Death and Taxes, Minus the Death

We're at that time of year when a lot of my photos are taken in the dark, since my walk home happens after the sun sets and walking the dog in the morning occurs before (or around) dawn. I'm inside at work during nearly all our daylight hours!

I've always liked this apartment building (above) in West Hampstead, but I seldom get a clear shot of it because there are cars in front. Last night I happened to catch it at a good time. I love the stained glass windows in that central stairway.

I am back in income tax hell here because I'm trying to file UK taxes for the first time. This has to do with income from my portion of my mother's estate, which I recently inherited, and I hired a tax adviser to compile my British return, since I'm unfamiliar with the system. She has done so, and let's just say my tax liability is higher than I expected. I'm still trying to understand why this is, but apparently it's because the UK taxes certain income at a higher level even if it's already been reported in the USA. I'm supposed to have a conversation with her next week to go over things, so hopefully I'll understand more then.

My feeling is, if I owe it, I owe it. And I'll pay it. But I do want to make sure we're minimizing the liability and I'm not filing incorrectly in the states in ways that leave me exposed here.

Sometimes living overseas is a huge pain in the neck. Not to mention expensive.

And then the question is, what's the best way to pay the tax bill? I'd rather not convert my American money, which would mean losing a percentage to the banks, so the alternative is to pay it from our British accounts -- and at this rate, a couple of years of income taxes on my American investments would drain our savings here. Obviously that's not sustainable.

Argh!

I don't think every year will be like this year. I think this is an especially heavy burden because of distributions I had to take from my mom's retirement accounts after her death. But still.

I took this photo yesterday in the library. Remember my purple heart plant, a type of Tradescantia? It's a relative of the plant now often called a "wandering dude." I have one here at home that I've had for many years and mentioned several times on the blog.

Well, every time pieces of it break off, I root them and stick them in a pot, which I then take to the library. This is the result -- we have at least six purple hearts on the library windowsill, along with various other plants from here and there. It's getting a little ridiculous, to be honest. I guess I have to be less soft-hearted about saving every cutting!

The Capsule

Here's another shot of the cleaners' shop around the corner, taken Tuesday evening as I was walking home. When it's lit up you can better see not only the contents but the leaded windows and the mosaic doorstep.

And here's the electricity repair on our street as of yesterday morning. As you can see, they dug out the hole a lot more and installed that weird torpedo-shaped connector thing. (I believe that's the technical name.)

I got more news and info about my upcoming capsule endoscopy. (Feel free to skip all this if you're squeamish about medical/bowel stuff.) For one thing, it's not happening Friday, but Monday morning. Apparently we needed a little more lead time for preparation. Starting Saturday morning I'm supposed to eat a low-fiber diet (which I'm going to hate) and only liquids from Sunday noon. I also have to swallow a dummy capsule about the size of the camera, as a test to see if it gets through my body without complication (apparently virtually guaranteed). On the off chance that it gets stuck, it won't cause harm because it eventually dissolves. And Sunday evening I have to take bowel prep (ugh) but only one sachet, so it's not quite as intense as with a colonoscopy.

Then I swallow the actual camera capsule on Monday morning at the hospital, and I have to wear a little monitor all day to collect the transmitted photos. So as it turns out I'll be taking Monday off. The nurse says the capsule, which goes down the drain at the end of all this, is the size of a large vitamin pill. We shall see!

This whole thing sounds wild and although I am not looking forward to the prep, I'm very curious about the experience (not to mention the results).

We've Got the Power

I came across this wine and liquor shop on Old Compton Street in Soho when I was down there a week or two ago. I was intrigued by the Southwestern motif on the sign -- apparently inspired by a bourbon called "Horse With No Name," which is made with habañero chilies, among other ingredients. I'm not really a brown liquor person, but if I were I'd be intrigued. (The web site is quite elaborate, once you verify your birth date -- and what's the point of that? Anyone could make up anything.)

