Wols Riverbank Tales Pt 4: Restitution & Renaissance

Karmacat

Wow to the welding - :eek: as well, mind you. And :j:j:j to ducklings and cygnets - of course, you'll be so close to the wildlife on a boat like that! Fantastic stuff! Definitely one of my more doable dreams, since Lula was talking about it at The Rave.

Hope it all goes well for you, Bast.

bast

Thank you Karma and I hope you are enjoying your new home...? I worried about moving to such a confined space she is a 46 foot narrowboat but strange as it sounds... I have honestly found as I have got older I need less space and things about me.... The joy of waking up and looking out on such beauty is very peaceful... I also never knew how much geese quarreled and how noisy they are... god they bickered.....:) Lula... I love her thread she also would like a camper van as well I believe...:)

Karmacat

I am, thank you! Even tho this is also a 3 bed semi, there's a lot less space here, and my definition of "need" has suddenly changed like you, I'm finding I want less space as I get older - I've also done some developmental work recently thats mean I'm not hiding at home the way I used to, this is a space I go out *from*, rather than pull the drawbridge up behind me. Its very satisfying. And I can see my way to something of where you are, tho I admit there are still several full cardboard boxes in various rooms here - I used to have lots of fitted cupboards that would hold all this *stuff*. I've still got a lot to learn, I think.

bast

*things* *stuff* really have cluttered my life and I am slowly ebaying them :) I think you have done very well making the move is the hardest thing.. everything else you can do in your own time....I admire anybody that decides to make a difference in their life... For me at 46 it was hard, but it would have been harder to carry on like we were... We rent our house out or will do from the end of this month, but we spend from Friday to Sunday on the boat... By the end of this month we hope to have our bathroom in on the boat so we can move.... The setbacks we have had are just like any setbacks in life... although sometimes you do find yourself wishing for a *break* We wanted to sell our house but here in the north-west the housing market is still very slow.............

Wol2

oops...sorry everyone


Bin a bit AWOL recently :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

Offloaded (in a strange kind of way :eek:) to Numpty tonite (thank you Hun :A)


Sorted out SOA and all things money saving...but clearly it would appear I have "une grande problemo about Grommie and the method of his passing....."

No more details..but clearly I am whipping myself quite badly over this :o:o ...and spoiling for confrontation with vet :D


Normal service will be resumed as soon as poss.....:D


Ahem...'scuse me but,.....Waaaaahhhhhh..he was my favourite baby and I SO feel I've let him down when he needed me most
:wall::wall::wall::wall::wall::wall::wall::wall:

Had a good weep tonight (thanx Numpty :cool:)
xxxx

RIP my luverly Grommie guinea ...you deserved so so much more,,,,,

xxxxxx

P.S. We WILL sort this out..I have every confidence in [STRIKE]myself[/STRIKE] Numpty :money::j

xx

Karmacat

Oh Wol. You feel things so intensely about the guineas, and of course you have one or two that you feel more connected to. I still feel a little guilty that I was more connected to one of my cats than the other .... can you still come round later today? There's gluten free cake .... we can talk then .....


Bast ... I want to know more! Where is your house, can you pm me? I'm a scouser originally! As you say, the move is hardest, and everything flows from there really. I've just been wrapping up some spare mugs to send to the charity shop, for instance. I wouldn't previously have dreamt of getting rid of any of them, they all mean something in some way. So I've taken photos, and I'm letting them go. I still have 20 mugs, which is plenty for a single person. Its stuff like that.

Wol :grouphug:

Wol2

Hi bast and KC:wave:

Decluttering is certainly something I am starting to do - but still haven't got round to putting anything on ebay yet ....guess I just need to take a deep breath and start


Well I had a good old sob last night over Grommie and feel a lot better today ..(thanx Numpty:A).....and looking forward to seeing KC later and [STRIKE]eating cake[/STRIKE] see how she is getting on with her new home :j:j

I'm also really looking forward to seeing Aunty Smashed this weekend ....and Numpty too on my way back down.:beer:...Beechie and Muffin will be coming with me as they are still on regular meds.....so I hope Numpty will be able to find them some Yorkshire dandelions
Aunty Smashed is going to take me to Costco :money: before we truck on down to see Michael Buble :drool:


Now an update the tasks I am setting myself each week to reduce the SOA:

Firstly - I have cut down the wine consumption by 50% over the last two weeks and am now working towards 75% over the next two weeks and then 100% starting October. That will save approx £100 per month :eek:

Secondly I've produced a (vastly reduced) weekly shopping list of essentials that I can get by on now whilst relying on all the batch cooking in the freezer..thus reducing my bill by £25.00 per week..and by shopping at Lidl's/Aldi instead of my usual Sainsburys I can get the reduced weekly bill down even further from £25 to just over £15 per week. It's mainly for milk and piggie veggies :cool:. The monthly shop reduces from £96 to £66 if I also shop at the pound shop for toiletries/cleaning stuff as and when needed.

So Task 1 food bill" now completed - SOA reduced by approx £170 per month....although I will need to spend about £70 every 3 months to restock the freezer with batch cooking starting again in the New Year...

Next Task 2 also completed - the piggies own SOA (excluding veg which is part of my food bill as we share )
I have made the decision to keep them all indoors with me- as it will cost too much to heat Piggie Palace this winter. It also means I can spot if any of them go downhill fast as a result of the illness they all have. This means i can seriously reduce the straw/wood shavings bill as they will be on fleece/towels. I will need to make some capital outlay on buying 14 fleeces from Ikea at 0.99p each and have bought a couple more indoor cages (half price with an extra 10% off plus 4% top cash back plus 1% cashback on the credit card :money::money:)

So apart from the capital outlay - I have chopped £50.00 per month of the piggies SOA - it will mean they have to get used to a cheaper brand of food but I will introduce it gradually over the next couple of months.


Task number 3 for this week is to put together a cunning plan to be "Christmas neutral" :xmassmile....somehow I think this is where the ebaying will start in earnest


xxxx

Gemmzie

:T :T on the savings and the less wine and the Christmas plan Wol - all looking fab

Nargleblast

Hope you're feeling a bit brighter, Wol, I am sure it does us all good to have a good old howling session once in a while, in order to unload all the emotional baggage we carry arround with us. Glad to hear you are organising finances and planning to make savings, I think all of us will be having to do that before too long. And well done on cutting the vino - save it for special occasions, it becomes more of a treat then!

Karmacat

Seeing the detail of what we were talking about, Wol, it looks great. And you'd so often have to bring the piggies into the house last year, it makes sense not to heat the Palace.... there's a lot of lateral thinking going on there - I especially like your batch cooking scenario - you've seen the size of my oven, if I heat that just for one thing I'll go bankrupt so I must, absolutely must, learn to batch cook. Any tips? What kind of thing do you do?