Hegs

I agree with teamed up, a simulation is safer, or buy one of the many magazines with all the details and tables in such as "vos impots". There are all sorts of allowances and deductions that are completely unlikely the UK and quite widely used (such as an up to 30% reduction on declared income if you are a regular employee...).

Alexa is quite useful if you don't know anything about a website. It can give you traffic details, contact details for the owner etc. http://www.alexa.com/data/details/?url=holidayswanted.com You can probably draw your own conclusions above, but one more point: as a user/holidaymaker I am very reluctant to put in my email address to an unknown website, and so are many other people.

I've seen people do just that, I don't think you need a license so long as kayaking is allowed at the place. However I think there are occasions when you are supposed to have third party liability insurance - check with www.ffck.org

I will recommend OnSpeed too, I have also renewed and run it on two PCs. I have a single channel ISDN connection which is where OnSpeed works best as there is no default compression on ISDN connections unlike ordinary modems. Will, you can disable image compression in OnSpeed and still benefit from HTML, Flash and email compression.

Nightie, I think what you are referring to is ISDN, (or RNIS in French). If you can't get ADSL, then ISDN is the next best chance to get decent internet access, unless you live in one of the departments that has WiMax wireless access (see http://www.altitudetelecom.com/wimax.asp ) The way ISDN works is that your single telephone line is split into two "channels", each giving a *guaranteed* 64 kb/s. By comparison, an ordinary modem on an ordinary line (POTS/RTC in French) gives you an absolute theoretical maximum of 56kb/s, but that is on a good day with the wind in the right direction. Base ADSL gives you 512 kb/s. You can use one channel for voice, and one for data. You can also "bond" the two lines together to give you 128 kb/s, but that is dependent on your ISP (try www.netbysky.com) and generally you will pay twice the subscription to do that. Also you need a special modem for ISDN anyway. And FT will probably give you grief, but they are supposed to be required to install it anywhere in France unless you really are up a mountain.

>As for terrorism, surely we all live with this every day when we use public >transport,ferries,planes,the Channel Tunnel,anywhere that could be used to cause mayhem >and murder and we can't let it rule our lives as it would mean the terrorists have won. Brave words are all well and good, but it is a different matter to deal every day with the *level* of risk that ordinary London commuters do (and yes I did it for a couple of years after 9/11). It is only a matter of time before these maniacs use chemical or biological weapons and the dead will be numbered in tens or hundreds of thousands. It would only be natural if many commuters are asking themselves whether it is all worth it. The fact that people CAN live under constant threat of terrorist attack doesn't mean that they would not change that, even for a less comfortable life, if they were able.

Frankly I avoid Ryanair like the plague and fly from Toulouse.... but there was an article in La Depeche a week or so back. It talked about Liverpool being a cert, but the choice for the next line was between Eindhoven (NL) or Edinburgh. Eindhoven was less likely, can't remember the reasons. Ryanair do fly to Dublin from Edinburgh so they do have a prescence.

Another vote for Mousti-kit, I've done a couple in the last week. To cut down to size all you need is a hacksaw. Only point I would mention is that I found I had to make them a couple of mm smaller than the marking on the box. I also bought one of the other make (sorry can't remember the name) but it seemed to be missing bits and making reference to optional packs. Avoid.

The correct way to give a pill to a cat is called a "sweepie bullet" named after the cat who is currently eating my house down and has kept many a vet in business over the last 15 years. She would have died several years ago without this technique: Take one pill Smear liberally in butter or good margerine Wrap in thin Serrano or Palma ham Smear outside in butter... Feed to greedy oversized ill moggy

TU, you had ME worried so I dug out my "vos impots" 2005 tables and looked it up. For me the savings is EUR 2121 according to them. It does vary with income, as the net effect of the allowance is to remove a slice of the earnings from the highest rate of tax that you pay. But it is the same for everyone in the same tax band and 2121 should be the maximum saving. For someone earning 20000 net imposable it is "only" about a EUR 600 saving a year. 40000 is EUR 1300 etc.

Deby, I was in this same field 10 years ago. The British professors eat packed lunches every day and wore clothes that were either from charity shops or 10 year old M&S stuff. One of my profs was promoted after 30 years work, a renowned expert in his field, to the absolutely highest grade in the university, and was earning 44K... I left and immediately got a job paying double than the research assistants who were teaching me earnt... within three years at age 28 I had surpassed what my prof was earning. This is not even mentioning how poor us research students were... There is no money in the academic science game, at least not in the UK.

