This Is France

I'm starting to accept things that I never would have allowed before. Is this good or bad? Probably just a new technique to retain sanity and safeguard my spare time.

Our new refrigerator (one week old tomorrow) has a weird glitch. When we close the freezer door, the refrigerator door pops open automatically.

So we called BHV service-apres-vente.

The repair man came out this morning. After he checked it out, he told us that this happens because air is pushed out when we close the door and this causes the other door to open.

DAH!

We needed to wait around all morning to hear this! He then told us that the refrigerator is new and it has a two year warranty so if it doesn't adjust itself, call back. All very polite and normal. We had him re-look at it, re-explained the problem and he left without fixing the problem. We just have to be more careful when closing the doors, he said.

Now to EDF, our electric company.

We need an original, current EDF bill as part of the required, mandatory paperwork to renew our carte de sejour. But, EDF doesn't send monthly bills, they amortize the estimated cost of the year's electricity over 10 months and we pay the same amount automatically each month. Then they read the meter and adjust the charges for the following year.

Don't know why French immigration requests something that is no longer readily available, but they do. In anticipation of this, Terry called EDF this morning to try to get an original bill.

He reached a nice woman who told him that she could make an exception and send him the bill one time, but could not send a bill each month. She could also create and send an original "Attestation" which is, to the French, quite impressive. It is signed by someone, hopefully in power, that states that something is true, has happened, etc.

After talking to Terry further, the woman came up with a Plan B. EDF can send the bill electronically via email each month and we can then print it ourselves.

Paperwork problem resolved -- we will now have one original bill, one Attestation and a monthly email. From nothing to overkill in one phone call.