This interesting looking building, whose contents are also interesting, is the museum at the Gallo-Roman site of Argentomagus. The site itself is somewhat underwhelming compared to the likes of Pompei or Ostia. With respect to visible remains it's more like the Antonine Wall but with a bit of imagination you can see the Legion of the Ninth disappearing into the mists of the Creuse valley.

It was one of the spots covered during Alan's visit when I tried to go where I had not been before. Having cracked the business of checking museum hours before setting out we also visited Argenton's Museum of Shirtmaking and Masculine Elegance where as you can well imagine we felt thoroughly at home.

Gueret's museum was the final stop on Alan's culture packed visit. Despite its proximity it was the first time I had been inside. It's a museum very much in the old style and the natural history section in particular with its displays of stuffed animals in "typical" poses reminded me strongly of Kirkcaldy museum in the fifties.

From their plaster models of reptiles and amphibia I learnt that the creatures that had concerned me in the grass earlier in the year were not venemous vipers but harmless slowworms. The trick to identification is apparently to observe their eyebrows. If present then it's a slowworm. If absent it's a snake. Or is it the other way around?

Nature took revenge on me for that mistake a couple of days ago when a wasp stung me on the thumb as I bent down to pick up the toaster. My thumb is red, swollen and uncomfortable and to make things worse I still haven't worked out what the wasp could have been looking for in the toaster.