Carry on Questing

Shoe_Gal

Sounds like a busy day - I need to lie down after reading that! :rotfl::rotfl:

Horace

Congrats on the permanent job..that should keep you out of mischief for a while:j

I acquired two magazines whilst on hols as they had been left on the creature's plane and he picked them up. Well, I can't moan too much as I did tear out a recipe. It was a good holiday - I read loads, sat in the sun, paddled in the sea, saw some fisticuffs between some gangster types - one dropped a gun on the floor:eek:, shopped in cheap shops (chinese tat). We bought a freeview box in Spain (TDTs they're called) and ended up with 4 tv channels but as we were leaving to get the bus to town and then to the airport - some tv men came round and re-tuned the telly so now he gets 21 channels - only the disney channel is in english:rotfl:

Potato, Leek & Bacon Bake (serves 4 - costs 94p per head)

Heat 1tbsp vegetable oil in a frying pan and fry 4 rashers of back bacon for 4 min. Drain and set aside.
Thinly slice 657g peeled potatoes and 2 leeks. Lightly oil an ovenproof dish. Arrange half the potatos in the base of the dish, scatter over half the bacon and leeks. Top with a second layer of potatoes and the remaining leeks.
Pour over 200ml hot vegetable stock (made with a cube), cover dish with foil and bake at 200C/Gas 6 for about 40 min until potatoes are just tender.
Remove from oven and scatter over remaining bacon. Beat 6 large eggs with salt, pepper and half a tsp of grated nutmeg. Pour over dish, scatter over 50g grated cheddar, and bake uncovered for further 30 min until eggs are set and top golden.

Enjoy (they don't say cut the bacon into bits but I think from the sound of it that you should).

I complained to Waitrose about not having any vouchers for free meals - the last one being the trout which I couldn't use so they sent me a nice email and when I returned from my hollibob found that they had sent me a nice letter by way of an apology plus a £5 Waitrose Voucher:j

Lula-Hula

Ooh thanks for the recipe H - & glad you had a great holibob - inspite of scary gangsta types.

It'll take more than a job to keep me out of mischief but I am strangely occupied with being all homey at the moment & like to stay in when it's cold so I might have a few months mischief free ...

Horace

Lula (or should that be Frugal Fred) I thought that the recipe was right up your street as it contains spuds and leeks.

Not long back from the village - went to bank to pay in cheque, nipped into Tatco and headed straight to the whoopsie shelf - I only paid full price for a loaf of bread:rotfl:

Purchased: 1 dvd for £3 instead of £15 (not on whoopsie shelf), a stack of profiteroles, 4 quick frying steaks, a bacon n leek quiche, a genoa cake (I like a bit of cheese with it), chicken & bacon pasta bake oh and a loaf of bread. What did annoy me was that on the bread shelf they had some lovely large baps which had a best before today date on them but they weren't reduced:mad: so I bought an organic stonebaked loaf instead.

Just missed a call from National Express as I rang them to make a complaint about a nasty bus driver - now it seems they are having difficulty tracing him even though when I rang I gave them the time, the registration number of the bus, where the bus was going, where I got on and where I got off - now it seems that i have to provide this information all over again:mad: I just rang them back and got "press this button if you want to buy a ticket, press this button if you want a timetable, press another flippin' button to talk to a person and then I was shoved in a queue" - I shall ring them using skype as its free because I refuse to use my mobile:rolleyes:

Lula-Hula

I am just about to scream with frustration :mad:.

I've spent the last hour & a half trying to buy car insurance. I had a ridiculous quote from current insureres that I have no intention of keeping as they've jacked it up by £70 :eek:. so I did another quick check & co op still came out as the best price by far. Now only £55 cashback but that's ok. Went to buy but said my card details were incorrect . Tried again, same answer. Tried another card, same answer Tried the Barclaycard but apparently I signed up for a secure online visa password :think: sure I did, about a hundred years ago when I still used the card :rolleyes:. My life revolves around passwords, hundreds of them, a different one for each site I use. The BPB is not telling me what the magic word may be I will probably never know & I want to kick someone, hard :mad:.

DD1 has the opposite problem. She has a whole years worth of insurance, paid by me, but as of today she no longer has a car to use it on :rolleyes:. The exhaust has been gaffa taped on for the last 3 months as she never got around to sorting it out & was due to have it done for the mot next month. She has a 7 day wonder from local constabulary for only having one brake light, a parking ticket about to go to court as she didnt get around to organising & diplaying permit & today her car died. Head gasket gone RAC man poured water in & water poured out again through the radiator :rolleyes:

Guess who's car I was filling up with petrol last week :rolleyes:. I shall siphon every last drop out if it kills me. Fortunately she is able to get to work via train but I know just how bereft she feels; was almost beside myself when I thought mine was to be written off last year

I have suggested that as soon as the laptop she bought last week - which is why she's so skint - arrives, that she returns it so she can save for a new car. Not quite sure what else I can do to help her out, I have no spare money - mine needs a full service & cambelt next month & all available funds going to pay for that. Her karma certainly not good at the moment, but perhaps this is the final lesson for her. Cant even lend her mine as I now need it for work secretly relieved as my car doesnt like to run on flat tyres & the grit at the bottom of the fuel tank .

Other than very annoying car news today has been quite succesful. Decent amount of work, bracing myself to tell home job boss about new job as she wont like it & will probably make me go self employed.

