Does Australia cheat a bit?

I was recently intrigued by a front-page article, with a lovely photo, about the participation of Australia at the prestigious Chelsea Flower Show in London. Mystified, I asked myself how Australian horticulturalists might be capable of organizing and creating such a splendid show on the opposite side of the planet. Well, the answer was simple. All the plants in the "Australian" exhibit at Chelsea were Mediterranean specimens, imported from gardens in Italy! Maybe Australia was awarded some kind of a Chelsea prize (?) for counterfeit.

Recently, I wrote an article entitled Nothing like Sam [display] whose over-optimistic title was belied by the fact that our Gold Coast Samantha finally met her match. At the start of that article, I mentioned an Aussie video designed to promote tourism, which you're encouraged to examine [display]. Now, I don't wish to waste time in analyzing this outrageous production. I merely draw attention to the fact that it introduces a credibility gap, right from the start. It begins by an image of a guy seated at a white piano on a sandy beach.

Hey! Do viewers (including those who've seen the magnificent movie of Jane Campion) still believe in this kind of romantic publicity shit? We then see a pair of would-be surfers on an idle sea, awaiting "the first wave of the day". Do these dumb guys really imagine that waves are about to roll over this flat sea? Lo and behold: Two dolphins jump into the air, on the horizon, backed by the rising sun.

Sorry, mate. I don't buy one iota of all that video shit. You Aussie tourist folk are cheating ridiculously. One only has to analyze the shadows in the above absurd image to realize immediately that it's a fake video montage. You should be ashamed of yourselves.

Only one thing is true. As far as video cheating is concerned, there's nothing like Australia. This raises a more general question. Can outsiders believe anything about Australia that's related by Aussie tourist authorities. My answer to that question is a firm NO. Those folk spend their time (and financial resources) inventing a fairy-tale land—right down to details such as cute friendly Aboriginal kids swimming in billabongs—that simply doesn't exist!

Now, if you happen to be a Florida widow or an aged Japanese couple, with surplus dollars or yens dropping out of your pockets, please disregard anything I've just said.

Moving finger mauls

No, my pretty Benny, it's not good enough to simply ask for pardon for the sins of the past, and pray that they won't reoccur.

The moving finger of a priestly pedophile mauls an innocent child and, having mauled, moves on, maybe to other children. And all your pardons won't rub out an iota of the damage done. It's your entire system of prelates, priests and nuns that's rotten at the core, and the world wants no more of it. There's no longer any room for you and your mates, Benny, on the stage of enlightened humanity! We're not interested in your pleas for pardon. We just want you and your church to leave the current scene, as rapidly as possible, and be relegated to history books… where your posterity, in any case, is assured.

Self-publishing

Ever since I've been living in France, and writing in English (and also, at times, in hesitant French), I've discovered that attempts to get stuff published—either in the US or the UK (let's forget about my native Australia)—are a brick-wall affair.

Why? Well, publishing traditions in those Anglo-Saxon nations exploit exclusively the concept of literary agents. In other words, I can't simply propose a typescript to such-and-such a publishing house. I first have to find a literary agency, and it becomes their job to look for a publisher. Fair enough. Well then, why don't I simply link my existence as an English-language writer (residing in France) to such-and-such a US or UK literary agent? That's a good question. The truth of the matter is that I've never succeeded in convincing any serious US or UK literary agent that it might be worthwhile establishing a professional contact with me. Why not? Well, I don't know… apart from saying that they all reply that they're not interested, without taking the slightest look at anything that I've written (apart from my inquiry letter). I have the impression that there's some kind of credibility gap. Prospective agencies look at my address, "overseas", "on the European Continent", and they say to themselves: Shit, no… Or else I'm mistaken. Maybe they judge my literary nullity from the absence of subtle vocabulary and exotic forms of speech in my inquiry letter… I don't think so.

