Taking my finger off the self-destruct button

Seaxwyn

So pleased to see you back. And wow, how incredible about the house. How on earth did you pull that one off? Where is it etc etc.

I look forward to following your adventures once more.

miggy

Woooo - Wordsmith's back! And as good as read as ever, though I am very sorry to hear about both Mama Cat and the rented house.

That was a real roller-coaster of a post and it must have been a roller coaster winter too, but none of it prepared me for the last line, and to me the unexpected finale is a hallmark of a good story.

Thank you so much for coming back. I await the next episode with eager anticipation!

moo2moo

Whooooooooo hoooooooo you're back!

Wordsmith

Thank you, you lovely people. I was rather worried I might be excommunicated after such an un-MSE revelation. There’s more.

The house. It’s a small, old cottage, simply renovated (and in doing so lost its old-fashioned fireplace, sadly) – one (surprisingly large) bedroom, one living room, and a tiny kitchen (oh, what a shame – can’t do much in there, then) and bathroom (shower, no bath). It’s long and thin (unlike myself), in a quiet lane, forestry behind, fields to the front, forestry to both sides of the lane just hundred yards away, a view over a valley (in which mist was settling very attractively this morning), less than ten minutes away from the shop, on two-and-a-half acres … and I LOVE IT.

Very pertinent question, Seax – how did I pull it off. Oh, dear. Deep breath. I saw it months ago, but was happily renting with no savings blah, blah, blah. When I told the owner I wasn’t interested, it went on the market (at 25,000 less than he’d asked me to pay) for sale or rent, where it stayed for six months. When I then had to look for somewhere else to live I couldn’t find anything that was suitable and so I went back to the owner, offered him nearly 30,000 less than he was now asking, we haggled a bit and it went up 6,000. Then – and I blame Stitching Witch and Poorbutrich at this point: if I hadn’t got interested in the 101 things in 1001 days and sat down and made my list, on which I wrote “Negotiate a tricky deal” because I am a wuss and wanted to unwuss myself for a few minutes – I told him I loved the house, wanted to buy it, but didn’t have a hope in hell of raising a deposit or getting a mortgage (thought it best to be upfront!) and would he let me pay for it in monthly instalments with interest added (i.e. would he be my mortgagee). Then for once in my life I shut up and didn’t try to embellish, let him mull it over and in ten minutes we’d shaken hands and kissed on the cheek (I think the handshake would have done, but it’s best to be sure to be sure). The next day he went to his solicitor, who tried to talk him out of it but he said he’d made the deal (probably, then, the kiss on the cheek had been a good idea) and was sticking to it. I’m living in the house already, although things aren’t quite finalised yet – but the solicitors don’t know that.

So, it’s a mortgage but not as we know it. It’s rather more scary owing an individual that amount of money rather than an anonymous big company, but we’ve agreed a contract that protects him.

Ye Gads. _pale_ But wait, there’s more … but I’m having a moment and will get back to you.

moo2moo

and you were worried you'd write a boring diary.....

Love the sound of the house!

chevalier

YIPPEEEEEE you are back. That is one hell of a winter.

And that was some negotiation you did as well nice one
chev

Wordsmith

I’ve had a cuppa and am a little recovered.

Of course, the instant I made this massive financial commitment, work became a little sparse. But summer is on its way, so that means extra work at the restaurants because they will be open all week, and I just got a book for proofreading after a month’s absence of any. So things are scary, but if I keep my nerve I hope I can claw back.

Solicitors’ fees are massive. And I also have a bill to pay to my accountant. And I have had a humungous bill to pay to the Revenue. This was mainly because - oh dear, oh dear, once in the confessional I really had better get it all over with in one go – I haven’t paid tax or my VAT for three years. This was a risky but deliberate move on my part. Things were dire a few years ago and I just did not have the money for paying tax bills; once I got over the problem of paying other bills and got to the point where I could make my monthly commitments, for the second half of last year I just threw everything I could into a deposit account knowing the Revenue was going to catch up soon. And catch up they did, at just the exact point that I had saved just enough to pay them. Do not for one moment think I am not truly thankful and feel extremely fortunate that things worked out this way. It was a risky manoeuvre that I have no intention of repeating as you need nerves of steel (and, I have to say, I have nerves of feathers – the little downy ones that float about) and now I plan to put what I need into the deposit account as I go so I can pay the Revenue on time. Please, God.

