Literary success story watered down

“Tired and shagged out after a long squawk”.  So said a line from the old Monty Python parrot sketch. That is exactly how I feel. It has been a long summer and at last there are some days ahead with no social occasion, yet. Today, however the squawking will continue with lunch in Valbonne with the Cornish Tsunami himself, Matt Frost and his lovely carer and wife the willowy and wonderful Viv.

So called because, frankly, the Cornish Tsunami is a very large unit and is so referred to in this column due to his unwise revelations about some furious love-making on a beach in Cornwall in his youth, (in which his wife was apparently involved although with no memory of the event), he does like to lunch, and in me he has found a normally willing co participant.

Yesterday however, was taken up with feeling utterly jaded, some work on my music empire (rare but it does happen) and setting Sprog 1 on course for a job. A haircut a shave and a boot up the arse were all required and hopefully will have their effect. The real world for him starts now.

Feedback from one of the best nights of the summer at Paloma Beach in St Jean Cap Ferrat continued today. It seems my two wading trips into the sea to rescue the copy of my book, which had twice been flung into the sea by Mr Clipboard, were seen as some of the comical highlights of the evening. Having not seen them as I was err… doing them as it were, It seems I had underestimated the impact. I have a picture of that event I feature today, but it does not look very funny to me.

The gallant rescue of a damp copy of The Valbonne Monologues by the author

I have received an email from Chad the New York lawyer, who was with us at Paloma Beach the night before. Apparently he is still trying to ease his arm joints back into their sockets after the arm wrestling, and attempting to come down from the symptoms similar to those of an acid trip after the naughty boy availed himself of one of my Cuban cigars. The American establishment is still in an embargo situation with this Caribbean country, and, as such, I think the consumption of one of that countries cigars by this doyen of the law would be frowned upon at the Bar. Of course, my contention is that they are best smoked in a bar or with a drink in the other hand.

An epic summer has had a number of highlights, so that Nice Lady Decorator and I sat in the web, our outside bar, with a glass of wine last night, to consider the highest of highlights. Leonard Cohen in Lucca, the inevitable evenings in Valbonne Square, a curry party with Roly and Poly Bufton, almost surpassed by the seafood celebration at the same venue, Currencies Direct customer Tony “I Invented The Internet” Coombs and his beautifull flame haired wife Pat’s anniversary bash, the test match at Lords, the Arundel festival, Paloma Beach, fireworks in Cannes, The Bays birthday bash and other boat trips are all memorably engraved in our minds collective season review.

But, just when you thought it might be all over, consider what lies ahead. A Grimm trip to Germany to find Sleeping Beauty next week, cruising around Naples and the Amalfi coast in Italy at the end of the month, and the 140th sale of my book. Actually the last of these may be some way off as I seemed to have got stuck at 137. Clearly I need a wider circle of friends and acquaintances with no literary taste.

Chris France
@Valbonne_News