Mad Darby Diaries

I was just leaving the house this morning when a man in a white van stopped and asked me if I bred rabbits.  Mm no. While Houston is suffering devastating floods, we are experiencing drought and hose pipe bans.  Obviously nothing to do with climate change Mr Trump.  I was playing doubles this morning with 3 French women.  Well into the second set Yvette rushed over to the fence and started shouting at a man in his garden.  The other two joined in the chorus and it took me a minutes or two to twig what all the excitement was about.  The man was watering his plants.  At first he ignored them but when they ran off the court brandishing their racquets he put the hose down. After delivering a lecture to the unhappy gardener we resumed our game but the man  kept staring at us and behaving in a furtive manner.  As we changed ends, Yvette shouted at the man, picked up her phone and reported him to the Mairie.  I must remember not to cross t...

Am I mad to play singles tennis in a temperature of 35 degrees?  It was hot this morning and most people my age don't even play tennis let alone in the heat.  I remember when we were living in Khartoum in the Sudan, I used to play squash.  A friend, Valerie and I, used to play at 4.00am when the temperature was in the 30s.  Ok I too was in my thirties then but if you can do it then keep going. After all it is a privilege to reach old age not a right.

I decided to put my house on the market with 2 French Estate Agents and a British company.  After several months of nothing from the British company I questioned whether their high fees may be hindering the viewings, or lack of them. There followed an extraordinary outburst of e mails from the agent accusing me of not trusting him, ignoring his advice, being unco-operative and playing silly games.  The spelling and grammar was atrocious, even though he is English. I replied suggesting his e mail was unprofessional and rather surprising and asking what he was trying to achieve by sending such an e mail.  It got worse.  He threatened to take me off the books as I clearly was obstructive etc. etc.  It was totally bizarre and became more so when he tried to claim that he had sent totally different emails to the ones I had received  rather like Trump and his false memory. I wrote back and cancelled my agreement with the company and I am afraid I said I ne...

It feels sometimes as though it is always the shooting season in France.  It is certainly a dangerous sport for everyone in this country with dozens of people being killed every year.  They not only shoot each other, I assume by accident, although it would be a good cover for murder, but they have killed people going for walks on proper paths and even motorists passing by. Signs are put out on the roads, even major ones, and designated walking routes which say, 'Attention Chasse en cours', in other words be careful you don't get shot.  Err, you are the ones with the guns. This morning in the market while patiently waiting to pay for my myrtilles (blueberries) I saw a Korean lady pick up a punnet of strawberries, add about 8 strawberries from another punnet then go quickly to the front of the queue and throw some coins at the startled lady behind the stall and march off.  I asked the man in front of me whether he had seen it.  He shrugged and said, she is a ...

It was the AGM of our walking group, which is made up of French and British members in equal numbers.  Our AGM took place around a long table where we began with an aperitif, of course. Some of our members speak French and English, some speak only French and others speak only English.  The President, who is French, welcomed everyone and immediately handed over the proceedings to the Treasurer, who was also trying to barbecue our lunch at the same time. Our Treasurer, who speaks French like the policeman in 'Allo 'Allo, tried to talk in French but was shouted down, everyone asking him to speak in English.  The President decided to interpret.  After a couple of agenda items  the Treasurer handed over to the secretary, who happens to be his wife, while he attended to the more important barbecue. The secretary doesn't speak much French either but amazingly after a glass or two of Cremant the tongue loosens and the French flows remarkably well, although little...

Nesting in the eaves of my house are house martins.  There are 4 nests, one right above the back door so for months I have been shoveling up bird muck and hosing down.  Here we are in the middle of August and the little critters are still cosied up in their nests.  I thought birds were supposed  to hatch,  hang around their mother for a couple of weeks and then take off.  But still they stay like 25 year old teenagers refusing to leave their parents' home. In the front of my house I have shutters and behind each shutter there are bats.  Like the birds they have been busy reproducing and yes, you guessed it, leaving their mark all over the window sills.  Yesterday when I noticed that the droppings were about an inch deep behind the shutters I decided to unclip them and with a whoosh all the bats, including the little ones flew out.  Now why can't they fly round the back of the house and tell the birds to do the same so I can say goodbye, ...

