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Araucaria

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Everything posted by Araucaria

  1. [quote user="EmilyA"]Yes thanks I have done that. Thanks to all, obviously remembered it wrongly from school. Should I blame the teacher, it was only fifty years ago?[/quote] Yes, you should. I really blame my French teacher for not making a better job of teaching me French: after all, it was only just a little more than 50 years ago.
  2. [quote user="woolybanana"]Does this mean that the French are a century behind? One has wondered.[/quote] And everyone in the world except the Italians, then.
  3. Although it's not what I would call a "good read", Jimmy Carter's "The Hornet's Nest" is a novel about the American war of independence, set in the deep south, and it gives a lot of emphasis to the role of the French - both the navy and their land forces - in defeating the British. Here's a quote from an interview with Carter about the book: "The British sought to end a long stalemate in the North by launching their major strategic thrust into Savannah. The troops came from St. Augustine by land and from New York by sea. Once they took Savannah (the most costly of all Revolutionary battles), they moved to secure Charles Town, where almost five thousand American troops surrendered. From Charles Town, General Cornwallis launched his move northward, which was costly but with few lost battles. The heavy involvement of the French navy off the coast at Yorktown and French soldiers by land is what saved Americans from defeat." It's said to be the only work of fiction written by a US president, but I find that hard to credit. [edit] And didn't he get his apostrophe in the wrong place? I don't think hornets are usually solitary. Maybe American ones are different?
  4. It's the same as in the UK. So dates between 1800 and 1899 are in the dix-neuvième siècle. That's because the years 1 to 99 AD were the first century. As far as I remember, the only confusing bit is that it is common in Italy to do it differently: effectively down there they use a word we might translate as (eg) "the fourteen hundreds" to mean the fifteenth century. And of course you can do that in English too.
  5. [quote user="andyh4"]PS:  Do not assume the barn has foundations.[/quote] Indeed - and it might not be the problem you think, but a different one. Our barn had no foundations: as it turned out, it was simply built on the bedrock. But the ground sloped from one end of the barn to the other, and the job of digging out earth from the ground floor (where the previous owner's cows had lived many, many happy lives, to judge by the depth of fossilised manure at one end) was very easy at the downhill end, and at the uphill end it came down to excavating rock. The result was that the last couple of rooms on the ground floor are a step or two up from the others. A mini-digger (all that would fit underneath the beams) just wasn't up to removing a 25cm thickness of rock. I am sure it would have been cheaper to demolish and start from scratch. Indeed, it might even have been cheaper in the long run to have demolished and built an exact replica of the original barn, but with cavity walls, and sensible runs for the plumbing, and a damp-proof course. That's not to say I am unhappy with the actual result. It's just that I might have ended up with a smaller mortgage.
  6. They found traces of pork, too.
  7. I finally got to Mr Bric's stoves department in Aurillac today.  They were very helpful, and they have ordered the parts I need. As far as I was able to tell (and most of Jøtul's on-line parts lists seem to have been translated from the original Norwegian by a monoglot Patagonian) the price was about 60% less than what one of the UK suppliers was quoting. None of the other UK suppliers quoted a price at all, and one UK dealer I phoned offered a non-Jøtul spare ("which you'll have to adapt") for twice the amount I'm paying in Aurillac for the real thing. So thanks again Clair. Mind you, the state of the roads getting there was hair-raising!
  8. [quote user="Hoddy"]I can't imagine how anyone would believe that his LLD was a real one. Nevertheless, the threat sounds real enough, and any woman or child would have had to be made of sterling stuff to stand up to aggressive cross examination by a top QC. Hoddy[/quote] I don't think the threat sounds very real - the Old Bailey is the Central Criminal Court - the one thing you can't do there is sue - that's done in the civil courts. No matter how many friends you have. On the other hand, he actually did sue several newspapers successfully, though I am not sure how many (if any) of the cases actually came to court.
  9. Small update. As far as I know, I'm not being asked to go through the original paper-trail again. My wife is the person who is insured in France, and CPAM say her card is (now) OK. We've not tested it. I'll just have to pay for new photographs and fill in a fairly simple form - I remember it from the last time. The old photo was, well, interesting. It looked just a bit too much like me. The "software upgrade" story has the ring of truth in my view. Our pharmacist hadn't heard anything about it, but when I went back and told her what had happened (and mentioned the fonctionnaire at CPAM saying she must have been negligent in not checking the cards properly between 31 November and now), she rolled her eyes and said "l'administration francaise!" as if that explained everything. I'm guessing that in the last day or so our cards were retrospectively cancelled as of 31 November 2012. The pharmacist was sure they working fine for the last couple of months. And who do you think I believe?
