The House Part IV

(Suzanne and I pose in front of our "garden". She doesn't seem thrilled.)

Last week, Jérôme was so excited to have a receipt from the post office in the mail box. He came to me with bright eyes, "do you know what this is? it's the demolition permit!" He was a little less excited after actually getting the letter at the post office. The letter said that basically they had out request (we hoped so since we'd dropped it off 2 months ago!) and that if we didn't get an answer by June 15th, we could start work on the 30th. WHAT? That's a big difference from the "beginning of April" answer we first got. So...

Meanwhile, the guys continued to put down the structure for my dream kitchen. They also smashed up the concrete floor that will be the mini-garden finding...dirt that hadn't seen the light of day for about 50 years and a dog skeleton of which Jérôme said, "we kind of live in the Middle Ages in France." At least he knows it.

Then, as all hope was lost and the guys had taken the week off, I was on my way to the chicken butcher on Saturday morning and took a look in the mail box. There it was, marked "Mairie de Lille". I tore it open and read it to Jérôme while I crossed the street. He said to me, "I don't understand. Do we have it or not?". So glad that French administration is clear for the French too.

Tune in next time when the carpenter says, "in the 40 years I've been building roofs, I've never seen plans like this." To be continued...