Tag Archives: tax office

Thursday 25th October 2018 – I WAS OFF …

… on my travels last night.

However I shall spare you the details. You are probably eating your tea or something like that right now.

But I was so far away on my travels that I didn’t leave the bed until after the 06:20 alarm which was rather disappointing. But then, I didn’t go to bed until late so I suppose it was only to be expected.

After the medication and so on (I missed breakfast due to one reason or another) I had a shower – and a haircut too. This new hair trimmer works a treat and my hair (such as I have left) looks quite good now.

And then I headed off to the shops.

Just by way of a change I’d taken the Nikon 1 with me so that I would be ready if I were to see anything worth photographing.

And Iw as in luck down at the docks because one of the giant cranes had come back.

I’m not sure why because there were no lock gates to be replaced. It might be replacing the mast in one of the boats but I couldn’t really tell.

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall seeing a few months ago a photo of a house down in the rue du Port where they had demolished some of the walls.

Today, I had noticed that they were cracking on with building up the back walls.

They had made quite a good bit of progress while I was away.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch I hadn’t been on my way for more than 15 minutes when I realised that I had forgotten the details for my rail tickets. So I’ll have to do that again.

At LIDL grapes were €1:99 per kilo so I grabbed a load of them. Together with, finally, a pastry brush and a few other bits and pieces.

On the way back home I had to go to the Hotel des Impôts to pick up a form. But it’s only open 4 days a week. Can you guess which day of the week it’s closed?

At least, it brought me home via a new route that I don’t use all that often and with different views than the usual.

It was pretty cloudy and miserable as you can see. But none of this stopped the sailing club from taking out some of their pupils today.

Not what I would call plain sailing in this kind of weather, is it?

There’s a really good view over the harbour from this spot too. I’ve not noticed this before.

There’s the Pointe du Roc out there just to the left of centre and the Eglise Notre Dame du Cap Lihou on the skyline just to the right of centre.

Where I live is one of the large buildings just to the left of the church spire.

Walking a little further along the promenade at the bottom of the Boulevard des Amiraux Granvillaises, there’s a nice little beach here.

But it’s not a beach for sunbathing or anything like that because bathing isn’t permitted here due to its proximity to the harbour entrance.

To the right are the installations of the Port de Hérel where all of the maritime activities take place and where there is the Youth Hostel.

The view looking behind me is equally interesting.

Down at the end of the promenade is a nice-looking block of flats – the Résidence Port Granville – that’s maybe 30 years old or something, with the Roche Gauthier in the background.

That’s the kind of place where I would like to have a little apartment, but I saw how much it costs to rent something even smaller than where I live, and it’s well out of my budget.

That’s not a surprise though is it?

Regular readers of this rubbish will recall the house in the rue St Gaud that was demolished a year or so ago.

The other day we noticed the rear of the plot that was being rebuilt. From down here on the promenade we can see the front of the plot and how far they have advanced with the rebuilding.

Mind you, at this rate it’ll be another year or so before they’ll finish it, I reckon.

I carried on my little stroll along the Port de Herel and I was interrupted yet again.

Earlier today, we saw a large mobile crane working on one of the boats down in the harbour. But here now we have the mobile crane having finished its work and setting off to go back from whence it came.

It’s quite a bit of serious kit, isn’t it? I can think of a thousand uses for one of those back on my farm.

By now, I’d left the port and was climbing my way up the Rampe du Monte Regret and from there, there’s a good view across to the inner harbour.

We noticed in the photo of the cranes earlier today that the Channel Islands boats were moored up in the inner harbour.

Both of them too. Victor Hugo is there of course, but the new one, whose name escapes me for the moment, is also there.

It’s the first time that I’ve seen her back here for quite some considerable time.

I’ve often wondered where she has been for all of the summer. Probably working her passage out of Barneville-Carteret I imagine.

One of these days I’ll have to get myself aboard one or the other and go for a good run around.

Back here I unpacked everything and then made a coffee, seeing as I hadn’t had one yet today. And duly refreshed, I attacked yesterday’s photos.

