Last week and weekend was full of fun stuff... at the beginning of the week, we created our own entertainment by staging photographs in the back yard. Being the wife of a photographer has its drawbacks - such as posing in my underpants and tee shirt, wearing M's wellie boots, in the back garden. I had to balance on one leg as if running, hanging onto a bush for support - you can see the result at left. This was especially scintillating since people around here are not formal - if they want to come visit you, they just walk into the house or the garden - wherever you happen to be. In fact, during last visit our elderly neighbor from down the street came over while we were working on a re-finishing project - gave us some loud advice in French (of which we understood two words) and then left... imagine if he'd stumbled onto this project! Oh lala!
Luckily, the professional entertainment kicked in before we went completely bonkers. Friday was the circus - we were as excited as a couple of kids - in fact, we were the only adults without children in attendance. Our enthusiasm was a bit dampened by the crabby circus attendant, who looked at Dick's camera, shook his finger in our faces, and said, "NO PHOTO, NO PHOTO, NO PHOTO!" Our guess is that they have had some trouble with the animal rights people, and we definitely looked out of place in the small town crowd of moms and kids... at any rate, the circus was awesome - jugglers, balancing acts (the amazing glass pyramid!), goats, camels, llamas, and ponies doing cool tricks - and they were very affectionate with their trainers. Dick managed to snap one illict photo at intermission (see left).
Then came the vide-grenier (literally, "cleaning the attic") which is a flea market held on this occasion in St. Martin de Vieux Belleme, just a kilometer or so from our house. In addition to eating, drinking, a lot of good-natured conversation, pony rides for the kids... there were some cool antiques for sale. And the village is picture perfect - if you didn't know better, you'd think the Disney company had been at it again...
The Fete de Musique was held all weekend all over the country - what a cool idea. Free music everywhere you go - I understand that in Paris they play music all night at the park surrounding the Eiffel Tower. We had a lovely local accordion band that played the sweetest possible music under the trees, with the late afternoon sunlight dappling down... and then for a something completely different, a screaming rock band at the Cafe du Midi, singing no songs in English except one that consisted of a single line "I'm on a highway to hell!" We sipped our wine, smiled demurely, and slipped away to listen to more accordions.
Piece de la resistance of the weekend was an overnight visit from our old friends Jim and Sarah, who have been traveling around France and spent their last night with us before leaving for Amsterdam. They thoughtfully brought several luscious bottles of wine, so a good time was had by all!
Today we're off to Mt. St. Michel - we figure we'd better see if before high season hits and every tourist in Europe decides to stop by. A bientot!
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