It's all in the details

So this is it:

The key to happiness?

The key to a future in a beautiful home?

Time will tell.

It seems scant reward for a day of drama and (almost) disappointment and a very large cheque.

So, the day: riding was fine. My co-pupil was absent so the teacher had to exert all his torture on me. I was clearly looking exhausted so he relented and we spent the second part of the lesson on a ride around his farm rather than doing sitting trot around the menage. Apart from a bike appearing from nowhere and making my horse do that 'jumping six feet sideways' thing that they do when they're spooked (and me doing that inelegant grabbing the horse round the neck so as not to fall off thing) it was a very pleasant way to spend half an hour. My instructor chatted on incessantly about farming in the region and hedges and anything I remotely expressed an interest in. I mostly nodded and smiled. Occasionally I even knew what he'd said, though there was a long explanation of an accident where I thought he was talking about injuries sustained by a horse, but it turned out to be about a person. Easy mistake.

Later the last minute check that nothing bad had happened to the house we're buying went fine: everything was as broken and dirty as we remember it (and yes, I will post some 'before' pictures so you can see what we're up against).

Later still we headed off for the signing meeting. There all did not go to plan. The first problem was that no-one had thought to bring the key, which we saw as a primary purpose of the meeting: we hand over the cheque; they hand over the key.

Secondly, the seller hadn't shown up. Neither had his power of attorney.

It all looked as though the deal was off (Mr B was swearing and threatening to leave) until I pointed out that we were buying from a company and surely there'd be another signatory. (Why had none of the real lawyers in the room spotted this?) There was, she was tracked down and agreed to provide authority for the lawyers to sign on her behalf.... at 5pm. So we argued around the houses a bit more, and eventually signed. The Notaire who was leading the meeting started calling me 'Maître' part way through, which I'm sure our Notaire loved... My favourite was the bit where after everything was read out and signed he said "Maintentant, Monsieur B, le cheque?" Having addressed all his comments to me for the whole meeting, we then had to tell him that actually I had charge of the cheque too (which had been in my handbag and its presence verified every ten minutes since we picked it up yesterday).

On the way home we called into the estate agent and picked up the key. Now all that lies ahead is the battle with the seller who still wants to come and pick up some of his stuff which is in OUR house. He will apparently come on Tuesday. Or not. We shall see. I know, from the mood Mr B is in with him, that that will be an interesting meeting. I think I will have to be careful how I translate Mr B's comments in that one...

So, tomorrow morning we will have a call from the Notaire (yes, they work on Saturday too) to tell us that all is finalised.

Hopefully.

Fingers crossed.

And no, I didn't like the way the lawyer crossed her fingers when she said goodbye earlier....

EDIT: the answer to yesterday's quiz will arrive tomorrow.