Nice people thread part 4 - sugar and spice and all things

LydiaJ

zagubov wrote: »

Am I right in saying that this thread is geographically focussed on areas round the London/ Black Country/Bristol conurbations?

Every geographical reference seems in a triangle between London/ West country/ West Midlands. Nobody from Wales, east Anglia or points North?

Actually, scratch that- I forgot Generali's in Oz!

lostinrates wrote: »

......Aberdeen?

I'm within that triangle. Not sure if Pastures would consider Cornwall to be part of the West Country or beyond it. I think the distance from Bristol to where Pastures lives is further than London to Bristol. Dave is off down in that direction too, but not as far.

ETA Have told my dad that the considered opinion of my friends is that he should inform the police. He's going to ask all three of my brothers if they can shed any light, and will tell the police if not.

zagubov

lostinrates wrote: »

......Aberdeen?

Apologies to Aberdeenangarse

I'm sure half the posters here are from all over the country!

It just seemed that in my brief visits to this thread, Wolverhampton's about the most northernmost town I can recall getting mentioned more than once.

misskool

I'm not in the magic triangle. Some nice people know where I am but it's not public knowledge.

We pressed 7 gallons of juice today from 2 trees. only discovered how to pulp properly in the last 2 presses though.

at least next year will be quicker.

silvercar

LydiaJ wrote: »

Thanks for all the kind wishes for DS.

OK, I have a couple of questions for the NP.

1) I have a friend, single mother of twins aged 10, has been on benefits for a while but now looking for work. She feels her boys need her to be there at least some of the time, so she's looking to work part time, but of course she needs the magic 16 hours a week for tax credit purposes. She's happy to work more than 16 hours, but not full time. She saw a possible job advertised, but it was only 14 hours. She thought perhaps she could apply for it, and then if she got it she could look around for another part time job to make her hours up over that all-important 16. She went to the job centre, put forward her suggestion, and asked what would happen to her benefits in the meantime, while she was working 14 hours but looking for more work. If the job's hours don't fit nicely with school hours then she'll have to pay for after school club, and if she doesn't get help with that from TCs then she could end up worse off than she is on benefits. The job centre people said they didn't know. They said they'd get back to her but they haven't. I thought I might ask on the benefits forum, but before I do that I thought I'd just check if any of the NP have any advice, please?

I suspect the answer is that the rules are the rules. So if 14 hours don't give access to tax credits etc she'll be stuck with losing most of the benefit.

The answer is to find herself a little job now that is 2 hours a week. Cleaning for a friend, Avon or Ebay spring to mind. You don't even need to make money on it as long as you are spending 2 hours doing it.

tomterm8

Start up your own dog walking business. All you need to do is an extra 2 hours of work a week... that's one or two clients.


Edit: but check that is OK by the rules first, I'm no expert.

tomterm8

zagubov wrote: »

misskool wrote: »

I'm not in the magic triangle. ...

We pressed 7 gallons of juice today from 2 trees. only discovered how to pulp properly in the last 2 presses though.

QUOTE]


The references to cider- making were part of what confused me! I'd always associated it with the West country somehow. What I know about british agricultural land use I could write on my thumbnail without resorting to small print.:o

Kent used to be the center of apple production in the UK. Cider production isn't just a west country thing... it's all over (except highland Scotland, where apples don't grow).

zagubov

misskool wrote: »

I'm not in the magic triangle. Some nice people know where I am but it's not public knowledge.

We pressed 7 gallons of juice today from 2 trees. only discovered how to pulp properly in the last 2 presses though.

at least next year will be quicker.

The references to cider- making were part of what confused me! I'd always associated it with the West country somehow. What I know about british agricultural land use I could write on my thumbnail without resorting to small print.:o

By the way, I agree the hidden axe can't just be a lost item! Very dodgy.

tomterm8

I think apple production varied between before the war, and after. Before the war, you used to get apple orchards in land that was also used for chickens or sheep. The apple trees provided shade for the animals, and an extra two cash crops... cider, which was often an inducement for people who were hay gathering, and wood. Apple wood is by far the best fire wood. The trees were standards... very large... and there were hundreds of species. Different ciders from different regions would taste very different because they were made with different species of trees, and different natural yeasts.

After the 1970's, almost all of these traditional orchards were dug up, and replaced with monoculture crops... short trees easy to crop.

Finally, we go to today, where most apples are either grown as monocultures, or in the vast majority of cases imported.

LydiaJ

silvercar wrote: »

I suspect the answer is that the rules are the rules. So if 14 hours don't give access to tax credits etc she'll be stuck with losing most of the benefit.

The answer is to find herself a little job now that is 2 hours a week. Cleaning for a friend, Avon or Ebay spring to mind. You don't even need to make money on it as long as you are spending 2 hours doing it.

Thanks everyone.

I think she knows she won't get the childcare element of TC unless she does 16 hours. The question is whether working 14 hours would lose her all of her jobseeker's or income support or whatever it is she's on at the moment, given that she will still be actively looking for work.

I know she and two friends were making and selling a bit of jewellery a few years ago. I'll suggest she could maybe do a couple of hours a week of that if she ends up with a 14 hour job.

silvercar

The hidden axe probably was used a someone in the next street fed up with their neighbours trees and took an axe to them, then hid the evidence.