Time to Start the Christmas Season!

OK, so I am a little behind …I have been so busy de-cluttering that I almost forgot about my Christmas preparations.  Sad but true.  But I have made a lot of progress, so will be able to take out some time for wrapping present and baking cookies and stuff.

I have decided to respect other people’s space as well as my own by not giving them any Christmas presents.  Handy and cheap for me, you might think, and consider me a cheapskate and a tightwad.  Since I am the number 1 fan of Uncle Scrooge this does not faze me.  Anyway, you are quite wrong; although I shall no longer give the sort of rubbish which clutters up other people’s houses, I shall continue to give them (a) perishables, ie things to eat and drink and use up, (b) useful things, ie something they really do need, and (c) small things which take up little space yet are very beautiful, ie scarves and Christmas Tree ornaments.

(a) Shall be the subject of quite a few of my posts between now and Christmas, because I plan to give cookies and Stollen and perhaps even Dominosteine to my favourite friends.  I will make photos, too, so those among you who live to far away to receive baked goods can at least look at the finished products and imagine they are eating them.  I am very kind and generous that way.

(b) Is a minor category as far as my friends are concerned, since they are all rich and need nothing.  I have managed to find a little something for K, who is not really poor but has this habit of admiring something and then not buying it, and then regretting not buying it.  A very useful habit for me, because I quickly rushed out and bought it for her!

(c) Was much on my mind yesterday, because I haunted the website of my favourite Christmas Tree ornament manufacturer and ordered a few special items – some for myself and some for a few select friends.  These ornaments are very small and flat, so one can shove them into an envelope together with a Christmas card as a little present.  They are made of pewter, and beautifully painted, and I like to buy a few every year for my Christmas decorations trove.

So buying Christmas presents is not really necessary, except for a few little ones for myself.  Lest you think I have all of a sudden become frugal, let me assure you that I have bought all the big ones for myself a long time ago and am hoarding them in a secret location!

The most urgent thing now is to prepare the dough for Pfefferkuchen.  You may have encountered them in large cellophane bags in the cheaper shops in the pre-Christmas season, and wonder why I propose to produce such sad specimens of the cookie world.  Well, obviously mine are better!  I use an ancient tested recipe, and have been ordering ingredients from the German Bakery in London recently.  Sadly they didn’t have Butter-Lard, so I have to make it myself again.  Luckily I have an old cookbook that explains how.  If you live in a foreign country, far away from the flesh-pots of Germany, you learn to make everything yourself.  Would you believe I even made my own Quark, a sort of cottage cheese, so I could make cheesecake, when I lived in Oregon?  The list of my talents is extensive.

Anyway.  These Pfefferkuchen have two time-consuming requirements.  Firstly, the dough has to sit in a warm place for two or three weeks prior to baking.  Not an easy thing to achieve in my non-centrally heated house!  Secondly, they need at least two weeks to lose their rock-hard consistency after baking.  You do the maths!  It is high time I got going.  It’s this week or not at all!  Time's awasting!

After that the Dresdner Christstollen must be tackled.  Then Nuernberger Plaetzchen.  After that I will make Zimtsterne (except I never use the star-shaped form, way too much work), and probably Buttergebaeck.  Plus Nuernberger Lebkuchen, can’t miss them off the list.  And when all that is done I am going to try something new:  Dominosteine.  Never made them before, but I have high hopes.  They are dreadfully expensive to buy, so making my own will be a huge savings.  Except that I will eat about ten times as many and not save a penny – let’s not go there.

The other thing I am considering is making some more candied citrus fruit peel.  It is much better than the stuff one can buy ready made in shops, and doesn’t really take all that long to make.  I am almost out of the batch I made a few years ago.  Wonderful in the stollen!  The problem is, I need fruit that have not been treated with herbicides, pesticides, wax, and any of the other chemicals that poison the regular varieties.  This Saturday I am in London, perhaps I shall nip over to Harrods …

Of course there are many other things to do aside from baking.  I must dip a few bees wax candles, supplies are running low and maybe I will make a few spare ones and give them away as presents.  Things will really heat up just before the first of Advent, because ideally everything should be ready then.  But there is still plenty of time, and if one is organised one can get everything done.

So onwards and upwards, allez hop, los los zack zack mach schnell!

The pre-Christmas season is now officially open!

