Welcome to the 13th issue of the CUSA Newsletter or should we call it issue 12A for those members who are superstitious? Our organisation has once again had a successful year with both the Annual Dinner and Quiz Night being well supported. You will find a write-up of both functions inside, together with several photographs of the members enjoying themselves (in other words being worse for drink).

I am pleased to advise you that the 2003 Annual Dinner has been arranged for Saturday, 7th June. Full details are in the enclosed flyer, together with a booking form which needs to be returned by Saturday, 24th May. Once again can I remind you that we need as much support as possible for the social activities that are organised on your behalf, and I look forward to seeing many of you in June.

It is now four years since we last asked for a subscription from the members, and the cost of printing and postage is constantly rising. We therefore need a further influx of funds into the Association coffers, and if you still wish to remain a member of CUSA then we shall be pleased if you will send a renewal subscription of £3 per person to the Secretary by 24th May. I hope that the majority of you will decide to renew, as the Association is an excellent way of keeping in touch with both present and former friends and colleagues.

Finally, CUSA has now been brought up to date with the formation of our web-site (cusawww.tripod.com). This has been devised by Michael Ho and John Chan and will include a copy of the Newsletter, together with other articles and items of chat.

Contributions from the members to both the Newsletter and web-site are most welcome. Please forward these in the first instance to Marjorie Appleton.

Kind regards to all,
Alan Appleton

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This was held on Saturday, 16th November at our usual venue, the Bridge Hotel (opposite the Castle).

The Quiz Night is always popular amongst the members, and this time saw a record attendance of 42 people. The evening was excellent value for money, the cost of £7.50 per head covering a tasty hot buffet, cash prizes for the first three teams, and a free tombola, with prizes consisting of bottles of wine, boxes of chocolates, and a poinsettia plant.

The questions were set by our resident 'expert' David Hardy, who always manages to pitch them at the right level to keep all teams involved. The quiz was keenly fought, and the winners once again were Graham Bull / John Delap's team who received a cash prize of £15. (Remind us to handicap them next time.)

Polly Bowman's team was one of the favourites for the title, and they came second and won £10, whilst Liz Curry's team came third and won £5.

There was plenty of time both during the Quiz, and afterwards, to socialise with friends and former colleagues, and a very enjoyable evening was had by all.

Photographs from the 2002 Quiz Night and Social Evening can be found on the CUSA web site at https://cusawww.tripod.com/images/Quiznight-20021116/index.htm.

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On a very cold, dark morning in February, four CUSA members braved the elements to take a day trip from Newcastle to Monte Carlo.

Alan and Marjorie Appleton, Fiona Reynolds, and Quintin Smith (together with his Dad and Uncle) rose early to catch the 7.00 a.m. flight. We arrived at Nice on a cool, but beautiful, sunny morning. The sky was a lovely azure blue: a far cry from the wintry weather we had left behind on Tyneside.

Our coaches were waiting to take us to Monte Carlo. First stop on the way was at a perfume factory (retail therapy for the ladies), then on to Monaco old town to view the Royal Palace and the Cathedral. We were unable to go inside the palace as Prince Rainier was in residence (he might at least have asked us in for a cup of tea). However we were able to see the changing of the guard, and plenty of time was given to explore the old town and have lunch.

We then visited Monte Carlo and gazed at the yachts in the harbour with a touch of envy. They were more the size of mini cruise liners than yachts, several having their own helicopter on board. We drove around part of the Grand Prix course imagining we were Michael Schumacher, then visited the world famous Casino.

We mixed with the high rollers, who all seemed to be losing money, and tentatively placed our bets. Fiona and Quintin seemed surprised to see the CUSA Treasurer merrily gambling away, and I am sure that they made a mental note to check the books on their return! After a short while Alan was £30 in profit, at which point he was dragged away by Marjorie before he could lose it.

On our return journey to the airport we stopped in Nice for 45 minutes, which gave enough time to shop and walk along the seafront.

All too soon we were back on the plane, a great day over. Any suggestions for next year's trip?

Alan Appleton

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We decided to bite the bullet and buy a house in Lexington. It is just a few streets away from where we were renting. We moved in September and, needless to say, we still have boxes everywhere. It is nice to have a place of our own again and I think we all feel more settled.

Paul changed jobs last July and is very happy at the new company. It was a bit nerve-racking as he had to apply to have the visa transferred and there was always a tiny doubt that the Immigration Service would decide he was undesirable! We finally got approval in October. Paul has re-started his green card application but that can take two to four years so I'm not likely to be able to work in the near future.

