idun

On one of the UK calculators it says that I should be getting my vaccination from the 22 May to the middle of June. Husband from mid March to mid May. Unless there are terrible reports about the vaccinations and terrible allergies etc, we will be having them. I do not know what is happening in France with all this. Feels strange that it is not being rolled out and being taken up. As was said by wooly, get the armed forces involved, I really think in any country it would be a good idea. The logistics getting people to the vaccination point and medics to do it. France is so vast, that I do not know how they could do it it any other way at the moment. This isn't something that can wait, everyone needs to get this done, unless their health dictates that they cannot, and well IF they catch covid, what state will they be in then? And those mask refusers, what would they say in hospital with covid damaging their lungs and struggling to breath, no oxygen as it comes via a mask, cannot wear a mask.

I have just made 20 mince pies, made a double quantity and used 14ozs of flour half and half plain and SR. 6ozs butter, a little salt and a tub of mascapone. It is about the only pastry that one kneads a little to get it mixed. Mince pies are lovely, pastry cooked and golden, baked at 200c. I hate an oven on for just one thing, so baked 7 flutes and two small batards, half wholemeal and half plain flour.  Everything to be frozen now. Flutes and batards cut into useable pieces to be eaten au fur et  a mesure. I hate day old bread. And like this, it is as near as it can be  when  it has first cooled.

I imagine that we will end up with a lockdown at some point. The difference for us is that we are retired and ofcourse it doesn't really affect us. I do feel for those working and are affected,  terrible worrying times.

 I like asda's, but when I lived in France I made it. Easy and if I had not got any suet, just made sure that a pack of butter was VERY cold and grated it into the mix. Peeled cored and finely chopped 1lb of  apples  and cooked them gently in a little butter until they were soft and then left until cold. In a bowl : 2lbs of dried fruit, and if I couldn't get it, bought it all separately  and mixed together. I could always manage to get sultanas, raisins and currents and I would chop up glace peel to be included in that weight, although I am not bothered about that. My recipe states 8oz of brown sugar, but frankly you could put something called half sugar or even sweetner in it. Grated rind and juice of a lemon6ozs of suet or grated butter. If butter I would probably use a little less, 4 or 5 ozs I teaspoon of cinnamon  and  1/2 teaspoon of nutmeg  But I tended to use less cinnamon and some mixed spice if I had any in. 4 tablespoons of rum. Mix it all with the apple and leave for 24hours . And then I would place it in jars and fridge it as it would go quickly.  Make loads of mince pies and freeze them. A recipe that is very easy to reduce quantities and we used to enjoy it.

That amused me ChezShells, so you went from Finistere to Finistere.[:D] I too love Britanny and the north coast in particular.

Well a new keyboard, which seems to be working. I had really thought it was when I had updates that I had problems, and at one time, getting rid of 'orca' resolved' it. But not for the last few weeks. I am going to make this pastry tomorrow, and use the last of the sweet mince. I love mince pie parcels with this pastry, just love them. And with a little clotted cream on top, well, absolutely delicious.  

i have a recalcitrant keyboard, so am having to put a keyboard at the bottom on the  page and use my mouse on it, sometimes that is, as sometimes it works. Should work with plain flour. No water or other liquid just knead it together, bit like shortbread really. AND I would only use butter. And that is me finished with typing like this. no idea why the vowels work sometimes and not others[8-)] Well the smileys work!

I was going to send this later tonight, but my keyboard keeps blocking, so I thought that as it has decided to let me type vowels, that I should send it now. And so............... Bonne année et bonne santé  2021

I feel fine. Wondering how it is all going to pan out, but it will be OK whether it be sooner or later. Never felt to me like the french were 'good' europeans, just happy with what used to be a big slice of the agricultural cake for many years. I need to transfer money soon from France, AND send my son and his OH a parcel. The transfer, well, hopefully will be still fairly easy and the parcel should just be like sending one to say Canada, shouldn't it, so no big deal either.

 just been talking to a friend in France and she is very hesitant about having the vaccine. She said that the Deputes did not seem to be queueing up to have it to show an example to the nation, and why not, IF it were safe. And she reckons that quite a lot of our mutual friends are of the same avis.

 NH, expat views? anglo saxon views? Well I am going to disagree with you very STRONGLY about that. There are values that one would hope should be universal, and usually cultures and their religions, all male dominated........that simply do not want this happening. Here is an example of some of the stupid paperasse I had to deal with when I ran an association in France. On these rather official forms that the parents had to fill in, it stated that the HEAD OF THE HOUSEHOLD, had to sign and that meant the man!!!! this was in the late 1980's when I first encountered this. So, in came the ladies, usually rushing in from work to sign their child up with our association and then instead of it all being done and dusted, would leave with the paper work for their 'master' to sign, and would come back the next inscription day. Me, well, how on earth could I even believe that a child's mother was not 'fit' to sign for their own child. I was not nasty with anyone, I would be very gently, explaining that my belief was that they were as responsible for their own child as the father was and I could see no reason on earth why they should not sign. Some did, some panicked at this dissent which they thought bordering on civil disobedience taking the papers with them, duly signed by their lord and master! I discussed this with a good friend, her kids were not members of the  association I helped run, but it was September and her children were joining other things. Next time I saw her, she rather shyly told me that for the first time, she had signed as head of the household. And she seemed rather proud. You see, it does not matter where you are, there are some things that are simply wrong and it doesn't matter where you are from, when you see things that are simply not right/ injust, I will NEVER believe in simply ignoring it and keeping my mouth shut. Remember Saligo Bay's post, she had a friend who's baby's father had beaten her up. The gendarmes came, did not arrest him, took her to a place of safety and handed the baby to the perp!  There is something very wrong with that, and I hope, the law has changed. Although it hadn't when a friend of mine was attacked by her husband, he was simply classed as a bit of a naughty boy. Still I will add that a number of years after I saw an avocat, I mentioned, at the Tribunal d'Instance, french law did change a little, not a lot, but compared to how it was, a great improvement never the less. And sharia law, well, back to male dominated religious views again, like most of them. So yes, I am very much against the very idea of any religion dictating laws.

