Sitting here in front of the TV watching the Prince of Persia I am thinking back to the last year and trying to balance the negative with the positive aspects of it.
I end the year on a high with a grand total of 2 euro in my bank and no party to go to. Usually we go to a lovely party that is full of fun and laughter and have a great time. This year the lady who usually holds the party is in the UK so we are without celebrations this year.
We have three dogs staying now, several have already gone home. Each with their own needs and personalities, we juggle their needs to fit in with our own ever growing collection of animals.
Looking back at last year I had good and bad news outweighing each other so leaving me in the same place! I managed to get Barclaycard to agree that the purchase of a car was done by someone else and not me and so after two years of fighting they removed the debt which had risen to over £6000 and restored my credit rating only to have the French Authorities say they had paid me too much and I now owe them 5500 euro win some lose some! Then they changed my business and gave me a new Siret No and now my health care doesn't work so I can't get sick. My son is suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Syndrome and is having treatment so cannot work. My daughter had her heart broken by a boy and then mended with a new boy! My car cost me more than it did to buy it and some parts of it are held together with duct tape. My heating, yet again, isn't working for the winter so we are surviving with just a little wood burner in one room. I am hoping that the temperature doesn't get as low as -21 as it did last year.
On a positive note we rescued 6 kittens, we all made it through the year, my bronchitis wasn't too bad this year only lasted 3 weeks and I took up my beloved drawing again. I discovered Audible which is wonderful as I do a lot of driving around France and having a good book to listen to on my journey is brilliant. I've stopping worrying, caring and taking time on people who really wouldn't be bothered with me which has cleared my mind for other things. I am having a website designed for my drawing business and I am writing my book again.
I am so blessed to have such wonderful friends in my life, I have friends that have been with me for many years, ones who have just arrived in my life, wonderful online friends, friends here in France and many friends all around the world. I am happy to still have my father in my life and so glad to be able to care for him. I am so grateful to have the memories of my mother who was the light in our lives, who put the fun in the day the laughter in the week and made the year worth remembering. I am happy to have food on the table, a roof over my head (albeit leaking), a car to get from A to B, my family around me, my little animals and my clients who trust me to care for their animals.
So here we are another year over, I blinked and 2012 had gone! I'm making plans to improve our 2013, life is hard and it can get on top of you but there are always things to be thankful for.
HAPPY NEW YEAR WORLD
Monday 31 December 2012
Saturday 29 December 2012
3 am Breakfasts & Barking
Well the run up to Christmas in France is about the same as any other day in the year. The traffic increases by a few cars and they have an 'open exceptional' which means the shops stay open for a few hours on a Sunday! There is the Christmas Red Cross wrapping service and a Papa Noel sitting on a red chair surrounded by white twigs and fake snow.
At home we have a real Christmas tree this year as someone we know chopped down their tree and offered us the top. This was great although we had to cut off most of it to wedge it into out house it is now in place with the sad little baubles and tinsel with a few little twinkling lights.
Christmas is a time when many of the English people rush back to the UK to be with family and so my business of looking after pets becomes very busy.
So a few days ago I took charge of a few dogs and cats, some of which were with me for 2 days, some for a weeks, some for just a few hours. After spending a bit of time sorting them out and getting them in the right places so they have the best stay.
Well having so many dogs in the house is a noisy affair as they bark at any little thing and it only takes one to set them all off.
So This morning I went into see my Dad in his part of the house and he greets me with 'Oh yours back'! I said back from where Dad? He said the Christmas Markets, I see you went off at 3am so I got up and had breakfast and waited for you to come home. I panicked thinking my car must be stolen, jumping to the window looking out to my relief the car was still there. So I said the car is still there, he said well you said you were going out so I just knew you were gone!!
So what with out door dogs barking, indoor dogs barking, cats meowing, chickens crowing, fathers breakfasting in the middle of the night its a mad house most of the time! Im just hoping that the 3am breakfast is a one off and doesn't become a regular thing.
