I would have thought with all your proclaimed travels you would have a better idea than most about alternatives?
I left the UK in 1068 and also tavelled and worked a large chunk of the world, plus met and married a French girl in
Australia some 40 years ago, and went through a decisively bad time a few years back, which also made me concentrate my mind on what was important. Guess what although I recognise most of the things in your rant - not one of them made it on my hate/rage list! In other words they were not in the slightest bit important to me.
Now 80, deaf and infirm hopefully temporarily!). Sorry, but I donāt watch television at all as most of it is crap, and I can usually fnd a recommendation from anybody on youtube. Read a lot in both languages, but speak quite poorly - mainly through the deafness. Yes there are frustrations but for me mainly with the services - internet; etc more than functionaiires/
People talking in supermarket queues? Donāt tell me that is only in France. plus has it occurred to you that for many older people a bit of a chat in the suprmarket is the only contact they might have? Sorry, but the world does not and never will revolve just around you, unless you go and live up a mountain as a hermit. We live in societies, and if you adopt the attitude that āHell is the othersā you will always find confirmation. - wherever you choose.
But as ever, itās your life and if you are really that gutted with France you probably carry that around with you, so probably wonāt be missed if you leave.
Yeah, well, that William the Conqueror guy really messed things up in England a couple of years previously, I donāt blame you for getting out.
Yeah OK 1968!!
Sorry Norman - just pulling your leg.
I was just about to say the sameā¦
Left uk in 1068ā¦!
Norman youāre looking remarkable for your age
I havenāt been on this site/forum in years but I made the trip of logging in just to comment on that thread.
I am French but have lived in the UK most of my adult years and am now back to France and I must say that:
A - this post, Jim, is HILARIOUS, you should write a book, one reads you very well, it flows, it is just (my opinion) delightful to read. And those who didnāt get the humour behind the anger are dead souls, sorry, I have lived too long in Scotland to not spot other āmadā but funny, truthful people.
B - there are groups on social media for French ex-expats who have returned to France and I can, hand on my heart, say that 80% of those posting are sinking into either confusion or melancholy at how uninspiring the French people-who-never-left are. A lot of us/them are simply leaving after the 2 years-mark, usually for Canada, Australiaā¦ The way everything seems scripted here, un-spontaneous, rigid, where one is constantly being judged and mocked (the rule of everything can be summed up as : āqui est le con? Ah bah cāest toi!/lui/elleā), so that comes with watching people, staring at them, putting them in categories and declaring that their ideas are rubbish and doomed to failure (the opposite of the free/self-made entrepreneur spirit of many English-speaking countries), the obsession with having the right diplomas as opposed to the right attitudeā¦well, I could go on for long!
C - Continue ranting. It is natural and as I said before, it sometimes gives you the best ideas. Caging yourself wonāt help, it will just serve to validate those people who live cagey lives, people who insist on being āpositiveā (ie: dead boring and little tyrans) at all time.
D - What you complained about is NOTHING.
E - Ignore those comments telling you that you should leave as soon as possible and wouldnāt be missed (you have hit a nerve, in my opinion) or be wary of your own poisonous mind when traveling as you would probably bore yourself to death and risk jumping in a river while visiting China. My advice is keep ranting, keep writing but do keep travelingā¦if that is possible, with this new world we are now moving in, with restrictions everywhere.
A Frenchie.
I found it very amusing and honest. I have no desire to defend either the UK or France right now but everyone is entitled to their opinion. I did go to the supermarket today, however, and was held up by an older lady who had no regard for me and chose to chat to the lady on the till. There was no apology from the lady behind the till when it was my turn, just the usual ābonjour madameā. Is it any different in the UK, the elderly have a right to do what they want, including ramming a shopping trolley into your ankles if they so wish! I have found differences hereā¦who wouldnāt? It either suits or it doesnāt.
Yes, personally both the UK and France can get pretty unbearable.
So I find myself agreeing with criticism of both cultures.
I empathise with whoever is moaning as long as it is a personally experienced misery and not some repeated xenophobic rubbish, which I have heard often, the last was in Portugal a few English older men (who did not know each other and never met but happened to share the same mindset): āFrance is a lovely country, shame about French people living there ahahah!ā = to me it says āI never liked the French, way long before stopping for 48 hours in Brittany and quickly returning, horrified that there is another lively and authentic culture right across the Channel and NOT colonised by usā,
So if the rant sounds to me like xenophobia and nostalgia for the Great Empire then I stop listening, it is just poison, but if the rant is from someone having truly experienced France and with an open mind/heart to start with, then I am all ears, and being the sort of person who loves a good story, I inevitably end up on their side 
If all things were possible, I would probably be in Canada, but then, humans being unbearable, like the original poster, I would probably find the Canadian oppressively boring/annoying, etc.
Boring, oppressive? I have spent a lot of time in the Caribbeanā¦no, not boring or oppressive, just bloody loud and full of their own importance. We donāt have snow in the UK because theirās is fourteen foot deeper! Iām being lighthearted by the way, but only just. We used to have a game of cards in the reception in Barbados and a couple of Canadian couples would have a loud conversation across our game - it amused us!
I grew up in 2 then 3 countries and then lived in a few more - there are irritating/ frustrating/ marvellous/ amazing things in all of them. The only downside was having bores go on about my other nationality as if I were somehow responsible for the countryā¦ 
Vive la diffƩrence 
Couldnāt agree more. Iām a Brit, love France and love the Caribbean. Iām less likely to shout about Britain! Love Jamaica but itās a bit restrict
ing. Love Barbados but not all their visitors. Love France and here we areā¦it has always been my favourite place from a very young age and though I have to wait at checkouts, Iāll cope!
I attended some business training courses with the CMA (Chambre de MĆ©tiers et de lāArtisanat). On one course, the tutor announced - I have presented courses all over France, and it is a well known fact that I have found to be true, the Charentais are the most difficult people to do business with. The lady next to me retorted angrilyā¦No weāre not !!! And everyone sniggeredā¦
As others have said, itās good to vent. Sometimes we build something up to be the answer to all our problems and are disappointed when it isnāt. Sometimes we create idols and find out theyāre no better than the alternative.
And sometimes - as I think youāre doing, Jim - we have to choose to be content.
Youāll feel better now that youāve got all that off your chest Jim. Now just kick back and listen to my favourite song by your favourite singerā¦
Who the hell is Jeremy Vine?
At the risk of being eviscerated, what gender would these people generally be? And Jim, would you consider that it may be more a gender than an nationality related issue (Mike, maybe your Welsh adventures might also shed some light on the matter)?
Ha ha Johnā¦
Before anyone else leaps inā¦ I live in a rural community, where everyone knows everyone else (more or less)ā¦ and Iāve not noticed one gender more than anotherā¦ chatting at the cashierās sectionā¦
It did take a bit of getting used toā¦ on my part.
but, of course, Iām in the loop now and if itās not my own news someone is afterā¦ it might be news of one of my neighbours or someone else in my villageā¦
Franklyā¦ I love it.
Over the years, especially through stressful times, such friendly links have been very much appreciatedā¦
Thanks for the air cover Stella
Sex not gender, SEX (ooh shocking word I know).
Age is more of a factor than sex from what I see, but that is usually because the person on the till has been vaguely known to the customer since they were little.
At the moment as students are on the till in my local Inter I may well chat to some erstwhile classmate of my children or former pupil of mine - bite me 
They arenāt talking about nothing, they are talking about nothing which interests YOU , which isnāt the same thing at all 
Wow, eviscerated !!
Wot a word.