At last I have reversed the steady rise in my handicap. I won this bottle into the bargain. Could this be the start of something big?

You will note that this, shall we say undistinguished, building, which is just across the road from us, has a rather fine roof. All due to the great storm of 97, or was it 98?
No matter, the point is that we have a roof that deserves to be similarly replaced by a generous storm insurance payout but while we wait for that deliverance we have to keep applying patches.

Two or three years ago a M. Fruchou redid some of the internal wooden structure, replaced the ridge tiles together with a number of other tiles (some are visible in the picture) and applied other bits of builder’s bluffery with the aim of improving the overall watertightness of the roof.

Last year we decided to put a double-skinned tube in the chimney. Up till then we had apparently been in danger of burning the place down and falling foul of French building law. I’m not sure which carries the greater penalty. It seemed a good idea to add a bit of waterproofing around the chimney at the same time. We called on M. Fruchou but I think he got the idea that we weren’t totally satisfied with the results of his earlier work (true but not critical). Despite declaring that he would come and size up the job he never made it. Fortuitously we came across an English builder, Dave. He did the job and assured us that despite not having put flashing round the chimney (he had a reason but I can’t recall it) we were shipshape and watertight for a good three years.

Just before I went off to the Riviera it rained a lot and I went up into the roof to see what was what.
Well the picture shows clearly what was not watertight at all. I called Dave immediately but he had left the country. I suspect a love affair gone wrong but didn’t dare ask his mum-in-law for details. M. Fruchou may not have left the country but seems to have abandoned his business. His mobile number is now someone else’s and his fixed line has been temporarily out of service every time I’ve dialled it.

We don’t count our chickens till they are hatched but the French around here are even more circumspect. They don’t count the eggs while they are still in the chicken’s arse. So I don’t want to declare success too soon but the man who put Velux windows in for us some years ago says he can fix it and what’s more that he’ll do it soon. Stay tuned to find out.

After a day of domesticity (cut the grass, do three loads of washing) I set off for Bourges. It’s only an hour and a half away but it’s the first time I’ve been.

Probably not the last because it’s very lovely. A gorgeous medieval centre with a magnificent cathedral and other buildings of note. Their most famous citizen is, or rather was in the 15th century, a chap called Jacques Coeur who made lots of boodle, much of which he lent to Charles VII. Naturally he fell out of favour and went to prison. But he left behind a jolly mansion and here’s a detail from the façade.

Of course I went to Bourges not in pursuit of historical knowledge but to play two days of golf under the auspices of the Seniors of the Four Leagues.

The municipal course on the southern fringe of the town is very pleasant. There’s a lovely lake nearby with a sailing club, a jogging track all around and an outdoor pool is not far off. You can imagine there are worse places to be bourgeois.
This was a team competition in greensome format and Jean and I represented Les Dryades. We played respectably close to our joint handicap without covering ourselves in either glory or the other stuff. It was extremely hot but we were provided with bottles of chilled water, cans of Fanta etc at regular intervals by a young man who whizzed around in a golf cart. He raised the noisiest round of applause at the prize-giving.

On the way home I got a full frontal of an advert which had bedevilled (to a tiny extent) my stay on the Riviera, thanks to my holiday companion’s professional fixation. I’m not wild about the ad but I love the product. Here’s a picture. I leave it to you to interpret the slogan and to provide a catchy English equivalent. My starter for ten is “Aniseedy – yes!” “Anisickly – no!” You must be able to do better.

This morning I made one of my periodic visits to The Scotsman site to see how the land lies north of Hadrian’s wall. There was much of interest.
I was sorry to learn that Mr MacSween of haggis fame has bashed his neeps and chappit his tatties for the last time at the uncomfortably close age of 66.

Can you believe, as Tommy Sheridan would have it, that ten members of the executive of the Scottish Socialist party have perjured themselves to portray him as a wild swinger? He’s always been a natty dresser hasn’t he, even on half pay? These things are rumoured to go hand in hand but I await the outcome of the court case to learn the truth.

Now what thrilled me was PAL. I am sympathetic to Bill Clinton, ambivalent about bull-fighting, mildly uneasy about global capitalism, saddened by Darfur, made tepid under the collar by the intransigence of the parties in the Middle East but as anyone who has followed this blog from its beginnings will know what really gets my goat is litter. Here I found an article about a public spirited lady who, aghast as I am at the litter strewn streets and open spaces of Edinburgh and who like me makes a practice of picking up litter, has, unlike me, got off her arse and started a campaign, People Against Litter, to enlist the common man and woman in the great fight. She has shamelessly borrowed slogans from Mao Tze Tung and the like and brought great clichés to bear but she is right. I commend her campaign to you and exhort you to sign up. Become a PAL today! You know it makes sense!

