On the left, with the green garage door, the place we bought in 1999. On the right, the place we bought in 2015. The "new" place (1890 vs. 1400s) has a balcony perfect for speeches. Same village. Love the location. The old old house is a few footsteps from the village's medieval church. With the dining room window open, we listen to the chorale against cancer. We met our neighbors at the new old house, a woman and her 17-year-old daughter, Andrea. She's top of her class in English (good for idiot me). Our first night in the old old house, a heavy rain left a puddle in our kitchen; wind had lifted and moved some tiles around the skylight. The pull switch in the main bathroom broke again. Stores don't even sell this sort of switch any more (we discovered, after a couple of tries). Here's my "Jean-Claude Saved Us Report": he fixed that switch by taking it apart to its innards and rebuilding it; he replaced the broken hardware on a main window in the new old house, that wouldn't otherwise lock shut; he changed the mechanism in the tank of a toilet at the old old and replaced its leaking valve. We tried to sell him the old old house ... but no luck.
Thank you, Jean Claude!