FRench At Last

 

French At Last

I have just been informed that my application for French nationality has been accepted. As long as I retain my Britsh nationality as well I am therefore officially half frog and half roast beef, a strange creature indeed but I rather like the idea. Also it means I can now throw brickbats at Macron as well as Johnson and whoever succeeds him. It’s taken five years and mountains of documentation and…...it seems the documentation is not over. With the official acceptance I also received a whole list of instructions to download various documents, fill in forms and…..Boy, do the French love documentation! Where do they keep it all?

I’ve sent the news to some friends and suggested that any of themwith an artistic bent should try to visualise a creature who is half frog and half roast beef and received one response; I am obviously a John Bullfrog. I think that is brilliantly inventive.

To mark the occasion, or not quite, the local tourist office has taken a photo of the front of my house and made a jigsaw out of it which it sells to tourists here. My mother would have been proud but it seems I cannot claim any royalties as the front of my house is not copyrightable. Damn! It seems that they should have sought my permission but I am not repared to quibble about that. Anyway I bought the jigsaw puzzle to give to my granddaughter.

The allotment continues to produce and I now have enough ratatouille as well as aubergines to feed an army in the freezer and jars of pickled cucumbers and courgettes despite having given a lot away. Some of the plants are giving early signs of giving up and I won’t mind now when they do. It’s been fun doing the allotment and I’ve met a new group of people. On Friday evenings, since not all of us are retired, we have a ritual aperitif together on the tables and benches by the allotments.

This winter, though, promises to be hard work to improve the soil. I’ll need a lot of anything that retains water and I can foresee a lot of digging. I’ve bought some cauliflower, brussel sprouts, cabbage and kale seedlings, will get some radish and spinach beet seeds and will plant some garlic in November. . We don’t normally have a significant frost until December, but who knows this year? Anyway, I’ll take it from there.