A busy week

Lots of running around and organising things has been going on this week chez Jennyta. For various reasons, not least of which is 'because we want to,' we have decided that we want to up sticks and move to France; not next week, you understand, but in the not too distant future.
So this week, I have been mainly meeting with estate agents and showing them round our palatial mansion, resulting in an interesting range of reactions and suggested prices.
One wanted us to practically re-decorate the whole house and redesign the front garden for her to take it on board, whilst another quoted a suggested asking price considerably less than the others and hoped I hadn't spent too much on having the conservatory built, with the inference that it would have been a waste of money as regards selling the house. He spent most of his time enthusing about France and telling me about his recent holiday there before apparently realising that he needed to be somewhere else, as he put it 'to ruin someone else's afternoon.' Naturally, we want to sell the house and so are all in favour of a realistic price but we also don't want to give it away!
Anyway, the choice of estate agent has now been made and the HIP (Home Information Pack) ordered and paid for - with gritted teeth - and a programme of touching up, brightening up and tidying up has begun.
Now the good side of this, from my point of view anyway, is that all the estate agents, without exception, suggested that it might be a positive selling point if NASA were no longer commandeering the living room. Now that Keith has his new laptop, a little twist to his arm has persuaded him that the PC can now be moved upstairs to the study to do duty as a server and the living room can finally become a 'proper' living room.
My dream of achieving the minimalist look may at last become a reality!

End of an era

Three months ago, Keith decided to throw in the towel and give up the shop. The lease was coming to an end and the new rent was going to be increased by 50% whilst business was decreasing, in common with the experience of most other small businesses, so he went mobile. The shop still needed clearing, however, which is gradually being done, but yesterday, it was all hands to the pump (in a manner of speaking), as we dismantled the fixtures and fittings ready for Keith and Giles to transport them to their new home in 'Sath London'.
So that's where Keith has been today - a long trip to London and back, and now, completely exhausted, he is tucked up in bed, snoring away to his heart's content.
A good day's work.

Back again

Yes, I know I have been conspicuous by my absence for a few days but I just haven't been in the mood for blogging, I'm afraid. A distinct lack of energy and motivation has been the problem, which could just be a bit of reaction to what happened in France as Keith has been similarly afflicted. However, I haven't been languishing on the sofa doing nothing, oh no. There have been the insurance claims to sort out, which fortunately, have been fairly straighforward, so we have now replaced our laptops and GPS, which just leaves the phones.
Now that's another story. We have a contract with a company called Challenger, and boy is that name appropriate. It started off all-right. We were given new sim cards in loan phones (the size of small house bricks, but they work) and told that our account handler would be in touch when he returned from his holiday. That was a week ago yesterday. Since then, Keith has managed to speak to him twice, each time to be told that he was just about to go into a meeting and would return his call afterwards. You can guess the rest.
So, ever the impatient, I decided to take the bull by the horns and ring the company myself.
"Oh, hasn't he got back to you yet?" the receptionist tutted. I'll send him an email right away and I'll email his boss too."
"I'd be glad if you could do that," I said. "Keith needs his phone and especially the mobile broadband for work and it's causing him problems not having it."
Another day passed.
Today I tried again.
Again the receptionist commiserated with me and announced that she would put me through to the boss, only to report seconds later that, guess what, he was on his mobile, but he would return my call as soon as he had finished.
Half an hour later, I decided that he must have finished his call by now and rang again, this time to be answered by another of the office staff who toddled off to find out what was going on and came back saying...yes, you've guessed it... our account handler would ring me back before the end of the day.
I am presuming she meant midnight, as I am, yet again, still waiting.
Tomorrow, they ain't gonna know what hit them.
Jenny is not happy!

Re-grouping forces

We have a few jobs which need doing on the RV. It is under warranty, so it will be going back to Telford, where we bought it, to have the starter motor looked at (a bit sluggish when we stop and then want to start again within a few minutes, the fridge door repair redoing and the electric window on the driver's side, which conked out during our short trip. As the RV is left hand drive, this was a potential problem for those times when we couldn't avoid 'autoroutes payages'. However, Keith to the rescue, as always. With the help of a washing line I just happened to have on board (Be prepared!), he effected a workable repair which, however, meant that he needed his two hands to close the window so he had to choose his moment carefully.
We also want to get it fitted to use LPG, which will reduce fuel costs quite a bit.
That leaves the question of what to do to to ensure that we get no more break-ins. The lock on the driver's door, which Keith doesn't actually use anyway, is very basic, as we have now discovered, so that will have to be upgraded and perhaps a deadlock fitted also.
Then there was talk of Keith keeping a baseball bat beside the bed and starting blocks on my side so that I can get off to a good start when chasing the intruders. Further discussion with Elder Son (who is in the Royal Engineers) has thrown up a few more interesting possibilities.
"Mace sprays are legal in France," he suggested, but Keith reminded him that, in such a confined space, it would affect us as badly as the intruders. So then he suggested stun guns, to which Keith, getting fully into the spirit of the moment, added the possibility of a Thompson sub-machine gun.
Oh and we need razor wire around the rear ladder and an electric current through the door handles. Now we just need to check if the good people in Telford can do all that for us.
Well, it is still under warranty.

Robbed!

