Phew! So the French presidential elections have reached a conclusion and I for one can breathe a sigh of relief.

For one thing, my life can get back to normal (whatever normal is). The reason being that although I’m not really a politically motivated person, my other half is and she’s been hell to live with recently.

She has good cause as, although being born in France, she is descended from an intriguing mountain dwelling tribe in Algeria and what with Sarkozy’s recent attitudes towards foreigners she’s been imagining all sorts of threats to her future existence here.

Here’s another thing: N. Sarkozy’s xenophobia doesn’t limit itself to North Africans and the like. I get the impression that he doesn’t like anyone who isn’t pure thorough-bred Francais (which is pretty rich, bearing his own background in mind).

People like me for instance.

Wanting their cake and eating it. Or, as the French say: “Wanting the butter and the price of the butter”. By this I mean that “Sarko” had promised that no foreigners would have the right to vote in French elections no matter what their residential circumstances were in this country.

Now hang on a minute! It seems that the French authorities are quite willing (and able) to extract whatever kind of tax they can from me but won’t give me the right to have a say in the matter.

What’s wrong with this picture? Well, it’s totally one-sided isn’t it? I’ve only just managed recently to win the right to a Carte Vitale after five years (to the day, I believe) of administration back and forth, endless interviews and appointments.

My original point was that I had invested my miniscule inheritance of 120 thousand euros into the French economy but that just seemed to wind them up the wrong way – bad mistake.

This vital card gives me basic rights to health and social security etc. Before this, I was a non-entity; invalid and non-existent (except from the tax-extraction point of view of course).

As I said, I’m not a political animal and my French isn’t that good so have had to rely on my girlfriend’s interpretation of things which is definitely not unbiased!

However, I have been closely following the run up with the English slant on things, in an attempt of getting the (presumed) impartial opinion from BBC Radio 4 and it seemed that although a close-run thing, it was in favour of Francois Hollande being the eventual victor.

Well, close-run it was and victor he was so it remains to be seen how the future pans out.

Now then, can someone please pass me a small slice of that cake, preferably with a morsel of butter on it.