Siesta Time

I’m not too sure about this global warming stuff but I do know that today the temperature here is going to be in the mid thirties, which in my view makes it certainly a local warming!

When, some 400 years ago, the duc of somewhere or other instructed his ouvriers to go and run up a few little shacks for his staff, conveniently within sight of the chateau so he could keep an eye on them, they duly did so.

And now I reside in one of these bijou residences – fortunately the chateau is no longer occupied so I’m not under the surveillance of the lord of the manor. But the place, so wonderfully cosy in winter with log fires and thick stone walls, was not designed with this global warming nonsense in mind. More than a few days of raised temperatures turn it into an effective storage heater – and my office into something of a sauna.

The only solution, other than air conditioning, is to get up early and hammer out a few words before things hot up and then retire gracefully to a hammock under the trees, where I can keep busy correcting the proofs of my latest book.

Fortunately, at this point, I have only a couple of editing jobs on hand and no solid writing project so my normal daily stint is pretty curtailed.

Having lived in the tropics I understand the value of the siesta and, if this warming trend keeps up, so will a lot of other people.

As Noel Coward put it “Mad dogs and Englishmen go out in the midday sun.”