Acoustic

Oh dear, just when I had been to see what Super U had too!  I saw plenty of Label Rouge etc but I didn´t notice anything marked "élevé en plein air" on the meat counter.  Is it something I might find in the supermarket?  Might need a bigger store I suppose?

You could always do what we do - cheat!  This is a great recipe, especially if you substitute home-made ginger beer for ginger ale. 2 parts gin 2 parts rosso vermouth 1 part Orange Curacao liqueur fill with 7-Up® soda 1 slice orange 1 slice lemon 1 slice cucumber   Mix. Pour into tall glass. Add ice-cold 7-Up or ginger ale. Garnish with one slice each of orange, lemon and cucumber. Serve.

Thank you both for that!  After getting a pasting on another (not French based and  aimed at the quasi-self-sufficient minded folk) forum where I asked exactly the same question (apparently an avid vegetarian who objected to the wording of my posting) I was wary of what replies I might be getting.  That is absolutely what I needed to know and I´m off to the supermarket right now to stock up.

We normally eat exclusively vegetarian although OH will sometimes eat rabbit etc. and we both sometimes eat oily fish.  We have visitors coming who apparently live on chicken dishes.  I´ll quite happily cook it but wonder what the French term for "free range" is?  I´ve seen some packs labelled "poulet du fermier", is this it?  OH says he will probably eat some if he can be sure it´s not from battery farmed chickens.  I suppose I could buy from the local butcher to be sure but assuming I have to resort to the local supermarket does anyone have any ideas please? 

Thanks for that, I´ll be out searching for some tomorrow.  I´m told things like No Nails is no good as it might affect the silvering on the mirror.  Don't see why but better safe than sorry!

I did a test patch on our red stain using the €2.90 tub of antimousse from BricoDepot and it has worked perfectly - pristine white!  Now waiting for a non rainy/windy day when I will be up a ladder with the pulverisatuer and deal with the rest of it.  Thanks for the advice.

There is a product in the UK called Mirror Mate by Everflex, used to stick large mirrors to the wall without using any other fixings.  Does anyone know of a French equivalent please?

Thanks for that suggestion, sounds about right - junk room!  We´ve also decided that venti famon is in fact ventilation spread over two lines (also very badly written and faded so it doesn´t help).  Also thanks for information on the knob on the insert fire.  It seems to be jammed in the "in" position.  No wonder we couldn´t find a way of making it work very efficiently last winter! Back in the loft today to see if there are any signs of life in the VMC unit.  Then on to the problem of hanging ceiling fans etc from a tiled ceiling.  It looks as if we have to devise some sort of system of blocks attached to the underside of the joists so that they will fill the gap which is currently there, then screw through the tiles into the blocks.  It seems that we manage to solve one problem only to uncover 10 more!

I suspect she will do very well after her operation but I can really empathise with your concerns about whether there are alternatives.  About twenty years ago my husband was told his right arm would remain paralysed after damaging his neck in a cycling accident.  Through sheer doggedness and hardwork he perservered with his own exercises and physio (sawing logs was one of his methods even though he needed to use both arms to begin with) and he now has full use of his arm and was able to resume his career as a professional musician.  He still has all sorts of neck problems but he's certainly not paralysed. I know it´s the eleventh hour but you could try going onto www.giveusahome.com and posting on the Chat section.  There are lots of people on there at the moment trying to rehome kittens but if you start a new thread explaining the situation you will find one or two really knowledgeable people there who might come up with either re-assurance or alternatives. Good luck with whatever you decide!

We would like to mount two ceiling fans in our living room and also a reasonably heavy pot rack from the kitchen ceiling.  On going into the loft to check where the joists are to give these a firm mount we have discovered that the ceilings are in fact made from the same red section bricks (4.5 cm thick) as the walls and that they are somehow cemented and joined with wires and then suspended from the roof beams, ie they appear to have very little chance of supporting anything very heavy at all.  There is a gap of around 11 cm between the bottom of the beams and the upper surface of the ceiling itself.  Does anyone have any experience of dealing with this problem? 

