The long road

From 1978 to 2006 at least every other year, first with a group of friends, then with a smaller group, then finally with my ex, I've happily traversed France...  oddly, given how planned some of this may appear, I was happiest just wandering around out of the 'holiday' season - mainly August - just getting up early, driving to what looks like a great place to wander around, have some refreshments, a snack lunch (NEVER borrowing a restaurant's precious table space to do this*), then either a preprandial snooze, a game of Crib or Scrabble, in the shade (I get sunburned off reflected light), finally the serious business of discussing the meal, selecting a decent bottle to split between myself and a companion... then an aperitif and a very sound sleep.

In the early days before the French government forced hoteliers and restaurateurs to treat members of their families as paid employees and (the first in a long series of tax grabs), there were a much larger number of restaurants than there are now.  The quality has declined...  there are two excellent articles which explain the reasons latterly 

And across a greater span of time 

In the SW of France, a lot of restaurateurs and café owners hated Mitterand with the kind of feral passion they would normally reserve for someone who had slept with their wife.  On one occasion, after I'd said "Mitterand" and made various uncomplimentary gestures. ended up with the chap, his wife and I amiably talking nonsense over a bottle of brandy - they were both very kind and patient putting up with my mangling of their language.  If I'd spoken English at them in that intolerable way that middle class English people do, increasing the volume until they can be heard half a mile away**, my acquaintance and knowledge of France, French and two really nice people would never have happened.

**It's no wonder that waiters often just give a Gallic shrug and go and serve someone else or disappear out the back for a Gauloise...  Retribution was delivered on one occasion by someone adding a snail to the salad.  Mrs Shouty screamed and upset their table, Mr Shouty shouted at the waiter.  After a few muttered "désolé" from the waiter and after I'd managed to control the hysterical laughter that threatened to overcome me, I shouted at them to shut up and allow the others to enjoy their meal.  They did, once they realised their appalling behaviour was being witnessed by other English folk.

This is the excellent place in Cahors where these folk paraded their incivility...

Bottom* in a Secondary Modern

I am still healthwise in pretty much the same place as I  was, but I'd like to publish some of my reminiscences...  this first one is tangentially about the inequities and vile assumptions about children in the 1960s

*I love that word, bottom , always have since my fellow scruffy 13-14 yr olds in the dunce's school, aka Secondary Modern, were given A Midsummer Night’s Dream to learn for a term project... as most of them still found farts and beating up someone else funny, this was not a good plan. With characters like Titania, Puck and Bottom, any speech with their names in was repeatedly and loudly quoted by even the neanderthal thuglings from the mud on the floor of the gene pool; Especially Puck... 

"Those that Hobgoblin call you and sweet Puck, You do their work, and they shall have good luck: Are not you he?" As for the the Wall scene;... "O Wall, full often hast thou heard my moans, For parting my fair Pyramus and me! My cherry lips have often kissed thy stones ..." 

...was a particular favourite quote as they could shout this near prefects 

Giving that play to a bunch of rejects from the education system - "Here chump, go to Secondary Modern, and learn menial tasks as befits your future servile status... Technical Drawing (TD as in TDious), Agricultural Studies, Metalwork, PE, Woodwork amongst others was probably the only time a few of them engaged with Literature.

We were taught the same way as in Reform Schools - mainly to while away the time until you could legally be turfed out to go and get a menial job... The restrictive way 'education' was structured is exemplified by the choice children / parents were given to specialise at thir-bloody-teen. You had to choose between French, TD and Art; and the other choice was between Geography and History ... 

My parents with my hyper-genius elder brother (IQ off the top end of the scale, scholarship to a public school and at 15 going off the rails and becoming a rebel with the kind of destructive capacity deployed on all and everything around him and the other 'subnormal' child just couldn't work, keep control of Machiavelli and pay attention to me. 

So I made my ill-informed choices... I deliberately did only half the TD exam (getting 49%, I was extremely good at it, but I hated the obnoxious midget - Mr Roberts - no prizes for guessing his origins - who loved picking on all 6' 1" of me), illustrated my answers in French, and did an excellent pen & ink sketch so the teachers agreed I should do Art. The other choice was a horror because I wanted to do both, but Geography was chosen for me... I was lucky in one respect because the History curriculum switched from Ancients to 19th century and I loved history up until the end of the Napoleonic Wars.. 

 You can see why I loathed my schooldays....