And on … My extravagances. I am paying to have my bins collected. This is about €300 a year. Yes, it’s a lot of money and yes I could manage without this – after all, I am living on my own and surely can’t create that much waste. Well, yes and no. I am extremely careful with waste/packaging/recycling etc. BUT, the tip/recycling centre is about a 25-mile round trip and it is open only when I am at work, so I have to store the rubbish/recycling and then take time off work to drive it to its destination. I did think about this carefully and decided that it would be sensible to have it collected. Of course, I could remove a large part of the problem by shooting the cats so I don’t have so many tins for recycling. This is an option I must give much thought to.

Next extravagance – which could be argued either way, and I argued the way of spending. I bought a washing machine. Not having a washing machine is not an option – the get my washing done if I didn’t have one would require a 30-mile round trip to drop off the washing, paying someone to do it, and a 30-mile round trip to pick it up again. (There’s no such thing as a coin-operated laundrette near here.) So, the extravagance was in buying a new machine. It cost €250 (and was actually just about the cheapest I could buy here as I don’t need a fancy one, and indeed wouldn’t know what to do with a fancy one) and I opted for a new one rather than trying to find a second-hand one, because I am fed up with having other people’s cast-offs that don’t work properly. That’s not to say that when I have had other people’s cast-offs in the past, I haven’t been very grateful for the donation at the time, but this time I was going for broke. Poor choice of words. But quite possibly an accurate choice of words.

I have at last had my stuff shipped over from the UK. This in itself was a scary thing to do, and in some ways seems more of a commitment to stay here than buying a house does. I’m not too sure where it is at the moment: somewhere in Ireland, but I don’t know even whether it’s north or south. It was a hefty one-off expense, but does relieve me of the monthly storage charge. Unfortunately, this doesn’t include furniture. I got rid of most of it when I left and have only a couple of bits stored in the UK –these were at a different location from when the bulk of the stuff was stored, and the removal company wanted an extra £200 to collect it (for a diversion of 7 miles, pah!), so I decided to let it stay there for now. Someone gave me a couple of sofas and my landlady let me have the bed from the rented cottage, so I am OK for the moment. I’d like to get a table soon, though, so that I can work at home. Other things can wait.

I was going to buy a new bed. When I told lovely boss man this he asked “single or double?” Well, mister, you may think there’s no hope, but I’m not ready to admit defeat yet. Besides, me, two cats and a dog – a single would never be big enough. The next morning I woke up and found myself looking at the headboard on the other side of the bed – and the little cobweb gathering dust in the corner of it. Make of this what you will.

I bought a new slow cooker. Me, buying cooking gadgetry! Ah, how we roared. Yes, I’ve been trying to eat properly with the help of a slow cooker that I borrowed from favoured friend. This was working out very well, with me chopping up lots of veg and opening a few cans and chucking it in a slow cooker and kidding myself I was doing some actual cooking, but I was eating something each day that resembled nutrition. And I have to say, some of those meals were truly disgusting. However, I have also discovered the power of little cartons of grated hard Italian cheese, which if you sprinkle on enough of it can disguise a fair bit. This was all great until I broke the darn thing. So, I bought a new one, which works somewhat better than the old one. I also accidentally bought a kettle and a cheap microwave, thinking I had neither. I knew I had a kettle somewhere but when the one in the shop broke and we had to – just absolutely had to – have a replacement as soon as possible, I had hunted high and low for mine and couldn’t find it. When I bought a new one, I found mine in the first box I looked in afterwards. The microwave I thought was my landlady’s turned out to belong to favoured friend, but I didn’t discover this until moving day and I had already bought a new one.

Is there no end to this humiliating litany of owning up? Apparently not, for I have thought of something else. I am going on holiday to Cornwall next week. This was arranged months and months ago – I’m driving over with the tart we are renting a cottage in Cornwall with my sister, her husband and their dog. I really can’t afford to go, but lack the courage to tell big sis this, so going we are. On the plus side, the cottage is being paid for in return for some work on my sister’s web site. Apart from the travel, I shouldn’t have to spend too much. It is more the lack of wages for ten days that is worrying me, and the fact that the cats are being left behind.

Oh, and I bought a compost bin.

Time for another cuppa I think.

miggy

Loving it.

You might as well get all the confessions over at once, of course, because you won't feel right till it's all typed out. Anyway it all sounds so positive because however you present it, it adds up to your new home and some good stuff happening like the Cornish holiday. And you are probably happier being washed and fed, even if it meant spending.

Enjoy that next cuppa.

poorbutrich

Wordsmith! How wonderful to have you back! :j I have laughed my socks off at your latest adventures....until I got to the bit where I played a part in the retail therapy! Apologies for that, but it sounds like you got a fabulous deal and also can remove "being a wuss" from your 101 list.

I take it that my part in the deal means I'm invited to the house warming?

:beer:

Lula-Hula

Good work !

If you're going to have a blow out, might as well be a good one I say
Have a fabby time in Cornwall