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09/24/2007
England 44 Samoa 22
The weekend had been in the planning for 3 years with Rollo bringing over a bunch ex rugby players from Bude and I was to provide the transport so last Saturday I left home at 7.00 and took our Boxer 9 seater to Roscoff to pick the lads up from the ferry there was 7 of them so there was a place for Max who was also the backup driver. A quick coffee/croissant stop at Plestin then onto the N12 direction Rennes/Nantes. It was a 3 hour trip and well signposted into the various parking lots where a bus service took us to the Beaujoire stadium. Outside it was like a beer festival with lots of white shirts milling around supping beer and munching a baguette filled with chips and sausage. Amazingly there were no toilets they were inside the stadium where there was no alcohol,strange. We all had tickets for different parts of the stadium mine was near the roof level with the dead ball line next to a Breton Nationalist who cheered every time a decision went against England finally his day was ruined by the result. For the apres match entertainment we headed back to Rennes with a change of driver, Max sporting his new white shirt. In 15 years living in Brittany I have never been into Rennes the centre is really old and interesting a bit like Lannion x 10 lots of timber clad houses and cobbled streets. We found an interesting restaurant and ate outside on the pavement which was a bit tricky only one incident ,Chris doing a backward somersault with the waitress serving the dessert. She was excellent and didn't even drop the plate in her hand. During the meal large groups of people wandered pass as there was some sort of theatre in the street happening concerning witches. The lads needed a beer after the meal ( I was only drinking perrier water ) and the first bar they went they remarked how friendly and chatty everyone was it wasn't until Max pointed out to them it was a gay bar that they clicked.We looked for another bar and was directed to "rue de la soif" which is the heartland of Rennes a large cobbled square full of bars with their tables outside and hundreds of people just sitting around talking and drinking, but our destination was the Webb Ellis bar in keeping with the weekends theme a rugby bar. The sight of 8 English shirts entering the bar caused a lot of booing but after a few hours of socialising there was a communal singsong at 2.00am in the streets where the Bretons were taught the subtleties of Cornish rugby songs such as Camborne Hill and the nuances of Swing Low Sweet Chariot.Finally we dragged them away or carried in the case of Derek (the granddad of the group who should have known better ) back to the truck and home. Its around a 2 hour trip and arrived just after 4.00am where the lads crashed out in one of the houses and I went to bed but inadvertently had woken Paulien who wasn't too happy.
A few hours sleep then Sunday market where I met Oliver a local Irishman and wound him up about the rugby especially as he had been to the match at Stade France. I was amazed how quickly the lads recovered from the previous night they had to be taken back to ferry in the afternoon and as an appreciation of their company ( and slow down their improvement ) I gave them one of my vintage bottles of calvados which under Rollo's instructions they all had to sip every hour so they shoud be in a good state for work Monday morning.
08:40 Posted in Travel | Permalink | Comments (0) | Email this | Tags: brittany, gite, holiday, coat aillis, comments
09/18/2007
Quantum physics and water
I developed an interest in water during the summer as its always annoyed the piles of plastic bottles sold in the supermarkets ( questions of quality control ,how long they have been bottled and the recycling of the plastic ) also you read about Norwegian water being transported to the Middle East such a wastage of resources and also operating a swimming pool you become aware that water gets tired and can change its colour very quickly. So after researching the subject on the internet the first book to read is anything about Viktor Schauberger the water guru of the last century he been dead since 50years but now his ideas are becoming more acceptable from reading him we have fixed up a system for the domestic water a filter and then I bought a vortex jug from www.clean-water.com. Its a strange device it holds about 2 litres of water and then has a paddle at the top made of silver which spins around for 3-4 minutes creating a vortex which allegedly charges the water and purifies it. There is certainly a difference in taste and it is also cooler. The direction of the spin is important it has to turn anti clockwise as according to Schauberger this causes an implosion and gives energy to the water whereas a clockwise rotation "explodes " and depletes the water. He has lots of theories on the effect it has on the bonding of the molecules hence the quantum physics bit.
For the pool I got hold of some para magnets ( 3 ) which I strapped to the return pipe the idea being it de ionises the water reducing the bonding of dirt particles (cleaning the water's memory ) and also reinforcing the H2O bonds. They arrived last Friday and the pool water wasn't in a good condition on the verge of turning into a green soup ( I try to use the minimum of chemicals ) so a few drops of an algicide + some flocculant + the para magnets and withn 24 hours the pool water was clean and sparkling. I have a spare set so will put some on the incoming domestic water pipe it can only improve the efficiency of the septic!
12:20 Posted in Travel | Permalink | Comments (0) | Email this | Tags: brittany, gite, coat aillis, holiday, comments
09/15/2007
The "enterrement"
The funeral went quite well a lovely sunny day well attended and the band played much better than the previous night we were half way through the piece before Monsieur Echo had got his instrument warmed up enough to get it squeak out of it so he didn't completely ruin it as usual. I quite enjoyed the service it being catholic and is more ritualistic than the C of E I was brought up on not that I am a regular visiter. Jean Kerbaol the deceased had arranged 5 years ago which music he wanted for the occasion. Since my time in the band we have done 4 funerals of ex members church and civic, I find the church ones more satisfying as its a formal ritual whereas the civic ones are too casual just turning up at the cemetery playing a tune then retiring to the bar for a drink afterwards. I calculated during the service there could be 2 or 3 more this year as we have a few ex members in terminal conditions. I asked a few of players in the bar afterwards if they had chosen their music for their departure but they said they weren't in a hurry. Anthony the Irish ex guards ,ex colonel's trumpeter ( so very good player ) said he definitely didn't want us playing as we weren't good enough, after the others had gone he insisted on another beer ( the Irish in him ) he was giving me lots of useful information ( ? ) on crematoriums as he visited a lot during his time in the forces such as differing burn times for differing bodies according to their condition , fat etc , how the ashes were collected, collection of metal fillings and joints and finally that the Germans made the best ovens. I had to change the subject after that.
The latest hassle with bureaucracy is Max has to join his own mutual for health assurance its called SMEBA and its for students , fair enough but then they have asked for his birth certificate to be translated into French which is lunacy as most of the information is digits and translating 6th November to 6 Novembre is pretty dumb but if thats what they want will have to do it . Will now have to go back to my cupboard where I'm hiding for the duration of the WC after last nights shambles .
12:00 Posted in Travel | Permalink | Comments (0) | Email this | Tags: brittany, gite, coat aillis, comments, france
09/10/2007
Some sad French on Saturday
There is no better wind up than going into a French bar after a defeat and saying "Allez les Bleus " after last Fridays defeat the French were quite shocked I think they thought it was preordained for them to at least get to the final if not win the competition. Rugby being a minority sport there is a lot of public ignorance and they will struggle to get to the next round. My friend Yves the pharmacist ( a Tim Henman lookalike ) tried to hide when I saw him at the weekend at the "vide grennier " ( French equivalent of a car boot sale ) he has a ticket for the Ireland match at Stade france in 2 weeks time. I'm picking up a bunch of people from the ferry at Roscoff from Bude and taking them down to Nantes for what could be a humiliating encounter with Samoa. They have only recently acquired tickets from ebay as the match allocation was bought up hours and now the team isn't playing so well the tickets are being dumped.I did see a France/Argentine ticket go for more than 3000€ on ebay but I guess interest is falling although Chabal mania is taking off usually the French like their sporting heroes to be handsome but "l'homme de caverne " has caught their eye and even Sarko was trying to get on the bandwaggon to get associated glory if the team wins but as a wily politician he will back off now.
I have a funeral to go to tomorrow its an ex member from the town band in Lannion, the good thing about the band is you always get some free music when you die. He chose a couple numbers for his funeral a few years ago its "memories " from "cats " and another piece. I want a " Closer walk with thee " a nice New Orleans number but at current recruitment levels the band will be dead before me.
07:50 Posted in Travel | Permalink | Comments (1) | Email this | Tags: brittany, gite, holiday, coat aillis, comments
09/04/2007
Le Rentre
September brings a host of changes the tourist numbers drop off, the weather is a little cooler and school starts again so its a 6.30 wake up each morning to take Bas down to St Efflam to catch the bus to Lannion. Xav's school starts at 8.45 in Plestin so we visit the coffee shop a bit earlier.It also means the music practises start again which is exciting for me until the reality of the rehearsal, a mass of shrill noises over/under pitched but never in tune from the clarinets and Monsieur Echo 2 places from me sabotaging the sax section with his out of tune and delayed rhythmic contributions.I think that is why we have a drink after rehearsal to recover or perhaps to dull our musical susceptibilities at least the jazz fanfare is playing at the weekend so will get some musical satisfaction.
We have found an incredible source of cheap paints well its free at our local dump or recycling centre everything is well organised we have skips for wood ( heats local hospital ), glass, plastic + cans aerosols ,metal,carton and paper.The rest of the general rubbish goes to Beggard where it is incinerated but they do use the heat for glass houses and produce some electric from the burning.Garden waste is also taken and mulched then returns as compost it used to be free but now they ask for 16€ a cube metre which is expensive as its poor quality. They also take batteries dangerous substances and paint which Paulien checks out when we do our weekly visit when we dispose our visitors many bottles .The guardian is friendly and lets us check out his store as its only going to be dumped anyway its incredible how many full pots of paint and varnish are there barely used.The guardian of the centre did suggest Paulien gave him a kiss after she took 6 pots but I think he is pushing his luck.
06:30 Posted in Travel | Permalink | Comments (0) | Email this | Tags: brittany, gite, coat aillis, comments