Dog days in the Dordogne - survival ideas

 At last consistently hot days have arrived at La Chaise!   I can stop annoying everyone with my saying 'as a retired farmer, I am allowed to say we need a little rain...'  The temperatures for the last few days have consistently passed 30 C... This was written in July. 

This is a new friend - probably came in from the rain - no I don't know his name

As August  began it started to  behave like September or March - unstable temperatures and unpredictable rain. The months seem to have unfixed their habitual characteristics - April thought it was May, for example. I still do not accept that a shower can be 'sweet' except in the middle of a very hot month.

The death of the Camelia

The verandah always gets a cane roof for the summer.  This is very thoroughly watered.  I should have put on a double cane layer but it has taken so long to become really hot - that I forgot.  Otherwise the inside temperature is intolerable. I also wet the windows and the anti-insect curtains in the doorway.

The idea for wetting the window shutters and verandah covering came from a very ancient picture of my Grandmother's house in Indonesia.  A small boy was letting down a thin cane blind over the window, the next foto showes him watering it...

No wonder SOGEDO - loves me....it is my 'utility' whose bills are so very useful for proving something to legal minds - what and why I do not know.