Got back last night from a super holiday at the coast. Claire took full advantage of my newly acquired digital camera so I've got lots of lovely pictures to share with my loyal readers. Here's a view of Nice as a taster while I decide how best to set things up.

And here's one I took in the garden when I got home. The animal was
much closer to me when I first saw him but by the time I had gone into the house and got my camera he had moved off a bit.

I drove down to the Riviera on Friday. It is a long and fairly tedious drive and the roads were busier than I had expected but it is a good place to be for a little holiday. I am staying in Vence but came down to Nice this morning on a reconnaissance trip. I am picking a friend up at the staion tomorrow morning and although I have been to Nice quite often I wanted to be sure I could find the station.

I am now relaxing on the Promenade des Anglais. Life can be tough.

A few weeks ago my postman in a state of some excitement asked me if I had seen the previous day's paper. It seemed his picture was on page 5. Naturally I hurried off to a wee shop in the search of a copy and indeed they had one left. I suspect they always do. I wanted to share the picture with you because he has featured a few times in this blog and now thanks to my new toy, a digital camera, I can do so.
I expected an individual portrait recording some heroic chess exploit or postal honour, but it was a crowd scene. Admittedly he stands out because it's a small crowd. They are demonstrating in defence of the public services but as the caption points out, that particular Saturday evening they had competition in the shape of the world cup and a French rugby final.
Discussing it later I had to correct his impression that workers in the UK eat in soup kitchens and that there is no minimum wage. He accepted that but it proved impossible to budge him from the view that it is somehow unnatural or immoral to sell stamps and bread in the same shop.
[Acknowledgements to La Montagne for the picture].

I played golf very badly on Sunday in a competition and by chance this morning found that Andy Murray's remarks after his defeat yesterday fitted the case with only a few minor changes. Here's what he said with my replacement words in red.

"It was 10 times worse than I played on Thursday. I just struggled, it's hard to explain. I didn't feel good all round. I tried to get myself going on the back nine but I came up with a bad short game......which is normally what I do best and, when you are missing so many shots, it's difficult to win."

At least in my case no crowd of supporters went home disappointed.

The big news this morning is that I have been asked to play in The Caucasian Chalk Circle by Bertolt Brecht in Edinburgh in November. I haven't been on the stage for a few years so I'm looking forward to it eagerly.

Happy days are here again thought I on Thursday after breaking 100 for the first time in months. This was my reconnaissance round at Le Petit Chêne. Unfortunately when pitted against my fellow seniors the following day I missed a few putts, put balls in the water and generally messed up. Still it’s a beautiful course and I had a lovely time.

I’d set off on Wednesday for a leisurely drive to Poitiers. Now that’s an important place as anyone who’s read a guide book or taken a cursory interest in the Plantagenets, or the Arab non-conquest of Europe will know. It’s also famous for Futurscope, a multi-media theme park that I’ve left for a future visit.

On Wednesday though the poitevins (as langtonian is to Kirkcaldy so poitevin is to Poitiers) were thronging the streets for the first day of the summer sales. All shops start their sale on the same day and finish on the same day. The dates vary a bit according to region, like the school holidays, but there is no margin for individual initiative. Unless that is you choose to go out of business or relocate in which case you are allowed to have your own little sale then.

Now instead of trying to entice customers into their shops the shopkeepers had taken their stock, lock stock and barrel into the street. Every shop had a manned stall of goodies on the pavement. So the already narrow alleyways of the medieval town were extra squeezed. Then there was the actual outdoor market. Commerce rules OK.

Being a medieval town it’s got a crop of historic buildings, some of which I entered, most of which I just gazed at and strolled on till tired feet called for rest. Being a warm sunny continental day I chose a shady café terrace for a rest.

Later I went on to Niort where I spent the night. I thought Niort was lovely. It’s smaller than Poitiers but has lots of the same attributes. There’s a superb looking keep (thanks to Henry II), pleasant riverside walks, a magnificent covered market etc. I wandered uphill through what your guide book would no doubt call a warren of winding alleys to a twin spired church.

One of the things that annoys me about churches is that they often have a magnificent façade with a large imposing door flanked by smaller if no less imposing doors all of which are kept tight shut and you have to squeeze through some tiny side door. Well the Eglise de Saint André has seen the light and it streams through a beautiful stained glass window, floods the body of the kirk and rushes out of the wide open western door to meet the visitor as he crests the hill.

For an atheist I visit a lot of churches and particularly enjoyed recently a first communion mass in the austere black stone cathedral of Clermont Ferrand. I’m indebted to the Rough Guide for the knowledge that the Michelin tyre empire centred there owes it’s genesis to our Mr Macintosh the raincoat man. Apparently a niece of his married a Clermont Ferrand entrepreneur ( a pre Michelin chap) and brought to the marriage, inter alia, some good ideas of what to do with rubber.