as fast as he could. Ellie and I watched from the kitchen window laughing as he and the strange machine with its awkward wagging tail sped up and down the rows leaving a smelly trail in their wake.
Sean was getting neurotic about machinery. He smashed the back window of the tractor with the fertiliser spreader. Days later he drove under a tree and dislodged the exhaust. His number of visits to Monsieur Bonny in Coutures was travelling in the opposite direction to our bank balance. Soon Sean was back with Monsieur Bonny buying electric secateurs in preparation for the pruning season. This automatic pruning apparatus could take your finger off in a second. I eyed them warily, relieved that he would be wielding them and not me.
  Sean had learnt the basics of pruning on the vines in our back garden in Dublin: now he had to prune 25,000 of them. Pruning is one of the most important jobs in the vineyard and physically demanding. Jamie spent the afternoon with Sean helping him get familiar with this new task.
  While Sean learnt the practical details of pruning I tried to get the plumber, the tall, dark and handsome Monsieur Lombere, to commit to a date for fitting the new shower and toilet into the broken bathroom in our house. I had been waiting for months for him to do the promised work. We had family arriving for Christmas and I was agitated. When I signed his formal devis for the work â a quotation that becomes binding on both parties once signed â I'd included the statement that the work had to be completed before the end of November, which was now a sniff away. The charming but unresponsive Monsieur Lombere was taking no heed. I explained my worries to Jamie when he came up from the vineyard, showing him the name of the plumber as I had written it down when a friend in the village gave me the number. Jamie cracked up. 'Mr Lambert!' he said, writing down the correct spelling. 'I'll call him for you. He's doing all the renovation work at our place.' I went red, feeling like the village idiot. Despite years of classes I still had no clue about French spelling and pronunciation.
  Jamie's powers of persuasion were epic. Within hours, Monsieur Lambert called to say Jean-Marc would start the bathroom on Monday. He arrived on cue: a muscular fellow with a clean-shaven head and an upbeat attitude that remained even when he had to look into the bowels of old toilets. I showed him the renovation target. The bathroom had bright multi-coloured mosaic tiles on the floor, pink-flowered tiles on the walls, a broken basin, a broken toilet and a black depression in the wall where a shower had once been. I asked him what the white box behind the broken toilet was.
  'It's a broyeur . A broyeur is a chopper that minces the waste into a smooth mixture so that it can travel down a small waste water pipe instead of a large sewage pipe.'
  I interrogated him about whether this was acceptable sanitary practice and he assured me it was. The only alternative was to rebuild the main wall of the house so we could replace the small pipe with a large sewage pipe. The wall was close to a metre thick and three hundred years old.
  'You will have to use a broyeur in your new bathroom,' he concluded. 'You can use this one, it works perfectly.'
  He flushed the broken toilet and I heard the signature chopping sound of the broyeur . I was horrified by the whole idea but reluctantly accepted his suggestion, although I had a feeling it would be trouble.
  A few days later, after the new floor tiles were installed by our tiler, Jean-Marc reappeared to fit the new bathroom. I had worked until past midnight the night before removing the old pink flower wall tiles from the shower area. I was adamant that such an unskilled job had to be done by me to save money. The tile removal took much longer than anticipated but there was no way I was going to be the reason for a delay in the work after the
Sean was getting neurotic about machinery. He smashed the back window of the tractor with the fertiliser spreader. Days later he drove under a tree and dislodged the exhaust. His number of visits to Monsieur Bonny in Coutures was travelling in the opposite direction to our bank balance. Soon Sean was back with Monsieur Bonny buying electric secateurs in preparation for the pruning season. This automatic pruning apparatus could take your finger off in a second. I eyed them warily, relieved that he would be wielding them and not me.
  Sean had learnt the basics of pruning on the vines in our back garden in Dublin: now he had to prune 25,000 of them. Pruning is one of the most important jobs in the vineyard and physically demanding. Jamie spent the afternoon with Sean helping him get familiar with this new task.
  While Sean learnt the practical details of pruning I tried to get the plumber, the tall, dark and handsome Monsieur Lombere, to commit to a date for fitting the new shower and toilet into the broken bathroom in our house. I had been waiting for months for him to do the promised work. We had family arriving for Christmas and I was agitated. When I signed his formal devis for the work â a quotation that becomes binding on both parties once signed â I'd included the statement that the work had to be completed before the end of November, which was now a sniff away. The charming but unresponsive Monsieur Lombere was taking no heed. I explained my worries to Jamie when he came up from the vineyard, showing him the name of the plumber as I had written it down when a friend in the village gave me the number. Jamie cracked up. 'Mr Lambert!' he said, writing down the correct spelling. 'I'll call him for you. He's doing all the renovation work at our place.' I went red, feeling like the village idiot. Despite years of classes I still had no clue about French spelling and pronunciation.
  Jamie's powers of persuasion were epic. Within hours, Monsieur Lambert called to say Jean-Marc would start the bathroom on Monday. He arrived on cue: a muscular fellow with a clean-shaven head and an upbeat attitude that remained even when he had to look into the bowels of old toilets. I showed him the renovation target. The bathroom had bright multi-coloured mosaic tiles on the floor, pink-flowered tiles on the walls, a broken basin, a broken toilet and a black depression in the wall where a shower had once been. I asked him what the white box behind the broken toilet was.
  'It's a broyeur . A broyeur is a chopper that minces the waste into a smooth mixture so that it can travel down a small waste water pipe instead of a large sewage pipe.'
  I interrogated him about whether this was acceptable sanitary practice and he assured me it was. The only alternative was to rebuild the main wall of the house so we could replace the small pipe with a large sewage pipe. The wall was close to a metre thick and three hundred years old.
  'You will have to use a broyeur in your new bathroom,' he concluded. 'You can use this one, it works perfectly.'
  He flushed the broken toilet and I heard the signature chopping sound of the broyeur . I was horrified by the whole idea but reluctantly accepted his suggestion, although I had a feeling it would be trouble.
  A few days later, after the new floor tiles were installed by our tiler, Jean-Marc reappeared to fit the new bathroom. I had worked until past midnight the night before removing the old pink flower wall tiles from the shower area. I was adamant that such an unskilled job had to be done by me to save money. The tile removal took much longer than anticipated but there was no way I was going to be the reason for a delay in the work after the
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