Firstly can I say thanks very much for all this help - I really appreciate it! We have been into the loft.  There appears not to be any sort of pump/motor from the fire itself - just ducting.  This is somewhat torn/split in places so presumably not much use anyway until we repair it or replace it.  So a pump etc specifically for the ducting seems to be required from what has been said so far.  The insert fire itself does not have any sort of electrical switch anywhere near it.  The only thing we have never managed to work out a purpose for on the fire is a little black knob in the top right hand corner just above the glass door which appears not to do anything and although it appears it should perhaps pull in and out actually hardly budges at all.  The electrical unit I mentioned before has VMC P written on it and is then connected to a junction box mounted on a roof beam.  The trunking coming into it comes from the kitchen and toilet.  Nothing from the original bathroom vent and the second bathroom seems to have been converted from another room anyway and has no ceiling vent.  We can´t see any switches on the unit and it makes no noise, however it had fallen onto it's outlet so stood little chance of working anyway as the outlet is not vented anywhere and so seems to just empty into the loft space. I have been looking at the fuseboard and once again I'm a little lost as quite a few of the words are obscured or faded.  There is one 10A fuse which seems to be for something which could say "venti famon" although the second word is practically unreadable and I can't imagine what it should be.  I´ve put a new fuse in just in case it wasn't working and we will go back up to check for any signs of life in the unit tomorrow.  As a matter of interest, the "converted" room which is now a second bathroom seems to be referred to as Debanas on the fuseboard.  Can anyone hazard a guess as to what that might actually mean?  I think we'll take the opportunity of labelling the fusebox up more clearly while we are at it! Unfortunately, going into the loft uncovered our next problem so now I´m off to post again.  Thank heavens for this forum is all I can say...

There was already an insert multi-fuel burner fitted into our house when we bought it.  The previous owner explained the grille in the chimney breast and vaguely described trunking in the loft to feed hot air into other parts of the house.  We only had the fire lit a few times last winter but didn´t really notice any heat in any other parts of the house, although there are ceiling vents in the hallway, kitchen and bathrooms. However whilst organising a satellite dish we have been into the loft and notice that, as well as metres of silver trunking everywhere, there appears to be some sort of electrical unit connected to the system.  Does anyone know the principle of how these systems work?  Should there be a switch somewhere to turn this unit on and off?  The vent in the kitchen is somewhat different to the others, larger, directly over the hob and with a pad of filter material.  Any ideas on that one?  Is it just another version of the other vents or intended to work as an extractor in some way?  The electrical unit I mentioned is in fact more or less above this particular vent too. If this is some sort of vented system it seems to be inherently inefficient surely if hot air rises anyway?  Or should the pump be forcing it into the rooms?  

Thanks for the info.  Anyone else with a similar problem might be interested to know antimousse is on offer in Brico Depot at the moment, just over €2 for a large container.  I'll report back if it deals with our staining.

Our house is about 30 years old and is constructed from white-painted rendered brick.  The whole of one end of the building is marked with a deep red stain  in the white paintwork and I have seen something similar on a couple of other houses too.  Does anyone a) know what causes this? b) know how to get rid of it?  We want to repaint the outside but I would hate to think it might come back or even show through the new paint.   Thanks

At the moment our car is Spanish registered, taxed, tested and insured.  We spend a lot of time there, still have our residencia and it generally suits us that way.  We have fully comprehensive lineadireca insurance which includes breakdown cover too.  However, having broken down yesterday and spent many hours constantly getting an engaged signal from their so-called emergency number we have decided to get something equivalent to AA or RAC cover for while we are in France.  I haven´t been able to see any such organisations online.  Does anyone have any recommendations please?  Fortunately we managed to get going at 7am this morning with the help of a charming old French gentleman and his shed full of amazing bits and pieces and no thanks at all to lineadirecta!

We initially found moving to France hard after living in Andalucia for 6 years for this very reason.  There the level of familiarity is much more noticeable, although you would still definitely need to know the appropriateness of certain actions.  Moving to "tu" is quite rapid, much more so than in other parts of Spain, but you have to gauge the move pretty shrewdly!  And two kisses on the cheek is so common that I still have to think twice here as it is very usual on first introduction in Spain on social occasions, almost like the British handshake. But even there I would find it amazing in a commercial situation - the bank teller might be calling you "tu" after a few visits unless you make a point of using "usted" (vous) - sometimes used as a "distancer" in various circumstances (a whole other story) - but any kisses would be most unlikely! All in all I find it easier in France now, "vous" almost invariably (we've never yet got to know anyone where "tu" might be used) and, so far, no kisses!

We seem to be integrating courtesy of a Dutch lady who lives in the village.  She lives on her own and seems to get involved with everything, whatever goes on at the Mairie, local hunting group, demonstrations involving local environmental issues, exhibitions, etc.  I'm talking of a really tiny village, no more than 100 inhabitants.  But she seems to have managed to get us, plus the other English couple in the village, involved with just about everything going on, introduced us to everyone, made us take part in the very limited social life of the village, etc, etc.  Her French is not perfect by any means but she appears to be fearless and knows just about everyone in the place, doing favours for all sorts of people and generally just being a pleasant neighbour to everyone.  I'm sure we would remain "les anglais" under normal circumstances but we seem to have had very little choice here and are regularly included in whatever is happening now.  We also seem to be reasonably well accepted.  It appears the secret seems to be being prepared to join in, once you find out what is happening, ie put aside the English reserve.