No, there's no doubt. We English-speaking writers residing on the European continent are living in the context of a giant English-language publishing system that has little or no place for individuals who don't reside in the "right" place, who don't pay income taxes either in the US or the UK. Needless to say, the system has litle to do with an author's writing talents.

For an English-writing European such as myself, interested in several kinds of writing (blog, novels, genealogy, local history, etc), the concept of self-publishing is a potentially exciting but subtle affair… which I'm exploring intensely, particularly in the context of electronic books. In any case, I must break out of the present stalemate.

Branch removal

A few days ago, with no prior warning, the electric power was cut off at 9 o'clock in the morning. Unable to work at the computer or even make a cup of coffee, I drove down the road to see what was happening.

As I expected, electricity technicians told me that they had turned off the power so that a team of three tree-climbers could move through the zone in order to lop off branches that might touch the medium-voltage cables. For several weeks, they had been waiting for fine weather, to perform this overdue operation. Later on in the day, the woodmen turned up at Gamone and got into action at the level of my walnut trees.

They were good at climbing trees, and they operated rapidly on my young walnut trees.

What's more, they were friendly fellows, doing a job they liked, in a great outdoor environment. So, when I asked the boss whether he might possibly cut down three old dead walnut trees, he was happy to render this service… with the help of a ladder that I dragged down the slopes from my house.

Now that the three dead trees are no longer there, I have a clearer and wider view, from my front lawn, of the river Bourne and the Cournouze mountain.

Global view of Gamone

This amusing photo of the Gamone valley, taken a few days ago from the other side of the Bourne, reveals that I'm not exactly hemmed in by neighbors. To the left of the blue circle, the relatively bare zone that slopes gently upwards to the crest is the paddock of my donkeys Moshé and Mandrin.

Submerged in roses

That pompous title sounds as if I'm dead and about to be buried. Not quite. I'm still kicking, more than ever...

I've often evoked my longstanding and intense admiration of the Austrian poet Rainer Maria Rilke, author of The Notebooks of Malte Laurids Brigge… which I've recently adapted for a movie (project being currently examined by a French producer).

Roses were a refrain in the words and the life of Rilke. Towards the end of his life, he was living in Muzot, Switzerland.


Here, the great poet cultivated his roses.

Finally, a prick from the thorn of a rose poisoned the poet.

The poet himself wrote the mysterious lines that are engraved in German on his tombstone:

Rose, oh reiner Widerspruch, Lust,

Niemandes Schlaf zu sein unter soviel Lidern.

Rose, oh pure contradiction, desire,
To be no one's sleep under so many eyelids.

My friend Tineke Bot brought back this marvelous winter photo of Rilke's Muzot "castle" at Raron in the Valais canton of Switzerland:

Altering the view angle for her next photo, the artist Tineke captured the tortured soul of the poet, pricked to death by a rose thorn:

Today, at Gamone, I'm surrounded by flowers, including many roses.

The following blood-red specimen is certainly moving, in that it bears the name of Coluche [1944-1986], the great French comic who was killed in a motor-cycle accident when I was out in Australia for the America's Cup.

I have the abrupt impression that one doesn't grow roses innocently, just for fun. There's surely method in the rose-grower's madness. But there's no doubt a bit of pure madness, too. Look at this delightfully schizophrenic specimen labeled New Year. The rose bush is totally incapable of deciding what color it might adopt.

There are more familiar specimens, such as this Albertine (the treasured rose of Christine), which has had a rough time recovering from the exceptionally wet spring of Gamone:

Believe me, though, that I'm in no way obsessed by the task of identifying each rose, as if they were objects. Here, for example, is a splendid rose, in my Gamone garden, that deserves to be designated simply as "pure Rilke":

Having said this, I owe my Antipodes readers a few explanations (in fact, three), because I tend to be somewhat lazy at times.

