December 2015

This month Justine was rescued by the fire brigade when her car rolled into the river. Thankfully, having rushed into a friend's house, she didn't have to witness it crossing a busy road and carrying on down the verge before teetering over the river bank, Italian Job style, saved only by a little, lone bush that snagged on the underside. The fire-brigade arrived with lights and sirens and 8 men (sadly neither young nor strapping) and 20 minutes later Justine drove away with a little dent on the car, and a reprimand from the local police officer for not making good use of the handbrake. By that time she was late for a meeting to welcome four asylum-seeking families from Iraq to our village, who all knew her as 'the one who left the handbrake off' by the time she arrived. Elizabeth penned her this useful reminder.

November 2015

The bakery is the village hub. The staff are inundated with gossip, rumour, speculation, and sometimes people who want to buy some bread. In peak season there is quite a lot of bread to be sold so the staff are not given any time off. Justine covers their holiday leave only when things have really quietened down, (at least as far as selling bread goes), and there is little more to do than drink tea, eat cake, and be discreet.

October 2015

Regular testing in schools is as endemic in Austria as it is in England. Justine suggested to Mary that she should do some swatting for her exams and Mary informed Justine that swatting is when you find someone's address through their IP, or name and location, while they are live streaming, then you call the police and tell them that you have heard gunshots from that address, and watch their surprise and terror live when the police break down their front door. Justine needs to swat up on her modern English usage.

September 2015

At this time of year the hills are alive with the sound of chain saws and cowbells. Cowbells can reach up to 113 decibels and anti-cowbell animal rights activists have suggested GPS trackers as an alternative. The cows can be thankful that they can't hear the chain saws, having been made permanently deaf by the cowbells.

August 2015

One of our most favourite things about Summer are the songs that the girls bring back from their summer camps; Black Socks, The Teapot Song, Mary Mack, The Hammock Song, I need a waiter, Bongalow, Jeep, Calypso, Pop a cat a petal, Tarzan, The Fishing Song, The Bear Song, John Henry, Eine kleine fiegel-fogel-eckena-bockena-viegel-vogel-eagle-spitting-banana-eating bird. These songs, which are best heard in a place from which one has the freedom to leave at anytime, have countless verses and mostly end up back at the beginning to start all over again - easily 18 hours worth of song-time. One of our least favourite things about Summer is the 18 hour car journey home from our English sojourn.

July 2015

Maria Alm is, in some respects, about 30 years behind the UK, for example, health and safety - everything is quite delightfully and dangerously relaxed. In other respects it is about 100 years behind, for example, gender equality - the majority here cannot fathom how Simon could possibly cope when Justine goes to Dartington for a month. However, if you've got a prolapsed disc, spinal blockage, or have torn your cruciate ligament the treatment is cutting edge. What's more, Zumba has finally arrived in Maria Alm, only 5 years behind the UK! Now that Justine's spinal blockage is cured she neglects her wifely duties in favour of Zumba classes on Sunday nights at the primary school.

June 2015

Gunther and Christof, our policemen, would feel at home in the Scilly Isles. The Scilly Isles police, whose recent operations have included containing a stray seal, pacifying two drunken chefs rowing about the merits of sea salt and investigating a short sighted horse suspected of damaging cars, are currently busy with an investigation into a bogus parking ticket placed on a buggy. Gunther and Christof test the children on their cycling proficiency and might set a speed trap if the weather is pleasant. This week Justine's bike went missing. After a fruitless search it was reported stolen, whereupon our policeman admitted he had accidentally borrowed it and then, after a big night out, couldn't recognise it again. It was located, duly returned and the case was closed. A successful open and shut case for the Maria Alm police force.

May 2015

Despite the popularity of the BBC's 'slow TV' broadcast of a narrow boat navigating the Kennet and Avon canal creating a rush on narrow boat holiday bookings, the Peberdys had a very peaceful 4 days travelling from Newbury to Little Bedwyn and back. Three days of glorious weather, one of torrential rain, one collision, one incident of forgetting to close the sluice gates and almost emptying the pound, one grounding, and two children falling out of the narrow berths at night.

April 2015

Apparently Minecraft is the new Lego, developing innovation, creativity, experimentation and problem solving. Which is better, virtual or physical, is a point for debate. In favour of the physical, you can't do it lying across the sofa. In favour of the virtual, you cannot impale your foot on a Minecraft block. The virtual world is not unlike the physical in one respect at least - Caspar can still manage to really, really annoy Elizabeth in the virtual world.

March 2015

The plan was to ski-tour to the top of the Marbachhohe and watch the partial solar eclipse before skiing down in the spring snow. The plan was flawed for 3 reasons: 1. You can't ski-tour if you have taken off your skis and flung them to the ground in a fury. 2. The top of the Marbachhohe cannot be attained, as far as Justine is concerned, with an excrutiating groin sprain 3. The partial solar eclipse, hard to notice at the best of times, is easily missed if one is concentrating on expressing oneself in no uncertain terms. The ski down in the spring snow, however, made it all worth while.

February 2015

Off-piste skiing is endangered. New developments in farming have produced fencing which can withstand the vagaries of winter and can remain permanently in the fields, marking the criss-cross pattern of boundaries, winter and summer. Some of these fences are already in place and a perfect trail of powder turns must be interrupted by a climb over a fence just protruding above the surface of the snow. Farmers will be saved days and days of work. Off-piste skiers will be buggered.

January 2015

Photoshop. Hours of fun for Elizabeth, and hours of deleting hundred's, literally hundreds, on a daily basis, of photos on her ipad, for Justine.