Ticks in Boxes

No, not the type of ticks that give you diseases, but the check marks you make to say it has been DONE and DUSTED! I  could have called this blog "Checks in Boxes" but you would have thought someone was sending me money! I wish!

Anyway....We received today an e-mail from the Bank Manager to say that we have a BANK ACCOUNT! Yay! This follows close on the heels of my letter to him asking why we dont yet have one. It has been six weeks! Surely they dont need 6 long weeks to verify who we are, all the time we are sending this bank money and they are paying our bills for us?? Well, guess what, Petal! C'est France!:)

So, Check Mark in that box.

Another Check Mark is in the Electricity Connection box. Waz just had that conversation with the French company's English speaking help line! yay! DONE! We are officially connected.

Check Mark is in the Vehicle Purchase box....we have had that for a week tomorrow. We love our new-to-us car, and being a diesel vehicle, it drinks slowly!:) Excellent, considering the mileage we are doing right now between the two houses...house-sit and ours, an hour and a bit west of here.

Check Mark the House Purchase...We sign the final Acte de Vente next Friday. We will be formally given the keys, and become the official owners. It is normally a 6 week to 3 month process, depending on whether there is a mortgage involved, and how long it takes to get all the documentation and diagnostic reports done. As ours is a cash sale, it has taken less time, but would have taken less still, if their Notaire (Lawyer) hadn't come up with the SAFER (Agricultural clause saying any local farmer can purchase the property if they wish to increase their farm holdings...old law!) which put a bit of a spanner in the works, as you might have read on this blog.

We have sold our US car to other boating Kiwis living in the USA, so Check Mark that box.

We have arranged shipment for our Apartments-worth of 'stuff', to France, and arranged shipment of our household goods from NZ to France, a couple of weeks later...Check Mark THAT box.

We just have to fill in all the details in two languages and estimate a replacement cost! sigh! Fortunate that the companies we are dealing with already have those items translated, but we will have to add some boxes onto their list, I'm thinking. We do have rather a lot of unusual 'stuff'.

We have also concluded the Car Insurance, Personal Disaster Insurance (esp. for me!! Disaster Dora) and now the House Insurance. Check Mark those two.

Water connection has been done by our Realtor, bless him! Yes, another Check Mark.

Have I forgotten something??

Yes! The Internet and phone have also been set up! I told you that yesterday.


We have managed to get ourselves sorted through the use of both English and French. Mostly French, I might say, but we spend a fair amount of time using google translate to make sure every document we receive and have to sign, we know what is being said and what we are signing for. It pays!

Our Notaire will help us with our French Wills, next week and that will be another check mark in a box, and a most necessary one too. I think I have told you why we need this, but to reiterate, we need a French Will to dispose of our French Owned stuff, so that our children and next of kin are not burdened by Death Taxes, and we are invoking NZ law, which we can do, in this case. However, we also  want a charity to benefit from the proceeds of our property sale, so that is something we need to discuss and put into action.

It is interesting that I feel I have come full circle.
Back in 1981, I came to France for work purposes. To East Paris, to be more precise, and while I only had my school girl French to work with, I got by, in an area where most people spoke only French.

I felt as if I belonged here, then. I have felt like that each time I have returned (this is my 7th visit). While it has been an agonizing decision in some respects, it doesn't really surprise me that we are ending up here. We did think we might settle in gorgeous Bretagne, but after being in the wide open spaces and glorious countryside in the northern Dordogne/Perigord Nord, and then driving through the vine covered hills and stunning far-views of the Charente, we knew we had found somewhere we could enjoy living.

We just went for a walk, and though the wind is cold and we should have worn hats, the day is glorious and the countryside worth taking the time to stop and enjoy.


