The week kicked off with a phone call from a former client.  A client who had seen every house in her budget range in the local area; and was still renting.  My heart sank - please God, she didn't want to start looking again.  Fortunately not, her sister wanted to sell her holiday home, which she had bought two years ago, refurbished and then gone back to Tokyo, never to return.  We met up and she took me around.  All of the furniture was covered in white sheeting.  Shades of Miss Haversham...  My client told me how much her sister had paid for the house and I was stunned into almost silence - a loss of E80 000 was easily achievable over today's property prices.  I promised to do an Analyse Comparative du Marche and we had a very jolly lunch.

If you want to bring your animal with you to France from the UK, there are various rules and regulations which apply. 

When you bring a car into France from another country and intend staying for over 6 months, then the car must be formally registered with the French authorities.  Your registration plate (immatriculation) will be changed to a French one, bearing a unique reference together with the number of the Department in which the car has been registered.  The only exceptions to this rule are people who commute from a neighbouring country for work and EU students who are studying in France.

Speaking as an English person, when one of my compatriots sees a few holes in a piece of furniture, their blood turns to ice and they hiss 'woodworm' through clenched teeth.

We in the South West are made of sterner stuff.  Woodworm are literally the small fry when you put them in company with termites and capricorns.  Woodworm, left to their own devices,  don't make houses unstable.

It is my birthday today.  Early morning heralded thunder and lightening followed by torrential rain.  Happily followed by cards and presents - Rick Stein's Coast to Coast (must start cooking something from all of my cook books or at my great age I am never going to get through them all) and chocolates.

There are four types of French dogs.  There are handbag dogs, hunting dogs, tied up dogs and dogs on the loose.