 

 

Shopping for Plants in Paris

Paris is great for buying potted plants.  There are any number of street markets where one can purchase plants – and especially flowers! galore, but my favourite is just down the road from Notre Dame.  It is called Allee Celestin Hennion, and consists of a number of large green houses, filled to the brim with plants in pots.  There are also  plant shops on the other side of the Seine, and indeed pet shops as well, but although they sport alluring items like ten foot long artificial alligators, I prefer the ones at Celestin Hennion.  Photos are better than words to describe their manifold attractions, so here they are!

It rained and drizzled and dripped throughout my stay, but I dare say the plants loved it.  I was OK with it, too, since I was in excellent company and had some severely entertaining chats, and good food and drink, too.  The only fly in my ointment was that I did not find any new Oncle Picsou magazines.  Oh well, better luck in November!

The Great Post-La Bourboulian De-clutter Craze

It’s been a while since I last posted.  Partly this is because I have been frightfully busy at work, but mainly because I have been frightfully busy at home.

Whenever I return from La Bourboule I embark on a massive de-cluttering orgy.  One year it was the attic, then the cupboards, after that the kitchen.  When I am in La Bourboule I have a large spacious practically empty apartment.  There is practically no clutter.  Just a bed, a table, a few chairs, a cupboard for dishes, a wardrobe for clothes – and that’s it.  No books, no knickknacks, no pictures, no carpets – no dusting!  It is so restful for the mind, and so calming to the nerves.  And so great not to have to dust!  I am at heart a minimalist.  Unfortunately I am also at heart a Victorian pack rat.  An uneasy combination!  Anyway, whenever I return from La Bourboule the minimalist is in the ascendancy, and my mind craves simplicity.  So I de-clutter with a vengeance until the feeling wears off.  But this year I took things much further – my health was at stake!

For a year or two I had noticed an occasional tendency for the inside of my nose to swell, with the result that breathing through it was difficult, especially at night when I was in a horizontal position.  This was not an asthma issue – breathing through the mouth was fine.  OK, so I have a narrow nose, but this was a new problem for me.  I bought a little anti-snoring device that kept my nostrils open at night which I used when necessary and thought no more about it.  But within 24 hours of arriving in La Bourboule the problem disappeared.  And within 24 hours of leaving La Bourboule it re-appeared.

Putting on my detective hat I analysed the situation.  Why did I not have this problem in the past?  What had changed?  And why was this not an issue in La Bourboule?  We had just had two very cold winters.  I had secondary double-glazed all the windows.  I.e. I had not been keeping the windows open a lot these last two winters.  Which reduced ventilation.  Which lead to a build-up of indoor pollution, dust particles, etc.  Which resulted in some sort of allergic reaction in my nose.  That was my theory.

Extensive googling confirmed my hypothesis that asthma and allergies increased in houses with double glazing and insulation.  Doggone it, I had been so proud of my insulated house, and now I have to face the fact that I had basically sealed myself into an allergy producing chemical dustbowl cum hellhole!  Dash dash dash!!!!

What’s a woman to do?  The obvious thing would be to sell up and move to La Bourboule, but the market for university fundraisers is decidedly limited there, so I would be very poor, if disgustingly healthy.  Alternatively I could try and clean up the house.  That’s what I have been doing ever since I came back from La Bourboule.

Firstly, I surveyed my possessions.  They were manifold and gathered dust easily.  To clean the house was very laborious, partly because of my dust-catching possessions, partly because I have so much stuff that vacuuming requires an awful lot of moving of furniture.  As a result I dusted & hovered less often than was desirable (from an allergy point of view).  Therefore I decided to first thin out my possessions.

I donated 36 large shopping bags full of books to the Oxfam bookshop; I even filled out a gift aid declaration, I expect they will make a small fortune.  Then I summoned my trusted antiques dealer and sold him the following:  four bookcases, two large arm chairs, two tables, a mirror, a stepladder, a magazine rack, a laundry rack, and a few other bits and pieces.  This required quite a lot of work – going through one’s books and deciding which ones to throw out requires both time and moral fibre, as does finding places for all the knickknacks that had rested on the tables and bookcases I had sold.  I got rid of most of them.