Looking a bit like a wild woman, we took off for my 3rd attempt to get my haircut, this morning. I am as nervous a haircut victim as I am a car passenger. I had to deliberately unfold my fingers, while sitting in the chair, so as to assure my cutter that I wasn't nervous. Good thing I had drawn pictures of how I wanted my hair cut, because if ever there was a time I needed French language, it was this morning.
Not only was I already shampoo'd when my cutter entered the salon, but everyone was gabbing away at high speed (as they do), while I was trying to keep up with the 'general' discussion. The young man who cut my hair works in the salon with his mother, and she was annoyed that he was late for my appointment, and was rambling on about boys! lol..I told her how many sons I have, and she commiserated:)  The young man took charge of HER haircut, when he came into the salon, and did exactly what I would have done, to the victims hair...except that I wouldn't have used thinning or feathering shears! Lazy man's hair cutting tools, IMO!

Anyway, I was robed and wet headed and ready for whatever came next. I figured that it could look ok, or it could be a disaster, but it definitely needed cutting, no matter what.
The result isnt too bad, but I had to stop him using a hairbrush to straighten my curls. My hair is fine, so when it is brushed along with a blow dry, it goes dead straight. I showed him how I used my fingers to 'scrunch' my hair to achieve the desired curl directions. Too late, hair was already mostly dry, so the hair is mostly straight.
I think I needed a bit of lipstick on for the photo. I look a bit tired! Here is the haircut fresh from the Coiffeuse.

We got home at almost noon, and immediately put the pumpkin soup on to heat. We had purchased a fresh Baguette Cereal in Verteillac, while there, and I cut this to go with the soup.

Waz had spent his time waiting for me in Le Calice, our café/bar of choice in the town. I joined him there after the haircut, for a cup of grand crème...his second!

This is the last of the soup from the freezer. We are now counting the days until we leave, and food buying accordingly.

The freezer is almost bare, so our food choices will be a bit more immediate from now on.

I took my camera on our walk today. Enjoy our local views.
I love the coq on the top of the wind vane on this house next door...it's for sale, BTW...a real Moulin! Mill.

 I have watched these tulips come out of the ground, and today they have blooms appearing!

 These two fellas are off to fish in the Etang. It isnt a lake, but it is too. It is a smaller lake or body of water. I have no idea what fish they catch there, but think it might be Carp.

 The animal feed (Maize) has been here forever, we are told. It might last until the farmer needs more feed, except that he has now let his cows out to graze, we noticed. They have been in the barn for the best part of the winter...at least since we have been here.

  These lovely green and far reaching views, even though we are on the flat. Lots of tractors out finishing off their fields before planting the summer crops. That wind is still cold, but there is now some heat in the sun in the shade.

 The farmer is spreading gravel on his road into the farm.

 Looking the other way, can you see the archway over the road, in the middle of the photograph?  We havent actually walked that far. It seems rather a private space, between two homes. The stone wall in the foreground is fairly old, we think.

 Just outside the Hamlet is this cross. Normally crosses are found at Cross-roads, or 'Carrefour'. This one is dated 1903, according to Waz.

 The mill pond leading the to Mill Race, being fed by the Etang, we think. The lilies and bull rushes are now growing in the pond, which has quite a strong water flow.

 Someone has recently purchased this pile of rocks and work has begun to restore it. We will come back in the next year to find it lovely again, no doubt, but there is a HUGE amount of work needed to restore it. This is at the beginning of the Hamlet (Hameau).

 There is a lot of traffic coming through this main road in the Hamlet. We are on a main road from a small town, some 7 kms away.

 Leaning over the neighbors fence to see the shoots and buds on her Hyacinths. They are later blooming than most of the others in the neighborhood, strangely, because they get plenty of sun in her front garden.

HER neighbor's house. I love the starkness of this front door and wall.

 On the loop that we walk.

 Dandelions peeking around the front door shutter:) Such happy faces.

Waz is putting the kettle on, and we are making plans to go to our house again tomorrow. The Plumber will be there to service the Boiler (necessary for the house sale) and has been asked to look at the upstairs loo that doesn't work.  We are going to install some upper cabinets in the kitchen until we are able to redo the kitchen...might be a while, in the scheme of things.

We need to go via Leroy Merlin, tomorrow, and pick up the flat packs of cabinets. Cant beat 25 euros for some cabinets, can you?  We should arrive at our house around noon..just in time for lunch:)

Toodaloo for now...I think Im tired again! Too much thinking will do that for you, lol.