Not mentioning the T word at all

Mrs_Chip

First the good news...

We are getting a new oil tank on Monday, and at an astonishing price, which makes us very happy :j:j:j. Not sure when we will be able to schedule an oil delivery, but sometime next we we will be able to have a bath in our own home again :j:j:j.

Not such good news on the van front, the Gas Safe person was rather too keen to find faults and was not in the mood to be pragmatic, so much of the gas install is going to have to be replaced . The installer is hoping to keep the costs down, and we will make some modifications for the better, but it's a bit of a bu**ger, we could have said no to them doing the inspection. And we have to wait up to ten days for his report to come through before we can do anything. Installer has said that on the basis of what he has seen, 95% of all catering vans would be classed as unsafe by Gas Safe, so we have been very un lucky in one sense (although at least we will know our van is one of the safest on the road!)

HM butternut, ginger and chilli soup for lunch, which was perfect for what has been a horrible day. Going to 'extend' a bought pack of chicken curry by adding cauli and potato for our dinner.

Sorry for all the mechanical woes - seems to be a bit of a theme going on!

rising_from_the_ashes

Mrs_Chip wrote: »

First the good news...

We are getting a new oil tank on Monday, and at an astonishing price, which makes us very happy :j:j:j. Not sure when we will be able to schedule an oil delivery, but sometime next we we will be able to have a bath in our own home again :j:j:j.

Wow Mrs Chip, that's fantastic news:j

Mrs_Chip wrote: »

Not such good news on the van front, the Gas Safe person was rather too keen to find faults and was not in the mood to be pragmatic, so much of the gas install is going to have to be replaced .

Booger - not so great news:(. Hope it gets sorted soon (10 days for the report!:eek:) and isn't too costly.


Must go and start dinner!:o

Mrs_Chip

RFTA - thanks, it would seem that there is a lot of subjectivity about what consitutes a safe install, and what one engineer deems safe another will want changed - doh! Doing my best to not get cross!:D

mardatha

Mrs Chip I had my beautiful Zanussi LPG cooker condemned by the HA inspector, then a month later after I had flung it out and got a new (much loathed) elect one, we found out he'd "been on a course" which had obviously gone to his head, and condemed every single cooker he checked in 5 months until people started complaining about him!

Mrs_Chip

Oh how infuriating! Honestly I understand that gas can be dangerous, and that there has to be standards, but it irks me no end knowing that some jobsworth can make decisions that affect people, with no comeback unless someone finds out they are spouting twaddle.:mad:

SDG31000

Good Evening everyone

What a pain in the wotsit Mrs Chip. Are you allowed to get a second opinion before the work gets done? I would be trying and seeing what another Gas Safe inspector says. It is good news about the oil tank however

paidinchickens personally I would foster cats if I could, but that all depends on if you feel able to let them go when a new home is found for them. ( DH is allergic to fur and feathers, so no cats or dogs allowed )

katieowl those blondies sound soooooo good. I might have to have a try at those.

CCP I hope your tyres are now safe and left alone from now on.

suzid I hope that A1 has many more happy days ahead.

Life in the SDG household continues at it's normal slightly chaotic level. DH had a hectic start to the week, but has spent the last two days at home. So he has no excuse to stay in bed tomorrow and can try to draught proof the front door and windows. *Insert evil laughter here*
I got a Per Una spotty cardigan and a grey Autograph top for £2.50 this morning, so I'm happy I do love a bargain.
I need to go through my present list as DH has ordered lots of them from Amazon. That leaves me with more of my money for the rest and stocking filler type things. So my own body weight in chocolate oranges might be brought (and probably eaten before Christmas if past form is anything to go by)
Dinner tonight is homemade pizza, so I had better go and make mine.
Bye for now xxxx

kezlou

Hello all

TV Licences: We don't have one, in fact we haven't had one since 2004 and we don't regret it one bit. If we want to watch tv we use catchup i.e iplayer, 4 od, itv player. My boys are 11 and 7 years and also aren't fussed. They would rather watch a film to be honest.

You can have a television in your home for the purposes of watching dvd's, games etc basically using it as a monitor. As long as you do not have access to an aerial or signal etc then your fine. I just flicked through the channels on mine, basically very fuzzy images. Inspector saw them and agreed. Seven years later and alls well.

Mrs Chip - could be an idea to get a second opinion on a Gas Safe Engineer. but we have rently been updated about new regulations, my partners a domestic gas engineer, and they are getting even stricter especially with commercial vehicles. I know a couple of people who have recieved huge fines for not having adequate gas safety measures in they vans.:( Would hate that to happen to you. Great news regarding the oil boiler!:T

FTM wow what great news :D:D It will be lovely seeing grandchildren grow up together

Well in the madhouse we've been going about running like blue as$ed fly's trying to get everything sorted out for the business. So the purse strings are even tighter than before. Gawd knows what were doing about christmas, last year was bad enough. but we will prevail.

But on a more positive note were off the dole :j:beer::j, so now we can look for temporary plumbing work when before it was only really long term. Other wise benefits would have stopped and all hell would break loose., if it was us on our own, we would have done, but with children, you have to just bite the bullet and ditch the pride and sign on.

The boys are devastated, including OH and me, as its not snowing, even though its freezing here oop north. This time last year the floor was covered! but we have faith, ds2 , snips, is looking out his bedroom window and shouting "it not here yet, mam make it snow!" It isn't half dark though, by half four its petty much black.

