PigginSkint's DFW Diary

PigginSkint

Had the shock of my life when I got home last night – OH had actually tidied his side of the bedroom!! This included putting all his clothes away, sorting out those that needed to be washed and sorting out some to go to the charity shop! (who says it is only women who have too many clothes!!!)

He had also bought Casino Royale on DVD yesterday. Not very DFW I know but we rarely buy any DVDs at all now (stress on the ‘now’ – we are learning!!) and it was one that we really really wanted!! So instead of doing the jobs I was meant to be doing the 3 of us slobbed out on our bed and watched it, eating the risotto that DS had made at school yesterday afternoon, with salad, some nice bread rolls and beer (not DS obviously – he is only 12!!) What a treat!!

2 days to go until payday!!

PigginSkint

Arghh!! Bl*****y Southern Electric!! They have taken a direct debit payment of £26.69 out of my bank account today. I can only assume that this is my final payment to them as it is different (i.e. more!) than my usual payment and, needless to say, on a different date!! I am annoyed because they didn’t send me a final bill or give me any warning that they were going to do this and I am even more annoyed that the payment went out today as it is a day before payday – as a result this has taken me over my overdraft limit. O.K., only by £1.18 but still! Humph!! :mad: :mad:

Luckily (I suppose!) I always check my bank balance on my internet banking every morning and, also luckily, LTSB do not charge fees for going over the OD limit providing you pay in enough to bring it back under the OD limit on the same day – I have had to transfer some more money from my other account (and also luckily – as it is another LTSB account the transfer happens immediately).

Still I suppose this means that SE phones are now done and dusted and that from now on I shall be only paying one phone bill instead of 2! On that subject I had a look at my Talk Talk documents last night and I think that for some of the features I signed up for (free!) I actually need to go onto their website (or phone them up) to set them up. That’s another job for when I get a moment!!

One job I did get round to doing last night – I phoned LTSB to take advantage of their 0% for 6 months balance transfer offer and transferred the remaining balance from my Virgin card (APR 15.9%) to it. I’m glad I did it yesterday because when I checked the letter, the balance transfer fee goes up from 2.5% to 3% for any balances transferred from 30th March.

I also bagged up my Avon delivery last night so I can start doing my customer deliveries tonight which means I should be able to pay some of the money in tomorrow.

I’m quite proud of myself that I did so much last night as I wasn’t feeling very well at all – I had had dreadful stomach ache all afternoon (IBS playing up) and I had a stinking headache.

Confession time – we had Chinese last night! OH paid though, if that makes it any better! It’s not like we do it very often and it was only the 2 of us (DS was at his Dad’s) and we (or rather he!!) spent £14.90.

PigginSkint

Payday today!! Woohoo!! :j It’s more than normal this month because it is one of my 2 months off from payments for my travel pass.

I did most of my Avon deliveries last night so that is more money that I can pay into my bank account. Tonight I need to put my books out (which means I have actually got to get them ready first – I am really behind with this atm) and try to get rid of the rest of the deliveries.

Tonight my Sainsburys shopping will be delivered so we will actually have some food in the house. Last night I had a truly DFW dinner – I made fritters with some leftover vegetables (leek and mushrooms) and some left over milk powder that needed using up, served with baked potatoes and some Aldi tinned sweetcorn. Yum!

As my shopping is coming tonight it will be the start of another grocery budget challenge. This means I need to tot up exactly how much we spent in the last month – my list on the fridge seriously needs updating from receipts that are pinned to the notice board, others that are in my purse and some more that are in OH’s wallet. Then I should be able to set a more realistic budget!

I’ve got some more books that I really must put up for sale on Amazon but I won’t get time to do it tonight. I think it is a job that shall have to wait until the weekend.

PigginSkint

Quick update – I’ve been having a really good think recently about the money that’s currently in my savings account and how best to use it. As I said before, there is nowhere near enough to cover my debts and in any case the interest is more than I am paying on my credit cards. It is my emergency fund and my ‘oh let’s just pay a bit more off that debt’ fund. I’ve decided that it might be good to use it pay off any balance transfer fees that I incur while credit card shuffling so today I have just paid off the one that I incurred last month for a balance transfer to my LTSB card and when the other one goes through on the same card I will do the same again. This will give me a level playing field, if you like, as it means that my regular payments off these cards will go towards reducing the outstanding debt rather than the fees.

PigginSkint

Morning all! Well it’s Friday again – hooray!!! :j

Not much to report today really. Last night was very busy because I had to get my Avon books ready to go out as soon as I got home and then had to go straight out to put them out. I did just the one delivery – where I had said I would go back last night. I didn’t get time to do any others because I had to get back by 7pm for my Sainsbury’s delivery.

