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Frederick

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Everything posted by Frederick

  1. Earplugs !......if one of you snores .....the other loses sleep......lost sleep means tired and bad tempered during the day.....earplugs ....would never be without them !  
  2. I use  GENERALI   ASSURANCES  Homeowners Comprehensive Insurance Domicile......the policy is in English..it was easy to set up on the phone and by e mail through  Asttral SA who have an office in Marseille  they have a web site ...it was not expensive and the cost reduced this year ......  house and contents  covered together .....I notice in my wine celler......... liquids are covered for cracks in bottles barrels and casks ...........that is handy.........if only I had one !
  3.  This is what my wife saw...........it would certainly do the job covering a scruffy concrete  slab wall ....thanks very much ...  I now know what to look out for and a  job for  next weekend !
  4. Our village butcher has closed down ...........thanks to Super U  !
  5. When it comes to food..... quality and quantity.... our Super U is nowhere near as good as Tesco.....I have noticed that Super U seem to be moving away from being a food outlet into stocking everything else .......If  I want  a car battery.....Super U will have one ...fishing tackle....no problem.....motor mowers...... loads of them ......bag of nails and paint   good choice ..and so on.....decent tender beef ..........now that I wont find ....but .good selection of fish .....I will .
  6. I have neighbors wall made of the concrete slabs that are slid down the posts and it is about 8 foot  high and along the South facing length of my garden ......I have been dying  go over it with a roller and some white paint to cover the dirt and  blackish / grey streaks but dont think she would want me to do that...........  so............if  I run some wires in front of it  can sombody please advise me of some warmth  loving plants will grow fast and creep up and cover the thing .........ones that will fend for themselves ......My wife has seen some creeper with trumpet like flowers that seems to grow well in the Vendee .....but we dont have a name for it......... and its not pictured  in any book we have .....Thats the sort of thing we want.......... our local garden centre did not have it on display and we did not know what to ask for ....any idea please  
  7. Dangler...........I have a headphone splitter !...........not only can I  listen ....but  my wife can listen at the same time....on hers .......I know what you mean though......... it would brass me off as well to be surrounded by noise from games etc ......
  8. Quite right Hoddy.......after Mr Brown had his say ....I got a small increase in my OAP and then  a tax hike that leaves me worse off  by  £30 a month !   so much for looking after the retired .Its just another raid on my occupational pension and capital by these so called socialists . as far as I am concerned ..................I feel for those old people who are less fortunate than we are ......the little old ladies who will go without a meal in order to pay a guy to mow their lawn to keep up apperances  as they dont want the neighbors to know how they have now fallen on hard times ... and I have met them......... as they have been referred to me as a welfare officer for a Community Service Club we may be able to help ......I have been retired and  in my house in Dorset 15 years and the council tax  has gone from  £550....to £1789.92 . no wonder some OAPs are prepared to go to jail ......................rant over !!!
  9. Last month a guy delighted in telling me that 41 centimetres of sea level rise would put most of the Vendee back under sea  water from where it was reclaimed from . The village my place is in was once an island and my house is up on a slope .....but given all the arguements for and against I doubt I will see the benefit of having a house with beach frontage !
  10. Thanks Jacqui........This is what I suspected ...I shall pass on your comments ... as you are in the area ....Its going to be difficult for her to bring one with her so her stay will mean she will not get about as she hoped ....she uses a  ride on  scooter that does about 8mph .......sounds like there is a little hire business opportunity  here ?
  11. Confusing all this .....why is it when in 1991 Mount Pinatubo volcanic eruption took place and a massive amount of muck and gasses went up into the stratsphere the result was a global cooling that lasted two years ?  and after the Clean Air Act stopped all the coal burning in open grates in 1970 the temperate went up right after ? ......these two massive amounts of polution  seemed to be causing global cooling  ? I think we could take all the cars off the road and one volcano erupting would wipe out the effect of that in moments .
  12. A friend who is staying in a gite near Guingamp Brittany in June has asked me if it is possible for her to hire in France an electric scooter as she uses one in the UK due to mobility problems . I have to say France seems to be way behind the UK in the use of these aids to mobility by the disabled and unlike the many "Mobility  " Shops that sell and hire these  I the UK I have not  come asccross one in the Vendee  and certainly dont know how to advise her  re Britanny .... does anybody know of any companies who will hire mobility scooters ..........she really needs one of the type that will go in the boot of a car ....she hasnt really got room to take hers with her she is travelling with friends .
