A French gentleman of standing arrives...

It was the lovely Fabien in his light-grey suit with his modern-styled grey-patterned shirt, his striped-grey scarf worn with French aplomb, his wonderful, smiling, deep brown eyes with large black curled-away-from-his-eyes eyelashes. Can you hear a heart flutter? There was no fun to be had ... the artisans and we had coffee, then to business with technical discussion of the re-construction of the lucarne. After all, he is the Architecte de Batiments de France for this region!  We wandered up the lane, at the same time that a huge pantechnicon was delivering a beautiful furnished snooker table, in one piece, using hydraulic gear! Les Parisiens! Fabien explained which of the two examples in the lane was the better one in terms of tradition for when they re-build the sides of the lucarne.  The artisans had replaced the screws with nails in the oak stringer / edge support for tiles. He told me that the artisans were doing good work and he had no complaint.

I showed him the house interior, then the roof from the rear garden, then the interior of the grenier above my large salon. He told me that the bathroom vapour extraction unit has been installed incorrectly.  So I have to get the electrician to return. Oh lah, it isn't easy to get things correct to please 'regles et norms'. But he looked admiringly at the carpentry of the three St Andrew crosses and was in approvement of the hole through the wall that is planned to connect the two attic spaces.