DEAD FROGGY, DEAD BLOGGY

So look, I told him, didn't I? I warned him well. He was not a suitable suitor.
"You can't live with me", I said, "you'll die. You are a FROG, and I am a LADY." (well, lady-ish...)
But he wouldn't listen, he kept coming back, trying to get into my house and who knows, my bed.
And just as I feared, he is now one very very dead  Hyla Meridionalis.
Squashed.
It was my friend Patricia who found his small green corpse, flattened against the door frame where the door, at some point had slammed shut and  ended his pretty little life. "Well, he didn't suffer," said Patricia, brightly. But she would not allow me to take his photograph, even knowing how I like to record events here.
"Morbid," she said.
So he's gone, and so will I be now... although not in such a dramatic fashion, only for a few weeks or months.
The thing is, there have been some technical difficulties loading material on my BLOGSPOT blog that have been annoying and neither I nor my local computer-magicians, Jean-Michel and Jimmy, can find a solution. That's one reason to give the blog a rest... and another is the fact that there are no more bookings available for this autumn at the Mas Blanc Writer's Retreat.  I will fire up this blog again in the new year, either on blogspot or another carrier, we'll see how it goes...
The next rental period begins at the end of March, 2014, and continues until the end of June. So if you are interested in coming to the Mas Blanc Writer's Retreat -- be you writer, artist, or anyone else seeking a quiet place to work for a week or two -- you can get all the information you need from the website .....www.isabelhuggan.com

One of my delights in doing the blog these past months has been sharing photographs of life here in my little corner of Languedoc, and so I will leave you with three shots from the river, the  daily source of enormous pleasure not only for me but, dare I say... for frogs. It is a strange, quaint truth that the land on which Mas Blanc sits has, for centuries been called LA GRENOUILLE -- the French word for Frog. In fact, in the telephone book here, that is part of my address but I've eliminated it in my correspondence as it is simply too difficult to pronounce properly (unless you happen to be French).

So maybe that sweetly persistent amphibian was simply claiming his territorial rights? who knows....

The old bridge over the Ourne on the way to Mas Blanc

River-walking in the shallows, early morning/

Water is endlessly asking to have its picture taken...

So I'll say bye-bye for now.... And hope that you've enjoyed sharing my life this last little while.

"STRAW!" she said, balefully...

To a gardener, there's a reversal of the old Rumpelstiltskin fairy tale in which straw is spun into gold... for me, it's the other way round. There's nothing like a good heavy layer of straw-mulch to keep in the moisture, and keep down the weeds. I remember  well,  a few years ago seeing the marvellous vegetable gardens of  Canadian writers Merilyn Simonds and Wayne Grady and learned then that the straw must be laid on thickly to do any good...

But getting my hands on straw here always proves a bit tricky, and this year I didn't get my bales delivered until quite recently, just as I was coming down with shingles (I'm nearly recovered now, it has been a long haul, thank you for asking).By the way, if you have anything like a garden where you live -- or even if you dream of having a garden of flowers or vegetables, or a combination of both --  do yourself a favour and obtain Merilyn Simonds' lovely recent book A NEW LEAF: GROWING WITH MY GARDEN, published by Doubleday, 2012... google it, find it, get it, really not to be missed. 

Just three bales, that's all I needed for my little potager -- that's the French word for a small kitchen garden that supplies summer greens and herbs.

This may not look like much to you, but to me it is GOLD

The following photos were taken 10 days ago, just after the straw was laid, and I must say that even in the hot dry weather we've had, everything is coming along nicely, and the garden appears even more lushly green now than then... Of course, the whole area  is watered every few nights with a sprinkling system that brings water up from the river... without that, no amount of straw would keep these plants from burning to a crsip. It's hot here, 35-degree-hot day after day,  but then that's normal for the south of France, also known as the "Midi" --  hot as noon (midi) most of the summer -- which is one of the reasons I don't rent the writer's retreat studio from June through until the autumn. It'd be impossible to be comfortable enough to work during these months... So maybe it's unfair of me to show Mas Blanc during its summertime manifestation? In any event, here are a few more agricultural shots...

Two views of the potager two weeks ago... that's kale, by the way

Down in the "orchard" -- which is not really an orchard so much as an area where there are a few fruit and nut trees -- the apples are coming on nicely, but it's war now between me and the big  jays, who like to swing by during the day and peck a few holes in a few apples just for the hell of it... I didn't get the netting on soon enough this year, and my old scarecrow doesn't seem to be doing the trick somehow...

Poor old fella has really seen better days...

More later. Have to go out now and pick some beans for supper. And a few cherry tomatoes, although they'll probably not make it into the kitchen, I love popping them into my mouth when they're still warm from the vine. Life is good... particularly life-after-zona....