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Sunday, 11 September 2016

What's in a name?

Choosing names can be a mite tricky. What were we to call the farmhouse? It needed to have meaning, yet be pronounceable in French. Thus 'Le Farmhouse' just didn't work, whilst 'La Ferme' is a term of abuse.
Even worse, we decided that we needed names for each building.
The snooker room was first.

The obvious choice was 'Le Snook'. Easily pronounceable in seventeen languages, a 'snook' is an ancient French farming implement used for grimping mole droppings. Undeniably a useful thing to do, especially after an exhausting day flailing pastures, as farmers are wont to do.
The next to be named was the apartment.

As these are the guest rooms, it seemed logical to name it after an old English term for that little room in a pub that couples go to snuggle in. Smooching was also allowed.
The main house took more time to decide on. After proposing many different names such as 'the money pit', 'the retirement home', 'vet's end', 'the quarry' etc, we heard that the new owners of our old home in Caerphilly had turned our garden into a housing estate and done away with it's old name; Parc-y-lan. As it was also one of Papa's last wishes, this seemed like a no-brainer.

Parc-y-lan is Welsh for something like 'on the edge of the park'. It meant 'home' to us, and so it still does.
This left one final name. The old barn that we are renovating deserves it's own name. I bet you can't guess what we called it...

'Le Barn'.
Genius.

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