Hows HJ haven't seen her for ages is she okay xx

GreyQueen

Good evening campers, I am on broadband. In the evening. At the parental home. Have snuck off upstairs as they are watching a series that they've been following and I CBA to stretch my grey cells to work out what's going on.

TV Licensing.......my kinda people (not). Bear in mind I gave my last TV away in 1987 and I still get harrassed by them. My least favourite letter involved at lot of red ink and a threat to come to my home and interview me under caution; PACE. Like I was some kind of criminal for preferring books to the telly.

:mad: I mean, excuse me?! My neighbours get non-custodial sentences for dealing smack and having child !!!!!! but we live in a society where law-abiding citizens can be harrassed by TV Licensing, heavily-fined and even sent to PRISON for not having one of these wretched things? :mad:

OK, rant over, breathe.......sorry.:o

I actually rang the Police to clarify that these so-and so's have no rights to enter my home without a warrant and they don't. So I rang them up and politely told them so. The gennelman at their call centre begged to disagree; I pointed out they could come around whenever they liked and come in with a warrant. Otherwise, no entry. And that no magistrate will grant them a warrant as they have no evidence of a TV being used. Tell ya, Kafka would've topped himself sooner than he actually did, had he dropped into the parallel universe inhabited by TV Licensing.

They did call on me one June afternoon when I was gadding about over the county-line with a carful of amigos and left a snotty calling card threatened to return later....and never did. I can only imagine that they may have knocked on the doors of some of my immediate neighbours here at Shoebox Towers and had the carp scared out of them. 2.5 years ago and still I wait for a chance to torment one of them in real time. Bring it on.......might see if I can do better than 2 hours (and boy would I like to have been watching that ).

I spent some interesting time on the web the other year reading about how the New Zealanders saw off their TV Licensing...I commend it to you. A massive win for the ordinary person on the street and curiously under-reported here in Blighty.

Well, tomorrow we shall avaunt over to Nan's to visit, and do stuff like gardening and housework and to take her to the farmer's market. I shan't buy much there because it's hideously expensive.

I suspect that I am having a bear-of-little-brain moment but I've never understood why buying direct from the grower/ maker and cutting out the middle-man makes things cost 3 to 7 times as much. I mean, I don't give monkey's how delightful the gingham-lined willow basket on your display, I'm still not going to pay 7 quid for a loaf of bread. NMW for a 21+ year old is only 6.08. (Sorry, no pound signs on this keyboard).

Afterwards, we'll mosey into a Big Mr T and I will see if there's anything that's worth me swopping my clubcard vouchers for. Failing that, I shall see if I can get some more breadflour on the 3 for 2 deal. My Little Mr T has somehow been out of stock on their own brand wholemeal flour all week. Interesting, that, as they have daily deliveries and it just leaves the more expensive flours.......

Gosh, I do believe I'm getting cynical.......:rotfl:

Mrs Chip fantastic news about the oil tank! And ((hugs)) about the van.

Okay, gonna wander down to Cornwall and see what Froogs is up to, gawd bless that woman.

Love and peas, GQ x

Softstuff

GreyQueen wrote: »

Well, tomorrow we shall avaunt over to Nan's to visit, and do stuff like gardening and housework and to take her to the farmer's market. I shan't buy much there because it's hideously expensive.

I suspect that I am having a bear-of-little-brain moment but I've never understood why buying direct from the grower/ maker and cutting out the middle-man makes things cost 3 to 7 times as much. I mean, I don't give monkey's how delightful the gingham-lined willow basket on your display, I'm still not going to pay 7 quid for a loaf of bread. NMW for a 21+ year old is only 6.08. (Sorry, no pound signs on this keyboard).

I recently started going again to the farmers market next door to us each Sunday, but only for a few select things. Thanks to the price rises in the supermarket, these things are now the same price or less at the farmers market (seasonal fruit and veg, happy eggs for only 70c more than smartprice eggs). Things like bread, baked goods etc are still dubiously highly priced.

That being said, I wondered myself about baking some items to sell on the market and not only would I have to register my kitchen and have it inspected at high cost, each week at market would cost me $80+ for a small stall. You'd have to be selling a heck of a lot to just break even. To put this in my perspective, when I was in England I managed to convince a landlord to rent me an entire large shop for less than that each week!

VJsmum

Morning all

I have to be very non MSE today and take DS shopping :eek: He has been threatened with it and now it's going to happen - the boy has nothing to wear. He needs the lot - trousers, tops, hoodies, trainers and a coat, Pj's, the only things he's ok for are undies. We have to go out of town as he doesn't want his mates to see him shopping with his mummy:rotfl:

His last coat cost me £8 - do you think I might have to pay more now! :cool: I have pizza express Mr T vouchers to use up, so that's his bribe.

I also need to go food shopping but i'd best not combine the two, don't think DS will cope.

OH is taking MIL away for the weekend, so me and the kids can slob for most of it - marking is done for now so i've no work and kids have no homework. Am going to enjoy my weekend "off" - finish DD's jumper i'm knitting and sort out the next knitting project, ebay some stuff, fill my current charity bag with non ebayable stuff, and do some writing I've been meaning to catch up with. Well, that's sloobing about isn't it? :rotfl: