The right time

I’ve just been to post two letters down in the village. This, in itself, is a risky business: ever since the French equivalent of the Royal Mail was privatised the system has gone to pot. Here, with a tiny population, we have three companies vying for competition which, as far as I can make out, means that everything becomes lost. I waited twelve days to receive the only piece of post I’ve had from England in five weeks. Then there’s the perennial problem of trying to work out when anything might be open. It’s taken me five days to buy two stamps. I started on Saturday afternoon which was hopeless as the post office only opens on Saturday morning. Sunday was out of the question because it was Sunday and Monday is a non-starter being an extension of Sunday. An early start on Tuesday is pointless because they don’t open until 10 and I’d forgotten about my letters until lunchtime by which time they’d shut for the day. I thought I might try to pick a time on Wednesday afternoon to coincide with buying the bread. This was a partial success because, at last, the post office was open and I was finally able to buy the stamps. However, trying to post the letters was troublesome as the letter box had been sealed up. I was directed to the village car park where I’ve now put the letters in a yellow container which I hope was for the post and not for recycling. Hooray…now for the bread. Alas, the baker’s is shut because, of course, it’s Wednesday.


I arrived back and entered the house at which point the internal alarms went off. They sound like the four minute warning screeching around the whole region. This is the first time this has happened and in my panic, I tried to switch them off with the thing that activates the external alarms. This is the problem with living inside Fort Knox. So now I’m sitting quietly, happy in the ability to be able to communicate with the outside world without leaving the house