A new 'tougher' thread... and so it continues

gardenia101

Byatt wrote: »

Gardenia, the disabled rail card info is online, I think I Googled when renewing my DD's. She gets it but I can't anymore. Their criteria/conditions have changed.

Found it, thanks. I'm "lucky" enough to get mine as I have a CVI, but I don't use the train if I can help it as ours are usually so overcrowded you never get a seat. I've tried reserving seats but can never see the reservation cards or seat numbers & there is never anyone available to ask so it seems a bit pointless! I don't feel disabled enough to book assistance but a lady who travels in a wheelchair has told me that even when she has booked assistance, it often doesn't happen. Our station doesn't have a lift, so shes often left sitting for ages waiting for staff to put ramps across the lines.

I'm at my DD's now, total bliss to be warm in every room, and no trailing of duvets or slankets around with me!

Don't you find the sweeping duvets/fleeces help to collect all the bits you've dropped? I'm always finding stuff in the folds of mine (but I'm likely to be messier than you in the first place!).

smileyt wrote: »

That was me - sorry, Kidcat! :rotfl:David Ca-moron and Gideon Os-moron. The evil twins of Downing Street.

Love it :rotfl:

Could you not cut the cuffs off and stitch them on inside out and back to front? Having said that, a) I know nothing about shirt cuffs and b) I imagine your life is busy enough already.

That was my first thought, so I feel truly OS for thinking it :j. But then my "realistic" head thought I wouldn't have a clue how to, & maybe life is just too short . If I could still see well enough to sew then I might be tempted to have a go with one cuff, just for the challenge. If the shirt it trashed anyway I wouldn't mind making a pigs ear of it before I used it for something else!

GFN123 wrote: »

Wow, clever OH! It looks like he may have fixed the washing machine! :jThere was all manner of very old socks, and £1.10, stuck fast behind bits of the drum. So ladies, it's true, washing machines officially DO eat socks

I knew it! We rarely bother with pairing socks now as DD insists on wearing odd pairs to school (much easier) & DS would just wear the one pair continuously if I let him! Well done to OH :T. Every now & then I think an OH would be lovely for all sorts of practical reasons, but then I think about all the extra washing & cooking....

Having a lovely peaceful day here. The snow is sadly slowly melting (even though it's jolly cold so I'm not sure how that works :think:) but I've had the heating on while I catch up & do my accounts while listening to the Archers. Heating will go off when I transfer to the front room with a beer to watch the rugby (cheering for Wales) :beer: then I'll probably blob for the rest of the day, listening to an audiobook that needs to be back at the library tomorrow. Bliss.

Hope everyone has a lovely day. Hugs to those who aren't having such a good time.

kidcat

Thanks for the tips about the shirt cuffs and yes it is possible, however it would take me ages and in the meantime not having enough shirts to last a week adds real pressure to washing, drying and adds an extra day of ironing into the equation. It seems so wasteful to throw away otherwise good shirts though, so am going to put them on freecycle - maybe somebody with more time will be able to turn the cuffs or even make them short sleeved instead.

Its thick ice here with really thick fog - have watched our new car come close to being written off every time a car sweeps round the corner and loses control through driving too fast. Have closed curtains - I really do not need the stress at the moment.

DS13 spent last night at his friends so I will venture out in a couple of hours to collect him - praying it melts a little first though.
Bit disappointed we havent had snow.

QE and printing money is always bad, and pointless in my opinion, it causes as many problems as it allegedly alleviates so its simply moving the problem around a little.

Ds7 school is closed tomorrow (only told on friday) as due to the jubilee celebrations teachers will "miss" out on the extra bank holiday as it falls in half term week - (OH doesnt even get bank holidays as extra pay any more as his company now treats them as normal work days -union agreed to new contract) so schools have been told they can take an extra day this year and close. Seems slightly barking mad IMHO, but as its not been set as a particular day schools have chosen their own, this means I potentially face four such days over next few months, which for a working mother would be a nightmare.

My friend will end up with three which as her holidays were all prebooked months ago to give her childcare in school holidays means she will either have to have the day unpaid, or call in sick, which will cost companies a fortune. She will take the day unpaid but reckons the rest of her office will simply pull a sickie.

kidcat

Blimey GQ - your techie thread is full already!!

shelley_crow

BitterAndTwisted wrote: »

Something not dissimilar happened in Germany, too. My great-grandparents sold their farmhouse and all the land right in the middle of the worst inflation in recent history. That land is all developed now in what became a very fancy sea-side resort on the Baltic coast. Worth millions and millions now but the house is still standing. When we visit we stare wistfully through the gates at it and imagine "what if?" The real "what if" is that if it hadn't been sold my mother would never have been compelled to come to the UK in 1946 as a 17 year-old to work and support her family back home and would therefore never have met my father.

My father's side of the family lost their retail business during the same period and my Granddad became a dealer in second-hand clothes to make ends meet. Nana became a domestic servant.

Lower middle-class to dirt-poor working-class in one fell swoop!

that's terrible Things can change so quickly. At least something good came out of it, you!

I'm really tempted by a cheap kenwood chef, it's got a lot of attachments with it for the money but it makes a vibrating noise on slow speeds. Might have to read up on it and see if it's fixable.

lizzyb1812

Well pup is a bit overcome by his first taste of snow. Cold - OK, wet - OK, powdery - OK, compacted snow between toes - NOT OK :eek: He kept sitting down to clean up his back feet poor lad. Which led to dangleberries! Yes, new word for me too but a neighbour took one look at pup's fluffy back end and the ice blobs attached to it and called them snow dangleberries - it's a sheep thing I think - or perhaps a reference to, you know, bits :rotfl: And they took some getting off too when we got home. Pup is now lying down to get over the experience - oh, actually that's what he does after every walk ........

