Michel

I think this is possibly only the third or fourth time in over twelve years that I've completely forgotten to to consciously take a photo for my Blip. As on other occasions, I've had to scrabble around to find something that might qualify but all I had today was this screen grab, which formed part of a conversation with Dom about the website.

Later, the pair of us had a chat with the Minx and another colleague, Laura, about rebranding. It always amuses me how long these conversations end up taking, and I thoroughly enjoy them. Over the course of an hour, we made some progress, although, as is the way with these things, not very much :-)

The other notable event today was the arrival of our host, Michel, who has come to sort out the pool. He turned out to be a lovely guy, who insisted on taking us out for dinner in the evening. 

He turned out to have a very interesting story: his parents came across from Vietnam by boat - if you are of a certain age, you will no doubt remember the 'Vietnamese boat people' - and settled in Paris where his father retook his exams to qualify as a pharmacist in France. 

Michel followed in his footsteps, only to make an abrupt career change into engineering and... house building! He built the place that we're staying in.

It was also interesting getting a bit of background on La Tranche-sur-Mer. Michel reckons the winter population, i.e. now, is around three thousand people but over the summer it's a hundred thousand! Indicating the quiet streets outside the restaurant where we were eating, he says in the summer season, they're packed solid.