Beach erosion at Clymping

Living in Valbonne, France; Monday, you go to the drawer containing the vital drugs required to keep you functioning and find to have run out. You ring up Dr Pat, who leaves you a prescription in his anti room. Result; you collect it 20 minutes later and within half an hour you are at the pharmacy and the drug alert is over. Living in Arundel: you go to that very same empty, but English drawer, and realise that you have forgotten to request a repeat prescription. You cycle to the surgery to deliver said request which takes 2 working days to be available. You cycle back on Wednesday to collect said prescription and deposit it at the pharmacy. You are asked to come back in an hour. You cycle back an hour later and are told that they do not have said drug in stock, but they expect it on Thursday. You go to London for work, lunch and drinking. On Friday you cycle to pharmacy to collect said drug, pharmacy informs you that there are supply issues with said medication, and ask you to return to surgery to ask for an alternative prescription. Receptionist at the surgery says she will ask a doctor and to come back tomorrow. Tomorrow is Saturday and surgery is closed for the weekend. Result, man suffers through lack of vital medication for a week and wistfully dreams of being back in France.

I would love to say that this scenario is a fabrication, but sadly it is all fact. I know you will think that such a healthy looking specimen as myself would never require drugs, and it is true, I do not, but these doctors do like to fuss. Anyway, I live (just) in hope that the problem will be solved on Monday. If I cannot hold out then may I take this opportunity to say that it has been a pleasure providing a platform for all you mad limericists and potential future Currencies Direct clients out there. I am humbled that so many of you feel moved to celebrate my daily musings with rhyme, and hope that one day, you will all need the foreign exchange services for which Currencies Direct are renowned.

Clymping beach after the recent storms

Saturday morning was spent lamenting the ridiculously cumbersome workings of the NHS, and nursing a febrile hangover acquired as a result of spending an evening with the beautiful, fiery and Mighty Omega, and James “Desperate Dan” the Landlord of the White Hart at the err… White Hart the night before. If I needed reminding of the many bottles of a cheeky St Emilion that we had consumed whilst chewing the cud of life, I was reminded as I mounted my bike for yet another abortive trip to the surgery when I encountered Terribly Tall Timothy Taylor outside the pub weighed down with empty bottles of said French nectar. He was complaining that the table at which we had sat, and the surrounding area, which had needed bleaching due to the amount of wine that had been spilled. I pointed out, rather testily , that I had not spilled any wine and that perhaps he should seek an explanation from his god and Landlord.

Amazingly, it did not rain much yesterday, although there were two fierce hail storms, so we went to Clymping Beach to see the destruction wreaked by the recent run of storms, as my picture shows. It was sufficiently sobering that we felt in need of something to offset that sobriety. The Holly Tree at Walberton was the pit stop on the way home, and an afternoon cap, inevitably at The White Hart should have been sufficient for anybody, so why was I dragged up to the most haunted pub in Britain, the Kings Arms for early doors yesterday evening?

Perhaps the reason was to show some solidarity with landlord Charlie Pistorius Malcolmson, who had suffered a fire upstairs at the pub the day before, but had manfully opened for business as usual.

Chris France
@Valbonne_News