Next time you are tempted to take a second helping of pudding spare a thought for the distress you may cause posthumously to your nearest and dearest. A French family eager to satisfy their deceased relative's wish to be cremated have been thwarted because the corpse is too big to fit into the incineration chamber. Could there be a better reason to exercise self control around the dinner pail?

Disturbances are taking place throughout France at the moment in an attempt to prevent the government from increasing the pension age from 60 to 62. In one of the reports I heard about this an expression that obviously meant work to rule caught my attention. Its literal translation is zeal strike.

Now don't you think that the crematorium employees could have gone out on a limb as it were and with a bit of zeal got that poor lady to where she wanted to be?

It is heartening to learn that the Indian authorities are putting their shoulders to the wheel, straining every sinew and marshalling all their resources to ensure that the Commonwealth Games go ahead.

But did they have to repatriate their summer this morning?

This may not look like a technological leap forward in the fields of medicine or warfare but in the fight against household dirt it has both improved the quality of my floor cleaning (look at those tiles shine) and reduced the strain on my ageing joints and knees now that I no longer have to get down on all fours with a scrubbing brush.

The big smoke around here is Limoges. Although I’ve been there often; to the golf courses, to the airport, to the station, I’ve only once had a stroll around and that was just to some fine gardens not far from the station. So I decided to have a day out to see more of the place and to let the train take the strain rather than drive down.

I was a little put out at being asked for €25.40 for the privilege but Michelin assured me later that it would have cost me €18.30 for petrol and I am sure I could easily have spent the balance of €7.10 on city centre parking so I suppose it was a competitive price. My belief that rail travel in France was relatively cheap was shaken though and to reassure myself I investigated the costs of a similar journey in UK.

I chose Berwick-upon-Tweed to Edinburgh as a comparable market town to big smoke expedition of roughly the same length (in fact 10 kilometres longer) and started digging. Now France offers various fare deals but nothing of the complexity of the British system. Eventually I managed to get a fair comparison. I chose trains leaving at approximately the same times and on the same day of the week and under an equivalent fare regime. Lo and behold I was not reassured at all because that journey would have cost only €20.88. So no whining from the rail passengers alliance next time fares go up. They don’t know when they’re well off.

Saxophone players however may well have cause for complaint. Reeds are sold in the UK at French prices.

As for the day in Limoges, it passed very well. The weather was lovely for a start. If it had rained I might have gone to the museums that I had pencilled in but instead I admired them and other buildings from the outside (apart from the cathedral, into and out of quick I went quickly), strolled in the gardens, watched the world go by while sipping coffee in a pavement café and browsed in a shop or two.


The city’s iconic building is its railway station (completed in 1929 from a design done in 1914), seen here across a fountain, but there are others of interest. The round one in the picture is an art gallery that started life as a cold store for Argentinean beef in 1919 and another is a trompe d’oeil. The flag bearers are gathering for a demo in protest against the retirement age being raised from 60 to 62 and the boys in the orange suits are not a chemical warfare unit but gardeners spraying some toxic juice on the grass. The suits and breathing apparatus may help them to get to 62 but what about the punters sitting in the little garden doing some passive inhalation?

One of the shops in which I browsed was practically giving away DVDs so I went home clutching a handful, including Das Boot. I’ve never seen it. To do so I need to find five hours to get through its two discs, but I’m bound to be confined indoors by rain sooner or later.

These ducks are escaping a barrage of balls from oncoming golfers at Royan. Although the ducks probably don't appreciate it this is a lovely course that is well worth a visit even just to stroll around. It is set in a beautiful pine forest a couple of miles inland from the Atlantic. When we were there last week the sun shone and a good time was had by all.

In contrast to Dryades where bunker shots are a lottery the bunkers here are full of proper sand and it is a positive pleasure to get out of them with a classic stroke that sweeps sand and ball onto the green.

Two failures to report.

I failed to refuse to take a copy of the Watchtower from two English Jehovah's Witnesses who live in a neighbouring village. I need a strategy for the return visit they will no doubt make.

I failed to resist a bribe from Carrefour to sign up for a loyalty card. At least they don't have either my email address or my phone number so perhaps I'll just get more junk mail than usual and the €10 came in handy.

It's been a relatively busy week for my lifestyle in this part of the world.

On Monday I went up to Chateauroux to collect Claire and Naomi. They had been to a wedding in Normandy at the weekend and were adding on a few days down here. They were very lucky with the weather. We enjoyed a little tourism and a gentle country walk on Tuesday, a chill-out day in the sun-soaked garden on Wednesday and off they went on Thursday.

Luckily they left from La Souterraine which made it easy for me to join some friends for a day's golf at Chammet. This is a nine hole rustic course on the Millesvaches plateau which is a northerly extension of the Massif Central. The countryside is very beautiful and it must be one of the most peaceful spots on earth.

It's always difficult to capture landscapes with the sort of cheapo camera that I have but you may get a flavour of the place from this picture.



The course was in beautiful condition, especially the greens. They were a lot better than when I played there last. We played nine holes in the morning and apart from a splendid par on the third hole that saw me land my drive on the green from 200 yards away and 500 feet above I failed to impress and delivered several balls up to nature.

One of those great value French country lunches followed; four courses, coffee, wine, aperitif, mineral water. The whole for 16 euros apiece.

That bucked up my game and the afternoon's round was much better.

Then it was back to Pierre's in Gueret for dinner. The accompanying refreshments were wisely handled and I drove soberly home to a good night's kip.