Garden

These are all plants we bought last year, and they seem to be liking their surroundings, though the heavy rain on Monday took its toll.

Pat Austin

Birthday Girl

And and old 'un: Danse de Feu

In the edible department, we lifted some Charlotte potatoes at the weekend, and they are delicious, with rather more flavour than the first ones cropped, Rocket.  There is some sign of life from the beans, and a few carrots appear to be germinating.  The onions are coming along, and we have a good supply of herbs, though the rosemary is looking rather tired.

Meanwhile, we are creaking slowly forward with the planned rebuild of the kitchen.  The new sinks are in a box in one garage, the new wall tiles are in the other one and we received a final estimate from the plumber/project manager today.  The work surface has been ordered, and we've agreed a layout that will avoid big joints.  The sparkies came round on Tuesday, and the tiler today.  We've paid the deposit, so are working towards a start in early September. 

A neighbour thinks our plan to decamp during the work is madness, and I have to say I start to have my doubts. D'une part, it would be nice to be spared the daily anguish of dirt, noise, chaos, fish and chips and inferior pizzas, and we've survived owner-absent work often enough both at Forges-l'Evêque and in Another Place.  I turn into a one-man hissy fit when forced to live in a building site (see under Smith Towers kitchen refit and the building of the sitooterie at Forges-l'Evêque).    D'autre part, my control-freak nature and tendency to fret would suggest that being present might be a good idea.  We have between now and September to ruminate on the subject.

There are signs that the laptop is tiring.  Having a cup of tea emptied into it didn't help matters, one must allow.  Who knows how much longer one is going to live?  Intimations of mortality abound: a friend 14 years my junior reports having had a heart attack some months ag, for example.  After surviving 10 minutes of Hewlett Packard music on hold yesterday, only to learn that they refuse to supply a laptop with a proper Swiss keyboard in the UK, I think we're Geneva bound on the way south next month, and to hell with the expense.