Tour de force

A British victory in the Tour de France - a bit like a Frenchman scoring a century at Lords. Wiggins does seem to have won over the French public though, with his somewhat crooked sense of humour, quirky personality and willingness to give interviews in reasonably fluent French. And his triumph in what the French see as the ultimate sporting challenge has been welcomed, albeit somewhat grudgingly. Articles I've read have praised the professional, pragmatic way the Sky team controlled the race but at the same time bemoaned the way the spectacle was thus rendered somewhat less exciting than normal. This year's race has been described more than once as one of the most boring ever.

On the other hand, French commentators have also heralded it as a great year, largely due to the French success in winning five stages. In contrast to the boring Brits, the likes of Thomas Voeckler have been hailed for their panache and daring. French flair, quoi…

Growth record

Month five, visit to the paediatrician number five. No jabs this time, but plenty of screaming when the nasty man tried to stick his scope in little ears and nostrils. Another measuring session recorded a near doubling in weight and a height increase of 13cm since birth. At this rate la petite will as tall as her mother by the time she's four, and as heavy as her father by the time she's seven.

Of course child growth rates aren't linear, and obsessive that I am, plotting the little munchkin's numbers on the standard (British) curves has her height roughly following the 50th percentile and her weight steadily climbing from about the 60th to the 80th percentile. Hmm, nonetheless Monsieur le Pèdiatre expresses admiration for our treasure's chubby little legs and arms.
"She's not too plump, then?"
"No, not at all. You don't need to worry about obesity until she's two."

That's all right then, we'll continue feeding her 20% more than he recommends. And of course her excess weight could all be put down to her head, measured to be larger than roughly 90 percent of all other babies of the same age. Certainly takes after papa then. Well, we need large heads to fit in all that grey matter.

Daytime entertainment has been more difficult this week. Somehow, it's always raining when it's time for our afternoon stroll along the river. Naps in the cot aren't as much fun. And no more tennis, no more Tour de France on TV. Le Grand Boucle reached its climax on Sunday after three masochistic weeks for the riders that ended in plaudits all round: for the valiant failure of the local hero to hang on to the yellow jersey for the final two days, for the thrilling win at Alpe d'Huez that earned his teammate the white jersey and the burden of being the next great white hope of French cycling, for the attacking ride up the Galibier that earned the eternal runner-up the yellow jersey for one day, for the green jersey won by the greatest sprinter in the Isle of Man and the rest of the world, and finally for the Australian winner. Last year's winner did, after all, pay the price of trying to win the Giro and the Tour in one year.

The saga of cooling the car reached its end (we hope) yesterday. Not that we've needed air-conditioning in the last 2 weeks. Second hand compressor duly purchased (highly efficient online order and delivery, bargain at 100 euros) and fitted by our friendly mechanic. How much will that be then? Billed at 326 euros, with no repair warranty given that it was carried out with a second hand part. Or 250 for cash. Easy choice. Tradesmen are the same the world over.

Two seuls encore

And then there were two. La grand-mère et la mère left yesterday in the morning rain, heading for the airport at different times in separate taxis, the former heading home after two weeks of grandchild entertainment, sundry sewing jobs and jam-making, the latter reluctantly flying off for a meeting in the company mother country. She will be home this evening but meanwhile la petite et son père have just each other for company once more. Teething troubles seem to be the main preoccupation at the moment. Nothing a bit of drugging won't solve.

On Monday we had a visitor (NB arrived despite making few plans), and la petite coquinette awoke from early evening sleep in her most beguiling mood to meet our dinner guest with sleepy smiles and coy flirts aplenty. He left with a belly full of moussaka, crumble and Coteaux de Tricastin, and a phone full of blurred photos to show to Dr C. His mission of finding the hotel at the top of the tallest building in Lyon was eventually accomplished.

Rumours of the demise of Contador may well have been premature. Yesterday's stage, previously assumed to be anodyne, saw him attack on the only climb of the day in driving rain and autumnal temperatures, leaving the man who was runner-up last year trailing in his spray. Lots of complaints about the weather in France at the moment, particularly from the holiday industry. Temperatures for the middle week in July are forecast to be about five degrees lower than those we had in the middle of April. The next three Alpine stages in le Tour could be interesting, including two climbs up the col du Galibier, which on Sunday was under several inches of snow, occasioning the rescue of a number of cycling nuts who were attempting to emulate the professionals in shorts and t-shirts.

