Lord, I've been feeling fed-up lately. 

Work seems to be a treadmill and I've had no time to do the daily walk that keeps me sane, the weather's been bloody awful, my computer is dying on its little rubber feet, I've got conjunctivitis and eye strain so I haven't been able to go swimming, my dog's got congestive heart failure and my cat's got thyroid cancer, the DH is feeling overwhelmed and depressed and on Friday I finally got sick.

I'd managed to avoid it all winter by avoiding ill people and obsessively washing my hands (with an auto-immune disease, I can't be too careful - I wear gloves when I shop and wash my hands before and after unpacking the shopping etc) but when I took the dog to the vet, the receptionist was full of cold and I think I must have picked it up from there. I hit my bed at 4.00pm Friday afternoon with the shivers, nausea and a blinding headache, and didn't get up till the next morning. 

Blurgh.

But heck, no wonder we are tired. We didn't get a holiday last year because of our cancer cat, who need dosing every day, and I think we are just feeling worn out. We haven't had a break since November 2011 and barely a day off either - we usually do a six-day week and often a seven-day week. I can't remember, I really can't, the last time I had any FUN. Just pure fun. And oh I am sick and tired of being COLD. Ack. I fucking hate winter. This is my 49th and every damn one of them seems to get harder. 

It didn't help that our last load of wood, from a new supplier, was hopelessly unseasoned and isn't giving out much heat, plus which it created so much tar we had to get the chimney swept mid-winter, which is unheard of. The bedroom temperature's been as low as 9 degrees (teach me to live in a medieval shitpile instead of a normal house like a normal person), the kitchen is about 10 and you can see your breath in there. Every day is a task of donning ski thermals and fleece layers asap and spending the day hunched against the cold, all of which is do-able when you're feeling well, but doesn't feel so do-able when you're unwell.   

Still, all is not lost. Yesterday I worked like a dog to get work out of the way, and today we finally - yay! - managed to get out to the Parc Floral de Haute Bretagne. I really wanted to take the dog to the sea, which he loves, because I don't know how long we've got him for, but he knows the park and I think it was enough for him right now. At least he seems to be coughing less on his new diruetics. 

Oh la. Let us be thankful for small mercies. My swimming mask has arrived, so I can now risk the pool again, thank heavens (I couldn't get a mask round here for love nor money - I was told they wouldn't be in stock before April - how the hell is a swimming mask a seasonal item?), and the Abufène the doc put me on in the hopes of fixing these hot flushes does, fingers crossed, seem to be working and I am finally getting 5-6 hours sleep a night, which feels miraculous after 3 or 3.5 hours had become the norm. 

And my new Macbook Pro is on its way and might just get here before this one dies. And the days are getting slightly longer, just a couple of minutes a day. My David Austin roses have turned up (this year, deep crimsons of Guinée, Etoile d'Hollande and Crimson Glory (Climbing), and even in the chopped-back Parc, the odd camellia and witch hazel were giving just a hint of promise. Oh, and the the new Lands' End Stadium Coat was the perfect garment for walking around in an icy wind - lightweight, waterproof and totally windproof.

OK: rant over, but finally, finally, are we seeing the end of winter? I hope so, because right now, I have really had enough. 

Has anyone noticed it's FREEZING?

Jeezy Creezy. Today it's mostly snowed but yesterday in the glacial wind the DH and I spent the day doing the delightful task of shopping in Mayenne, something marginally sweetened by the buffet at the Palais de Bonheur Chinese restaurant, but heck, what do you wear on days like this?

It was alright for him - he climbed into the usual ski thermals, topped with fleece layers and then his navy super-insulated parka from Land's End, and he's away. 

It's different for a girl. Given that my winter get-up at the moment is ski thermals, fleece layers and Ugg boots, and the past few nights I've been sleeping in our 9-degree bedroom in fleece PJs, an alpaca wrap and a massive cowl wrapped round my head, I thought it might be good to take the opportunity to look - you know - nice.

