Well, I've been a busy little bee today.

Yes, and I don't normally do all that much on a Saturday either.

We started off at this meeting at the Maison Ducros that is threatened with demolition. Te mayor turned up to meet us as promised, but only 50 minutes late. He told us about the reasons for its demolition, which was sond logic as far as it went, but once we began to push back the barriers, his logic became more and more shaky. What was so funny about this was that one of my arguments is that all of the civic and social functions of the town ought to be regrouped around a focal point, like the town square. Dispersing them is really dispersing the soul of the town. Just at that moment two people, clearly out of breath, came up to us and asked "where is this restaurant - the Queue de Milan?" And so we explained that it was another 500 metres outside the town opposite the old railway station. It rather proved my point.

After that I headed out to St Julien to the formal opening of this Gite, which has been excellently done, that's for sure. And I was talking to the owner who wants a web-site doing. So I'll give him a quote and see what happens.

In the afternoon Marianne and I had an informal meeting to plan our next line of attack about the Maison Ducros, and then went out to one of the other members of the Pionsat Patrimoine who was having internet issues - for which I diagnosed a new cable (which now works).

I managed 10 minutes to do a quick bit of shopping at the Intermarche and then it was off to Marcillat to watch their 1st XI take on Breuil, 2nd in the division. And much to mysurprise, and that of everyone else in the crowd, Marcillat wom 3-1 even though they were under the cosh for much of the game. Mind you, this was a game at level 6 of the French pyramid - 1 level higher than Pionsat (although in a different part of the pyramid) but believe me, Pionsat's 1st XI could have played both these teams at the same time and won the match with some to spare. The level of football in the Allier is way below that in the Puy-de-Dome.

Tomorrow, still no footy at Pionsat (what a waste of a weekend this is!) but according to Franck, the Pionsat trainer who was at the match this evening, there's a match at St Marcel, about 5 miles from Pionsat (but in the Allier), kick-off at 15:00. I don't recall ever having been to St Marcel ;-)