Cooling and climbing

Baby travel tale number five, Tuesday: in thirty-five degree heat, la grand-mère, la mère et la fille set off in la voiture with broken air-conditioning to visit a friend and her baby. Short ten minute journey fortunately, and la petite behaves perfectly during the trip there, the visit, and falls asleep in the car on the way back! Hallelujah.

Next day le père takes the car to the garage to get the air-conditioning fixed. Diagnosis: leaking compressor. Cost of repair: 900 euros for a new replacement, or 560 for a repaired one. Plus labour costs. Hmm, trusty (air-con apart) old banger is barely worth that much. Internet search reveals second hand compressors are available for about 100 euros. Wonder if the (franchised) garage will put it in? Quatorze juillet yesterday and bridging day today, garage closed. Have to wait till next week to find out…

There was the usual fireworks show above Fourvière yesterday to celebrate la fête nationale, an event dampened by the deaths of five French soldiers in Afghanistan but not by the torrential rain, which came and went the previous day. La belle-mère et le beau-fils toddled to the end of the road late last night to watch, while la bienheureuse looked after last feed of the day for la petite coquinette. The latter has learned a new trick recently - blowing raspberries. Which she does frequently and with great gusto. Significance? No idea. Any baby behaviour experts out there, answers on a postcard please.

Bastille day also produced minor fireworks yesterday, during the start of the real Tour de France, the first mountain stage. As expected, French cyclists made valiant attempts to win the stage, accompanied by a worthy Welsh gooner, but in the end the favourites all finished more or less together. Main talking point though was the fact that the others gained a few more seconds on Contador. Never seen before.

Up until yesterday the Tour was characterised by the number of falls. Contador alone has tumbled four times. Seems it really isn't his year, but the most spectacular day of chutes was on Sunday, when several riders were severely injured in one major crash, and a car belonging to France Televisions knocked two of the leading group into a barbed wire fence. Both bravely got back on their bikes and finished the stage, but the incident made lots of noise in France. The car driver was excluded from the tour, and there is talk about requiring all drivers and motorbike riders to be former professional cyclists. Most already are, though not the culprit on Sunday.

Summer sport

The first weekend in July marks the real arrival of summer: the schools are on holiday, the city starts emptying, and the Tour de France starts. And that means the first major bouchons on the A7 autoroute between Lyon and Marseille, the first time there might be a small chance of finding a parking space outside the apartment, and the first bit of previous-winner-of-the-TdF baiting by the French public and press. This year, with drug allegations hanging over him, it's Contador's turn again. Booed when the teams were introduced on Thursday, and yesterday caught up in a major pileup, which lost him over a minute on his main rivals. Suggestions in the French press this morning that he may even give up…

Anyway, with Wimbledon almost over, le Tour provides me with afternoon entertainment to supplement that provided by the little sweetheart. Who has been a real dear most of the week, despite apparently starting to teethe. At least, she chews on everything and anything at the moment.

In the wider world, l'affaire DSK is once more dominating the headlines. A poll in one of the newspapers this morning suggests half the French public would like to see him making a political comeback. Assuming of course he is cleared of all charges, as most people here are expecting to happen. The fact that he did have sex with the woman is apparently neither here nor there…

At the other end of the political spectrum, the current president was 'violently attacked' in Agen, which was almost overlooked when the new Strauss-Kahn revelations broke. The attack turned out to be a man grabbing him by the lapels and pulling, which provoked the amusing sight of Sarko ducking a blow which never came. He sportingly let it known he wouldn't file a complaint afterwards, but his aggressor still copped a six-month suspended prison sentence.

A wee spot of bother

The Bettencourt affair was pushed briefly off the front pages yesterday by the mise en examen of two international footballers for sex with an under-age prostitute. The summer of Les Bleus grows ever stormier.
 
It wasn't long, however, before the Bettencourt story was back, rolling along with no sign of grinding to a halt. Government minister Eric Woerth's wife was questioned recently by the procureur investigating illegal political funding and nepotism, and the labour minister himself is due to follow her into the hot seat, as soon as he's finished presenting the government's plans for reform of pensions and retirement to parliament. A busy man, Mr Woerth. Not surprisingly opposition MPs have been asking how he can devote himself fully to his job while defending himself against the Bettencourt bribery allegations. One of his alleged crimes was to ask Liliane Bettencourt's financial manager to give his wife a job, and the task of defending himself against the claim wasn't made any easier when said financial manager told the procureur that Woerth had asked him to 'advise his wife on her career'. Quelle difference?

