bubbles

That's exactly how we like ours too, Clair. And we always buy it in Lidl when we are in France.

Bona fortuna, Teddy and Mrs Trunk. Hasta luego.

According to wikipedia she is just coming up to 43. That is definitely not a spring chicken - more like an old boiler.

sweets, joe king is an orphaned child - also known as no pa king. thought everyone knew that.

Nah, that's cheating and will cut the thread short! Only joe king!

What about "En sortant de l'ecole, j'ai vu mon frere"? That's pretty clear.

Just put it on record. Thanks.

We too stupidly signed an exclusive contract with an agent - and ours was for 6 months! during that time he showed our house to precisely nobody!!! how useless is that. added to that he was very slow to reply to our emails. we couldn't wait for the 6 months to end and had three agents signed up as soon as we were free of them. what we didn't realise until told by one of the new agents was that our exclusive 6 month contract would just continue even after the 6 months was up unless we wrote a cancellation letter. In fact it would have gone on for ever apparently!!!!!!! And, the useless agent still hasn't replied to our email of 6 weeks ago asking how we could best get our keys back from him.

And our Tax d'H was almost 900euros this year! We are moving back to England this week. The sale of our French house is not completed yet and probably won't be completed until the new year. Will we still be responsible for the whole of the Taxe d'Habitation for 2011? This seems unfair if true. I can see that, if one is moving to another property in France, it is a simple solution and a swings roundabouts situation. However, we will be paying council tax on our property in England, starting next week! I just have a feeling that the French 2011 bill will land on our mat this time next year and come as a very nasty surprise. Does anyone know for sure what will happen and if there is any way out of paying next year?

Thanks, Norman. That looks nice. We will be on the N road - going to avoid motorways this time. Use the money we save to splash out on hotels such as this one. Will check whether they are open as you say. Think we might get a little further than that on the first day - Tramontagne permitting!!

Thanks for that, ericd. Sounds good. oops - jut checked it online and apparently it is fully booked for the date we would want. shame - looks good and very reasonable too.

The advert wasn't much good then was it? The whole idea is to make you remember the name I thought.

Thanks, JJ. Unfortunately I can't get that link to work.

We are shortly to undertake this mammoth journey by car for the first time in many years. As it is now out of holiday season we thought we would use the N roads and not motorways. We have plenty of time so thought we would perhaps take 3 overnight stops. The last one we intend to make within 100km or so of Calais so that we can face the final leg of the journey in England after the crossing. Just wondered if anyone can suggest some relaxing, easy-to-find, overnight stops - preferably where we can get a slap-up dinner, bed and breakfast all under the same roof. It would be nice too if there was somewhere to stroll around before dinner and a local shop where we could buy bread and cheese for the following day's lunch. Our route will be: Perpignan-Beziers-Clermont-Ferrand-Moulins-Auxerre-Troyes-Epernay-St. Quentin-Cambrai-Calais. thanks in advance.

I have a feeling that LL was referring to the tv licence bit - not general income tax. In England the licence is free if you are over 75.

I can't remember exactly but I'm sure there was a button to press to ask questions. I asked questions and got answers before I agreed to the bid. Have another try, SW17 - it must be fairly straightforward or I wouldn't have been able to do it! I'm not the world's best at this sort of thing.

A bit like washing hair. Plain lukewarm water - gets it clean and causes no damage!

Their furniture looks really just what I would like. Trouble is we are moving back to UK. Almost tempted to buy some and ship it back. Having looked online there seems to be a lack of sources in England for this type of furniture - probably a little bit upmarket from Ikea but modern and with a quirky look and some panache. Can anyone advise me? There must be somewhere I can find similar pieces in England without paying a fortune. |Any website would be very welcome. Thanks.

We have been told there are no costs for the seller - apart that is from the diagnostic tests. Ours cost 550euros. That should be it!

Lovely story, Chancer.

had to read that twice. but then of course i was...... please keep on sending these funnies. they often seem to arrive when I need them most.

Erm. Are you sure you saw that correctly? I take into account your username!

What an excellent, cunning plan. I'll remember that!

When we changed our British licence for a French one, they gave us something written on a piece of paper just in case we were stopped in the meantime. Can't remember what documents we had to take but it included two photos. We did the deed at our local mairie. There was no cost at all (amazingly) and someone popped a little billet doux into our letterbox to let us know when the French licences were ready for collection.

Does anyone know if this is still going to happen? We are due to fly from Stansted to Gerona on that day so in theory we should be ok (not landing in France). Just getting a bit jittery really.