La Capounado

Until the last war, there was a bronze statue in the park in Lézignan depicting la capounado, a prank traditionally played during the grape harvest when a young man would creep up on a girl while they were picking grapes and mash a bunch of ripe grapes all over her face. This would probably be viewed less benignly nowadays, but in those days that's about as subtle as flirting got.

One day in 1943 the Germans removed the statue and sent it to Düsseldorf to be melted down for munitions. Last week, as part of the vin primeur festivities, a newly commissioned replacement was unveiled, in the presence of a delegation from Lézignan's German twin town, Lauterbach. I missed the inauguration, but I popped along to the park today to take a photo of the new statue.

Today I also did my first online supermarket shop (we're a bit behind here in rural France). Very efficient: having placed the order earlier in the week, we drove up to the supermarket on the way back from the market, a young man put the shopping in the car, I paid him, and was off again within a couple of minutes. No trailing round the aisles or queueing at the checkout, no extra charge -- I like it!