A spot of lunch

Been here a week now. I must say, no regrets so far. The smell at the back of the house was a bit strong this morning, but Monica threw the windows open and let the good fresh air in. And no noise, it is just so quiet, a bit of bird song and the view across the field is simply wonderful.

Late morning we were wondering about a walk when there was a crunch of gravel, a car door slam and a brisk knock on the door. A chap wearing jeans and a woolly hat beamed at me.

“I’m Jeff. I know your wife’s met Megan at the boulangerie and we wondered if you’d like to join us for lunch today. Unless you’ve got other plans?”

You can hardly say no and we were just reckoning on a bit of bread chez nous and cheese, so off we went.

It was full of English, we couldn’t believe it. The entire restaurant was buzzing with English voices. There were a few French ouvriers stuck away in a corner but they were vastly outnumbered. Apparently there’s a group of expats that goes regularly to the restaurant every Thursday. It’s a get together they have. Monica and I looked at each other because this isn’t quite the plan we had, mixing with the English like this. We’d sort of got the idea that old chaps like old Pierre, he of the scraggle teeth, would be our friends. But of course, we can hardly understand a word he says so social chit-chat is a bit limited on that front.

Anyway Jeff and Megan sat us down with this party of other Brits for the regular Thursday lunch. It’s very cheap, 13 Euros for four courses with wine, which has to be said it pretty astonishing, don’t know how they make money. I had a bit too much wine to drink and can’t remember all the names now, but there was definitely a David, a Lucy, a couple of Tony’s and a Sylvia. All very nice, but awfully British. We enjoyed ourselves of course, but have said it’s not really something we want to get totally involved in. Otherwise we’ll just never integrate with the French here and that is really what we’re after.