I couldn't believe it yesterday, seeing a couple digging up Primroses from the bank beside the road.
Friday, 13 March 2015
The garden starts to do its thing
I couldn't believe it yesterday, seeing a couple digging up Primroses from the bank beside the road.
Monday, 9 March 2015
New adventures in crockery
So there we are in this factory china shop, buying lasagne trays. Not a particularly interesting passtime. But I was surprised to see a new invention: crockery pots that you can use on an induction hob. Apparently they are especially resistant to thermal shock, and you can use them on any kind of heating appliance. We bought one.
The company has a patent on the material. (French for patent: un brevet, that is also the same word for diploma or certificate).
The company has a patent on the material. (French for patent: un brevet, that is also the same word for diploma or certificate).
Sunday, 8 March 2015
Breaking good
When equiping a gîte with crockery, glasses and cutlery, one must bear in mind the ease of replacement in case of breakages or loss. Glasses and plates inevitably get broken from time to time, and cutlery can slowly disappear as it gets lost or misplaced. They need to be replaced with items that match or after a while you end up with a random hotch-potch of table settings that don't convey the right quality image.
We forgot this rule when we were on holiday in Brittany, when we stumbled across a nice little shop selling a vast range of nothing but white porcelain. We bought a set of four oven-proof lasagne trays (one for each available oven shelf), to replace other supercheap ones that weren't coping very well with being put in the oven. And inevitably, one of the four we bought got broken. They're the type of tray you can use directly from the oven, to serve the meal, so we have to have four the same.
Getting a replacement wasn't easy. The shop is about 4 hours' drive away, and neither the shop nor the factory will ship by post because they are fed up with things getting broken. So a personal visit is necessary. And it so happens that if you are prepared to take a relaxed or creative approach to the concept of something being "on the way" to somewhere else, a visit to the factory is not out of the question if you are travelling between our place and Paris.
And since we were off to a concert in Paris, and also wanting a short break, we ambled down and stayed overnight at a B&B in this lovely Chateau de la Brosse, not too far from the factory. It's run by a Dutch couple, the latest in a line of recent owners who have done various renovations. Previous couples in this rôle have divorced, so they are avoiding the curse by not getting married. The renovations are excellent; I don't think I have seen a chateau in such excellent repair. The outside walls in particular are bright, clean, and recently refurbished by a master of the craft over a period of some eight months. The rooms are spacious and comfortable, and children are not allowed, so the place is peaceful and the decoration has a better chance of maintaining its condition.
As it turns out the couple are also car racing enthusiasts who have friends in Holland who, from time to time, are looking for good group accommodation for about 25 people, not far from Le Mans. Could be right up our street.
We forgot this rule when we were on holiday in Brittany, when we stumbled across a nice little shop selling a vast range of nothing but white porcelain. We bought a set of four oven-proof lasagne trays (one for each available oven shelf), to replace other supercheap ones that weren't coping very well with being put in the oven. And inevitably, one of the four we bought got broken. They're the type of tray you can use directly from the oven, to serve the meal, so we have to have four the same.
Getting a replacement wasn't easy. The shop is about 4 hours' drive away, and neither the shop nor the factory will ship by post because they are fed up with things getting broken. So a personal visit is necessary. And it so happens that if you are prepared to take a relaxed or creative approach to the concept of something being "on the way" to somewhere else, a visit to the factory is not out of the question if you are travelling between our place and Paris.
And since we were off to a concert in Paris, and also wanting a short break, we ambled down and stayed overnight at a B&B in this lovely Chateau de la Brosse, not too far from the factory. It's run by a Dutch couple, the latest in a line of recent owners who have done various renovations. Previous couples in this rôle have divorced, so they are avoiding the curse by not getting married. The renovations are excellent; I don't think I have seen a chateau in such excellent repair. The outside walls in particular are bright, clean, and recently refurbished by a master of the craft over a period of some eight months. The rooms are spacious and comfortable, and children are not allowed, so the place is peaceful and the decoration has a better chance of maintaining its condition.
As it turns out the couple are also car racing enthusiasts who have friends in Holland who, from time to time, are looking for good group accommodation for about 25 people, not far from Le Mans. Could be right up our street.
Wednesday, 4 March 2015
Sunday, 1 March 2015
Light and sound levels
As my avid reader will have surmised, music is my preferred art form. Not that others have no place, but it's music that moves me the most often, and the most effectively. And it's the art form to which I contribute, in my modest and amateur way, via my flute.
And so it's this, I imagine that drives my interest in hi-fi. I like to listen to music at home, and when I do, I like it to sound as realistic as possible. I have listened to enough hifi equipment over the years (I used to trade in it in my spare time), to know that they all sound different, regardless of what the measurements will say, and I have a good idea of what is good and what isn't.
