The Film Show

24th November
I’m still reeling from going through a year's worth of dramas these last two days. The Director spent Saturday morning setting everything up at the Salle des Fetes – and nothing worked. The speakers were duff, the screen turned out to be puny and the projector wouldn’t work until we figured out how to screw the bulb in properly. Sometime during the afternoon we ditched the tiny screen and wiggled stuff in the right way to make sound happen.

On Sunday while The Director was doing last-minute adjustments I put out some chairs, I wasn’t sure who’d turn up so I put out about 50 and started fiddling around with bowls of pretzels. Our friends set up the drinks table and we realised that Mme Bontette, who is a bit distracted by her new job, had made us a tooth-achingly sweet rum punch so we collected up all the supplies of lemons and limes we could lay our hands on and squeezed them into the mix. Then people started coming - and they kept coming and we were all pulling out stacks more chairs because the hall was filling. The advertised start time was 6.15 but by 6pm there was a room full of people looking expectantly at the bit of wall where the projector was pointing, they weren’t interested in rum punch or Ricard they were just waiting. So we rolled the film which was a shortened version of the pilot with subtitles (thanks Florence!), followed by a series of sequences that we’d filmed over the last few months. At the end everyone cheered and asked to see it again immediately.

Mme Bontette is loving her new job as a reporter for the local paper and has bought a new set of reporter’s outfits which are very glamorous and seem to be mostly furry-edged, she was taking a lot of photos.

Then we cleared up and went down to the bar which was heaving. The Goths had gone to town with candles and drapes and stuff, the tables were put together to make a big U shape and set with pitchers of wine and baskets of bread. Trays loaded with glasses of Cava were passed round. The meal was great: bowls of salad and the famous cassoulet – and they’d even done the crispy crumb thing on top. The really fantastic thing though was that there were people there who’d told me they’d never be in the same room together and there were French women there who told me that they’d never go to a bar because it wasn’t ladylike. Anyway the whole thing went on late and it was a great party. And now The Director and our friends have returned to the UK and I feel completely discombobulated.

Heffalump Trap Part II

18th November
Early this morning I was washing my hair when I heard loud rapping on the front door. Thinking it might be a delivery I ran to get it and found Old Dad there.
Come early - before midday, I don’t want the postman to know you’re there. We’ll shut your bike in the garage and then I can close the shutters and lock the door and it’ll look as though there’s no one in.
That’s ridiculous
No really if the postman sees you he’ll tell every one
Why would we be worried about that?
Well I don’t want the postman to know
(What are we talking about here?) Well I won’t come then

My hair was dripping and I was caught off-balance. Old Dad just repeated that he’d see me before midday. Then he walked off.

I spent the morning slashing at swathes of thistles and thorns but by noon I was still feeling thoroughly disgruntled. On the way to Old Dad’s house I passed the bar which was open - that stopped me in my tracks. Being a nosey parker I wandered in. A strange young man was sitting at the bar, his hairline has receeded right over the back of his head the remaining strands have been grown long and combed-over. I also think he might have gained weight recently because his clothes don’t meet in the middle. Kurt (up already!) introduced him as 'Ed from Toulouse who has recently moved near the village’.

Last week I put flyers around advertising our upcoming film show at the village hall and the cassoulet supper in the bar afterwards. I learn that the supper is already booked up. The event is this Sunday, I got Kurt talking about cassoulet and it became apparent that he had neither eaten nor made a cassoulet in hs life, I started panicking, then Ed said
I’m from Toulouse I’ll show him how to make a cassoulet

My brain didn’t know what to think then, so I left, and went for lunch, I was late, the postman had been and gone and I insisted we left the shutters open and the door ajar as usual.

I sat down and it was all a bit tense, Old Dad handed me a large tumbler of neat Ricard
Thanks but no, water will be fine – I need to get back to work soon
Glasses of various sorts of alcohol were poured for me over the following long hour, they lined up untouched across my side of the table.

Conversation didn’t flow easily. I resorted to asking him about his upcoming heart operation - he can usually go on about that at length, but today he didn’t seem in the mood to talk about that or his bad leg, or the way he’s a martyr to heartburn.

Finally, as I pushed back my chair and made leaving noises, he said in exasperation
what do women like - how can someone like me give a girl a good time?
I suggested that he pop up the road and ask our lovely neighbour Hélene
Old Dad roared at me
Hélene – she’s nearly 80, what would I be wanting with her?