saddie

Benjamin, I am sure that I will be corrected if wrong but you cannot open an English easy come etc account if you are domiciled in France. I assume the converse applies and you cannot open a French livret if you are domiciled in England so the question is specifically where you can get some sort of near equivelent to an ISA in France regarding the tax situation.

la poste bank offers an epargne which is free from all fiscalities. You do not even have to put it on your tax return. Each person may have an account max 15300 € The interest rate is 2.25% not high but tax free.

It must be me who is odd.I don't understand Marmite. What do you do with it? (Keep it clean). It is only some sort of yeast based paste isn't it?

I am sure that I read (and equally sure that I shall be corrected if I have imagined it) that the nation whose ex pats (I hate that expression) are in greatest numbers in France are the Portugese. Also there are more Germans than british living here. Can anyone verify the facts. As for France being overun with brits there are 600,000 on the costa brava alone!

I have sometimes wondered who or how certain things came to be eaten. For example whelks ,lobsters,snails, frogs. I can accept that people may have ben hungry but who might have thought that shrimps may be edible , or mussels?

I believe that there are no beaver in France. It was probably a coypu - can't remember the French name but they are fairly common. They were exterminated in England as they had become a pest in the fens.

In the pagesjaunes there is a women's help no for conjugal violence 01 40 33 80 60 and also I saw a notice in the doctor's surgery about the same thing. Not much but it is a start. Hope it helps

According to today's paper Haute-Vienne has had more rain in thr first 7 days of March than it normally gets in the entire month!

It is very difficult to say what the weather is like in Limousin. It is a sizable area and the weather varies not only from north to south but east to west and uphill and downhill. In the department description section of a forum it is described as hot in summer and mild in winter. I don't call regular -5° overnight mild! In our commune there is someone who charts the weather. From their observations we have about 50 days when the there is frost but on the other hand an average of 40 days when the temperature exceeds +30°

My sister took in a small hedgehog, fed it and cared for it. She was still a little concerned that it seemed to have lumps on its back and so she took it to a vet. He pointed out that these were its shoulders!

Have a look at www.elite-auto.fr they claim large discounts on the recommended price of most makes and models and deliver to a concession near you. Payment is made through a notaire and it is a well known company. No messing about with importing and reregistering.

We had 300 euros back on the first house and 500 on the second - my question is - why can't they get it right - the notaires & les impots get paid enough - don't they ?[:^)]

Hortiflorbureau.com is good also leclosdarmoise.com Try a search on jardin +vpc   (vente par correspondance)

the latin name for the hydne hérrison is hericium erinaceum   and it is sort of shaggy/spiky so it looks like a different species

To Pixietoadstool I am very English in regard to fungus but I have a book with lovely pictures in French. According to this the "hydne hérrisson" is a protected species(by the convention of Berne no less).Presumably this is not what you refer to by hedgehog mushroom?

Does the annual mechanical rule apply to "inserts" as well? We asked the plumber(most of whom also do ramonage) to sweep the chimney which has an insert and he was perplexed. It seems that noone round here has them swept. Peering into it I think it would be a biggish job as you would have to dissassemble part of it. The previous owner of this house said in the presence of the notaire that his insurance company did not demand an attestation de ramonage. Seems tha most people use the buches de ramonage. Clarification please.

Eugenie le bains is , if I remember correctly, a spa town patronised and therefore named afer the empress Eugenie. I believe it has a luxurious and expensive thalassa therapy centre.

Is this sad or what. I have just read the wrapping on a pack of loo paper. It points out that coloured versions of the product or not produced using any toxic materials and the the paper breaks down easily and is very suitable for fosses septiques and broyeurs. However, I have had properties with fosses septiques in England (plenty of England is not on mains drainage) and the subject of loo paper suitability never came up, cleaners yes, loo paper no.

Hi David and Aileen We are in Perpezac le Noir.   Rte de Vigeois actually. Lovely area. Hi to SuninFrance We will  be at the triathlon at Poncharal as MOH Ron (racing snake) is keen on cyclisme. I have told him wearing a tee shirt with "Lance Armstrong is innocent" is probably not a good idea. Perhaps we could all wear pink carnations or something. Other than that we are in our 50s (ouch) both tall and obviously English. Ron is the one with the beard and I am the one with the glasses.

There is not much room to expand Brive airport(which is on the terrasson road). It can only take small planes and it is unnerving enough to be in the carpark at Carrefour when one of these lands. I heard that a new airport was being planned further down the motorway towards Souillac. All they need to do is fond enough flat ground

It pains me to quote George W but he apparently asked "do the French have a word for entrepreneur"   perhaps he had a point. The definition in English dictioneries differs from the French in that the English mentions risk and initiative.

You can't choose to pay tax where you wish otherwise we would all be taxed in the Isle of Man! If you are a French resident you pay tax in France and income is income to the French authorities however gained. The only exceptions to this as far as I can see is those who receive pensions payed direct by the government eg police,teachers in which case it is taxed at source. You can continue to pay into the state pension scheme and they will be able to give you an estimate of what you might receive and the cost. You will have to join the French health system and pay -- see other posts on this forum for ideas about amount.    

The film about the two men being transported to the future. There were two I believe. The first "les visiteurs" with Jean Reno and Christian Clavier was funny. The sequence - well you can only stretch a gag so far.  Asterix also with Christian Clavier was also funny in French and you didn't need to be fluent to understand it. Come to think about it Christian Clavier is usually pretty good.

code de la route 2005 has pages on "régimes de priorités" with pictures. page 100 la voitue verte doit céder la passage à la voiture bleue. attention, pour la voiture bleue, la priorité de passage n'est pas un doit. Le conducteur de la voiture bleue doit d'assurer que la voiture verte lui cède réellment le passage.

Living in England we had more choice of places to visit by air. Short breaks to Nice,Paris,rome,Madrid etc and longer holidays further afield. These were made more affordable and accessible by the low cost airlines. Now living in France the choices are not only limited but expensive. Some friends suggested we might join them (coming from England) for a week in southern Spain. To fly we would have to get to Toulouse , about one and a half hours, park and the fare would be 282€ each! We could drive the 1612 k at a paege cost ofapprox 150€ and 200 or so litres of fuel. It would take 15 hours 37 mins to Malaga according to mappy. Fortunately we have seen most of the parts of the world we wish to but it would be nice to say have a weekend in Prague. The French are a little more adventurous than say 30years ago but I can't see the type of exploratory travelling becoming more common. After all they always have full board (and no doubt French food) if you look at their holiday brochures.