Ask French people  to organise something small like who is going in whose car or who is partnering whom in tennis and it can take them half an hour to make a decision but ask them to organise an event including feeding 60, hundreds or over a thousand and they are magnificent. Recently we went to the Car Rally, which is really a race of very old cars and motorbikes but you are not allowed to call it a race because that would involve a whole lot of bureaucracy.  The French are past masters at avoiding their own laws or those of the EU by simply ignoring them.  Unlike the British who scrutinise and analyse every line and go to great lengths to ensure that everyone adheres to them, no matter how stupid the law. The British would have got on a lot better in the EU if they had taken a leaf out of the French book.  Let the law makers employ their time setting out laws and regulations and then adapt them to your own use. But I digress.  On Sunday I went to a hog ...

The French disappear in August but thankfully I managed to get a game of tennis with a Frenchman yesterday.  He beat me spectacularly but we both did an awful lot of running and most games went to deuce. There is a small bridge near where I live.  When I say small it is about 75 meters maximum.  It is not a fancy bridge, nor is it old, in fact it looks as though it was made out of those barriers that the police put across the road.  Anyway, they started painting it in May, or at least scraping the paint off, so temporary lights were erected and the daily trip took an extra five minutes.  We had lovely dry, hot weather in June and July but there was little action taking place on the bridge.  This week it started to rain so the painters came along and erected plastic shelters so that they could work in the dry.  It is three months since they started and I would estimate another 3 months before they finish.  Thank goodness they are not painting th...

When my first two sons were aged two and nearly four we were living in a rented house in New York.  I woke early one morning to an eerie quiet apart from the distant sound of running water.  I leapt out of bed and rushed into the bathroom.  Both taps in the sink were full on and two face cloths had been thrown in acting as good as a plug.  Water was overflowing all over the floor. I turned off the taps and rushed into the children's bedroom.  Empty.  I ran downstairs.  At the bottom of the stairs I could turn right into the kitchen or left into the living room.  I turned right.  My bare feet hit inches of water and I got an electric shock.  I leapt back and ran through the living room into the dining room.  Mark and Paul were sitting at the dining room table playing with the scrabble letters, seemingly totally oblivious to the water cascading through the kitchen ceiling and across the dining room floor soaking the carpet.  I...

The truth is that 2 year olds do not understand consequences of their actions unless they have already experienced it.  They are on a journey of discovery so everything needs to be touched and experimented with. Philippe telephoned this morning.  His 2 year old granddaughter had locked herself in the downstairs toilet and it had taken a long time, a great deal of persuasion and a few tears to get her out.  Now Philippe is a retired General and his son is also in the army so one can imagine that one two year old locked in the toilet would be chicken feed to them. So what is worse?  A 2 year old being locked in the toilet or a 2 year old who locks his mother in the basement as my son Mark did, while his brother Paul, who was nearly 4, was getting up to other mischief? A small child locked in the toilet can do a fair amount of damage if they put their minds to it but it is limited.  They can turn the taps on, throw things down the toilet or rip  off the...

I played tennis with Yvette today.  Yesterday I asked if we could play early before the day gets too hot.  She suggested 9.30am.  I was thinking of 8.00am but Yvette has been married 46 years and her husband still brings her breakfast in bed every morning so 9.30 is probably the crack of dawn. I thought I had got used to Yvette's little antics but this morning she behaved like John McEnroe.  I was 4-1 up in the first set when suddenly she announced that the score was 4-3.  I am used to these little tricks so I stood my ground.  She argued, she shouted.  I ignored her and took my position ready to receive serve but her shouting got louder, calling me a cheat and then using some choice words.  Her ploy worked.  I lost concentration and started to lose, eventually losing in a tie break.  I was not happy but said nothing. At the end of the set Yvette asked me if I was angry with her, using the expression 'tu me fais la tete?'  I sa...

When I first came to France even the big supermarkets closed at lunchtime for two hours.  This custom continues for the other shops but I can at least do the supermarket shopping between 12 and 2.00pm.  So in some respects France is dragging itself slowly into last century and some day, long after I am gone, they will face up to this century. Not that everything is like time stood still in France.  Their health service is fully computerised, the payment  system works, there are no delays in seeing a doctor or operations and it would be the envy of the United States if the US ever accepted that other countries can do things better than they can. But I digress.  On one subject the French will not change because it isn't on their radar.  Holidays.  July and August still comes to a virtual standstill, except for the roads, when the French go on holiday.  This week I can't find anyone with whom to play tennis because they have departed for the sou...