The Christmas pet sitting rush will soon be over and all the dogs will be back in their rightful homes and peace will resume on the funny farm.
Just want to wish all my readers a very healthy and happy 2013 and meet you again in the new year with more fun and laughter from the funny farm x
At home we have a real Christmas tree this year as someone we know chopped down their tree and offered us the top. This was great although we had to cut off most of it to wedge it into out house it is now in place with the sad little baubles and tinsel with a few little twinkling lights.
Christmas is a time when many of the English people rush back to the UK to be with family and so my business of looking after pets becomes very busy.
So a few days ago I took charge of a few dogs and cats, some of which were with me for 2 days, some for a weeks, some for just a few hours. After spending a bit of time sorting them out and getting them in the right places so they have the best stay.
Well having so many dogs in the house is a noisy affair as they bark at any little thing and it only takes one to set them all off.
So This morning I went into see my Dad in his part of the house and he greets me with 'Oh yours back'! I said back from where Dad? He said the Christmas Markets, I see you went off at 3am so I got up and had breakfast and waited for you to come home. I panicked thinking my car must be stolen, jumping to the window looking out to my relief the car was still there. So I said the car is still there, he said well you said you were going out so I just knew you were gone!!
So what with out door dogs barking, indoor dogs barking, cats meowing, chickens crowing, fathers breakfasting in the middle of the night its a mad house most of the time! Im just hoping that the 3am breakfast is a one off and doesn't become a regular thing.
The Christmas pet sitting rush will soon be over and all the dogs will be back in their rightful homes and peace will resume on the funny farm.
Just want to wish all my readers a very healthy and happy 2013 and meet you again in the new year with more fun and laughter from the funny farm x
Thursday 13 December 2012
The Reality of Rural France
As you drive past all the wonderful stone buildings the lush green fields and the 40 degrees sun thinking wouldn't it be nice to live here such an idyllic place, well before you do let me share a few secrets.
Winters are a survival game of the highest proportions. Yes you can dress it up saying that you have a wonderful wood burner and an electric blanket but that's just the facade, a covering for the world to think how lovely. The reality is rooms where you can see you breath, water running down the walls, ice on the inside of the windows, duvets nailed to the doors, plastic duct taped to the windows and towels to stop the rain coming in.
Having a wood burner is wonderful, don't get me wrong, but the romance of the naked flame vanishes when you realise you have to chop the wood and drag it around the farm to the shed, bring it in every night. To keep warm you have to clear out the fire ever day and relight it before one room gets warm enough to sit in.
Taking a shower is an excruciating experience. The bath itself is like a block of ice and standing anywhere other than under the thin shower of hot water is a painful experience. The shower gel has to be coaxed out of the bottle due to the near frozen constituency and the blob that finally lands of your scrubby rolls straight off unless you are quick to capture it and hold it in your hands until it is pliant enough to froth up and clean you body. Towels are always damp and do a sad job of drying. The dash from bathroom to bedroom is like diving down the piste on your stomach naked and the dressing experience is now perfected to half a minute.
The wonderful tiled floors are blocks of ice and chilblains appear before you even slip your left slipper on. the shutters are wonderful and do help to draft proof to some extent, but it mean the whole house is plunged into a darkness where you need to lights on just to see to open them. In the morning you stumble around in the dark trying to find enough coverings to be able to function without bits freezing and dropping off, just to you can fling open the windows, letting out the tiny heat you may have built up in the night, just to open the shutters so light can flood in. There have been occasions when the damp has swollen the windows and after flinging them open and folding the shutter back the window then refused to shut leaving you with the dilemma of whether to force the window and risk breaking the already rotting wood or leaving it ajar and letting in the sub zero temperatures.
The only saving grace is summer, a few wonderful months when the pains of winter fade and we bask in the sun and visitors arrive and say what a wonderful place you live in you are so lucky its magnificent!!! .