I shouldn't complain, I know. It's been a mild winter on the whole, for all that it's chucked it down almost every day and at least I'm not a blue tit trying to eat my body weight in fat balls every day, but having decided to be girly and wear a skirt for the first time in months, I found myself in the following: big thick knee-length mohair socks, fleece-lined tights from Japan, a turquoise knee-length wool sweater dress from Land's End, a long, thick jade knitted wool skirt from John Lewis, a thick primrose vintage cashmere cardigan, a blue vintage leather 1960s coat, blue corduroy bucket hat, magenta pashmina, vintage turquoise leather gloves, vintage black leather riding boots and fleece wellie socks. And I was just about warm enough. Just about. As long as I kept moving.

It's nice, said the DH, that you're wearing turquoise because of your eyes and your yellow cardi to match your hair. This was an accident, I had to admit - I'd just fancied something a bit brighter than my usual navy bomb-proof getup.

In to town we went. A Chinese meal, a wander round Noz (for me), where consumer goods go to die, and I get to rummage through the detritus that is Western civilisation, picking out must-haves like pickled peppers, travel deodorant and a chiffon scarf; then Lidl, since ours is closing down, dammit; then SuperU for the main shop; then Intersports for a fruitless search for a swimming mask (they won't be here till April, apparently). 

Home again home again, jiggity-jig, where the house was so cold I unpacked the shopping still in my coat and hat while the DH lit the woodburner and I then swapped the coat for a thigh-length fleece parka, as I could keep my head covered. I was wearing more bloody clothes indoors than I was outside! Even several hours after the fire had been put on, it was still cold. 

Walking round in the cold in 'posh' clothes is very taxing. Really, I would rather have been in my trekking gear, which is really designed to keep the cold out, and I seriously regretted - not for the first time - not getting my Land's End fleece-lined parka in a darker colour. Mine is screaming daffodil yellow - great for trekking, and for walking the dog down our narrow country lanes, but it makes you look a bit of a dick in town. 

I felt another purchase coming on and it didn't take me long to succumb. In theory, the last thing I need is another coat - I have some great winter warmers. But they are all wool or skin, not the kind of thing to stand up to the endless rain and filth and mud we have endured this winter. So welcome to my new coat, the Stadium Squall from Land's End. Not the most stylish rig in town, I grant you, but the waterproof outside, fleece lining, fleece-lined handwarmer pockets, button-down pocket flaps, fleece-lined hood and storm-flap pockets are persuasian enough, along with one crucial detail - it's machine-washable, which I'm certain will prove invaluable over time.

You can get this coat in a more stylish cut (see the purple version above), but mine (which I got in black, not aubergine) was £59 in the sale, as opposed to £140, so I am willing to forgo a little taste in favour of not breaking the bank, and since I want it primarily for practical reasons, I want to be absolutely sure it has the features I'm looking for.  

I can forgive Normandy everything on a morning like this. I've just got back from walking the dog in this first hard frost of the winter, and it was so gobsmackingly beautiful it took my breath away. 

The whole countryside looks like it's been dipped in sugar: every catkin, every withered leaf, every blade of grass (the photo at left was taken just after dawn). The fields were peppered with crows, waiting for the sun to thaw the maize left over from the harvest. My neighbour's willows were reflected in his lake, preternaturally blue and lined with ochre bullrushes. A solitary heron was hunting by the stream, and the dog and I seemed to be the only other creatures on the surface of the earth as the sun came blazing out and turned the whole world into a mirror.

I didn't see another person or sign of life, nor heard a sound until I reached my gate again after an hour of walking, when a solitary tractor appeared on the brow of the hill. Not even a single cow was in any of the fields - this temperature drop was forecast, and the farmers have taken the cattle in. 

The dog is always happiest on a frosty walk, but now that he is 12, I put a coat on him when it's below freezing. He looks very sweet in his scarlet Land's End fleece, which (other than the colour) matches my Squall Parka. No more perfect coat for dog-walking was ever invented, btw, with its fleece-lined handwarmer pockets and hood, drawstring waist, and screaming daffodil yellow colour that I hope will prevent me being mashed by a tractor. Luckily, no-one could tell this morning that I still had my polkadot pjs on under my layers of fleece.

