A Sunday of two halves
Jan. 20th, 2025 05:32 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shewhomustSunday began with fireworks, but fizzled out into a damp squib. Oh, but with a cherry on the top!
At 2.30 on Sunday morning I heard a series of loud bangs from outside. I don't know whether they woke me up, or whether I was awake already, but I was sufficiently half-asleep to think "Don't be silly, it can't be gunfire..." It sounded very much as I imagine gunfire to sound, though. It stopped, then started again, more than once, and eventually I realised that I was seeing lights through the gap in the curtains, and someone must be letting off fireworks. And that they were letting off enough of them that it would probably be worth getting up to see where they were doing it. It sounded very close, and I was puzzled that I couldn't see anyone in the gardens of the houses downhill from us. Then another batch of fireworks went off, and the fountain of light was way off, on the horizon...
durham_rambler slept through all this, but by the time he was up and online the grapevine was abuzz with people demanding an explanation. There was plenty of speculation: was it a Chinese New Year (very early) celebration? Were the fireworks synchronised with the ones the President-elect was letting off in Washington? The answer is no to both of these: today's update is that neighbours were able to identify the property concerned (the empty box of fireworks on the lawn outside may have been a clue), the police have visited, and the person responsible has explained that after a drink or two on Saturday night, it had seemed like a good idea to let off the fireworks left over from Bonfire Night.
Most of my tax is paid throughout the year: my employer (durham_rambler) deducts from my salary a figure calculated to allow for my pension, too. But I have savings, and the rules have been changed so that these are no longer taxed at source. There's a figure below which the Revenue are not interested, but when interest rates went up, I became concerned that I would no longer fall below that figure. I was quite surprised not to incur tax last year, so this year I gathered all my figures together, and headed for the HMRC website: but when I answered all the questions, the answer once again was "You do not need to submit a tax return." I'm uneasy about this. I'm happy about my answers to all their questions, but durham_rambler found web pages suggesting there were other questions they might have asked, but didn't; if there were any easy way to submit a tax return anyway, I'd be inclined to do that, and let the government make up its own mind. But, having re-read the relevant pages several times, the instructions led me round in circles, and demanded an identifying number which I need to apply for before October 2024 (actually, I suspect I did this in the past, but can't now find any trace of it). So I will take their word for it that all is well.
In the evening we tuned in to a LiveToYourLivingRoom event with Sandra Kerr and family talking about Bagpuss: for which I may have been somewhat spoiled when I saw it in Hartlepool. Still fun, if not quite as magical.
At 2.30 on Sunday morning I heard a series of loud bangs from outside. I don't know whether they woke me up, or whether I was awake already, but I was sufficiently half-asleep to think "Don't be silly, it can't be gunfire..." It sounded very much as I imagine gunfire to sound, though. It stopped, then started again, more than once, and eventually I realised that I was seeing lights through the gap in the curtains, and someone must be letting off fireworks. And that they were letting off enough of them that it would probably be worth getting up to see where they were doing it. It sounded very close, and I was puzzled that I couldn't see anyone in the gardens of the houses downhill from us. Then another batch of fireworks went off, and the fountain of light was way off, on the horizon...
durham_rambler slept through all this, but by the time he was up and online the grapevine was abuzz with people demanding an explanation. There was plenty of speculation: was it a Chinese New Year (very early) celebration? Were the fireworks synchronised with the ones the President-elect was letting off in Washington? The answer is no to both of these: today's update is that neighbours were able to identify the property concerned (the empty box of fireworks on the lawn outside may have been a clue), the police have visited, and the person responsible has explained that after a drink or two on Saturday night, it had seemed like a good idea to let off the fireworks left over from Bonfire Night. Most of my tax is paid throughout the year: my employer (
durham_rambler) deducts from my salary a figure calculated to allow for my pension, too. But I have savings, and the rules have been changed so that these are no longer taxed at source. There's a figure below which the Revenue are not interested, but when interest rates went up, I became concerned that I would no longer fall below that figure. I was quite surprised not to incur tax last year, so this year I gathered all my figures together, and headed for the HMRC website: but when I answered all the questions, the answer once again was "You do not need to submit a tax return." I'm uneasy about this. I'm happy about my answers to all their questions, but durham_rambler found web pages suggesting there were other questions they might have asked, but didn't; if there were any easy way to submit a tax return anyway, I'd be inclined to do that, and let the government make up its own mind. But, having re-read the relevant pages several times, the instructions led me round in circles, and demanded an identifying number which I need to apply for before October 2024 (actually, I suspect I did this in the past, but can't now find any trace of it). So I will take their word for it that all is well.In the evening we tuned in to a LiveToYourLivingRoom event with Sandra Kerr and family talking about Bagpuss: for which I may have been somewhat spoiled when I saw it in Hartlepool. Still fun, if not quite as magical.
