About midday I walked into town. It only takes about 15 minutes. It’s a lovely place. If I recommend anywhere to anyone I think this would be the place. It’s a pretty town with a long central high street with loads of bars and cafes along the entire length. Light music is played from small speakers up and down the high street (In Foix they played rock music!!). The only downside for me is there are too many tourists, which also means there are too many rubbish gift shops and the prices are quite high. Mountain biking is the main summer activity testified to by the number of bike hire shops on the high street. Paragliding and actual real gliding (in a glider!!!) are also very common. If you look up at any point in the day you’re bound to see something of this (or down, if you happen to be on the peaks).
The town is nestled in a very steep mountain valley; huge mountains on either side are covered in trees and brightly lit by the sun. The town itself is at about 900m and the immediate peaks on either side rise to about 2200m. Behind those are even higher peaks rising to well over 3000m, well above the line at which trees stop growing and permanently capped in snow even in the middle of summer.
My ‘emplacmant’ in the campsite
I wasn’t terribly hungry but thought that it might make me feel better. I went for the gourmet salad. I felt terrible afterwards. Now nauseous too! I tried to settle the nausea with a small beer, but that made it worse. Maybe I didn’t use enough beer? I couldn’t risk it... I hobbled off home feeling like I was about to puke. I didn’t.
I could have picked up a bug. Given the number of flies walking around on the table when I’m preparing food, on my cup rim when I’m drinking tea, not to mention the number of ‘mostiques’ that have gorged themselves on me when I’ve been sleeping, it’s surprising this is only the first time.
Mostiques
That night as I was sleeping, I had my ear plugs in, so I couldn’t hear my neighbours whispering sweet love gibberish in each others ears. However it also meant I couldn’t hear the high pitched wine of a whole army of mostiques that had amassed on the frontier to my kingdom. I must have had a temperature as I haven’t yet been bitten 12 times in one night!
I woke up about 2am itching like crazy. There were two really fat mostiques on the bedroom ceiling. They were so fat with blood that they probably couldn’t fly even if their life depended on it. And now.... it most definitely did! As the shadow of my big fat thumb grew around them, they could barely manage to cling on to the roof. The roof that will always bear two slight stains... of my blood!
Evolution
I like to co-exist where possible with my fellow creatures of the universe, because I believe that peaceful co-existence is the sign of true evolutionary development... not just technical development, which is a much narrower concept. Neither do I believe that human development is the pinnacle evolution within the universe. I’m sure that any truly advanced society will either put aside its greedy aggressive ways or destroy itself before it has a chance to colonise the cosmos. And rightly so... as I believe we are about to demonstrate! Now if I’m wrong, and aggressive species can survive then maybe there is a big alien thumb shadow approaching us right now. Instinctively though I don’t feel this to be the case. Now mosquitoes and flies I make an exception for. They spread germs and make me ill. I wouldn’t want to eradicate their species because they are all a part of the delicate balance of nature, upon which we all depend, but if I find one inside my kingdom... he gets the thumb!
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