On a more successful sporting note (what is politics if not sport?), this year's Tour de France is being heralded as one of the best in recent years. There certainly has been a fair amount of excitement, with plenty of twists and turns, but I suspect the French view is tinted a somewhat pinker shade of rose by the success of French riders. Six stage wins so far, the most in any Tour for nearly fifteen years. To top it all, three of them came in successive Pyrenean stages earlier this week. The final mountain stage is taking place today as I write, the final climb up the mythic Col du Tourmalet in damp cloudy weather (much like Lyon today - a break in the hot spell at last) certain to decide the overall winner of the Tour. Somehow, I think a fourth successive French win is unlikely…

Lyon is the subject of a bit of piss-taking in the national news today. Municipal police in the Parc de la Tête d'Or cautioned a man yesterday for allowing his three-year daughter to urinate in public. Authorities say it was on the pavement in front of a restaurant, with public toilets only a short walk away. He says he was on crutches, his daughter was desperate, he couldn't get her to the loo on time, and it was under a tree nowhere near the restaurant. Ho hum. He faces a fine of as much as 450 euros if he can't convince magistrates…

Mountain high

Another weekend, another trip to the mountains. With la belle-mère visiting and la bienheureuse taking a couple of days off work, after viewing the traditional quatorze juillet impressive fireworks display on Wednesday evening, we enjoyed three days and nights in Valmorel. After a stop en route for lunch on the shores of Lac d'Aigeubelette, walking plans for the weekend were thrown into partial disarray by the fact that the Valmorel chair-lifts don't work over the weekend. Strange way of pulling in the punters. Compared to a winter weekend the resort was empty, even with the extra numbers attracted by the passage of the Tour de France over the Col de la Madeleine in midweek.

The one place that was teeming was the swimming pool, so we enjoyed a cooling dip rather than a swim shortly after our arrival on Thursday afternoon. The following day it was sunny and already warm as we set off for ramble through the forest and hills above the resort. It was supposed to be an easy walk designed to offer la belle-mère mountain panoramas with which to test out her new toy. The views were there but the length and steepness, in places, of the path were somewhat underestimated. Nonetheless, it was a very pleasant nine km hike, with a stop for lunch in a refuge hut 400m above our starting point. From there it was downhill all the way, and via an encounter with a herd of cows we reached our home for the weekend six hours after starting out. The new camera was thoroughly tested, much like the three walkers.

Dinner out, and an early night followed. Showers and cooler weather greeted us on Saturday, providing an excuse for a lazy morning of reading and recovery and whiling away the time. The rain cleared by late afternoon, so we went for a much shorter stroll through and round the resort, the upper reaches of which are in the throes of major redevelopment. Five large cranes working on a new hotel and complex paused only at night and on Sunday.

We took the scenic route home on Sunday, via Lac du Bourget. Wending our way along the western shore of the lake we eventually found the tiny harbour  tucked into the rocks below the village of Bourdeau, reached only on foot down another steeply descending switchback road. There we ate another tasty picnic lunch before climbing back up to the car and then driving up and up the road over the ridge above the lake. More scenic viewpoints afforded more panoramic photo opportunities before we reached the top and headed down the other side, back towards a warm and stuffy flat in Lyon.

Hells, bells and bicycles

Escaping the heat of the city, we headed into the hills for the weekend, in search of cool, quiet countryside and a travelling circus named the Tour de France. The Jura was the destination. We drove up on Saturday morning, parked in the sleepy village of Les Bouchoux, and set out on a gentle stroll up the hill to find a vantage point from which to view the cyclists whizz past.

It was certainly cooler, it was certainly quieter (for the moment) as we meandered along a pleasant path, fighting off an attack by killer horse flies along the way. At last we reached the quiet fly-free sanctuary of a picturesque waterfall where we paused for a picnic lunch. Thence it was onwards and upwards until we reached the route of the 7th stage of the Tour de France 2010. Finding a shady spot a couple of kilometres downhill from the Col de la Croix de la Serra, we settled down to await the spectacle. The caravane went past first, vehicle after dressed up vehicle spraying the roadside with giveaway caps, cakes, detergent samples and sundry other publicity items. Then at last came the racers, a strung out echappée followed a few minutes later by the peloton, then a few minutes later came the stragglers.