James seems very happy here though I know he still misses some of his friends in Newcastle. He is still playing football and enjoys playing in goal most. His team was undefeated this season so he was very happy. Paul wasn't coaching!! James is still very keen on baseball and devours statistics. He also loves American Football and was delighted when our local team, the New England Patriots, won the Superbowl. He is doing well at school. He has two teachers this year as they are doing a job share. One of them (male of course!) is really keen on baseball so James is in heaven. The other teacher, though, is very strict and works them really hard which I think is good preparation for middle school next year.

I have been keeping myself busy by continuing to work at the school. I spend nearly three days a week there. It certainly keeps me out of trouble. I spend a lot of time in the school library. I started out putting books back on shelves but once the librarian realised I could use a computer, I was promoted to cataloguing. I have found my vocation! To the huge amusement of my friends and family, I am also vice-president of the PTA.

I had hoped to do something with the website that I set up (moxonsonline.com) but unfortunately haven't had the time. Maybe this year

James and I went back to England in August. It was wonderful to catch up with friends and family again. It was great going back to Newcastle. I enjoyed catching up with everyone and managed to do a year's shopping for "essentials" (M&S underwear, Thorntons chocolates, teabags, etc) in one afternoon. We also caught the ferry across to Holland and I was able to show James where he born and show him some of our favourite places.

We haven't been out and about as much as I would have liked but we did have a good week's skiing at Lake Tahoe and a long weekend in Washington D.C.. I highly recommend the National Zoo and it is free! Paul and I also managed a night away in New Hampshire while James was on a school trip. It was bliss!

We have had some visitors but I would love to have more. If you ever feel like coming over, please let me know, I'm dying to do my tour guide bit.

Best wishes for 2003
Maria Moxon

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This was held on Saturday, 25th May at Puccini's Italian Restaurant, Newcastle.

The Annual Dinner is one of our most popular social events of the year, and once again it was well supported. Commiserations go to those members who telephoned their apologies on the day to say that they could not attend as they were ill. In addition one prominent member of the Committee, who shall be nameless (Ralph Fleeting, if you must know), failed to appear as he had forgotten the date. This caused consternation on the night as we tried in vain to contact him, and you can imagine the comments he had to endure afterwards.

A free tombola was held during the evening, and everyone appeared to enjoy themselves.

Photographs from the 2002 Annual Dinner can be found on the CUSA web site at https://cusawww.tripod.com/images/Dinner-20020525/index.htm.

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Editor's note: French Connection Update (Part One) appeared in issue 12 of the CUSA News-letter.

It was during the summer of 99, whilst our friends Pete and Sue were on holiday with us, that we had a phone call from Sylvia and Ian Armiger to say they would be travelling north tomorrow from Toulouse, could they come to say hello? When they arrived we discovered that Pete and Sue and Sylvia and Ian had so many friends in common, and with Ian's mother living in the same street as Pete and Sue, that they might as well have been related. Add to this that, of the couple staying in Hen House at the time, her an up and coming film star, it turned out he (Don Maw, in case any of you remember the name) had taken his degree in Construction at UNN. None of us recognised each other, but on the strength of "a small world", we all went to dinner at a restaurant, lost in some woods near us, that we had never tried before. Another night to remember, eh Sylvia? Suffice to say the owner/waiter, shuffling around in his slippers and cardigan would have made an excellent stand-in for Rigsby in ‘Rising Damp'. But the food was good. We also very much enjoyed a day visit that year from Lynn and Mac Hopper at the start of their holiday with some other friends in the Dordogne. Weather-wise 1999 went through extremes. It snowed in February, well for about an hour on Mike's first birthday here, we were outside in shorts from the middle of March, the tornado in May, temperatures that we thought abnormally high, around 45°C, throughout the summer and finally we didn't escape the infamous hurricane that swept across France on the 27th December. Our son Paul was here again and, after his and Mike's third trip to the loft to put back slipping and falling tiles, they beat a hasty retreat as we lost the same quarter of the roof again.

