Korean meatballs?

9 30pm was about the right time to leave after the rugby on Saturday evening, so why was it that nice lady decorator rolled home at 2am? Most sensible people were readying themselves to head home at that time, myself included, but I was persuaded to stay for a nightcap and finally escaped, alone, at midnight.

There is some pathological dread within that nice lady decorators brain that she may miss something, some gossip, a joke, anything if she leaves while people are still standing. She cannot leave until the end, or after the end, when there is no more socialising to do. She often waits for the host to put on their pyjamas and start yawning before she will cast around for any bottle with anything left in it and suggest one for the road. The fact that an enormous amount of wine had been drunk, sufficient for no recollection of almost any detail of the many and various deep and animated conversations that had been conducted, is of no consequence, this time or actually, on any previous occasion.

Subsequently, she was not in the best shape yesterday morning, requiring her sunglasses for a trip out to Lac St Cassian, despite the palpable lack of sunshine on offer, as my picture taken from the lake yesterday below shows.

Lac St Cassien in the Var, from a bar on a cloudy day

Thus, the whole weekend was an utter blow out, and normal people would be looking forward to a quiet period of recovery. I count myself as normal, contrary to some reports, but discovered last night that there is a luncheon appointment in the diary for today, so not the quiet the ideal start to a quiet week.

My new Mr Angry blog for Anglo info to promote the services of Currencies Direct under the name Happy Mondays is published again this morning. I am feeling very much as though my complaining persona is becoming an easy mantle to adopt, especially on a Monday, and especially after a weekend of this nature.

So last night we (that means she) settled down to watch yet another crime mystery on the TV. For once, there did not appear to have been a Murder in the village of Midsommer , perhaps all the inhabitants of that very unfortunate village are now all dead? and with Hercule Poirot obviously away on half term holiday, the sky control settled on yet another murder mystery. That nice lady decorator ventured the opinion that had she been more attentive at school, she would have perhaps been able to enjoy a career in criminology. I knew, the moment my mouth opened, that I was in trouble. My response, that perhaps shoplifting might have been a good career choice, because, after all, it would have given her a good insight into the mind of a criminal, was met with the suggestion that if I carried on with that line of discussion that I may myself become the subject of a murder investigation.

Apparently, I am renowned for getting away with murder myself (a comment made by at least one of my more literary minded friends) in the writing of this column on two fronts; firstly because that nice lady decorator declines to read my daily missive, enabling me to explore themes beneath a cloak of invisibility, to her in any case, and secondly because of the content. I don’t quite understand the second point unless it has something to do with the impending demise of the cocked up cocker spaniel, Banjo. Lin Wolff from the English Book Centre in Valbonne made a very good suggestion yesterday about meatballs, and wanted to include her cat in any Korean culinary exploits I may have in mind. Clearly there is more than one problem animal in the neighbourhood.

Chris France