Well stocked up thanks to the winter prep thread so no other need to go out. Will be making sausage casserole for tonight but otherwise just hunkering down on the sofa with a good book.

Stay warm.

PS - Quantitative Easing = QE = Quite Expensive :eek:

Hardup_Hester

Snappy put downs, one of my favourites, which I did have the opportunity to use in my previous life was 'I'm sorry but I refuse to fcuk someone I could have given birth to'. I didn't invent this saying, I read it in a book by Kathy Lette.
Hester

prepareathome

GreyQueen wrote: »

:j
I've decided to have a sort-of day of rest as I'm a weary bunny. I shall pootle around on the interweb and do a few chores and call that enough. I have also started a thread on the Techie board, where what I've asked is probably the equivalent of enquiring the best way to tie my shoes................I hope they're not dangerous over there.:o Mind you, I have done stupid things with pooters before now and I have still to live some of them down.
.

Just popped over and read your question and answer is yes, you can easily run broadband on it - I have an old packard bell from 1995 that had windows 98 sec edition on it and no ethernet cable or wireless card, was for dial up only, I not only added a wireless card - then it had to go inside nowadays you just get a cheapo one that plugs in, and changed it to XP ( I have my own legal copy I got sent as a present way back when it was new out). I was told by the techie helpline my pc was not powerful enough to run windows - at this moment cannot remember the specs, except it only had a 8GB hardrive and that was considered very big when it was new. It did come with floppy drive and cd/dvd drive but couldn't write to them, so I upgraded all the bits.

We have a slightly more modern pc but its still about 8 years old it also came with no wireless card so I installed one, but I still have old pc, I adore it and yes its slow, so its just kept for backup. I refuse to buy anything better pc wise as this one is still fine, its not used for gaming so doesn't need to be fast and many used by hubby to read all his bowls forums. I think though it is on its way out, just a few little things that point to motherboard and it will actually be cheaper to buy a new one than replace the motherboard.

Basically no pc is to old to be upgraded unless you back to the ones like my very first a - arggggggg mind blank, but it was pre-windows ran on the floppies and only had enough hardrive to keep the basics you couldn't store anything on it at all. I had to change batteries every year to ensure it had enough power just to store that, and had to know DOS to use it, but loved it, was more of a challenge than modern ones. Eventually about 3 years ago it gave up the ghost completely as I used to put it on and write small programmes for it in the old DOS, new machines use more modern codes and only very slowly learning them and code year is helping even more.

So honestly don't worry about your pc not being able to handle broadband it can quite easily.

You just have to decide whether you are going to connect via Ethernet cable ( faster) or wireless. Price most likely will come into it as not all packages offer a wireless router free, and also whether your exchange offers it.

Ethernet connection is done by a cable running from your router to pc.

Router a box that is connected to your main phone box.

What will happen is you will receive your broadband package and in it will be the router, Ethernet cable and at least a couple of splitters

You plug the splitter into main phone box. The splitter has two openings in it one where you plug your phone into ( instead of straight into main phone box) and one where you plug your router. Router also needs to be plugged into mains.

Whether you want or need to use wireless can basically be due to how far away from your router your pc is. It all depends where your main phone box is. Mine is in my bedroom so it means can connect laptop to it quite easily with Ethernet cable, but the pc is in the study and I would have to run a big long cable from router to it so pc is connected by wireless.

Wireless does mean you can connect anything with a wireless card to your internet.

Now you can spend money and make a power point into a router point in another room but this piece of equipment is not that cheap, so I have never done it, but an option if your phone box is no where near where your pc is and you don't want wireless.

Not sure if I have explained all this properly. I have a lot of time sitting in bed so I tend to read all tech sites as I find them interesting, and always have had interest in pcs - my first course to learn about them was in 1986, but I am no expert.

Hugs and stay warm and safe..........no snow here just ice and sunshine

katieowl_2

prepareathome wrote: »

Just popped over and read your question and answer is yes, you can easily run broadband on it....etc. etc.

Not sure if I have explained all this properly. I have a lot of time sitting in bed so I tend to read all tech sites as I find them interesting, and always have had interest in pcs - my first course to learn about them was in 1986, but I am no expert.

I kind of lost you from easily run broadband...by half way down my head exploded!!! You may not think you are an expert, but you are playing in a different league from me! LOL!

Kate

rosieben

prepareathome wrote: »

... and had to know DOS to use it, but loved it, was more of a challenge than modern ones. Eventually about 3 years ago it gave up the ghost completely as I used to put it on and write small programmes for it in the old DOS, new machines use more modern codes and only very slowly learning them and code year is helping even more. ...

I used to love DOS, gave you so much control over the machine. I have DOSbox installed to run some of my old progs;

[STRIKE]micros@ft[/STRIKE] micropowermad have taken control from users, I'm learning linux

lizzyb1812

Oh dear, not very thrifty behaviour here. Put sausage casserole on and turned it down to 1 to simmer....some time later v nasty smell coming from kitchen. Turns out casserole is still on 6 and ring behind it is on 1 - and on that ring is a plastic box with cream crackers, biscuits and a bit of bread in it:eek: Or rather there was! Back door now open to clear the stink but not clearing it up until it has cooled down because the fumes are truly dreadful. Won't be storing the next bread box on there will I? At least the casserole is OK :rotfl: