Diary Extracts - 20th and 21st,Dec.1973

Fandango on wailing wall keeps me constantly twixt sleep 'n' slurch so doesn't help mornings dismal awakenings. Did I say I'd go home today? Well perhaps I was a bit hastey. Still got 200f to keep my pocket happy 'til Feb. at least. Thinking of going to pictures in Albi, five cinemas! 101 Dalmations on this week, also Lawrence of Arabi- yuch! Got a runny nose!? A man in an ear flap hat came to the door this morning as I was making tea but I couldn't understand him, nor he me! "I had a red door but a had it painted black". Just wired up the extension speaker from the record player in Lynne's room, bored a hole in the floor to put the wire thru'. Sounds alright, Yoko's "Cat Man" is on now. Bill's gome wood cuttin' on his own - leaving me to get on with my water colouring. Bill and Lynne have gone to Albi ( I think - that direction anyway) on a secret mission. Bill has met some new people today, a sculptor, a woodman whose given us a pile of his wood for nothing and an English couple who have some land near Cordes somewhere................. Bill is getting it off his chest about record players - seems I've had it for far too long and played it too loud. Naughty me. "Eeeraaaaagh !" goes Yoko " Ooooowgh!" Went to saw mill on River Cerou today to collect off cuts given by the little baggy eyed man today. Its beautiful around there, nestling in a wooded valley among many hills with towers and secret dwelling places. I got a parcel in bed this morning that cheered me up no end - a packet of custard and a Mrs. Peaks Christmas Pud! From Dick and Cheryl. - cost £1.40 to post!! Madness!! Got two loads of wood, one stacked outside gate - fine spindles and sawed other at Marcs - drank some potent wine - we may buy some off Marc! Perhaps a turkey! It rained.

Diary Entry - 14th October 1973

What a night! Gales blowing shutters about - bang crash! Couldn't stand it no longer and did them up, walking over Bill's walnuts in bare feet ugh! Not much sleep again. There must be a cure. Rain comes through window too, and big drips in B's studio. Moustache man gets big wind blown nuts. Down deri to get windows , hinges etc. But make quiet back exit when two people stop to look in ! Up the secret path to the mayors cess pool. Have to go back tomorrow. I seem to have something wrong with my internal functionings! squirt- plurp! This Bournevita is nice change. Table is position , needs nice legs. Perhaps orange box shelf units at end to make it look more weighty. Lovely big area to work on for a change. Egg and chips for tea.

Diary entry (copy of letter} - Friday 28th Sept. 1973

Dear Mum and Dad et al, Here I am at last in the land of peaches and custard. What a nightmare journey over! The ferry was some old tug that had no seats, so half the 200 passengers( including us ) had to sit in the rain outside on wooden benches or inside on the floor! It was like a refugee ship or something. Then we were an hour late for the train to Paris, so we missed our connection. We had to wait in Paris for two hours so we didn't see much only the metro and going over the Seine to the big station. Coffee was 5/- a cup! Eventually at 12.20 Saturday afternoon we left for Cordes and after jumping out onto other trains trying to make ourselves understood by silly guards etc. We arrived at 10.30 that night! We had been travelling for 30 hours! and slept hardly at all. Bill was there to meet us at the station with his friend the Mayor and his wife, who drove us back to the Presbytere. It was great to sleep on the floor in and empty room with beetles. Now it's Monday night. I've just returned from working all day picking grapes for the local farmer. Back aching work too! from 7-30am til about 7-30 this evening! In return for breakfast and two huge 4 course meals plus money ( we don't really know yet how much or if indeed any 'cos our French is bad and their English is worse!) They are really friendly though and try their hardest to comprehend our weird English ways. All kinds of fruits,veg and nuts grow around here so we could live quite well on those during the Autumn if one wishes. We got a huge sack of walnuts yesterday which are delicious, so too are the figs and peaches that grow in abundance. Lynne and Bill have a vegetable garden which still has tomatoes, cabbage , leeks, onions and beetroot etc. growing. It was really hot on Sunday. Bill showed me places of interest - lovely views along the valley and Tummy Belly man's house ( He and some others were picking his grapes ) We went in the church also, which is good. Such a shame it's unused ( perhaps not ) for all the vestments and robes etc. are rotting in the woodwormy cupboards. What treasures also , gold goblets and candlesticks just left for anyone to take! Strange figures of painted plaster stand around staring into space. ( Some saints etc. in the loft at the presbytere too ) The door is locked to the bell tower. Bill and I stumbled in the dark to the farm nearby for some fresh milk from the cows that escaped that day. Mr & Mrs. Grits? were there milking by hand as well as machine. They seemed a jolly couple. The sky was spotty with stars - the Milky way was really evident, never seen them so bright. The milk has to be boiled before you use it to kill the germens. Little lizards on the well and on the wall in the sun. Gyp bites their tails off. A jumpy cat that bites and scratches for fun. Bill has almost finished the shower bath and toilet area - another bottle window to go in yet and electricity connected. Have to wash in a bucket 'til then. I have a very nice looking wooden bed from the mayor but it's very uncomfortable with just wooden planks and thin lumpy mattress. No more grape pickin' for me. I went sleepy eyed this morning and found it really hard going 'cos of the rain during the night and all the vines were wet and the huge lumps of cruds! So when it was dinner time I said Au revoir to the Monsieur farmer and his pals. I was only doing it cos Bill was anyway - and to be neighbourly. We have to cook on a small stove range heated with a wood fire ( stumps ) very old fashioned! It stands in a huge fireplace with an old wooden beam going across. Its a bit smokey. You can stand under the chimney and look right to the top - soot in the eyeballs!

