Frosty French morning

We woke up this morning to brilliant sunshine and frost. We've been having some much needed rain so we welcomed the sun. Also, the frost made the ground firm so we decided to take one of our favorite walks both Rupert & we love this one hour walk.

It around Causseviel a small hamlet at the end of a dead end road. The country side is rolling and is a combination of meadows and woods. Some are lush and others are 'causse' which is very rocky & sparse. Its only a five minute drive from our house.

Off we go!
We start off a small lane with a cross & head down this track. Field on both sides. Normally there are cows, but not this morning. Expect we'll see them later in a different pasture.







Here comes Roop flying back to us. He's got his coat on just in case the "chasse" sould mistake him for a small brown bear. I think he's having fun!









We stop so Linda can photograph these beautiful leaves. Gorgeous aren't they?


















Roop on guard. Who knows what he sees? "Why are we stopped? Let's go!















More beautiful leaves. The Winter colors are superb.
























Off we go again. We're working our way along the bottom of a hill. Soon we'll start up a bit.





















We've just turned right & started up. I've always particularly liked this stretch of path. There's a beautiful field off to the right with a small pond for the cows and a path that leads over to La Cazoul.












Here are our regular cows. They've moved to a different field. Pretty aren't they. If you look very closely you can just see the leader's collar & bell.

















More cows. Different breed; milkers these. They're getting their hay.











The view opposite the 2ond lot of cows. Lucky cows to have that. The village in the distance is Pech Bernu, population 14. 16 in the summer when our American friends are in residence.











A little abandoned barn. These dot the countryside relics of a more prosperous past. I can't help looking at them & thinking gee, I could buy that & fix it up as a summer place for next to nothing. Dream on!





And so we reach the juniper patch and we're nearly all the way around. Just a right turn past some great stone walls and down the hill to the car.





A beautiful morning, one of our favorite walks and a happy dog. A happy Linda & Dave as well. We're privileged to live in this beautiful country where walks like these abound.

Diet - No, I haven't given up

I'm stuck at my 10 pounds weight loss & have been for a while, but I'm still trying. This 190 pound barrier seems to be a tough one.

I think I'm at a point where I'm to strategise just continuing to keep the 10 pounds off over the holidays and then make a big push for the second 10 pounds in January.

Last night we went to special Greek evening at a friends restaurant, tonight we're having slow roast belly pork and Wednesday we're out for dinner. Thursday we leave for England and a round of visits with kids & grandkids, Linda's family and friends. I'm going to be hard pressed to keep the 10 pounds.

Its a tough life.

Good Deed for the day

As Rupert & I were pulling out of the drive on our way to his morning walk we had to stop for a van coming up the lane. This is a pretty rare sight as we get 5 cars a day if we're lucky. Well not only did we have to stop, but the van driver got out & waved me down! A closer look revealed that there were two vans both from Salson who are a local dealer in household appliances.

We hadn't ordered anything from them recently although they got all of our orders for major appliances when we redid our kitchen. Still, I recognized the driver as he had delivered to us back then. Hummmm... what's going on?

Turns out he's looking for a Mr Stanley. Do I know where he lives? Well, no I don't, but I do know that there are some English people who live down the road a ways. Perhaps this is Mr Stanley? Wait, I say, I'll go ask my wife. She doesn't know either. I go back out & he shows me the delivery slip. Mr Stanley, Lacaou. Ah HA! I'm pretty sure Lacaou is where I think the nameless English couple live.

Follow me I tell them I know where Lacaou is. Ok, but they decide to turn around instead of following me up the lane. Now this is dangerous as the lane is one way. (Jacques found this out to his cost, but that's another story.) Anyway I went up, turned Left, drove down the road towards Caylus & waited for them. Sure enough they appeared and then followed me for the few hundred yards to the lane on the right up to Lacaou. I waved, they waved and Rupert barked. Good deed for the day done.

This is typical of the local Gallic logic. They came to us because they knew we were English. (well I'm American, but let's not get into nuances here.) Because we're Anglais the French automatically assume that we know every other English person within a 10 mile radius. Logical isn't it? Not true of course, but virtually impossible to convince the locals otherwise.

This happens pretty frequently with the Mail lady. Any letter that has an Anglo-Saxon name on it which she doesn't know gets delivered to us in the hope that we'll know. We only recently found out that she keeps trying until she finds the addressee; if we don't know she takes them to Micheal & Ruve & if they don't know she goes to Denise & Alan and so on.

Guess what? The Gallic logic works. Most of the time the letters get delivered to the right party and people do get found. I'm sure that Mr Stanley is now enjoying his new appliances whatever they may be.