Champion

Enough Said

As appeared in the local newspaper Le Dauphiné, I am now known in the village as «le champion».

Summer.....and How

Summer………. And How

The weather forecasters got it right and the predicted heatwave is upon us. I am still playng boules almost daily in 40+ degrees but can't say I do so with a lot of vigour or enthusiasm. In this sort of weather the time to play boules is about 9.00 at night. The «haute aire» above the Cafe des Sports can be floodlit through a control box we can get at so I'll see if I can drum up some support for boules sessions starting at 9.00.

The pots on the balcony need watering daily but they are giving value for money. The jasmine is doing its nut (see photos) and perfuming the whole area around; it can go on blooming for a couple of months or more so I'm keeping it well watered. 

At the back there is still plenty of colour despite the main roses having finished and the tiger lillies in particular seem to be enjoying the heat. So are the frogs in the river opposite; the noise they make at night is enough to wake the dead. Usually, in the past, they have risen to a crescendo and then all cut out together before starting up again. But they seem to have done away with their orechestra conductor this year and carry on continuously.

Last monday was the feu de la St Jean and it lived up to my expectations this year with mussels and chips and music as wall as the usual bonfire and fireworks. The result was a large turnout of villagers and a good time had by all. Next up is Bastille day on the 12th of July.

I finally managed to get all the documents required for my French citizenship application accepted by the immigration service and was given a date for the next stage, an interview in Grenoble. But it is for October 2021 i'm finding the whole process a bit Kafkaesque.

Ideas

An Ideas Factory?

Looking back on my working life I find that there is a common thread. I worked in various roles in IT and businesses but the common thread seems to be that I was above all paid to think and to think differently (outside the box). That holds true from my days in teaching, through the early fundamentals of computing to drawing up business plans. Thinking originally, differently is what has done it for me, often borrowing ideas from others that related to other contexts. So here are some more thoughts along those lines, of whatever import.

My balcony is an obvious place to have an aperitif or late night drink for much of the year. Up one side I have a honeysuckle growing and over the balcony itself is a jasmine, providing beautiful scent through the spring and summer. Anybody else might have planted the same but the way I came to this is as follows. An American architect, Christopher Alexander, had a significant influence on software development through his ideas on how to use space and to define and connect spaces and I was familiar with his ideas. His prime criterion for how to design within a defined space (my balcony in this instance) is a dependence on how that space is going to be used. I have read that he was given the task of designing a university campus and plotted out the main buildings, halls of residence, lecture theatres, laboratories, etc, but left the canvas otherwise blank (grass actually, between the buildings) and said he would complete that 7-8 months later. When he returned, students had defined paths between the buildings by tramping grass down and also defined areas where they congregated in leaisure hours. He simply endorsed the status quo, creating concrete paths where the students had shown where they were needed and leaving grass areas with tables and benches where students congregated. This was not artistic design but design according to use. Others may well have decided on my balcony plants by another route but this is how I decided on mine.

Friend Steve and I often have discussions of a semi-political nature and recently he said that governments should be care ful not to tax the rich too luch because then they might decide to migrate and they paid the most tax. I said no they didn't and Steve, being a friend, rather than tell me to piss off said something like «well I must have been misinformed«. It was a misunderstanding. Steve was talking about the tax individuals paid and I was talking about the revenue that the Exchequer receives. Leaving aside for the moment tax avoidance and how much tax rich individuals actually pay, the open question is what is the importance to the Exchequer of tax paid by the rich? We're still looking for data on that, to test my off-the-cuff contention that if all the rich buggered off it wouldn't make that much difference to the Exchequer.

I had a follow-up thought. Tax avoidance is obviously a reason many tax specialists/accountants are hired. So what if all such costs above some earnings threshold, say £100,000 for an individual and £1m for a company, were made non tax-deductible? There would obviously be a bun-fest on cost attribution but could that have a useful impact? I don't know but it's a thought. My focus on tax currently is, incidentally, because that is what I believe that Brexit is fundamentally all about; all the rest is theatre to sidetrack the plebs.