1. The first reason why the Antipodes blog exudes an aura of drowsiness, from time to time, is that I've been devoting a huge amount of time and effort to the construction of a staircase down into my rose and peony garden. I've been imposing upon myself an information blackout concerning this staircase, which exploits an experimental construction approach! No images will be published before the completion of the project… which has been one of my major recent outdoor efforts at Gamone.

2. The second reason behind my drowsiness is that I've been devoting a lot of energy to the project of starting a legal association, to be named ROYANENSIS, to handle the publication of ancient texts concerning my adopted Royans homeland.

3. The third reason for my other-worldliness is that I've become addicted to the concept of electronic books. It's a huge subject. Basically, inspired by the arrival of the iPad, and the strong words of Steve Jobs on these questions, I've decided to focus upon this kind of software construction, at all levels (including genealogical documents).

For the moment, let's admire quietly the voluptuous roses...

Tranquil but treacherous

This delightful stretch of the Bourne lies below the Trois-Châteaux mountain, which separates Choranche from Pont-en-Royans.

The mountain was so-named because because medieval sentinels, posted on its slopes, could keep watch over three impressive feudal domains down in the Royans: the Bâtie fortress of the powerful Bérenger lords, the Flandaines castle erected on clifftops (reputedly inviolable, and consequently razed to the ground, in a fit of jealousy, by king Louis XI) and the exotic castle of Rochechinard, whose ruins are still perfectly visible today.

At this spot, the Bourne emerges from beneath the Rouillard Bridge, near the ancient mill of my neighbor Jack Oyhancabal, and flows just twenty meters down from the road, alongside a convenient parking zone for vehicles.

As everywhere in the Bourne, there are huge fragments of limestone—some as big as a house—that have tumbled down from the slopes in remote eras.

This is an ideal place for sunbathers and trout fishermen.


But the river, so tranquil most of the time, can become abruptly treacherous. Passers-by who have the privilege of being able to read French would do well to take notice of warning signs put up at this spot, and elsewhere alongside the Bourne between Choranche and Pont-en-Royans.

The meaning of this pair of signs can only be grasped, however, by local people who are already fully aware of the situation.

—The top sign, of an old-fashioned and straightforward appearance, has been pasted over an earlier version in which the phrase "Il est dangereux" was not yet in upper-case characters. We're told that it's dangerous to wander around in the river or on the banks of gravel (?) because the water level can change abruptly as a result of the presence of hydroelectric works and dams upstream.

— The lower sign is inextricably complicated. First, it's funny to discover that the sign has been installed by two quite different partners, who apparently combined their efforts in order to design this warning message: the national EDF authority (in charge of French electricity), and the local AAPPMA (fishing association). Maybe the presence of the latter partner is due to the fact that trout fishermen are the most vulnerable potential victims of surges in the level of the river. Instead of saying this, though, the fishing folk have terminated the sign by a couple of lines of banal propaganda, in red letters: "The river is a fragile environment. Thanks for avoiding all pollution." Then they've inserted their big colorful logo. But the most intriguing part of this sign, by far, is the small print about a so-called "warning wave". Truly, few passers-by could be expected to imagine what this might be. I myself, having lived here for 17 years, have never actually seen such a "warning wave", but local folk have told me about this phenomenon. To understand the situation, you have to go upstream a few kilometers. Unknown to most of the tourists who drive past on a road up on the slopes, there is a dam on the Bourne, just upstream from the village of Choranche, and it backs up a big lake.

From time to time, after high rainfall up on the Vercors plateau, or following the melting of snow, the EDF authorities realize that they'll be obliged to release a lot of the water that has been accumulating in the lake. Now, they've invented the notion of a "warning wave" as a way of letting people know, between Choranche and Pont-en-Royans, that the river is about to evolve into a roaring torrent. That's to say, five minutes before opening the valves completely, they release a relatively small quantity of water: just enough to let sunbathers and fishermen know that they should immediately scramble out of the water and up the banks to safety, before the massive overflow reaches them. Those EDF people are thoughtful, aren't they…

Not long after my arrival in Choranche, I recall a sunny afternoon when I was having a beer at the Jorjane in the village of Choranche, and chatting with Georges. We were annoyed by the repeated shouting of what sounded like a few boisterous youths wandering around in the woods alongside the Bourne. It took us about twenty minutes to realize that the cries came from stranded fishermen. Meanwhile, fortunately, village folk who were more alert than Georges and me had called the local firemen, who rapidly got the fishermen out of trouble.