Winters are a survival game of the highest proportions. Yes you can dress it up saying that you have a wonderful wood burner and an electric blanket but that's just the facade, a covering for the world to think how lovely. The reality is rooms where you can see you breath, water running down the walls, ice on the inside of the windows, duvets nailed to the doors, plastic duct taped to the windows and towels to stop the rain coming in.
Having a wood burner is wonderful, don't get me wrong, but the romance of the naked flame vanishes when you realise you have to chop the wood and drag it around the farm to the shed, bring it in every night. To keep warm you have to clear out the fire ever day and relight it before one room gets warm enough to sit in.
Taking a shower is an excruciating experience. The bath itself is like a block of ice and standing anywhere other than under the thin shower of hot water is a painful experience. The shower gel has to be coaxed out of the bottle due to the near frozen constituency and the blob that finally lands of your scrubby rolls straight off unless you are quick to capture it and hold it in your hands until it is pliant enough to froth up and clean you body. Towels are always damp and do a sad job of drying. The dash from bathroom to bedroom is like diving down the piste on your stomach naked and the dressing experience is now perfected to half a minute.
The wonderful tiled floors are blocks of ice and chilblains appear before you even slip your left slipper on. the shutters are wonderful and do help to draft proof to some extent, but it mean the whole house is plunged into a darkness where you need to lights on just to see to open them. In the morning you stumble around in the dark trying to find enough coverings to be able to function without bits freezing and dropping off, just to you can fling open the windows, letting out the tiny heat you may have built up in the night, just to open the shutters so light can flood in. There have been occasions when the damp has swollen the windows and after flinging them open and folding the shutter back the window then refused to shut leaving you with the dilemma of whether to force the window and risk breaking the already rotting wood or leaving it ajar and letting in the sub zero temperatures.
The only saving grace is summer, a few wonderful months when the pains of winter fade and we bask in the sun and visitors arrive and say what a wonderful place you live in you are so lucky its magnificent!!! .
Friday 7 December 2012
Rescue Me!
As I drove down the tiny path from our farm to the country road, the weather was cold wet and windy, i could see two tiny white blobs on the path in front of me. As I drove closer they didn't move and I could see they were kittens. I phoned my daughter to get the wire basket and come to meet me on the path.
The path
As we approached these tiny kittens they cried out. We expected them to run away but they just sat there in the path crying and waiting to be picked up. We gathered them up put them in the basket and took them home.
When inside we examined them, they were filthy, cold, thin, shaking and wet. We gave them both a warm bath and it would be no exaggeration to say the water looked like mud at the end of it. We dried them off and gave them both a bowl of baby cat milk. We then applied worm treatment on them and checked for fleas. After all the cleaning, feeding and de worming/flea treatments they settled down in front of the log burner together and went to sleep.
We have 15 cats now in various stages of kitten hood to old age moggy. After the initial hissing and sniffing the pack of cats accepted our new little bundles and they are rushing around the house playing and getting into mischief.
People ask me why I picked them up when I have so many cats and I say how could I leave two tiny little babies cold, wet and hungry - I just couldn't
Here they are with my daughter and our other newest kitten who is getting quite big now. He was rescued on the road one day all cold and hungry and is now in our loving household too.
Wednesday 5 December 2012
Domestic Violence
I was watching a programme last week where a woman was shot by her husband several times, then hanged himself, and a few months later her 15 year old son couldn't handle what had happened and hanged himself. The lady, although had been shot lots of time, survived and was there on the show smiling and saying if she was meant to survive all this violence and grief then she should make the most of ever day and live life to the full.
She was telling the story of how the control, or abuse, started with he husband not letting her wear certain clothes, no make-up and not allowing her to go out for a girls night, never believing anything she said always accusing her of things and becoming violent if he didn't like her answers.
This make me think back to my marriage, when I was first married I was not allowed to wear tight clothes or make-up and gradually all my friends were cut off. I ended up with no friends and wearing baggy tops and jeans. This control went from what I wore to where I was allowed to go to following me around the house.
