In Hiding

SSSSHHHHHHHHH! We're in hiding. We're in the cupboard under the stairs. Don't make a sound. We'll all squash up a bit so you can come in too. Yes, I know it's a bit dark but we've got our wind up torches so don't worry. OK, comfortable?

So what are we doing in here? Simple. We're hiding from possibly the most annoying child in the world who's staying in our cottage for 2 weeks - and today is only the first day!

Why is it that some guests assume that not only have they booked your cottage, but they've also taken an option on your life? The joy of our little cottage is that it is very secluded with it's own garden and pool, so guests can tuck themselves away and don't need to even see us if they don't want to. The other side of the coin is that guests can tuck themselves away and you don't even need to see them which is kind of how we like it.

In the space of a day we've gone from one extreme to another. The last guests, who've stayed with us before, arrived last Saturday and with the exception of going to the supermarket to get supplies on the first day, didn't move from one weekend to the next, to the point that I even went and spied on them to make sure they hadn't pegged it in some bizarre suicide pact - two heads in the gas oven or something, or been viciously slaughtered in their beds by Colombian Drug barons (well you never can tell, can you?). Fortunately they were alive and well and thoroughly chilled out.

The next guests arrived with MACIW, aged 5, who has spent most of the afternoon knocking on the door - the record was 8 times in 5 minutes - wanting to know where the cats are, where's the dog, can I take her for a walk, where's the lead, can I come in your house, I want to go in your back garden, that cat scratched me, where's the lead, the dog won't come out of the bushes, you still haven't got me the lead ........... and on and on.

In desperation I decided the only thing was to go out to the supermarket and get a bit of shopping and respite. DS, driven half demented by the constant banging on the door, because she doesn't just knock once, she keeps on knocking until you answer, volunteered to come too. That's how bad it was.

So I grabbed my bag and we left the house, saying goodbye to M.A.C.I.W as we went.

"Why do I have to stay on my own with the dog?" she asked.

"You don't" I replied through gritted teeth, "you can go back to your Mum and Dad".

"Can't" she said "They've gone out".

"Don't be a ninny, of course they haven't"

So we went to check. The car was missing so we went and knocked on the door and the parents were missing too!

I'm not often speechless but on this occasion I was. They had actually gone out, leaving a 5 year old unattended, in a 2 acre garden with two swimming pools. I could only assume that they thought I would mind their little darling - which I probably would have if they'd only asked.

With only 15 minutes left until the shops closed, DS offered to babysit MACIW whilst I at least went to the village to get some milk.

Up in the village, who should I see but the Irresponsible Parents browsing properties in the window of an estate agent.

I'm not by nature a confrontational person but I have to admit to seeing red.

I marched over and told them they had no right to leave their child alone at the cottage, that I didn't offer childminding services, that I had no idea that their child was alone so if she'd wandered off or fallen in the pool I'd have had no idea as I certainly hadn't been watching out for her and that luckily for them, DS had offered to stay with her while I went out. Remember Madeleine McCann, I felt like shouting!

They had the good grace to at least be very embarrassed and apologetic, saying that they'd asked her to come along but she wanted to stay with the dog so they didn't see the harm.

I gently explained that the 45,000 euro fine I would receive if MACIW drowned in one of the pools would cause me harm, thanks very much.

Can you believe some people? I'm all for guests having a nice relaxing time on holiday but why do some people seem to relinquish all responsibility the moment they arrive.

So, now we are hiding under the stairs in case MACIW comes over again, but so far, not a sight of her. Maybe the Irresponsible Parents got the hint.

Still, we aren't planning to come out until after dark....... just in case.

If you don't hear from me for a few days, you'll know we're still in hiding.

