Island Life by David Slack

My doctor upped my dose of life-saving heart drugs when I told him we would be in the southwest of France for six weeks. He also gave me the address of a place to get a haircut. "They'll make a real fuss of you," he said, jotting down the address in perfectly legible handwriting. Say what you like about the Cartwright inquiry, I do like the frank exchange between doctor and patient you get in the modern era. My one even likes to do a bit of cussing from time to time.

Our holiday home set us in the heart of Gascony. The Gascons were fattening geese and duck and grapes long before anyone was fretting about cholesterol, and the French still scoff down the foie gras and the confit de canard and draw your attenion to the reassuring statistics of the French paradox.

We think perhaps the secret to the paradox might be portion control.

Night after night, we dined on their wonderful food and the duck carcasses mounted. I did not do a lipid test, so I can't tell you what adverse consequences I may have brought upon myself. I can tell you that the foie gras, even the one with armagnac, still seemed a bit much. Thank you, but no.

Every French market is a delight. We brought home apples and grapes and artisan bread and dried ham and sausages and most memorably of all, the duck dishes from la ferme d'Enjacquet; proprietors: Patrick et Maguy Bécoye. Such choices. Albondegas - a form of spanish meatball; daube of canard; choux farci; duck breasts as big as you'll find on your turkey this christmas; pure duck sausages; 99 ways to eat a canard. We also ate elsewhere and well, but this was truly our kitchen away from home for six weeks. If you find yourself in the southwest of France, look in the markets for a friendly, smiling, Spanish-looking woman with trays full of duck. Or go to her website.

We became friends. "Would you like to come to see the farm," she asked. Well, of course we would. Down the road we went, from St Lary, through Barrane and on to St-Medard, second road on the right after the cafe. We found two houses, a large shed at the rear, some horses grazing and a chill in the November afternoon. Saturday had begun at minus 8. Today was a toasty 4 above, but already droppping.

We sat down to coffee and talked about the farming life in France. They like the countryside. They have had their taste of the city and this is their preference, but none of their grown children have had the same interest, and they work in town.

We finished our coffee and went out to see some ducks. These are not the slight things that drop out of the sky into New Zealand dams on the first Saturday in May. These are birds as big as geese, brought in at a few weeks old and fattened on maize, for your table. Skip your eyes forward now if you are either vegetarian or the kind of carnivore who likes to overlook any bloodshed that precedes the arrival of your dinner. In the space of a just a few thousand square metres, a few hundred birds at a time are held here, prepared for the table and then quickly and humanely stunned, killed, plucked, eviscerated, chilled, cut, packaged and prepared for sale either as raw pieces or cooked items of the type we carted home from the Auch market twice each week. The facilities are efficient, compact, gleaming. The ducks look content, if a little over-alert, necks rising and falling like waves of corn as you walk by. For foie gras, there is the force feeding, which is to say: each gets a hose full of maize offered to them which they gladly chug down. Patrick has a kind of milking stool at which he will sit for two and a half hours each day, working his way one by one through the flock. Mary-Margaret was wide-eyed. She told us later that she felt a bit bad when she heard the ripping sound of the poor ducky as the pieces were being cut up but, trouper that she is, she said not a word at the time.

This is value-added farming, to be sure. Each week, 200 ducks go out the door, many worth substantially more euros per kilogram than a bare carcass might fetch. The Becoyes take great pride in the quality of their ducks and their produce, and deservedly so. Inevitably, the usual rules of modern agriculture apply. If you have a big enough operation, you'll be doing well, and able to show a profit, even at the tight margins the hypermarkets chains will be trying to squeeze. But if you're not big enough, you'll have it all against you.

You just hope that it remains viable for the people who are doing it well.

The hairdressing business, by contrast, remains wide open for the small enterprise. Down we go, one sunny morning, towards the Pyrenees, in search of snow and a haircut. Bagneres de Luchon is a ski resort town. Steep alpine roofs, a long row of hotels, friendly cafes, pretty trees. You can drive up the hill to the south of the town, and in fewer than five minutes, rise 2000 metres, hit snow and the Spanish border. Naturally, you biff snowballs while you wait for Coiffure Evelyn to reopen after lunch. Yes, they can offer a cut in ten minutes' time. I explain that my doctor in New Zealand has prescribed this. Which one was he? I offer a few details. "Oh," they say, "the Australians who were here for the bicycling." Six, sex, sux. None of those distinctions in pronunciation are distinguishable to people who speak mostly in southern French. My doctor was right, though; they did make a fuss. I also got possibly the briskest haircut I have had in some time. This may be because in Takapuna I get very careful attention from Monique who gamely does her best to arrange a thinning pate to its most flattering advantage. I came out of Coiffure Evelyn looking pretty bare on top.

