Coming Home
Well Mrs B and the children made it home safely and all is back to normal.
They were a bit annoyed with the cross-channel ferry company, who let them on-board in England at midnight and then turfed them out of bed and off the boat at 4.00 am. They had imagined that because they had been obliged to pay for a cabin, they would be allowed to ‘sleep-in’ until say 6.00am and then drive the whole length of France slightly refreshed.
Well no, that is not how it works. So a big thumbs-down to the company concerned – it is not really sensible to wake hundreds of people at 4.00am and make them drive for six-ten hours in a state of severe sleep-deprivation. Still I’m sure it was in the small print somewhere.
By the time they got here (about 4pm) none of them could open their eyes, let alone manage a happy smile, so the home-coming was a bit of an anti-climax, as they all went straight to bed.
The main things that they remarked on as being different between the UK and France were, predictably, the traffic levels and shop opening hours. As all our holiday makers tell us, traffic in the UK goes from bad to worse, while we have barely a car to be seen for most of the year.
During July and August the Dutch bring over their enormous people carriers, caravans and camper homes, blocking up the supermarket car park and driving unnaturally slowly, but otherwise all is calm, and France is big enough to absorb plenty of two metre tall Dutch giants and their vehicles.
Apparently the subject of shop opening-hours kept coming up because Mrs B was always trying to hurry people up so she could get to the bank before midday, or to the shops before they closed. Of course, in the UK banks don’t close for lunch and supermarkets never close, so people have forgotten about the need to worry because the milk is running out and the shops will soon be closing for the next two days.
Anyway they are all home safe and sound, and although the cat is missing the Quality Time we spent alone together for two peaceful weeks it’s nice to have things back to normal.
We did have a bit of an emergency yesterday when a parasol next to the pool got plucked from its holder by an unexpected gust of wind and almost garrotted a guest sleeping by the pool, bringing a 21st century meaning to the word ‘guillotining’.
I rushed off to buy something more sturdy – concrete bases with steel pipes in, as it happens – so I think we can avoid that risk now. Only in France would a shop think it a good idea to display these very heavy concrete ‘pieds parasols’ on a shelf at head-height, behind a large range of other concrete slabs and ornaments.
It took me a good 30 minutes re-arranging things and straining myself just to get two of these unnaturally heavy umbrella-bases onto the trolley, and I think I may have developed a curious medical-condition in the process of lifting enormously heavy things around at head height. Funnily enough I didn’t seem able to find a member of staff to help me.
Being the gullible kind of person I am, I then spent another 10 minutes rearranging their display for them so it looked attractive for the next customer. Anyway net result is, no more hacked up guests because the parasols are now firmly bolted into their new bases.