A C in car theft?

A call in late morning lead me into disrepute. By that I mean I was invited to the house of the Master Mariner Mundell in Valbonne for lunch, on the way to which I took today’s picture. I say disreputable because, I am a respectable council house and grammar school boy, and I risk disrepute by associating with the likes of the Master who had to slum it at Gordonstoun, the same school Prince Charles attended, whilst according to the Master, I studied car theft and petty crime at a something akin to a reform school.

I say invited for lunch, and on the surface it seemed a perfectly plausible invitation, but with the Master there is always an ulterior motive. He wanted copies of the photos and videos I had taken aboard L’Exocet at the Bistro Rally, and was under the impression that he could gain unrestricted access to these valuable copyrights in return for a free lunch. Let me return to the copyright issue shortly, but I want to delve into lunch. As a man who lives alone, I was understandably wary about eating lunch in such circumstances. He has never struck me as a practical man, emanating as he does from Alderley Edge, a very affluent part of Cheshire now much sought after by Premiership footballers. He was probably brought up by a nanny and a gamut of servants and was probably never require to learn how a kettle or toaster worked, so the idea of him cooking lunch sent alarm bells ringing.

It was a curry, (just what I needed after two curries at the weekend at Le Kashmir in Valbonne), which, under pressure from me, he admitted was made from a left over chicken which he felt compelled not to waste, and to which he had added ingredients because “it did not look or smell right”. Hence the invitation. He also agreed that he had only invited me because it was either that, freeze it and hope it looked better when it was defrosted, or throw it away, but the Semitic spirit burns bright and the idea of exchanging some dodgy food for something he wanted, appealed to his inner self.

Cat on a car in the streets of Valbonne

Arriving at a little after one, I was distressed to see a box of Uncle Bens 10 minute rice, so no saffron rice or delicately flavoured basmati, no, we were getting bog standard boil in the bag plain rice. He then said that he had added tomatoes, because “it wasn’t tomatoey enough” when every right thinking man knows that tomatoes are the spawn of the devil. I was able to amuse myself by twice picking him up on grammatical faults, a fact that will surprise many of my readers, but a split infinitive must be exposed. I feel it is my job to properly expose them whenever I see them.

Now to copyright. These rights can be very valuable, and clearly there must be some consideration to the owner of them, but it was a concept he was un willing to embrace. I bet he was the type to download material from illegal sites, but I did not labour the point as he is a valued Currencies Direct client.

Later on, it was my duty to collect That Nice Lady Decorator from the airport. I was exactly on time, but because her flight was early, obviously I was late and to blame. I had been thinking of taking some roses to the airport with which to greet her, but had figured that two glasses of the local wine might spill on the way in the car so had decided against it,

Chris France
@Valbonne_News