It's a funny sort of day

It's been a funny sort of day, one of those days when you feel strangely detached from reality. (Actually, the days I feel strangely detached from reality seem to far outnumber the ones that I feel attached to!) You know, when you walk into the kitchen then can't remember why you are there, completely failing to notice the vat of chilli con carne bubbling over on the stove, then walk out again. "MUUUuuuuummMMMMM, you've burned the tea again" shouts DS while at the same time failing to rouse himself from 'doing his homework' (on the Wii?). Ah well, at least I've only burnt the tea. Last year it was the whole kitchen, but that's for another day.

I put it down to the weather. Two sunny days in a row after what seems like years of rain has thrown me completely. That or spending the day filling in our French tax return. A greater work of fiction than Mme Bovary. It's not that we are evading tax or anything, it's just that the French and English tax years don't coincide so I have to do a certain amount of 'intelligent' projection. All well until they phone you, as they did last year, to ask you how you arrived at your figures. ''Errrrr, not entirely sure' I smiled.

I can't seem to concentrate on doing anything and a million and one unfinished jobs surround me. With the return of the sun came the return of the flies so I dug out my lovely silk fringed fly screen to hang over the door - also a good chicken deterrent as mine have no compunction about coming into the house whenever the mood takes them. But I got distracted and left it on a chair, so now Mad Baz is having an eppie in it and it and he are all tangled up. I've extracted him three times but it's obviously the most fun he's had in years and he's straight back in before I have a chance to move it.

He's now alternatively sitting on my lap, walking on the keyboard, deleting my post and nibbling fingers, nose (ouch! Fang up the nostril - nasty!) , toes, anything he can sink his pearly whites into.

I have a broody hen, the first one ever, who's sitting entranced on her little pile of eggs. Boy will she get a shock when he little chicklets hatch and she discovers they are three times as big as her. She's a tiny little bantam but she's sitting on a pile of eggs from one of our Marans, which are one of the larger breeds of hen. I can identify with that. It'll be pretty much like the shock I had when all 10lb 13ozs of DS was handed to me. He had a full head of hair, looked 6 months old and was practically walking (unlike me, who struggled to walk for months afterwards!). I've no idea what we need to do for maman-to-be so today maybe I'll do a bit of research. She looks very contented, all puffed up and oblivious to the world. That must be nice. No need to worry about bills, break-ins, how to get the pool to change from a delicious Chartreuse green to clear blue in three weeks when the first guests arrive, no housework. All she has to do is sit.

I had an appointment at the Gendarmerie today to 'porter plainte' about our losses in the theft at the Salle des Fetes at the weekend. Gendarme Adjoint S was barely out of nappies, with a fresh crop of pimples and a very large gun. It was quite weird to think that this young boy could pull his gun and shoot someone dead. I have a huge horror of guns. Must have been shot dead in a past life. That doesn't however, explain my morbid fear of toilet cisterns. There's no word for a fear of toilet cisterns although I know I'm not alone. I listened to a phone in on phobias years ago and someone else phoned to say they were terrified of toilet cisterns. "Hooray", I thought, "I'm not alone!"

Epibiphobia is a fear of teenagers. I've definitely got that if it means a fear of your children turning into knuckle dragging, hissy fitting teenagers, rather than a fear of teenagers per se. There's even a fear of chopsticks for goodness sake, Consecotaleophobia but no word for a fear of toilet cisterns. I feel robbed!

M. Le Gendarme Adjoint is going to personally interview everyone who holds a spare key for the village hall, probably most of the village I would think, to see if he can get to the bottom of the break in. He's also told us he'll be going to visit M. Le Maire to tell him that he is responsible for our losses. That should go down like a pork chop in a synagogue!


The Conquering Hero phoned to tell me that due to a much better offer, sorry, a business meeting with the director of his current tv series in Dublin, he won't be able to get back on the 14th June to see DD in her starring role in the end of school play then have dinner with some horsey friends. He'd probably rather have dinner with the horses than the friends themselves anyway, which would be useful as he could then suss out which end is which, which would be a huge step forward! Did I mind? Well, not really as he's missed all the shows, both Christmas, end of term and Carnaval for the past three years so I don't think it makes much difference.

