TV or not TV?

I've just been surfin' around - as you do - to try to find comment on the fact that we, in the bits of Europe nearest to the United Kingdom, can access pretty-well all of British television via satellite. Not many people seem to want to discuss this, at least, to link the discussion to the raging BBC licence debate which never seems to subside. Is it because we don't want to make these particular waves?

Ravings over the pros and cons of the BBC licence fee are legion on the web. My own sentiments are equivocal; on the one hand I think the service on  the whole is excellent and the programs generally better than any other service I've seen, and worth paying for. On the other hand, why, I ask myself, do the BBC make it so easy for the whole of Europe to watch their stuff for free by satellite. Knowing what I know now about picking up the transmissions here in south-west France, not to mention all the regional channels, ITV channels, Channels 4 and 5, etc. etc. etc., I'd be anti-paying the licence too if I were still in the UK.

Just look at the coverage (the satellite 'footprint'): It means that even this far south, you get a perfectly good reception even with the tiny Sky-dish supplied in the UK.

You don't need to subscribe to Sky of course for the main channels or the 'freeview' channels; you don't even need a Sky 'digibox'. A digital satellite receiver bought off the shelf in the local supermarket here for 60 euros or so will do the trick. Even our son in northern Italy gets perfect reception with a 1 metre dish.

What is this all about, auntie BBC? Or should I address this question to the British government? You can't prevent hundreds of thousands of us in Europe watching all your channels for free while the law in the UK makes anyone with a TV pay the licence fee. How can this be fair, to make your main source of income a UK tax on a service which can be used with impunity by anyone up to a couple of thousand miles beyond your shores?

There are few disadvantages for us. If we use a Sky digibox, we don't have to subscribe and it will continue to work for all the main channels but we might suffer a little more on reception break-down when it rains. This is often easily cured by installing a bigger dish. If we use a cheap-o receiver bought from the local supermarket, we also suffer a bit when it rains but occasionally 'lose' a channel as the frequencies are sometimes changed without warning, something the Sky-boxes seem to cope with automatically. It's a simple matter to refind lost channels by putting the receiver in 'auto-scan' mode on the Astra 2 satellite. Alternatively, all the up-to date frequencies can be found on the Internet (e.g. 'Lyngsat').

That's enough of that. Time to watch the news and, no doubt, another debate on the UK TV licence fee.

Mapmaker

Keeping Idle Hands Busy

At last! - It's now a simple matter to start a small business here without the cumbersome and complex bureaucracy previously associated with this activity. In fact, up to now many immigrants to France, me included, have fought shy of jumping through the hoops set before us in order to start a small legitimate company or trade. There's no doubt that the 'black'  activities (no, not racist; the French call illegal trading 'working on the black') of many people here, including the French themselves, have thrived simply because of the onerous registration processes and up-front tax charges which exist as a burden to all sizes of commercial enterprises. 'Sarko' seems to be making waves in all directions since his inauguration in May 2007 and this is another of his changes in order to shake France into life and increased profitability.

The instrument of change is a new category of business called an "Auto-Entrepreneur". The link shows a brief description. In fact, you can carry out the whole registration process on-line.

At the end of 2007, I was offered some work as an artist-painter, painting large acrylic scenes of early twentieth-century French rural life. These are displayed, screwed to the walls as theme-decor for a chain of franchised fast-food restaurants called 'Lapataterie', a sort of 'Spud-U-Like'. It meant producing three or four paintings a month and it had to be legitimate, so I took advantage of the services offered by the 'Maison des Artistes and registered as a professional "Artiste-Peintre'. The MDA, among other things, organises your social security payments for you in such a way as to protect you from the highs and lows associated with the life of an artist who never knows what the future might hold, income-wise. Other advantages include the non-necessity to register your business for VAT, or to use an accountant, or keep complex records of income and expenditure, and so on. The new 'Auto-Entrepreneur' category enables the same, but for anyone, doing anything.

There is a recession ringing in our ears but above this din I've just heard that for me, the new year has started with a new order for four more paintings so - so far, so good.

Mapmaker

This Mortal Coil

Pam died two days ago. Her husband Tony has been an active member of our art group for some years, so that's how we got to know them. Obviously, this sad event focuses our thoughts on Tony and his family to whom we all offer our condolences, who have had a hard year coping with Pam's illness.

Without meaning to be morbid, I can recall that there have been at least three occasions since our arrival here in 2000 where we have been confronted with the death of a close friend and subsequently reminded of our own mortality, not to mention its actual location. The practicalities of dealing with the death of a relative or friend here are not complex, but our Anglo-Saxon attitudes will most probably mean that we'll seek the nearest crematorium. There are not many more than 100 of them in the entire country, the equivalent of one per county if this were the UK or one crematorium per half-a-million people. 

Another thought occurred to me; the differences between those people one meets back in the UK or on holiday here who will say that they are "dying to live in France one day". It's those who find no problem saying that they're "living to die in France one day" who actually settle happily here.

Mapmaker

Apocalypse 2009

The holiday season seems to have made an even briefer appearance than any other that I can remember. The Christmas decorations are still up, but will be confined to their dark drawer dungeons by the end of tomorrow; the desiccated mistletoe will be thrown out and the 80 or so cards pinned to the kitchen ceiling beams will be prised off once again and banished to the appropriate waste recycling container. It seems a shame, particularly the fate of the greetings cards but what else can you do with them? Those with new addresses have already been copied into the address book and the one or two 'unknowns' will have to stay that way.

Simon came over from Italy with the family on the 29th December. He hit a blizzard on the A89 motorway when he was less than one hour from us and spent more than three hours trapped there, finally escaping out onto the old National Route highway by means of a service road. 

We exchanged a few anxious mobile 'phone calls during this episode while we waited and the dinner was put on hold. We didn't get a single snowflake during this time, 40 kilometres away but more than 500 metres lower down the valley.

And so, on into 2009...

Will life as we know it come to an end? Will it be worth making a few new years' resolutions? Will the pound fall so much against the euro that my weekly UK pension amount will be totally blown every time I go to the baker?

We'll see.

Happy New Year

Mapmaker