Caz counts it down

cazmanian_minx

Mr Minx's turn to have one of those days today. He was due to drive down to Inverness this afternoon to stay overnight before catching an early flight to London tomorrow. Things got off to a bad start when he turned up back at home late morning, having forgotten his suitcase when he left for work, and he mentioned that the funny metallic noise we'd heard in the car a couple of weeks ago had happened again and he thought it was the wind blowing through the tubes on the running boards. 'Are you sure?' I said. 'Do you think you should take mine instead?' 'No, it's fine.'

Famous last words! I got a phone call at 1pm. 'Do you want the good news or the bad news?' 'The good news.' 'I love you.' The bad news was that the noise turned out to be a wheel bearing giving up the ghost. Fortunately he'd managed to coax it as far as the nearest village and a phone signal, because he was driving down single track where it's 20 miles between houses and no mobile signal. Also fortunately we've got the top-level AA membership and they had someone with him in half an hour who confirmed that it was knackered and called in to arrange a tow truck, which he said would be with him in two hours.

An hour and a half later, the tow company called to apologise and say that the truck on its way to him had been diverted to a broken-down ambulance and they didn't have any other trucks available. However, in a show of pro-active thinking and excellent customer service (very rare these days!), they dispatched a member of staff in a hire car, picked up Mr Minx and his belongings, drove him back to their base to drop off the member of staff and then let Mr Minx take the hire car on to Inverness. They'll collect the truck tomorrow morning, take it to the Nissan garage in Inverness, who are expecting it, and will collect the hire car from his hotel at the same time.

So a knackered Mr Minx is tucked up in his hotel room with a Domino's pizza and the dog and I are on the sofa with the fire on watching Posh Pawn on the Sky box. Fingers crossed that the repair won't be too expensive and they can fit it in before Mr Minx gets back on Thursday afternoon, because all trains north are cancelled tomorrow because of the weather and might well be on Thursday too, so I'd have to go down and pick him up.

I did point out that there was a bright side to all of this - he was a bit glum about the fact that this repair was going to have to go on his credit card, but when we first got together, he wouldn't have had room even on his credit cards. Okay, he might not be out of debt with a nice fat emergency fund, but at least he's got £13k of available credit card now for when the brown sticky stuff hits the swiftly rotating object.

DebtFree2012

What an eventful day in the totally wrong way Great thinking that you are already covered by the AA for such emergencies and a pat on the back for them for being helpful.

Sounds like a lovely evening for you and the dog though !

cazmanian_minx

Well, better news today in that a) Mr Minx's flight took off and his meeting was very successful, b) the truck got to Nissan safely, c) Nissan reckon they'll have it fixed by the time he gets back to Inverness tomorrow afternoon and d) it's 'only' going to cost £440 which, in the overall scheme of over-sized truck repairs isn't actually too bad.

We've been experiencing a bit of Weather up here today, fortunately the power stayed on until about 5.30-ish, when the flickering lights finally went off as a big storm went through. Fortunately I've got a phone in the house that isn't cordless and doesn't require power to work, so was able to call the power company helpline (no mobile signal here), which had a recorded message saying they hoped to have us back on at 8pm and they managed it at 8.02, which I thought was impressively accurate!

Other than that, it's been a day of proofreading and packing a few orders. Definitely shutting down next year and I'm thinking it's probably sensible to do it before my year end on March 31st, just to make things neat and tidy. Scottishspendaholic, if you're still reading this, I know you said to let you know if I ever gave it up as you might be interested, but I seriously wouldn't recommend taking on a bead shop right now.

cazmanian_minx

Mr Minx is home safe I've had one of those days where I don't seem to have done a lot, yet haven't stopped. Probably not helped by getting a fit of insomnia - I ended up tidying Mr Minx's t-shirt drawer at 11.30 last night! I've been reading the Marie Kondo book, The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying, so decided to have a go at sorting my chest of drawers and then started Mr Minx's. Pretty pleased with how it turned out and will try to make sure they stay that way! http://instagram.com/p/wceyZ_jwZ9/

I sat down to catch up the accounts in Sage this afternoon, as I knew there was a TNT invoice in the pile that was going to need paying fairly soon. Tracked it down and it's the 15th, so I've got some time, which is good, because it was rather more than I'd remembered. Fortunately most of it is VAT, which is a nice big chunk off against the next quarterly bill.

cazmanian_minx

Oh, Mr Minx's mug turned up today and is fab, well done MSE and Truprint I've just sorted out my niece's presents plus one more for Mr Minx's stocking - that's wiped out my Amazon tokens now. Total actual money spent on Christmas presents so far: £13.14. Still left to get: Mum, brother & his partner (know what I'm buying them now), more bits for Mr Minx. We've agreed not to do a 'big' present for each other this year, because there's nothing either of us really want (well, he wants a petrol-powered cement mixer, but £550 is a bit out of my budget!) and we did buy the quad. However, he's spent about £150 on me(!), so I do feel I need to get him a bit more than I already have. The car's booked in for its MOT and service next Wednesday, so I'll have several hours to wander around town (what there is of it) and see if there's anything he'd like.

DebtFree2012

Love the tidiness!!! I am going to do that when I am off for Xmas

Ohh It's Friday!

cazmanian_minx

Some flying scores on the doors, because I should really be packing orders:


Business
Overdraft: -£-5,830.00 / -£5,700.00 +£130.00

Business total: -£-5,830.00 / -£5,700.00 +£130.00

Personal
Halifax card: -£5,310.00 / -£5,250.00 +£60.00

Personal total: -£5,310.00 / -£5,310.00 +£60.00

Grand total: -£11,140.00 / -£10,950.00 +£190.00

So, a double celebration today, firstly for getting down into the £10,xxx band and secondly for reaching 60% paid off :D:D:D:D:D:j:j:j:j:j:j Starting to feel as if I'm reaching the end of the slogging bit at last.

DebtFree2012

Wahooooo where are the dancing bananas?

cazmanian_minx

DebtFree2012 wrote: »

Wahooooo where are the dancing bananas?

No more dancing bananas until it starts with a £9

dawnybabes

It's a downhill run now xxx