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trolley in the car park, which we thought was fairly sad for France! Our next IKEA trip we took full advantage of the cafeteria — we actually thought that being able to have a glass of wine there was hugely appealing. We later discovered that the motorway service stations also fully cater to travellers and have great food, including, again, plat du jour and wine. All very sophisticated.
    Before our first night in our house we stayed in the nearby town of Souillac. It was the last ‘normal’ night for quite a while. On the way to stay in a local hotel, we unloaded all the bags and boxes from our car, ready to start camping in our petite maison the next day. Well, we were moving in, but in every other way in my mind it was just like camping except with four stone walls.
    To even start staying in our house, we had to buy everything that is conceivably needed to set up a house: from tea towels to coffee machine (essential for us), to bed and broom. So, the next day, we embarked on yet another of many shopping expeditions and the first day of many, many lists. It became the holiday of lists. What to buy virtually every day at the supermarché and bricolage , to the allocated list of tasks for the day and what each of us would be doing. Just like at home, the hardware store became Stuart’s second home. The luxury part of the holiday was well and truly over. The working part of the holiday had started in earnest.
    Day one at our house. We left the hotel and headed back to the whitegoods shop. As I said, throughout June it is Solde season everywhere and, as the prices were so reasonable, we thought we may as well get everything we would ever need. Our rationale was that we were going to need it all eventually so why not just buy it all at once? So, this trip: vacuum cleaner, TV, dishwasher, range hood and even a hair dryer. It seemed like we thought euros were Monopoly money.
    Now, despite setting up a French account before leaving, there was a daily limit on the card, which we hadn’t been aware of. At just before 11.50, Stuart went to pay for all our purchases on the card and it was declined. The owner suggested going to the bank to get the difference. Now, keep in mind that in France absolutely everything (except restaurants) shuts for the two-hour lunch break, so we ran madly down the road to the bank. The first bank we came across wasn’t ours, so we kept frantically running. I yelled at Stuart to run and told him I’d catch up, as he could run faster. If we didn’t get there just before twelve, we’d have to wait around for two hours — and we had a huge list of things to do, not least of all buying an air mattress so we had something to sleep on that night.
    We finally flung ourselves, panting, into the bank at five minutes to midday, gasped our request to the ever-immaculate single teller and showed her our whitegoods receipt. Stuart couldn’t withdraw cash from the machine, either, as we were over our daily limit. The bank manager, who only had a few words of English — and, keep in mind, her sacrosanct lunch break was about to start — rapidly set up a special one-day-only account and in just a few minutes we had a huge stack of cash. We resumed madly running back down the street to pay for all our whitegoods. It was now 12.10: well and truly the French lunch hour. The shop owner had all his shutters down and was waiting impatiently. Stuart rapidly counted all the money out and we too sought somewhere for lunch (and to recover).
    The speed at which we were accomplishing things never fully registered for me, because it was always time to move on to the next item on the daily list. Oh, the lists. Our lives seemed to be consumed by them.
    Thank goodness for the civilised French lunch hour (or two) that gave us time to catch our breath in the heat of the searing summer’s day. It was always such a luxury to have a glass of rosé and linger for a while over a delicious