Day 27

I am pleased to say that we are  now back up to date.  This will conclude TODAY'S events and I am pleased to say that it will be posted in the usual manner as we are now back on the information super highway.  The phone technician came by and had us up and running in no time.  I had sent my wife off to work and dropped the kids at school in just enough time to meet the man from the telephone company.  He was a very nice young man who went about his business in a very quiet fashion.  With few words spoken, he checked to be sure we were online and then made a quick and quiet exit.

Now it was my understanding that once the phone situation had been resolved, the satellite television would be operational.  I can report that it is now 12:35 in the morning and the satellite is still not operational.  I can only presume that this will require yet another technician to come by the house to sort this out.  After my visit with the phone company, I returned to my work.  As boxes become emptied and items find new homes, what was once Madam Chabou's house is starting to feel like my own.  I believe that by tomorrow evening, all boxes will be disposed of and I can return my attention to the remaining painting that still needs to be finished.

The best part of any move is when the house you are in starts feeling more like your own than that of the prior occupant.  For me, the biggest part of that is olfactory.  I still get a hint or two of Ristine's presence, but it is already starting to smell like home.  I suppose now is as good a time as any to describe some of the oddities, both good and bad, of our new domicile.  The first I have already mentioned.  Having to lock and unlock all the doors with a key from the inside is frankly a pain in the ass.  It takes half an hour or better to make sure this place is secure at night.  There are 7 doors leading to the outside of the home and each has a different key.  The front door actually has two keys.  Anyone who has been in my home back in the States knows that securing several exit doors is a part of my nightime routine, but this is getting rediculous.  In addition, since we only have one set of keys, it will likely take a big chunk of my children's college fund to generate a second set.

The second feature of the home that we have yet to conquer is the stove.  It is a touch screen affair that doesn't seem to work at all.  Apparently, after some further inquiry, we discovered that it is infact and induction stove that requires a special pot.  None of which we have.  Great.  Looks like we will be hitting the ole Auchan for another shopping spree after all.  A third feature is the naked light bulb.  What I mean by this is, that most homes in the area are not equiped with light fixtures.  It is apparently quite traditional to simply have a wire hangin out of the wall with a lightbulb at the end.  That pretty much describes all of our lighting with the exception of the chandelier in the living room that we got second hand from Madam Chabou upon her exodus.  There are a couple of rooms that don't have any fixture at all.  I am going to have to see what I can do about that.

Another interesting feature is the washer and dryer.  No ventilation, so you must empty the condensation resevoir at least twice during the drying process.  All appliances in general are quite small, which continues to keep us tied to our daily shopping routine.  Finally and perhaps the most troubling is the separation of the toillete from the bathroom.  The toilette is not just in a separate closet, but usually down the hall from the bathroom.  It makes washing one's hands awefully inconvenient after using the head.  Other than these small annoyances, things seem to be coming together fairly smoothly and my hope is that we will be back to some level of normalcy by the weekend.  After a bit of paint and wallpaper, I should be able to shift my attention to the garden.  There are a few items of Madame Chabou's left both in and out of the house that I intend to put in her storage building so that we may finally call this our own.

That is really all for now.  I am going to try to get a better night's sleep this evening as the youngest saw fit to pass on his plague to his pappa.  Cough cough, sniffle sniffle.