I spent many years being told I was useless, ugly, fat. For anyone going through this kind of abuse its the mental abuse that does an immense amount of damage that is unseen. It crushes self esteem and makes the person feel like they are worthless and need the abuser to look after them. This is when the abuser has total control over their victim. When the verbal abuse is not enough it then turns to physical, they feel the need to attack their victims to show who is in control.
Usually a abuser is someone who has low self esteem, feels worthless and quite often have some sort of mental problem themselves so to do this to another person empowers them.
The victim does not realise what is happening until it has gone too far and they are then afraid to leave for fear of being attacked, plus feeling like they cannot survive on their own.
I spent many years feeling worthless, but I had a good job, one I enjoyed and had many good people there who knew me before I met my husband. My boss had faith in me and encouraged me to take courses and to work my way up the firm. I went to London gained an HNC and a Degree and became a manager. I had two lives I had my important life at work, where I felt worthwhile and successful and my life at home where I had to say nothing do as I was told and just get on with household jobs. My children spent most of their days with my loving parent and this saved them from many of their fathers outburst and violence.
In 2004 I found out that my husband, who had been really difficult for many months, violent and vicious to the children, had been abusing our daughter. It was then that he lashed out and tried to end my life. Out of the blue he grabbed my hair thrust my head through the banisters of the stairs and then split my head open on the coffee table and proceeded to try and strangle me. It was my son who saved my life, he was 12 at the time, and said he had to do something because I was going blue.
The police said that they may lose the case if they went for manslaughter but he would plead guilty to GBH! This went through and he got 3 months for strangling me. He got 6 more counts for the abuse and 3 years for each count so he should have done 18 years but they ran all counts together so he did 3 years and he finally did 15 months!
For anyone who is being controlled by their partners please take a look at why he would try to control you. There is no reason for someone to tell you not to wear make-up or certain colours or clothes. If you find that your friends get cut out of your life one by one due to certain reasons your partner doesn't like about them and your life gets smaller and smaller until you spend most of your time in your house then you need to wonder why.
I know that many people who are in this kind of situation think there is nothing they can do and feel trapped and lonely. People usually don't feel they can talk to anyone and no one would believe anything they said. They may feel silly saying oh I'm not allowed to wear make-up or certain clothes but remember this is just the beginning and the start of taking control of you and its just the start of molding you the way they want you. Watch out for the signs when little things make them lose their temper, it all starts small but it will escalate and before you know it you are in a violent relationship.
This lady on the TV was saying that her relationship started off with the controlling and developed into violence. He also tried to strangle her, she had no friends and didn't go out.
Please if anyone is in this kind of relationship they need to be strong and get out. Never think there is no where for you to go and nothing you can do - you are worth while you are smart you are a valuable person you deserve a good life no one had the right to control, abuse and crush you. Tell people never be afraid to let everyone know what you are going through and what you have to put up with on a daily basis. One Website to get help in the UK is http://www.nationaldomesticviolencehelpline.org.uk/
She was telling the story of how the control, or abuse, started with he husband not letting her wear certain clothes, no make-up and not allowing her to go out for a girls night, never believing anything she said always accusing her of things and becoming violent if he didn't like her answers.
This make me think back to my marriage, when I was first married I was not allowed to wear tight clothes or make-up and gradually all my friends were cut off. I ended up with no friends and wearing baggy tops and jeans. This control went from what I wore to where I was allowed to go to following me around the house.
I spent many years being told I was useless, ugly, fat. For anyone going through this kind of abuse its the mental abuse that does an immense amount of damage that is unseen. It crushes self esteem and makes the person feel like they are worthless and need the abuser to look after them. This is when the abuser has total control over their victim. When the verbal abuse is not enough it then turns to physical, they feel the need to attack their victims to show who is in control.
Usually a abuser is someone who has low self esteem, feels worthless and quite often have some sort of mental problem themselves so to do this to another person empowers them.
