Gloomy (ish)

The first even vaguely gloomy (weatherwise) day for a week or so was lifted by the arrival of our friends from Castres for a walk. Well, I say a walk but what I really mean is a very long very boozy lunch and much chat, followed by a quick stroll and then back to the table for cocktails and more food.

This scene in real life looked not much like this - the sky wasn't anything like as threatening and I have had to turn down the green colour as it looked too fake in the original. But all in it was a fine walk (5km so not teeny) and we avoided the rain. Though I think the girls would have sooner avoided the walk altogether as M turned out to have not just a bit of a cold, but a temperature, and Katherine had - going against experience and advice - eaten quails eggs for lunch and had a very sore stomach all day and most of Monday.

Conor avoided the whole walk by going on a birthday trip to Castres with a neighbour. Despite my terrifying the parents of the birthday boy with the epipen/allergy talk (I seem unable to do that in a nuanced, non-scary way in French) all was well and he was delighted to have been allowed four pieces of birthday cake (I had firmly emphasised that chocolate cake was fine for him to eat - so I guess he was allowed to eat all he wanted of that!)

Just as I was beginning to feel a bit overwhelmed by the the task of building a social life in a different language and culture, it was refreshing and reassuring in equal measure to have a day like this.