The biggest struggle was a certain armchair, which I loved fiercely despite being totally useless and consistently in the way.  In the end I bribed myself.  I am technically on a scarf-ban (I have so many that I decided to stop buying them for a while), but for this noble purpose allowed myself an exception.  So I swapped the chair for Rythmes du Monde.  Half of me feels pathetic for needing to be bribed to let go of the chair, half of me is grateful there is something I can be bribed with – without my lust for scarves I would still be stuck with that chair!  It was touch and go – five minutes before the dealer arrived I almost decided to keep it, but told myself sternly that I had bought the scarf so could not back out of the deal now.

Having de-cluttered the house of furniture, I turned my attention to the garden, and cut it back savagely, much to the disgust of the neighbourhood birds.  After a weekend of hard work I returned to the house for some more de-cluttering.  I had become a fanatic!  One morning I woke up at 5, decided to get up to make a cup of tea, and while my tea was getting cold I sorted through my CD and DVD collection and discarded half of them.

Whereas I used to spend my Saturdays haunting thrift-stores I now wandered through the Little House, casting a jaundiced eye over my possessions, thinking, do I want to dust this for another 50 years?  And I continued to fill large shopping bags with things. 

Last weekend my de-cluttering reached a major peak: first I sorted out the Mouserleum (conservatory), threw out all sorts of ‘this will come in handy some day’ bits & bobs, and made dozens of spiders homeless.  Then I had a quick dinner, and decided to watch a movie.  On route to my Nostalgia Studio, where I watch movies, I passed the bedroom.

The top of the curtains were very dusty, and the bed-hangings impossible to vacuum properly.  Moths had been having orgies in them for years.  I hated to look under the bed, because although I did not store anything there, reaching the dust in its outer reaches was tricky.  Something had to be done.  It was 20:30 hours Saturday night.  I decided to move all the furniture around, the four poster bed, the six foot long wardrobe, the tall linen cupboard.  God gave me strength.  I finished at 23:25 hours, and sank into my bed utterly exhausted.  But the job was done.

Did I mention that my vacuum cleaner is crap?  There are few things as soul destroying as spending two hours hoovering the house, putting the hoover away again, and discovering that the carpet is still covered in dust and fluff.  I had enough!  I bought a Dyson.  Even though I bought a reconditioned one, one third off regular price, it was still expensive.  But I did not care.  I decided to pay for it out of my scarf budget.  I had turned from being a scarf addict to being a Putzteufel (cleaning fiend).

I had recently acquired some humidity meters, and discovered that the humidity in the Little House was unhealthily high, so I bought a dehumidifier.  Every 12 hours I collected 2 litres of water.  This went on for weeks.  Currently the collection rate has slowed to about 1 litre every 12 hours.

Sunday morning, after the Great Bedroom Shift Around, I longed for nothing but rest.  I bought two (!) croissants, the Observer, and barricaded the front door.  Peace at last!  But alas, after a mere half an hour of reading my urge to clean & de-clutter arose again.  Sighing deeply I put the paper aside and set to.  I dusted and vacuum cleaned for about six hours, I wiped the floors and washed the top of wardrobes, I dusted picture frames and polished the stairs.  Clearly I had gone quite mad.

Where will it all end?  Will I wake up on bare boards one day, having de-cluttered my bed?  Will I limit the number of my books to three, like Leberecht Huehnchen – one Bible, one cookbook, and Don Quijote?  My journey has only just begun.

 

 

Anyway, I hope all this frantic de-cluttering and cleaning will appease my mucus membranes!

My Last Day in La Bourboule

It is always the same, on my last day, when I am super busy, the weather is great and I decide to take a long walk, usually up the mountain.  Thus it was today.  Georgeous sunshine, and beautiful blue sky – one day I will figure out how to have a polarising filter effect on my camera and have truly great photos!  It is very frustrating, because my sunglasses make colours so rich and saturated, and then I look at my photos and everything looks washed out.

Anyway, I took to the road and walked basically for six hours.  Oh my aching feet, not to mention thighs and other assorted muscle groups.  But it really was a great day.  I deposited three rolls of toilet paper in the toilet of the Glider Shack – having waited until the fifty or so bikers has disappeared from view, I don’t want them to discover the toilet and muscle in on my laboriously transported paper – and scaled the heights of la Banne, taking photos as I went along.  I even climbed under the Antenna to try a few shots, thus adding an interesting new angle to my repertoire.

Barely home I had to go to Le Galapagos, because I had promised to come by for a last supper (as it were).  Not only did they insist on letting me have a free meal, they also poured alcohol down my throat until I was a bit tight (well it doesn’t take much, especially at the end of an epic hike).  They only let me leave early when I promised to have a coffee tomorrow before my Autocar leaves.  Wonderful people, a real home from home! 

