AnOther
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Posts posted by AnOther
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Funny, we both had ALD's but still had to pay €23 when we went to see the doctor.
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Even having left France and moved to Spain I harbour a certain fondness for this forum it being the very first I joined even before we actually moved to France in 2007.Yes it's had it's problems and ups and downs but has survived whilst others have fallen by the wayside.
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No smart meter for me where I live but I bought one of these and it paid for itself in the first couple of months.https://www.geotogether.com/consumer/product/minim-energy-monitor/Sensor clips over the incoming live cable and then talks wirelessly to the display. With a little tweaking of the fine tune facility it reads within 1% of the main meter. Always on and easily monitored, no need for smartphone apps.
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You must be thinking of a different 'Bluecat' coz 'er indoors doesn't know a 'mint' nor a 'sweet 17" (nor I unfortunately [Www]) and is all but tea total.Have you noted our (ex) location?
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She is (or was) and I will.Will she know you by 'mint' though?
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I might make the odd cameo appearance for old times sake.Car's running a little better than your signature I'm happy to report [:D]39c is a bit hot without AC though so she hibernates for July and August.Now on her 4th registration number and nudging 400,000 miles, not too many can say either of those.Might be looking to pass her on in the not too distant future though, memsahib is knocking on a bit and having trouble getting in and out (more so out than in!) and without our long distance soirees, well it's just not the same.
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I did and am still there, no regrets with the move BTW.Hot out today so I was just having a lazy afternoon on the computer cleaning up a few things and as the site was still in my bookmarks I thought I'd drop by to see what was going on.Hope all are well.
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I presume they were relying on the stock closing mechanism for the shutters, BIG mistake as those are easily defeated in seconds with nothing more than a screwdriver - ask me how I know!You need steel bars across the inside (buy at any Brico) and at my old house as a very visible deterrent I added a 50mm x 5mm bar on the OUTSIDE bolted on through the shutters, they would have taken an angle grinder to remove but even then the steel bars inside would have prevented entry.
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[quote user="BritinBretagne"]I’m sorry you didn’t understand what I meant[/quote]I knew exactly what you meant and agree wholeheartedly.In 32 years of ownership and close on 300,000 miles of driving my MGB has never once failed either an MOT in UK or a CT in France.Somewhat farcically that unblemished record was broken just a few months ago here in Spain where the car was failed for having a MPH speedo however considering a year previously whilst switching to Spanish plates it passed the obligatory engineers inspection and subsequent initial test with that same MPH speedo I think it's fairer to call that an aberration rather than a failure.Incidentally I did have a KPH speedo but had never got around to fitting it so the tester was quite surprised when I returned within the hour for a retest, I in turn was equally surprised when he asked for a certificate from whichever garage had fitted it, something which would be expected for a more modern car where a replacement speedo would alter the recorded KM's, but when I politely pointed out to him that it was a 43 year old car, AND on it's 4th go round on the odometer, AND that the replacement odometer actually showed a significantly HIGHER number than the original, he saw the folly of his request!I'll add finally that in the whole of that 32 years what precious few breakdowns I recall (maybe half a dozen at most) were all minor and were fixed on the spot allowing me to complete my journey, none of them were safety related.In short: There's maintenance and there's maintenance and whatever the age of a car simply following a manufacturers schedule ain't it !
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[quote user="mint"]Nomoss, I agree; that annoys the hell out of me.[/quote]It's a forum setting.Go to At the top and after 'Edit your details' click on your user name, then scroll down and change from 'Ascending' to 'Decending.' then scroll down and 'Save'Clicking Newest to Oldest' in a thread is temporary and for that specific visit to the thread only.Computers don't stop popups and browser alone are not much cop at it either. For effective pop up and ad blocking you need browser add-ons or extensions but they all work differently and some are more effective than others.If your blocking is effective then whilst browsing you will often encounter pop ups on sites asking (or telling) you to turn off blocking or to whitelist them, if you don't get that then whatever you're using is not working.You can use multiple ad blockers simultaneously.
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Not to crow but I predicted more accidents and deaths as soon as the 80kph change was announced.Reverting piecemeal is not the answer and is more likely to make things worse than better.As ever myoptic French attempts to influence end results fail because they do not address root causes.https://www.connexionfrance.com/French-news/Map-of-France-shows-roads-changing-speed-back-to-90kph
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They can if they are non UK resident.
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[quote user="suein56"]and won't let Chrome users use the quote function[/quote]I just did although a preview shows no line breaks - unless that's the alleged problem?Using both Samsung's own browser and FF on my tablet the cookie popup is persistent and on every click. On the PC with FF 69 no popup at all, conclusive proof I think that it's NOT just a FF problem! The one consistency seems to be that it's inconsistent.
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Call a general election to legitimise his illegitimate PMship for starters.The EU have already said that they would extend the Oct 31st date in those circumstances.Unfortunately with his rabid 'do or die' leave on Oct 31st mantra he's painted himself into a corner infinitely tighter than May's from which there is no escape except total humiliation hopefully followed by resignation and to go down in history as the shortest serving PM ever - as well as probably the least legitimate.I can scarcely imagine the schadenfreude I will rejoice in if he's brought to heel and is forced to extend yet again.