Diary Entries - 11th 12th October 1973

Misty moisty morning. To Cordes to buy provisions - walk to very top this time , phew! What a climb through the narrow cobbled streets. Not much to se when you get there - a big portico market place thing and lots of arty crafty shops,like St. Ives in the air.No people - deserted. Down again for food, bottles of plonk, weird old postcards and cheap envelopes, writing paper. Afternoon struggling with screwdriver and monkey in the deri, at last all the planks are transported. Not without much transputation and nervewacking over being spotted about my devilish task. Better to be a table in a presbytery than a port in a storm , that's what I say! Put out more figs. Great moon this night - quite early. Bill went with "dangle arm" and got some champignons after work. Vin helps to sleep at last. Friday. Send P. C's to Rose Croft and Bob Rider, also lettre to Philip and M. No more to send now- just replies to recieve. None today though. Carry On Scraping starring Kenneth Bucket, Hattie Rag, Joyce Stepladder and Sidney Scraper. Lynne's gone off up hill with Bill to do her coupe de raisen bit. Draw insects , strange leaf shaped ones on the droopy sunflowers. Get planks sorted out. Think about tables, window seat and shall I do stuffed peppers or a curry- plump for latter - big mistake! Took some photos of Gyp, cows and the church. Now it's dark 7,15pm. by my watch and Bill & Lynne noshing at Emmanuals no doubt. I have the radio tuned to some crappy Italian station, Elton John , now blurp blurp! Turn it off. Strange van playing loud music? Bread van? Too much vin de plonk.

Diary Entry - 9th October 1973

Mornings jottings. Walked with Bill to Cordes. He decided to take the scenic route up citroen hill and through scrubbly fields, nutbush cite limits about half mile out of our way! Tres idiot! At Cordes friendly clerk changed my money for me £70 into Bill's account ( for rent ) and £20 cash pour moi. The exchange rate had dropped to 9.80f per £1 . Sent a goat postcarte to Trevor, Jenny and Perce. Foode. Met three farmers at wrong times. Beraque told Bill to come coupe la raisen. Sarfternoon after dinner. Bill said O.K. Tricky French devil! Walked back eating walnuts. Afternoon wash body . clothes , hair etc. Long look at wood/ room/ table to be made. Typed a letter to Dave.

Diary entries - 26th - 27th December 1973

Misty and horrible. Thought the bed was vibrating during the night! Too much rhum and coke I guess! Played hangman, battleships , cards, dots and other party games listening to records from my room. Eating and getting Christmas sicknss in France.No letters or parcels pisses me off even more. Eat turkey, Lynne's special victorian gravy; sprouts spuds mincemeat stuffing and listen to canal men. Play cards. A greasy man comes to the door selling beds. Lynne and Bill cannot understand him but he is evil looking they say. Off to Albi to the flics later. Search for ages to find a decent one with English and eventually find VOX opposite the gare (station ) , a little pea flit , strange 50's entrance but unfortunately modernised inside, small for small audience of neat and tidy french. Horrible films. One about french fish guts, another that I didn't understand about women telephonists etc. and the feature was a spaghetti western dubbed in French starring Henry Fonda..............(Thursday) Ah! at last! A nice letter from Dick ( with Tony Eve's address ) and a present from Barb - The Goon Show Scripts by Spike Milligan. Great ! Then it's reply to T.E. and rest of gobbler. After a trick in the van over hill and dale to dead ends and little houses, binoculars looking water mill, river and round about a nice little village called Salles with a rickety church tower, dogs, that we climbed through holes, and old ladies came out. Bill found a deri. Whilst I was in the van, and two old tins of tapioca that looked like beans. Blown a cleeping hairy eight legged monster that sounded like leaves rustling. Nice carved heart and club on brick arch on one deri house near mill. Rhum and coca cola.

