Taxing Time

Tuesday turned out to be quite a tiring day for two reasons.

Firstly because after my Internet connection finally died at about 3pm yesterday I summoned up my best French and called the euphemistically called Help Line. As I knew would happen, explaining the problem didn’t help, I had to go through their checklist including switching off and then back on the modem and swapping the ADSL line filters. The latter meant disconnecting the telephone line, which in turn disconnected the call to the help centre. By the time I got through again it was of course someone else and my dossier was ‘locked’ and he couldn’t do any further checks. All this palaver goes on at my expense, as it is a pay per min help line. The second guy’s conclusion was that it wasn’t my computer – well I did tell him that – so I would need to have one of their line experts call me; first appointment being Thursday afternoon. So I have a few days without my link to the outside world and oh my goodness do I miss the easy access to news, other blogs and comments and to my friends and family. Yes I know I still have the telephone (so that’s an improvement over the last telephone/Internet problems) but it’s not the same.

Secondly, Ann and I spent the afternoon at the tax office trying to find out what I actually needed to file. It seems that as I’m officially registered as an agriculturice I have a different tax regime. We managed to file one form but in doing so we got given another form and told to fill that one in, take it to another office and ask for yet another form. As far as we could tell, none of theses form were what you and I would recognise as an income related tax form. The form we submitted was the statement of what I had been paid for the sunflower seeds by the cooperative. I was assured that that was all I really needed to submit and my tax would be worked out on that. I’ve been here long enough to be sceptical about anything in the French bureaucratic domain being that simple. We set off for the second office, took out ticket and waited. After quite a wait without the call number changing, we realised that we were next so just went in and waved our ticket – yes we were next. The form we had been sent to get doesn’t come out until the April or May and I was told to come back in June, just to make sure, and collect it then. The form we had been given to hand in, I started to fill in and then pointed out that it appeared to run from the 1^st January 2007 and I had only bought my house at the end of February. Well that was it, I couldn’t submit the form. So it appears I submit 2007’s data along with 2008’s data next year.

I am now confused over things I didn’t even know existed before I went to the tax office but hopefully I should be able to prove that I have been there and trying to pay my taxes if I should pay them this year.

If I though that not having to do my tax return meant I could take it easy I was wrong as an centimetre thick envelope was delivered this week with my DPU PAC. This is the declaration for, I believe, the Common Agricultural Policy (reverse the letters and you get the French version – a rule of thumb that usually works), my land usage payments so I will be working through those. This is what I sent to Agen to do last year on the last day for submission (15^th May). A total panic for me with lovely people who took me from office to office and stamped everything with the 15^th May so that even though I had to take it away and collect other information it would still be counted as submitted on the 15^th.

Tartiflette Time

Back at the beginning of the month I asked a question about using up stored potatoes that were beginning to sprout and mentioned Tartiflette. Well today (Easter Monday) was Tartiflette day. The late post is due to no Internet connection until now (27th). The Internet limped through to 3pm and then gave up the ghost completely.

I’m not too good with recipes and tend to make it up as I go along. If I had worked out the recipe for this one it would have started with ‘take one 5 litre bucket of potatoes’. So basically it is to taste and quantities to fill the baking dish.

First up are the potatoes. These are more or less the last of my ‘Charlotte’ potatoes I grew last year. Why did I grow them? They were all that was left when I went to the shop and the poor things were almost wizened to nothing before I got them into the soil. I was amazed that I got anything from them, but I did, and they have stored well, hold together nicely and taste good when cooked.

So first up, peel and cook potatoes until they are just cooked but not falling apart.

While they are cooking – I had to do mine in two batches as my large pan was being used for something else, I prepared the lardons from the bacon I’d home cured. I cut the bacon into small pieces for two main reasons, firstly to allow the fat to be released and secondly because even though I reduced the curing time I still find the bacon rather salty. This doesn’t matter too much when mixed into the potatoes.

