Pre-paid SIMs and other lessons in Paris

Lesson #1:
In one of my earlier posts I described the early (not so fun) experience of owning an SFR Pre-paid SIM. You may recall that I arrived in Paris pathologically disinclined to buy from SFR (having relegated SFR to the same league as Telstra i.e. a former telco monopoly) but finding that on arrival at the airport, SFR was the only available option.
My French is very basic so navigating the sfr.fr website is daunting. I did manage to create an account but without them getting some form of acceptable identification e.g. photocopy of my passport photo page the "my account" section basically does not work (you get various error messages which don't mean much). I did not understand this until after I got through their id process and then voila the web site started working correctly.
How to get through the SFR La Carte identification process:
I also managed to navigate to a PDF product description of the La Carte (pre-paid SIM) - it's also all in French but I did understand a couple of things: I could call free to a 1025 that provided "English" responses, I also figured out that I could email my identification stuff to indentificationacarte@sfr.fr. So I took a photo of my passport and using free wifi hotspot emailed it from my iphone. A couple of days later I rang the 1025, spoke to a lady who sort of understood English but hardly spoke it and when I finally got her to understand (in the nicest way I could muster) that I wanted to know if my id had been received she simply said "Oui" and instantly hung up. At least I think she said "Oui".
When I bought the La Carte I also bought a 35 euro recharge and then had the fun of figuring out how to enter the recharge number to add it to my pre-paid SIM. I believe I can buy further recharge codes from any Tabac store.
How to recharge your pre-paid SFR SIM - La Carte:
Basically you make a free call on the number 952. A prerecorded voice will speak to you in fairly rapid French. May hear her say the word "un" meaning "one" if you miss it just wait while she prattles on and just enter 1#. She will then shut up momentarily and then start prattling on some more just type over the top of her by entering the recharge code and # - that's it. If you want reassurance you can free call 950 and another French voice will read out to you your balance. Or you can log on to the sfr.fr "my account" section - it's the hyperlink called Accéder à votre espace client
 on the right hand side of the main web site. After logging on on the left there is a link called Ma conso
(my consumption I presume) it will tell you what's left on your pre-paid SIM.
How to add a data plan to your La Carte:
After going to a SFR store (by the Saint Paul Metro station in the Marais) the answer is "NON"
I suspect this is not true but I am exhausted after getting this far with SFR and I have a phone that does calls and texts so I give up on data. Our apartment has free wifi included in the rent so I will survive on that - in fact I would say without the free wifi in our apartment we would have been up the creek without a paddle.

Lesson #2:
Never rent an apartment in Paris without ensuring it has free wifi included.

Lesson #3:
If you think it's a great idea to go shopping on a Sunday in many cases you will be very disappointed. The shopping areas look like they're expecting some riots and have brought the shutters down in advance, so you can't even window-shop.
I'd suggest: sleep in late, go see some tourist sites, sit in some cafes for a fair few hours then go to some wine bars and get hammered.

Lesson #4:
August is annual holiday month for France so, for perhaps 10% to 15% of the shops, every day in August is a Sunday. We arrived on 21st August (leaving on 20th Sept) and sort of expected some shops to be closed until end of August but if we had arrived on the 1st August and not understood what what going to happen we might have been somewhat disappointed to say the least.