Incidentally, the fly-fisherman seen in the above photos is in a particularly dangerous situation, because there's a vertical cliff behind him, and he would have to wade across the river to get to safety.

Bunyip still protecting lizards

In my article of 15 April 2010 entitled My bunyip has broken a leg [display], I explained that temperature variations had split a stone that has been lying in front of the house for ages. But this fracture hasn't prevented my bunyip from persevering in its protection of lizards, much to the disgust of Sophia.

I'm always amazed to realize that the dog's sense of smell is sufficient to inform her whether or not there's a lizard hiding behind the bunyip. A universe in which even tiny lizards have a distinctive odor must be a fabulous place.

After waiting impatiently for the lizard to reappear (which it never does, because I would suppose that the reptile senses the presence of a predator), Sophia resorts to barking… which provides the lizard with an additional motivation to lie low. At that stage, to break the vicious circle, I often intervene by moving the bunyip a little, which gives the lizard an opportunity of dashing to a more tranquil shelter. Sometimes, though, the lizard makes the fatal mistake of moving too close to Sophia, who instantly breaks the reptile's spine.

Bob's shoulder

My ex-neighbor Bob (who has become one of my regular visitors at Gamone) has just dropped in to pick up his mail.

During his career as a top-grade rugby player, Bob received a lot of knocks. But none of those rugby incidents ever did him as much damage as his recent bicycle collision with a tractor. During the last month or so, while his fractured collarbone was mending, Bob has been constantly in pain, and he's still unable to move his right arm freely. His doctor has just learned from a scan that Bob's shoulder joint was smashed in the accident, and will necessitate surgery. Fortunately, an orthopedic specialist in nearby Romans was able to put Bob in contact with one of the leading European surgeons in this field, and he'll no doubt be undergoing an operation in the near future.

Knowing that he'll be out of action for a couple of months, Bob has asked me to search the Internet for information about computer tools in the domain of landscape gardening (akin to the computerized design tools used by architects). This was Bob's initial profession, many years ago, until his firm folded up. So, he's wondering whether his forthcoming convalescence might provide him with an unexpected opportunity of moving back into this kind of work. I'll do my best to provide Bob with useful information, because I've come to appreciate the rude but sympathetic common sense of this friendly guy.

Intellectually, it's a fact that we agree about almost nothing. Bob seems to believe in the antiquated biology of Jean-Baptiste de Lamarck, rather than that of Charles Darwin. Besides, he has always believed in various miraculous cures for rugby injuries. But our disagreements have become a regular pretext for splendid friendly debates, of an uplifting nature, on the sunny terrace in front of Gamone.

Mosques

Whenever my donkey Moshé sees me approaching, he leaves his companion Mandrin and dashes over towards me. I think his eagerness has something to do with the ingrained hope that I might be bearing oats or apples. Be that as it may, it's clear that my donkeys are not exactly starving.

The reason I've mentioned my friend Moshé is because of the name I gave him, which (as I've often explained in my blog) is the Hebrew version of Moses. It's a good name. I've always felt that my dear Provençal donkey—with a dark cross on his back—would be perfectly capable of wandering around in the wilderness for 40 years in an attempt to lead God's chosen children into a land where milk and honey were flowing. That's the sort of straightforward challenge that my donkey would adore. The only problem with this name is that my neighbor Madeleine got it wrong, right from the start. She called my donkey Mosquée, which is the French word for a Muslim mosque. My lovable beast was transformed overnight into an ecumenical symbol of the three great monotheistic belief systems… which, for an atheist such as me, was truly an unexpected gift from God.

