The latest cultural event is in progress. (Les Abracadagrasses do not count.) The current one is Les Pages Musicales de Lagrasse, and, if last night's concert was anything to go by, it's of the highest quality. The Brahms I could take or leave, but the Beethoven was very good. The second half was of Franck and Ravel works, including one of my desert island discs, the Chorale N°2, played very well by young Thomas Ospital on the rather over-powered organ, but with a sensitivity to registration that I haven't heard in the church here before. It's all too easy to deploy all the reeds and mixtures, which leads to an uncomfortable, deafening experience. Thomas got it right, maintaining complete clarity throughout, with appropriate and sparing use of the blazing reeds. The concert ended with Franck's rather repetitive piano quintet, which I know only from an ancient Clifford Curzon performance on LP. I found it rather tiresome - maybe Curzon omitted a few of the repeats! The concert was very well attended, despite tickets at €25!
We are entertaining tonight, so took a ride up to Carcassonne on Friday for provisions. Since I hadn't yet seen in the metal a car of the kind I've ordered, we looped round via the SEAT shop to find that they had a demonstrator out the front and another example in the showroom. It seems OK: plenty of room front, back and boot (though our boot will be smaller, to accommodate four-wheel drive and a spare wheel). It's a touch lower than the Tiguan, but no less easy to get in and out of. You can't see a damn' thing out of the back window, but that's modern cars for you. The bells and whistles on the one we're having include a camera in the back end and a screen on the dashboard, so that may help. I think ours is being built this coming week, so it should reach us some time in October. Surprisingly, in the five or ten minutes we spent in the showroom, we were not pounced on by a salesman, far less offered a test drive. Probably as well, since the demonstrator had a superflous pedal and a funny stick thingy in the middle with numbers on it. We don't do stick thingies these days unless forced to.
Earlier in the week we took a ride down to La Franqui for lunch at our usual watering place. We perhaps unwisely went for the mix tapas, which were obviously bought in from the cash and carry. Thick, chewy chapelure, flavourless chicken goujons and chips that once cooled were inedible. We'll probably go back, but that's another dish off the list, following from the grotesquely over-salted moules on previous visits. I suppose we keep going back because it's pleasant to eat looking out over the sea, and the patron recognises us and is welcoming. Eggs and bacon next time, maybe. I was not keen to do the winding narrow Corbières roads this time, so we spent a bit of time on what used to be the N9. I'd read that there was now legislation prohibiting payment for sex. It doesn't seem to be enforced on the N9, where at least two ladies of the afternoon were out on the game, and doubtless others a few paces back into the garrigue.
Temperatures in the thirties make it easy to sit and do little other than reading and scribbling a bit for the blog. The countryside is utterly parched, and the peace and quiet are broken from time to time by the drone of the Trackers overhead. Nights are a bit uncomfortable, but the fan in the bedroom is discreet and efficient. We've been for a few strolls round the village, including a visit to the café at the Abbey with neighbours Anne and David. (We hadn't been there before: it's very pleasant and shaded, and lacks the traffic noise of the Prom Caff.) But I'm a bit fed up that I can no longer do the hikes in the hills that attracted me to the village in the first place. Well, perhaps help is on the way: we'll know a little more in a few weeks' time.
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