We are off to visit some friends in Almeria (Spain) this weekend and they have asked me to bring some Bordeaux Mixture.  They tell me it is used here to treat problems with vines but that it also good for peach leaf curl, which is what they want it for.  Before we head off to the garden centre, does anyone know what I am supposed to be looking for? If it's good I'll buy some for our peach trees, which also have peach leaf curl.  I had read previously that I have to wait until the end of the season to use the usual treatment.  Anyone have any other suggestions though?

We divide our times between the UK and France and our cat comes with us every time.  He hardly seems to miss a beat when he finds himself in different places.  He seems to know which house has the cat door, which one doesn't, where his food bowls are, where his cat acquaintances live, etc, etc.  Of course he can't say so but he seems perfectly happy with the arrangement! He travels in a big cage (large dog size) which fills the back of our MPV and which has his cushion, litter tray and food dishes and we make sure it is placed quite high up with the luggage underneath so he can see us and the passing scenery.  The only time he gets a bit fed-up is if we travel at night and there isn't anything to see.  He does need a pet passport and I have to take him to the local vet for the France to UK run (tick and tapeworm treatment, about €35) but other than that it is a pretty painless trip.  We did get some tranquillisers from the vet for his first few trips but he never needs those now.  The trip, including one of the longer ferry crossings is about 20 to 24 hours but with the large cage he doesn't even need to come out for the UK to France run and only to have his micro-chip scanned when we go from France to the UK. 

Thanks for that.  Yes, I fiddled around last night disabling and enabling firewalls, opening and closing ports, etc, etc. to no avail. The GOOD news is that I seem to have fixed it this morning - I suspect the fear of having to speak to an engineer about all the technical terms in French galvanised me to try more and more options.  The secret appears to be that the Nom de Compte is actually NOT what they tell me it is on the sheet I printed direct from their account set up screen and NOT what their automatic set-up system installed! It is in fact my tele2 email address minus the @tele2.fr.  Absolutely nowhere do they tell you this and I only discovered it by trial and error.  By the way, the right outgoing server port is in fact 587.  I believe it's something to do with the fact that port 25 can't now be used when authentication is needed.  Thanks to everyone who came up with ideas on this, I really appreciate the hand-holding and assistance.  Now on to the next problem - what I need to make my PC interact with the wireless aspect of the livebox...

Thanks for that suggestion.  I've got it set to 587 already though.  I've had my son (an IT specialist in the UK) prying around in my computer via an access site all evening and he can't find anything which should be causing a problem and all he can suggest is a call to Tele2 engineers.  So I'll take my life (and dictionary) in hand tomorrow and give them a call.

Now here's a strange thing - I had already tried this idea of Test Account Settings and it works its way through that right up until it gets to Send Test Email at which point I get a red cross rather than the green tick.  This is in the settings I have entered manually on Outlook, ie all my old email accounts.  The Tele2 account (which has been set up automatically from the Tele2 site) is in Outlook Express and doesn't have this facility.  What it does report in the Tasks and Errors box is this - ERR incorrect password or account name', Port: 110, Secure(SSL): No, Server Error: 0x800CCC90, Error Number: 0x800CCC92. This is becoming really frustrating!  I've set this sort of thing up lots of times with different ISPs and usually manage to work my way round any little glitches eventually but this one has me completely foxed.  

Thanks for the suggestion.  This is the "easy" way Tele2 suggest and I agree it works fine.  However it also means that I can't access our other emails from other ISPs without doing the same with each of their sites.  I need to use Outlook or Outlook Express to do this as an "all in" operation and it's pretty crucial that I should be able to to. I suspect I will be phoning the engineer on Monday - I'm practising the phrases already...

Thanks for the assistance here.  I found Outlook Express BUT it seems I am no further forward!  The new tele2 email addresses had in fact been configured there as Tele2 had said but they don't work on send either.  There is an ongoing request for account name and password which suggests the ones it entered itself are wrong.  I've exported them over into Outlook (and in fact vice versa) and none of them will send.  The info sheets I have printed out confirm the Nomme du Compte they have used in the set up although they seem to have added @tele2.fr on the end. Taking that extra bit out makes no difference either way.  If anyone is able to check via a working Tele2 Outlook/Outlook Express set-up it is a string of 3 groups of four lower case mixed numbers and letters divided by hyphens. Has anyone any further suggestions please?  Otherwise it will be a very tortuous conversation with an engineer at Tele2 on Monday.  They seem to rattle off at hyperspeed talking about acronyms which puzzle me so I'm not sure I will ever get to the bottom of this that way - my French is probably never going to be up to the job.

Thanks for that and I'll look at it a bit later this morning.  Sorry, I forgot the System info.  It is in fact XP Pro.  I have Vista on my laptop and haven't quite got my head round it yet!