
‘There,’ le
Comte called over his shoulder as he headed off to his bunker. ‘Now you can
have a bonfire.’
‘Yes,’ I said. ‘Right. Thanks.’
Bonfire = Understatement. There was enough wood to
create a wood lake. Enough wood to build an entire wooden planet to be launched
into orbit with le Comte on it.
Enough wood build a lifesize model of the Armada.
I thought seriously about my options. The planet was
appealing but I really needed le Comte
to finish the bunker before I sent him off into space. And I couldn’t see any
use for the Armada since our river is quite shallow. The lake was just silly.
So I went for Bonfire, but added some sss. I have enough wood to have enormous bonfires every single day for a month. So that’s good.
So I went for Bonfire, but added some sss. I have enough wood to have enormous bonfires every single day for a month. So that’s good.
Pierre is an acquaintance
ancien. We
first met him in those early days when we were fresh from dear old Angleterre and didn’t know one end of
a goat from the other. He was recommended to us by Robert Mouton as being the
only person in the entire department who would climb 50ft up a tree without a
harness, brandishing a chainsaw. Pierre claims to be a tree surgeon. This is
his metier, possibly even his vocation, he says. He
effects surgical techniques that are postively medieval in scope; no fiddly micro
procedures here. However, I have blown his cover. I have discovered that he is
also Father Christmas. How do I know? Well, firstly because he said so. He
arrived to do some work last autumn just as his annual beard was beginning to
sprout and simply announced;
‘Je suis le Père Noel.’

‘Rubbish,’ le
Comte declared when I propounded my theory. ‘He grows a beard every winter
to keep his face warm because that’s what country people do.’
Nonsense. He could knit himself a balaclava if that
was the aim. There’s no shortage of sheep. Anyway, this totally explains how
come he has no fear of heights. You wouldn’t, would you, if you spent so much
time flying around the sky in a sledge? Balancing up a tree waving a chainsaw
would be easy-peasy.
He broke our ladder today, however, by dropping a very
large bit of branch on it. Maybe he’s losing his surgical touch due to his exceedingly
advanced years; he must be several hundred. Le
Comte is now muttering from his bunker about the problems of soldering
aluminium.
Addendum:
The delightful photo of the donkeys is nothing more than pastoral embellishment.
They were captured on camera just after their morning swim.
No comments:
Post a Comment