Mad Darby Diaries

When I lived in my last house my neighbour, Marie Jo, used to sing while sweeping her steps, which she did most days.  She had a beautiful voice, soft and melodic and she was an early riser so often I would be woken up at dawn by her singing.  Don't ask me why she felt the need to sweep her steps at dawn but if it made her happy that is all that counts.  Now I live in an apartment where all my neighbours' windows are open all day and night.  I don't hear much noise from within  the apartments, only conversations that go on across the courtyard between the neighbours, all friendly.   Outside my apartment I hear the constant singing of birds.  They gather in the bushes and walls where the cats can't get to them.  I never get tired of hearing birds singing.   Next week I will play golf, the second time this year and clearly not often enough to avoid humiliation. Our international group that meets on a Saturday can cause confusion, lang...

 I know from living in a small village in France that all sorts of shady deals take place without the authorities ever knowing or likely to know.  The black market thrives, the economy suffers but people do their deals and celebrate having 'got one over' on the powers that be.  Since I moved to Saumur, a town, I sailed seamlessly through my MOT thanks to a friend knowing the owner.  Not that anything illegal was done but I didn't have to wait for an appointment and the process was carried out quickly and efficiently.  A few days ago I was telling my neighbour that it was impossible to find a dentist.  The next day she slid a card into my hand and said take this to the dentist, ask for Francoise and say Philippe sent you.  That afternoon I walked round to the address on the card, spotted the lady sporting the name badge with Francoise on it and slid the card across the counter.  I said who I was, that I would like an appointment for a check up and ...

 The other day my neighbour banged on my door and asked to borrow something.  I didn't understand what she meant, so she said blanc en neige.  White on snow.  I shook my head, so she hurried back to her apartment and re-appeared with a bowl containing egg whites.  Ah she wanted a hand mixer to beat the eggs whites but blanc en neige?  Then it clicked, whites to snow.  This conjures up  something so much nicer than ' beat the egg whites until they form soft peaks.' I was trying to phone a dentist but the recorded message said they  would be closed until the 9 May so today I tried again.  Same message except 'en plus' had been added.  Does that mean it could be closed after the 9 May? I wondered.  'Mm', my neighbour said, 'it could mean anything.'  Well if the  French  don't understand it how am I supposed to figure it out? The 9th May is Putin's excuse to show the world that he is important.  Why did every ne...

I know how difficult and expensive, if not impossible, it is to get travel insurance once you reach a certain age, particularly if you have a health issue or even a previous health issue.  However I object to being written off, which has led to my intense dislike of insurance companies.  Although we are living longer and staying healthy in our dotage the insurance companies and banks have decreed that being in your fifties is bordering on personal extinction.  A friend in his fifties is finding it almost impossible to get a 20 year mortgage, and life insurance, a requirement to get the mortgage, is equally challenging to obtain. I was lucky to survive my twenties and thirties, what with being shot at, having operations in barely equipped hospitals , childbirth, frequent international travel and living in countries where your chance of survival was limited.  I am much more likely to survive now except the insurance companies don't see that way.  What makes me eve...

 I have spent the last two weeks with my grandson who is a confident 6 year old, not shy in voicing an  opinion or being critical.  'You're rather hopeless at drawing aren't you Grandma?  I can teach you how to draw a tank.'   'Mm,'  he said, staring at my pathetic efforts, 'you're just not very good at it, are you?'  We visited my adult grandson in Kettering and we were playing hide and seek.  Looking up  at his 6' 4'' uncle he said, 'Would you like a rest because you're not very good at hiding?' He announced yesterday that he had lots of ideas of how to get rid of Trump, Johnson and Putin, and he did, but my favourite was putting them into a car with ejector seats and sending them to syrup land. France has been saved once again from the far right taking control but it there are a scary number of people who support Le Pen.  I am not a fan of Macron but I can tolerate him, although he needs to come down from his high opinion o...

 This is the week all my  sons are gathered in the same place.  There is something special about that, especially after the enforced separation caused by the pandemic.  Since my visit to the UK at Christmas, one son has acquired 2 cats, not yet fully grown, and they have led us on a merry dance with their antics.  I am not a cat lover, more of a cat tolerater so it was somewhat disturbing to be woken up during my first night here by cats walking across my head.  I tried turfing them out but as I sleep in the attic and there is no door, I gave up  and waited for them to stop leaping about, an event that was never going to happen.  The second night my  son blocked the stairs to the attic with a screen,  to no avail.  I caught them up on the roof having escaped through the Velux window.  Now I  know  where the term 'cat burglar' comes from.   Yesterday I took  my grandson for a walk and stopped in a pub fo...

 People complain about bureaucracy in France and it is true that it can be a bit convoluted, but it does function and work if you produce the correct paperwork.  I am in the UK at the moment and nothing seems to function.  After 8 months, HMRC finally  answered the phone but they couldn't explain why there was a problem, although they did acknowledge that a problem clearly exists.  No, they couldn't do anything to rectify their obvious errors because they were dealing with queries from 2020. My son had a scan five months ago and has yet to receive the results.  My sister has been told that she could expect to have her cataract operation, which she badly needs, in about five years time.  As she put it bluntly, 'I probably won't care whether I can see or not by then.' We went for a walk yesterday along the canal and had lunch in a pub.  What a joy it was to see a whole table of adults with learning disabilities enjoying their Sunday roast.  Why...