  10. I think it's worth reprinting what the CPS reckons he had actually said to the two policewomen: it sounds so much like him (and maybe it was a recording?). "If this [these allegations] does not disappear then my policy will swing into action. I have an LLD, that's a Doctor of Laws, not an honorary one but a real one. That gives me friends. If I was going to sue anyone, we would not go to a local court, we would go to the Old Bailey 'cos my people can put time in the Old Bailey. So my legal people are ready and waiting. All we need is a name and an address and then the due process would start. I've never done anybody any harm in my entire life. I have no need to chase girls, there are thousands of them on Top of the Pops. I have no need to take liberties......the newspapers consider me to be very boring, I have no kinky carryings on. But because I take everything seriously I've alerted my legal team that they may be doing business and if we do, you ladies [the two female officers] will finish up at the Old Bailey as well because we will be wanting you there as witnesses. But nobody ever seems to want to go that far." I'm surprised the CPS just rolled over and gave up in the face of this kind of absurd bluff and bluster. Perhaps he really did have friends in high places?
  11. Funny day today. I went down to the pharmacy for some meds, and the pharmacist, a helpful woman who I know well, said my Carte Vitale was coming up as "invalid". She'd tried cleaning the chip, and then entered the details on the computer. No, it was "annulé". And what's more, so was my wife's (I'm piggybacked on her E121 as I'm not yet 65). So off we both went to the CPAM in Aurillac. When we eventually reached a fonctionnaire with a computer, we got one of those explanations that explained nothing. Yes, it was right. No, there was nothing wrong. It was because of the old system. In fact, our cards had been invalid since 30 November - we just hadn't tried to have them "mise a jour". The fact that my wife had (succesfully) picked up her meds at the pharmacy last Friday just showed that the pharmacist was negligent in checking our cards. It was because we were migrants. It was a check that was done every three years. It was different now. Shouldn't we have received some notification that our cards had been made invalid? No, that wasn't how it was done: you find out when you're refused. It wasn't because we are migrants: it works the same for French people like her. How often does this happen? Aren't the cards for life? Yes, they are, and you shouldn't have it happen again - unless your country of origin stops making the payments. That's unlikely isn't it? Yes, it's unlikely. They hadn't stopped this time. What should we do now? Nothing. She would just unblock the cards. Tap-tap for five minutes. Madame, your card is OK, you can continue to use it. Monsieur - because the pharmacist tried to make your card "mise a jour" it's now fully de-activated. Give it to me. Tapes it to a piece of paper printed out from the computer, and tosses it into a basket. You'll have to apply for a new one. Yes, I'll give you an attestation (it gets printed out). Here you go. Will they send me a new card? No: you'll soon get a formulaire in the post: fill it out, new photographs, and send it back. Then you'll have you new card. Have a nice day!
  12. I think it is really worth comparing again what the BBC spokeswoman says and what the law says. The spokeswoman puts it like this: "the Government prohibits the BBC from broadcasting BBC One etc. into countries other than the UK" and the law says: "The BBC may use sums paid to it ... to fund any activities properly carried on by the BBC except .... any service aimed primarily at users outside the UK" So the BBC couldn't beam services to France and Spain that were tailored for French and Spanish audiences (or expats in France or Spain). But they don't seem to be under even the slightest obligation to try to restrict the number of people in France and Spain who can receive their broadcasts. It's pretty obvious that the BBC's normal broadcasts are all aimed primarily (the key word here) at users in the UK.
  13. Lacanau Océan sounds very nice - we had a couple of family holidays some years ago a bit further north on Les Landes and it was lovely. We went in high season and it was crowded too. Google Earth seems to have sent its Streetview cars there in winter - looks like every other off-season resort! But compare with the users' photographs taken in summer. Do make a point of going to see the Dune du Pyla just down the coast. There are some wonderful restaurants in Arcachon. And there's the "hydraviation" museum in Biscarosse too - pretty well unique. Biscarosse was where the French had the base for their transatlantic flying boat flights.
  14. So it does Clair - as I'm a frequent visitor to Mr Bric, I'll ask in the garden shop part (it's also Mr Bric) next time I visit. I'd forgotten all about it. Thanks very much!
  15. I've recently bought secondhand a Jøtul Woodburning Stove, the model Number 3. It's in pretty good condition. It was used originally with a rear exit for the flue, and that's how I'll want it too, but from looking at the Jøtul websites there maybe ought to be a special (?) cast-iron collar to accomodate the flue pipe. My stove just has a hole in the back. Can anyone recommend a helpful Jøtul supplier who might be able to get me this part? Alternatively, does anyone know whether the collar is actually needed? I suspect it is, as the flue gases are hottest at this part of the chimney (just as it leaves the fire) and presumably the galvanised chimney that I intend to use would pretty soon burn through.
