To Please Uncle Geoffrey

First an apology.

You may have heard that huge clouds of dust have stopped the airlines of Europe. Whilst not accepting all the blame, maybe we have played our small part: the masons arrived yesterday to put in our new stone lintel. This was achieved with much Gallic muttering and one or two educational phrases, none more so than when trimming the stones to fit.

Apart from that excitement things went well: the lintel is in, the new step into the salle à manger is fitted, and work has started on raising the lintel on the toilet door. Which will please Uncle Geoffrey.

Our new doorway.

Talking of the back door: we ordered it from Lapeyre 10 days ago, and were told it would be available from the 17th. On Saturday (the 17th) they rang to say it was available, but wouldn't be delivered until the 27th because the driver was on holiday. To Stéphane, this was red rag to a bull territory. Susan and I joked that he would say "five million unemployed and they can't find someone to deliver a door" - which is exactly what he did say - to Lapeyre.

The door will be delivered tomorrow.

Raising the level. The toilet door
improvements in progress.

We may now have even more dust than before, but we also have real, visible progress.

Which is exciting.

Simon

p.s. guess where we ate lunch yesterday...