....since we move into Forges-l'Evêque, a move we haven't regretted for a moment. Since we moved in, traffic has pretty much doubled, now that the best part of sixty additional households use our street to access their little new-build boxes. But on the other hand, we now have easier access on foot to the village, and also to another bus stop.
We've done a fair bit of improvement over the years. The biggest improvement is, of course, the sitooterie, which increases our living space (public rooms, as we say in my country) by over 50%, and gives us a comfortable summer living room. The original sitting room has essentially become the television and music room. Another early change was a refit of the shower room adjoining the main bedroom: we inherited a rather cramped shower enclosure and a ridiculously small wash basin, and a lot of boxed-in air. We have put in units more suited to us two strapping lads. That and the kitchen were somewhat depressingly beige, so both have now moved to a scheme of white and dark grey. We've almost eliminated miserable magnolia from the premises, and only the bedroom - magnolia walls and putty-coloured cupboard doors - remains to be redecorated. The bathroom is the last bastion of grotty DIY wooden flooring and beige tiles, but we'll live with that for a little longer.
Outside, I don't think the previous administration would recognise the garden. About half of the leylandii have gone, and there's probably about 20% less grass, replaced by the pond and rockery, the conservatory and the path round it, the garden studio and the path up to it (that involved taking out two more leylandii - hurrah!), and large areas for planting. The decrepit paving at the back is now level and firm, and the front drive, which had subsided round a drain top, no longer presents a trip hazard - quite a consideration, given that we have no street lighting. We still have a tall hedge of leylandii across the back, though an early job was to bring it down by a meter or so. A few more remain down the west side, but they do at least spare the neighbours the torment of having to see us. The main purposes of the hedge at the back are to provide an unité d'habitation for the blackbirds etc, to give us a green - well, green with patches of brown and sundry gaps - outlook from the back of the house, and of course to prop up next door's rotten fence. (Correspondence continues with absentee landlord...).
Another rash of leylandii used to separate our front drive from next door's, and yet another formed a sort of hedge across the front. I replaced both with an unstructured selection of shrubs and perennials, some of which in turn have already passed their sell-by dates. This past week I've hacked down some of the hebes and penstemons to give a bit of breathing space for Annie next door's lavenders. All of the above have a tendency to become leggy and unsightly. I think the penstemons will bounce back, but if the hebes don't, I shall not cry myself to sleep.
Conscious of the march of time, we have converted some useless savings into a deposit on another Jolly Jaunt in a Big Boat in the summer of next year. (Same Big Boat, and even the same cabin as last time!) We do pause to wonder, however, whether two of the ports of call, Tallinn and St Petersburg, will be accessible sixteen months hence.
Having sacked RBS a few years ago in disgust at the behaviour of the management thereof, I find myself on the point of doing the same to the Co-operative Bank, the value of which has just been written down to zero by the parent company. Although the service I've had from said bank has been very good, I don't want to be caught up in a Bank of England winding-up process, which could follow if the potential buyers (one of which I don't care for anyway) pull out. We are seeing a potential replacement, spun off from a state-supported failure of a bank by order of what we used to call DG XIII. Wish us luck.
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