  16. [quote user="Aly"]If Hollande introduces some kind of US style Tax that applies to all French citizens regarless of  residence. I wonder how many French living overseas especially in London will give up there French passports. [/quote] Very few countries try to tax their citizens regardless of where they are resident, because it makes for so many complications and raises so very little extra tax revenue. I always thought it ironic that the two main countries that do so are the USA and China.
  17. [quote user="PaulT"]I am sorry, but I cannot see how either wind or wave power will not affect the planet in a negative way. Both methods take energy out of either the winds or waves. This surely must have an effect - wind power will be decreased causing a change. Similarly wave power and patterns will be changed. The result changes to wind and sea patterns. There is no such thing as a free lunch, nor free energy. Paul [/quote] Harnessing the tides will make the moon move further away.
  18. Oracle - do you have a commercial interest in evacuated tubes?
  19. I found myself wondering whether the "support and counselling" the two nurses were said to be receiving wasn't a euphemism for something a good deal less friendly - perhaps something like the "words of advice" that policemen are occasionally reported as getting from their superiors.
  20. [quote user="Jonzjob"]OK, I'm by noo means a joiner and I don't particularly like doing joinery, but what, pray tell, is a cross dowel? [/quote] It's that little metal cylinder with a threaded hole though the middle. You put it into a blind hole near an edge (usually) of a bit of self-assembly furniture, and a long-ish bolt goes into it at right angles. It holds furniture together. They are usually necessary because an ordinary wood-screw doesn't hold very well in an end grain (and even less well in MDF). They are similar to the bolts you sometimes find holding together older French beds. But these sometimes have a special nut (with bored holes) that you turn with a short piece of rod, rather than a cylinder that stays put. Thanks again Chancer, I'll keep my eyes open for the hones. I should be all right for the cross dowels, though.
  21. [quote user="Chancer"]............. I have just tried these ones and they arent very well finished, a couple didnt like cutting and got hot, they are all transformed by a couple of minutes with a Lidl diamond hone, a small engineers oilstone would suffice à la rigeur. Are you intending using them for bench dog and vice holes or for counterboring the fixings? [/quote] Well Chancer, originally I thought I would be using them for the dog holes, but my dogs are 3/4", and that's not one of the sizes supplied in the Lidl box. Having tried them out, 20mm is a bit slack, and 19mm (which is within a gnat's whatsit of 3/4") is really just right. So I think the dog/holdfast holes will be done slowly with a flat 19mm bit, and I'll save the forstner bits for counterboring - there will be (if it all goes as planned) a thick strip of wood across the end grain at both ends of bench, held on with cross dowels. Any idea what these (cross dowels, I mean) are called in French? And just when were Lidl selling diamond hones?
  22. [quote user="Kong"]I think you might find the problem is with DNS. If IP addresses have been changed for a particular domain, new addresses are published to the millions of DNS servers throughout the world. It can take hours or days for these updates to propogate worldwide and may not have reached your DNS/ISP. Using different machines on the same internet connection gave me  the same wrong sites, so it's not the machine that is at fault. If you are using windows you can clear the DNS cache in your machine using the command line command: ipconfig/dnsflush. This might help! Kong [/quote] Thanks Kong - that sounds logical. It was just peculiar to see something like that happen and not know why.
  23. What I did was to delete the (Firefox) bookmark, restart the computer, and find the site again (and bookmark it). Now it's back to being a proper weather forecast. Though I do wonder what had happened.
  24. [quote user="Albert the InfoGipsy"]Having had a further search using google.fr I've managed to find this link that works normally. http://france.meteofrance.com/france/accueil/ [/quote] That one takes me to the Network Solutions website. Grrrrrr!
  25. [quote user="Judie"]My saved bookmark for my local Meteo-France weather is fine, so not very helpful, I'm afraid. [/quote] My saved bookmark takes me to a "Network Solutions" website - and I think it suggests that the domain - www.meteofrance.com - is available for purchase (or needs renewing). I'm using Firefox - do you have a different browser? [edit] In my case the address bar just says "http://france.meteofrance.com/france/accueil?xtor=AL-1", which isn't quite what I type in. But I can also get exactly what I thought I wanted - "www.meteofrance.com" in the address bar, but still with the wrong website. Does anyone have the numeric IP address?
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