Nuclear Drill at R's School

As far as I am aware the advice in the event of nuclear attack is:  take shelter under desk and kiss your ass goodbye, but maybe I'm out of date.

We did have a nuclear attack preparation at my school in the 1970s, but even then the teachers exposed it for what it was by simple addition of logic to facts.  Mrs Williams and Mr Abbott, once they had given lip-service to the obligatory bits,  drew out their guitars and gave us a hard-strumming rendition of the anti nuclear protest song 'Before we had the War', which was much more sensible.  God I loved the 70s.

However, R has been recalled on Wednesday afternoon for a 'What to do in the event of a Nuclear Attack' session, where the class will learn to tape up the windows and take shelter under the desk.  The class teacher Mrs Essex-Facelift has let it be known that she is Not Happy about this as she is not being paid for the extra hours.    Good to know we can rely on the French teaching profession in an emergency.

R hopes that once the windows are safely taped up they will be able to play cards and board games, but suspects Mrs Essex-Facelift will vent her spleen by making them WORK.

When R came home after the nuclear drill he was in a sweat and could only mutter 'torture, torture' so I had to drag this out of him.

The Headmistress Mrs Scruton opened the proceedings by shouting

"NUCLEAR ATTACK NUCLEAR ATTACK'

over the tannoy, which was broadcast in every classroom,  Big Brother style.    Then she shouted something like:

'ASSUME HIGH SECURITY POSITION' but no-one was sure as her voice had become distorted beyond recognition by the excessive shouting and poor quality of the PA system.

At this point a mysterious man in black entered the classroom, opened his black attache case and withdrew one bottle of water, a handful of plastic cups, a pair of scissors and some rolls of sticky tape.

'Who was he?'  I asked, aghast

'Um, 'chief of zone B'  or something...nobody knows.' (his identity will have to remain mysterious).

Mrs Essex-Facelift was in a bad mood about it all but this did not stop her making sure the job was done in every absurd detail.    Every window, keyhole and air vent was taped up.  Clothes from Lost Property were employed to cover the internal door.

'Did you recognise any of your lost clothes?' I said excitedly.

'No' replied R, with an air of detachment.

'I have another question.  How do you know you will have sufficient sticky tape should the terrible day arrive?'  I asked, but R could only continue with the story.

It then became very hot indeed in the classroom, and of course airless.  When someone complained there was only one bottle of water between 30, Mrs Essex-Facelift shouted 'I HAVE TO STAND UP AND TEACH YOU FOR TWO HOURS AND DO YOU EVER SEE ME DRINKING?'  and she set about banning pupils from fanning themselves and wiping water on their faces and other survival initiatives.  'AND STOP FIDGETING, YOU'RE WASTING OXYGEN' she added.

 R later found out that the other classes had an appropriate number of bottles of water and plastic cups but Mrs Essex-Facelift had apparently decided to make the nuclear survival process just that little bit more challenging.     I think she would benefit from some counselling.  They shared out the water, one cup between four.

'What about the spread of infectious diseases?' I asked.

Bets were on that Mrs Essex-Facelift would force the class to do extra French, but she appeared to have been banned from doing this by the Minister of Education (or perhaps in this case the Minister of Defence) so she had to resort to forcing them to watch Alfred Hitchcock 'The Birds', a puzzling choice.    R complained that it was an 'old film from the 70s' and 'very badly done' with 'random birds and blood everywhere.'.  (Yes we did have the discussion about the old days when there were no computers simulations etc).  After one hour and a half of suffocating heat, oxygen deprivation and bird terror, the pupils were released, their physical and mental health shattered.

I asked R if he had learned anything about nuclear explosions, or if he knew why they were taping up the windows but he did not reply.

Woodland Garden in June

Here is what has happened so far to the structure built in April, the only maintenace was one short weeding session.  I'm overwhelmed by the show put on by our dry shade tolerant iris foetidissima.  Is it the loving attention? (more likely our exceptionally mild winter, which they appreciate apparently).

It's name (trans;  the most stinky one)  comes from the fact that it's leaves when crushed are stinking man (but I've never gone searching for what I don't need to know).  It's colours (cream and pale veined lilac) are not exactly striking, but I think the overall effect has subtle charm, and anyway if you've got dry shade you are grateful for anything you can get.  

The clumps of leaves have looked good winter and spring, and I'm hoping for a good crop of scarlet berries in the autumn;  I'm cautious about this as we are experiencing Paris Monsoon season , something which pleases our friends the snails.  Yesterday I observed one large snail on every flower.  JC threw them over the neighbour's wall.  When I questioned the morality of this he said:  it will help him mow his lawn - and in any case there's no food over there so they head straight back to our garden - but at least the climb over the wall will slow them down.  (I'm wondering if JC isn't a secret adept of chronic uneighbourliness?)

The structure holds in the 'tatty' season, with primula and violets which have gone over, the remains of  herb robert flowers and a touch of wild strawberry and ground ivy

Iris Foetidissima

A small stone owl I fell in love with

The pebbled areas still look good, campenula late flowering in the shade

Yes we did get some cherries, the one straggling tree we saved did the work of many, 2 kilos, 4 pots of jam

Storm Aftermath

After the storm, the moss is knocked from the roof, and plums, leaves, twigs and surprised snails are shaken from the trees, the geraniums are no more, trees are war torn and new inland waterways have formed.  Here are the culprits.   R&B braved the storm in short bursts to gather them, and B had the brilliant idea of storing some in the freezer.

The Giant Hailstones

Leaf table cloth

A surprised snail, previously lodging in a tree, finds himself on the ground

Japanese Neflia damaged in the bombardment.

The lake in the waterproof cover of swing seat

STORM; Paris, June 2014

After a 35 degrees hot and humid day I noticed flashing lights in the evening sky.  We all rushed up to the loft and gasped over the spectacular light show.  It was as if the sky gods were in a battle, shooting lightning at one another without once touching the ground.  Every dot-to-dot possibility was explored, in hues of pink peach and purple, and sometimes the sky lit up like day.

Sky gods shooting lightening at one another

B and I went out into the street to try for some overhead shots.

The lightning continued to flash, but it was calm, and it seemed as though the storm would pass us by.  B had packed up his tripod, and I was lingering awhile in the quiet night when I heard a noise, rather like a stone hitting some metal scaffolding, then a thud, then a blow to the van next to me.

I looked round for someone throwing stones, but there was no-one, just an ever increasing collection of thuds and whacks.  There was almost no wind, so I reasoned it couldn't be flying debris in the path of the storm.  I felt at any moment I would be hit by an unidentified flying object, so I made my way inside, and on the doorstep I saw a large white rock of ice, and  I realised we were about to be pelted by giant hailstones.

I shouted at everyone to shut the windows and shutters and get the cats in.  Then suddenly the sky became a squealing mass of furious fiends hurling rocks at our roof, windows and doors, a pounding bombardment with occasional foundation-rocking direct hits, surround sound so loud we could not hear ourselves shouting.

The cats called this Unnatural and went howling mad.

THE WILDEST AND MOST THRILLING STORM EVER EXPERIENCED, even by those of us approaching 50.