The victim does not realise what is happening until it has gone too far and they are then afraid to leave for fear of being attacked, plus feeling like they cannot survive on their own.
I spent many years feeling worthless, but I had a good job, one I enjoyed and had many good people there who knew me before I met my husband. My boss had faith in me and encouraged me to take courses and to work my way up the firm. I went to London gained an HNC and a Degree and became a manager. I had two lives I had my important life at work, where I felt worthwhile and successful and my life at home where I had to say nothing do as I was told and just get on with household jobs. My children spent most of their days with my loving parent and this saved them from many of their fathers outburst and violence.
In 2004 I found out that my husband, who had been really difficult for many months, violent and vicious to the children, had been abusing our daughter. It was then that he lashed out and tried to end my life. Out of the blue he grabbed my hair thrust my head through the banisters of the stairs and then split my head open on the coffee table and proceeded to try and strangle me. It was my son who saved my life, he was 12 at the time, and said he had to do something because I was going blue.
The police said that they may lose the case if they went for manslaughter but he would plead guilty to GBH! This went through and he got 3 months for strangling me. He got 6 more counts for the abuse and 3 years for each count so he should have done 18 years but they ran all counts together so he did 3 years and he finally did 15 months!
For anyone who is being controlled by their partners please take a look at why he would try to control you. There is no reason for someone to tell you not to wear make-up or certain colours or clothes. If you find that your friends get cut out of your life one by one due to certain reasons your partner doesn't like about them and your life gets smaller and smaller until you spend most of your time in your house then you need to wonder why.
I know that many people who are in this kind of situation think there is nothing they can do and feel trapped and lonely. People usually don't feel they can talk to anyone and no one would believe anything they said. They may feel silly saying oh I'm not allowed to wear make-up or certain clothes but remember this is just the beginning and the start of taking control of you and its just the start of molding you the way they want you. Watch out for the signs when little things make them lose their temper, it all starts small but it will escalate and before you know it you are in a violent relationship.
This lady on the TV was saying that her relationship started off with the controlling and developed into violence. He also tried to strangle her, she had no friends and didn't go out.
Please if anyone is in this kind of relationship they need to be strong and get out. Never think there is no where for you to go and nothing you can do - you are worth while you are smart you are a valuable person you deserve a good life no one had the right to control, abuse and crush you. Tell people never be afraid to let everyone know what you are going through and what you have to put up with on a daily basis. One Website to get help in the UK is http://www.nationaldomesticviolencehelpline.org.uk/
24-hour National Domestic Violence
Freephone Helpline
Freephone Helpline
BE STRONG DON'T LEAVE IT UNTIL IT'S TOO LATE xxxxxxxxxx
Sunday 2 December 2012
Life past and present!!
While sitting in a strangers house, after washing and feeding an old lady with no teeth, cleaning up cat vomit, clearing litter trays and lightly toasting a piece of bread for a bird, I think back to times gone past.
My day used to consist of waking at 5am and getting the children up driving them to a friends house for onward transportation to school. Then 2 hours travelling to London. When there, I would be organising work schedules, production, order creation, outwork and keeping all the clients happy. I held meetings and spent all day rushing around. I then spent 2 hours driving home, picking up the children, making dinner and bed ready to do it all again the next day.
Now my days consist of walking dogs, cleaning up poo, talking to parrots, getting chickens up before it's light, cooking boiled eggs for Great Danes, keeping wild cats out, keeping guest cats in, staying in cold houses, creaky houses, big houses, grand houses, spotless houses, at home houses, knocked over by goats, chased by sheep and finding chickens who have forgotten where their home is. There are houses with well water, tap water and bottled water. Electric is a hit or miss thing. the lights dip when the kettle goes on and putting on more than one appliance trips the whole system.
