September already

and only four months to Christmas. Will the barn be ready by then? I've no idea...

The electrican came to say that he'd not be starting this week, but next Monday instead. A lively woman came from the other side of Aurillac to measure up for the lino in the upstairs bedrooms, real retro stuff in several alarming shades of yellow, orange, red and blue, but she isn't sure she can get what we want here in France, so she'll also quote for getting a finish on the walls that the Moroccans left a bit rough.

In between times I got a third and final coat of linseed oil on the doors, without scalding either myself or any passer-by, and finished off the glassfibre wallpaper. That was a nasty job so I'm very pleased it's finished.

I'm possibly giving the impression it's been all work and no play lately, so here's a list of what I've been reading in the last three weeks:

Two Niven/Pournelles (Lucifer's Hammer, and the Mote in God's Eye), re-reads, obviously,
Niven's Rainbow Mars - I'd not read this before and I shouldn't have bothered
Two William Boyd's, The New Confessions and Any Human Heart, rather similar in that both are birth to death narratives set in the 20th century - I preferred the second
Griff Rees Jones' Semi Detached (I only later thought of Manfred Man)
Robert Harris' Ghost - hmm, he doesn't think much of Blair, does he?
Floyd V Filson - A New Testament History, very very badly written but fascinating
and a slim book about the J Lyons lithographs

One reason for getting the barn habitable is that it will let me get more books out of cardboard boxes, though quite where they will actually go will depend on how I get on with building the barn-floorboard bookshelves. However, I have marked down for future use (as the front of the computer desk) a large new oak truss, left over from the balcony, just slightly too heavy for me to carry. I'd just better get it inside to dry out a little more - it is supposedly already seasoned.