HoneySuckleDreams

the plasma i bought in the UK 4 yrs ago works ok here. We have a french friend who has always poo-pooed (!) us buying cars in the UK...simple economics we keep saying, £1000 in the uk €4500 over here.  He's done a U turn and just bought a big motorbike from the UK and is driving up to get it this weekend. Even with the drive/hire of a van etc, it's still less than half of what he would have to pay here. I don't think the french will do their tesco runs up into the UK but for certain big capital outlays it is worth them doing it.

no 3 son (CM1) has just informed us that his teacher is on strike on the 20th. No. 1 and 2 sons at college have no idea....no change there then!  

it's not just pensions. I work short term contracts (mainly in the UK) and get a rate-per-day in GBP. Since last november, just because of the GBP-EUR exchange rate I have effectively had a pay cut of 16%. And as the day rate is now starting to drop as well thnigs will get worse.

i concur with anton. I have a Le Guide des solutions from Chausson...only 200 odd pages but very, very useful. if you have a chausson local go and pick up a free copy.

if you can lay your hands on a recent legrand catalogue it will help with all the re-wrireing. I have a 2005 version, but doubt it's changed much. Very useful for cabling and schematics. very clear pictures as well, and useful for printing of and taking into your local leccie place and pointing to the picture... je voudrais quelque chose comme ca.. etc

find a local book store (le'clerc etc). They normally have "Local" authors who write about the local region, which normally includes building/architecture/local history type stuff.

Hi Where are you buying? French houses differ quite a bit from region to region so it's difficult to offer specific advise..but i will anyway! After 3 yrs on my house don't bother with a book. Common sense, trial and error and talking to locals who have done something similar will start you in the right direction. I'm afraid if you have to read it from a book then you've got a long, slow slog ahead of you. good luck anyway

you running Norton on it by chance?

my eldest (14yr old) son is worried about me not being able to buy him a scooter so he can get around and see his mates

further ... further to the above had a note from the impot who "Apres un examen attentif....." have reduced the amount to 741. So it does help a bit if you can argue your case.  This is still to high mind you, so we're going back to see them armed with drawings/photos and a friend who is good at arguing the toss. So hopefully we can get them to agree to a further reduction.

we are an hour ahead of you in the UK My children go to school in the dark and come home in the dark in the winter. It gets darker earlier in the summer. 2 things you can do to avoid this...  1) move to the arctic (land of the midnight sun)  2) always keep your clocks set to GMT, then it will get dark after 9 in the winter

further to the above... Went to see the mayor and asked if he thought it was right.  He said definately a definate no and we should go and some bloke at the tax office who had something to do with valuing the properties in the village. Even the mayor didn't understand all the bumf the hotel d'impot had given us and how it was calculated. Basically we have a base of 2245, which was 335 last year. about 7times more. So .. watch this space.

on a practical note of finding work as a Gardener (ie not cutting lawns for non-resident english)... My wife wanted to do the same thing as you. The idea being that she does garden design and does all the planty things...whilst I do the building walls/patio stuff.  You must find somewhere where there are people willing to pay.  Deep south west (Pyrenees) is very sunny and warm (most of the time) but is quite poor, lots of unemployed, and no place to pitch up and expect to find work. Unless you can offer something very specialised,  (and I know a few English down here one as a tree surgeon and a couple running a nursery..successfully), you will find it very hard to make ends meet. Those French who want nice gardens are generally retired and do it themselves. They don't have the money to pay others to do it for them.  Try Paris.  

OK. Just done the Hotel d'Impot. You're right JR. The difference is because the previous H1 was done in 1970 and made no mention of anything we currently have. i.e the had 1 toilet and lived in one habitable room. We filled in an H1 last year as they wanted to know about the swimming pool. Like the complete idiots we are we filled the form in to the best of our ability...hence the 175% rise in cost. Lesson to be learnt for all those brits buying houses where the Immobiler says the Tax Fonciere is "only" €150.... make sure that the H1 matches what you've currently got in your house. Otherwise you will be in a for a nasty shock. I know it's a generalisation, but the french seem to make a national past time out of avoiding paying the correct taxes, then winge like hell when someone else trys the same. When you try and be honest... you get screwed.

