The debt free journey of an easily distracted Moog

LittleMoog

Evening diary

Masterchef thing was pretty rubbish. We had to make vegetable soup, tomato pasta and vanilla ice cream. At least I was in the fresh ingredients team, so didn't have to deal with the revolting packet soups and try to make soft scoop ice cream look appealing! The Asda soup looked like someone had been sick in the bowl!
Knackered now, went to check out the new Aldi on my way home, and DH bought us a Dominos takeaway tonight to celebrate my appraisal results.

Looking forward to a long lie in tomorrow, definitely won't be setting an alarm!

LittleMoog

Morning Diary

Ended up having a very lazy weekend, didn't make it to the shops, or even off the sofa for most of the time, but I think I needed the relaxing, as I feel much better today. I did manage to finish knitting the sleeves for my niece's birthday cardigan, just have to do the borders and collar and it will be done, just in time for her 1st birthday next Sunday!

Had friends over for dinner and board games on Saturday, which was very enjoyable, especially as I made a no hassle dinner out of stuff from the freezer, so it was very economical and stress free

Weighed in this morning, officially started my healthy eating plan last Monday although I'd been trying to be sensible since new years. Anyway, 1.5lb off this week, would probably have been more but we had a sinful takeaway on Friday, and lots of drinkies on Saturday .

I've been using this site which has a free food diary to keep track of my calories: http://www.foodfocus.co.uk/home.php

It's quite clever, it calculates your daily calorie requirement (~2400 for me) and then tells you how much to cut back by to lose weight at a specific rate. To lose 2lb/week, it says to reduce my calories by 1000 a day, to 1400ish. I figure that even if I don't always manage that, as long as I stay in the 1400-1800 region I should be heading in the right direction. You can enter the exercise you do as well and it knocks that off the calories you need to cut back by.

Kepp

Sounds like a lovely weekend - lazy days are needed once in a while!

jtr2803

Well done on your apprisal rating hun :T, I don't think I could cope without a payrise for 4 years :eek:

Lazy days are the best....and usually free

LittleMoog

To be honest, it's the norm in my company to give only very small payrises, unless you change job grade. At the same time they move the payscales almost every year, so some people are in danger of falling below 80% on the scale due to the lack of payrises. If there is a payrise they get priority (as long as they've rated well in PDP), and everyone else slides down a few %! I was at 99.5% of my payscale (which ranges from 80-120%) when I went permanent in Feb 2009, but they moved the scales on 1st January, so now I'm at 96%. It's all very confusing!

And don't even get me started on the promotion procedure, I've been working here for 4 years (although 2 as a contractor) and I have no idea how the system works! Some people have been listed for promotion every year that I've known them, and the goalposts for what they have to achieve to get it are moved every year so they're still the same grade.

Woowoo

It all sounds very complicated!

It's simple in my place, crap payrises and crap bonuses lol!

LittleMoog

It's one of the joys of working for a massive multinational! All our procedures are global and apply to all 137000 employees, and therefore don't really work for anyone! :rotfl:

LittleMoog

Afternoon Diary

Had a very productive lunchtime in a DFW way:
1) Arranged new AA cover as our current cover was due to renew in Feb and they sent a letter saying the monthly fee would go up from £11 to £18! That's a 64% increase! I rang them and they offered to get it down to £12 a month, but I cancelled. Gone through quidco today for the same cover, but with £60 cashback.:j Also can afford to pay in one lump sum this year, so will free up another £10 a month to put in the snowball.

2) Did online Tesco shop to be delivered on Friday with £10 off voucher and £7 cashback from Quidco :j Even with the £5.50 delivery we're up by over £10! Plus I think I spent less than normal, although our shopping is so variable from week to week that I can't be sure.

3) Cancelled CreditExpert membership, now that MBNA have finally marked the card I closed in August as Settled, so that saves me £7 a month.

Went to GP this morning to try and sort out my referral to a back specialist, it's been an ongoing fiasco since before Christmas. Physio told me to ring and ask for a referral letter, so I did, but GP I spoke to wanted letter from physio, who only works Saturdays so was off for 3 weeks over Christmas/NewYear. She sent them a letter 2 weeks ago and I rang on Monday to find out if they'd done the referral only to be told that I still had to go in for an appointment as they weren't happy to refer me without seeing me. Went in today, GP asked all the same questions as the one on Monday, didn't even do a physical examination and will write the letter. What was the point of me even going in :mad: Still at least they're doing the letter now, so I should be able to make an appointment with the specialist next week.

LittleMoog

Morning Diary,
not much to report today, payday tomorrow so just a quiet one today. Back worse again, it's waking me up at night so I feel completely exhausted now. Have booked a physio session for Saturday, hope it will provide some relief. Hoping to get an appointment to see the consultant next week, now the GP is finally doing the referral letter :mad:

LittleMoog

Morning Diary :rotfl:
It's finally payday :j still not much to spend though, as have a very expensive month coming up - car tax and insurance for my car, plus need to buy a gift for my brother's baby which is due in 4 weeks, and I think I'll have to pay something towards my sister's hen weekend, which is 4-6th March. Am currently trying to work out how much of the weekend I can afford (real answer = none probably, but that's not really an option!).

Plan is to have a family spa day, probably at the Sanctuary in Covent Garden, followed by dinner and games with all the hens at Sister's house. On the Saturday plan is to go and do an activity (no idea what yet, but probably not free ) before dinner, drinks and dancing into the night. Sister lives near family home, so free accommodation and no transport costs except getting to the spa and back, but realistically I think I can only do one of the days and will have to plead poverty. I'd rather do the spa day, and dinner at home than the night out part, but that's the bit that will be really expensive. We went to the Sanctuary for sister no4's hen do, and by the time I'd paid to get in (£75!! :eek:) I couldn't afford any treatments, which was pretty rubbish, although it's still a lovely place to spend the day. If I do go I'm determined to have some sort of treatment, even if it's only a manicure or a facial (I've never had either!) Since I put all my birthday money into the debt repayments, and will put all my spare bonus after car service and MOT in as well, I don't feel TOO guilty about spending a bit on this, it's the last sister's hen night I'll get to go on now we're all married. February is a council tax free month as well (we only get one this year because of how the payments worked out after we moved), so will have some extra cash available then.

Anyway, will wait to hear how much I have to pay for hen before deciding what to do, but hopefully will be able to manage both days, and just skip the night out part on the Saturday.

Have budgetted for my new swimming costume this month, I really need to start doing some exercise, and I think swimming is the only thing I can really manage atm. Hoping to get over to MK tomorrow after physio, so will be able to try on costumes at the bravissimo shop to find the right size - with their delivery charges I don't gain anything by ordering online through quidco, so if they have one that fits I'll buy it then. Also need to buy new socks, all of mine are full of holes Will also take a look at the end of the debenhams sale, just in case there are any major bargains to be had, I could still do with a few more long sleeved tops, it's freezing in my office, and most of mine are short/3/4 sleeved.