Pat Condell is a 60-year-old English intellectual and stand-up comedian. Richard Dawkins said of him: "Pat Condell is unique. Nobody can match his extraordinary blend of suavity and savagery. With his articulate intelligence he runs rings around the religious wingnuts that are the targets of his merciless humour. Thank goodness he is on our side." I found this excellent video on the website of the RDFRS [Richard Dawkins Foundation for Reason and Science]:



It's weird, indeed alarming, that certain religions are in fact power systems whose purpose consists of seeking to dominate humanity. It's good that we realize this, in order to remain constantly vigilant.

POST SCRIPTUM: I'm dismayed to find my intellectual hero Dawkins using the American slang term "wingnuts" to designate folk who are already the object of nice epithets such as "loonies", "fuckwits", etc. I belong to the generation of former cyclists who used real-life wingnuts to secure their wheels. So, for me, these devices evoke tender joyful memories. As a substitute for the derogatory use of "wingnut", I quite like "arsehole" (with British spelling), but Moshé (alias Mosquée) and I reject unequivocally, for obvious reasons, the US spelling "asshole". For similar reasons, I once sent an email complaint to a fellow who dared to designate Bill Clinton disparagingly as a "donkey dick". Insults are fine, and I approve of them wholeheartedly, but they need to be conceived with a blend of rigor and finesse.

Nothing like Sam

To sense the spirit of Australia, you might like to look at a ridiculous antiseptic touristic video, entitled There's nothing like Australia, in which the name of our nation is screamed out, unnaturally, as Aus-stray-lee-YAH:



To my mind, a better way of envisaging Australia would consist of watching tomorrow's tennis female final at Roland-Garros.


I'm convinced that our Samantha Stosur will win, because she's a fabulous Aussie freak, of the kind we all love and admire. Have you seen her muscles? Have you read about how she escaped from death after being bitten by French ticks? Truly, there's nothing like Sam.

BREAKING NEWS: Sam jammed! She left Roland-Garros with a silver plate, not the coveted cup. An Italian publication, admiring her muscles, said that Sam looked like a colored illustration in an anatomy textbook. Fair enough. I have the impression that the reasons for her defeat this afternoon might be found rather in psychology textbooks. At the time of Ernest Hemingway, aficionadas of bullfighting used to say that a potentially successful matador had to be hungry... meaning, not only that his origins had to be humble, near the poverty borderline, but that he had to be inspired by a voracious desire to kill bulls, be applauded and be paid muchas pesetas. If you weren't hungry enough, you would never succeed in tauromachy. Better stick to repairing bikes, working at a meat abattoir, or selling peanuts at the entrance of the arena. As I watched TV images of the finalists about to enter into the arena of Roland-Garros, I had the clear impression that Sam simply wasn't hungry enough. She looked like a politely serious and muscular Brisbane lady about to spend an enjoyable afternoon outdoors, whereas Francesca Schiavone, from the moment we saw her in the dressing room, was like a hungry warrior. And the hungry warrior won.

Exemplary Australian scholarship

I've always known that, when my compatriots decide to tackle seriously various cutting-edge challenges of an intellectual or scientific nature, they are capable of producing world-class results. A typical example of Australian excellence concerns the domain of the computer processing of our journalistic heritage.

Click the banner to discover a fabulous website that offers us access to our nation's newspapers from 1803 to 1954. Needless to say, my praise of this kind of historical and technological effort is unbounded, since it enables every one of us to explore freely the events of our past.

