Excusez moi!

For a while now we’ve wanted to buy a couple of fire extinguishers for the house. One to have on the landing by the guest rooms, and the other in the hallway on the ground floor. However we were finding it really difficult to make contact with the local fire safety firms. I called a couple of them and left messages and also emailed, but never a response. So the other week, when we’d stopped off for a coffee before heading home after collecting the wood for the library, I saw one of the fire companies vans in the parking lot. He was about to drive off, so I quickly said to Brian “look there’s a fire safety company, let’s go and talk to him about getting a couple of extinguishers”. These sort of moments always appear way easier than they are, but Brian agreed and followed me as I jogged across the car park shouting, “Bonjour monsieur, excusez moi”. He stopped and turned, looking a little quizzical, and probably thinking to himself ‘who is this crazy woman, trying to get my attention?’.

The conversation started with some difficulty, as I wasn’t really prepared, but luckily Brian came to my help, and for once I was glad he butted in with his way more eloquent French than mine, explaining to the man who we were, and what we think we needed. After a bit of toing-and-froing we seemed to have communicated well, and we all went away very happy, as he’d arranged to visit us on Monday to view our property and discuss exactly what we needed.

As promised he visited as arranged, and we are now the very proud owners of two shiny, red fire extinguishers. We have agreed he will be back next January to service them for us.