Day 10/Friday meeting

I was finishing off my exercise DVD [must remember to rave about Angie Miller's Kettlebell Bootcamp some time] when I heard the first van arrive. Now, when you are following the DVD you feel as though any excuse to stop would be wonderful, but in reality it is so much harder to get going again and those nicely warmed-up muscles start to cool down, so I didn't go and greet the plumbers. [Not to mention the smell... I'm still at the point where I have no trouble 'working up a sweat'!]

Carpenters arrived before I hit the trail on my mountain bike [again I was frantically trying to get my day's exercise over & done with before the day warmed up, and so I could shower before the meeting, and then the rest of the day would be time for David & I to grab lunch/shop/sightsee the area] so I frantically waved "hi & bye" & struggled off to my 'challenge hill'. Can't begin to count how many times I had to stop [I think all those squats mean your quads need a rest before trying to cycle?].

So, I frightened my deer, provided hilarity to a vigneron [he tried politely waiting whilst I went past - NO chance; humiliation one thing, but having someone watch as I have to stop to catch my breath three or four times in 100 metres, no way] and a hare [well, it felt like he was laughing at me; doing that "catch-me-if-you-can" thing of waiting a bit before gently loping off before I got anywhere near], and only a headwind on my usually-lovely downhill bit put the teensiest damper on it.

So I was showered, hair-washed & dressed up 'nice' by 9.50 [and I'd put another "gold" star on my exercise chart - I'm 'saving up' for a saddle stool], just in time to wait around for 40 minutes till Jean-Marie showed up!

The meeting [apart from antsy attendees, who'd been around since the stated start time of 10am and also had other things to do] seemed to go OK: there were minor adjustments to the plumbing, and during the part where Laurent Mazij couldn't make any noise he very kindly smoothed out the boo-boo that the digger had made in the beam; it's virtually invisible now, and will age down beautifully, I'm sure.

We've got an action-packed couple of weeks coming up with plasterboard, more plumbing & electrickery going in, and the carpenters are back to finish the corridor joists; they've done all the reinforcements, and we've got a load of [totally unexpected] cross timbers.

I think I was right to be concerned about the plasterboard, but I can watch M. Kadir like that hawk, and I have M. Mekki's mobile number if needed...

The only slight downside was David having to work later than we'd both hoped so our outing has been postponed till today.