Bannon

How about just putting in a complete new shower cubicle - one of those that come complete with plastic walls n things? That way you can leave the tiles where they are. I've had so much grief with leaking showers - especially those upstairs and found this was a great solution and not really that exepensive.

..... a woman's right to Choo Choos?  Groan

Ah yes, that is an interesting point Sprogster and one I have been mulling over - looks like we might be heading up a financial cul-de-sac then. The other puzzle is that with pension credits being available from the age of sixty, is it not a route to early retirement? or am I missing something? The other option is to return to the UK, get my pension credits, and come back to France... but I'm sure the guys in Newcastle have sussed that one out :-) .....although we did manage to get our winter fuel payment paid which is as they say, better than a poke in the eye.

Seems then we are between a rock and a hard place. Struggle on a pension here in France or struggle on a pension back in the UK. Reckon we'll take our chances here and see how it works out. At least it's warmer.... well, sometimes anyway :-) Thanks again for your input guys. 

Thanks guys, lots to think about and you never know maybe by the time we do retire the UK will have joined the euro which will of course make it much easy to construct a stable household budget. The other thought of course is equity relase which is now available to ex-pats but not until you are 70 and only from one French bank in particular?  

Thanks guys, I did do a search by the way Bugbear - I'll try again though.

We are fast approaching retirement and consequently winding down our small business here - to much hassle and to much bother with officialdom. The thing is, are we going to be able to survive here in France on a basic UK state pension? Mine is pretty well paid up with the Mrs not far behind. We'll have a small additional income from our little gite/annexe but that's about it really. Any thoughts guys?

Thanks for the info guys. Just what was needed! Where can we get the Spa Flush from John?

We'd always had in mind to lay floor tiles on our existing concrete floor but of late have been picking up on coloured resin floors. I've seen a couple of really smart examples in French magazines but nothing so far in UK ones. Any of you guys know of any links to a good UK site about this? I know we'd need to use levelling compound first but that's about it. Laying floor tiles in the area we had in mind would cost in the region on Euro 1000 for materials so not sure how that would compare with a resin coated floor.

You've all noticed of course that you cannot watch the Olympics live from the BBC for example - which is fair enough as far as it goes, but now it seems you cannot access any of the video news clips either due to some restrictions or other. A taste of Chinese media/marketing control perhaps? Anyway, I watched it live on the TV and thought the opening ceremony was amazing - it's all the running round the track n stuff that'll  send me to sleep. Motor and horse racing has the same effect on me as well in that it all seems rather pointless watching folks go round in circles. Now Morris dancing.. ...that's wonderful :-) Maybe they can make that into a Olympic event along with Musical Chairs? Ah yes, and synchronised swimming - who the heck thought that one up? Complete bonkers. That's my morning moan over with, have a nice day ya'll.

You may be right, she had the information from an unknown friend of our daughter :-/  It seems that the pipes get blocked with can be best described as 'detritis' and that you need to flush out the system once a month with a special fluid of sorts in which case, the problem is going to be - can this be allowed to go into our septic tank? Maybe it's not worth all the bother. 

Have you a septic tank in your garden? We had a problem with flies and just as a thought I checked out the main cover and found that there was a gap around it. I'll not tell you what I found underneath but suffice to say I ran some sealant around the rim before putting the cover back on. Still getting flies of course - but a lot less. Fly paper also works but looks disgusting!

We've been offered an unused hydro massage bath complete with all the fittings, the thing is I've always fancied one but the Mrs tells me they are difficult to keep clean and that the jets and pipes can get blocked. All sounds a bit yucky. Has anybody had this or other sorts of problems with them as I do not want to go to the bother of plumbing it in only to find out that it's a problem for us. Cheers guys.  

Well done Martin, found the required info on the Lyngsat link. Cheers.

Thanks Martin. If you have the transponder details for Channel Four that would be great (or post the link?) Again, according to the Astra site Channel Four is 'free conditional' so no other infromation is provided :-/ Cheers. 

Looking through the Astra web site at their list of free channels available at 28.2 east degrees east of south I noted that channels such as Film 4 were not listed - yet my digital decoder pickes them up. Anybody know why this is? Also, what's the latest on Channel 4 and Channel 5 going out unencrypted? Thanks guys    

Thanks guys

Anyone know if it's possible to use French fitting on UK bath taps. The fitting I tried seems the same size but also seems a bit loose, and really I do not fancy wrapping loads of  tape round the thread. I did hear mention that it was possible to buy some sort of 'thread converter'  - off the internet it seems. Should have got French baths taps I know but the Mrs likes the UK ones argghh!

Horses for courses guys... I've used three systems. Metal batons, timber, and at the moment concrete blocks. The metals batons are great of course when you have a rough wall and very handy for the insulation and hiding those pipes and cables. Used as a stud partition it's important to put insulation in as this damps down the noise quite a bit avoiding that 'hollow' sound. Timber I used up on our main floor as it was more solid - don't want anybody crashing over the stairs! The concrete blocks are being used in our downstairs bathroom/hall/utility room because it allows me to buttress a stone wall that has a slight lean to it.... nothing serious just me being fussy :-)      

Hi Jilly, I have sent you an email.

You have put that over at length and very well Gyn_Paul. Back in the 80's I had dealings with a company called AGB (Audits of Great Britain) who in turn supplied data to BARB (British Audience Broadcasting). Modems were installed into 'panel members' homes which monitored not only what and when they watched... but even who was watching. It all depended of course on the member entering the correct data which was then collected overnight when the modem was polled. It was never very exact - as the old saying goes, Garbage in, Garbage out - but it was data and it was presented as valid. How a toddler or even a teenager 'member' could be relied upon to log on baffled me then and baffles me now. One got the impression that they (the program providers) needed to tell their advertisers something even though they knew it was skewed and we knew it was nonsense.  As the other saying goes, lies, dammed lies...and statistics!

It was not the dealer that wanted the utility bill, it was the Prefecture.

Thanks guys

Any ideas guys on how to register a car in France if you are unable to supply a utility bill. A friend of ours need to do this but lives in a long term rental and their name of course is not on any of the bills that come into the house. The vehicle is already on French plates. Cheers

Ah no sorry. If  Sky get a sniff of the fact that you are using an address that is not your own or that your original address has changed they may cancel your subscription. Having said that I am sure that Sky are well aware of the situation and cannot be unhappy about taking those unoffical subscriptions from literally thousands of subscribers in continental europe. They just cannot as said be seen to be endorsing it. Advertsiers also have a vested interest in that they need to target specific groups in specific areas - and there budget must be in the millions. I'd not be a happy exec bunny if I thought my advertsing target was skewed to any great extent.