In twenty short minutes it was all over and we walked back down to the car to find our hotel in La Pesse, a neighbouring village. Looking forward to a cool, quiet night we dined in and collapsed into bed. Coolish it may have been, at least with the skylight window in our room open to the night air, quiet it was for a while. Then the clock on the village church struck ten. With the window open and the bell tower fewer than 30 metres away it was ten rather loud bongs.
"I think most church bells only ring up till about ten or eleven in the evening," said la bienheureuse, hopefully.
The clock duly announced eleven pm, then midnight..
Then one, then two, and so on through all through the night, with a few random chimes thrown in for good measure at one o'clock, which temporarily lulled me into the blissful false belief that I might have actually fallen asleep for more than an hour.

Lesson learned. Never book a hotel without checking the whereabouts in relation to the village church. In the morning, dark rims and bags under our eyes, we set off for home, stopping off en route for another pleasant walk, up and down the Crêt au Merle, followed by a short stroll to take in the stunning view at the Belvédère du Cuchet. From there it was downhill all the way, back to the Lyon heat...

Tears and greasy palms

The Sarkozy regime continues to battle allegations of illegal political 'donations'. Yesterday government spokesmen claimed Monsieur le Président had been cleared when the former Bettencourt accountant backtracked on earlier claims that Sarko was among the right wing politicians who regularly received cash from the major shareholder in L'Oréal. However, closer examination of the 'retraction' reveals that she says she told the media site, which broke the story, that Sarkozy only 'may' have been among the beneficiaries of the Bettencourt largesse, rather than claiming she definitely saw him, as was originally reported. She also holds to the claim that the Bettencourt financial manager told her he was giving 150000 euros in cash to the Sarkozy presidential campaign in 2007. A bank official at the branch 50000 euros were allegedly withdrawn from has now categorically denied speaking to the accountant, who claims she told her the money was to fund the Sarko campaign. Is that the sound of UMP thumbscrews being applied?

Elsewhere in the media, the left-wing magazine Marianne claims to have seen the famous account books kept by the accountant, and reports that they show cash withdrawals totalling 380000 euros in the first 3 months of 2007 (compared to about 60000 in the equivalent period the previous year, when there was no presidential election campaign). The Bettencourt lawyers say the cash withdrawals were all to cover the personal expenses of André Bettencourt, but Marianne says that only about 180000 worth of spending is accounted for in the books. All rather surreal. How can anyone need sixty thousand euros worth of petty cash per month, let alone a hundred grand plus, and haven't billionaires heard of credit cards?

Meanwhile the Tour de France reaches the end of a rather eventful first week, characterised by sundry crashes, hot weather, government politicians making a point of comparing the approachability of the cyclists comported to French international footballers, and a lot of fuss surrounding the poor form and behaviour of the British 'bad boy' of sprinting. When Mark Cavendish finally won his first stage of this year's tour yesterday, he promptly burst into floods of tears in the middle of a live interview on French television, and it took a full minute before he managed to recover sufficient composure to continue. Which appears to have rather endeared him to the French media, who love a good bit of high sporting emotion.

And in local news, it's hot in Lyon today. Very hot. And tomorrow, and…

Crime and non-punishment

Plenty of news and noise in France over the last few days. Making the headlines at the moment is Frédéric Mitterrand, the Minister of Culture who made waves a few weeks ago over his denunciation of the arrest of Roman Polanski, and is now struggling to fend off a storm of criticism over a book he wrote ('neither novel nor memoire') four years ago describing his experiences with 'garçons' in Thailand. Last night he was interviewed live on the main French TV news and defended himself in lively, if somewhat rambling and confused fashion. He condemned sexual tourism and paedophilia, which he had never indulged in, but admitted sexual relations in Thailand with 'men of his own age'. He didn't help his own case by continuing to refer to 'boys' though, and the polemic continues this morning.

Earlier in the week Le Monde made waves in the cycling world by publishing extracts from a report by the French agency against drugs in sport (AFLD), which apparently criticised the international cycling union (UCI) for giving Astana (the team of Contador and Armstrong) 'privileged treatment' during the Tour de France, allowing them extra time between the end of a stage and the drugs test, among other things. The implication of the report is that the UCI did what they could to ensure a Tour without positive tests, which the organisers of this year's Tour congratulated themselves for achieving. The AFLD however say they are working on new tests to detect the latest generation of EPO and the whisper is that 20 odd cyclists in this year's Tour are under suspicion...