My grandfather Ernest William Skyvington [1891-1985] once told me of his arrival in Sydney on Christmas Day, 1908. He described the thrill of seeing excited crowds at the Rushcutter Bay stadium, the following day (known traditionally as Boxing Day), awaiting the monumental match (which would go down in history) between the white man Tommy Burns and the Negro Jack Johnson. What a fabulous symbol for a young lad who has just arrived in the Antipodes. The website offers us a short article concerning this match:

I'll surely be spending many long hours in front of this wonderful Australian website, which can reveal so many secrets about our past. As you might imagine, I jumped immediately onto the issue of The Sydney Morning Herald dated 24 September 1940… when my peephole opened at the Runnymede maternity clinic in Grafton. Well, I'll let you share my joy (if you're interested in this kind of archaic stuff) by discovering that the king of England himself made a celebrated wartime speech on that very day. Personally, alas, I was far too young to hear him. Indeed, I'm not sure that anybody did.

Gamone strawberries

At this time of the year at Gamone, it has always been a delightful early-morning ritual for me to pick and eat a handful of strawberries, chilled by the night air. I have to move swiftly, otherwise various equally-avid insect consumers are ready to attack. That's to say, strawberries at Gamone have no time to grow old. Nipped in the bud. They are sensual fruit. Authentic nymphs. This morning, I was amused to discover this juvenile "topless" specimen, which I devoured voraciously, with concupiscence, straight after taking the photo:

Let's call a spade a spade. As far as young strawberries are concerned, I tend to be a pedophile werewolf. I'm so evil in an Epicurean way that I don't even give my young strawberries a chance of maturing. Now, having made this coming-out, I'm aware that this image of a nubile strawberry is likely to be banned in my native land of Australia by the censorship services of Stephen Conroy, acting in liaison with countless Catholic clerics. But I bet the bastards like strawberries.

Israel, bad news

Everybody knows that, for centuries, Jews have had a hard time… to put it mildly. The Holocaust revealed unequivocally that God does not exist. The tragic emergence of the modern state of Israel provided certain naive observers with the proof that a Hebrew Yahveh not only existed, but was encouraging his chosen flock to hate Palestinians: a weird idea for a supposedly universal deity.

Today, those who care about Palestinians are bundled into buses with blanked-out windows. Israel doesn't want to acknowledge the existence of humans who are worried about Palestinians. Through this disgusting concealment administered by the Hebrew nation, such individuals are designated as bad news for Israel, to be hidden from the people and the world. But the really bad news, alas, is "modern Israel".

Doing things on a computer

Using my iMac to communicate through blogs is an interesting activity. In associated domains, I'm fond of Twitter, but I see it as subservient to blogging, or simply as a convenient means of pointing to exceptional things on the web. On the other hand, I get bored by Tweeters such as Nassim Nicholas Taleb (the Black Swan guy) who stretch over backwards in attempts to impress us with 140-character aphorisms. As for Facebook, I find it totally uninteresting, if not vulgar.

I've become accustomed to using my iMac in two or three other ways. Above all, I devote a lot of energy to writing, using the excellent Pages tool from Apple. I've also built various websites, mainly for fun. A typical example is this short presentation of the medieval hermit Bruno [1030-1101] who inspired the foundation of the order of Chartreux monks:


The following archaic example is an online sales demo that I produced for a competition. I rarely show it to anybody these days, because it incorporates unpleasant audio clicks, which I put in deliberately (a decade ago, I thought that was smart). I've lost the source code, otherwise I would eliminate these annoying sounds:


To build these websites, I've been using a tool named Flash, now marketed by Adobe. Long ago, before getting carried away by Flash, I used to create conventional HTML websites by means of a dull tool named Dreamweaver, also marketed now by Adobe. Here's a satirical example, designed in pure HTML, which dates from 2003:


Today, alas, a big problem has arisen concerning Flash: Steve Jobs doesn't like it, and he prohibits it on both the iPhone and the iPad!


Click the above photo to access an article entitled Thoughts on Flash in which the CEO of Apple makes it clear why there won't be any Flash stuff turning up on their iPad device.

