7 August 2006

Finished digging out the patio (did I say that?) before David got here, and went to Bar-sur-Aube on Friday (4th) to see if we could find one in a circle (i.e. that we didn’t have to cut to shape). Owing to tiredness/randomness, I didn’t measure how big the circle was. They had one at Duchesne Gedimat which looked about right – 270cm in diameter, but as it was 349€, we didn’t want to buy it if it was going to be too big (didn’t fancy digging out another 50cm! Took me best part of 12 hours to do that!). We checked they did deliveries, which they do, for a “small” charge (don’t know how small), and they could deliver on the 11th – we’d better hurry up & order. Went home and measured (I knew it was a bit flat – but didn’t want to “round” it up if it was too big…) the circle 250-270cm – only a small bit of extra digging out necessary! By then we were both knackered so planned to go the next day & order. I ended up having an afternoon nap on Saturday, so David went on his own to order the circle of paving – comedy of errors! He couldn’t make one shop assistant understand there was only half a circle stacked on the pallet because the other half was incorporated into their display (and not because David’s French is bad; it isn’t!)! They ended up going to the warehouseman who said he’d have to order one – we’ll probably get it mid-September! Of course you can’t get them in August!!

At least now we’ve got the hole (and the weed-suppressing membrane) we can fill the hole with hard-core (a.k.a. all those small stones we keep tripping over!) & build the pathways. All we are waiting for now before we can plant the plants is Dominique to remove his rubble. He said he’s coming today…

Watch this space…