We wanted to hang up some posters we’d bought from recent visits to exhibitions.

After a trip to the supermarket to get some frames we came back to find…

We eventually persuaded Ula to move and so were able to adorn the walls with some new pictures.

More than seven months after I first reported that a road sign for Venelles had been écrasé we have a new sign.

Once more motorists will be able to find their way to our village.

Still no update on the other sign being replaced. I guess that will be done in January.

While we’re on the subjects of signs, I hadn’t noticed how the sign warning of le verglas is covered up in the warmer months.

I guess the risk of black ice at the moment is fairly minimal.

On Sunday night there was a massive storm in Provence.

It caused a lot of problems.

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Fortunately we were safely indoors and all we had to worry about was whether la piscine would déborder ou pas.

I looked out of the window and could see something bobbing in the swimming pool.

On closer inspection, it was an animal struggling to keep its head above the water.

I dashed outside and found a big lizard just about managing to float upright like a big green pencil.

I fished it out and let it recover by the side of the pool.

It is my third rescue mission with animals that have fallen into the pool.

Le crapaud was a success, I’m not so sure about la musaraigne.

I think le lézard recovered from his ordeal.

I spotted this sign in a local supermarket.

It lists the six whiskey producing areas of Scotland and their different tasting notes.

A few new words for me:

Tourbé – peaty

Iodé – Briney (I think)

Boisé – woody

Bruyère– heather

FYI – my favourite is Speyside whiskey- Aultmore but particularly Glenfarclas.

Just saying.

Our always excellent local paper La Provence posted on Instagram about a tradition that has taken place on the first Sunday of September for centuries – the blessing of the traditional local almond sweet les calissons.

In 1630 Aix was suffering from the plague and they prayed to Notre Dame de la Seds for help and after the Mass they gave out calissons and Aix was saved from the plague.

So once a year, the archbishop blesses 2,000 calissons and they are given out to the people of Aix.

It was a very enjoyable spectacle to watch pass through the central streets of Aix.

Even if all the participants didn’t seem to be enjoying it as much.

This weekend we had some visitors – my former colleague from Euronews, Toks, and his wife Laurence.
We took them on a tour of Aix and also fitted in a trip to the seaside at La Çiotat.

The weather was lovely and eating by the port made me remember how lucky we are to live here at the moment.

And it was lovely to see some friends from Lyon again.

À bientôt

As you may remember Aix is celebrating its most famous son Paul Cezanne and there is an exhibition of the work he made at his family home in Jas de Bouffan.

It is a really impressive exhibition with lots of drawings and paintings by the great man including les joueurs de cartes (the card players), plenty of self portraits and still lifes – nature morte in French.

I love his nature morte – he painted a lot of fruit – pears, cherries and apples.

His use of colour is really eye-catching. I didn’t take any photos of the paintings in the exhibition so here’s a quick photo of the bookshop’s offerings.

If you are in Aix before 12 October I would highly recommend buying a ticket.

We are continuing our house hunting and had spotted a potential new home in an estate agents’ window in La Tour d’Aigue.

The house itself was in Cucuron – a nice little village not far from where we are now that is quite lively – with plenty of bars and restaurants and un marché nocture.

The lovely agent showed us round. The house is made up of a top floor flat with three bedrooms and a couple of terraces.

There is also a completely self-contained guest flat on the ground floor and a studio that is currently rented out to a doctor.

It was right in the heart of the village but with a garage and a pool – our ideal combination of a mix between quieter countryside but not quite as remote as where we are now.

It could be a good opportunity to try our hand at renting out a flat in the summer to visitors to Provence – AirB&B style.

We are planning on going back for another look.

I had to go to a workshop at the French unemployment office France Travail.

As ever, it was an opportunity for me to practice my French listening and speaking skills.
After having sat through a presentation about another way to potentially find work we all had to give our opinion on what we had heard.
The woman in front of me was an artist and so said it wasn’t really her thing but that she had to come.
She then asked: je peux m’eclipser? and the woman running the workshop said of course.
I had to look it up but it means Can I sneak out?
I like that and will make sure I try to use it when appropriate.
On the job front, I saw a couple of interesting leaflets asking for applicants.
Might give this one a go.