I travelled via Belgium last week and decided to stay overnight at Dinant, where I have stayed previously and found to be marginally less bad than most towns in Belgium.To anyone contemplating a similar stop - don't.The whole of the town is being
At La Dolce Vita exhibition at Olympia this year I bought a jar of garlic cloves preserved in a pizzaiola type oil and vinegar mixture.It is just amazing for snacking, the whole cloves are really crunchy with a fairly mild flavour of the garlic an
I need to buy a tyre for my car. I googled all the usual words but came up with nothing. Back in UK I would simply go to Kwikfit, or ATS etc and it would be done on the spot.
Does anybody have a contact for a sun blind maker?Think of a conventional, rather old-fashioned roller blind with the roller fixed at the top of the window and the blind hanging vertically down.
.....about "shorting" - it's not that big a deal. The real speculation happens in the currency futures and options markets. Not even to mention commodities. A quick read-up on how these markets work and the differences against the "stock market" is well worthwhile, and recommended. TK
Except that there would only be a new lira in the event of financial meltdown, i.e Italy not being able to pay its debts in Euro. Thus it would need to pay its debts in new lire, would fall short because of the exchange rate against the euro, so would need to print more, thus adversely affecting the exchange rate, etc etc. (quantitative easing they laughingly call it these days). In other words, a valueless currency, rife inflation, zero take-up on Bonds (hence a need for tax increases) and a routing of the economic middle ground. You would need to be either very wealthy or happy to be poor. Business could then only be done in hard currency, so the economy shrinks as well, which means less and less public services. Not too good. Wasn't the old lira a bit like that though? Terry
But would you buy anything fixed interest with financial chaos looming? If the euro falls apart, expect rife inflation and a need for massive interest rate rises in order to stabilise and get anyone to invest in your new currency or your economy. Then even a 10% discount on bonds wuld look silly, never mind a 10% premium. I'm not sure the ECB is in for that kind of a gamble, nor am I sure I would want them to be. I don't claim it's necessarily the most enlightened view, but it's all mine . Terry
I've had best results by going to the Telecom Italia shop in person. I guess it depends what your nearest branch is like but the two branches I've used both did the necessary with no problems.
A minor niggle I have with the planners is that they calculate journey time on the assumption that you can (and want to) travel exactly on the speed limit for the whole of your route. Which means that unless you do that, your ETA gets steadily later. At least with TomTom you can programme in a maximum speed for your vehicle (say 100 kph), which is a quick and dirty way of getting a better idea of how long it really takes. Then your ETA improves as you travel. Terry
Portofino itself is hugely expensive, maybe even deservedly so, but apart from being absolutely wonderful there's not really much there for more than a day or so. Whenever I've been there, apart from cruise stopovers, I stayed in Santa Margherita Ligure which is a pleasant spot, much cheaper and only a short bus ride away from Portofino. Short of any personal recommendations, have a look at the reviews on TripAdvisor. I stayed at the Best Western on the sea front and it was pretty good. Terry
We had a great stay for a few days last September in a b&b called Oceano Mare. It is in a quiet part of town but only a few minutes walk away from the massed throng of tourists that populate Venice all year round. We chose it from the Tripadvisor reviews and we'll probably stay there when we go next time. Soon I hope.
If you are resident in Italy you should pay tax in Italy. Then because of the double tax agreement you can deduct any tax already paid in UK. So yes, you are theoretically taxed twice, by each country in turn. I'm led to believe tax in Italy is higher so there would be extra to pay. (But if tax in UK is higher I doubt they would give you any back if you were officially tax-resident in Italy ). HMRC complicate matters by deeming you tax-resident in UK if you spend more than 90 days there, regardless of your actual residency under the 6 month rule. But I doubt you could persuade the Italian authorities to let you off your liabilities just because of that.
I have some large and some medium boxes which came from accessstorage.com - on the boxes it says they are supplied by smithpack.co.uk. The accessstorage website shows a range of box packs to suit the size of your move. The large ones are 457x457x550. Being cardboard, it's likely the size is limited by the strength of the box. Terry
Comments posted
.....about "shorting" - it's not that big a deal. The real speculation happens in the currency futures and options markets. Not even to mention commodities. A quick read-up on how these markets work and the differences against the "stock market" is well worthwhile, and recommended. TK
Except that there would only be a new lira in the event of financial meltdown, i.e Italy not being able to pay its debts in Euro. Thus it would need to pay its debts in new lire, would fall short because of the exchange rate against the euro, so would need to print more, thus adversely affecting the exchange rate, etc etc. (quantitative easing they laughingly call it these days). In other words, a valueless currency, rife inflation, zero take-up on Bonds (hence a need for tax increases) and a routing of the economic middle ground. You would need to be either very wealthy or happy to be poor. Business could then only be done in hard currency, so the economy shrinks as well, which means less and less public services. Not too good. Wasn't the old lira a bit like that though?
Terry
But would you buy anything fixed interest with financial chaos looming? If the euro falls apart, expect rife inflation and a need for massive interest rate rises in order to stabilise and get anyone to invest in your new currency or your economy. Then even a 10% discount on bonds wuld look silly, never mind a 10% premium. I'm not sure the ECB is in for that kind of a gamble, nor am I sure I would want them to be. I don't claim it's necessarily the most enlightened view, but it's all mine
. Terry
It's peeing down here at Lake Como, and has been for some time. Hmm, maybe that's why there's a lake. Terry
I've had best results by going to the Telecom Italia shop in person. I guess it depends what your nearest branch is like but the two branches I've used both did the necessary with no problems.
A minor niggle I have with the planners is that they calculate journey time on the assumption that you can (and want to) travel exactly on the speed limit for the whole of your route. Which means that unless you do that, your ETA gets steadily later. At least with TomTom you can programme in a maximum speed for your vehicle (say 100 kph), which is a quick and dirty way of getting a better idea of how long it really takes. Then your ETA improves as you travel. Terry
Portofino itself is hugely expensive, maybe even deservedly so, but apart from being absolutely wonderful there's not really much there for more than a day or so. Whenever I've been there, apart from cruise stopovers, I stayed in Santa Margherita Ligure which is a pleasant spot, much cheaper and only a short bus ride away from Portofino. Short of any personal recommendations, have a look at the reviews on TripAdvisor. I stayed at the Best Western on the sea front and it was pretty good. Terry
We had a great stay for a few days last September in a b&b called Oceano Mare. It is in a quiet part of town but only a few minutes walk away from the massed throng of tourists that populate Venice all year round. We chose it from the Tripadvisor reviews and we'll probably stay there when we go next time. Soon I hope.
If you are resident in Italy you should pay tax in Italy. Then because of the double tax agreement you can deduct any tax already paid in UK. So yes, you are theoretically taxed twice, by each country in turn. I'm led to believe tax in Italy is higher so there would be extra to pay. (But if tax in UK is higher I doubt they would give you any back if you were officially tax-resident in Italy
). HMRC complicate matters by deeming you tax-resident in UK if you spend more than 90 days there, regardless of your actual residency under the 6 month rule. But I doubt you could persuade the Italian authorities to let you off your liabilities just because of that.
I have some large and some medium boxes which came from accessstorage.com - on the boxes it says they are supplied by smithpack.co.uk. The accessstorage website shows a range of box packs to suit the size of your move. The large ones are 457x457x550. Being cardboard, it's likely the size is limited by the strength of the box. Terry