Land Reclamation and Mr Muscles the Gardener

A long running saga of minor territorial skulduggery was finally settled last week. Allow me to outline the story.


Part of our holiday hideaway is a small parcelle of land about 50 metres or so from the house; its essential purpose is as a veg patch. A vast majority of Breton country-cum-village dwellers have something similar and a great many of them are at least partially self-sufficient. For example, this is Jean-Luc's soon-to-be-sown veg patch (or potager to use the local parlance) on the communal land behind our pad.

And this is our wee parcelle as it appeared only last week. It's the bit to the left of the old privy.

Long running readers might recall my obit of the ever-mischievous Jean-Pierre who lived along the road from our pad. His partner, Michelle, still lives there. JP was a bit of a one for quietly moving his boundaries and enjoying the benefits of his neighbours' land. He didn't do that to us, he just offered to clear our veg patch; we accepted his offer and bought him a beer or two for his efforts.


The next couple of photos (from Sep 2005) might have been the after effects of said beers. JP was very fond of a drinkie or seven. Sadly it led to his early demise, but I still remember the old rogue with a certain fondness. JP's the one in the blue tee-shirt.

On with the narrative:


. . . potatoes began to appear on our parcelle; followed by numerous other crops over the years. Finally, this summer, we decided to reclaim our patch and after some negotiations involving the jovial mayor of Trebrivan we agreed to allow Michelle's crop of artichokes to stay until harvest time and then this autumn, we'd plant out some fruit bushes and an apple tree or something similar.


And so, I bring you some incredibly exciting photos of a muscular fellow at the peak of his fitness performing gardening tasks that display his fabulous muscle tones to the world. Do please try and control yourselves, ladies. I understand how hard you will find this, but you must show decorum.

Trebrivan's Mr Sex was not working alone, however, his lovely Mrs The Millbrooker was also doing digging and compost spreading duties in the chill December air.

And so neighbourly harmony has been restored in rural Brittany and, in a couple of seasons, we should be enjoying our very own goosegogs and black/red currants. We might even get a small crop of apples. Huzzah!