For this post I am trying out how many photos I can incorporate, the number seems to have increased recently (might it be my new camera?  Then I must do a bit more house cleaning and prepare myself emotionally for life away from the Auvergne.  Because, to quote my newly favourite film, “C’est chouette, La Bourboule!”

Fog, Coins, and a Haunted House

Today I had planned to scale one of the many mountains around La Bourboule, but alas the weather was still inclement.  Foggy and overcast, with occasional intervals of sunshine.  These intervals are actually quite annoying, because every time they occur I think, aha, finally the weather has improved, and put on my boots and jacket ready to go hiking.  But ten minutes later we are back to dark and gloomy, and I return home.

What is one to do on a day like that?  Hunt for coins, of course!  After lunch I spent an hour in the backstreets searching every nook and crevice, to no avail.  La Bourboule is difficult terrain for coin collectors like me.  Usually, no matter how long or short my holiday is, I find exactly one coin – usually a 2 cent copper.  Last year I almost despaired, but on the last day I found a 5 cent piece under one of the tables at Les Galapagos – phew!  I do hate to break a long standing habit.

This year, however, La Bourboule has been extremely generous to me.  I found six coins!!!!  Two 2s, one 5, and three 1s.  Unheard of!  The La Bourboulians are very thrifty and keep their coins safely in purses, not just loose in their pockets, and therefore rarely lose any of them.  But this is obviously my lucky year!

Often while searching for coins one encounters suspicious individuals, who enquire about one’s peculiar behaviour.  “What are you doing, have you lost anything?”  “I am looking for coins,” I reply.  An uncomprehending stare is the usual response.  “Comme Onc’ Picsou” (like Uncle Scrooge) I add, helpfully.  Then their faces light up, they smile approvingly and sometimes even pat me on the back.  “Well done,” they say, and often enquire about my takings.  Last week I found a 5 and a 2 cent piece within ten minutes, and upon hearing of this haul an old man suggested I go and invest the money in the casino (La Bourboule actually has one, though it has seen better days).  “Oh no,” I replied, “I need this for my money-bin!”  He smiled indulgently.  Yes, the people of La Bourboule understand me and my ways.

Today, though not finding any coins, I did discover the Haunted House!  Well, I don’t know whether it actually is haunted, but it jolly well should be, because it has been completely overtaken by some extremely ambitious vegetation and must be pitch-black inside.  It would take a machete just to get to the mailbox!  Despite this overgrowth it does seem to be inhabited, some of the greenery gets trimmed back occasionally.

Afterwards I bought a piece of cake for my Afternoon Tea, and returned home for a nice long indulgent perusal of The Economist while having my tea (no paper today, since the Press is on strike).  Seeing as the weather is so disagreeable I might as well enjoy my light and airy apartment while I can.  Tomorrow is the last day of my holiday, and then it’s back to the grindstones for me!

Just now as I was typing this I had a bit of a shock – Bomb Alarm!!!!  There is a siren somewhere around town which seems to be tested every Tuesday at lunch time, but today is Thursday and it happened at 17:05!  The alarm went on and on, I looked out of the window and no one was outside – all headed for the bunkers, obviously.  I grabbed my purse and a packet of tissues (still got that cold) and raced down the stairs (one is not supposed to use the elevators in emergencies, of course) to the reception.  Several people were checking their e-mails, looking supremely unconcerned.  So I asked the receptionist whether we shouldn’t evacuate the building?  Oh no, she said, there is a fire somewhere, it does not concern us.  No enemy attack? I asked, just to make sure.  Not as far as I know, I hope not, she replied.  Oh well.  It sounded like a bomb alarm to me.  We used to have drills for them when I was a child.  We were supposed to hide under the desks, not sure how that would have been helpful.  But our school didn’t have a bunker.  Upon reflection, I am not sure who would want to bomb La Bourboule.  I wonder whether there even is a bunker?

The City Hall of La Bourboule

Despite having less than 2,000 inhabitants, La Bourboule has any number of beautiful buildings of the type more generally seen in large towns.  The weather has been rainy ad overcast again, and to show sympathy my body revived its cold, so I have been staying indoors much of today and yesterday.  It is bound to be good for my French – I have watched the DVD Cleopatra in French over six times already, and at four hours a sitting that must have made an impact.