Dave and I finally had a normal night's sleep, with no malfunctioning burglar alarm or dog. Hallelujah! It was wonderful to go to bed at 10 p.m. and wake up at 5:30 a.m. with no awareness of the hours in between.

So, yes, the power is back on. Here's what it looked like out in the street yesterday morning as I walked to work:

Doesn't really tell you much, but at least you can visualize the repairs. I think the power didn't return until early afternoon. Dave and I were both at work, but before we left we shut off the circuit breakers serving the burglar alarm, so it wouldn't go off and freak out the dog. I checked the Olga-cam a few times in the morning and it wasn't working, but around 1:30 p.m. it was up and running -- which means we had power and Internet by that time. And Olga was asleep on the couch, untroubled.

I promised you an Olga video and here it is. I'm sure I've posted videos of her dreaming before. I always find it poignant to think that in her dreams she's still young, chasing squirrels across Hampstead Heath.

Stone Age and Space Age

I am blogging from my phone, so God only knows what this looks like. We’ve been thrown back to the Stone Age here in West Hampstead, or at least on our side of the street.

At about 1:30 am our burglar alarm went off, which usually happens when the power goes out. We scrambled around to find the code to shut it off, and after a few minutes things were quiet again. But we realized we had no power. It flickered on once or twice, momentarily, before dying completely.

I went out in the street and found all the houses on our side dark, the streetlights out. A guy with the electrical utility walked by and explained something about a fault blah blah and they tried to fix it and it failed again blah blah. Anyway, they called out a crew to dig up the pavement a few houses down in order to replace a cable (I think?). I had an early estimate that we’d have power back by 6 am, but now, at 6:27, i’m thinking not.

I did manage to make coffee by boiling water on the stove, after hunting through multiple cabinets and drawers for our lighter wands. We don’t use them anymore since we got a hob that lights itself, but of course that function doesn’t work without electricity. Thank God i hadn’t thrown them out — i was afraid i had!

(Why doesn’t my phone capitalize “i” in the text? I’m doing a kind of kd lang thing here.)

Now i’m hearing jackhammers. This may be a while.

Well, i had an Olga video cued up for you but that will have to wait until tomorrow.

I had my doctor’s appointment yesterday to follow up on my elevated calprotectin. This new doc, who seems great, suggests i do a capsule endoscopy in order to look at the small intestine, which is basically the only part of my innards that hasn’t yet been endoscopied. This requires swallowing a tiny camera that surveys the length of the digestive tract. It sounds very space age — is Raquel Welch going to be aboard? — but i don’t yet know all the details. He doesn’t seem at all concerned about the dreaded c-word given that i’m healthy otherwise, so that’s good.

Also, I FINISHED “BLEAK HOUSE”!!! All 880 pages. It did finally come together in a more or less comprehensible fashion but i’d still argue that Dickens could have done without about 30 percent of those 65 or so characters.

(Photo: Near my doctor’s office on Portland Place, yesterday morning.)

Shopfront with Sagging Pumpkin

Walking Olga yesterday morning, I noticed once again this picturesque dry cleaning and alterations shop around the corner. The dresses in the window caught my eye (they didn't do a Halloween display this year) and I loved the tied upstairs curtains and the soft-looking jack o' lantern on the ledge between the windows. The original shopfront, with its leaded glass and Welsh dragon mosaic on the doorstep, is always eye-catching. I've shot this same view at least twice before, in 2016 and 2022.

After dropping Olga off at home, I grabbed my camera, walked to the corner and took a few shots. On the way back, I happened to see one of our famous neighbors; I kept the camera down with the lens cap on, so she wouldn't think I was stalking her.

Back at the house, though, I realized my pictures were all unfocused, because I'd set the camera to manual focus for an earlier shot and then forgotten. Argh! So I reset the camera to autofocus, went back to the corner and took my pictures again. A photography teacher years ago taught me to always reset the camera when you've changed your normal settings, and I didn't. Lesson learned! At least it was a shot I could easily retake.

Otherwise, it was a quiet day at home. I've got 80 pages left in "Bleak House." I couldn't finish it over the weekend, as I'd hoped, but I am so close.