I've swapped my suit for a waterproof coat, court shoes for wellies, briefcase for a wheelbarrow, doing my hair now means teasing straw and hay out of it, running my fingers through it and forcing it into a scrunchie. Making my face up means smiling, having a nice soak means taking the dogs for a walk in the rain and holding a meeting consists of me giving the chickens a good talking to when trudging around in the dark with a torch gathering them up. A dual flush system now means pressing the button twice and watching the trickle of water reluctantly make its way out and try lamely to make its way down the hole, anything more than a wee doesn't usually make it. I spend many hours driving around the french countryside in search of places hidden deep in woodland, out of the way spots, down tiny tracks, some with grand entrances and some with no entrance at all. Getting lost is an everyday thing even with a SatNav, turn left often leads you across a field, take the next right has been the entrance to a cowshed. Then there's the fog which creeps across in seconds creating a blanket of white making driving impossible above 10kmh.
So while everything was available at the touch of a button I never really appreciated it until now. There is nothing you can rely on to work here and just a hint of a storm and the power sulks. Taking the rubbish out now means a 15 minute walk to the end of the road several times. Putting the heating on means chopping the wood bringing it in and lighting the fire. Getting ready for winter means banging nails in and hanging blankets at doors and entrances, duct taping up holes, double glazing means sticking plastic up at the window and laying duvets on the floor in the loft. The luxury of having hot running water is beyond utopia and the immense happiness at having a 20 year old car that starts first turn of the key makes life worthwhile. I have definitely realised the real value of life and any materialistic tendencies have fizzled away into the distance.
Life in rural France is definitely different, interesting, eventful, stressful and hard - but that's just life on the funny farm
My day used to consist of waking at 5am and getting the children up driving them to a friends house for onward transportation to school. Then 2 hours travelling to London. When there, I would be organising work schedules, production, order creation, outwork and keeping all the clients happy. I held meetings and spent all day rushing around. I then spent 2 hours driving home, picking up the children, making dinner and bed ready to do it all again the next day.
Now my days consist of walking dogs, cleaning up poo, talking to parrots, getting chickens up before it's light, cooking boiled eggs for Great Danes, keeping wild cats out, keeping guest cats in, staying in cold houses, creaky houses, big houses, grand houses, spotless houses, at home houses, knocked over by goats, chased by sheep and finding chickens who have forgotten where their home is. There are houses with well water, tap water and bottled water. Electric is a hit or miss thing. the lights dip when the kettle goes on and putting on more than one appliance trips the whole system.
I've swapped my suit for a waterproof coat, court shoes for wellies, briefcase for a wheelbarrow, doing my hair now means teasing straw and hay out of it, running my fingers through it and forcing it into a scrunchie. Making my face up means smiling, having a nice soak means taking the dogs for a walk in the rain and holding a meeting consists of me giving the chickens a good talking to when trudging around in the dark with a torch gathering them up. A dual flush system now means pressing the button twice and watching the trickle of water reluctantly make its way out and try lamely to make its way down the hole, anything more than a wee doesn't usually make it. I spend many hours driving around the french countryside in search of places hidden deep in woodland, out of the way spots, down tiny tracks, some with grand entrances and some with no entrance at all. Getting lost is an everyday thing even with a SatNav, turn left often leads you across a field, take the next right has been the entrance to a cowshed. Then there's the fog which creeps across in seconds creating a blanket of white making driving impossible above 10kmh.
So while everything was available at the touch of a button I never really appreciated it until now. There is nothing you can rely on to work here and just a hint of a storm and the power sulks. Taking the rubbish out now means a 15 minute walk to the end of the road several times. Putting the heating on means chopping the wood bringing it in and lighting the fire. Getting ready for winter means banging nails in and hanging blankets at doors and entrances, duct taping up holes, double glazing means sticking plastic up at the window and laying duvets on the floor in the loft. The luxury of having hot running water is beyond utopia and the immense happiness at having a 20 year old car that starts first turn of the key makes life worthwhile. I have definitely realised the real value of life and any materialistic tendencies have fizzled away into the distance.
Life in rural France is definitely different, interesting, eventful, stressful and hard - but that's just life on the funny farm
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