A final thought for football fans. Technically gifted players get fouled constantly. In the last season in the UK Hazard and Saha were the most fouled players in the Enhllish Premier League. Some of the fouls are no doubt unintentional but there are fairly obvious attempts to avod red and yellow cards by spreading the fouls out between defenders. Referees already keep count of the number of fouls committed by a player, issuing yellow cards to repeating defenders. So what if they also kept account of he number of fouls commited against one player, with a ruling that, for instance, the fifth foul against one individual automatically incurred a yellow card irrespective of the player who committed that foul? It might be unfair to the player committing the foul but would protect technically gifted players (whom everybody wants to see display their skills) and would send a message that such players can't be taken out of a game by fouling them.

Ah well, just thoughts.

Summer Musings

Summer

Summer is here, even if the weather doesn't seem quite sure about it. We've recently had very hot days and warm but overcast days in almost equal measure. Rain is often threatened but rarely materialises, which means I've spent a lot of time watering. The results are definitely worthwhile, however, with bot front (pictured below) and back looking good. My numerous clematis, mostly blue (fancy that) are in full bloom in both the front and the back, as are the fuchsias and the pelargoniums and, at the back, the campanulas (blue again). Come on Chelsea!

Also, for reasons unknown to me; the honeysuckle this year, of which there six front and back, seem to have found their perfect conditions and have run riot.  The perfume at the front is overwhelming and those at the back have combined with climbing roses to break the pillar and arch over which they climb. That is going to be a major job in the autumn.

Summer doesn't begin officially here until the 24th of the month (don't ask), with the fêu de la St Jean. There follows a whole month of celebrations of various sorts which I find enjoyable and look forward to, as well as the weekly Saturday market throigh to the end of August and the mussels and chips sessions on Thursday evenings. Bring it on.

Musings

I keep wondering what makes plants either perennial or annual in different places. If the winter kills them, obviously they must be regarded as annual but I can't understand what it is about winter that kills some plants and not others. Temperature doesn't seem to explain it entirely and neither does position and I wonder if humidity has a rôle. For instance, marigolds, antirrhinums, larkspur and california poppies all proved to be annual when I grew them in England but are generally perennial here despite winters reaching much colder temperatures. On the other hand, winters are drier here. I shall just have to muse on.

UK politics also occupy much of my musing. I remember a time when political debate was subject to thought. Now lies, fantasies and illusions seem to be the order of the day. As Saul Bellow once remarked «Great intelligence is invested in ignorance when the need for illusion is deep». The front-runners to replace Theresa May as PM and leader of the Conservative party, the traditional home of prudent economics, all propose a no-deal Brexit to wreck the economy and tax cuts and extravagant spending as a way out. To ensure that the democratic Brexit vote is implemented, it is proposed to suspend democratic parliament. Meanwhile the Labour party, almost certain to win the next general election in spite of itself, unless there is a hung parliament (please God!), is tearing itself apart. My mistake in my musings here is probably to try to apply any sanity to the situation.

There has been one disturbing legal development. A private prosecution of Boris Johnson for deliberately lying to the public when in high public office was thrown out by the High Court. The Court has yet to give its reasons. An initially suggested reason, that it was because the case was politically motivated, surely cannot be true. That would give the green light to all public officials to lie ad nauseam. I shall be interested in the Court's explanation for its judgement.

Raoul Taburin And Garden

Raoul Taburin

Raoul Taburin is a comic strip created by Jacques Sempé, one of my favourite cartoonists, who displays a very dry sense of humour. The comic strip was made into a film last year and and the film was shot in Mollans, a good part of it in my very road and not 100 yards from my house. So of course I went to see it when it was shown in the local cinema in Buis last week.

The story line is typical Sempé, about a Frenchman who suffers the ultimate disgrace for one of his nationality: he can't ride a bike. In the film he is befriended by another man, a photographer who doesn't know how to take photos. In one delightful scene he is being cosied up to by a lady who clearly wants a declaration of love. He becomes coy, says it is very difficult for him to say what he wants to say, says he has never told it to anybody before, and with the lady all encouraging smiles and expectation, finally blurts out that he can't ride a bike. A tragic end to the budding romance!

It's a truly delightful film, and not just because it was shot in Mollans.

The Garden

The Mairie managed to prevaricate its way out of pruning the trees opposite my house (never underestimate the ability to prevaricate in Provence) but I've ploughed ahead with my gardening plans. The back has been looking good for some time although the Banksia rose is more or less over no; but the other roses will kick in soon and a couple of dahlia tubers are sprouting nicely on my kitchen windowsill and will add to the colour later on (photo below)

My take-over of the Mairie's pot in front of the wash-house, with its Banksia rose and clematis, has also worked well this year and is being appreciated particularly by neighbour Mercedes, whose house is opposite, so she tells me (photo below)

And now the front (photo below) is beginning to look good too. I managed to get a new blue pot onto the roof of my porch and I think (hope?) it's stable there, barring any exceptional winds. Visitors to the village and even some villagers are already taking photos so some people at least think it looks good. The shade makes photos difficult but I've done my best.

