October 2025 Update

So I realised around 05:00 that the reason my laptop reception had stopped this time was because of another power outage. The first electricity loss had occurred on the 23rd & lasted 24 hours. This time it was maybe a few hours less. I phoned Enedis immediately, & a guy came around 10:00 that morning but could not repair the external cable connection. He said someone would come in the afternoon. I was now without any laptop. The battery had depleted. Penny arrived & realised she had said the wrong time. With Daylight Savings, we had at least gained an extra hour for the possibility of some sleep. We drove to Jessica’s, & she in turn drove us to the Thai restaurant beyond Carces. The food was delicious. The others were Wendy & Leo, Macia & Phil, Elizbet & Jaap, Barbara, Susie & Bobbi – 13 in all. It was a fun group. When we got home, we discovered that we still did not have electricity. We declined staying at Penny’s or Jessica’s and continued packing & closing things down.

Joe was here when we arrived back & took the hammock down for me. Around 17:00, Enedis phoned & said they were coming from Draguignan. When Jessica had phoned them, she told them that we were two old men but didn’t tell them we were leaving the next day. Enedis arrived around 19:00. It was pitch black, but they got the power back on around 19:40.

The next day, Joe arrived as we were closing all down & doing the last of the packing. The shelf of the bedroom wardrobe had collapsed as we were going to bed. I tried to fix it, but it collapsed again. So I left it for Philippe to repair, but Joe did it instead. Penny arrived & got us to Les Arcs a half an hour before our train’s departure. The train, however, was suspended at the last minute, and there were no further trains to Paris that day or, I was told, the next as well. An electrical centre had had a fire – perhaps vandalism. We tried Ryan, but he was moving house that day. Jessica said that Zach had got stuck in Lyons but later said he was getting a train & trains were being restored. At the ticket counter, the attendant insisted there were still no trains & sent me to the station master about trains for the next day which he confirmed. But at the ticket office, I was then told there were no available seats for tomorrow’s trains. Eventually we got a taxi back home.

So we had two more nights at Tellus et les Étoiles, and somehow went through the whole process of departure a second time. But we missed our bookings in Paris for both the d’Orsay & Louvre Museums. And the train fiasco and power outages have only seemed to be continuations of some electrical or electronic nexus of a cosmic something. My internet connections and computer reception have been on & off for much of the month, Alexa ceased functioning as well, and even a session with Scott had not helped. But despite all these semi-catastrophes as well as the French bureaucracy, France is a beautiful country,

and I know I am absolutely privileged to be able to call her a home. Vive la France!

Jezznette and her daughter Claire arrived for a whirlwind two-day visit. We did the lake tour with them and had a dinner at Solea. Later in the month, Joe, Lise I., Lise G., Kathy and Colleen arrived and had booked a bed & breakfast in town. We had a dinner with them also at Solea and another with them and Penny at La Table. In addition, at their place, Joe prepared a delicious meal of Rhode Island quahogs that he managed to sneak into France. For that meal, Penny and Barbara joined us. Other meals this month included one at Feu with Penny and Jessica, one at Joanne’s with her dirty martinis & Richard’s subsequent fall on his face as we were drunkenly leaving, a luncheon at Chateau Mentone with Penny and Jessica, dinner chez nous catered by Jessica with Julie serving for Jim & Annie, Penny, Susie, Yvonne, Lise I., Lise G., Joe, Kathy, Colleen, Pierre & Catherine, and there was also the Thai luncheon meal for Penny’s birthday. We also had coffees with Joanne and Yvonne at Joanne’s before her departure to Paris and on to America. And on the 15th, we had drinks at the Calalou with Lise, Lise, Kathy, Joe, Colleen and Yvonne. For further entertainment, Yvonne could not find her car keys when we were leaving. They were on her the whole time but in a pocket she never uses.

More mundane things included a carte vitale appointment with Lydia and Jessica assisting, an inquiry at the Mairie with Penny about the possibility of Richard having an exhibition next year, the posting of our ballots for the Dutch elections, and our cardiologist appointments. With the last, we were both assessed to be okay.

For films at Penny’s this month, one was The New Zealand movie Tinā (Mother) which we watched with Wendy, Jessica, Twig & Carol, and the other was Steven Knight’s strange but interesting Locke with Tom Hardy. We had to miss Woody Allen’s Annie Hall because of our electrical meltdown at home that night. Pierre had brought us generators, so at least we had light and some internet on that occasion. We’ve had a couple of phone calls each with Gin and Jimmy. I had a Zoom with Theitic, and Richard & I had a Zoom with Coral, Nancy and Rosie. Further, I enjoyed online Ethan Doyle White’s interesting and well-done talk on Robin Hood.

On the 10th, we had learned from Santima that our dear Vicky had passed three days before in Cyprus. And then in London with only being able to access my emails on my phone atVardo’s, I learned that while visiting her brother in Italy, Santima had had a stroke and died in Asti on the 24th. This has been a deep and unsettling shock.

And for my birthday, one of the books Penny had gifted me was Daniel Dennett’s 1995 Darwin’s Dangerous Idea. It’s thick, and I have now just reached Part Three. As an atheist, Dennett cleverly distinguishes between skyhooks and cranes. He dismisses the notion that evolution is the product of some pre-existing mind (a skyhook). I am with him on this, and I feel or argue even that what I refer to as the co-natural (also sometimes referred to as the

preternatural, the supernatural or the magical) is something operative that evolves or emerges from the natural. It is in this sense a crane.

This month I have also had a most enjoyable online exchange with a Slovakian lad. I remain uncertain where it could be going and am even uncertain whether I have not actually encountered something along the lines of AI.

In Paris, where we finally arrived on the 29th, we had dinner with Pierre & Catherine our first night at l’Epigramme. And though two days late getting to the City of Light, we still got to the Musée d’Orsay exhibition of John Singer Sargent and Foundation Louis Vuitton exhibition of Gerhard Richter – both magnificent. Two hours at a nearby Apple store before a service person got the machine working correctly in just a few minutes, but the laptop did not work once I got it back to the Hotel de Seine. At the Tea Caddy, we had some time with dear Saskia. For Richard & me, Shakespeare and Company followed, and then at Anahuacalli, we had margaritas &, except for Richard chile rellenos, with Anne-Laure, Yael and Florence. It was all delightful. Richard was happy with an extra serving of corn chips.

And then in London the next day, it was more chile rellenos along with a pizza and ice cream at Vardo. The next day with Penny, we watched the intriguing film Bugonia directed by Yorgos Lanthimos and starring Emma Stone. This was followed by negroni and dinner for the three of us at the Sloane Club. And finally today I did another radio interview by Jeff Lipmann on the Indo-European impact in southern Asia (India & Iran).

Finally, I just want to say Richard remains the most generous & encouraging of loves.

Sonnet #325

Since my deep wish is to return there and

Home where the life and all our dreams just are

Easy, enchanted, magical and grand.

Not to dismiss dark night with stars afar ...

Rock reason ‘gainst the gentle but backseat,

Against the joyous grasp’s surprising love

Per perfect passion’s tingled touch repleat.

Game best both earth-bound and celest’ above

Might yet arrive when least so guessed or sought?

Amazement ‘yond imagination’s schemesIs when the gods allow no second thought.

Lost soul whom sadness here ends her power

Combining meadowed bliss’s sacred hour.

17 October 2025