Lunch was taken indoors in view of the cold, windy, overcast weather. And short commons too because I forgot the lettuce.

The afternoon was spent doing the rest of the photos and working on the pages for the Arctic. It’s really slow progress and I’m not sure why because it’s not as if it’s complicated or anything. I just don’t know what the issue might be.

But then, it didn’t help with having a little half-hour curled up on the office chair.

The afternoon’s walk was around the walls again.

Despite the cold weather, it had brightened up considerably and the sun was out making the day quite pleasant.

And the sun wasn’t the only thing that was out either. The tide was out, and so were the people.

And that wasn’t all either.

The fishermen (at least I imagine that they are fishermen) were also out there working away.

No idea what it is that they are hoping to catch, but it can’t be very much given the size of the boats. But they are out there quite often so it must be something worthwhile.

Further down along the beach, the sun and the low tide had brought out even more members of the public.

They were all there having a good look in the rock pools, presumably for crabs and other crustaceans and the like. Although I have heard that there’s a ban on harvesting from the rocks around here due to pollution issues.

But at least it keeps them out of mischief.

And the other day we talked about the old stone construction on the beach that I reckoned was a tidal fish pond.

Now that the tide is going out, we can see it much more clearly this afternoon.

I would have expected to have seen more water in there given the fact that the tide hasn’t long gone out. But there are several people having a ferret about in there to see what they can see.

Round on the town side of the walls, I remembered that I hadn’t taken a photo of the rue Paul Poirier for quite some time.

It’s all covered in bunting right now and I’ve no idea why. But it still looks quite interesting from up here.

It’s not as crowded as it usually is either. On a Saturday it’s absolutely heaving, but then that’s market day so that might account for it.

There’s not much going on today so I came back here to carry on work, with another coffee to keep me going.
.

For tea, I had a frozen potato and chick-pea curry from last year. And it was just as delicious.

Later on this evening I went out for my night-time walk.

I took the 50mm lens and the tripod with me and took a hotograph in the dark of the rue do Nord inside the walls and the Plat Gousset.

On the left-hand edge of the image is the beach at Donville-les-Bains.

But the purpose of going out so armed was to have some more fun with long exposure photos

The scenery didn’t come up too well, but the moving car lights were a great improvement on what I managed yesterday.

I was out there for a good half-hour amusing myself with the lights, the exposure and learning quite a lot too.

Back here, I sorted myself out and then prepared myself for yet another early night again – I hope.

Tomorrow it’s back to the Hotel des Impôts and then, if I remember, I can pick up the rail tickets.

I’ll leave you to look at a few more of my long-exposure night photographs.

Night-time photography with long exposure times, Rue du Port, Granville, France

Tuesday 6th December 2016 – SO HERE I AM …

… back home again to stay for a few days if I can last out. The first time that I will have stopped here since November last year.

And I wish that I wasn’t here either. The internet is down, the ‘phone isn’t working, the room is covered in dust, some animal has made it inside and made a mess that I shall have to clear up. It’s all so depressing.

I lit the fire and that immediately awoke a hibernating fly that has been buzzing around my head all night. I can’t find half of the stuff that I need for cooking so it was a very rudimentary meal that I had, cooked in the oven bit of the woodstove so that’s something, I suppose. But I can’t see me being here for long.

On a more positive note, all that I can say about these Ace Hotels is that they live up to their names. I’ve paid twice the price for conditions and facilities that haven’t been as good as this. I had a really good sleep and was off on my travels again during the night, although you are probably eating your breakfast this morning so I’ll spare you the details.

Breakfast was superb too. In fact, everything about it was definitely good value for money from my point of view.

When they threw me out I went to the Tax Office and found that my hospital payments are all up-to-date which is good news. I did a little shopping and then headed out to Evaux-les-Bains. I was early so I tidied up a little (yes, just a little) in Caliburn. The garage where I have to go is a body shop as you might expect, and he had an old Ford Vedette V8 awaiting attention.