It is not arrogant, just that so much of french inheritance laws seem very unfair................... AND for the likes of me, who returned to native shores, found that much of UK inheritance law is also very very unfair!!! Frankly, good sense says that we could do with something mid channel, as both systems have good things associated with them. But that will helas never happen. When we first moved to France, there was not what I considered proper protection for a spouse, one had to be on top of it all to get it right. AND I heard horror stories, nothing to do with les etrangers but french families with absolute nightmare stories of inheritance going awry. As mentioned the lack of proper protection for the spouse, was yet another reason why we did not want to spend our dotage in France. And even though things are a lot better, I would not be very happy about the inheritance laws there if we moved back. And a footnote a senior avocat at the Tribunal d'Instance  told me that my 'anglo saxon' views on the particular law I had gone to see him about was very very arrogant, as I questioned what he had told me, which I had imagined, could surely not be correct. That the particular law in question completely lacked humanity and justice, bof, no justice at all, had no effect on him at all, head held high, as the french are so good at, he announced, that french law should not be questioned. And that signaled that the conversation over, a curt nod and 'Madame' as I was expected to leave, which I did, sobbing.

I could open the link, and then realised that it had something to do with Tony Blair, and stopped reading. Truthfully I could put something through my tv screen when the little xxxxx comes on the telly. I will say immediately, 'get him off' if I haven't got the tv control near me...........and, if he gets to about 6 words, I am just about screaming like a banshee.......... GET HIM OFF! Such is my loathing for him and one day, he may have a good idea, but I there are others who can have good ideas and I would prefer to listen to them. I have not watched the news yet. They say an agreement is done and as with  the majority of divorces I have seen in my life, I daresay both sides will end up with some  grievances. How it will affect us personally, well, to be seen as yet. We will adjust to circumstances, quite simple really.  As I keep saying, if we have to move back to France, well, so be it, but I really would prefer not to.

All the Very Best to One and All!

30€'s is perfectly fine. A nice menu too. Bon Appetit  NH

I have good friends who rejoice when this shortest of daylight days is over, but me, no, I feel happier on June 21st when it is the start of them drawing in. I just love autumn and winter[:D]

I wish to goodness you could send them here, their efforts would be really appreciated at the moment.

Let us hope that the  Oxford / Astra Zeneca vaccine comes out soon then. I am only 10-12 from getting my vaccine....... I am talking in millions ofcourse[Www] as there are plenty of folk who should get it before me.

When I grew up apart from Boxing Day and August Bank holiday they were all religious holidays. No idea what is boxing day about, I have never known. And one of my first jobs was in a Bank and we had to work on New Years Day for my first few years, it certainly was not a bank holiday.

Bank holidays were always 'very different' in France. And the 26th was never ever a bank holiday, still there are so many anyway. You only get them if they are a Mon to Fri working day if you work. ie next year the 25th December is a Saturday, so that 's it. Everything shut on the 25th, well  the obvious will be open on the mornings ie bakers, tabacs etc and then everything closed. And that is it, back on Monday.......... however, even then there can be the very very odd exception to that, usually, if it is some sort of a foreign ran company. The only exeption I heard of was the 1st May when people who were not supposed to work sometimes got an extra days pay, AND that would depend on the contract they had with their employers.  I haven't forgotten the 'ponts' which are something done with actual holidays or lieu days to join a bank holiday up with a weekend and that again is not always done either. 

On our local news channel they reported from a tree plantation where people could hire their xmas tree for a few weeks, told how to care for it and then took them back to be replanted, or however, they are grown.......... idun who knows NOWT about growing stuff  [:$]   [Www] Sounded like a good idea.

The week before xmas 2001 we had a holiday in Brittany. On or way up we used some smaller roads and in villages there were 'santas' crawling up walls, or on roofs. I found it definitely spooky. The following year, they appeared in my village too. Our village always had 'some' lights up, at first they were so pathetic that one wondered why. Then some better ones years later. The towns used to be quite well decorated and some of our local cities were lovely. Due to shutters and most people having xmas trees, one could not see how well, or not, their homes were decorated. Here, in NE England there are lots of homes that have the whole house lit up. It is vulgar , and JOYOUS, and makes me smile. And last week, I saw the best ever lit xmas tree  in someone's garden, magnificent it was. And if people haven't done the outside of their homes up, curtains are open and xmas trees on display in the windows. Should be a live link! https://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/news/north-east-news/gallery/north-east-christmas-light-displays-19388405

That was an interesting walk down memory lane. I looked up just 'opas' and 12 pages came up, but nothing about her husband being arrested. I think it may have been moderator deleted to be honest. And now to have a lie down, I am most unwell, and that was exhausting. Not covid, I must add.[blink]

I believe it was opas (wife) who said that her husband had been arrested in the UK driving a french lorry......... something along those lines. I cannot remember what happened subsequently, if in fact we were told. JohnM any news on the Turin freight line. I have spoken to friends and they seem to know nothing at all, when in fact I reckon that the line will be very very close one particular friend's son's home.

If you have rice wine then I personally wouldn't even look for anything else. In the chinese recipes I have, sherry will replace rice wine, so why not the other way round.