Once the potatoes are done, drain them and then cook the lardons slowly until they have released their fat and are just crisping. Peel and slice the onions thinly and if liked, chop up some garlic.

Then add the sliced onions and garlic if used and gently cook until soft.

While the onions are cooking, slice half the potatoes and place them in a greased baking dish.

Once the onions are well softened, layer half the onion and lardon mixture over the potatoes and pour over some cream. I used UHT cream from my store cupboard this time but I quite often use crème fraiche as I usually have that in the fridge.

Slice the remaining potatoes and place on top, followed by the remaining onion and lardon mix. Then dot the surface with the cheese. The best description of the Tartiflette cheese is a cross between Brie and Camembert. It’s not particularly strong so I quite often add a layer of Emmental too, I’m far too miserly to use any of my more tasty (and more expensive) cheese, usually aged Comté. Then bake until it’s hot through and the cheese has melted and started to brown.

It’s peasant food but it is wonderful on cold evenings along with a glass of red wine.

Easter Sunday

Today has been a really pleasant day doing nothing. Regis and Ann invited me to Regis’s parents house for Easter lunch so after a leisurely meal I returned home replete but really tired. Regis’s parents don’t speak English so I had to really concentrate on understanding and participating in the conversation. Shattered I may be but I’m also really pleased with just how much I did understand, I know I would not have understood anywhere near the amount I did had it been this time last year. There is no way I can rest on my laurels though as I was really frustrated by what I couldn’t say when I wanted to join in to the conversation, so that’s my goal for this year, to be able to speak as well as understand conversational French.

Over the holiday period, my Internet connection has degraded dramatically, If I can get connected it is at half the speed or less than I normally get and by the evening the connection fails altogether. I don’t think this is a fault with the line this time as my telephone line is fine so I guess that Orange are working on the servers yet again. I do wish they would warn users but the worst thing is I expect the outcome will be very similar to the ‘upgrades’ to Microsoft’s operating system.. A whole new lot of functionality that you don’t really need or want, that harbours more bugs and slows the system down. Now all I have to do is wait until I get connected again and then it may let me post this. If last night is anything to go by, I won’t get a line again until the morning.

Easter Beckons

Today I was hoping to get the installation of the hot water system finished but sadly the immersion heater I was told would be here on Wednesday still hasn’t arrived so the plumber and electrician didn’t come. I will telephone them when it has arrived and try and arrange another day for them to finish the work. I thought things were going far to smoothly.

Still on the plus front, I finally remembered which safe place I’d put the camera so I have been able to take a few more photographs. This is the new range cooker complete with shiny new pipes but no chimney and my electric cooker, now wired in. I feel like I have to learn to cook all over again, it’s been more than a year since I had a proper cooker.

Now the wiring is finished, I’ve been able to move a few things back to where they should be and in doing so I uncovered the stored squashes. Some of the butternuts were showing signs of wrinkling so have been made into roasted butternut and red pepper soup – lunches for the next couple of days. The next try out for the electric cooker was a batch of hobnobs. The soup was a success but the hobnobs while tasting fine weren’t quite right. The oven is very fierce and it will take a bit more practice to learn the best heating options and shelf placement. It just means I’ll have to make more hobnobs:-D

This view is of the old sink waiting to be taken out and the new sink unit ready to be put in place and the new sink plumbed in by the plumber when he returns. Everything is now on hold, as until the old sink is removed I can’t place the new sink or the corner unit, visible on the right of the picture of the cookers, and in turn, these two units are taking up space where other things should be. Still maybe next weekend, that running hot water is so tantalising close and still yet so far.

Final picture is of some of the rain clouds coming down from the north. The temperature has dropped a bit but not as much as expected. I think it’s just because the bad weather is taking a bit longer to get here than predicted since again tonight the forecast is for sleet and snow.

Spring Birthday

The first day of spring corresponds with the last of my special birthdays so it’s time to say Happy Birthday to my younger son who is currently based out in Singapore. Hi A hope you had a great day and I’m looking forward to seeing you when you’re back.