Early months of 2000 saw us with a complete new roof — no, not D.I.Y. and not on the insurance because, trust our luck, we had already arranged for it to be done before the hurricane struck. We decided that our other gite, now named Corn Corner, was not up to standard, completely redesigned the interior and set about tearing down walls and rebuilding. In June we returned to the U.K. primarily for our friends, Pete and Sue's, son's wedding, but were also pleased to be able to see many of you at the CUSA annual dinner. We also paid a visit to the Newark Kit Car Exhibition, where Mike was able to place an order for a JBA Falcon kit. This is something he has dreamed of building for a long time. Unfortunately, we delayed our return trip and then our car broke down in Perigueux on the way back, delaying us even more, and so yet again Corn Corner was not ready, despite working completely right through one night. It was worse than Hen House had been but thankfully again we had some very understanding and helpful clients. We had our usual family and friends on holiday during the summer and the rest of the year was taken up with the construction of a new garage within our barn for the kit car. This involved laying 36m² concrete about 15cm thick as well as making the new entrance and new full height doors. In October, after failing health and other difficulties we brought mother back to a nursing home in the U.K. and also brought tiles with us to begin the rebuild of our daughter's bathroom! November saw us back again, this time with our own car transporter to collect the kit from Manchester, finish our daughter Julie's bathroom in Blyth and return back here with the car kit. A memorable journey, no problems with the transportation apart from frequent stops to tape down ever expanding tears in the tarpaulin, but we did think for a few minutes that we were about to lose the kit when gendarmes who stopped us at a motorway toll for a document check accused Mike of not having a valid licence. We convinced them otherwise, don't ask how, and they waved us on our way without even asking what was on the transporter! Our wonderful local Renault garage workshop owner, who is fascinated by the idea of kit cars (unheard of in France) gave Mike a Ford Sierra as the donor car and has offered to lend some equipment when the time comes. Unfortunately, so far Mike has not been able to find the time to start the car build. Paul came again for Christmas, this time with his girlfriend, Lucy. They saw a house, well actually a two storey carpenter's workshop set between two houses, about 25km from us, and decided to buy it. He then proposed and they get married in Lincoln in September 2002. When the conversion work is done on that they propose to let it for a while but eventually hope to move here. Can't imagine where he gets it from!

Early in 2001, realising that we could have a little time off and not having had a "proper holiday" since 1997, we achieved another milestone, language-wise, and booked a one week package holiday to Tunisia with a local travel agent. The hotel was great, and as we were the only English people amongst hundreds of French, Italian and Dutch holidaymakers the staff treated us like VIPs, making sure we were always taken care of. We went on two or three organised trips and were pleased with ourselves on how much of the tour guide's information, in French of course, that we understood. Later, in May, we had an interesting fortnight. On the 4th, we decided, for Sylvia's birthday on the 5th, that a trip to Barcelona would be quite nice. Well, we can easily drive there in a day. But we didn't leave until 2pm on the 5th, so stayed in a hotel on the French side of the border for two nights. Enjoyed a trip to Barcelona the following day and then on the 7th we drove back to Carcasonne, flew from there to Stansted, hired a car and drove to Newcastle. Early on the 9th we made the return trip with Mike's Mum and Dad, allowing them to fly for the first time. Two weeks later we flew back with them spending only one night in Newcastle, then driving to Lincoln to meet Paul, Lucy and Lucy's parents for the first time. The following day we drove to Stansted, dropped off the hire car and continued with Paul and Lucy to London to spend a couple of nights with them to see their new flat. Next day back to Stansted, flight to Carcasonne and three hour drive home, phew! We decided that during 2001 we should try, for sanity's sake, to turn our house into less of a building site than it currently was, and to undertake more "development" work in our garden, a mere three acres, including the field. The bedroom, which had been temporarily set up in four days in '98 and was in dire need of proper attention, was basically ripped out: one wall pulled down to extend the size, a new ceiling, new concrete floor, new window installed and the remaining walls relined. We only just managed to finish it in time for Julie, Paul and Christopher's summer holiday visit. We enjoyed a lovely afternoon visit from Robin Reed and Lorna, with sister and friend, who were holidaying nearby. In September we were very pleased to have our good friends, Bill and Robyn Dobson spend a week's holiday with us. We are still not quite sure who was most thrilled, them or us, to locate various places and sites near us, which were mentioned in a book that they had read recently. Finally, of 2001's visitors, we were also pleased that Ralph Fleeting spent a night with us, during a holiday with some of his friends in the Dordogne. We are also very happy that Jenny and Ian Tolmie are going to spend a week with us in May 2002. We love having visitors, so please keep on volunteering.

So, how do we summarise life here in France so far. Well, you could perhaps say that the majority of what we do now, seven days a week, is more or less what we did in England, on a two day 'relaxing' weekend, it's just that now we do it at 40°C most of the time. Hey! That's great, I hear some of you say? Well, try it sometime: great for holidays but not for laying concrete. Mike is still in charge of hardware, it's just that his toys, as he calls them, are much more solid, tractor mowers — yes two of them now — cement mixer, angle grinders, etc. Sylvia, of course is still in charge, of systems: the business system, the booking system and the work planning system. Of course we do have endless BBQs from about mid March until the end of October and if we had time we might swim in the pool as often as our friends, family and numerous clients do. We are just about to tear out the en-suite that Mike built for Mother and convert her room into a large office, extend the rather small kitchen to twice its size and almost finish the downstairs with a total rebuild of the dining room. Well we recently discovered that one of the main roof support beams is located above a 'lintel-less' dining room door, explaining, perhaps, a few cracks appearing in the wall. Then we move into the loft. Hopefully, within the next two or three years, we will have a five bedroomed house, the little campsite, another (or maybe two more) gites and something substantial done with our 300m² barn. Perhaps then we will retire here! Also, more hopefully, Mike will find time to build his kit car and then we can come to show it off to some of you.

