As The Workhouse Approaches....How To Do Everything To Avoid It, the Old Style Way

Hippeechiq

Morning all

Been awake since 4 and up since 5am as other half was making such a loud noise with his heavy breathing that it woke me up and I couldn't get back to sleep.....After seriously contemplating suffocating him, I decided it would be best if I got up instead

I was asking about what to do will all the tomatoes I'm expecting to get off my plants, and someone kindly suggested that I could put them in my food processor, whizz them up a bit and then cook until reduced by half to be frozen and used as tinned toms.

Sorry if this is a dumb question but do I have to skin and de-seed them first, or can I just whizz up them up whole?

ceridwen

Butterfly_Brain wrote: »

Things are actually made to be thrown away how else would the companies make huge profits year after year, I have a belling cooker that is 2 years old and all 6 of the knobs have snapped and two of them were replacements - the cost to replace them is £7.50 each = £45 :eek: I will never ever buy a belling again.
Luckily I have a friend who is a white goods engineer and he has managed to get a year old cooker (halogen topped) that someone was throwing out - nothing wrong with it apart from that it needs a damn good clean because the nanny couldn't be bothered to clean it so they bought a new one :eek: beggers belief so that is DH's project of the week. Then friend will connect it up for us all for the price of a cuppa and some cake

The thing is that even the same manufacturers are making things to a lower standard it seems. I had a Belling cooker for many years - 20? - and there were two things that went wrong in that time. The auto timer on the oven went wrong fairly early on - but I didnt bother (as I dont use that anyway). Also a hotplate needed replacing - and my father bought a replacement for about £6 and swopped it over himself (that was in the days when cookers had those "swirly" element type hotplates - why oh why did they ever change from them?:mad:). So - I'm guessing Belling have joined in with "downgrading the quality" on more recent products.

I think a lot of the trouble isnt just that manufacturers are doing "built in obsolescence" on goods but consumers arent prepared to pay enough for them to get decent quality ones and they tend to assume we all want cheapest possible (even if its poor quality).

Some years back I had my boiler replaced and - on complaining later to my "little gas man" about the quality of it - he said "Well - there is a German brand as well - but everyone seems to want this British brand because its cheaper". At that point - he got filled in on "I want German standard products - even if they are dearer". Didnt stop him doing a later job on my place with a bit of gadgetry that was the cheaper alternative (and I subsequently complained that he should have pointed out there was a dearer one - as I would have chosen that instead:mad:).

Note to self - whenever anything needs to be replaced by a workman - ask him how many alternative products there are and tell him I want the German one (if there is one) - even if its dearer. Workmen just make the automatic assumption that everyone operates on "Everything must be the cheapest possible option" mantra - and they dont cater for those of us that dont (because we know its often false economy and we cant stand unreliable products).

valentina

r.a.i.n.b.o.w wrote: »

Same as here (council flats, water paid as rent charge) and I'm currently paying approx £400 a year too (eek! I didn't consider this cost until I read your post!!!)...would it be worth me looking into getting a meter? I live almost on my own, I *think* I don't waste water, I do the "if it's yellow let it mellow" mantra with the toilet (:D), don't have a garden etc etc...is there anywhere I can get an estimate for comparison between 'set rate' and 'metered' water?

£90 for you - well done!! How do you achieve this? I mean, what is your average weekly usage, do you bath or shower? Hand wash-up? Washing machine?

Anyone else on a water meter? Good or bad results?
:beer:

We had a meter fitted years ago (ten years ago maybe) when the water rate was around £250, that year our bill was £120. This year our neighbour told us the rate is now (around) £450, well last year our water bill was about £200. So he's going to get one fitted! :rotfl: I think you can get a meter fitted and then you have a certain amount of time in which you can ask for it to be removed (say a couple of years or something), then it's there for life.

redlady_1

smileyt - you are dealing with TV Licencing now. They are muppets!!! Do not be threatened by them. The least contact you can have with them the better. Reasoning does not happen with them. If you have any problems then let me know. I am a dab hand at dealing with these fools. They dont seem to comprehend that not everyone has a TV. And if anyone turns up at your door, dont let them in either. Good Luck and welcome to TV free living! Oh yes, and dont bother explaining where the TV is,just tell them you no longer have one. Its much easier.

Mardarthas toms would have to be Artic living up there!!!

Red_Doe

My tomatoes are three inch high seedlings
Slugs and snails ate my chili pepper seedling, does anyone know if it`s too late to sow more please?
Weather is wild here again today...gales and lashing rain. Add to that the expected ash from Iceland and I may hope to win the Lotto (cept, I dinnae do it! ) and emigrate to somewhere nice and warm. Sigh.

mardatha

If you emigrate then come in for me on the way down !! The weather is unreal :eek:

mardatha

Bear in mind my tomatoes are inside on a south-facing windowsill. They'd last 5 minutes outside Next door madly built a polytunnel 2 weeks ago and we notice this morning that it's gone. Just some bent pipes now - the cover is probly sailing over the Danish coast right now

greenbee

ceridwen wrote: »

Note to self - whenever anything needs to be replaced by a workman - ask him how many alternative products there are and tell him I want the German one (if there is one) - even if its dearer. Workmen just make the automatic assumption that everyone operates on "Everything must be the cheapest possible option" mantra - and they dont cater for those of us that dont (because we know its often false economy and we cant stand unreliable products).