Well, outside it is raining. Inside television is on and we are half watching 'Breakfast' on BBC. Bet you didn't think we'd be able to get British television down in the south west of France. The fact is that we are no longer in France, but back at home.
On Friday evening, we pulled up at one of the 'aires' beside the A70 for the night. This is quite usual in France. 'Aires' are sometimes the equivalent of our service areas and sometimes quite small picnic/resting areas but they are almost always well maintained, landscaped etc and people do use them to stay overnight if they are on a long journey in a campervan/motorhome etc.
This one was fairly large and very busy. I had forgotten when we booked our crossing that the first weekend in August is when the French depart like lemmings, hurling themselves down the motorway to the south for their holidays, so traffic was heavy, the aire was busy and there were comings and goings all night.
But despite all the people who came and went that night, it seems that we were the only ones targeted for robbery. Sometime during the night, while we were peacefully slumbering, some s***s took a screwdriver to the lock on the driver's door of the RV and let themselves in. They then proceeded to rifle through all the cupboards and lockers in the living area and relieved us of our two laptops, our mobile phones, the GPS, a pair of binoculars and, for some reason, our picnic set, before popping into the bathroom and collecting my watch and earrings, which were both absolutely worthless. The laptops, of course, have english keyboards, so would not be much use in France. They left all the cupboard doors open but did have the consideration to close the driver's door when they left. We discovered the deed when we got up at seven in the morning.
I have mentioned before on this blog, I think, that if I were escaping a burning house, the two things I would take with me are my laptop and my mobile phone so, as you might guess, I was less than happy. What I am tremendously relieved about is that something had prompted me to hide my bag in the cupboard beside the bed that night, which I hadn't done on previous nights, so at least we still had our money, ferry tickets, passports, credit cards etc and I had my business mobile phone in there too.
The police were good and describing what had happened and giving a statement in French took my mind off things for a few minutes, but for me, the holiday was spoiled. The doorlock still worked but was obviously insecure so we made the decision to come back home, although with mixed feelings. Keith felt that cutting short our holiday was giving in to the thieves but I knew I would not be able to relax until the lock had been replaced with something more secure.
Oh well, you can't win 'em all, it seems.

Let's get this show on the road!

My counselling session with my last client of the day ended at 7.30pm and at eight o'clock, we were on the road, first to extricate the RV from its resting place, then to begin our journey to Bristol to visit Dad. By half past midnight, we had reached last service station on the M5 before the turn off onto the M4 and pulled up in the lorry/caravan park for the night. A peaceful night's sleep and we were ready for the last few miles. The ring road taking us past Asda, we decided we might as well fuel up for tomorrow's journey to Dover there and then and so we did.
An interesting experience, fuelling the RV. For one thing, it has to be a fuel station that is wide enough between rows of pumps and ideally, one which is drive-through. This one was except that the drive through bit was rather on the narrow side, although there was an open gate just at the back of us which would take us straight back onto the road. So I explained to the nice lady on the till that this is how we would leave and that I would come and pay her when we had filled up, rather than attempt to squeeze past her kiosk and she readily understood the logic of that.
It's amusing to watch people's reactions to this beast of the road. Some squint at it sideways, pretending that they are not really looking at all, while others apparently ignore it completely, which does make one wonder about the results of their last field vision test, and some just gaze open-mouthed. You can almost lip read their thoughts.
"What do 'e think he'm doing bringin' that thing down they narrow roads, then?" (Imagine the broad Bristolian accent if you will.)
Then there was the young lady who pulled up right behind us just as Keith was about to reverse. I signalled to her that we needed to back out and she looked at me in disbelief, before reluctantly backing her car about two feet. Eventually, the penny dropped and she reversed some more and drove over to the next row of pumps, possibly helped in her decision by Keith revving the engine as if he intended to gently edge her out of the way if she didn't move quick sharp.
All good fun!
Tomorrow, we're off back to France and Giles is looking after the house and - I hope - keeping my potatoes and tomatoes watered, if the rain doesn't do it for him.

Camel into the eye of a needle

We took charge of our RV on Friday and decided to road test it over the weekend, so off we went into Snowdonia and ended up on Anglesey - Beaumaris, to be precise. (It was at this point that I discovered that I had forgotten my camera so had to use my mobile phone for photos.) The RV is left hand drive and quite wide and it's a bit like sitting up in the front of a coach. You feel as if it is way over the white line down the middle of the road and that your half is going to get sliced off by oncoming traffic at any moment. You are relieved that you have recently made your will.

However, I eventually discovered that the bottom wing mirror was very useful for checking where the right hand wheels were with regard to the white line and my blood pressure reduced considerably. So did Keith's as I was no longer screeching at him to 'Move over!!!' and he was no longer having to assure me that he was nearly in the gutter.

Beaumaris was lovely - peaceful, surprisingly not too busy, sunny and hot. The RV performed beautifully and it provided a chance to check on things we might need for our forthcoming trip back to France.

Coming back and parking it at Keith's other house was the perfect end to a perfect weekend. Well, it was eventually, but there was a point at which I was convinced that the vehicle was going to end its days stuck crossways in the road. I would have taken photos of that too, but was too busy hopping around, checking available space on either side of the gateway (very little) and relaying instructions from Giles, at the rear, to Keith, in the driver's seat. He did it though. Next time, we just need to remove the gate and gatepost on one side and the tree on the other. Simple!