Carried off to the pub

Following my piece yesterday in this column about innuendo in Italy the Reverend Jeff suggests in the comments section of this column that the Italian word for sex must be innuendo. It is the type of stupid, inane juvenile pun of which I would have been proud, don’t know how I missed it. Talking of Italian words, I wonder what the Italian is for “default”? If they do default as Greece must surely do then Currencies Direct will be able to provide a solution for Italians bearing lire. In fact a break up of the euro may have a silver lining for some. I may be part of that some, I certainly hope so.

Another Italian word that I came across in Private Eye this week is “Schettino”. It means roller skate, so it should come as no surprise that the captain of the Concordia, the cruise liner that “fell over” recently was called Captain Schettino. That’s Captain Rollerskate to you and me, you could not make it up. I have always thought that roller skates are dangerous but I suspect that after the court case our dear brave captain won’t even be allowed to be in charge of one skate let alone of a pair of them.

After several days hard skiing last week, that nice lady decorator got home safely and then on Friday promptly slipped on some ice, fell and hurt her ankle, thus I was the unlucky lackey upon whom fell the responsibility to be her slave in the absence of her ability to walk. I did however manage to delegate this responsibility to sprog 1 for a short time when it came to getting to the pub on Friday night as my picture shows.

That nice lady decorator being carried to the pun by sprog 1

So drudgery became the watchword of my life yesterday. I am not sure if any of you are old enough to remember Alo Alo? The TV series with the semi-invalid mother that lived upstairs and rang a bell when she wanted anything? Well, you get my drift. She has crutches for Christ’s sake and is she making the most of it or what? I “cooked” dinner under serious and continual abuse (she called it advice) and was left in no doubt as to my shortcomings in the kitchen department. In fact it seems that I have suddenly developed faults in every area of my persona. I am as certain as I can be that this sudden sea change can in to way be attributed to her injury as that would be a very selfish stance to adopt, but I am beginning to think my certainty needs revisiting.

Because of her injury we had to refuse an invitation to lunch in the Auberge Provencal in Valbonne with Wayne Brown who had organised a TV commercial shoot for Citroen in Valbonne. I say we, but the rejection of the invitation was made without reference to me but had I voted, I am certain that I would have been thwarted by her casting vote. Best then that I was not given the option.

Still too few people know about the South of France English Theatre production of “Barefoot In The Park” which opens at the Pre Des Arts in Valbonne on Valentines Day. Tickets are available from their website by clicking on the link above, or they can be purchased on the night at the box office. There is also the small matter of the after show party which takes place at the same venue for a mere 10 euros extra, and of course for the very few of you who have yet to purchase a copy of my book, an opportunity to secure a rare signed copy of the limited first edition (limited only by the number of people prepared to pay for it) copy of my book “Summer In The Cote d’Azur”.

Chris France