If there is one sole thing that I regret living where I do, it is the fact that I would love to live by the sea. Only trouble is I would miss so much else that I have round here.
An iPad or Android tablet can act as a Kindle reader (there is a free Kindle app available) and has better screen quality than the paper white dedicated Kindle devices where illustrations are concerned.
Plus of course a tablet does a whole lot of other things (though as you are a non-smartphone user they may not appeal). 
The downsides of an iPad tablet are greater cost and weight compared to a Kindle-only device, but that’s the price for the versatility.
Yes Shiba, we adopted a friend’s dog after he died.The dog originaly came from a home but The SPA lady still came this Sunday to check us out before transferring the adoption papers to our name.
2 Likes
Yes, you are right, there is no way I would be moving a round with an IPad and to be honest the lack of good pictures is not an important thing for me, I only mentioned the fact so that Shiba wouldn’t be misled into thinkng they are the same as books. And that fact is a plus for me, I appreciate the concentration on print, I left picture books behind me many years ago as a child.
@Mik_Bennett Like banks in France, SPAs are regionally independant and very very much different from place to place. Perigueux simply told us to go away and come back when I had a fence and a job when we first turned up to live here in September '99. They also had a no kill policy, as did Carcassonne. and as a result both were overwhelmed with crowded pens with dogs mentally scarred like classic caged lions, simply pacing up and down.
Bergerac, on the other hand had a regular kill policy. I was shocked when asked to collect a dog from there at 1pm precisely on a Thursday. The reason being that it was shut to the public on that day and they would only deliver the dog to me at the opened gate (I was not allowed inside) during their lunch break. The reason was that the vet was there, just killing dogs.
The year before last I adopted an aged dog from Perigueux, only minimal questions asked and all I had to do was turn up and collect her. They did though keep in touch from time to time to check how she was and even sent condolences to me when she died 8 months later.
A lot of non-fiction for grown-ups needs illustrations. For instance a historical map of France doesn’t readily translate into text!
Agreed David
In which case you would buy a book, horses for courses. I have loved and been fascinated by maps all of my life and have very many of them made out of paper.
I even have a plastic coated 4 foot square road map of France on my bedroom wall, obtained in the early '90s, before many of the autoroutes were built. Ideal for me for route planning when doing my dog journeys as I always preferred the RNs. My car has paper road maps of Spain, Portugal, France and Britain permanently inside too, just in case, but my Kindle is for reading. 
I seem to keep finding lovely houses in Italy with a view of the sea around the cinque terra area right now… 
2 Likes
It’s one of these, I put my mobile telephone next to it so you can see the size. Very handy as takes no room and contains hundreds if not thousands of books.
Thanks for the info. I had never seen one before, no one I knew had one or said they did and I thought it was something that had disappeared with time like the clunky mobile phones.
1 Like
I did previously in Bretagne and my car was continually covered in green algae in the air plus the salt too. Never went down to the nearest beach except in spring and winter as too many tourists and many people over the years have said the same, keep away until they are all gone home. One thing that was nice was that there was always a breeze regardless of it getting to 30°C once in a blue moon.
1 Like
Known (affectionately) as DDTs (Dirty Day Trippers) to many of us living in/near popular seaside towns…
back in the day we would steer clear at peak holiday times…
Vero’s phone is much larger than mine 
which is why I didn’t show you a comparison, but talking of clunky, my brother and I were well ahead of the game with our small haulage company way back in the '70s. It was the size of a brick and had a battery attached which was the same size. The places it could be used were very limited but from time to time it came into its own. I was in the lorry one day high on the Yorkshire Moors and pulled into a lay-by for a break. The ground gave way beneath me and I was well and truly stuck. But about 100 metres a way there was an enormously high radio tower, several time higher than modern equivalents, and I easily got a signal to call for a tow truck.
1 Like
I bought a Kindle in France a few years ago because at that point I couldn’t connect my UK and French Amazon accounts. However, the really ancient UK one (over 10 years old I think) I have is still going strong and, although I much prefer “real” books, it is invaluable when travelling or, eg, in doctors’ waiting rooms etc as it slips easily into my handbag.
1 Like
Del Boy east european special model??
I had the really ancient one with the keyboard, it died and the daughters got me the slimline teeny version 
No way before that I think, weren’t they '80s or '90s?
The problem I have with my more modern one (though not as modern as yours!) is that the old one had a good French/French dictionary. The newer one has several which aren’t anything like as good AND require an internet connection to use. The old one allowed you to look something up and then also click on a word in the dictionary explanation to look up that as well. Very handy when I was trying to understand something in a vocabulary area that was completely new to me, especially if I was somewhere away from home (as travelling about is where I normally use a Kindle)
Kindle is the very best way to take books on a flight. No weight or space used. Fits in a jacket pocket.
2 Likes
Absolutely the best for travelling, and the battery lasts for ages which was great on my trip down under in the summer I crocheted mine a little sock which protects it from scratches.