Boystown

While Helene and Loic battled the elements Declan and I settled in for a boys night out that would last four days. Helene was so right in guessing that it would involve burgers and hockey. Thursday and Friday Declan attended school so I was allowed lots of free time to sip espresso's by the seaside all morning and then beer in the afternoon. Evenings included skipping stones in the harbour and then back home for, yes, burgers and fries and hockey games on the internet. Now don't think that I'm not allowing my eldest son to drink in French culture. The first morning after hockey and burgers he insisted that we run out to the bakery and get fresh crossiants to dip into our cafe au lait and hot chocolate. He also explained to me that he doesn't speak English anymore. If he wants me to understand anything he will!
Our own storm experience was much less dramatic than Helene's. We lost power but only for a couple of hours and had candles, but no matches. I flagged down a cop and asked if he had any since all the stores were closed due to the power outage; they had none but offered me a fresh bagguette(just kidding). Declan was not keen on the wind. We had walked around town at the beginning of the storm, not really knowing how bad it was. A few flying store signs and flower pots clued us in pretty fast. We went back home, shuttered the windows and took stock of the food. Lots of good eats but only 1 litre of coke and 1 bag of Madeleines..it seemed grim. The sound of the freight train(that would be the wind from our skylight in the bedroom) tapered off around midnight and as most of southern France suffered I watched another hockey game on-line and ate madeleines and drank the last of my coke while Declan snored. The next morning broke sunny and warm and I had my cafe noir at the seaside terrace in a t-shirt while Declan played at throwing stones into the sea. I'm sure the god's will make me pay up sometime or other.