thanks for that.... right.... off down the hotel d'impot this afternoon for a discussion in Franglais

is it possible to argue a reduction? our situation is that in 2007 the base was €890, this year it is €2450!!! We have added a swimming pool, but the tax has gone up from €350 to €970... This is ~175% more! Who said France was cheap

I get to cut down 10m3 of wood in our commune forest for €80 [:)] (thats about 10 trees)...bargain. But then I don't mind where the things land. Seriously though, if the wood is Pine then get them to take it away as it's no good to burn. Unless you need a pine beam somewhere and know a saw mill that can cut it up for you. I do know that it's very hard work climbing and cutting trees down in pieces (after trying it!). So paying someone to do it for you makes life a whole lot easier.

thanks for that. It's a salt water pool, but I get your drift. I managed to talk her round about the lime anyway.  I've also got bags of the Weber-Joint stuff but doubt I will use them now.

hi I'm at the stage of pointing carrelage around the pool. The joints are quite wide > 20mm. Wifey favours a lime/sand (sable de mer) mix (because of the colour - sort of 'off sand'), I favour normal washed sand/cement (because of the price, the other is x5 plus). Has anyone used a lime morter mix around a pool? Any pros/cons that I could use as an argument against.

bmt No offence taken. I'm, supposed to be an IT professional as well! (but I don't do hardware..thats my excuse anyway). I've given up for now. I'll probably go and buy a router on Tuesday and go wireless so both the XP and Vista boxes work. The 25€ power supply I bought to replace the dodgy one that went up in smoke seems to be holding up OK for now at least.  I've got a pet geek up the road so I'll see if he's come across this before. But i reckon he will just tell me to get my Carte Bleu out and buy something new.

been there, done that, got the t-shirt i'm afraid.  First place I searched for help. sorry to be flipant, but it's driving me up the mur. I'll try re-installing using a different version of the driver. The Vista41C.exe setup has a couple of alternatives. But it's a bugger to uninstall the original, you have to be in Safe mode to get rid of the actual software even though the uninstall removes the system drivers.          

Danny Yes,  the drivers on that site are the same as the ones on the Thompson (speedtouch) site. tried those and the Vista41C drivers as well. The advice on the other site is the same problem I am having, what number to call Wanadoo on. 8,35 for the Sagem, P8,35 for the speedtouch from XP. someone takls about using the 6digit number you get the original documentation but I can't find a 6digit number anywhere. I get an error 815, which means that the modem is working but the connection information I'm using is wrong. The Wanadoo site is still saying that the drivers are not available, but I know they are as the Modem is working fine.  

Hi Anyone done this ? I'm having problems trying to get my laptop (running Vista) to connect to the web (my ISP is Wanadoo). I've downloaded the Vista drivers for my speedtouch 330 modem (which works OK from XP) onto the Laptop. The laptop->modem is working fine, however, when  I try to get to Web it can't connect. This is a really geeky question but ....     I installed the PPPOE 8.35 drivers and then changed the Service Name to P8,35 (which is how XP dials through to Wanadoo). But I still can't connect.  I've read various forum threads on this and no-one seems to have had a definative answer. I was hoping someone within France has got this working. Is the Service name different in Vista? I will probably go Wireless soon, but don't want the expense of buying one (and it's bank holiday this weekend) and I have to get some work done. My main PC has just had its power supply go up in flames so I would prefer a backup in case I can't connect via XP. Many thanks in advance  

Hi Has anyone got any information about the various Organismes Conventionnes that I have to choose between for the RSI people? Does it matter who I choose? I have a form to fill in and rather than close my eyes and take pot luck, I was wondering if anyone had experience of them.  The list is:    La Mutuelle De L'est (strasbourg)    FMP-CAMPI (paris)    Reunion des assureeurs Maladie Des Professions Liberales Provinces - RAM (BOURGES) Many thanks

Thanks for the costs everyone. I've just measured up : 24m of 20mm, 60m of 16mm, 105m of 12mm Which is around 150euro if you take Antons numbers He's also tried to charge me 95euro for 5m of 14mm copper pipe... i know copper isn't cheap but 19euro a metre is a bit steep I will ask him over to explain his calculations.  I think I will suggest at first that he has got his virgule in the wrong place and see what happens.