Tuesday, April 27, 2010
PHOTOS
IT'S OURS!
Friday, April 23, 2010
IT MUST BE TRUE AFTER ALL
Wednesday, April 21, 2010
COULD IT BE TRUE???
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
No wonder the Parisians think of everyone else as hicks
Friday, April 16, 2010
I can't believe it. How can anyone be this stupid?
Wednesday, April 14, 2010
The Physics of Moving
Saturday, April 10, 2010
The Bank Saga - Chapter 483, Section 37, Paragraph 94.82
Ahh, but it's that "when the money appears" that is the continuing problem. Yesterday we stopped by the bank, just to let the banker know we were still there, still waiting for the money thay had agreed to lend us a full four weeks ago. Alors! He had some news! The dossier that had been sent out from Montpelier had surfaced once more, back in Montpelier. It had been sent to our Espéraza address, where of course we no longer lived, having sold that house. (Were you paying attention, monsier le banker?) Instead of forwarding it to our new address, La Poste saw fit to return it to the sender. The banker said we were lucky that it wasn't just thrown away - a disturbing comment on the reliability of the postal service, eh?)
So he sent email to the Montpelier bank, directing them to send it directly to him, personally, at the bank in Espéraza. So we are again - still - waiting, but this time with a new and different story. Stay tuned; we'll see what they come up with next.
Now, I think if I were a banker, and I had clients who were selling one house, moving to a second one temporarily, and buying a third one, the very last place I would have chosen to send the dossier would be to the house being sold and moved out of. It's not like this was not known to him, since documents outlining the date of the sale of that house, the amount of money to be realized, etc, had been provided and talked of in detail.
On the brighter side, spring is here to stay, the orchards in and around Nojals are now clouds of white blossoms. Oh, another little thing. I was a bit sad thinking that when we left Espéraza we would no longer be living in an AOC wine region. But not true! Nojals is in fact in the Nergerac AOC wine region. We learned this at the notaire's office, it being mentioned as part of the description of the location of the house. So we're moving not just from the Aude to the Dordogne, not just from the Languedoc-Roussillon Region to the Aquitaine Region, but from the Blanquette de Limoux AOC wine region to the Bergerac AOC wine region.
Salut!
Sunday, April 4, 2010
Soooo, just how large an overdraft can YOU write??
Saturday, Bergerac
While lunching at a Chinese buffet today, John's phone rings. It's the estate agent, who has talked to the banker this morning, to whom he delivered the news that he had not received the magical – and seemingly ephemeral - papers. He tells us that the banker has come up with a workaround solution – he wants to give us an overdraft line for 47,000 euros. Yikes! That's certainly an overdraft arrangement larger than any I've ever been offered. But apparently not unheard of, since the banker says that this is actually over their limit for overdrafts, which is set at 40,000 euros. I am not making this up. But, Hey Ho, why not? It seems that otherwise we could sit here in limbo forever, waiting for the fictitious mailings to arrive. At any rate, Mikael, or agent says that the notaire might possibly be able to fit us in on Wednesday morning. So, instead of trudging back to Ste. Colombe on Tuesday as we had planned just this morning, we will be staying at least through Wednesday. Which means we can keep an appointment with another bank. We're trying to open an account at a local bank, in Beaumont. We stopped in their office on Thursday morning and asked to open an account. Of COURSE this could not be done on the spot. Could we come back at 3 in the afternoon? Yes. But wait, this is too easy and Yes, here comes the hitch - a colleague walks by this woman's office and points out that whoever does such things is not free that afternoon. Much calendar checking ensues. The first available appointment is the following Wednesday afternoon at 5. What is it with banks? What on earth takes up so much of their time that they can't open an account in less than a week? Ah well, we say Yes, with the caveat that we may have to cancel if we are no longer in the region by then. I almost called this morning to cancel that appointment, but we didn't have the phone number with us. Just as well we didn't. So it looks like things may progress. We'll see. I am quite fed up with all this, I must say.
Meanwhile, we went to a local home-decorating store this morning to have a look at possible floor coverings to replace the hideous and grubby olive-green carpet in the tower bedroom. There's a lovely wool pile that looks gorgeous, but maybe it's too light, being an off white. More stores are available.
But maybe we can start thinking that things will work out and that we will actually own this house before too long. (I'm almost afraid to get my hopes up.)