Nevertheless I got a bit stir-crazy this afternoon, and went for a short meander.  First I visited the Mairie (City Hall).  I have fond memories of it ever since I managed to convince the Major to let me sponsor the bench up La Roche des Fees, and shall never forget their last objection to my scheme (after numerous others raised during my six month campaign had been laboriously resolved), “But if you buy this bench for your friend, where will everyone else sit?”  This sums up La Bourboule perfectly for me, so charmingly old fashioned and otherworldly one hates to disturb their repose and is tempted to tiptoe away quietly without having achieved one’s designs.

Architecturally I am most fascinated by the staircase barristers, painted a beautiful fire-engine red.  Since it was quite dark inside, my camera kept flashing, which changes colours dramatically.  But when I changed the setting to ‘Night’ I got colours much closer to the originals.  Just behind the entrance there are all sorts of stone arches which serve no discernable purpose except being photographed, so that’s what I did.

Having thus exhausted my camera’s batteries, I dripped over to Pascal’s Delicatessen Wonderland to buy my leaving presents for the hotel and themes.  I figured I’d do it today, if the weather improves I might need my remaining two days going up various mountains and what not.  Pascal has a special offer, if you buy half a ham you get a free sausage thrown in, but I am to lazy to carry a ham half way across Europe – maybe I’ll order one for Christmas?  Just three more months!

Tele-cabining up the Mountain

Feeling much improved today, I went for a little walk in Parc Fenestre to admire its many attractions.  As usual mini-golf, kiddie-train, and climbing-jungle were out of commission, it being the off season, but the Tele-cabins were working.

The Tele-cabins are a sort of ski-lift, I imagine – I have never actually been in a ski-lift.  Picture a strong metal rope suspended between two large towers, one tower being on top of the mountain and one at the bottom.  Suspended from the rope are six small cabins, which go up and down the mountain in regular intervals.

The towers can be seen from anywhere in la Bourboule, and are quite ancient – even my old prints from the town from around WWI show them.  Usually when I am here the Tele-cabins don’t seem to be in operation, again it is that seasonal aspect to the la Bourboulian attractions that continue to confound me.  Occasionally I would go to Parc Fenestre and walk past the Tele-cabin harbour? port? and sigh in disappointment that they din’t seem to be working any more.

But today I noticed the six little cabins actually going up the mountain, and was suddenly filled with a great desire to ride in them myself.  I anxiously checked my money supplies, wondering whether I was rich enough to pay for such an extravagance – Euro 26,98 was all I had.  A trip to the bank was perhaps indicated.  But first I would check prices and departure times.

I was pleasantly surprised!  For the paltry sum of Euro 3,85 I could go up the mountain and return as well!  I rushed to the ticket office to enquire when the next cabins were due to leave.  Five minutes!  I was clearly in luck.  Actually, later I found out that these cabins leave every five or ten minutes, between 930 and 12 in the morning and 13:45 and 17:15 in the afternoon, every day except Mondays.  And they stop going altogether as of end September.

Clutching my ticket I impatiently waited at the end of the queue.  Since I was the last passenger, I got a cabin all to myself, so had no unwelcome witnesses for my uncontrolled excitement as we went up the steep mountain.  Once again I blessed my lucky stars for being in possession of a camera and snapped away in ecstasy as we ascended.  Leaving behind la Bourboule, Glider Mountain, which is opposite Tele-cabin Mountain, loomed ever larger into view, and I could see numerous little glints from the cars that were parked in the little parking lot at its feet.

The only fly in the ointment of my bliss was the atmosphere, which was a little murky and had a bleaching effect on my photos.  The journey only lasted about five minutes, and too soon for my rupture to wear off we had arrived at Tele-cabin Port 2, on the plateau of Charlannes.

It is a popular sight seeing spot, and there is a café as well as a hotel (whether still in use I am uncertain).  I had been there before, but usually I walk.  Tele-cabin Mountain is covered in woods, with lots of nice little clearings thrown in, perfect for hiking.  Today I wore my fancy shoes, and a dress and a lilac hat – the latter much remarked upon by all and sundry! – so was clearly not in a good position to go hiking.  But now that I know how the tele-cabin set up works I shall become a frequent utiliser!  Tomorrow of course is Monday, so nothing dong, but after that I shall ascend the mountain daily and explore the vastness of Charlannes!  I do hope I spelled that right ….