Thanks to the previously mentioned server crash, I have also ended up a little thinner all over, notwithstanding all the food. By remaining well, I have not yet been able to fill my doctor's other prescription. "Take advantage of the French medical system. It's wonderful."

Poor Mary-Margaret, however, was able this weekend to satisfy the requirements thanks to a wave of gastroenteritis which has apparently been washing around the town of St Valery on the Somme, which has been our home for the past few days. We started with the chemist who looked at our pale, trembling, little girl and suggested we go to the doctor just down the street. We established, by degrees, that we were in fact bound for the town hospital, which has two huge cranes currently building a new facility. Inevitably, the existing facilities can become hard to find while such work is going on, but before long we were being greeted by an amiable, competent doctor of about our own age, with a bandage on his right hand. I am forever shaking hands too vigorously. It was to his credit that he appeared not to bear a grudge.

He diagnosed gastroenteritis, prescribed flat coca cola, anti nausea tablets and a diarrhoea treatment, not just for the little one, but the adults as well. Just in case. It was all efficiency, scarcely any paper work, and he was quickly done, taking time to chat briefly about our holiday. I told him our doctor had prescribed a visit to the medical system that was the envy of the world. "Indeed it is," he said, "but it's terribly expensive." Our bill was 22 Euro. What he meant was that it's terribly expensive for the French state, and that's true.

As you might imagine, the French have made much of the Michael Moore film, but not entirely in terms that endorse his assessment. Yes, the system is better than the American one, but you will hear misgivings expressed in similar terms to those of the doctor - it's terribly expensive. France is reportedly spending something north of half its GDP on debt servicing. You look for savings wherever you can.The French/ American comparison is most telling when you line up the efficacy of the two systems. This, of course, is a measurement which can be enormously problematic. The numbers do seem to favour the French in the few reports I've seen. The recurring theme seems to be that the US spends more, but gets less for its money. You may have seen different ones. Do feel free to compare them.

Don't forget to factor in the consumption of duck fat.

So farewell, then
John Howard.

Thrown overboard
by the people of
the good ship
Australia.

I thought you might
end up wading
into the surf in your
track suit
and never coming
back but

I knew you would
never get
taken out by a
stingray.

You always looked
too safe around
dangerous pricks.

I was at the third chapter of The God Delusion when the server crashed yet again, with, yet again, extreme prejudice.

Loyal readers will be aware that the last time this happened, the fate of my business was in the hands of a data recovery team in Dallas. Loyal readers may also recall in my telling of the last story that I took steps to ensure that such a thing should never happen again. On my technology slot on Radio Live I proselytised about the necessity of safety nets and backups. I meant every word, but I also reposed undue trust in other people to ensure that such things were being done. If you want to be sure it's being done correctly, do it yourself. Our holiday in France was interrupted for the worst part of three weeks as I slowly put the pieces back together and waited once more for hopeful news from Dallas. It was a very long time in coming.

For the past six weeks we have been living in truly remarkable surroundings. Our home has been a stone guard house in a 13th century fort, sitting on a hill in the fields of Gascony. We are here because last Christmas I went to see The Checks play a homecoming show at the Masonic and got to chatting over a beer about holiday plans. I learned that Ed Knowles' dad's friend has a place in the South of France. Voila, and merci David Knowles and Cam Calder.

It's a faithfully restored stone building with exposed beams, windows that taper to a narrow slit through which one can fire arrows and defend oneself, one's honour, one's wife, one's family, one's lord and master and one's cattle. It also has piping hot water, all modern appliances, beautifully decorated and spacious rooms, and enormous swords above a fireplace large enough to accommodate a small bullock on a spit. It will not, however, have internet or telephone facilities until next month.