I played tennis this morning with Caroline, who is in her late forties so a lot younger than I am.  I told her about my 21 month old grandson who put a tennis ball in the tin then bending down to pick up the second ball the first ball fell out.  He had repeated this exercise for several minutes before my son and I put him out of his misery. We played 2 sets, winning one each.  While I started sweeping the court I noticed Caroline putting a ball in the tin then bending down to get the next one.  The first ball fell out. There doesn't seem to be much difference between toddlers and the middle aged. A friend phoned today to say that he had fallen out of bed and hurt his back.  As he has a king sized bed this would seem difficult to do, so I questioned him further. He said he was sitting on the bed putting on his shorts.  He put both legs in the same hole and didn't notice until he tried to stand up. We don't want to believe we are caricatures of our...

In typical French fashion my garden is not attached to the house.  It is along the road, up a lane and down a path and no matter how many times I shut the gate it is always open when I go there. This garden is about the size of Central Court at Wimbledon and is cultivated by the Triffids.  The Triffids, for those too young to have missed them, scared the hell out of me when I was a child listening to the play on the radio.  And now they are back, haunting me and growing a foot every day, menacing what should be a haven for bees and butterflies. I have tried many ways of taming this wilderness, the most successful being when I asked my neighbour if she would like to grow vegetables on it.  Marie-Jo tackled the garden with a vengeance and soon there were rows of vegetables and fruit bushes.  Then disaster struck.  Her selfish daughter in law ran off with another man so my neighbour went to look after her son and grandchildren.  Within days the Triff...

My family left yesterday and the house is quiet, too quiet.  The tell tale signs of living alone pervade the house.  I put something down and an hour later it is still there.  The kitchen is always clean. I talk to myself - and to the radio, and the television.  In fact I argue with them, which is fairly satisfying as they don't disagree. I don't close the bathroom door and I can go there in the night in the nude. The days have twice as many hours in them. I don't have an excuse not to do all that laundry and wash the floors. I have good memories of their visit and hopefully my daughter in law will send me some photos as once again I forgot to take any.

I kept driving until I reached the Costa del Sol in Spain.  As I was driving through Malaga I noticed a machine on the sidewalk.  Above the machine there was a large notice. 24 hour coffee                  tea          erotic sex

So escaping winter I decided to drive south and to keep driving until I reached warm sun. When I stop in hotels in France I do not get excited about the breakfast.  Continental breakfast means hard bread, cheese, ham or fruit if you are lucky and all charged at an extortionate  price.  Customer service generally is sadly lacking too with a seemingly inability to link customer service with profits. On my feedback form I rated services low.  The wifi didn't work, the toilet didn't flush, the printer in reception didn't work so no receipt etc. I received an e mail from the manager. I'm sorry you didn't enjoy your stay in our hotel. 'It is true that several aspects of the hotel were not functioning during your visit.  Did you enjoy your breakfast?'

After a week without heating and the temperature outside and inside below zero, I decamped to a friend's house for 3 days. Day 1.  I was up early so made myself a cup of tea.  There was a little dish to put used tea bags so I took a teaspoon out of the drawer and put the teabag in the dish with the spoon.  Friend enters kitchen.  Conversation as follows. Friend: 'You have used the coffee spoon.' Me: 'I took it out of the drawer.' Friend: 'But it's  coffee spoon.' Me: 'It's a teaspoon' Confused, I changed the subject. Day 2.  There was already a spoon in the dish.  Aha that must be the coffee spoon, so I took a clean one from the drawer. Friend: 'You've used 2 spoons'. Me: 'No, I took one from the drawer.' Friend:  'How do I know which is today's spoon and which is yesterday's spoon?  And where is the coffee spoon.' Nonplussed I stayed silent while he chuntered on for 5 minutes about spoons. Day...

I volunteered in a French school yesterday.  The aim of the day was to engage French children in English conversation.  The children had questions written down which they had to ask in English.  They were aged between 12 and 16.  Faced with 2 pupils aged 15 I answered the first question clearly and simply but they didn't understand the answer.  A rapid conversation in French passed between them and they then asked me in French if I would write down the answer. 'If I write down the answer you won't learn anything,' I said in French.  They asked the teacher what to do. 'Of course you can write down the answers for them and they can study them  later'! Listening skills?  Speaking skills?  I give up