Pots 1 - Terracotta

I'm not generally a "thing"-oriented person. I prefer functional objects over decorative ones, and I like to keep a critical eye on the things I keep around me. However, I do have a fondness for pots, I have no idea why. So here is the first in an occasional series of posts about pots that I like, starting at the bottom, with the humble terracotta plant pot.

In some ways it is surprising that you can still find them in garden centres: they are buliker than the modern plastic equivalent, heavier, more expensive, more fragile, and not even frost-proof. Yet I find something satisfying in them. Their earthy origins, their weight in the hand, and the way they carry the tide marks from their history of plants they have cradled. Their porous nature helps prevent rot, and if you tap them they will sing their charges' need for water. And when they break, you can put the shards in the bottom of a different pot, for drainage.

Cultural nuances

We had a wedding party in the gîte this last weekend. The guests were all French except for one English man. This combination highlighted a little cultural difference that perhaps is a reflection of a more profound difference in thought.

There were two different cakes; one in celebration of the wedding and the other in celebration of a birthday, both events being celebrated at the same meal.

Faced with dividing two different-flavoured cakes between 16 people, the English instinct is to divide the two cakes into 8 portions each and ask the diners which flavour they would prefer. This is so that everyone can choose their favourite. The French instinct is to divide each cake into 16 portions and give everyone a smaller piece of both cakes. This is so that everyone gets an equal share.

Curious. And with interesting implications for possibilities of conflict, resolution and negotiation too.

Adults evening

Under-18s keep out! proclaimed the posters. Yep, it's time for the adult students' evening concert at the Evron music school - sorry conservatoire. An evening of performances followed by a bring-and-share picnic. Here's me and Alain with a piece by Celso Machado entitled Sambossa.

Gender issues

The assignment of gender to nouns in English is logical. The noun is masculine, feminine or neuter according to whether the object it describes has these characteristics by nature. (With a few exceptions, like ship)

As a lad learning French, I was puzzled but not dismayed to learn that every French noun is either masculine or feminine, with no apparent rhyme or reason. But I was astonished by the straightforward illogic of German with its three perfectly sensible genders, all assigned to nouns at random. I learn that some languages have even more genders, including one with 14 or so. I guess that gender in language is essentially an abstract concept.

Some curious anomalies arise in French. Vagina is masculine (le vagin) as are breast (le sein) and tit (le nichon). And while penis is mercifully masculine (same word in English and French), dick (la bite) is feminine. Very odd.

Which leads on to the curious fact that some words have one gender in the singular, and the other one in the plural. French for organ (the musical instrument often found in churches) is orgue (pronounced "org"). Our French teacher told us that in the singular it is masculine, and in the plural it is feminine. I pointed out that this must be because only women have multiple orgs. No-one laughed. A bit straight-laced, I reckon, our French class.

Madonna Lily

I have never before managed to get Madonna Lilies to thrive in my garden. Usually I hoe the buds off in Springtime when they are just appearing above soil. This puts paid to any flowers for a year. If they make it past this stage, I find they usually get eaten by slugs or something. I don't know what eats them, but it completely removes all growing parts, leaving nothing behind except small black turds and the stalk.

These Lilies came up under my trees this year, and it has been so long since I planted them that I had forgotten what they are. I thought maybe they were Fritillarias. Anyway, this year when they came under attack I drenched them in insecticide and surrounded them with slug pellets and they have now flowered. A first for me.

Even more belles chaises

Les Belles Chaises is a little village event that has been held for several successive years in the throbbing metropolis of St Pierre sur Erve. It's basically an excuse for a get-together, the central organising theme being decorated household chairs which are displayed in the village centre.

Here is a chair that has been creatively turned into a rocking-horse/car toy, much to the delight of my friend Christian.

Cart vitale

There is a drought across most of France, and although we don't have a hosepipe ban in the Mayenne yet, one will surely come. I don't yet have an electricity supply to my well, and using watering cans is hard work and time-consuming, so I have been looking for another watering solution that doesn't involve hosepipes.

I started with the idea of a wheeled water tank that I can fill up an then tow behind my lawn mower. Being a farming area, you can find a lot of used water bowsers for sale, but they are too big. Starting at 500 litres and built for rough use on farms, they weigh anything up to a ton when full. Much too big for my little mower.

I ended up with the concept of a number of jerry cans on a cart. I can pull the cart around with my mower, and load it up to capacity with cans. I can get empty plastic containers up the dump, so I am left with the problem of finding a trailer that I can tow. A new or used "proper" aluminium one would be a few hundred euros; overkill and too expensive for what I have in mind.

I was explaining this problem to my friend Christian in the coffee bar the other day, and it turns out that he has an old unused cart that should do the job. Great! Even better, I can have it for free! A bit of refurbishment and off we go.




Here it is! A good set of metal wheels and axle, the rest of it wood, some of it rotten.
















Knock the floor out, take a good look at the chassis.

















Cut the rotted ends of the chassis,

















Replace the strut with a new one,

















Make a new floor out of some old oak planks I happen to have lying around,

















Some sides so the water containers don't slide off, and off we go!

















Oops! Handle broke. Idea sound, execution failure. Must make a new handle....