"Simply not solvent!

Seaxwyn

Hi Karmacat.
The French trip does indeed sound fab - let's hope the car is able to make it!

Chinatown outing was not really my cup of tea. It was SO crowded and noisy, with amplified music and speeches being played in the streets and constant firecrackers.

My kids and their friends love shopping in the Chinese shops, they are all satisfied with their haul of sweets, chopsticks, cricket cages and the like. But they could have bought those any day of the year!

We had a nice meal and stuff but I won't be going next new year.

taxi73

Sorry to hear you're having such an expensive time at the moment..cars are a pain aren't they?..hope it doesn't cost too much to fix.

Sea78

Hey

Sorry to hear the chinatown trip wasn't great - sounds like the kids enjoyed it though

hypno06

Sorry to read about the car - I wish I could do without mine. They are a constant financial drain aren't they.....petrol.....tax.....mot.....tyres.....:mad: :mad: :mad:

big hugs x

Seaxwyn

Yay! The first part of the work I bid for recently has just come in - a few hours worth and they're paying £175. I'll make sure to do a really good job as this could lead to a lot of work coming in small batches over the year. Also, one other job that was due to end in March has been extended, possibly for another year. This is 2-4 days a month and very flexible, I fit it in around other things, so it's a nice contract to have, even if the work is very tedious.

The car is in the garage, they are trying and failing to find out what is wrong with the indicators. The locksmith has reluctantly agreed to look at the jammed up locks - though he won't come out so we have to drive to him, about 10 miles away.

We've got several largish bills waiting to be paid and coming up. I wish we knew how much OH will be getting paid his month.

hypno06

Good news on the work front :T and fingers crossed the car gets sorted soon without too much expense xx

Sea78

That's great news Seax - so glad the work front is beginning to look up a little.

Sea xx

taxi73

Hi Seax...hope they fix your car soon at not too much expense!!!...Fab news on the work front and hope that one turns into a bigger contract..yuck to big bills xx

Karmacat

Hiya
Yep, work sounds good, car sounds bad. It seems *so* difficult to cope with cars when you're in debt, and yet when you've got kids, and you want to keep their standard of living up to what they've been used to, or public transport is ridiculous, they stay the only option. I don't *need* a car, so I don't have one, but everything takes longer because of it, I must say. When I get to "wealthy", I'm gonna have a car. A nice one! [KC dreams away, then notices she has to do the input for the latest mystery shop, oops].

Hope you're having a good day... I've stopped dreaming, and am off to the mystery shopping website.

Seaxwyn

Thanks all.

The car will be fixed and ready to pick up tomorrow, no idea how much it will cost though. Yes cars are a pain... I have lived most of my adult life without one but my mum insisted on buying us one when we moved down here (Surrey) as the local public transport is not great. Having said that, I'm sure we could get most places and we could cycle more than we do.

Anyway, it will be handy for picking up six boxes of books which I'm getting off a kind freecycler this weekend. Hope at least some will be sellable on Amazon, though I suspect most will not.

I'm feeling in a strange state of flux just now as contracts are ending and starting and I have no real picture of how much work I have left. I could be sleepwalking into a really difficult patch as OH has only three more weeks work booked and our outgoings are truly enormous.

Still, I can't get too worried about it. Despite our past troubles I persist in believing we'll get through OK.