Eating chocolate

There is a programme on Sky 3 called 'The Secret Life of Suburbia'. I stumbled upon it by accident the other evening, whilst searching for something mindless and trivial to watch and decided to have a look as it seemed likely to be one of those quirky peeps into eccentric lives that television is sometimes quite good at. This week it featured housewives; those who love housework and make it the centre of their everyday lives, those who do it because they have to and because their husbands are unbelievably idle and can barely dress themselves without help (one of those in this programme) and those who are chasing self-sufficiency and the good life.
But then there was one lady who really grabbed my attention. She was 50 but looked at least ten years younger, had the figure of a twenty year old and
SHE EATS NOTHING BUT CHOCOLATE!
How can that happen? We saw her piling handfuls of chocolate into her supermarket basket, stacking it all in her own special cupboard and tucking into it at the table when the rest of her family was eating a normal meal. Although she cooked the meals, she had to ask her husband to taste the food to make sure it was ready; not a mouthful of ordinary food seemed to pass her lips.
Yet she was enviably slim, had no spots or greasy hair and generally looked wonderful.
How unfair can life get???

Positive marketing

When I took the forms and identification into the estate agency, there before me was the young man who had taken the photos and written up the description of our house.
"Was the write up OK, then?" he foolishly enquired.
"Well, actually, it is a bit boring," I said. "We could do with more of an upbeat description, maybe a few 'very attractives', 'viewing highly recommendeds' etc. We do want to sell it after all and in the current climate..."
To his credit, he took it on board, especially after I had assured him that my criticism was 'nothing personal.' So now, it's back to a couple of days intensive housework as Keith has now managed to transform my bureau into a close copy of NASA. I wonder if he might be persuaded to move into the RV for the duration?
Only joking... really!

Desirable residence for sale

Well, the sign is up (Ar werth is Welsh for For Sale) and we have received the other photos and details of the house to check over. This is the information which will be given out in leaflets to anyone who shows an interest in chez Jennyta. Reading through it, I was struck by the mediocrity of the description. 'Damned with faint praise' is the phrase that sprang to mind. Could they not have said, 'Internal viewing strongly reccommended' and scattered a few 'delightfuls' around? I know it's not a country mansion but it's not bad, you know!

The other thing that annoyed me is that the estate agents require sight of, for example, our passports, driving licences, utility bills, bank statements - choose two from the above to prove that we are who we say we are. It's getting to the stage now where we practically have to undergo a CRB check to undertake all but the simplest of operations.

I mean, do we look like squatters???

Car boot sales

Sunday and yesterday were busy. I persuaded Keith that it would be a good idea to sell some of the stock from the shop at a car boot sale, and after he got tired of being nagged, he agreed, so off we set at some unearthly hour to a large local sale. What amazed me was the number of eastern European people around. At one point, I couldn't hear anyone speaking English within earshot. The people on the next pitch to us obviously had Welsh as their first language, the rest were - well, Polish and maybe other eastern European nationalities, but all were polite and courteous and spoke at least some English.
What amazed Keith was that I allowed him to have a bacon, egg and sausage bap - at least on Sunday. When we went back on Monday, I had it all organised, and had made nice, healthy salad sandwiches. Well, no point spending the profits!

The RV comes back home

Today we went back to Telford to collect the RV after it had had the outstanding jobs done on it. It was lovely to see it again - and made me wish we were off on our travels again immediately instead of (hopefully) in late September. Yes, gluttons for punishment, but as Keith said, we can't let the ******* who robbed us get the better of us. I suppose it's a bit like getting back on a horse or a bike after falling off and anyway, we need a fact-finding tour to check out where we want to live when the time comes.
The RV lives at Keith's Dad's house, which is at present being done up, and it is a very snug fit, so the usual practice is to ask Giles to pop over and shout out the relevant instructions for guiding it into the garden. Today however, he was unobtainable, which meant that the whole responsibility fell on the shoulders of yours truly. Two problems:
1. Keith can't hear me when I shout instructions from the rear of the vehicle.
2. I'm not sure what instructions to shout.
I know what I want him to do, but I don't know how to tell him how to do it. For instance, 'left hand down a bit' - does that mean that the wheels will turn left or right and consequently, will the van go left or right? 'Full lock' - well what on earth does that mean?
We managed to get it in without too much trouble but I need to have a set of meaningful instructions to shout out - oh and a megaphone to do it with.

Serrurier, anyone?

A very nice man came to do the energy assessment of the house for the HIP yesterday (that's the Home Information Pack - yet another of the government's 'jobs for the boys' and means of extracting ever more money out of us). As I say, he was very pleasant and even changed into another pair of shoes to come into the house in case he made the floors dirty. Apart from that, he prowled round the outside of the house for a few minutes, counted the radiators, looked at the boiler and stuck his head into the attic space to check on the insulation. Money for old rope, really. I was tempted to ask him if there are any vacancies in his line of work.
Then he told me that the highest score any house can possibly get is about 66% as the system is set up to take account of the years ahead when houses will be ever more energy efficient, but not a lot of people know this. Given that, according to estate agents, very few people bother to read the HIPs anyway, those who do are perhaps not going to be terribly impressed by a reading of 66% or less.
Anyway, to get the the title of this post. Keith is now getting very excited and is wondering about taking his van with him when we go to live in France so that he can carry on with his business. He has spent a few hours this morning searching for auto-locksmiths in France and has not come up with any. I told him the word for locksmith is 'serrurier'. Try saying that after a few glasses of vin rouge and pronouncing the 'r's properly!

It's all going on!

It's been a hectic few days. On Sunday, I decorated the bathroom - yes the whole room in a day, including popping out to buy some nice little colour co-ordinated accessories for the finishing touches. Then there were the paint touch ups around the house, tidying up the garden, chucking a few plants in strategically placed pots and.... the big one, dismantling NASA and putting it in temporary retirement in the shed. Not for nothing am I a fervent desciple of 'House Doctor'!