Balloons

[Alice Abbott]

We had a sort of barbecue yesterday lunchtime. We have an old oil drum split lengthways and punched with holes to make two of them and they balance on rock piles on the covered "patio" (a very polite word to describe the rather rough old stone slabs outside the back door). We fill the drums with charcoal and small logs and they also make braziers which keep us warm if we sit out there in the winter.

We were just tucking into baked potatoes with roast chestnuts and soup when we heard the strangest hissing, puffing and rather frantic voices from above. As we all looked up an enormous hot air balloon passed very low over the house, brushed over the hedge and plonked down in next door's garden. As the neighbours are away in the UK we went to see what the problem was. Three rather dishevelled German guys emerged from the basket - apparently they had had problems with some sort of flame control and had needed to get down poste haste. They were all fine but freezing cold - they were very happy to sit over the braziers for the hour they had to wait for "rescue", helping us drink a big pot of mulled blackberry wine. It seems one was the owner and the other two were along for a "fun" ride.

I had never realised how enormous those balloons are, it gradually collapsed into a huge space, covering most of the garden plus our neighbours' rather large RV. They phoned for their back up vehicle and eventually crammed it all into a trailer and left. Nothing at all was said about the state of the hedge and I imagine the neighbours will never believe us when we tell them what happened to it. I've never been up in one but it seemed very flimsy, I don't think we shall be going up in one any day soon!

Has anyone else ever had a ride/experience in one of these?

[Green Aura]

Wow Alice, you have some amazing adventures. I think I'm going to come and live with you!

I'd love to have a ride in a hot air balloon but I've never fancied the landing (same reason I've never done a parachute jump, bungee jump etc). This just confirms I'm right

[Milims]

I've never fancied the landing

I dunno - I quite fancy the sound of landing in Alices garden!

[MKG]

I have to wonder what this story's going to be like from the German balloonists' point of view.

Mike

[Millymollymandy]

Just amazing, thanks for making me smile!

[old tree man]

Wow that could have been quite a different experience if it had hit your home Alice still very exciting , i have been to a balloon fair and they are huge some of them arn't they although i have never been up in one i bet its really good fun scary but fun

[Alice Abbott]

Actually I think they were deliberately aiming for the neighbour's lawn (almost an acre of pristine grass - I should know, I mow it as part of my ongoing bartering system). Ours is a mess, pots and tubs waiting to be planted, scavanged bits of wood waiting to be chopped and dried for the woodpile, chicken pen, the kids' "swimming pool" (covered and empty but still not exactly a pretty sight), a trailer full of our old roof tiles which are awaiting the friends who have begged them to make room in THEIR garden for. They would have been very hard pressed to find anywhere to set themselves down on this side of the hedge!

My only "adventure" at the moment is trying to work out why my older sister is depressed and practically suicidal, why my younger sister has such an abnormal hatred of our parents and why said parents manage to breeze through life ignoring everything which goes on around them. It makes our little family look so normal by comparison. Whereas I normally feel as if WE are the crazy ones... Roll on Monday when they all go back to lala land!

[oldjerry]

They drift over ours a lot in the summer,Mrs.OJ would love a trip in one,I'm thinking of buying a trip for her on her 40th. (you wouldn't catch me in one,I get vertigo on deep pile carpets.)

[Millymollymandy]

My only "adventure" at the moment is trying to work out why my older sister is depressed and practically suicidal, why my younger sister has such an abnormal hatred of our parents and why said parents manage to breeze through life ignoring everything which goes on around them. It makes our little family look so normal by comparison. Whereas I normally feel as if WE are the crazy ones... Roll on Monday when they all go back to lala land!

Has your mayor met the extended family yet..... As you say, I'm sure he'll realise your immediate family are really quite normal.

[Alice Abbott]

The mayor encountered Mom last Christmas - she had him giggling on mulled home made blackberry wine. I expect the village grapevine warned him there would be even more of them this year and he's stayed way. I haven't even seen him drive along our lane lately so he's apparently using the other, longer approach to his Mairie this week. Perhaps he's worried he might be dragged in if he passes by. He's very sweet but very wary of chez Abbott and probably even more so if he thought there were four more of us in residence!

Last time I saw him (I had popped up to the Mairie where he often acts as the sole member of staff and was busily mopping the floor) he presented me with a rather gorgeous but battered copy of the Pear's Cyclopedia from 1888. Now where did he get that? And why did he think I needed it?

He's apparently a bit perturbed about the cat rescue antics as we now have plump healthy strays rather than sad little creatures scuttling about. No new kittens at present so we are holding our own wth the neutering too. He doesn't say a word to me but I've noticed him giving our first "customer" Nobu (who now lives with us) a few hard looks before now. Nobu is now a total house/barn cat who never leaves the garden so I don't think he can really criticise but I think cat rescue goes against the grain here.

[Green Aura]

My only "adventure" at the moment

Alice, your whole life is a wonderful adventure, I wish I'd had the guts at your age to do what you're doing.

Sorry to hear your sister's depressed - family get-togethers are hard when feeling like that and it's not the best time to explore feelings either. Hope she gets some help when she goes home.

[Alice Abbott]

Thanks GA. Yes, I'm glad we're doing this now when we are probably still reasonably blind to the dangers of dragging our kids off to live in this house the way it was when we first arrived. Of course it's so much better now but still has a way to go and once again we've spent up the budget and back to our own resources!

I think I might have to post somewhere else on this site for ideas on Loren actually. From what I can see things have actually been made worse by visiting our madhouse as her childless state was more to do with the ex husband who seems to have been very controlling, and now she's realised it wasn't her idea at all. He eventually managed to run several credit cards in her name up to the max and also managed to organise the divorce settlement so that she had to pay him a large sum in relation to the value of the house which had actually been hers even before she met him! She has lost out all round and is wary of starting again at 36 years old.

Anyway, Mack and the parents are childminding on Saturday and we are having a girlie trip to La Rochelle - for the whole day if I have my way! I shall try my skills at sorting both of them out. I knew I would have been better going in for psychiatry...

[MKG]

36!!!! She's a mere sprog.

You tell her from me that it is distinctly possible to start again at 40. And again at 50

Been there, done it, got the T shirt. Age has absolutely bugger all to do with anything except swinging a sledgehammer.

Mike

[Green Aura]

I'll second that Mike.

We didn't get married until just before I turned 50 and we moved up here a year later.

I suppose the biological clock is ticking a bit if your sister wants kids Alice so I can understand her feelings a bit - although I believe it's fashionable to have them much later in life these days. I've also been involved with a complete **** who ripped me off and went on to pastures new - it knocks your confidence totally.

I think a nice girlie day will help to start the recovery process, so enjoy it all of you.

[Millymollymandy]

Have a lovely day on Saturday all three of you!