I have been happy with my current stereo for a while. The key component is the speakers, they come from here, and to my ears they are hard to beat. They aren't cheap, though. The amplifiers I have been using are these Bantams from Temple Audio. They are very cheap compared to the speakers, and you'd imagine that they could sound rough, but they don't. They rank amongst the very best I have ever heard at any price. They are based on recently-developed digital amp technology.
There is only one problem with them, which is that they don't go very loud. And here we come across a problem of English usage: I don't mean that they only play at very modest sound levels, I mean that they don't go very loud, even with the Bastanis speakers that are quite sensitive. And there is some music that just needs to be played loudly.
When you turn up solid state amps too loud, they start to clip the waveform, which presents as a harshness to the sound, that makes them sound like they're playing loudly, even if they're not. The more you overdrive them the harsher they sound as more and more of the waveform gets clipped.
It's quite noticeable at concerts that the music is playing much louder than I listen to at home, without any form of harshness. What's more, my ears are not what they used to be. Distant and and mid-field crickets no longer form part of my soundscape, and bats that I used to listen to as a lad now flutter silently overhead. And a tinnitus left me by an unfriendly ear infection needs to be drowned out as well.
So I have resolved to replace my amps with more powerful ones. I have chosen these, the NCORE400 amp modules from Hypex electronics, that use the same digital concepts as the Temple Audio Bantams, and have been well-received by the DIY community. They come in kit form - amp and power supply, you have to put them together, and you can get nice housings for them on the commercial market. I chose these ones from Ghent Electronics in China. Putting them together is a bit like plumbing - just a bit of soldering involved, nothing too tricky.
(I suspect that these amps are the ones used in the B&W Zeppelin, since the amps are round - a strange shape for an amp unless it's going into the Zeppelin, and Hypex do supply the amps for it. And Hypex are explicit that they don't want OEM enquiries for the amps, so perhaps B&W have an OEM exclusive.)
Here's the two amps and power supplies, all nicely wrapped in anti-static bags, laid out ready to mount in the case, and a pic of the modules installed.
Here's what the back panel looks like, and the finished article.
Now when I first plugged it in and turned it on, I did so with the top off the box. Experience has taught me that if anything is going to go wrong, smoke or other evidence is more quickly and easily seen with the electronics exposed. I also wired in an old cheap speaker since something that can dump 400 watts of audio into a loudspeaker when it's working properly, could do a lot of harm if it's not working properly.
Click went the switch and phut! went the spark. Odd, but after that the amp seemed to operate OK, and subsequent switchings on and off gave rise to no spark. It all seems to work fine. But then then next day, turning it on from cold produced another spark. So I contacted Hypex tech support: "is it supposed to do that?" "Noooooo!"
So this aspect of the project is on hold while we resolve what's going wrong. Looks like a dodgy power supply to me. Meanwhile I'll put the other amp together and see if the problem reproduces.
And so it's this, I imagine that drives my interest in hi-fi. I like to listen to music at home, and when I do, I like it to sound as realistic as possible. I have listened to enough hifi equipment over the years (I used to trade in it in my spare time), to know that they all sound different, regardless of what the measurements will say, and I have a good idea of what is good and what isn't.
I have been happy with my current stereo for a while. The key component is the speakers, they come from here, and to my ears they are hard to beat. They aren't cheap, though. The amplifiers I have been using are these Bantams from Temple Audio. They are very cheap compared to the speakers, and you'd imagine that they could sound rough, but they don't. They rank amongst the very best I have ever heard at any price. They are based on recently-developed digital amp technology.
There is only one problem with them, which is that they don't go very loud. And here we come across a problem of English usage: I don't mean that they only play at very modest sound levels, I mean that they don't go very loud, even with the Bastanis speakers that are quite sensitive. And there is some music that just needs to be played loudly.
When you turn up solid state amps too loud, they start to clip the waveform, which presents as a harshness to the sound, that makes them sound like they're playing loudly, even if they're not. The more you overdrive them the harsher they sound as more and more of the waveform gets clipped.
It's quite noticeable at concerts that the music is playing much louder than I listen to at home, without any form of harshness. What's more, my ears are not what they used to be. Distant and and mid-field crickets no longer form part of my soundscape, and bats that I used to listen to as a lad now flutter silently overhead. And a tinnitus left me by an unfriendly ear infection needs to be drowned out as well.
So I have resolved to replace my amps with more powerful ones. I have chosen these, the NCORE400 amp modules from Hypex electronics, that use the same digital concepts as the Temple Audio Bantams, and have been well-received by the DIY community. They come in kit form - amp and power supply, you have to put them together, and you can get nice housings for them on the commercial market. I chose these ones from Ghent Electronics in China. Putting them together is a bit like plumbing - just a bit of soldering involved, nothing too tricky.
(I suspect that these amps are the ones used in the B&W Zeppelin, since the amps are round - a strange shape for an amp unless it's going into the Zeppelin, and Hypex do supply the amps for it. And Hypex are explicit that they don't want OEM enquiries for the amps, so perhaps B&W have an OEM exclusive.)