These are copies of 1940s American cars sold by Ford France, and when that company was nationalised after World War II, Simca took over the plant and designs and carried on making them. Simca Vedettes are reasonably common, but a Ford is rare.

So we have a plan for the repair, and he’s going to have a look at the rust that’s appearing on the nearside sill while he’s at it. I’m entitled to borrow a car while the repair work is being done, so I may as well have everything done all at once.

From there I had a delightful meander through the countryside. The wheel bearing is by now driving me mad so I went to see the garagiste there and we had a chat. He can fit Caliburn in Wednesday afternoon and Thursday which is good for me – it means that I can hit the road Friday night. He’s going to find me a hire car for a couple of days while Caliburn is receiving attention.

I’ll nip into Montlucon tomorrow morning and take two wheels with me. If the tyres have arrived, i’ll have them fitted. If not, I’ll leave the wheels and go back for them in the hire car. That means that I’ll spend the first part of the morning fitting Caliburn’s winter tyres on the front.

That’s what I should have done in the first place.

Thursday 19th May 2016 -I WAS OFF …

… on my travels again today.

I started off at the Doctor’s this morning at &0:00, only to find that my doctor is on holiday and it was a locum in attendance. That means that most of what I wanted to discuss was pretty pointless but I handed over a few letters from the hospital and had a form signed, as well as a quick check-up. My heart-beat is high but apart from that, things seem to be quite normal for now.

Montlucon was the next port of call. I had to pay a bill at the laboratory that does my blood tests and then another bill at the tax office for all of the documents that the hospital gave me before I went off to Leuven. There’s nothing else outstanding that I cans ee for the moment, although I have a couple of bills to pay at Leuven when I return.

Once that was out of the way I went back home for an hour, most of which was spent chatting to Nicolette whom I encountered in the lane. She seemed to be quite concerned about my health, which is nice of her.

Caliburn had his controle technique at 15:OO and the garage had forgotten that I was coming. But they squeezed us in and of course Caliburn passed with flying colours. And then we nipped off to the other side of St Gervais d’Auvergne for his service. So he’s all done and dusted now and ready for the road.

Back here, I crashed out for an hour and then made tea. Microwaved potatoes and mushroom and lentil curry was on the menu followed by some of Liz’s home-made vegan ice-cream. And now I’m off to bed. I’m feeling even worse than yesterday and to make matters worse, my “upset stomach” has returned.

I’ll see if I can pick up where I left off last night because I was off on a few travels too. The first part involved my being somewhere on the continent – it may have been in Occupied Europe or a neutral country during the war but it was a big tower-block kind of building. I was talking to a woman there who was expressing her surprise that the top floor was occupied by the British Royal Air Force Bomber Command which was using the premises to direct the bombing attacks against Germany, whereas just a couple of floors down, the German Luftwaffe had offices used to direct fighter control against the British bombers. I replied that that wasn’t the only thing that was unusual – out in the grounds was a military hospital where half the staff was British and half was German and they were dealing with wounded soldiers of both armies.
From there, I found myself in Crewe in a huge traffic queue trying to go over Edleston Road bridge. I was in a driverless car – a while Volkswagen Karmann Ghia – and so I left the car to see how it would do. And it advanced quite nicely in the traffic, except that it was going too fast for me to walk after and with my illness I wasn’t able to run after it – and this really had be worried. I remember that on the bridge was an end-terraced house with the door round the side (which actually fronted onto Edleston Road) and it was actually my house. I was reminiscing about how many of these houses used to be built on the bridges in Crewe.
We haven’t finished yet, because there was a football match taking place between one of Pionsat’s teams and a team that consisted mainly of females and which only had 10 players. Pionsat were however struggling to get on top in this game and on one occasion they broke clean though the defence and the player had a shot but a defender stuck out a foot and diverted it out onto the post and out for a corner. From the corner the ball came in and the keeper missed it but a Pionsat player headed the ball in off the post for a goal. There were three Pionsat players in an offside position but they weren’t interfering with play so there was no reason why the goal should be disallowed but one of the defenders, a young man, argued so much with the referee that in the end he was sent off the field, which tilted the game even further into Pionsat’s favour.