Let's suppose that, contrary to my article of February 2010 entitled Second look at iPad weaknesses [display], I were to become concerned by, or even interested in, this new device… primarily because of its potential in the domain of electronic books. If this shift in attitude were to occur (as I think it will), then what should I do about my longstanding commitment to Flash? The answer to that question reflects the fact that "longstanding commitments" simply don't exist in the computing domain, where things are evolving constantly, and we have to accept all kinds of changes, including those that look at first like disturbances. So, obviously, I should abandon Flash… But what should I put in its place?

Steve Jobs provides us with a serious answer, maybe the only serious answer: HTML5, that's to say, the upgraded variety of HTML that the World Wide Web Consortium is currently examining. Apparently, there are significant parts of this future standard that are already operational, as long as you build your sites by means of a "good editor" (such as the latest version of Dreamweaver), and read them with a "good browser" (such as Safari). And of course, any vague feeling you might have that the computing world is becoming more-and-more Apple-dominated is just pure coincidence…

But that's not all. I wrote my first computer programs in 1958, when I was working with IBM in Sydney. Today, I'm still fascinated by computer programming, but purely as a hobbyist. If this new beast known as the iPad is here to stay (as would appear to be the case, at least for a while), then I've decided that it might be a good idea to learn how to write programs for it. In that way, I would surely feel less frustrated about abandoning Flash, whose scripting was a kind of Canada Dry ersatz for real programming.

Archaeolodog

This corner of my house was the place where the farmer kept pigs.

The big door on the right provides access to a kind of prison cell, about two meters wide and two meters deep: large enough to house a hog, a sow and their offspring. The trap door on the left opens inwards, enabling the farmer to feed the pigs. On warm days, this corner of the building must have had a powerful smell.

The earth in the corner below the trap door is unusually fine, almost sandy, for reasons I don't know. Maybe former Gamone dogs used it as a cool dusty place to drowse. I've noticed that my Sophia is vaguely interested in this soft earth, and the presence of an oval depression suggests that she probably takes a nap there from time to time. Well, this morning, I was intrigued to see Sophia using her snout energetically to eject three ceramic fragments from the depression. She even walked away with one fragment clenched between her teeth. Was it possible that these old fragments might still retain odorous molecules that my dog was keen to "taste"? I promptly washed the fragments, and tried to imagine their origin.

It had been a fine earthenware bowl, no doubt created on a potter's wheel. But much of the glaze coating on the inside has been chipped away, suggesting that it had been produced by an inexpert craftsman, who hadn't fired the object correctly, maybe in a primitive kiln. I glued the fragments together.

It looked like an ancient soup bowl.

Even with so much of it missing, the old bowl retains its elegant form.

I imagine a farmer, once upon a time, sitting here at Gamone, gazing out towards the Cournouze and scooping up his meager vegetable soup from this lovely old bowl.

Although I've always known that my dog was unusually intelligent, this is the first time she has displayed a taste for archaeology.

Franco-British leave

When somebody disappears abruptly, we say in English that he has "taken French leave". In a similar situation, the French would say that he has "left in an English manner". (There's another amusing example of Franco-British passing the buck. The contraceptive device known in Britain as a "French letter" is designated by the French as an "English overcoat".) So, I'll split the difference and say that my family of mésanges (common tits) has taken Franco-British leave of Gamone.

I had imagined confusedly that the parents, on the eve of their departure for Africa (or wherever they plan to spend summer), would drop in on me for a moment to show me the babies, bid me au revoir (see you next winter), and maybe even thank me for my hospitality. But no, they simply packed up their stuff (maybe during the early hours of the morning) and disappeared, without a chirp. Maybe the family of mésanges will return here next winter, with scores of others, but I'm not sure I'll recognize them. I've never been good at remembering faces. Besides, they'll all have a suntanned look after spending the summer months outdoors in a place like Africa or Arabia.

Restaurant facelift at Pont-en-Royans

The restaurant and bar known as Le Picard at Pont-en-Royans are composed of two former cafés, which were united a few years ago by the present owner, my friend Jean-Noël Soulié. Attempting to sell his establishment, he has just given the combined façades a new coat of paint, to make them look a little more uniform.

