Peace, perfect peace.

After seven weeks of hammering, sawing and drilling an all embracing peace has descended on the household. All the kitchen fitters and ancillary hangers on have gone while they wait for the marble counters to be cut to size and delivered from the masons in Toulouse. On current estimates the pose of workers don't expect to return until Tuesday to install the work surfaces and finish the job. How strange it is to have a house to ourselves. Even odder to be able to hear the grandfather clock in the hallway ticking. Wilf and Digby are quite nonplussed. They threw themselves out of the front door only to discover there was nobody there for them to bark at. Canine chagrin .

Yesterday afternoon Madame Bay asked me to escort Monsieur Bay into the local market town to buy a new television. Madame Bay was quite clear that she wanted a 3D television while Monsieur Bay was equally clear that no such thing existed. 'Women !' he would exasperatedly mutter under his breath as Madame held forth . At three on the dot I was collected at the front gate. La famille Bay have a rather dapper little black Renault Twingo which ( for those of you who have never seen one ) is a very, very small , easy to park, two door car much loved by Parisian students and 20 somethings. How the statuesque Madame Bay and her chiffonerie manages to squeeze into it has always been something of a wonder to me.

Until yesterday I had thought of Monsieur Bay - ' call me Herve' - as a rather shy and retiring gentleman. How wrong can you be? Get him behind the wheel and another side to his personality comes to the fore. We lurched off, Herve hunched over the wheel, foot to the floor, changing maniacally from first into fourth and then back to third, all the while the little Twingo's engine thrumming away like a demented banshee. At junctions he would rousingly toot the horn, a clear indication to one and all that priorite a droit didn't apply to him and the tiny Renault. The zebra crossings in town ( we have three of them) were ignored and the roundabout at the bakers treated as though it were a chicane at Le Mans. Latin bravado or an adverse reaction to his medication - who knows what causes this alter ego to emerge behind the wheel ? And the television? Herve was able to return with a new HD set wedged into the parcel shelf that doubles as a back seat. 'See? ' said Madame Bay delighted that she had got her 3D television. 'Women !' muttered Herve alarmed that 3D really would be available by the end of the year.