santa's little helper

The builders didn't turn up last week despite the weather not being as bad as predicted, but they were back on Monday and Tuesday and are absent again because it hasn't stopped snowing since Tuesday night. Over a foot and counting. The plan was to get all the masonry work (pool, supporting walls, new lintels and first floor concrete slab) done by Christmas but that's not going to happen now.

The annual battle for the most garish Christmas lights has begun and new-kid-on-the-plateau Poire looks to be in pole position, with M. Slip a close runner-up. I went up to the plateau to have a look tonight and even through the thick fog it looked like Vegas - dancing Santas climbing up the outside of the house, lit-up reindeers and sleighs all over the lawns, flashing lights on all the bushes and trees and all over the house. It's enough to bring on an epileptic fit.

Interesting fact: In 1962 a law was passed in France decreeing that all letters written to Santa would be responded to with a postcard. What an interesting job description that must be.

bear hug

BB is helping Poire put the roof on his new garage and in return, Poire will help BB with the mill roof when the time comes. Snow is forecast for tonight and all next week, so I doubt much masonry work will be getting done here anyway.

With all his tractors broken down, Mini-B is also calling upon friends to help him deliver bales of hay to the snow-covered fields where his cows are - or where they should be, because for most of this week they've been wandering about all over the road again. Roquin has just dropped off some cauliflowers and reckons Mini-B will be failli (bankrupt) by next year if he carries on like this.

Roquin also told me that there used to be brown bears in the mountains here until 1913, which I never knew. (They disappeared from the French Alps altogether in 1937.) His grandfather used to tell him the story of his two friends who shot one high up in the mountains and while one guy ran down to the village to fetch a sledge (a four-hour round trip), the other guy hugged the dead animal to keep warm - and got fleas. Pah! Serves him right!

secrets and lies

To mix the cement for the swimming-pool walls today, the builders had to break up the sand with a pickaxe and smash through two inches of ice on top of the water barrel. The garage tap has thawed out but we are having to keep it open to prevent it from freezing again until we can move the wood - which we can't do until the enormous pile of sand has gone.

BB spent all day wrestling with coils of armoured flexible PVC tube for the pool - which in sub-zero temperatures is extremely difficult to unroll and cut - whilst trying to avoid impaling his eyeballs on the reinforcement rods sticking up all over the place every time he bent down.

People keep stopping to ask why we're digging such a big hole in the basement so we're having to pretend it's a cave (cellar) otherwise we may have difficulties when we come to applying for planning permission. Apparently, the planning authorities can come to your house before they grant permission to make sure you haven't started the work already - and if you have, they can refuse your application. It's probably the worst-kept secret in the village right now, so we'll just have to make sure we don't fall out with anyone!

too much information

The builders are back, it's -8 outside and in no particular order of severity:

• a block of ice has formed in the internal workings of the crane making it inoperable


• in order to thaw out the crane (and the workers) they've lit a bonfire on top of the (PVC-coated) earth pipe for the crane


• the water tap in the garage has frozen


• access to the water mains to turn off the water and prevent the garage from flooding is under five tonnes of wood


• the toupie (cement lorry) has arrived and they are now pouring the base for the swimming-pool on to a slab of ice.

All of which is far too much information for me!

génépi

The builders arrived at 7 o'clock this morning and after clearing the snow off the materials started putting in the reinforcement for the pool. Work on the foundations for our current house and the garage was delayed in previous winters because BB refused to pour concrete in cold weather because he said it would crack (setting us back months but conveniently allowing him to have very long skiing holidays) - but he doesn't seem to mind when other people are doing it!

He came back from the écurie tonight with the news that Mini-B was off out on a hot date and had spruced himself up by taking a piece of folded-up cardboard and scraping the cow shit off his jeans!

While BB was out, Roquin came round with some eggs and a bag of génépi - a rare aromatic plant that grows high up in the Alps - which I've put in la gnôle with some sugar to make a digestif. The bright green liqueur is a speciality of this region for which you pay a fortune in the ski resorts. What with the génépi and my other homemade liqueurs (vin de noix, calava, kirsch and vin d'orange), I could be on to a nice little earner. At the rate BB is paying the builders, we may need it!

set back

The builders were due to start today but the materials are currently under several inches of snow!

cracking on

Things are moving at a cracking pace now. Monsieur CAHAL has been here since Monday, knocking down a section of stone wall and digging out the foundations for the new internal walls and the swimming-pool (which we haven't got planning permission for yet!). Just as he finished, it started pouring with rain, so now all the foundations are full of water.

The builder, who starts on Monday, spent all afternoon dropping off materials - sand, sacks of cement, reinforcement bars - and installing a porta-cabin in front of the garage, so it appears they may be here for some time.

There are people in and out of the house all day long now and as soon as I've cleared away the pastis glasses, wiped down the table and mopped up the floor, the next lot of builders or inquisitive friends or neighbours arrive. With our house on constant public display I'm having to do far more housework than I would otherwise like!