Discussion > BH readers in France
SandyS
Haute Vienne Dept 87, Limousin nearest town Bellac
Formerly Derby UK
Originally Perthshire UK Near Crieff
When we used to do Keycamp and Brittany Ferries holidays we'd often stop in Falaise for breakfast on the way further south, good memories.
SandyS
Saône-et-Loire (71) - 30 minutes from Chalons-sur-Saône; an hour from Dijon
(Ex-Midlothian)
Mike Jackson
I don't quite qualify, I have a holiday home in France in the town of Cognac, 16100, Charente. I seldom go there these days making an exception for the admirable Blues Festival in Cognac at the beginning of July.
Originally a Scouse but live in Suffolk (Ipswich) now.
geronimo
geronimo
This is a long shot, were you in the airline industry?
SandyS
SandyS. I wasn't in the airline industry although I flew more miles than most airline pilots each year. I worked in Telecom originally for BT (in the labs too) and then for various US companies - finished working for WorldCom just before I retired!
geronimo
Geronimo, another east Anglian... do I know you? :)
TheBigYinJames
Worked at BT labs pseudonym close to name. Can say no more without threatening your life. You?
geronimo
Same, eerily.
TheBigYinJames
So did Stephen Richards, who lived in Kersey I believe, but now lives in France. Who was director when you left?
geronimo
I left in 2000, can't recall who the director was at the time.
TheBigYinJames
My dad worked at Dollis Hill.
Martin A
Perpignan, Pyrenées Orientales (I'm in the annuaire).
A few months ago I had an article at the climatosceptique blog
http://www.skyfall.fr/
and over a year ago I put a post on my blog about the French Climatosceptique scene
https://geoffchambers.wordpress.com/2013/12/03/climatoscepticisme-a-la-francaise/
I recommend the comments under my post. Benoit Rittaud who runs the skyfall blog is a mathematics lecturer. He has a new book out about Malthusianism before Malthus.
I'm off to Paris for a week. I'm thinking of paying a visit in early December for the Great Climate Kneesup. Any thoughts?
Geronimo
My wife's cousin, some way south of Cognac, has a ninety year old friend who used to organise blues festivals back in the dark ages. It's thanks to him, I learned, that I was able to see Sonny Boy Williamson and John Lee Hooker in Portsmouth in the 60s.
They all stayed in his farmhouse and naturally jammed all night, and he naturally filmed and recorded them. All this is a secret between him and my wife's cousin and no doubt a coterie of French blues fans. One day Europe will free itself from absurd anti-libertarian American copyright laws and we will be able to spend a few hundred happy hours not thinking about climate change.
I'll keep you posted.
geoffchambers
Geoff the Cognac Blues Festival is fantastic, last year George Benson turned up and Mrs. Geronimo near thought she'd died and gone to heaven. Sting, Tom Jones, Seel (the best) lots of other big names and you can go to every concert for Euro160ish. Jarnac is always the first night and if there is a better concert venue in the world I've yet to have seen it. For me it's the busking, blues wannabes (some of them brilliant) form all over the world and jam together all day in Rue Canton.
BTW I was probably the worst research engineer ever to have darkened the BT labs doors. TBYJ Tom Rowbotham was probably director followed Stewart Davies, the latter and i are good friends, and I knew Tom well he was the protege of Alan Rudge a leading light in getting the RS to change their statement on climate change.
geronimo
Geoff, forgot to say, saw Sonny Boy Williams in the Cavern Club in L'pool. Fantastic, no doubt lots of up and coming musicians went to his shows there. Last year Muddy Waters' son backed Steven Seagall (awful) and had a guitar play off with George Benson. Wow!
geronimo
Stewart Davies was there when I left, I took the very generous VR shilling that was on offer and went freelance.
TheBigYinJames
John de Melle (Deux-Sevres 79)
John de Melle
I have noticed from their comments that a number of BH readers, presumably of UK origin, are, like me, based in France.
For interest, I invite any BH reader who wishes to do so to post a note of their Department and nearby large town. Or simply their department.
For starters:
Martin A: 61 (Orne) Falaise