Let us pray

I often think that there's enough material here to keep six blogs going, but then a lot of it is probably quite boring if you're not personally involved in it. However, I couldn't resist sending you the latest development in the non-sale of the gites.

We at this very moment have a very nice couple from Cork in Ireland staying with us. Their names are Michael and Mary and they are both chefs, she in particular is a pastry chef. They came to see the gites through an estate agent with a view to buying them earlier this year. They (like many before them) decided there and then that this was what they had been looking for to establish their long held dream of a cookery school. They cancelled all their other appointments, then went home to Cork and arranged a euro loan on some rental properties that they have in Dublin. So far, so good, so you know that there's going to be a 'but' and here it is...

Mary's father has never got over the recent death of her mother and has been going to rack and ruin ever since. The minute they got the loan agreed in principle from the bank, he went into a steep decline and ever since he's been in a hospice, weaker by the day and they're just waiting for him to be taken so they can get on with their dream cookery school.

Is God trying to tell me something? It does seem a bit harsh that somebody has to die in order to sell the gites and move on with my/our lives. I don't mean to be cruel to the old boy, but could he please get on with it? I don't want it to be painful, just quick! The banks will be on our backs any day now, and you have to admit it sounds like a pretty lame story to pass on to them. They'd laugh us out of the place. Now let us pray....