OH got back quite late last night (though not as late as we had been expecting) because he got a call at lunchtime yesterday to go to a casting in London for an advert yesterday evening. Should know today or tomorrow whether he’s got it – it’ll be well paid if he gets it. He is certainly getting the auditions at the moment so fingers crossed he will get something good soon. (i.e. something really well paid!!:D )

I’m on my own at work today as the 2 colleagues that I share an office with have both got annual leave today. While the cat’s away eh?!!! Not really – I’ve got too much to get done today.

DS goes to his Dad’s tomorrow for a week and then I’ve got him for the 2nd week of the Easter Holidays – at least he will be with me at the same time as I’ve got time off (unlike the last 2 years - grrr!:mad: ) and will be with me for Easter Sunday for a change (ditto!:mad: ). It will be nice to have some peace and quiet but I will miss him!

PigginSkint

Had a very lazy weekend (but I needed it!!) so nothing much to report today – so I won’t bore everyone with a long post today!!

However I have just done my preliminary start-of-the-month debt figures (just got to check a couple to get the most up-to-date situation) and it would appear that I am very close to reaching my current small target (see sig). It looks like I am less than £30 away from it so I should definitely crack that by the end of the month and be well on my way to what will be my next small target which will be for my credit card debt to be less than it was at my lightbulb moment – that will be one to celebrate!!

PigginSkint

Last night I got home late as I had a late appointment at the doctors – my scan results on my knee have come back and according to my doctor I am officially weird! I have some damage to the bone but we have no idea how it has happened – apparently it takes some serious oomph to damage it in this way. Got to see another doctor next week (at the same practice) who is apparently a musculo-skeletal expert and my GP is referring my scan results to a consultant to see where we go from here.

Last night I attempted to transfer some money from my savings account to my ISA. However, despite the fact that I had previously been told by one of their customer advisers that I could do so, last night LTSB informed me that I could not do that over the phone – I would have to go into a branch to do that! How annoying! :mad: :mad: So at lunchtime today I shall have to go for a walk down to the branch on the campus to see if they will do it for me – I don’t even mind if they say I can’t do it to my NS& I one in time and have to take out one of theirs, so long as I can do it before the deadline. Oh how I wish I had done this last week! I was actually in my own branch on Saturday – I could have sorted it then! Doh!!:doh:

Yesterday the Halifax credit card statement came – how depressing. OH has spent loads on travel expenses to auditions in the last month - £274 to be precise. :eek: I was so p*****d off – all my hard work undone. Anyway, it’s not so bad as OH says he will pay that off straight away. Also it is not like it was money that was just frittered away as it was money spent in the pursuit of work – if only one of those auditions comes to something it will have been worth it. Apparently he is on a very short shortlist for one of them so it is looking promising.

Last night I also put some more books up for sale on Amazon so fingers crossed for them. These were ones that were being chucked away from work so I searched for them on Amazon to see if they were worth anything and most of them are worth quite a bit so if they sell that will quite a lot of money into the pot.

Still haven’t updated my sig – have just got to check two figures from the relevant statements and then I can do it. I shall use 1st April as the cut off point and as my Halifax statement didn’t come until yesterday I shall ignore that little blip!!

PigginSkint

Oops forgot something again! Got an email and a letter from Sainsburys (home shopping) yesterday. Currently if you have a delivery on a Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday and spend over £70 (which I do as I only do it once a month), you get free delivery instead of the normal £5. They have decided not to do this any more and from now on there will be a fee of £2.50 for spending £70. It’s so unfair!! :mad:

PigginSkint

Well after yesterday’s drama of our bikes being stolen (see separate thread) I have finally got some good news – OH has got a job!!! Woo hoo! :j :j :j

One of his auditions has paid off at last! He will be doing a touring production of a play – rehearsals in May, development in June and July and performances from September through to November with a couple of extra ones in August. All work that he does on this will be at a really good weekly rate (plus, I think, extra for subsistence when they are away) so this is really fantastic news! Especially as work has been a bit thin on the ground just lately. We will be celebrating tonight with gin and tonic – probably a lot!!:beer: :beer:

On a minor point (pales into insignificance compared to the rest of the good and bad news over the past 24 hours) I finally got my ISA sorted out yesterday. I had to take out one of LTSB’s own but the interest rate is not bad - 5.5% if I don’t touch it for 12 months. I am not likely to touch it as I have enough in my savings account for emergencies. Of course with OH guaranteed a decent income until November, emergencies are likely to be fewer (hopefully!!)

PigginSkint

No time to do a real update today – I’ve so much to do this afternoon it’s untrue. I have been putting 2 exam papers together this morning (very time-consuming) and this afternoon I am invigilating.

But after today I am not back in the office until 16th April – hooray! :j :j

Proper update tomorrow!!!