French language Q&A Forum

In the case here, the act of receiving presents serves as a general statement about Christmas. To my mind no specific Christmas is understood here; instead all Christmases seem to be the explicit understanding.

Thus, following your grammar explanation, the more correct grammar choice seems to be "à".

I am perplexed with this particular example (repeatedly get it wrong on the tests). I believe I understand the concept, but in this instance could you explain why spelling of "ecrite"? Wouldn't the last "e" also have an accent aigu? For example (from the same lesson): J'ai rencontré les actrices que j'ai appréciées. Some examples have it, others do not. Though I've reviewed the lesson repeatedly, obviously something is going over my head!

Thank you. 

Valerie

Someone presented the example, "merci de m'aimer" which I believe means, "please love me" rather than "thanks for loving me" and directed them to this lesson. However, "merci de m'avoir aimé" doesn't, in my mind, capture the sense of "thanks for loving me" as an ongoing action/effect.  After digging further, I found some texts such as, "merci de m'aimer autant" and "merci de m'aimer" on reverso. I'd like to test my instinct and the found examples. Is this an exception where the construction will retain the sense of thanks rather than a polite request, due to context, or are these examples incorrect?

Tangential follow up question: I understand "du cadeau" will be interpreted sarcastically, but is this only for physical gifts? For example, I have found a bit of text with "merci du cadeau de ta présence". Does the modification into a more conceptual gift change meaning, or is this simply incorrect, wanting instead, "merci pour le cadeau de..."?

Merci de m'éclairer! 

I believe the je form of the conditional of préférer is je préférerais, not je préfèrerais as in the text. Am I correct ?