And, finally, on the subject of the language: it does improve but there are still classic misunderstandings, which can have interesting(?) results, as related below.

Early in October 2001, attempting to practise a bit of French with our neighbour, Rene, I, Sylvia, tried to explain to her that our clients during the summer and then ourselves had been feeding a small barn kitten that didn't seem to know how to hunt. I explained, or I thought I did, that although the kitten had never been into the house we were very worried about leaving her in November when we returned to U.K. to see the new grandson. A couple of weeks later Rene brought us a tiny cardboard box from which appeared the head of an adorable little kitten. Apparently her poodle had carried it into the house in its mouth and she thought, "Oh, good, Sylvia and Mike want a kitten" and said to choose a name and that she would look after it until our return at Christmas! I hadn't the heart to tell her of the mistake and have since promised Mike never to speak French again!

We took possession of her, or maybe that should be the other way round, on Boxing Day and we began to be trained by this four-legged variety of furry animal known to us as Jasmin, but frequently shortened to Jazz with various expletives, on how not to provide accommodation, etc, to an aspiring queen of the jungle. Scars to prove it!! but she can be so sweet (when she is asleep). She very soon broke one of Mike's tankards (excuse for return trip to Greece one day), switched off our answer machine several times and linked us to various new internet sites. But the incident we would most like to attribute to her, but can only do so if we can prove she pushed the steps, occurred one Sunday afternoon early in January and could be entitled:

How not to take down a Xmas tree.

1. Remove all but highest baubles and lights from tree.
2. Place household steps on tiled floor as close to tree as possible.
3. Remove accessible baubles and hand to female assistant.
4. Wait for female assistant to turn her back then stretch to retrieve the remaining bauble (perhaps best reached by first moving the steps).
5. Perhaps Jazz enters here. The steps slide.
6. Master of operations attempts to test the rigidity of the walls in the corner of the room.
7. Test proves positive but highlights a weakness in the joint between the thermostatic radiator valve and its associated pipe.
8. Dirty black water gushes upwards. Master of operations continues downwards.
9. Female assistant turns round on hearing a whimper. Takes in scene but is unable to prevent the inevitable departure of the tree, complete with two baubles and 250 lights, from its vertical position.
10. With tree now in a horizontal position, and chandelier threatening to join it, female enquires the state of health of the master, quickly ascertains that no bones have been broken, attempts to remedy that situation in chastising the stupid boy and promptly takes on the role of master.
11. Water and central heating turned off. Tree lights disconnected from already wet socket. Buckets acquired and cloths laid down for mopping up operation.
12. Tree baubles removed. Tree returned to the vertical, to allow removal of lights, and ceremoniously removed from the room in another horizontal position.
13. What had been bright, cheerful curtains now removed to washing machine in the hope of returning them to their former glory.
14. It is Sunday — do we have the necessary parts she says. Of course I have says he.
15. Luckily, for him, he has. New section of pipe required.
16. Water is trapped in a U-bend of the pipe. After several time-consuming, fruitless attempts at lowering the water level by obvious(?) technical means, she who must now be obeyed tells him to blow the water out with a straw.
17. He gets a wet face and has the audacity to drop straw down pipe.
18. He is prevented from crushing straw in pipe with a long screwdriver by her.
19. She refills pipe with water causing straw to float to the top for simple extraction.
20. He blows water from pipe. He gets wet face again but holds on to straw.
21. Plumbing repairs carried out successfully in 15 minutes.
22. Remy, Rene and poodle, Tintin, arrive to visit Jazz — excellent timing.
23. Jazz, who since the early stages of the above saga has necessarily been locked in the dining room, is now in no frame of mind to accept visitors, especially of the canine variety, even a past playmate.
24. Remy, Rene and Tintin, no longer Jazz's favourite people, decide to retreat home.

• His only injury is hurt pride.
• She continues to gloat.
• Jazz gives step ladders a wide berth but continues to attack anything that moves.
• Central heating functions correctly (at least he got something right).
• Three sets of tree lights remain a tangled mess although Jazz attempted several times to help(?) us to sort them out.

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For a printable crossword, click on this link: Crossword and for the answers click on this link: Answers.

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