Yesterday we had the 1000-litre fuel oil delivery, just in time for this freeze, so we actually woke up to a warm house, ye gods. Until now, the mornings have been a rush to get into my down dressing gown (Lands' End again - I should take out shares) and Uggs and get down to the living room to bang on the paraffin heater.

If we're frugal with the heating, running it for just two hours a day, the oil lasts a year, at a cost of just short of 1,000 euros (and right now, this office is 17.5 degrees, which seems to me stiflingly hot - about 16 would suit me better, as we're just not used to being this warm).  The wood will be, what - another 1,000 euros this year? For six cords. Plus maybe three lots of paraffin, and say the same of butane, and about 200 euros a month for electricity. No wonder we're broke when it costs over four grand just to heat the house to a moderate temperature, LOL, though of course that lot also includes cooking gas, hot water and lighting. 

Oh well, enough whingeing. Lunch is in the slow cooker (rabbit and lentil casserole), the birds have had their second feed of the day and I've put vegetable scraps out for the deer, so I'm now off for a bath before we get the wood in.

Wrap up warm, people.  

It's morning, and I've just been watching the BBC Breakfast programme about people who are suffering from a lack of heating oil this year.

I feel sorry for these people - I really do. It's scandalous the way the price of heating oil isn't regulated in the same way as mains gas, etc. But watching people being interviewed, complaining about how cold their houses are, I can't help but notice that not one of them is dressed properly. 

If you live in the countryside, you can't twat about in a cotton blouse and a t-shirt indoors, wittering like a townie - you have to tog up. That means Aran or Shetland sweaters, hats, thick wool trousers, Ugg boots.

We are so used to this way of dressing in this neck of the woods that we don't even think about it, but it is, after all, only the way we all dressed when we were kids, before central heating became ubiquitous. 30 years ago, people didn't expect their whole house to be warm in winter - you heated only the space you were IN, and you stayed in that space.

Right now, I'm not yet dressed, and that means: full-length silk nightie, cashmere cowlneck sweater, beanie (this is my actual sleeping attire - if I slept without a hat, the cold would wake me up). Add to that Ugg boots, full-length wrap woolmix cardi worn as a dressing gown, and a calf-length wool kimono.

This might seem like overkill if you live in town, but our living room temperature is 13 degrees right now, after three hours of the central heating being on (it will now go off until tomorrow). However, I'm warm as toast. 12-14 degrees is pretty much as good as it gets here and I don't think of it as cold indoors until it drops to about 10 degrees.

In case you're wondering, the DH hasn't had a cold in years, and I only get bronchitis in summer. On the downside, we do find shops, offices and hospitals appallingly hot, stuffy and airless.

Another thing I notice from the telly is people's apparent reliance on only one form of heating. But you can't live in the countryside and rely on supplies - they can be disrupted for all kinds of reasons. You also have to order well in advance - you can't leave deliveries till the last minute and it looks like many people have been caught out in this way in Britain this year, with the suppliers running around like blue-arsed flies trying to do a month's deliveries in a week.

Here, we have tough winter weather - icy winds and well-below-freezing temperatures for days or weeks at a time - and if you're not prepared, you're buggered. The power also goes out at the first opportunity because cables run above ground in France. We therefore have a plentiful supply of candles and paraffin lamps, lots of bottled water (no electricity means no pump for our well) and four forms of heating: oil-fired central heating (which we use for just a few hours in the morning); electric blow heaters in the bedroom and office; a butane portable heater in the kitchen, and woodburners in the kitchen and living room. We also tried a fifth form - paraffin heating - but found it too smelly, and these days, we also have two types of wood fuel - logs and densified wood - so that we can ensure supply at any time of year.

Country people in England are learning the hard way this year how quickly everything can grind to a halt, as are many in town - it is only when the weather really bites that you become aware of how precariously we all cling to the illusion of civilisation.