Big Day!

           Before you read this post, let me warn you:  Averil makes me videotape all the little things that happened in the Big Day, as if people will actually be interested in this minutiae.  Whatever . . . I just do as I'm told.  If these tiny details make you bored, please skip the blog today and tune in next time.

           It all started with Le General announcing the plans for the Big Day:

          

          Sound ambitious?  Not for Le General!  Now that our bank account was finally open 4 weeks after arriving in France, we had received our very own money in the account, and we had justified the withdrawal of a large number of euros by documenting our car purchase so the French government could feel confident we would not spend our money in the black market, we felt we might actually be able to acquire our car!

          The first stop was the insurance agency.  That went off without a hitch.  We have video of it, but it is too boring for this blog and I have secretly taken it out of the blog against the direct orders of Le General.  Then, it was off to Carpentras for the next part of the Big Day!

          We would get to Carpentras.  But we arrived on Market Day.  Would we find a parking spot in all the hubub?  Listen to Le General narrate the harrowing tale: 

          We found a parking spot!  But would we find the bank?  Check out this exciting action:

          Sorry, that was the part where we asked for directions.  Here's the really exciting part where we actually found the bank:

         Yeah baby, we found it, we found it, we found it!

          After the victory dance, we had to go inside.  This required passing through a top secret airlock which would admit only one person at a time.  Then we went inside where we were helped by a soft spoken monsieur who pushed buttons and wrote on papers and sealed papers inside secret containers as he worked . . . and worked . . . and after 25 minutes of silence, he invited us into a top secret bureau where he provided us with the money so that we could take it to Sorges and promptly spend it on a used Korean Hyundai.

          Have you ever been on a used car lot in France?  You haven't?  Well, you're in for a treat!

          Then Le General went in and signed the papers for the used car!  Yes, the used car salesman is her new best friend:

          You can't see the dragon tattoo in this picture, sorry. 

          Then Le General insisted that I record the actual taking of the delivery of the vehicle. 

         
          After that, can you guess what the final stage in the Big Day was?  Yes!  Returning the rental car!  This actually involved some high drama:

          So Le General took matters into her own hands:

         After that, we found the Europcar that was at the train station, and this one was open!  We successfully dropped off the car! 

        Whew, what a day!  Yup, Le General's got "Panach!"