What, you may well ask, was I doing at 3 o'clock yesterday afternoon, drinking beer with a half naked French farmer and his toothless wife?

It wasn't some sort of bizarre 'swinging' thing, although I am reliably informed (by several very unreliable people) that there is an active swinging scene around here. I'm deeply offended that I've never been asked to join!

Before I continue though, I should say that this couple, M et Mme de B are some of the nicest, sweetest people you'll ever meet. They are, however, true French agriculteurs with a rundown farm full of rusting machinery, countless half wild dogs and cats and lots of fleas!

In actual fact I was going to pick up an old school friend of DS who moved to French Guyana a few years ago, but comes back here to spend his summers. Wish I could find someone to have my little darlings for 2 months! The maximum security summer camp is only for a week.

So, we dutifully turned up at 3pm to pick him up from M et Mme de B, with whom he is staying. They invited us in and we sat down at the kitchen table. M, due to the incredible tropical heat we are experiencing, over 30 degrees in the shade yesterday, was stripped down to his shorts. That's the half naked bit sorted then.

We chatted away, or at least they did and I tried to decipher Mme's accent. Its the sort of local accent that you could use to cut granite and the lack of teeth doesn't help. Every other sentence I was whispering out of the corner of my mouth to DS 'whasshe saying?

We talked (I think) about how DS's friend was passing his 2 months in France, had we met up with his Mum when she was over in the Spring, wasn't the weather hot. All the while, waiting for the appearance of said friend. Eventually the son arrived (he's like a mini Sylvester Stallone) so we discussed the impending arrival of his partner's baby, her Braxton Hicks contractions, how difficult it was to be pregnant when it's so flaming hot! Still no friend.

I nodded my head, put in the odd 'oui', 'non' and 'd'accord' and apparently at some stage of the proceedings I said yes to a cold beer. I don't really drink and certainly not during the day in the heat so when it arrived, I explained my misunderstanding and said no to the beer. M de B was having none of it. 'Don't worry, there's no gendarmes around here' he said. Just as well because it's a standing joke among friends how I get stopped by every single gendarme I pass.

Only a few weeks ago I arrived at school with 3 carloads of gendarmes following me.
'Oh look' commented a friend wryly 'here come VLiF with her police escort'!

Eventually, after about 20 minutes of pleasant chat and still no sign of Friend from Guyane, I mouthed to DS 'he's not here is he?' 'No' replied DS.

I backtracked on the conversation and managed to deduce that he was most likely with a Croatian family in the village with an unpronounceable name.

'Ah, il est encore chez Draganononovinic' I slurred. (Told you I can't drink at lunchtime!) 'Oui' they answered in unison, not for one minute wondering why I was, therefore, sitting in their kitchen and not in the kitchen chez Dranogoanivinicic.

We bid our fond adieus, jumped up and down a few times to knock off the fleas and left to try and find chez Dargonvinicicic.

The trouble with Croatians is that they are like policemen, they go everywhere in twos, so we arrived at the little lotissement where live les Dragonvincicivivnics only to find that in our tiny little village, there are, in fact more than one. There are three.

Eventually we were reunited with Friend from Guyane, instantly recognisable by all the flea bits on his legs, which he politely insisted were mosquito bites, and all was well with the world.

Back at the homestead, Mellors the gardener was quietly expiring in the sub-tropical heat but godammit, he still had his shirt on. What's the point of employing a 22 year old gardener if he doesn't at least get his kit off (not all of it you understand)? Note to self to re-write his employment contract. Just my luck that the only bit of chest I've seen today belongs to an elderly French farmer with a paunch you could balance a tray on.

'Gosh, this is like the heatwave in England in 76' I comment. He looks at me blankly. The penny drops. 'You weren't even born then were you?' I ask. 'No ma'am' he replied. (OK, OK, he didn't say ma'am)

I went inside feeling every bit of my 40 something years.

Anyone for chicken.........

Being as this is la France Profonde, no self-respecting person would be seen dead without chickens. So, thanks to a friend who was moving back to the UK I became proud owner of Three French Hens and a stunning cockerel, a huge mass of black and white Brahma. Well if you're going to have a cockerel why now have one that's a statement?

My three French Hens and one French Coq lived in blissful harmony until a 'fouine' (stone marten) came a-calling and brutally murdered two of them. Bloody thing only bit off their heads and left the rest. What a waste.... although I did briefly think about whisking them down to my fearless French neighbour Chantal so she could do the business and we could all enjoy a very large chicken curry... but in the end I couldn't do it so they were rather unceremoniously dumped in the large poubelles at the end of our lane.

Two weeks later and M. Fouine came round again. He hid under the henhouse and ambushed my poor cockerel as he went to bed for the night. Off with his head, leaving me with about 4kgs of dead cockerel. Now I felt that M. Le Coq deserved a better burial but being as we are on bedrock, the chances of digging him a grave without the aid of either dynamite or a rock breaker were minimal so after much deliberation I opted for chucking him in the woods so the local wildlife could dispose of him.

I lugged all 4kgs of him into the woods in my trusty Tubtrug, selected a spot on the edge of a steep drop, said my fond farewells and threw him down the slope. Thing is, I nearly went too. The only way to stop myself was to let go of my Tubtrug and hope for the best. Poor M. Le Coq cartwheeled down the slope in his 'coffin' before coming to rest against a tree with his big yellow feet sticking out!

So, I set off in search of new chickens. You'd kinda thing that this wouldn't be too difficult living as I do in the middle of the French countryside.

I'd been reliable informed that a local market was a good place to start and on arrival I was faced with two benches of old farmers facing each other like some sort of avian standoff, clutching baskets of eggs with cages of rabbits at their feet and piles of chickens, all looking like they had seen better days, with their legs tied together to stop then escaping.

I hung around a bit to see what the form was. An old boy arrived, selected his chicken and was handed it, legs bound, whereon he hung it from the handlebars of his bike and wobbled off into the sunset with the poor bird swinging. All a bit too 'paysan' for me I'm afraid.

I didn't fancy wandering round the market swinging a chicken 'handbag' so I beat a hasty retreat.

Oh well, there must be somewhere else I can get them.