Sunday 6th March
This has been my first full Winter in Eymet. Previously we had spent a few days around Christmas and New Year here, and then come down for the February half-term and again for Easter. So we had had a taster of the weather but only in dribs and drabs, and it was really okay, sunny and cold and bright. We spent this Christmas in England and came down on the 27th December. New Year and the weather was fine, chilly and sunny and dry, but since then and almost without a break it has rained. Cold wet drizzly and then hard rain with the occasional burst of Winter sunshine before the rain returned, often with a vengeance. One sunny spell I managed to mow the lawn and another time we had lunch in our jackets on a sunny terrace. The rest of the time it has been cold and wet. We might as well have been in England. And this year is unusual, it hasn’t rained this badly for a few years.
But we have been shifting furniture, a few pieces a week from the old house to the new one. And every darnered time I have got soaked, struggling with fridges and freezers and cupboards and chests of drawers snd sofas and chairs, trying to get them into and out of the Ford Galaxy in the pouring rain. Note to myself: Never Move Houses in the Winter Rain. It is truly miserable.
But surprisingly the Café has been doing okay. We have only been open mornings so far this year and despite a couple of really quiet days we have been quite busy. Maybe a shelter from the gloomy weather, or more likely the fact that often we were the only place open. Most of the French shop and bar and café owners have been taking holidays this Winter. There is also the mess of a major sewer replacement going on in town at the moment, so pneumatic drills and diggers are everywhere, and as they aren’t tarmacing the dug up roads until they finish, just covering with sand and pebbles there is mud everywhere too.
I have just landed at Stansted for a couple of days and it is cold and wet here too, I might as well not have left home.