Surreptitious investigative chat with co worker has revealed that she is all talk & has no intention of taking on the business. Last week I asked what the average weekly amount of business was & she didnt have a clue :eek: This is quite a concern as she collects all the orders & prices them & then collects payment & has done so for the past 7 years. Cant believe that she had never taken any notice - if the boss had been moaning at me about the weeks takings I would have immmediately been able to evaluate it against previous weeks. I would make it my business to know just how much she was raking in compared to the outgoings. Maybe I'm just nosy . I have since discovered that co worker also grossly exaggerated boss's illness so have mentally filed her under 'drama queens with not much interesting happening in own life so has tendency to overdramatise every little thing' .

Sounds like the xbf :rolleyes:.He still texts me about 3 times a week with random messages - the last one was "is this even your number anymore ?" - that I assume is because I have continued without exception to ignore them with even acknowledgement for the last 2 months. He can text all day for all I care. I see the name 'Idiot' appear on the screen & just delete without reading unless I'm really really bored :rotfl:. I never thought that ignoring someone could be so empowering, he's almost unreal now, like character from a book rather than an actual person. How sad, that after all this time he still hasnt moved on with his life. Loser.

Yep, I am not a nice person :whistle:.

I am however, a person who has had another NSD & who by 9.30 this morning had made a batch of hobnobs & weetabix chocolate brownies.

I am also the person who fed her DD leftover leek & potato soup & shepherds pie for dinner tonight.

I am the person who returned library books today with 10 minutes to spare & then drove her DD back up to the allotment so she could rescue her library book from the shed :rolleyes:

I am the person who really should go to bed as she has to use her brain for work job [STRIKE]tomorrow [/STRIKE] later today :eek:

night night
xx

Shoe_Gal

Hi Lula

Your day sounds overwhelming - and :mad: to car insurance!

Horace

Try the Post Office for car insurance - although I am not sure if you can get cashback. I too hate those security things when you use your credit card online - I tend to say that I have forgotten it and I can reset it:j

Hope you have a better day today.

Lula-Hula

Phew,

today has been much calmer. As soon as I dropped DD to school I came home & reset Barclaycard password, then logged on to co op site via Quidco & went through the whole procedure again, it worked :j. Bit of pain that I had to use Barclaycard for the deposit but will pay it straight off. The insurance cost £205 total & I will get £55 cashback so I'm happy with that.

Work was good; I am getting a feel for what's going on now & was casualy asked whther I would be interested in increasing the days I work; one of the bosses wants to ge me involved i more projects but sayas there's no point if I am only there 2 days a week as I cant follow through with them. I agree with this & am keen to get my teeth into more serious stuff when I feel more competent but have said that I am not keen to work on fridays for the forseeable future.

That may sound odd but as a totally single parent I need one day a week to myself, whether it's to clean, do the food shopping, go the allotment, read a book, decorate or meet a friend for lunch, I need a day on my own ( well 6 hours :rolleyes:) to do as I please with no responsibility. It also saves a day of childcare costs during the holidays & friday is the day that school usually have all the extra inset days too. When DD is older & can amuse & transport herself about at weekends I wont mind working all week but for now, friday rhymes with my day

It should have been a NSD today but I forgot to take the bolognese sauce out of the freezer this morning :doh: & it was getting late by the time I finished home job work so we whizzed to the co op & bought some quorn chunks & milk then threw a curry together with the help of a jar of sauce & some naan bread. So I spent £3.86 which means I'm over the budget again but the chunks were on offer at 2 for £3 & I got a till coupon for £2 off my next £20 shopping bill. Will make sure I use that instead of a trip to Waitrose then .

I've earned a mahoosive 550 points for one survey so half way to another £10 voucher again .

Catapuss is an absolute sweetie, his coat is now gleaming & really smooth; he's not that keen on being groomed by me but I always distract him with a few milk drops & he hasnt used the litter tray for the last 24 hours :T.

Tomorrow I need to try to get DD a place at sports camps as work want me in on the tuesday. Dont think we will be going to cornwall as DD1 wont be able to get to work so easily from here by train & she was due to catsit. I do want to go & love the drive but the knowledge that the cambelt is overdue for replacing has been playing on my mind as it's a 500 mile tround trip & also the car hasnt been serviced for a year. I do like to know that my car is in good order if I'm undertaking a journey like that with DD. Apparently the business shuts down for the whole of the christmas / new year so maybe we can go then ...

Must go check on my subscriptions now to make sure everyone is behaving themself

makeup

Wowza's on car insurance, excellent work.

Think you are totally right about keeping Friday's to yourself. Makes perfect sense and can see how that helps you keep your sanity.

Have finished two good books this week (from library).

Balderdash & Piffle - all about English language (based on TV show of same name) - very interesting all about origins of words etc. I love all that kind of thing so found it brilliant. We all know that Shakespeare gave us lots of words and phrases but what about the ones that didn't 'stand the test of time; - acture, conceptious, fustilarian and besort?!

Blue Diary by Alice Hoffman -she wrote Improbable Future which I love love love. This is a very good book too, she is very evocative and writes really interesting women. It is quite a shocking book in one way. It is about a woman who thinks she has the perfect life with her wonderful husband and lovely son and then her husband is arrested for a horrible crime. I really enjoyed it.

Lula-Hula

Ooooh thanks for the book tips makeup

-it's been ages since we last had a book club meeting. I remember watching Balderdash & Piffle. My father would love you , he's always correcting me on my speech errors . I started reading One Red Paperclip - about the guy who swapped his way up to a house but then started reading Parrot in the Pepper Tree - family move to rural Spain & their adventures - easy going & funny sequel to Driving over Lemons.

Had to take the book back to the library yesterday & havent done much readingother than that as always seem to be on here :rolleyes:.

Drinking all this coffee at work is playing havoc with my time zones. Must get to bed now ...