CH had to have a tooth removed today and was in much pain. (Much pain.... try childbirth!). He broke it months ago but was too busy to see a dentist so he paid the price when he spat it out with his Aquafresh into the bathroom sink. I was suitably sympathetic, and made lots of soothing noises. Well, you have to, don't you. He called me back later to recount the soft, squishy things he's managed to eat for tea. "Don't write about this in your blog" he told me. "OK", I said.

Tonight is Karate night, which is just an excuse for the mums to nip off for a drink or a coffee leaving our little darlings in the care of the smallest karate teacher in Europe, possibly the world. DS takes it terribly seriously, and you can see that every chop and kick is, mentally at least, aimed at his sister. DD, laughs, pulls faces, gets her feet the wrong way round and farts occasionally! Money well spent if you ask me.

Mother's Day

Mother's Day (which occurs on a different day here in France) passed in a heady whirl of cards and flowers, chocolates and breakfast in bed, smiling, shiny children and a loving, thoughtful husband. And then I woke up.

Reality hit me in the face like a wet kipper.

"DON'TA", "STOPA", wailed DD as the replay of the Hundred Years War, which has been raging in our house since puberty kicked in, continued into another day.

"MUUUuuuuuUUUUUM" she called in that special whiny way that is genetically programmed into girls at birth. "He's bugging me".

Huge sigh.... all I want for Mother's Day is peace and a day without the inane bickering that they have developed into something of an art form.

DS has sent me an e-card. "Don't forget to smile", it said. Do you think he's trying to tell me something? It's hard to smile when both little darlings spend their waking hours devising new and more inventive ways to wind each other up to the max. DD has made two cards, one with a sweet little poem in French, and painted a little mirror for me.

The Conquering Hero makes a lovely big breakfast with all the trimmings. Yum. Then we set off for a vide grenier in Monflanquin, one of the most beautiful villages in France, though how anything can look truly beautiful on the ten millionth day of rain in the Sunny Southwest is beyond me, in search of that rare thing in France, THE BARGAIN.

We pass by the Salle des Fetes, where a local cat charity is having an art competition and where my little business, Izzy Bean, has a stand selling our gorgeous candles and superb garden accessories. I've got the day off so a colleague is manning the stand. As we pass, I notice two gendarmes standing in the doorway. 'How nice of them to turn up and support us' I thought.

We eventually found the vide grenier and paddled around a damp field looking for suitable 'tudor' looking items for the CH's latest production with mixed success.

Having now not eaten for nearly an hour DD and DS announced that they were ravenous and with the rain falling steadily we headed for the clubhouse (it was at a football club). There we endured that peculiar sort of organised chaos that is endemic in France. Go to the cashier, tell her what you want and get tickets indicating your choices. Go to this lady for your drinks, that man for your sandwich and outside for your chips. All this has to be achieved while negotiating your way through a French queue which is like a rugby scrum but you keep your hands to yourself. Queue is French for tail but a French queue resembles the tail of some sort of Medusa like being, with people joining from all sides, much pushing and shoving and irate calls of 'c'etait moi d'abord' (I was first) and 'Enleve tes mains de mon cul?' (take your hands off my a**e).

Still, the chips were good.

We head home via another town, where we stop for a cup of hot chocolate. The cafe is full so we sit outside and enjoy a bit of French cafe life - looking out on leaden skies and torrential rain. 'Il pleut comme les vaches qui pissent' comments DD. (It's raining like pissing cows!) Remind me again why we decided to bring our children up in France?

We set off for home where I find a message from my colleague to say that there was a break in at the Salle des Fetes and most of our merchandise has been stolen - hence the gendarmes. Don't let anyone tell you that there is no crime in rural France. This is the third break-in in two weeks. The idiot Maire failed to mention this one intsy little fact when the keys were collected nor that he had not had the broken lock repaired although he had had a meeting about it. Only in France! No doubt the burglar couldn't believe his luck that he could just walk into the hall again and nick a whole load more stuff. The gendarmes said we should have slept in the hall - yeah, and take on the burglars single handed. What's the point of a police force then? It's not exactly like they are overworked! End result, no insurance cover and no claim for replacement of our stolen goods.

