To join the local cycling club, we need a certificate from the doctor (no, that’s not we need certifying!), to say that we’re fit enough to ride with them. It’s the same for any activity; even if all you want to do is go line dancing, you have to do the same! So I set off to the surgery this morning to register with a doctor (my French isn’t up to doing this sort of thing by phone). I made an appointment and the receptionist gave me a form to fill in. I failed at the first hurdle, however, by not having a social security number; so I was sent to see the CEPAM lady at the Mairie, but she couldn’t help because we haven’t got  forms S1 and our EHIC cards have been cancelled by the British authorities. We’ve sent the applications off, but they hasn’t arrived yet. When they do, I have to go back to the CEPAM lady with S1 forms, passports, birth certificates, marriage certificate, bank details, a utility bill and a wheelbarrow to carry them all in; she will then give us our “secu” numbers, and we’ll start on the tortuous process, or so I’ve heard, of getting our “cartes vitales”. Well, yes; we were warned that French bureaucracy is like nowhere else on earth.

Having spent the morning trailing round, making little progress, I felt I’d earned my afternoon off at the local patchwork and quilting club, but wasn’t quite prepared for the surprise Nick and Kieran had in store on my return. They’d bricked up the door from the kitchen while I was out, as well as building more of the walls to form Nick’s workshop and bricking up the fireplace in the blue bedroom. Of course this involved lots of cutting of breeze blocks and briquettes, so everything I’d cleaned earlier is now under a thick layer of dust again 🙁  But it’s progress; I’ll just have to adopt Quentin Crisp’s approach, that after 6 months, the dust gets no thicker. Shouldn’t be too difficult; I’ve never been much of a house-proud spouse anyway!