I’ll see if I can pick it up from there.

Friday 29th May 2015 – THIS BACKING-UP …

… of my new laptop wasn’t as straightforward as I had thought it might be. And when I finally did go to bed – at 03:45 in the morning, it was far from finished. Mind you, I was. Keeping my eyes open at this time of night was not as easy as it used to be.

And I was up early to – a good few minutes before the alarm clock went off, and I even had time to make myself some breakfast before setting off to Marcillat-en-Combraille and the radio recordings for Radio Anglais.

Everything went according to plan and we were away quite early too. And that was just as well as I had to go to the garage at St Gervais d’Auvergne with Caliburn. Liz ran me back to her house for lunch afterwards and then Terry and I went down to Riom to sort out the tax payments on his van.

THat was quite straightforward too and we even had time for a run out to Lempdes for Terry to buy a new ladder.

It really was a gorgeous day and we made the most of it, sitting outside having a coffee in the sunshine, and then Liz ran me round to the garage to pick up Caliburn.

All of the mechanism on the brakes is working fine, so the problem isn’t there. If I take Caliburn back on Monday they will strip it all down and check to see exactly what is going on, and why the rear brake isn’t doing what it is supposed to.

The good news is, however, that according to them, there is nothing wrong with Caliburn in the grand. I dida sk them to check it over and their opinion is that he is in good condition for his age with nothing to worry about. The conclusion that I have drawn from all of this is that Barrat Ford in Montlucon will not be able to rely on any more of my custom.

Back here, I carried on with the backing-up and the re-installation of my 3d Program. However, I didn’t get very far. It’s 22:00, I can’t keep my eyes open, I haven’t even done the stats and I don’t care. I’m off to bed before I ……. (zzzzzzzzz)

-1

Monday 12th August 2013 – THIS BLASTED ESTATE AGENT …

… is thoroughly and completely getting on my nerves now and I’ll be resorting to violence if we have much more of this, I promise you.

We were all at the notaire’s today and ready to sign up when the purchaser requested a six-week delay (usually a delay of 10 days) of the final act in order to confirm the acceptance of the loan.

Yes, that’s like forever, but he wasn’t willing to budge, that was clear, so I wasn’t all that bothered. So I’ll have to pay another month’s service charges on the place, but that’s a small price to pay.

I was confident that given 10 minutes with him afterwards I could have managed to persuade him to shorten his time scale no matter what he had signed up to.

But this blasted agent immobilier went on and on and on at him for about half an hour (and I had an attack of cramp while she was doing it) and wouldn’t leave him alone.

In the end I had to tell her three times to put a flaming sock in it. Then once the meeting closed she had another go at him, and then she had another go at him in the hall and then a further go at him outside.

I tell you now, I shan’t ever be doing any more business with her – it’s appalling.

We didn’t sign the compromis because yet another snag has surfaced. Marianne and I have told everyone that there’s a cellar included in the deal. And indeed there is, and Marianne (and now I) has the keys for it.

But nowhere in the deeds of the property is there any mention of the cellar. Maybe the owners of the apartments don’t own the cellars and only have the enjoyment of them, but that needs to be cleared up.

So this morning I had another exciting dream. I was part of a team of people going exploring, and we were on a kind-of converted fishing trawler on our way to some remote spot somewhere. But the guy leading the expedition was something of a martinet and at he first sign of dissent he sailed to the nearest port and offloaded the dissenter. I remember chatting to a young guy who was working on the deck above me, an open deck, and I climbed up onto his deck to have a chat, but he informed me that he was being put ashore at the next port.
The trawler had in fact turned back and after a while we sailed into a harbour in South Western Ireland just as three small Ro-Ro car ferries were leaving the harbour in line astern. We sailed up the harbour wall and onto the car park and across the car park to a building on the far side (it’s a dream, of course).
A little later I was driving a taxi with a woman passenger in the back. I was taking her somewhere where I was sure that I knew the way but at the end of the road (on the outskirts of Crewe) I couldn’t remember whether I turned left then right, or right then left. I went right then left and I was sure that it was wrong, and how I wished that I had made sure before I set out.