I did some garden clean-up, cutting back dead stuff and trimming the part of the neighbor's extremely large and vigorous rose bush (aka "the monster") that overhangs our patio. Mrs. Russia came out on her terrace and apologized for Saturday's power-washing; she said she and her husband hadn't even thought about the effect it might have on our windows. She offered to clean them but I declined. They're not that dirty this time around, and I'll do them again in spring anyway. I appreciated her kind offer, though.

I also trimmed the front garden a bit, but only as a temporary measure to let more light into the dining room. (The huge hebe bush was blocking about a third of the window!) I've got to find out where that issue stands. Remember, the front garden is supposed to be the landlord's responsibility, and we've asked for a trim but I haven't heard anything in months.

Olga was up and down all night. At first we thought she was sick, but I think she was actually hearing foxes. She went out this morning and ran around barking and wheezing and generally making a geriatric scene. So fierce!

Wabi, Sabi and Bobby

Here's the Dowager Duchess of West Hampstead, in her autumnal domain. You can see that things are looking quite weedy and seedy out there. I trimmed back three more of the dahlias yesterday and put them to bed in the shed. Only one is still out -- the red one, which still has green leaves and doesn't quite seem dormant.

And although I'd pledged to spend yesterday reading, I wound up doing a bunch of other gardening, too. I took some toadflax out of another dahlia pot and even though it's basically a weed, I put it in its own pot. Now, when the dahlia goes in the shed all winter, the toadflax won't die. It might die from the shock of being repotted, but hey, I tried.

And I potted up the violas I found last week:

These are on the front porch, where the Gaillardia and Osteospermum used to be. I moved those two to the back patio. I also have a hanging basket of violas outside the back door.

It may be mid-November, but there's gardening to be done!

I also moved around some plants in the living room, in an effort to make space for the citrus tree, which will eventually need to come inside. It's not getting very cold yet -- only into the 40s F -- but I'm thinking ahead. I wiped down the grimy walls and floor around the plants by the back door...

...and revealed Wabi, Sabi and Bobby, who have been pretty much hidden by the jungle up to now. I haven't mentioned them since 2017 but they're still standing sentry, and Olga is still wary of them. Those big eyes freak her out. Bobby's pink ribbon, which was tired even when we first got him, has completely faded to a sad shade of gray. I've considered buying him a new one but I like his world-weary persona.

Oh, and Mr. Russia was pressure-washing their terrace AGAIN! Remember how he spent four hours on it just a few weeks ago? I actually got quite cranky with him, since last time I had to wash all the windows afterwards, but he said they'd found more problem spots. This time he only spent an hour and a half on it, and our windows are still more or less clean, thank goodness.

And yes, I did read about 100 pages of "Bleak House," despite having trouble concentrating over the hum of the pressure-washer. Progress!

Not Much to Tell

That's what it looks like here at the moment. Many if not most of the leaves have fallen; the sidewalks are strewn with them, the grass invisible beneath a leafy blanket.

I don't have much to report today. Yesterday was pretty chill and I actually got some reading done in addition to all my regular duties. I have 280 pages left in "Bleak House." I'm going to do my darndest to finish it this weekend, or at least Monday. I'm getting a little more enthusiastic now that I'm within striking distance of the end, and I do have some curiosity about how (or if) Jarndyce vs Jarndyce, the interminable lawsuit at the center of the plot, is going to be resolved. Will Lady Dedlock's secret be revealed? Will Esther marry her benefactor or the dark, sexy doctor who's just returned from India? Will the purposeless Richard sink farther into debt and dissipation? Will I ever figure out how all the other characters are connected? So many questions.

Here's the crazy girl, in case you're wondering what she's up to. This was on a walk up to the corner last Sunday. Just a day or two after I took this picture, the occupants of that blue-and-white shopfront put up a huge blue canvas awning over their front forecourt. It's a shop that specializes in cleaning supplies, which seems very specific, and it's one of many businesses around here whose viability I doubt. And yet they hang on.