Here's the two amps and power supplies, all nicely wrapped in anti-static bags, laid out ready to mount in the case, and a pic of the modules installed.
Here's what the back panel looks like, and the finished article.
Now when I first plugged it in and turned it on, I did so with the top off the box. Experience has taught me that if anything is going to go wrong, smoke or other evidence is more quickly and easily seen with the electronics exposed. I also wired in an old cheap speaker since something that can dump 400 watts of audio into a loudspeaker when it's working properly, could do a lot of harm if it's not working properly.
Click went the switch and phut! went the spark. Odd, but after that the amp seemed to operate OK, and subsequent switchings on and off gave rise to no spark. It all seems to work fine. But then then next day, turning it on from cold produced another spark. So I contacted Hypex tech support: "is it supposed to do that?" "Noooooo!"
So this aspect of the project is on hold while we resolve what's going wrong. Looks like a dodgy power supply to me. Meanwhile I'll put the other amp together and see if the problem reproduces.
Saturday, 21 February 2015
Amateur dramatics
The village of Vaiges (pop. about 1,200) is perhaps 10 minutes' drive from my very own St Pierre sur Erve (pop. about 150). About halfway between the two places is a big quarry, an open-cast limestone mine. This is a boon for Vaiges, since the quarry lies within their boundary, and it pays quite a lot of tax. This to the extent that, according to our mayor, their council has about 440,000 euros to spend each year; that takes some serious spending on a population of 1200. Surrounding villages are enviously eyeing this wealth, and proposals for reducing local government costs by combining small communities are being actively debated.
The town hall (le mairie) looks very fancy, and the gardens have recently been landscaped and redone. There is a new car parking area beside it, and the street lamps are new, and illuminated at night with little LED rings at about chest height so that semi-blind people don't walk into them. The salle socio-culturelle (village hall/community centre?) has also been done up recently. It now features a fancy professional kitchen with all mod cons, and a new stage/theatre, with bar, lighting, sound system; everything you could want except, it would seem, air conditioning.
It is here that my dairy farming and guitar-playing friend Alain, and his troupe, perform their annual amateur dramatics offering. Last night was the last night and we went along to see. The evening starts with offerings from the younger performers, sometimes a short play, this time with a series of comedy sketches. Then the main event, a comedy about a French camping holiday site, featuring various figures recognisable from the local community. It's fun to spot the local personalities. There's Alain, of course, and the lady who works in the supermarket. Plus the one-armed garden nursery manager, the trumpet-player and the flute-player.
There's a tombola at half time, with crêpes, beer and other delights on sale, and an opportunity to mix with the people you recognise. And I won a very fine Easter cactus in a pot. These kinds of plants do well in the conservatory, and I have various shades of red, but no pink-and-white. Cool.
In the end, it's a fun, if rather warm, night out. And even though my French isn't up to following all of the rapid-fire dialog, nor catching all the jokes, I can still grasp the plot. But as a fund-raiser for the school, it's a great way to contribute and be entertained at the same time.
The town hall (le mairie) looks very fancy, and the gardens have recently been landscaped and redone. There is a new car parking area beside it, and the street lamps are new, and illuminated at night with little LED rings at about chest height so that semi-blind people don't walk into them. The salle socio-culturelle (village hall/community centre?) has also been done up recently. It now features a fancy professional kitchen with all mod cons, and a new stage/theatre, with bar, lighting, sound system; everything you could want except, it would seem, air conditioning.
It is here that my dairy farming and guitar-playing friend Alain, and his troupe, perform their annual amateur dramatics offering. Last night was the last night and we went along to see. The evening starts with offerings from the younger performers, sometimes a short play, this time with a series of comedy sketches. Then the main event, a comedy about a French camping holiday site, featuring various figures recognisable from the local community. It's fun to spot the local personalities. There's Alain, of course, and the lady who works in the supermarket. Plus the one-armed garden nursery manager, the trumpet-player and the flute-player.
There's a tombola at half time, with crêpes, beer and other delights on sale, and an opportunity to mix with the people you recognise. And I won a very fine Easter cactus in a pot. These kinds of plants do well in the conservatory, and I have various shades of red, but no pink-and-white. Cool.
In the end, it's a fun, if rather warm, night out. And even though my French isn't up to following all of the rapid-fire dialog, nor catching all the jokes, I can still grasp the plot. But as a fund-raiser for the school, it's a great way to contribute and be entertained at the same time.
Sunday, 15 February 2015
Je suis un lapin
The owner of the mill in the village has been improving the site, trimming hedges and cutting down some of the trees. In the spirit of support for Charlie Hebdo, one of the trunks was left standing and carved into a pencil. The guy who lives just down the road from this assures me that his own artistic carving is of a rabbit.
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