Country Living

View of House when you arrive

I wish I could say that I'm done with the unpacking, but I'm not. Far from it. Ages from it. Maybe even light years.

I can't believe how much rubbish I have managed to stock up in the past decade. To think that I arrived in Europe nearly 12 years ago with just 2 bags. And a comforter.

I have given, thrown away, pretended I didn't see etc quite a bit of my stuff and there is still a very whole lot around.

The house has only walls and 5 trips to IKEA, 4000 Euros and literally days of assembling furniture later, I still lack storage space. What the f#@*+...

Eldest Son's F1 Bed that took me ages to assemble

It has been 3 nights since we've been sleeping in the house. And I've slept badly. First, the mosquitoes. They sing in my ears and bite me in the dark. I am dying from the heat, but have to hide myself under the 500g/m2 duvet out of fear.

The Chimney in my Bedroom

Then at 6 o'clock in the morning, I usually wake up to the sound of someone knocking, knocking and knocking away. I would tour the house (all 3 floors) and each time I walk near the windows (with their wooden volets), the noise would stop. Woodpeckers. Eating up our windows. Funny that they do not peck furiously like in the Woody Woodpecker cartoons I grew up with. It's more like toc birdy blah blah toc more birdy blah blah. Of course Hubby never hears anything.

Otherwise, I would have to listen to the pigeons coo and worry that they are going to shit on my car (again). The owner said that we should shoot them and Hubby reflected that good French restaurants always serve pigeons...

Yesterday I watched a wild hare hopping its way across the field. Mental note : Forget about starting a vegetable garden.

And I spend hours watching the ants crawl about everywhere in the house. I'm starting to sound like my mother in Singapore. Please eat only in the kitchen and don't drop anything anywhere or the ants will come!!!

Staircase - favourite dwelling of spiders and other insects

The spiders, they come in all shapes and sizes. And I've emptied 2 aerosol cans of insecticide in 4 days and removed spiderwebs everywhere, but within hours they would be back. Die Hard. Hubby left his usual smart ass opinion about having to clean and disinfect the whole house regularly so that the insects will not return. I suspect that they will be back even if I should paint the house with insecticide. We are in the country, man.

Last but not least, never leave any door or window open and not shut the mosquito netting. You'll soon be surrounded by flies and wasps. They are very very irritating insects because they make alot of noise. I was walking around in my panty this morning and had to give up and put on my pants because this wasp kept following me around the butt and I didn't fancy being stung. Hubby said that it must be the fishy smell.

At this moment I would like to go shut the wooden door covering my back door, but there is this big dog (I think it belongs to the owner) sitting just out there and from time to time it would give my door a push to tell me that it would like to come in. As dogs don't eat spiders nor ants but they do pee and shit around, I'm not interested. Besides, I was just reading yesterday about the French woman who had a face transplant after being attacked by her own dog...

I told Hubby that the next time we move, I want to live in a Penthouse in the middle of a big city.

Back to more unpacking and guess what? We have guests starting tomorrow!