Pondlife... couldn't resist it.

Agrion jouvencelle (fr) or Common coenagrion (en) Coenagrion puella. Male.

There ya go, for anyone interested and who might be passing this way. It is identified.

Photographed at the pond in Parc de Neuvecelle. A day that inspired me to get out and run off some of these kilos, pounds, stones; call them what you will, they add up to too much weight being carried around for no good reason. So I did the parcours de santé up and around the pond and marais doing the exercises that one finds at various points along the course.

I doubt I lost any weight doing it, but at least the mojito before, and the Côtes Du Rhone with, dinner went down well.

Quote of the Day... The Victorian Sex Explorer

"This is the way we live in India; a pitieous situation."
This off-camera remark was made to Rupert Everett during a visit to a prostitute's room in a seedy part of Bombay and was part of Everett's fascinating documentary about Sir Richard Burton called "The Victorian Sex Explorer.>

It was a shocking scene in many ways; the candid manner in which the girls talked about their way of life, a life they had been forced into. The quote is issued just after one of the prostitutes reveals her small son, a baby, in a box, covered and concealed under a bed.

So having decided to include the quote here, I looked through photos I had taken during visits to Kerala and Rajasthan, but all I could find were pictures of people smiling, kids with siblings, a grandmother straight faced holding her grandchild; very poor, but not pitieous. And it would be wrong for me to include them when they have left me with some far better memories.

A lesson perhaps in photojournalism.

Nineteen

That is the age of two of the last British Soldiers killed in Afghanistan.

19

...just 19. Kids. They should be watching Euro 2008.

Forgive my anger but I would really like to know what they were doing there and why?

It is only my opinion but I do not think the British Government has a clue. Democracy to the people of Afghanistan is meanlingless and if it were ever achieved at any point, it would not be long before that democracy was superseded by some other system more acceptable to those that want power.

Just because I DO NOT support the British Government does not mean I do not support our troops. I do indeed. They are prepared to do what I was never prepared to do, and for that, with not a little embarrassment, I thank them.

But I am so angry at PM Gordon Brown. The decisions are at his desk. The buck stops there.

Picture: CHRISTOPHER PLEDGER

(I hope he doesn't mind me using it...)

It has rained constantly...

... it seems for the past two or three weeks. Certainly it was raining on the Monday I went over to the UK, and it continued until the Thursday morning that Jag wrote about, which I spent in Whipps Cross Hospital waiting for my Mum to be treated for acting her shoe size and not her age. More about that another time. But it rained on the Friday as we left to walk to the Underground Station to get the Central Line tube into central London and Kings Cross/St Pancras. It rained as we caught the 11 0'clock Derby train that would deposit us at Luton Parkway and continued while we jerked along in the shuttle bus making pointless stops to the Luton departure terminal. It may have stopped while we wandered around the shopping mall that is Luton Airport, but it chucked it down as we walked to the aircraft.

It rained in the clouds. Above the clouds it rained some more by virtue of the higher level above.


As we diverted to Lyon the pilot told us to expect rain and then we started our long slow descent down into rain-heavy clouds, where it continued to fall as we sat immobile on the tarmac. Ninety minutes later we turned to takeoff and the taxi-ing lights of receding aircraft diffused in the droplets clinging to the windows before the speed of lift off turned them to thin streaks then nothing.

Eventual arrival into Geneva welcomed us with rain, and it hit and spattered the train windows as we hurried towards Lausanne. The streets shiny wet in the early evening low light as the sun made an attempt to burn through the thick Europe wide cloud base. Even when it wasn't raining it was very damp... http://youtube.com/watch?v=cRMsvfrg2UE&feature=related in an Olthwaite like way.

The next boat bound from Ouchy to Evian-les-Bains would not be for another hour, so we sat at a street side café, shielding our Cardinals from the dripping clouds.

Like Hitchcock's Birds the rain hit beat beak like onto the windows of the boat as it crossed the lake and as it fell heavier still Mrs Pondlife waited in the Caytrois to carry us up the mountain side to our home.

Nine days later and the rain has stopped. Roses are rotting on their branches. Petunias are dripping colour and perfume from flowers is negligible to all but the more sensitive of noses but the rivers and down hill streams bubble with fury over the tumbling stones.

So much for flaming June.

And I still have so much gardening yet to do.

Fagiolo All'uccelletto - Feve/Broad beans..try it.

I don't recall where I found this recipe, but at this time of the year, young fresh broad beans are finding their way into French supermarkets and then into my bean pan...

Here's what to do with them once you have the following:

450 gr freshly shelled Broad Beans or Feve
3 tbspns olive oil
garlic, 3 or 4 or 5 cloves depending on how big the cloves are and to your taste...
1 sprig of fresh sage.
450 gr of good ripe tomatoes - and don't keep 'em in the fridge.
salt and fresh ground pepper to taste.

Simmer the beans in unsalted water until cooked (about 40 mins or so...) and then drain them. While they are cooking peel and roughly chop the tomatoes. Heat the olive oil in a good sized heavy type casserole and lightly brown the garlic and the sage leaves. Add the beans, stir them around to coat them well with the garlicky oil and then add the tomatoes and their juice. Season to taste and cover and simmer them for about 15 minutes letting the flavours really mingle.

This is very moreish. Eat them on their own or as a side dish to some barbecued meat.

Enjoy...Bon Appetit.

About A Year Ago...