  13. I think the time has come to stop this obsession with cameras and the belief that they will force everybody to tow the line ...they will not.... and  from what I have read more and more people are finding ways to avoid penalties from them. Registering your vehicle at another address to avoid being traced seems to be one .cloning the number plate another...I would like to see more Police stopping drivers who speed and drive recklessly and cheking them out.....It appears that we have in the UK thousands of vehicles on the road driven by people who have no licences and insurance many who have arrived in the UK  probably believe they dont need them !....how many additional cameras ...and the showing of accident scene photos are going to get them off the road ?  My sat nav tells me the location of every speed camera I pass and the  designated location of the mobile ones as well ... and thousands of driveres have these now .......kind of defeats the object of still siting them  doesnt it ?
  14. Thanks folkes !   got to do this now ....
  15. I have been told that I should not have thrown out a dodgy bottle of wine........it should have gone into the vinegar pot .....never heard of such a thing ......are these common in a French kitchen .....do people actually make their  own vine vinegar ?
  16. Dont take any notice ...the French are a very friendly and  helpful people ......My latest experience of this was only last month when in a car park my car would not start.....On opening the bonnet I seemed to gather a posse of diesel experts in seconds who discussed among themselves  what the problem was....told me to get in the car ...forced the fuel through the injectors .....told me to start up then advised I change the fuel filter  as that was the problem ......... you cant do better than that ! 
  17. I  noticed our local Super U now have a section displaying lots of litttle Union Jacks on the shelving ....closer  inspection reveals ..Tetley  and Typhoo   tea bags.... proper ones no string !......... Birds Custard ...  Tins of treacle   tins of shortbread  biscuits  and the like .....The penny is dropping  from the lots of campsites up and down the coast that  Brits are  visiting ...and  from those who have bought houses near by .. they have realised at last  just how many people are wanting these things.  
  18. Yes........some time ago now my wife and I were shopping in the supermarket in Benodet....we paid for our purchases and on leaving the alarm kicked in.... the manageress went through our stuff checked everything  and again on leaving the alarm  went off. It was then decided that a search of my wifes handbag was in order  and this was duly carried out....By now a crowd was convinced we were crooks .....after nothing was discovered in her handbag we went to leave and again all hell let loose......I  then came to the conclusion in her bag must be somthiong with a bar code on it...........there was ....a  Dorset County Library  Bar Code ..... on a Guide to Brittany .......The manageress left us with the words "Please dont come back in with that book ! 
  19. I have discovered  "Mille Stocks "  I seem to pass a branch in most towns I go to ...so they have masses of  stuff  to sell  and I believe it is mostly  goods from businesses who are no longer trading  ?... crockery ....cookers ....fridges .... clothing  in fact  just about everything  ......... But ..... the wine ...they seem to have loads of it at cheaper than Supermarket prices for what looks like good  propriete  bottled  stuff ....I tried a Bordeaux  2000 which at less than 3 euros seemed fine to me but I am not an expert.....are wine producers going out of business ? or is this just old stuff they cant shift and Mille Stocks do it for them ?
  20. Got a caravan parked up in the garden and loads of them are settled in  the treads of the tyres ....the only place I have found them ?
  21. While filling in a trench in the garden after putting in a sewer pipe ...one of my neighbors passed by walking his dog and mentioned   that  the handle of my shovel  was not red ......he had passed by the time I realised  what he was saying ......the cheeky blighter must be suggesting I should be digging  hard enough to make it glow ?   French humour I suppose ! 
  22. My wife uses a broom and usually steers them out the door .....me .....not bothered by them ....they can stay and eat what passes by in the way of insects
  23. Thanks Chris !..........Its a risky place to drive past ...they launch off and swoop down  over the road to get up some speed to bank left into the field and fly off ....its a bit scarey when you have one bonnet height with wider wing span than a Citroen C5  windshield  coming straight at you !
  24. One again this year the storks have taken over the nest on the EDF Pole between Angles and La Trance sur Mer in  (85 ) Vendee . I am advised by the locals that EDF people turned up 5 strong for a site meeting with cameras last year and decided that they should stay ...so.... hats off to them..... and lets hope like last year... two more chicks are  raised ....My last  sight of them a few days ago was while two more were overhead and the nest occupiers were making a great noise like clacking machine gun fire .no doubt to make the point they were staying put ....After winter winds of 140 kph they did a pretty good job of building the nest into the pole framework.. it does not seem to have taken any damage .     Chris .... .I have sent you some photos  as I am  not sure how to post them so if you feel that you can post  for me I will be grateful ...
  25. We came back yesturday on the Norman Spirit... the recliner chairs are  very comfortable ...there were very few  people  on it  and we found it a very good value and a hassle free crossing  and the food was OK .They did  roast beef and roast  lamb .... and also  pasta dishes  as well as fish and chips and curry and chilli  dishes with rice in the self service for a reasonable price ..... no sign of a burger bar ! ....Its the first time I have used it .....I noticed that in the seating area there are places that have  plugs handy for lap tops ....and some teenagers were into their games to keep entertained ..and some people were working ..I used mine to watch a DVD and nobody said anything ...it killed an hour . so ..I shall use them again
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