Further financial faux pas and even more disasterous decisions

moo2moo

New month, new plan! Prepare to be very bored!

Got a shocker of a phone bill this month. Post takeover our broadband package went up considerably and we recieved our highest ever bill at £21 for calls and broadband. Added to that £11 for line rental from elsewhere and its a hefty £32 a month. So with that in mind I've combined my line rental with my broadband package and gained free evening calls into the bargain for a mere £18.48 a month. The robbing barstewards wanted a one off payment of £30 for the pleasure of doing this but overall we'll be better off in just under 3 months time. We rarely make daytime calls anyway and those tend to be mobiles so spending another fiver on the free anytime call option seemed a bit daft.

OH got an unexpected long service award from work in the form of a gift voucher for the company shop so hes going to purchase the wireless heapdhones he fancies but which I said no when purchasing them from cash was mentioned because no headphone is worth a three figure sum. This way they're free gratis and he has enough left over to buy a couple of other bits too. Hes a happy little boy.

I blew a whopping £3.87 on an E-bay dog harness yesterday, need to keep my fingers crossed that it arrives before next monday so that I can get houdini the puppy to her vet appointment without resorting to plan B which involves a large cardboard box and a lot of parcel tape.

Started attempting to plan my summer childcare. Its going to cost a small fortune *again*. May end up working predominantly afternoons as OH is off then so that we don't have to pay out quite as much. I know £40-50 a day isn't a huge amount but four days a week of this pretty much wipes out my salary.

Have booked three very frugal weeks away over the summer hols. We all need a break. One weeks camping at around £120 in campsite fees on an island with nothing but hikes and beaches to explore. The second is dependant upon puppy being sociable, if she is we're all going and if not OH is taking the DDs and going to stay with his mum for the week without me and the third and final week is minimalistic camping at £35 which is already paid for. It does sound rather extravagent when you see it written down like that. In theory its all written into the budget.

Have found a puppy training school locally so will be enrolling for the next series of classes which start at the end of May. Hopefully I'll have made some headway myself by then but at the mo. shes treating her lead as another chew toy and playing tug-of-war with it. Still at least when shes doing that shes not chomping my arms. Resorted to covering my jumper in grated pepper yesterday after she was particularly rough. Shes been far better since.

Baked buns with the DDs on saturday and have managed to eat them all already. Fairly confident I've eaten more than they have. I am a pig.

moo2moo

Its [STRIKE]monday[/STRIKE] tuesday aleady. Was awake before the dawn chorus or the puppy thanks to Hairball no. 1 who was adament that 4:30am was a great time to howl at the moon. No amount of caffiene is turning me into a perky early morning person today. Fortunately puppy is being very calm which makes her so much easier to deal with. With this in mind I've booked her onto a formal and structured training course from the middle of June which gives me five weeks to transform her into the perfect puppy rather than turning up at puppy school with the puppy from hell, theres always one.

It looks like being a glorious day which suits me perfectly as I have road safety lessons all afternoon. Its so much nicer to do when its not pouring with rain.

Have been rather spendy of late. I have minimalistic bids on E-bay jeans. I know E-bay clothes buying is a bit hit and miss, usually rather more of the miss if I'm being honest, but I'm sticking with jeans identical to those I wear everyday for work as mine are wearing out rapidly. Planning to keep under £4 a pair, that way I don't mind too much when I get bleach or paint or oil down the front the first time I wear them. Nothing in the shops seems to fit me again. This years trend is clearly not moo shaped.

Get the feeling I'm going to end up having a very long day as we're unofficially moving into the new extension which means allt he old carp needs transporting from whence it is hidden, sorting through, mostly chucking out and then the stuff we're keeping needs cleaning up before it can be put away. I also have several dozen ghastly pictures to hang which could take quite some time, planning to ignore those for as long as possible in the hopes its decided not to put them back up.

How could I possibly forget - tonight is make-up demonstration night which goes on until 10pm and some smart !!!!! from the PTA suggested it would be fun if I was the guinea pig as the transformation would be remarkable (cheeky g!ts). Boss was pishing himself laughing when he told me that had been suggested but none of the PTA has been brave enough to suggest it to me as yet.

Lula-Hula

Morning Moo,

just popping in to say 'Hi' ( mainly on paint fumes ) & that I too can be up & posting with the sunrise - have just done some banking & love your pup, the large fluffy ball of cotton wool next to it is pretty cute too ,

Happy Mooving Day - yes I've had 2 cups of coffee already ...

moo2moo

Happy Early Morning People of t'internet and wahay to being up early Lula! Am sitting here half asleep wishing I was still in bed. The house reeks of puppy poo but I'm not awake enough to deal with it yet. OH cleared up yesterday and puppy was sooo excited by him doing this that she leapt up at him knocking him backwards into a pee puddle. Perhaps now he'll realise why I shut the door first.

Came home to find him ironing... everything.... towels, tea towels, underwear.... I'm clueless why. Was told I looked exhausted and dispatched to bed. Awoke 30 minutes later to lunch, discovered he'd loaded the dishwasher, hung out the laundry and put on another load (must not get annoyed with whites and reds being in the same batch). My sceptical side is now wondering why hes being helpful. Possibilities range from an extravagent expenditure being on the cards to having spent 4 days at home hes sick of playing the same PC game over and over again.

