Blogger’s block?

Man with paper head using typewriter

Having just been dug out of a snow drift in Yorkshire, this blog feels like the first after a long hibernation. I’d been on a creative writing course run by the Arvon Foundation. The course was at Lumb Bank, a few miles outside Heptonstall, in a house that used to belong to Ted Hughes.

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Bright lights, black socks

Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum

‘Black socks, they never get dirty.

The longer you wear ’em, the stiffer they get.

Sometimes, I think of the laundry,

But something inside me says ‘Don’t send them yet.’’

(Children’s song)

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Out, damned spot

Drawing of Dracula and bats

(In memory of Pearl, the wire-haired German pointer who loved a juicy bone)

It being Halloween and this being my thirteenth month of bloggin’, my mind has turned to ghoulish things. There’s has been a spate of recent judgements of the European Court (four in six months no less) on the application of VAT to what may be loosely termed ‘body parts’.

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Welcome to my world

Sign outside thanking Alistair Darling for VAT reduction

For many years I have been a member of the VAT Practitioners’ Group. According to the VPG website:

‘The VPG membership is comprised of specialists from the VAT profession, leading law firms, industry, major retailers and commerce…’

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