One Wednesday evening, me an 'er went to see Bob Dylan in concert in Geneva. I had looked forward to the concert although not passionately so, having agreed to go to keep her happy, she being the Dylan fan from decades back - not me. Having said that, I think a Desert Island Disc might well be Girl From The North Country, from Dylan's Nashville Skyline album. But I digress, so off we toddled.

Upon arrival at the venue, the Arena we founds hundreds, maybe thousands of people queuing to get in, being funneled around the side of the building from the car parks, to wait patiently as people, mostly middle aged and middle class, are wont to do. The two security staff frisked the masses, asking for mobile phones to be turned off, or cameras to be deposited at a safe store. These same people then waited while attendant audience members then had to hurriedly consume drink from the bottles they were prevented from taking in. Security reasons you understand. These rock concert goers despite so many being in their late sixties and early seventies, are obviously temperamental and rowdy folk, who are likely to storm the stage to rip Dylan's clothing from his skinny but aging frame.

The conversation in the crowd was carried on in many languages some of which I could not identify, but Geneva, being more international than Swiss, can supply almost upon demand a few people from every country on the world. French were shrugging their shoulders and saying how long they had waited to see, Dylan. A man next to me explained that Dylan was from his époque - he had seen him on film and had all his records. A family in front of me, Anglo-Americans judging by their accents, were made up of three generations and this was not unusual. Several older people had teenage children or even grandchildren in tow, giving them an opportunity to see and hear a Master.

But we couldn't get in. The queue wasn't moving. The concert was due to start at 8pm, it was now 7.58, and we'd been in the same place give or take a few metres for 40 minutes. The Missus got through and I was asked to wait, eventually being allowed in, and past the bars, staffed with several good looking young women. No drinks allowed inside due to security measures ? I think not.

Then I heard the music. The show had begun and Dylan's unmistakable but definitely older and raspier voice, the band in full flow, sounded good. Through some draped curtains and into the auditorium, and into pitch black. Our tickets had numbered allocated seats, but no one, it seemed could find where they were, and on the band played. We found our section and stepped to our right and occupied two places but stood as everyone else was. Every few moments one of three usherettes with tiny torches got down to ground level to find which row belonged to which anxious ticket holding audience member. Some people were being asked to move. The situation was quite ridiculous by this time. It was now 8.45 and Dylan had been singing almost non stop since 8pm, audience members were still shuffling in the dark back and forth looking for somewhere to stand, usherettes were continuing to move on hands and knees with torches lit looking in vain for row KD seats 41/41 in zone ZG.

This was Swiss organisation in reality. They had a ticket with a seat numbered and, by William Tell, that was where they would sit!

Surrounding me were people who had finally got to see Bob Dylan. Two guys behind me, screamed loudly whenever they discovered the song Dylan had just started was known to them, they then started to sing along, not loudly but often in their own languages, then when the refrain they knew well, from songs like She Belongs To Me, would sing in English, loudly mispronouncing the words. It was wonderful! A couple in front stood after a few numbers and started to boogie. She was overweight and a little unsteady, and maybe had never tried to boogie like that in such confined space, her grey haired spindly husband was doing better, his head was moving, his arms and legs jerkily gyrating, having the time of his life. It was a privilege to be part of this.

Two leather clad, cropped haired and bearded Germans in suits standing in the aisle next to me swigged their beer and clapped each other on the back as they recognised songs from their youth. Not your average middle management bankers, these guys. Spanish speaking women moved into vacant seats in front, stashed their holdalls, and clapped, singing along when they knew the words. I was as much aware of the audience make up as I was of Dylan's presence on stage, shielded by his white stetson, looking mostly downward, growling into his microphone, while playing some mean licking guitar.

And suddenly, it was over. Two hours later after non stop performance the lights were extinguished, and Bob Dylan was gone. The crowd of old timers, clapped, they stamped, the whistles grew as people who had previously forgotten how to whistle with fingers filling their mouths remembered how it was done. The noise grew, some people left, and still Dylan didn't return. More whistles, some frantic shouting, stamping feet found a rhythm. From a festival memory in the distant past sounded a chant, and after what seemed an age the lights went up, and Bob Dylan and his Band gave us an encore. A couple numbers more and again he was gone, and we filed out quickly, into the warm Geneva night, past the peddlars and their t-shirts "cinq francs!".

Swiss organisation. A misnomer if ever there was one. But the aging international fans would forgive that. They had boogied like they hadn't for years. And those old albums would soon be dusted off, and neighbours would complain again...

Pondlife or Stream life ?

Late May early morning run down to the river and around the man-made lake, that is now home to a large gaggle of incontinent Canada geese and their goslings. The sky, heavy with rain and the constant sound of the speeding traffic on the nearby motorway threatened an enjoyable workout as I plodded 16 stone past the dog walkers who seemed surprised at having me greet them...

I'm used to greeting and being greeted here on my various hikes up mountain and down valley, but on my journeys to Britain it rarely happens. There is never much eye contact either.

The river was swollen from the past days constant rain; the muddy brown whirlpools as quickly as they appeared, disappeared again as the river flowed towards the Thames.

Yellow lilies amongst the leaves and rushes brightened the overwhelming sense of greenery, and darting about, quickly resting for a second or two were several damsel flies. Some brightly shiny green and others a deeper blue. Laying an egg on a leaf here and another egg there...

Beautiful. I like this time of year, even in heavy rain when the landscape is covered in a grey cloud from one horizon to another. Even grey has its shades.