Most of the old furniture is now in the extension meaning I can start the mamoth clear out of carp thats in storage that nobody has missed. More fun will be had in making an 8x6' perspex glazing pack fit a completely different shaped 9x7' greenhouse frame. Dire warnings on the box claim that this particular product is entirely unsuitable for glass glazed frames which of course this is. Did I amention its the flimsiest carpiest stuff going. Even coke bottles are made of thicker plastic. That'll stand up to the regular onslaught of footballs then.

Spent £3.99 on yesterdays jeans. Currently watching another 6 pairs, not that I need six more pairs but you just never know. Working on the basis that instore I'd spend £20 on each pair at least if I buy 5 pairs at this price it still works out cheaper and I won't need to buy any more jeans for another two years.

moo2moo

Morning all! Was rudly awakened at 5:15am by the sound of something being chewed in my bedroom. Since puppy was firmly shut in downstairs this could only mean one thing. Someone was daft enough to think it would be fun to allow her to explore. Moments later a very dozy DD2 appeared to complain that puppy had crashed around her bedroom, barked and departed. OH is not a popular chap this morning.

Much coffee later I still feel more at one with my duvet than I do with the dawn chorus. Its grey and groty out and most definatly not the sort of day that fills you with enthusiasm. Even my typing fingers are half asleep so its taking three attempts for the words I want to use to reach my fingers.

Still today is OHs first day on shift which means its my first day of peace. Pretty sure there are plenty of productive things I should be doing with it but just enjoying radio free silence is perhaps highest on my list of things to do. Its not that I don't like music, I just don't want noise filling every single waking moment.

Need to start writing DooYoos before my points start to expire. Can't remeber when I last got a cheque, I've a feeling it was January which gives me until the end of June or thereabouts to write another 30 or so. Have most definately lost my enthusiasm for that. It was very good whilst it lasted but having written 250ish reviews I'm running out of things that I want to write about. I could spout drivel about pretty much anything but that makes it feel even more like a chore. Pretty sure its something I'll go back to in the winter when its cold and dark outside and I've nothing better to do. I *will* be debt free by then so it'll all go into the moos new car and frivolous treats saving account.

moo2moo

*insert tearing my hair out smiley here*

Puppy has learned to open the door to puppy land thus letting herself out of solitary confinement as and when she feels like it. Shes also grown enough to climb on the sofa which is most definately not allowed, not that this seems to have got through to her as shes sitting there looking at me every time I turn around.

First pair of jeans have arrived as has the puppy harness. Both are a perfect size and fit. Two DooYoos written. One £1.50 survey done and a 10,000 point Toluna survey completed too. Two loads of laundry done, the first of which is in the drier. Going to grab an early lunch and then tackel the housework. Have spent far too much time today sitting on my bum.

moo2moo

One door wedge aquired. Puppy firmly shut in puppy land and door wedge inserted under door. Jobs a good 'un or at least it was yesterday. This morning was a completely different story. Puppy managed to open door and hurl herself with sufficient force to make the wedge slide on the tiles by enough to get her body through the teeny gap arriving in the bedroom with a very waggy tail somewhere around 5:25am a mere 10 minutes after OH departed.

Am now torn between being very impressed that shes so intelligent which will make her much easier to teach, assuming she wants to be taught, whilst being rather grumpy and very sleep deprived at being up before dawn for the third day in a row. Will be searching the shed in the hopes of discovering a circular door handle. Pretty sure I spied some in there a while back. Quite where or whether we even still have it is an entirely differnt matter entirely.

moo2moo

Starting the day in a very positive frame of mind I can happily report that my current account contains sufficient cash to cover the direct debits due between now and payday in addition to paying for the chunk of half term childcare that needs doing in advance and even better than that total debt is now v.v.v. close to being sub 14K. Finally feeling like we're making progress despite all the unexpected glitches and extravagent four legged purchases.

Being realistic its rather clear that we won't be debt free by my birthday and its rather unlikely that we'll be debt free by Christmas, its all approaching far too fast and with the best intentions in the world 7 months to clear 14K requires 2K a month in repayments which simply isn't going to happen. Still it is going down and its going down quickly, just not that quickly. I suppose being sensible I should conclude that £1K a month is a reasonable target and 14 months isn't *that* long.

moo2moo

Today can't possibly be any worse than yesterday. Got parented in the carpark and talked at by a random irate woman who hoped I wasn't going to vote Lib Dem because Clegg was half Russian. Same woman helpfully told me that Labours Candidate was slimey with BO and voting Welsh was a complete waste of time. Bah. I hate things like that. Apparently she got her iside information from a dinner party held by an albanian imigrant who knew more about the British voting system than she did. Fruitcake alert. Will be running in the opposite direction should I spot her again.

moo2moo

I have found a use for the excessive quantities of dog food. 25kg leaned against the door, in addition to the door wedge, stops Houdinis escape attempts.

Have spent an hour with the special special needs teacher who isn't supposed to have anything at all to do with DD1 because she isn't special enough to warrant external attention but since the lady in question likes to buck the system when needs must shes been spending time with DD1 and has come up with some super suggestions which have made an enornous difference in a very short space of time.

Tomorrows riding lessons have been cancelled which means I have an extra £20 to play with ... sadly I also have even fewer excuses for not taking advantage of the free listings day on E-bay.