And In General……..

This is my time of the year. The garden is done, barring casualties, and all that remains there is for the plants to do their stuff (and rather a lot of watering). Asparagus, strawberries and melons are plentiful and reasonably priced in the shops and markets; the asparagus will be finished in another month but the strawberries and melons should remain for most of the summer. Peaches and apricots from Spain (of variable quality) are appearing in the shops which means that the local produce is only a few weeks away. My fruit-aholic cravings will soon be fully met.

The Mad English Gardener

The Mad English Gardener

I've been doing my best to live up to my reputation here. The back garden is essentially done. Friends René and Armelle asked me at the pizza evening yesterday when they could come to see my back garden and I suggested that they wait until the roses are in bloom. I can conceivably get one more clematis in a pot there but there is room only for one or two “fill in” plants at most otherwise. Pictures on this blog will certainly follow then.

Across the road in the front the daffodils and crocus are over but some grape hyacinths are still in flower and the first of the irises is out; Last year the clematis over the wash-house across the road came into flower only when the Banksia rose had finished but this year the clematis, a light lilac in colour, looks to be ahead of the rose. I'm hoping they both come out together. I've also stuck some old nasturtium seeds in the ground around the trees in the hope that they may come up. And I've put some sunflower and morning glory seeds in pots and will find somewhere to put them when they come up.

Nobody has yet come to prune the trees opposite but I'm betting that they will and so bought more petunia surfina and will put up a third hanging basket. I also bought marigolds to go in the pots outside my bedroom window. That's it for the front, barring any casualties. The mad English gardener strikes again!

It was Steve's birthday today and he and Jo invited me to have lunch with them at the Dandelion cafe in Faucon. We sat outside in shirt sleeves gazing up at one of those pale lilac skies we get here and at the snow on the top of Mont Ventoux. Blissful. I got Steve half-a-dozen muscat grape vines, black French grapes and white Italian ones, which je can plant to grow up the fence around their garden. Jo wants some plants climbing up/down the wall on their terrace as I have on mine at the back so I've been building stone “cups” into their terrace wall. It will take a little while to get going, as mine did, but should look good in the end.

Then there is the watering to come………………….

Nationalism

Nationalism

I was born, grew up and, for most of my life, lived happily in England. I regard it as a moderately well run country most of the time, often beautiful, there are many things within it that I love and its people are generally kind; in fact, it's like many other European countries. I can say that it has served me well, and for my part I always tried to act positively while there, but I have never felt any need or desire to claim allegiance to it in any nationalist sense.

If I view Europe, or indeed the world, in terms of human subdivisions, in terms of peoples' language, work habits, aspirations, culture, cherished traditions and so forth rather than in terms of historical wars and fiefdoms, then regions make far more sense to me as subdivisions than do current countries. Countries are just what we're stuck with. Indeed, most European countries as currently constituted have been so only for the last 150 years or so. In that relatively short space of time millions of people have had their nationality changed, sometimes more than once, without any say in the matter. And various sets of genetic testing sessions reported suggest that during that period or very slightly longer we have nearly all become national mongrels.

I therefore regard nationality as essentially arbitrary and of little fundamental importance, a question of having the right piece of paper.

As an aside I find hilarious the millions of ardent American nationalists who are the most mongrel of all.

All this leaves out the question of education. Prior to 1945 and the advent and threat of nuclear weapons, wars were quite frequent events, even if it was just a question of beating up the natives, of whom there were many, often rebellious, in colonial dependencies. There was therefore a need for troops who would be willing to die for country, God, king/queen, whatever, my country right or wrong. Education inculcated that need and fuelled nationalism. Those educated in the 15 or so years after 1945 were fed that propaganda and many still feel that nationalism and have passed it on to their offspring. Leave aside the rights and wrongs of that but how relevant is that to today's world? I venture to suggest that the current nationalist movements in Europe demonstrate how successful that early propagandist education was and how family loyalty, probably, has passed it on. But it is essentially of the past and not of today.

We need to think differently