First thing after 0900h on Friday morning, we called our insurance agent GAN in Castelsarrasin, who we joined up with after a glowing recommendation from John and Irene. We were going to be testing that recommendation much sooner than we had anticipated! We first reported the theft to them, and were most impressed by the sympathetic attitude of Lucie, who took the call. It was just what we needed at the moment. We then explained that all the papers were in the van when it was stolen, and asked if they had taken a copy of the Carte de Grise (the ownership papers). They said they didn't, but would send us a copy of the cancelled Carte de Grise from John (which also contained all the vehicle details). They explained that with these details and some proof of identity, the police would be able to get a copy of our Carte de Grise from their systems. Lucie also promised to send a copy of our policy papers, which listed us as the owners. Within 10 minutes, the papers had arrived by email, so GAN has passed the first test with flying colours.

Our next task was to go see the Gendarmerie in Auxonne to report the theft, after picking up the attestation letter from Alain. The police lady was very polite and efficient in taking the details of the incident, and the Kanumbra website blog was very useful in supplying photos of the van, the eBikes and a couple of other things. At the end, she gave up paper copies of the report documentation, and also emailed the report to us. All in all, she was very friendly and efficient, but not very optimistic. Despite putting the van on the police watchlist, she advised that if they were professional thieves, the van would probably be unrecognisable by now. It all sounded very similar to the Victorian police who came to our apartment in Fairfield in 2006, when thieves broke in and stole all our computer equipment while we were out for a few hours at Rita's PhD graduation ceremony.

After we had finished with the police, we drove over to St Jean de Losne to see if any mail had arrived from the Prefecture in Dijon in connection with my application for a Carte de Sejour. Unfortunately, nothing was there, so the wait goes on. We then had a very slow drive back to Besain along back roads (not annoyingly slow, just relaxingly slow). After dinner, we went for a walk around Besain, just as the sun was setting over the fields.

We continued walking until we reached Lac Besain, where we discovered many campervans settling down for the night. It's still too soon, and any signs of campervans just make us think of what might have been.

When we got home to Sarah's place, Rita continued her reading for her project, while I finished reading The Dogs, by John Hughes. This author was recently in the running for a major literary prize, but several stories appeared in the media claiming that he had stolen words/sentence/paragraphs from other authors for this book. He explained it as being a natural byproduct of the 15 years he took to write the book, where he naturally read works by many other authors, and some of their phraseology and ideas naturally stuck in his mind. He explained that, after many years, it was sometimes hard to distinguish his own ideas from those which other authors had also used. Anyway, I'm glad he wrote The Dogs. It tells the story of several generations in his European family, but the more important part (to my mind) was his ongoing relationship with his mother, who was suffering from dementia. Towards the end of the book, he quotes (word for word) a brochure about dementia that he had been given by one of his mother's caregivers (is this plagiarism, as well?). To me, it was one of the most powerful parts of the book, given his struggles in how to deal with his mother's situation. I won't give away any details of the story, but I found it to be a good, if difficult, read. Given that my dad died from dementia twenty years ago, and my sister only recently died in similar circumstances, I could readily identify with some of his torments. It does cause you to think seriously about what you would do if you or a loved one was experiencing the same situation in the future.