August 2026 Update
August 2026 Update
I learned from Michelle that Fern passed on the 5th of July. She had made it to 100. Also this month, Nikki Wyrd has died, and Dolly Parton too.
Natacha & Jonathan returned to the UK on the 10th. Chloe & Rix stayed with us briefly from the 2nd to the 7th. Robin & Teo arrived on the 18th. Chloe and I had a lunch together at the creperie on the 4th. Later that day, she was in tears because of another problem with the Bristol house that she’s about to sell. On the 5th, Jessica and Julie prepared and served us all a most delightful meal which we had outside. Fortunately, the rain earlier was light and did not last long. We oscillated at the last minute about the final table setting between 12, 14 and 16 since I had lost track of who was actually coming In all, we were Steve & Annie, Paul & Diana, Penny, Peter & Alex, Natacha & Jonathan with Marie-Eve, Rix, Chloe, Richard & me. At the table, I had placed Chloe and Natacha next to each other, and that worked very well. Ultimately everything did.
Other social events included our taking Penny to La Table on the 12th; Jim & Annie’s taco party on the 15th (Penny, Eric Idle, Macia & Phil, Susie, Jessica, Jacqui and Stella among the many); visiting Liliane, Lorna, Fedrich and Marius on the 14th; our going to La Tuilliere on the 17th to get some of Micheline’s art books (we saw Birgit as she was leaving, Liliane arrived at the same time as we did, and we saw there Sylvie, an 8-month pregnant Alice, Jean-Christophe and Claude); Penny treated us along with Guy & Caroline to a delightful dinner at Solea on the 21st; our enjoying delicious cappuccini on the 25th at Paul & Diana’s where we sorted through a lot of Dutch & French stuff; and Teo & Robin preparing delicious dinner on the 26th for us and Yvonne. On the 30th, Jessica treated Richard & me to lunch at Feu.
Cinema this month has been Spielberg’s Disclosure Day which I loved as great fun & with ample humour; H is for Hawk (almost boring; I did not care for Claire Foy’s character) and then the interesting documentary The Tech Billionaire Takeover; with Wendy, Guy & Caroline, The Children Act with Emma Thompson and Stanley Tucci (excellent); and with Penny, Caroline & Guy, Heads of State (entertaining enough but totally preposterous and, I thought, a terrible film).
In Draguignan at the Hotel Département des Expositions, we enjoyed the ‘Inca’ exhibition – a most remarkable collection of huacas & statues, etc. There has also been locally the Festival du Haut-Var de Musique de Chambre. I missed the first because of computer problems but did attend the Promenade Musicale and two concerts at the church: Dutilleux’s Sarabande et Cortège pour basson et piano, Charles-Marie Wider’s Introduction et rondo pour clarinette et piano, Poulenc’s Sonata pour hautbois et piano, and Schubert’s Trio pour piano & cordes no. 1; and François Devienne (3rd Quartet), Camille Pépin (Feuilles d’eau de Silvacane pour Quatuor à Cordes) & Brahms (clarinet quintet). These were all fabulous including both the cellist Alejandro Costa Marti and the pianist Miharu Ogura.
The madness has been on-going computer problems, France-Musique reception, posting a cheque problem, not being able to find an item with which I was just working, unable to find the vital Deel II certificate for the VW Beetle in NL which I can no longer keep in my own name, searching for the Arctic Blast, and Magda the Golf being out of commission. Have been extraordinarily fatigued with no energy. Probably this last, apart for age being a factor, was due to the intense heat dome over Europe for virtually four months straight. We had rain on the 14th, and it cooled down to 27C on the 20th. We also had rain on the 21st & 28th.
The 21st was Audrey’s birthday, and she treated us to our afternoon coffee. Romain has found the pool leak and informed Susie. Gin phoned a couple of times, & the preparations for Richard’s art show are proceeding. I have made a submission to the Global Pagan Summit (‘Pagan Society vis-à-vis Global Insanity’). I have finished reading John Hamlet’s Khabzist Paganism: Spirits of the Caucasus: The Ancient Faith of the Circassians & wrote an endorsement for it. I have also read W. Watts Miller’s Durkheim, morals and modernity (1996), Alex Ross’ “The Dream of Reason: Jürgen Habermas offered a philosophy of hope in a darkening age;” Angie Buchanan’s “The Web Still Holds,” and am now reading and immensely enjoying Nicolas Shakespeare’s Secrets of the Sea. I am continuing to work on my ‘Conflict’ which I have decided to name “Conflict and Random Swansong Musings of a Militant Optimist.” I have no idea what to do with this last.
Somehow through something I posted, Angie interpreted it erroneously as Richard having passed. Various consolations have been received as a result. But we are both still here and, apart from aches, fatigue and memory problems, still happy.