The art of negotiating with French nurses
‘Ça va, Monsieur Clarke?’ said a nurse when he noticed I was stirring. It was an effort to speak. ‘Thirsty,’…
The curse of surgical stockings
The porter rolled me off the trolley and on to the bed, wished me a good day and departed. My…
A taste inquisition on Stink Street
Walking up through the Stink Street medieval arch with a bag of shopping, I spotted Michael between the oleander branches…
The joy of ironing
On the Saturday morning of the Ascension Day bank holiday, I swung down the stairs and ladder to the little…
The myriad signatures of a canine pissoir
Sally (la Sal, the Salster) is part whippet, part Labrador and part dormouse. She is 16 years old, stone deaf,…
If all else fails, there’s always basket weaving
The only thing left for me now is to embrace humility and take up basket weaving. In our dog and…
My clairvoyant GP
‘Willie or bum?’ I said to Catriona on the motorway. Everything in my recent medical career has been introduced via…
I have been ambushed by the past
The other week I turned up for the village walking club’s Monday hike. A dawn meet. Two cars. A 90-minute…
Mon dieu! Our French residency permits have arrived
For EU nationals living in Britain and wanting to legally remain after Brexit, a letter or an email was enough…
My best Duke of Edinburgh salute for my oncologist
In the waiting room I thought about the Duke of Edinburgh. In particular, I pictured him saluting the cenotaph on…
My French lesson has taken a most unexpected turn
‘Alas, David can’t be here this afternoon,’ I told the French teacher as she let me into her light and…
The tyranny of French bureaucracy
Applying for a French bank account is like trying for a permit to open a Christian bookshop in North Korea.…
My thrilling rendezvous with the sausage lady
One day last week we did a wine run up to Manosque in the foothills of the Alps, leaving early…
My €25 Covid jab surprise
Around the time that poor M. Macron was casting televised aspersions on the AstraZeneca jab, I was offered one by…
The beauty of French nurses
I was supine on the slab and a nurse was rigging me up via wires and tubes to machines and…
Why I need to become a French citizen
After weeks of living in the 18th century, going everywhere on foot and encountering few other souls, I drove to…
My French lessons with Lord Nelson
Every Friday afternoon the foreign correspondent and I attend a French lady’s home for our one-hour French lesson. The foreign…
How I got my encyclopedic knowledge of current affairs
Seven bells. Pitch dark still. I descend the creaking wooden stairs in the darkness, let the dog out, make tea…
In praise of the bacon butty
I was tipped off to meet a white Hyundai at a French motorway toll rest area at 2.30 p.m. (I…
The joy of my new British passport
‘Anything you want?’ says Catriona on her way out of the house to go to the shop. I’m standing at…
My message to the log police
Here, as in Britain, everyone is a log expert. The woodman leaves a heap at the bottom of the drive…
My future hangs on the result of this blood test
A new year and another round of medical treatments in the French health system. On Saturday morning, needing a blood…
In praise of nuns
Although I was ten minutes early, Vernon was there ahead of me, framed in the ancient chapel doorway, chatting up…
The magic of Anthony Powell
Every few years I’ve picked up one or other of Anthony Powell’s A Dance to the Music of Time series…
What French women want
Considering the subject of compatibility, experienced British expats in France maintain that a French man and an English woman might…