I wondered why Jean-Noël didn't take advantage of this repainting to create a spectacular vision: for example, the name LE PICARD plastered across the entire combined façade. Well, I've just learned that this whole repainting operation was carried out under the strict control of French state authorities who dictated exactly the colors, dimensions and forms that were to be employed. The outcome, in any case, is high-class. It'll be interesting to see what kind of potential buyers might be attracted by this exceptional but high-cost affair. An obvious restraint must be respected. The future purchaser will need to step into the shoes of a fellow who actually played rugby in the local team. But, whenever we start talking about such-and-such an individual who cannot possibly be replaced, facts and imagination inevitably replace him overnight.

In memory of my grandmother

Upon the death of his wife in 1964, my grandfather Ernest Skyvington reacted in the style of a prosperous businessman and dutiful Anglican citizen (who played chess regularly with the dean of the cathedral) by sponsoring the installation of a magnificent stained-glass memorial window in Grafton's Christchurch Cathedral… which is by far the finest of the rare Skyvington evocations in my birthplace.

At my humble level, I find myself celebrating differently the memory of my grandmother Kathleen Pickering [1889-1964] by researching and writing about her ancestry. I have just produced a new downloadable version of chapter 7 [download PDF file] of my monograph entitled They Sought the Last of Lands.

Awkward doorways

I've always been intrigued by this series of three doorways that give out directly onto the main road entering Pont-en-Royans from the Drôme.

A passerby has the impression that it's a long while since anybody ever opened any of these doorways. In the case of the one on the right, severely attacked by humidity, its days of being opened are surely a thing of the past. I refer to them as "awkward" because the proprietor of a doorway, prior to opening it, would need to ask the gendarmes to halt the traffic on the road. And I don't think these busy officers would be happy to intervene in that way for any significant length of time.

The proprietor of the middle doorway (and the space behind and above it) is none other than my neighbor Dédé Repellin, whose photo appeared at the top of my recent article entitled Down by the riverside [display]. A few weeks ago, Dédé told me the full story of his curious doorway. To appreciate the details, you need to know that, at the rear of this building with the road-level doorways, there's a prominent and ancient street: the rue du Merle (Blackbird Street), which lies two or three stories higher than the doorways and the road. Dédé purchased this place long ago, and he used the upper space (not shown in these photos), giving out onto Blackbird Street, as his workshop, enabling him to look after his trade vehicle. In the space above his doorway, to the right of the wooden ladder, you can see a curious box structure, composed of concrete bricks and apparently fixed to the far wall. Well, this was in fact a cavity that Dédé built so that he could drive his vehicle into the workshop, up at the Blackbird Street level, and then crawl down underneath it, inside this concrete box, to change the sump oil. Fair enough. He could still do that, if he wanted to… but Dédé's personal garage at Choranche offers him, today, a more comfortable environment in which to replace his sump oil.

The most amusing part of the story concerns the stuff to be found today behind Dédé's road-level doorway. Apparently, long ago, he bought a secondhand metal lathe, weighing a ton, and installed it in the space behind that door. It's still there, and Dédé would be thrilled to be able to make use of this precious equipment. But this is unthinkable as long as he's faced with the problem of opening and closing that doorway. So, the ideal solution would consist of extracting the metal lathe from that place and reinstalling it up at the Repellin home in Choranche (just down from my place at Gamone). But this transfer would be a major undertaking, requiring that the road be blocked for a period of at least a few hours, so that a mobile crane could be brought in to grab the lathe and lift it onto a truck. Dédé has concluded that a such a project is far too complicated to be imagined. Consequently, his precious metal lathe is likely to remain forever imprisoned behind the old brown door.

Incidentally, this story suggests that vague dreams may have been unfolding in Dédé's mind, a few days ago [see my earlier blog], while he watched the movements of the giant mobile elevator work platform…