Richard, I cycled about half of Saturdays route in reverse from Couiza to Narbonne a month ago, and did about 15kms extra each end to my house and to Gruissan... wow what an experience, the range of countrysides, the smells, the towns, gorges, rocks, castles crossing the Corbieres, the sea, descending into Narbonne... I can't imagine there is a more varied area of France with so many varied landscapes in such a small area as the Aude! I will be glued to the TV Saturday then go watch the real thing in the Ariege Sunday!

Depends on what you mean by benefits. There is a benefit if you pay income tax, in that the child gives an additional half a part income tax allowance. It's worth a good deal, from memory up to about 2000 EUR. I can check if you need the exact figure.

I'll try and give some answer to get things started. We buy wood by the "pile" which is 4 cubic meters (I think) or thereabouts. The other measurements are the "cord" which is 1 cubic meter, and the cord which is 3 or 4 depending on where you are apparently. The cost per pile is 150 E in 1 meter lengths or 190 E in 50 cm lengths for "good" stuff, which is generally a mix of oak and ash. Age is supposed to be 2 or 3 years "pret a bruler" depending on who you talk to, some people say 3 years is too dry and burns too quickly. The length you should go for is what will comfortably fit in the stove, given that your woodman will not get every log right! Splitting is always something we've done ourselves, you need a good ax, ours is one of those yellow plastic ones as the wood ones were breaking at the rate of two a winter. Kind of fun and Where we live at any rate, buying wood is a dark art done in cash, and frankly until you've done it a couple of times you really won't know whether you are being "done". Even if you ask for the right stuff, the guy will turn up with it and it takes experience to be able to tell if the wood is good or not - so I would ask your mayor or someone else locally for a recommendation. For the amount you will use, last year was very harsh and we used 5 pile across three stoves (in two houses), which were going most of the time for the very harsh period. The year before that we got by with three pile. But it will depend on how big and well insulated the house is, whether you are in there all day, how efficient the stove is so it is hard to make a judgement call. I'd advise against down low while you sleep *all* the time, as I understand it, it can fowl the chimney and increase the risk of a fire. Make sure your chimney is swept obviously, and if you do burn overnight make sure you have a mid season sweep.

Thanks Miki!

Did you guys ever get this up and running? I'm planning a long cycle trip and would like to know what points are possible for an overnight stay. Cheers!

[quote]It's at times like this that I thank God we are now out of London. Had we still been there my husband would have dropped me off less than ten minutes walk from two of the Underground bombs and about ...[/quote] Coco, I felt the same - Russell Square being the center of my universe in London when I worked there. Though I worked happily in central London through the later IRA period, post 9/11 the fear of something like this, or on the mainline railway back home, was one of the reason for wanting out. I'm thankful that, bad as this is, the nightmare scenario of a chemical, biological or nuclear attack killing hundreds of thousands hasn't yet happened. I fear that is only a matter of time as I can't see what will stop them in the long term. >What exactly do these people want, apart from the total destruction of the West. And then where will they be??? They want to die in combat for Islam, so they go straight to heaven with 72 virgins. So they don't care.

If you haven't heard, at least 6 bombs have gone off in central London this morning, on the tube and buses. Please check the news for the latest information.

Are there still plans for a Eurostar terminal in Stratford? In which case the Parisians should soon realize will be able to get to the stadium quicker than most west Londoners, which might help their mood a little ;-)

Do what I do, give it to the mosquitoes instead;-)

>I know nothing about Linux other than often reading that it is much more suitable for computer gurus than those of us >who just like to switch on and go. I agree completely - and I write software running under Linux for a living and have some clusters of Linux machines at work which I use every day. Linux frustrates the hell out of me, there is no way I would have it on my personal machine. I was suggesting Linux as a way of seeing what the drawbacks of a non-Windows machine could be, without spending serious $. Also missing are a lot of the toolbars and Internet Explorer plugins a lot of people have.

I think the assumption that a Mac will be trouble free is false - no computer is. I have to reboot my Apple iPod, and that doesn't really do anything! As others have said generally the problems with XP come from either ISP software, anti-virus software, spyware, bad drivers (particularly video drivers) or - and this is very possible with blue screens - hardware problems. You should note the details on the blue screen before taking it to an engineer so he can see. Macs tend to do better because there is a lot less custom software, less spyware and the hardware is defined by Apple so many fewer driver issues. Another option I have yet to see mentioned that is much cheaper than buying a Mac is to install Linux on your existing machine. You can generally get the install CDs on magazines for 10 euros, and you will be able to try it without wiping the existing Windows install ("dual-boot"). It will solve many of your problems and will let you see how you cope with some of the limitations of not running Windows (missing applications, unreadable file types etc).

