The town of Lagrasse, in the Aude, is both beautiful and charming, two properties which do not always go together. Coming upon it from the west at mid-day, the road leads across an old stone bridge that traverses the river, blue under the azure sky, and those who pause to look could think that the town was an organic thing, grown from the earth, its stones being the same colour as the dry soil about.
On the banks of the river, a few mangy dogs toy with something rotting dragged from the water, worrying at the decaying clothes with their yellowed teeth.
In summer, the old stone walls lining the cobbled streets of the vieille ville bring welcome shade, and from the cool shadowed courtyards hidden behind comes the innocent laughter of children as they play at "pelting the tourist with dead rats". Be grateful that they're not playing the version that involves roof tiles; fatalities have been known to occur, although they're usually hushed up.
It also has a monstrous civic carbuncle, the memorial to the "Great" War (1914-1918, as if we haven't managed to do better since then, the old farts are always on about how it was so much better back then well I've got news for them) and quite frankly it needs a caption at the very least.
The poor guy seems to be in some pain, I would say a bad case of heart-burn only he's clutching the wrong side of his chest, and the lady behind him seems rather totally unconcerned: maybe she's the one wot done it, I don't know. Could be she stuck him with the flag-pole while he wasn't looking.
Whatever, I am inviting submissions for captions, the lucky winner to get a year's free subscription to this blog. Runner-up gets two years, third-place gets to look at Riddled for the rest of their natural lives.
To your word-processors, now!
I will not enter for fear of winning 3rd Prize.
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