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March was pretty mad, and so was I. Mostly it was a month of relentlessly stupid bureaucracy, relentlessly stupid people, relentlessly stupid, well, pretty much everything really. Leavened by a couple of outings and my nearest and dearest. British bureaucrats at the Passport Office are trying hard to out-stupid their confrères in France by demanding…
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This is the full report on the famous Michelin-starred restaurant in Ynyshir in Wales which received a 1 star health rating last year. I note that the chef, Gareth Ward, is still complaining that the inspectors “Don’t understand” what the restaurant is doing. Right.
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We – Roxanne and I – went to Paris for the weekend to meet quite possibly our favourite person, her sister, my daughter, Scarlett. Scarlett is currently studying Art, with a capital A, in the UK and is wondering what to do when she finishes her A-levels this summer. The serious money down at Ladbroke’s…
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Things are going to shit in France. All of the schools where I work are losing students in large numbers because of stupid government decisions, I am losing work and very few people care about it apart from the end users – students and teachers. France has always been heavily over-bureaucrated, something I may have…
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I used to cook for a living, as I may have mentioned before (cf My Book), but haven’t done it very much for a while now for one reason or another. Laziness, being too busy, whatever. I have started cooking again, properly, over the past couple of months though; lasagne, shepherd’s pie, cakes and, for…
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I moan about my students because it’s funny. Well, I think it’s funny and that’s what counts, n’est-ce pas? Mostly, of course, they’re fine. Some are even good. One or two are excellent. The interesting ones are stupid, lazy, ignorant and make good copy. If it bleeds it leads; if they’re stupid, something that rhymes…
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The past five and a half years have been a long history of moving on; from marriage, from living in a family, from jobs I didn’t like, from people I don’t appreciate. Next month comes one of the final steps in that process: Leaving the flat which became my haven in 2020 at the beginning…
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It was a very happy birthday indeed this year with lots of friends and family in Paris for a few days, see photos below. We variously visited Notre Dame – absolutely spectacular- the Pantheon, the flea markets at St Ouen, The Niki de Saint Phalle/Jean Tinguely/Pontus Hulten exhibition, the Apple Store and, of course, that…
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La Rentrée, The Return (to school (implied)) is a big deal in France. I guess it is elsewhere too, but here it has A Name with Capital Letters, special supermarket displays and Special Offers from everyone including Chanel. This year for me it meant moving house, albeit slowly. I’m still doing it, in fact, as…
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