Meanwhile in Lyon a couple of tragic but slightly curious cases made the national news. The first involved an unsolved murder from 34 years ago, which was apparently cleared up when a suspect confessed. The bizarre thing is that he can't be tried for the crime because the statute of limitations in France is a mere 10 years. The second case was an abandoned new born baby who was subsequently discovered to have a rare genetic disease, so doctors have appealed for the mother to come forward...

It's been a quiet week on the home front, apart from having a commuting English colleague of la bienheureuse (the witness to my earlier in-flight misdemeanors) round to dinner on Wednesday. Ma bien-aimée has a rare week without travel and I've been slogging away at re-write 4 of book 3. Not much incentive to get out of the apartment anyway - the weather has finally broken. It started raining on Weds night and has barely stopped since...

Overheating...

It's been a quiet couple of weeks on the home and personal work front. While I've struggled unenthusiastically with synopses and query letters to agents, la bienheureuse has really been overworked. A couple of inactive weekends were thus something of a welcome change.

The hot spell was thankfully broken briefly by a three day cooler period in the middle of last week, but over the weekend the heat and sunshine returned, bringing with them the inevitable forest fires, threatening Marseille and Corsican villages. Two volunteer firemen are among the suspected arsonists.

This week, fires and pyromaniacs were pushed off the front pages by Monsieur le Président's little turn. Never in the history of human health has so much newsprint and TV coverage been generated by one little fainting fit. You'd have thought a man in his fifties, who happens also to be in charge of a country, would have more common sense than to go jogging at lunchtime in the middle of a heatwave. But then, moderation is not a word in Sarko's vocabulary.

Other, somewhat fitter men overworking in the heat of the day were also in the news over the weekend. The three week circus that is the Tour de France reached its climax on Saturday and Sunday. After the first two weeks that had commentators grumbling about the lack of excitement, the final week exploded into action as soon as the race reached the Alps, and the general mood at the end was a mix of self-congratulation and anticipation of the next one. At last we a Tour without positive drug tests. Yet...
The Contador/Armstrong rivalry didn't do any harm either, and there's much excitement about the potential battle next year.

There are still plenty of sceptical voices about. A sports scientist (who also happens to have been Festina's sporting director, so he would know), writing in Libération, calculated that during the ascent towards Verbier last week Contador's VO2 (oxygen consumption) was 99.5 ml/min/kg, a figure the writer classified as humanly impossible. Or to put it in more understandable numbers, he covered 8.5km with an average slope of 7.5% in just under 21 minutes - average speed, more than 24 km/h. Greg Lemond, writing in Le Monde (where else?), said as far as he was aware, no athlete in any sport had ever achieved such a feat. The writer in Libération also calculated the power production of Contador and the Schlecks in the three big climbs towards Grand Bornand at 440 watts. He said it was established that doping could produce 410 watts, 430 watts was 'miraculous', and 450 watts 'mutant'...

Le Tour des berges

A remarkably uneventful week, if that's not an oxymoron, in a warm and mostly sunny city. The lyonnais bourgeoisie gradually desert town for their vacances in July, though it's not until the first couple of weeks in August that the population reaches a seasonal nadir.

Not a lot to report on the home front either. Been writing steadily, if not prolifically, over the last few weeks, book number 3 now about 75% finished, la bienheureuse hasn't travelled abroad for 3 whole weeks, and most of the voisins are on holiday. Most exciting event of the weekend was a cycle ride along the river yesterday morning before it got too hot, having had a teetotal Saturday because of the after-effects of a half-bottle of wine each on Friday evening. White wine, too, we are becoming lightweights, alcoholically speaking.

Anyway, we did the full tour - north along the berges du Rhône as far as the bridge over the périphérique, and then all the way back as far south as the Parc du Gerland, then home. Total distance covered, about 22km. Might not sound like much, but to cycle-rusty legs and bums, it was.

Meanwhile, cyclists on a somewhat different level, planet even, came to the end of their 3 week trip round France. Le Tour 2008 is being seen as somewhat transitional, with the battle against the drug cheats seemingly being slowly won, and the old guard, brought up in an era where pharmaceutical aid was rife, superceded by the new, clean generation. So they say... There was plenty of suspense, right up until the penultimate stage, if only because there was no single dominant rider, but it seemed to me somewhat lacking in real drama...