There is a hotel twenty minutes down the road with high speed internet. For the better part of three French autumn weeks I have been a semi-permanent guest toiling up to twenty hours a day here without a permit. Even if you're entitled to work, you're really supposed to limit yourself to 35 a week, although of course Nicholas Sarkozy aims to change that. I can promise more to come on such things and many others, now that, I trust, regular posting has resumed. I actually resolved the problem about a week ago, but the experience was such a sour one that each time I've sat down to write about it I have lost the will.

Stupid, stupid, stupid. I have rolled through much of my life with a relatively cavalier outlook and there has been little cost. Only occasionally have the wheels come off, and then not for long. This most recent experience has chastened me. I'm getting too old to live with quite so much insouciance.

Dinner began with a plate of assorted hams, salamis and sausages of the French southwest. To follow, succulent rich slabs of duck, and to their side, potato drenched in roquefort. After that, more cheese, concluding with an apple tart and God Defend New Zealand in the adjoining bar. Even a fine French country restaurant brings forward its opening hour on the night of France's encounter with Les Blacks.

We arrived in the middle of the afternoon in a little village a few miles down the road from the first great piece of 21st century architecture.

"Anglais?" asked the young guy with broad forward's shoulders as he showed us up the stairs to our room. "La Nouvelle Zeland," we told him. Sometimes if you throw your dog an especially tasty bone, he will give you a growl of pleasure that sounds almost as though he is laughing. Ahead of us on the stairs we heard something of the same thing. In my fractured French we exchanged predictions and I established that toute la ville would be in the bar for the big match.

Come 9.00 pm, and indeed they are. Mary-Margaret goes upstairs to fetch her black t-shirt, and I offer the light-hearted rivalry at the bar. The haka begins and the crowd both admires it and laughs in delight at the responses of their players, particularly Chabal. Your team is always going to be more formidable if you have Marcus Lush in your starting fifteen.

Karren and M-M return and we take our seats in the New Zealand section, numbering three in total. I get the drinks in. A beer for me, Orangina for the women. The crowd of fifty or so is enjoying pastis, Heineken, trays of fine French pastries and the right (to expire in the new year) to smoke in a bar freely and at will. It's a jubilant mood as we begin, but by 13 nil, they're a little glum, and I am making the polite and generous remarks you offer when your team is looking pretty good.

The rest you know. With each French point, the proprietors plied Mary-Margaret with more implements of cheer-leading: a whistle, a giant hand, a cap, a ball, sundry implements of noise making. The locals were also offered whistles, and as the margin narrowed, the noise grew. As the situation grew progressively more dire, I began to chuckle, which perturbed Mary-Margaret greatly. I hauled her onto my knee and gave her a potted history of my jaundiced view of our country's consuming obsession with what is, when it's all said and done, a game. I promised to stop laughing; she assured me she understood.

At 79 minutes, I switched my cellphone to video camera and held it up. The internet here isn't up to YouTube transfers, so let me describe the clip. In it, you can see the crowd's unalloyed delight. You can see the barman (the one who showed us to our room) proffering me a glass. What it doesn't capture is the guy who brings over a serviette for me to dab away a manly tear should that become necessary; the woman in the French team jersey bringing me a drink; the proprietor hauling a rugby jersey off a head of antlers and presenting it to me with a flourish. The bar applauded as I pulled it on and offered them a "salut". I then struggled , in a halting conversation to understand what the proprietor's partner was telling me, namely that they would like me to give them a haka. I explained that there were half a dozen reasons why this would be a wrong idea, and enumerated them: disrespectful, not entirely honest on my part, the general lack of effect when such a special thing is performed by an unco- type like myself, and so on. I didn't tell Mary-Margaret that this was the topic of our discussion, and perhaps I should have . She could have done a blistering job.

I then played the video to various happy Frenchmen and explained to them that there would not be a bar in New Zealand that day in which I could have captured such footage.

Something about that 21st century architecture, though. If you want something to make you proud of your country, perhaps, as the saying goes, you need to build a bridge.

If you don't own a car registered in France, it will probably not vex you to learn that 30 million of that nation's citizens will have to get themselves a new set of number plates within the next year or so. Pardon me if I have some of that wrong. I watch the evening news these days with a different perspective, namely that of one who is scrambling to keep up.