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Excuse me, I may have left France but departed I most certainly have not [:-))]
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Although we do not know the full story in principal I agree with you, you know the rules and have nobody but yourself to blame.That said before judging so harshly it's worth remembering that the 50mg limit in France is some 40% under the UK limit of 80mg so at one and the same time in France a driver can be deemed a drunk and a menace to society whilst in UK the self same driver would be well under and you would say had partaken of alcohol perfectly responsibly.
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[quote user="slowfox05"]I cannot understand how a public service is able to get away with such inefficiency.[/quote]Perhaps because it's A France and B you have no other option but to use it !When you've been around a bit longer and you'll come to realise that it's more the norm than the exception.
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If it were commercially viable there would probably be a mast somewhere reasonably nearby already but in any case somewhere to site a mast is only a tiny tiny fraction of the total involved in putting one up and no operator is going to do it to serve a mere handfull who have chosen to situate themselves in some remote corner of the middle of nowhere.Don't forget though that for any given spot the level of service can vary enormously between operators so just because you can't pick up a signal from whomever you are currently with that does not automatically mean that all operators will perform as poorly.Also 4g LTE is an incredible technology which can provide a very surprising performance from what in 3g terms would be a completely unusable signal.Without getting too technical I'm talking of signals in the order of say -105 to 110db microvolts which would be useless on 3g but with the same signal level a 4g LTE router could potentially give you as much as 20mb, and thats on it's own internal antennas, bang up a couple of external ones and you'll be the envy of the neighbourhood !Assuming you even have a 4g LTE phone (not all 4g phones are LTE) the big problem is that there is no easy way to evaluate what any individual operator may be good for at any given location and the only real way to check it out is in to buy a prepaid 4g LTE data sim from each and see which works and which doesn't.
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Have you investigated 4g ?My French landline scrapes in 3-4mb (recently improved from 2) but with a 4g router and an external antenna I can pull in 20mb or so with 5-8mb upload speed.The irony is having limped on with that frustrating 2mb misery for 10 years just as I throw off the shackle I sell up and move to Spain ![quote user="clairegs"]we will be doing some work from home. Appreciate any comments![/quote]I know this is going off at a tangent but with the justification that you did say 'any' comments, you do realise that ANY work you do in France MUST be through a legally established business entity ?Being confined to a computer keyboard does not absolve you from that, in France work is work is work and believe me you the last thing you ever want or need is the French tax man taking a special interest in you !
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[quote user="Gardian"]I can only repeat what I said earlier & what my new licence (received yesterday) says - valid until 2033.[/quote]The French photocard licence is valid for 15 years regardless of age and currently at least requires no medical for group B. 15 years from 2018 is of course 2033 !Older paper ones may be non expiring but EU rules require them to be withdrawn and replaced with photocards by 2033, quite how they propose carrying that out when there is no requirement to notify a change of address should be interesting to watch.As far as UK goes an expired photo card does NOT, repeat does NOT, mean that you are driving without a valid licence, 'holds or has held and is not disqualified from holding' is the relevant term in the law. Technically you can be fined up to £1000 for failing to renew a photocard but I doubt you'll find that has actually been excercised against a single 'offender' in the entire 20 year history of the photocard.I can't believe after all this time and so many discussions on the topic there is still so much confusion and misunderstanding although I suppose I shouldn't be surprised when so many folk still labour under the misconception that the (now abolished) paper counterpart to the UK photocard is some sort of licence in it's own right.Personally I'll be on a spanish licence long before any of that though.
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It's worth mentioning that DD's can be cancelled at will and at any time simply by instructing your bank, it's a core function of the system.Seemingly some banks don't understand that though and will try to tell you it has to done by the recipient but that only applies to SO's (Standing orders).I have all of this to go through in a couple of months time but I'll be keeping my CA A/C open both to cover odds and sods and because the Bip & Go peage doofah - which also works in Spain - is dependent on a French A/C and I plan to hang onto that.
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Whether you class it as helpful or not is for you to decide but given your experience thus far and the general the difficulties in dealing with authorities in France personally I'd be asking myself if, for a modest €48, it was really worth the potential aggro.
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[quote user="Simon"]I am stuck with a vehicle that has an expired MOT and I am reluctant to make a 1000 mile round trip to the UK for the sake of a 6 month wait.[/quote]Technically of course with an expired MOT you cannot drive it 1000 yds let alone 1000 km, and that's without consideration of any potential insurance irregularities (i.e. UK insurance and French resident perhaps ?)Just sayin' [Www]
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In France scratches and minor dings are the norm and to be expected and unlike in UK owners do not rush off to the body shop for every minor blemish.That's in no small part because if you make too many claims (and with some insurers three 'no faults' incidents can be 'too many') you can find your cover withdrawn leaving you to the mercy of the French government scheme which appoints an insurer to cover you but at the minimum 3rd party until you have rebuilt a no claims bonus from scratch.Easy answer, don't buy new or nearly new cars
Where to live next?
in The Complete France Post Bag
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