Daft dogs & a wooden anniversary

A frustrating and interesting day last Friday. Trudging round town in search (ultimately fruitful if not entirely successful) of a suitable cadeau en bois, I happened upon a minor stir as I crossed the footbridge near home. A handful of people were watching a dog which had jumped into the river only to find itself unable to get out. It was in no danger, but couldn't scramble up onto the raised embankment just under the bridge. At that moment a police launch went past and someone attracted its attention.

Thus the rescue operation was launched. A policewoman donned waders, was dropped off into the shallow water around the end of the bridge, and eventually succeeded in luring the stupid animal round the side were there were some steps. Of its owner there was no sign, though it sported a collar and lead, but a bystander apparently offered to look after it in some way. Presumably he either knew the owner or took it to a shelter or dog pound, or took it home himself...

Second dumb dog I've seen in the river in recent weeks. The previous one had jumped in chasing a stick, been carried by the current past the slipway and been unable to swim back. Its owner was in attendance, but
I didn't hang around on that occasion to watch the denouement...

The following day we drove to the Auvergne again, for a short weekend away to celebrate reaching a wooden milestone. A night and a meal in a hotel in the Mont Dore ski resort was preceded by a long drive across the middle of the Massif Central. Taking the scenic route seemed a good idea at the time, and indeed, from the point of view of scenery on offer it was, but the 6 hour journey time wasn't. However, we still got there in time for a short stroll, and the pleasant evening weather encouraged us to take the télépherique up towards the highest point in the Massif Central, the Puy de Sancy the following morning.

Unfortunately the weather in the morning wasn't quite so nice. We reached the top cable car station in billowing mist, which was being blown across the top of the mountain in intermittent, swirling clouds by a howling wind. There were however, occasional breaks, and well, we were there, so we decided to climb the wooden staircase right to the top, despite being singularly ill-prepared for such a venture - sandals & light trainers respectively, shorts and a single light cardigan between us.



The video above gives some idea of conditions, but nonetheless we got to the top, waited 10 minutes in vain for a clear patch, then trudged back down again. Ten minutes later the summit was clear, and the weather stayed sunny for the rest of the day. Sod's law. Still, enjoyed a very pleasant stroll down, and drove home along roads newly surfaced in honour of the Tour de France, via a stop in St Nectaire to visit a church and a grotto. Took the autoroute back and halved the journey time...

Fêtes, Floods and Fireworks

The promised thunderstorms arrived on Friday, including one downpour with hailstones the size of grapes and minor flooding in the apartment. The rain was so heavy it got in through closed windows, first time I've seen that happen, though I suspect it was due to the shutter casings channeling water onto the window frame...

Two days of cool, occasionally damp weather followed, but the sun reappeared in celebration of the Fête Nationale on 14 juillet. We strolled out to watch the annual fireworks display atop Fourvière, though it was somewhat less spectacular than the extravaganza in Paris which followed a free concert on the Champ de Mars in front of 600 thousand people and was also in celebration of Quebec's 400th birthday.

Traditionally 14 july is also the day when a Frenchman tries to win the day's stage in the Tour de France. Yesterday was no exception, but a valiant attempt over two hors catégorie climbs was foiled by circumstances - a couple of the main contenders cracked on the famous Col du Tourmalet, which meant the other leading riders pushed as hard as possible to distance their rivals. Made for an interesting day though, and commentators here are gripped by what is turning out to be the most unpredictable race in years.

Orange storms, black Saturday

Second big weekend of the summer on the roads coming, the first to be marked black on the French scale of classifying road conditions - green, orange, red, black. In fact it's red elsewhere Friday & Saturday, but black tomorrow in the Rhône valley as half of France streams south to the Mediterranean beaches for their two weeks in the sun.

At least the vacanciers might have cooler conditions tomorrow. There's an orange alert in the Rhône department today, warning of thunderstorms, which should cool things down. La bienheureuse was on an overnight trip to Germany on Tues & Weds, acting as referee between feuding locals, where it was cold & wet, but was greeted on her return by a couple of days of hot and heavy sunshine. Have to say it has so far been a changeable summer...

It has been a quiet, steady writing week on the home front, enlivened by the Tour de France and some fireworks on the political stage. The surprising prominence of Brits in le tour was followed by the first 'medium' mountain stage in the Massif Centrale, while Ségolène and Sarko (or more accurately Sarko's minions) have been reprising their battles of a year ago. Plus ça change...