What has brightened your day? -ongoing thread

Do you have quinces in your garden?
Jim made membrillo with ours and we put it into festive packets and gave it as Christmas presents.
It makes a wonderful addition to a cheeseboard and all you need to pay for is for the sugar and the cellophane packets.
There is also wonderful golden sunshine this morning.

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Brilliant here too, Jane. Will have the sheets on the line by mid-morning… they will smell so fresh even if they have to finish drying-off indoors.

There are quinces around, the village…it’s an idea.

cheers

It’s -3° here with a freezing fog ! Brrr

Can’t remember the last time I had sheets out, enjoy your sunshine :slight_smile:

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We usually get the mist from the Saone or the Loire, but not today.
It is bright and cold, but not freezing.

This afternoon I made a small batch of dark chocolates filled with my lemon curd. OH is over the moon… and me… well, I 'm really chuffed. They are absolutely delicious.

I have to make a large batch tomorrow or Monday… as my pals at the Mairie are waiting for their tasters… (although OH will ensure that I don’t give too many away…) :thinking::hugs:

I love it when an idea proves to be a winner. :grinning::grinning:

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can you post me 500 g please… pretty please…

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Daughter has placed her order… only she is in UK … :thinking:

Today, I’ve made 2 batches both based on dark choc and dried plums… for my pals to enjoy tomorrow… one lot is spiced with piment d’Espelette and the other has crystalized ginger hidden inside…

More lemon ones will be made tomorrow… I’m on a roll… :joy::joy:

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Well done Stella.
We have just come from lunch at our village restaurant where we were bought an aperitif by our friend the Mayor.
We started up a conversation with people at the next table, who are poultry vets from Bresse.
I was asked if I was English and when I said no I was a British European he came over and gave me a huge hug.
We were told by the restsurant proprietors that we had been adopted by the village.
We are more welcome here than we ever were in UK.
We shall be taking French nationality whatever the outcome of Brexshit.

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Bravo the Williamsons !

I don’t much like being known as English here in France or anywhere, to be honest and prefer to refer to myself as Brittanique or citoyen du Royaume-Uni. It’s a bit of a mouthful but makes I think, a worthwhile point. The ascription of Englishness has, in foreign partsa negative connotation of arrogance, untrustworthiness, and cultural vandalism.

While not being wholly deserved, perhaps, it clings like dog-shit and I can do without it.

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You too can call yourself un European Britannique.
We are so lucky to have moved here, but saying that there are a goodly few who vote for Le Pen in the commune.

Peter have you ever been tempted to take dna swab and send it off for analysis? Europe’s blood is pretty mixed isn’t it, you might already have studied your origins? I suspect you come from a line of troubadours and are likely to be a mixed bag.

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Interesting fact: In the US personal DNA testing has been done by so many people that law enforcement agencies have successfully tracked criminals by identifying relatives through DNA matching.

The morals and ethics of this are somewhat complex.

Grinninng from ear to ear, I offer my most courtly leg, Your Grace! That’ll give me months of narcissistic pleasure, and will brighten my SFN day perpetually. :hugs:

But I don’t feel much disposed to disturb the bones of ancestors, let them rest in peace, they best know themselves, I think.

There was always a rumour (but more than a rumour) that my paternal great-grandmother was a mulatto woman whom great-grandfather bedded in Bermuda. He came from a ship-building, sea-faring line, now widely scattered in USA, but originally Sussex yeomen. All my father’s many siblings (bar one) were of ‘mediterranean’ appearance with black hair and brown eyes. I was fair with blue eyes.

As you suggest, a mixed bag. And my wife is of bantu origin, and she suspects with either an Arab or an Asian admixture somewhere along the line, from the deep penetration (no salacious pun intended) of sub-Saharan Africa by traders and adventurers down the ages.

Have you, Sire, had your genes felt up yet? :scream::grin:

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I’ll not be giving up my Englishness any time soon…

I do think the English get bad press and it actually makes me feel quite sad but I refuse to be stereotyped by a rabid bought and paid for mainstream media…I remain unapologetic…

I’ll continue to be English if only to prove that the vast majority of us are nothing like we are portrayed in the press…x :slight_smile:

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It’s the issue of informed consent again…if any of us have ever been arrested by police and then released without charge then in that hostile and closed environment people are forced into giving their fingerprints and dna through mouth swabs…a case of presumed guilty until proven innocent which flys in the face of presumed innocent until proven gulilty…anyone innocent then has to actively pursue having their fingerprints and dna removed from the databases…

Personally I wouldn’t actively choose to give my dna to any company…

In the UK if you are not charged then the police are required to destroy the DNA sample immediately.

This happened to me.
I was charged and the prosecutor refused to take the case and then, I was told by the sergeant , his chief insisted I be brought back to be fingerprinted and photographed to complete the file.
I was in tears and have never felt so humiliated in my life.
In my opinion the Gendarmerie are out of control.
This was pure vindictiveness because they were forced to withdraw their false case against me.

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Wasn’t there a ruckus a while back when it was discovered that the police had retained samples which should have been destroyed?

100% believable and absolutely disgraceful, Jane. Are there no means to getting redress?This has obviously left a painful scar on your emotion.

I wouldn’t think so Peter.
We would be afraid of being targeted if we made a fuss.
The Cluny gendarmerie are the black mark about here.
Our friends say avoid them at all cost.