It's been a while, hasn't it?
Well, most of January has been like most of most other months, except a bit quieter. We had snow, and then it stopped, and then we had snow again.
I've been busy, but not with work. What is it about January? Everything goes dead here for a bit. So I've not had paid work to do.
But I've been busy with my tax. I had to have my tax return in by the end of the month, and that's today.
So on Tuesday night I spent most of the evening and late into the night trying to piece together the story of last year. Last financial year, that is - April 2001 to April 2002. That's soooooo long ago....
Well, I managed to put together a plausible account of my financial dealings - helped mainly by the fact that I didn't really have a huge number of financial dealings - and I think I can justify it with receipts and stuff.
I had to then post off my form to my accountant in snowbound Lincolnshire (very flat, Lincolnshire) and basically ask him to do his magic stuff and convince the Inland Revenue that they should pay me money instead of the other way around.
You never know, it could work ...
 | When we were in Germany, we visited Dresden, a lovely city in Saxony. Dresden is famous for being bombed, for having the oldest Christmas Market in Germany, and for china. They don't call it Dresden china in Dresden though, possibly because it's not from China. They call it Meissen. |
 | On the day we visited, the fog drifted in slowly and hung heavily over the city all afternoon. |
 | We visited the art gallery, which has a number of famous old masters. |
 | When the city was flooded, earlier in the year, the water lapped against the base of this statue. Millions of priceless paintings had to be saved. |
 | See, I told you they had the oldest Christmas Market. We bought gluhwein and bratwurst (though we turned down the opportunity to eat the half metre long bratwurst sold at some stalls. I bought my Mum a rauchermann, which is a little wooden statue of a man. You put incense inside and the smoke comes out of his mouth as if he's smoking. |