I wouldn't assume that the german one will be better. A lot of my german colleagues complain that manufacturing standards have dropped and are now looking to high end eastern European, Asian or even British products as replacements. Best thing to do is ask what the options are and ask the workman for their opinion on quality and value for money. Most of them have one, and it may not be the most expensive one.

redlady_1 wrote: »

smileyt - you are dealing with TV Licencing now. They are muppets!!! Do not be threatened by them. The least contact you can have with them the better. Reasoning does not happen with them. If you have any problems then let me know. I am a dab hand at dealing with these fools. They dont seem to comprehend that not everyone has a TV. And if anyone turns up at your door, dont let them in either. Good Luck and welcome to TV free living! Oh yes, and dont bother explaining where the TV is,just tell them you no longer have one. Its much easier.

after 12 years at the same address with no TV I don't have any problems, just an online declaration once a year. The threatening letters stopped after about 4 or 5 years, and no one ever visited (then again, I had pretty long working hours and a very hectic social life, so the chances of them finding me in were slim!)

GreyQueen

r.a.i.n.b.o.w wrote: »

Same as here (council flats, water paid as rent charge) and I'm currently paying approx £400 a year too (eek! I didn't consider this cost until I read your post!!!)...would it be worth me looking into getting a meter? I live almost on my own, I *think* I don't waste water, I do the "if it's yellow let it mellow" mantra with the toilet (:D), don't have a garden etc etc...is there anywhere I can get an estimate for comparison between 'set rate' and 'metered' water?

£90 for you - well done!! How do you achieve this? I mean, what is your average weekly usage, do you bath or shower? Hand wash-up? Washing machine?

Anyone else on a water meter? Good or bad results?
:beer:

Hi there, I think that a singleton is pretty much guaranteed to save money with a meter. I answer tenants' enquiries for the local council (in case anyone thinks there's any favouritism going on, I was 10 + years on the waiting list and was a tenant for a couple of years before I worked for the council ).

Water rates as a weekly rent charge are about £9.45 in most of our homes, and no dearer for houses than tiny flats like mine. I don't know exactly what the rates are for Shoebox Towers because workplace policy is not to handle enquiries from neighbours (or friends, acquaintances, relatives) so I would never be in a Shoebox Towers rent account so let's say it's £9 x 52 weeks = £468.

Eeeek! I get billed every six months and my January bill was £46.92 and six months earlier it was £43.07 = £89.99 for 12 months.

I have a washing machine and started to tally it's use at the start of the year out of curiousity as to how many loads I did. Answers thus far are 7-10 washloads a month. The washer is a Bosch and is A rated for water use as well as energy efficiency.

I wash dishes by hand under a slow-running hot tap into the bowl, and use slightly sullied dishwashing water to soak the worst off a really mucky pot whilst I dry the rest, then wash it properly with fresh water.

I don't have a shower as they're not a standard in council flats around here but you do get one if you ever get an upgrade. I bathe 2-3 times a week and stripwash between times. My skin doesn't like too much bathing and gets all itchy if I overdo it. Never can use showergels even when there's a shower to play with.

As to the other bathroom feature...ahem....yellow mellowing is the rule unless there's company, in which case I pretend to be normal.

I've not got a garden or even a balcony as I'm ground floor and the tower flats don't have them at g/floor level. I choose to take some recycled bathwater up to my allotment but that's because we've got a drought and it needs it and I hate waste. I do let some go down the plughole to keep things moving.

Well, I suspect that TMI about the GQ lifestyle but you can't make a decision without knowing the facts, so I'll show myself up once again by putting my lifestyle out here.:o

So, I pay £1.73 a week as opposed to £9-something, which adds up to the price of a cheap holiday over the year. Also, our water company allows you to have a meter for a year and then take it out but after a year it's permanant. I inherited mine, it had been in here for several years before my tenancy.

If you ring your water company and tell them the make-up of your household, what appliances you run (WM & DW) and whether you water a garden, then they should be able to tell you if you'll save with a meter.

I always advise single tenant households to consider a meter as they're paying thru the nose otherwise. And, with water rates appearing on a rent account, they are rent arrears if you fall behind and as they're not covered by housing benefit, we have lots of tenants on benefits who get into a lot of trouble because of these.

HTH and wasn't too gross for the rest of the readership.

smileyt_2

mardatha wrote: »

Bear in mind my tomatoes are inside on a south-facing windowsill. They'd last 5 minutes outside Next door madly built a polytunnel 2 weeks ago and we notice this morning that it's gone. Just some bent pipes now - the cover is probly sailing over the Danish coast right now

Oh that's a shame. They probably had such plans. I'd be gutted if that happened to me (not that I could ever afford a polytunnel, mind!).