Diary entries - 5th and 6th December 1973

Not much sleep again last night. Awoken by chinese drip torture other side of wall next to head. Rapid drips and echoing down below and omnibus large drip! Quickly sleep jump out of bed to find gaping hole in plastic pipe near tap in Bill's stewdew. So then downstairs finding drippings in hall on table I made. Lynne has been awake all this time but thought the noise was from outside! Look around for more leaks, don't see any so outside so cut off the tap near the graveyard. The snow is thawing, drips everywhere. The useless torch doesn't find tap under manure? First time second time turns the water off. Back to quiet comparitively warm uncomfortable bed. It can't go on like this for much longer surely?! - A travelling barber calls but we need all our warm hair. Thought it was the gendarmes again. Abortive attempts to fix pipe ( I hope ) Water from pump is going now so alright. This has filled Wednesday up quite nicely. Nothing else will happen, or will it? THURSDAY. No nothing much did. A General Strike today in France but postman came and went just the same. Thursday is a bit more exciting though - to a degree. And talking of degrees - it's a lot warmer ( milder) today- feels warm outside although a ceiling of grey cloud still covers the sky. It's as if it never snowed - no trace of it is left, just it's faint ghost, the flattened grass, the bedraggled flowers and plants. Feel like an old peasant , puts me in another distant time long past , slooth! slooth! creek! slooth! Putty stuff on broken pipe still as soft as a baby's bum! Went to Cordes this afternoon on the mobydick for d'ashe and veg. and stop at garage for two litres of juice and ask for a pompe - but the man explains that he has none and that a certian type of pompe will do - not a bicyclette pompe or a foot pompe but a mobylette pompe. I drove slowly as to not attract large lorries on sharper bends.

Diary entry - 12th November 1973

Wrote to Leigh's - a little drawing of gate on the bottom - ooh saucy! Still awful - but a sunny day at least. No lettres as usual. Cold. Some must come tomorrow, surely?! Lynne's gone off to see if Marc will give her a lift into Cordes for shopping. She only has 50f so insists on eating in garden! I walk over the Tummy Belly track to the local rock and wreath pile. To view the valley and two white towers ( walls ) where we once saw one and found the other. ?! Too cold and nature calls to write a brief word of praise on the lessons we learn from postmen, The cauldron is boiling , so i must away and don my kitchen slug outfit. Bubble-hubble toil and trouble. Hiss! Spit! The logs scream, the coffee pot harmonises. Kite broke in breeze, Gyp jumped on falling remains. Tried to saw/ machine some muslin for another but it kept going wrong. O what a day. Lackaway!

Diary Entry - 30th December 1973

Woke late, made breakfast and sitting in omnipotent sun that gets voltage reduction every now and then. Wish Lynne would put a record on, but they are outside walking the dog ( a cat ), leaning on the graveyard wall. Quick! while it's quiet ! Bill is sawing thru' his wooden legs next door and has his dreaded radio on. Lynne and I have the dreaded recordsayer on in here - "The Show Must Go On" - Bill's fave of the moment - he rushes in - it sounds like 300 frying pan's of boiling fat! Went for a little moped ride today to try and blow some cobwebs out but my thumbs dropped off with cold so I came back quick! Quick! I did a bit of tracing and drawing and water colorin' too - the le Bengali mouth organ bit. I don't know what for really. I tried to do some oily cockerale , but turned sour on me. Yuk! Aeiough!..................... (31st December ) Last day of '73. What a year! Quite a lot going on I suppose but then it's always been like that. Fog listing now. Bill's rattling about next door in his studio - things are really happening at last?! The wine has been drunk ( just one bottle with pate ) and it's about 11 I imagine and we've listend to the same old 73 records and read about John Lennon from '71 and hoping '74 will prove better than the preceding year in all ways and to it start off some nice fat letters from Blighty or some place!? I've washed my feather bed today and hung it in the night air to freeze. Twiddled and twaddled about, painted a little boy scout and Bengali letter heading for the first of 1974. Nood Gight. Sweet beaming jeans and dreams.

Diary entry - 26th October 1973

B's building a rickety wall outside my door from the bricks he broke down. Doesn't look save to me. Quick! the mayor comes to take us to the Supermarche! near Albi - not a Hypermarket but like Tesco's and just as expensive as Cordes. Spend over £6 between us on supplies oil, sugar and other items. Could have got some nice green wellies but not my size on show. Into Albi after which proved to be a bore, watching Mr. Pratt nearly getting run over was quite amusing I suppose. The Pratt's TV had blown up so they had taken it to the shop - some records there too, cheap ones too by French standards.

Diary entry - 23rd December 1973

Quite uneventful really, most of the day spent listening to records and getting bored with them, doing a cockeral watercolour for Bill and Lynne. Bill's been mending his van doors and Lynne's been typing and reading. Grey day, now radio's on fading blue denim american dutch doublers. No good strong stations on at this time (4.30pm ) getting dark - I've changed a light bulb in my room - I thought it was a bit dim - it faded away to nothing and I discovered it was a dutch double 40 watts!! What happened to the 100w I put in when Bill came doubling back? ! Search me! Nice and brightly now. Wrote a letter to the folks back home. Bill went for walk in dark to the ruins in Cabritte's valley and was frightened by torchlight - he put batteries in from dump and they worked. ................. This is a bit more for Sunday. I decided, after I'd done the water colour with the black border for B &L - that the painting on the easel should be the same. Now it stands upside down - blackened. A piece of Lynne's dough and currants is inside me now and I feel not like reading or writing or doing anything. I hope I get something in the post tomorrow being Christmas Eve, but things take so long I have my doubts. Linda's package should come soon surely? And Barbara sent the Goon book I hope. A nice giro from the tax man would be the best present of all !