No Workmen Today

It’s been very quiet today, as the electrician and plumber won’t be returning until Saturday. The cats have been ecstatic, lounging about where ever they feel and not shooting past strangers in a mad panic.

Since the plumber is moving the pipes around the sink I’ve brought forward the building of the new sink unit so he can plumb in the new sink as well. This entailed a dash to the shops today to buy a sink.

Being France there was a slight added complication. I had to go to Villeneuve first, (about 25 mins south of me) to explain that when my kitchen had been packed into my car a mistake had been made. I should have had one of those end of unit set of shelves complete with pretty little balustrades.. The balustrades come as a separate parcel but have the same order number as the shelf unit. I had been given 2 sets of balustrades but no shelves to put them on.

I thought about trying to explain this on the telephone but decided not to. I’m so pleased I went I to the shop; trying to explain did take a bit of time. Firstly I got told I should have 4 balustrades as each they came in 2 parts for each shelf – no it didn’t. Then they realised that they came as one piece so we went through what I had and what I thought was missing. I can see why some people complain that the French are just difficult. I have another spin on that. I think that the French education system while very good in some ways is actually quite narrow in others. Lateral thinking is not taught, no one thinks out of the box and they only deal with whatever is in their job description.

Once the sales person fully understood she then ‘phoned through to the after sales area and explained it all to the person there so that I didn’t have to go through it all again. Once it was all explained and understood everyone was so helpful. There were no apologies as you would expect, that is not the French way but my shelves are on order as is the piece that fits the feet to the units, I had found one that was broken – the after sales lady actually ordered 2 for me.

That done I then went off to get the sink; it required me to drive within half a kilometre of the house and then another 20 mins to the west. There they had to remove the sink on display as they only kept what they had on display and none in the warehouse. As it is ceramic, 2 large sinks and a drainer, it weighs a ton but the young lad who served me was kind enough to load it into the car and also practiced his English too.

I managed to get round both shops in the morning and then raced home for lunch. The reason for the hurry was that Regis was coming round to put the fertilizer onto the wheat. The soil has dried out but we have rain forecast for the end of the week so the timing is good.

Actually when I say rain I mean hail, snow, sleet and some rain thrown in. This is really worrying for the farmers round here as just about all the plum trees are in bloom and they could lose this years harvest. Lets hope that it’s not as cold as they forecast.

Talking of temperatures, I put the min max thermometer into the little plastic greenhouse yesterday to see what the minimum temperature was overnight. By the time I got back from my trip this morning the temperature in the greenhouse was sitting at 50°C! Needless to say, I opened up the front very quickly. Baked lettuce isn’t one of my favourites.

St Patrick’s Day

Somewhere I read that St Patrick’s day had been moved this year but here in France it was today as usual. On the weather front, it was cooler than yesterday but it was dry all day so I managed to get a bit of the grass mown. The ground is still far to wet to do anything with. I had to re-site the posts for the raspberries and the kiwis as the very strong gusts over the last week had brought all of them down. I just didn’t get time to set them securely the other day. Having done that I then tried to walk back to the house and nearly left my shoes behind, they were totally caked with mud and heavy enough to be pulled off my feet.

In the house, the electrical work is nearing completion. Tonight the power was switched through to the new system so there are working lights and sockets everywhere. I’ll have to sleep with the shutters open for a few nights, when it’s warmer, to see how often my PIR lights are triggered and then adjust them so the cats don’t trigger them. It will be great actually being able to see the keyhole when I try to get back into the house at night. There is practically no light pollution round here, full moons mean wonderful moon shadows and new moons bring blackness but myriads of stars.Tomorrow, the last few lights will be connected, as will the electric cooker and the new telephone points and then the old wiring will be removed or blanked off.

The heating guy might turn up too and move the radiator so I can finally position the wood-burning cooker. But the best bit of all is that I finally have an earth cable that works – no more static shock when I brush the door of the microwave or from the edge of the monitor screens