DOG DAYS

Today I am totally pissed off and bored, so perhaps it is time to have a little blog therapy.  Firstly the weather is totally awful – damp and dark and sad – I had forgotten how depressing weather in northern Europe can be … I left England thirty-odd years ago and lived in the south-west of France where the sky is lighter in the winter and then I moved to Switzerland high up in the Alpes above the clouds so in winter if it wasn’t snowing, we had brilliant sunshine.  Since my move to Brussels a year ago, apart from May last year, the weather has been overcast and gloomy.  Added to which for our holidays last year we decided to do a rain theme – 10 days in Brittany and 10 days in Co. Mayo, Ireland – both met our expectations!  One day of sun in Brittany and one in Ireland.  I like to think I am not a lying on a beach all day person, but at the moment four or five days of sun wouldn’t go amiss.

We could of course just shut up the house and whisk ourselves away to a week of sun and bugger the footprints we would be contributing to the Earth’s demise – unfortunately the recession is starting to be felt quite seriously and although the New Husband beavers away, clients are being sluggish in paying up.  He has in fact just whizzed to the shops to buy supper as I think he is fed up with my menus on a shoestring … however at least it gets him in the kitchen doing other things than raiding the ‘fridge!

A couple of days later …

Although he doesn’t cook, the New Husband turned out an enjoyable dinner of chicken with lemon and ginger – this is his only recipe, so I think in a couple of months’ time, I will hate the sight of it!  We won’t talk about the state of the kitchen after his culinery efforts.

Yesterday, to add to my general gloom, I looked out of the drawing room window and noticed a flat tyre on the car – odd, as the tyres are only a couple of months old.  On going to investigate, found that a second one was flat … some sod had either let them down or slashed them.  Rang the garage who said ‘Unscrew the valve caps and see if there is anything inside’ … bingo! a peppercorn in each valve cap.  Better than having them slashed but a stupid bloody thing to do.  I normally just get in the car and drive and never check the tyres.  I admit to having a large gaz-guggling SUV which I love.  Now that I live in Brussels I no longer need it, but of course it is totally unsaleable so I am stuck with it, and even if I did sell it, the money from the sale would only buy a horrid little car, totally unsuitable for long journeys.  We also have a small car for the town – what makes me so cross with all these idiotic people who take it out on SUVs is that in fact the big car gives off less CO2 than the small, ancient car.

I do try and do my Save the Planet bit – we recycle everything possible, I buy as much as I can food-wise that doesn’t come from the other end of the world, our house is pretty chemical-free, I walk to the local shops and take the tram when I go into the centre – all that kind of stuff, but when some idiot does this it really gets me angry.  If they want to be eco-warriors, that’s fine by me, but do it in a more intelligent manner.  Because of their bit of fun I had to drive to the garage, get the compressor, drive back and then go back to the garage to return the compressor and get the tyres checked and THEN drive home again, and not forgetting the time I had to run the compressor to inflate the tyres.  So how much extra CO2 did I put into the atmosphere?