A stroll in the sun

A lovely day today, serendipitous and stimulating. First, it's my birthday, so we took the day off work. Second, my presents consisted overwhelmingly of books. That's always good. Especially when one of them was Rick Stein's Spain (you can't have too many Spanish cookbooks) and another was Diana Henry's Salt Sugar Smoke. As well as the Rick Stein, S bought me Matt Armendariz's book about food photography (heavy hints dropped there) and a polarising filter (likewise). I bought me Tom Ang's Digital Photography Month by Month, for those "no blip mojo" days.

After breakfast, we headed off for a rare visit to les Halles in Narbonne, to shop for dinner. When we bought a small amount of pata negra ham for 100 euros a kilo at the Spanish stall, we became the patronne's new best friend, and she happily got out bottles of wine for us to taste. At the cheese stall, S went overboard as usual, buying some St Félicien fermier, some goat's cheese shaped like scallop shells, and some Mont d'Or that was literally running off the plate. And finally to the butcher who sells the best fillet steak we have ever eaten.

When we were in Lézignan yesterday, we bumped into E, whom we haven't seen for literally years. And as we left the butcher's who should we see but ... E, this time with her husband F, who used to be in the same hiking club as S. They were just heading to one of the market's bars for lunch, so we spontaneously joined them, enjoying a good catch-up chat over chicken kebabs supplied by the neighbouring butcher's stall -- run by the parents of the bar owner.

We left les Halles replete, and walked over to the Médiathèque because I'd heard a rumour that there was going to be a One Billion Rising event on the esplanade. And there was -- a whole load of teenagers dancing by turns, including, pleasingly, some boys. The dancers wore masks, which doesn't seem to have been a general phenomenon.

After this, we went to Bages to try out the polarising filter, very successfully, on the sparkling lagoon. Although today started out grey, it had turned into the best weather I've had on my birthday for years, with wonderful cloudscapes (February is not a good month for a birthday, even in the south of France). We strolled around the village and along the boardwalk in the sunshine, happy to take time not doing very much. Then home, with a detour to the best patisserie in Lézignan to buy dessert. Sadly they had none of their addictive and wonderful white chocolate and rum-soaked raisin tartlets, so I bought some polonaises instead: rum baba, fluffy crème pâtissière, pineapple, Italian meringue.

At home, after an aperitif of chilled white wine with jamón and olives, S cooked dinner: mussels with tomato vinaigrette from the Rick Stein book (which were superb -- I'll be doing those again), steak with sauce Béarnaise, cheese, and one of the tartlets between us because we couldn't cope with any more food. And now, some happy browsing of books by the fire. There's a slideshow of our day here. And thanks to the Blip Assistant, and the polarising filter, for today's blip of Bages seen from the lagoon:)