I watched that item with particular interest because technically we own a two-week old Renault Clio. I would call it a shopping basket car if I hadn't spent the last fortnight doing high speeds down 130 kph autoroutes. Those things can go. I say 'technically' in the sense that if I put a big end through the block, I pay for it. If I back into a truck, and walk away in one piece, I - supported by the insurance company - pay for it. Thanks to the boundless imaginative powers of the car leasing people, when we return to Paris at the end of November and hand over the keys, ownership and liability is transferred and no fiscal adjustment is necessary. Or something like that. Ask Karren.

We have been in a freewheeling mode for the past fortnight. When you're in your twenties and single, rolling into a town and finding a hotel and an interesting looking bar is a large part of the charm. I know a man who posts regularly on this site who is a year or two older than me and still finds great pleasure in doing just that. Once we're not responsible for an eight year old, Karren and I might enjoy doing things that way again, but for now, that strategy has less charm and more grind to it. We started with a relaxed attitude. We picked up the car in Paris early in the afternoon. After the obligatory half hour of making sense of road signs, and letting your wide-eyed daughter see how Dad deploys the F word when he really means it, we dropped into the groove and set our sights on Chartres. Wait until you see the Cathedral, said Karren. The fields were golden in the late afternoon light, and the skies were blue.

Once, heading south, we started looking for a hotel around Waitomo. We didn't find one until Wanganui, although we did pass up a chance in Raetihi where the hotel billboard offered nothing so sophisticated as Sky TV or spa baths, but simply "clean sheets".

Chartres was hosting a festival. There was no room at the inn. Nor was there room at the next town or the one after that. We found a Raetihi with clean sheets about an hour down the road, but decided to punt for a good night's sleep on beds with still-functioning mattresses in a bigger town. As night fell we reached Orleans, which was also hosting a festival. In the time it takes for one client to phone in their cancellation a window opened and we were in, but chastened. You don't want to make an eight year old sleep in a car.

For the past two weeks we have been getting into town early, and finding a decent place to sleep, ideally with wifi. We have been in charming old hotels, we have been in modern and substantially less charming but more cyber-enabled rooms.

We have been on the run. Most of our time from now on will be spent in apartments and gites, but we had allowed some space for going wherever we felt inclined to drive. The problem with such a banquet is that you need to remind yourself how much room you have on your plate. On the run: down the Loire valley admiring chateaux and trying to work out, in response to Mary-Margaret's questions, whether Francois I was good or bad or both; standing in the room where Leonardo da Vinci died, and thinking how hopelessly meagre most of us all are by comparison; on to the Massif Central, into Clermont Ferrand and getting stranded looking for a nice place for dinner down a one way street with a mosque at its end, and waiting until the faithful had all driven in and parked their cars; on to Lyon and its inexplicable Peripherique. A freaking hour it took us to find our way in. I needed to go for a run almost immediately. Fittingly the iPod offered Sister Ray. Man, that motorway system. Talk about couldn't hit it sideways. Daddy said the F word again. On to Haut-Provence and Sisteron to stand at dusk at the top of the fort that might have barred Napoleon's return in 1814, but did not, and down to our hotel just along from the one bearing a plaque: Napoleon dined here in 1814; down into Provence and on to the Cote d'Azur where a month of perfect late summer weather got blown away by the Mistral.

Let me be measured in my criticism. Driving in that benighted corner of France is the living end. You crawl from light to light. You ask a passing old lady for directions because you have found that even with your strangled pronunciation, the French have been admirably willing to help you. Your luck has run out at Cagnes sur Mer. A look of disgust and exasperation fills her face as she makes to say something then thinks better of it and waves her hand dismissively and walks on. Here is my assessment of the people there: their home is Vegas with a waterfront and a tax haven. They have an undue concentration of old rich people. It is as ghastly and unreal as I recall Orakei to be when I lived there twenty years ago. The concentration of wealth brings chancers, criminals and unlovely parasites. Security signs and gated communities are everywhere. People look wary and sour. Oh, you may say, you're generalising. Not everyone in Cagnes sur Mer can be like that, to which I say: you're right. I'm not making a generalisation about Cagnes sur Mer. I'm making it about the Cote d'Azur. That's what we tourists do.

Now we're back in France, in an apartment attached to a stone-walled house in Provence. We are surrounded by olive groves, parched earth, and sitting beneath clear blue skies. Today I wore jandals, so French have I become. It is idyllic, and we have wifi. Occasionally you get a work related email from home that makes you roll your eyes and say I came here to get away from this shit, but essentially it's bliss.