So up long before the alarm, and into town. I’ve paid the outstanding property tax and that wasn’t without excitement. I also had to deal with some issues about Marianne’s succession –
Belgian Civil Servant “you don’t pay that here”
Our Hero “where do I go then?”
BCS “where it says on the letter”
OH “well you’ll have to tell me because you have the letter”
BCS “it says here (pointing) – Rue de la Regence”
OH “where’s that?”
BCS “I don’t know”
Further enquiry from a security guard (of an ethnic minority, not a Belgian) revealed that Rue de la Regence is the street at the side of the Tax Office.

Yes, you can’t make up rubbish like this, but everyone living in Belgium will tell you all about it. The whole lot of Belgians, especially Civil Servants, DiT shop workers and agents immobilier should be stood up against a wall, preferably at the tir national, and dealt with accordingly.

The same at the Post Office. I have an account at the Post Office, still registered at my Belgian address, and I want to change the address to France. Armed with a passport and French driving licence you might think that this would be easy, but I promise you that it isn’t.

She had to ask three different colleagues how to do it and none of them knew, so when she had a go on her own the computer system crashed. So that was that.

But it’s a good job that I went to my bank though. While I was activating my card (only one of them – I’ve flaming well forgotten to bring the other, haven’t I?) for Canada, the bank clerk noticed that my credit card had expired.

Luckily there was one awaiting me and so I picked that up and we activated it then and there, but by God I was lucky. I could have had a major embarrassment about that.

And then all of this flaming rubbish with the agent immobilier.

And Cecile and her mum are setting off for Brussels tomorrow. That means that, knowing Cecile, they’ll arrive some time in April 2016.

And in a master-stroke of organisation, they are taking the bus to Nantes and picking up Cecile’s car there in order to come here, rather than coming from door to door in Cecile’s mum’s car.

That means, of course, that they can only take back with them whatever they can carry on the bus rather than a whole car-load of stuff that is otherwise heading for the tip, and that defeats the whole purpose of coming here, doesn’t it?

-11

Tuesday 8th February 2011 – Well that was a waste of a couple of hours.

Apparently an identity card is INDISPENSIBLE (in capital letters) when asking for forms relating to property. So with my Belgian ID card having expired in March last year, and me still being on the demographics list for Jette (because I didn’t realise that you needed to do that – d’oh!) a piece of identity would not suffice.

Tomorrow I need to go to the Maison Communale to get myself taken off the list and instead, obtain an attestation that I own the property. Ahh well.

And while I was out, Terry cut all the tiles for the bathroom floor and Liz set to out on the balconies, moving all of the rubbish that has accummulated these last ever-so-many years and uprooted the trees that were growing.

This afternoon Terry tiled the floor in the bathroom and it’s looking excellent in there. Those tiles that I bought for the bathroom years ago, they are a perfect match for the ones we bought the other day and set it off beautifully Tomorrow he’s hoping to grout it.

Liz and I completely emptied the terraces and then we ripped up all of the tiles on half of the front balcony. It didn’t take much doing, that I can tell you, but shovelling up the sand that the gerry-builders had laid down instead of concrete took quite some time.

For a little treat I pushed the boat out and took Liz and Terry for a slap-up nosh at the … errrr … Simonis fritkot. Huge portions of food at … errr … economic prices. Still, they both deserved it and quite right too. we are working hard in this apartment.

EPIC HALL

The Poisoned Pen (or Poisoned Chalice, more like) – or my relentless struggle against reality

Tag Archives: tax office

Thursday 25th October 2018 – I WAS OFF …

Tuesday 6th December 2016 – SO HERE I AM …

Thursday 19th May 2016 -I WAS OFF …

Friday 29th May 2015 – THIS BACKING-UP …

Monday 12th August 2013 – THIS BLASTED ESTATE AGENT …

Tuesday 8th February 2011 – Well that was a waste of a couple of hours.

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