The perfect end to a perfect Mother's Day.

On a more positive note and with a great deal of maternal pride, I can announce that DD won the first prize in her age group (clearly takes after her mother!) and as her two entries were so good and the judges couldn't choose between them, they created a special prize for the most humourous card. Thassmygirl!

I lied...

Was it only yesterday I said that I loved my children? How things can change in 24 hours. It all started to go wrong when we had a sudden, very heavy downpour last evening. Earlier in the day DS and DD had been hanging out of the velux window (does that constitute reckless endangerment do you think?) flying some daft 75 cent wind up bird thing which they naturally got stuck in a gutter. After much prodding and poking said bird was removed from the gutter but do you suppose they shut the window?

It was only several hours later, as the rain continued to fall in stair rods, that DS happened to mention to DD that perhaps, possibly, maybe she may have left her window open. I rushed in to find water cascading down the open velux window straight onto her bed and the large pile of ironing that my dearest Mother had spent the last week sorting out, and which, of course, she had been asked to put away.

Now, being as I am a domestic disaster rather than a domestic goddess, the windows were probably last cleaned at the turn of the century, so the water which was now spreading across the bed, the ironing and the floor was a nasty shade of brown. End result, her mattress looks like the last resting place of a serial incontinent. Did I calmy clean up and say "never mind, darling, accidents happen" or did I scream like a banshee with PMT. You guess!

(I'm just having a quick break to restart my heart. My youngest cat just decided to jump onto the desk which is on a galleried landing, overjumped and just about sailed straight over the bannister. I had to grab him by his tail which now looks a good few centimetres longer. Talk about news as it happens eh?)

Back to my blog....

So DD had no option, or rather I had no option, but to let her sleep in my bed with all the midnight whacks in the face, grinding of teeth and speaking in tongues that that will entail - her not me I hasten to add.

When I finally made it to bed after seemingly hours of picking up clothes dropped on the bathroom floor, empty glasses left under the table (where else?), shoes missing their mates and other assorted detritus, I sought (blimey, couldn't remember how to spell that for a minute) the sanctuary of my bedroom where DD was doing a passable imitation of the Vitruvian man, mouth hanging open and snoring gently. Great.

I collected up the jumbled arms and legs and deposited them over to the other side of the bed and hopped in ready to endure another chapter of Carol Drinkwater's 'The Olive Harvest'. I've never come across a writer who can use so many adjectives that it makes my head spin. Still, I press on.

A peaceful 10 minutes pass before DS appears claiming that the storm overhead is stopping him sleeping and can he get into my bed too. (Thank god DH is away!) DS, despite being only 12, is already 5'7 so it's no mean feat to squash us all into the bed, despite it being a superking.

I can hear my mother's doomladen warning ringing in my ears. "You're making a rod for your own back letting the children sleep in your bed" she said when they were but little nippers. But even I thought it was fair to assume that by the time teenagedom was approaching they might have kicked the habit.

So, a very long, very sleepless night, for me at least, followed as I tried my best to hang on to the few square centimetres they had left me, fought for the pillows and prodded assorted snorers and teeth grinders. Eventually at 6am, Basil, my mad kitty decided to come and chew my nose, so that was the end of another rejuvenating night.

Talking of noses, I'm sporting a very sore one today. I tried to peer through a shop window which had one of those security grilles behind it. It created some sort of optical illusion (well that's my story anyway) and I didn't realise the glass was so far forward. I ended up nose-butting the window really hard and now have a slightly swollen, slightly purple nose. Only me...thank god I forgot to spend thousands on a nose job all those years ago.