why it is that I have accumulated such a collection of ─ well, I suppose you might say ghost stories, though I tend to think of them in less definite terms myself. The fact is that I have never seen a ghost with my two eyes, and in fact I long ago gave up any hope of doing so. I must not be one of those gifted with the sight, as it were. However that may be, though, I seem to be a magnet for stories of the weird and the macabre, as if they seek me out─ and in the strangest of places.

The most recent addition to my collection was found in just such a casual way as all the others. I had been on holiday in France, when I was suddenly called back because of an illness─a very severe one─in the family. It happened that the nearest airport from which I could get a flight home was Lyon, so I made my reservation and got myself there as soon as I possibly could. Continue reading “The Horror of the Blocked-Up Window”