Tresco: >It doesn't equate with being happy or unhappy at all. What on earth are you on about???? I find the idea of someone reading and posting obsessively on a forum for their "home country" they left 20 years ago incredibly sad. Maybe that is just me. >You seem to have been here a fair while yourself Hegs, and visit often enough to take note of and make judgements on the pattern >and style of 'old timers' posts to I read a fair amount more now the "good old days" are gone and I can keep up. I hardly ever post unless it is a quick answer or correction to a question I know the answer to, but life is too short and I usually regret getting dragged into the same old arguments like this one. Miki: >[what] did they actually get wrong The usual stuff: requirements for a CdS, carte vitale, passing a driving test, having a baby, income tax levels. The reasons have tended to been assuming it's done the same way in every department, assuming that the "newby" doesn't speak French, assuming that everyone is self employed, in the tourist industry somehow, or as TU says the information just being way out of date since when you had to do it, or relying on what their French neighbors say being gospel. My French neighbors tend to talk rot too! >Certainly I was left in no uncertain terms after asking that a few things I wanted to do would be practically impossible, in practise they >were actually pretty easy Income tax form, and passing the French driving test would be the two examples. >I actually fathomed it out really, as to why you quoted it ? Yes that was sloppy and I was unclear. It was a response to Patf's: > ps connection to "the old days"- why do people continue to come to live in France after all the off-putting messages on the forum? The other forum seems to be doing pretty well, but a whole load of other people have gone down the same path in blissful ignorance of this or any other forum, and seem in general to be doing OK as far as I can see. Don't get me wrong this place is useful but it is in no way a replacement for real life.

Vraititi, I am not so sure the good old days were so good. I've been a member for probably 4 years, maybe more, a French homeowner or in progress for 3 and a full-time French resident and employee for 2. Certainly this forum used to be the only game in town and the others were like ghost towns. I don't know if you ever travel by bus on pension day in the UK or have seen the "yorkshiremen" Monty Python sketch where they discuss how hard life was in the old days. To me this forum was like a cross between the two. It was only after a while people started to realize the small group of people who spent all day online complaining about how hard life was in France, seemed to have a fairly easy life compared to my working life in the UK (seeing as they could afford to spend all day online answering posts!), and that a lot (not all, but a lot) of information given out by them was absolute c-r-a-p. Certainly I was left in no uncertain terms after asking that a few things I wanted to do would be practically impossible, in practise they were actually pretty easy. At the end of the day, with forums like these, the people happiest with their move to France are going to drift off because they really have no further need - if indeed they ever went online here in the first place - and par contre the longest serving forum members will inevitable be those who are still unhappy and those who just have never settled. I've noticed a few of the old timers are being more choosy in how often they post and what arguments they pick rather than all the time and everything. That's a welcome change but it might still be too late. Lastly, this place just isn't that important anyway. In my case very few of the English I know living here read this forum, let alone post. Even if it were the largest, at my guess less than 5% even take a look here.

>Someone told me they are not only leaving for France, of course there is Spain, but also Bulgaria, etc. as long as they can "get out". Remember the US, Canada, New Zealand, Australia too. From memory France is actually a fair way down the list in terms of actual numbers. >TU, you have been here a while and like me still can't quite grasp this present exodus, at least not the extent of it. It's not rocket science. This is quite an interesting read on why people want to leave: http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0FQP/is_4699_133/ai_n6156974 "As to why they are leaving, 30 per cent mention work but 51 per cent give "other" reasons. These are not hard to find. A survey in Emigrate magazine found that roughly three-quarters of potential emigrants think quality of life in Britain is deteriorating. The YouGov poll cited crime, council taxes, congested roads, lack of space. Eighty-five per cent thought Britain was "grinding to a halt". ICM added a few more reasons to be miserable: bad weather, long working hours, regional unemployment, high house prices." The other side of the coin is the economic and structural factors that make emigration easier these days: high equity levels in the UK, EU single market, remote working, the internet, cheap phone calls, cheap flights, Eurostar, general increase in mobility especially in young europeans. Personally I think the house price issue is driving this a lot more than realized from both the push and the pull. What are the young people completely priced out of buying any sort of home, full stop, in 91% of towns in the UK going to do when they want to settle down and have a family? Until the UK gives them some kind of hope, they are going to be thinking of emigrating.