Preparedness for when

moneyistooshorttomention

nuatha wrote: »

If memory serves it was Carlisle Council that floated the idea of paying all its staff in Tesco vouchers - thankfully it didn't come to pass.

That would be difficult if those staff shopped at Sainsburys:rotfl:.

Visions of me (if a staff member) turning round and deliberately being awkward saying "But I shop at Waitrose and the local Farmers Market and the health food shops and my vouchers will need to be for that....oh and don't forget that some will have to be for the bookshop and don't forget some will have to be for John Lewis, etc, etc, etc".;)....and I wouldn't be joking either....

nuatha

moneyistooshorttomention wrote: »

That would be difficult if those staff shopped at Sainsburys:rotfl:.

Visions of me (if a staff member) turning round and deliberately being awkward saying "But I shop at Waitrose and the local Farmers Market and the health food shops and my vouchers will need to be for that....oh and don't forget that some will have to be for the bookshop and don't forget some will have to be for John Lewis, etc, etc, etc".;)....and I wouldn't be joking either....

And with the repeal of the Truck Acts you wouldn't have any defence. If your employer decided to pay you in peanuts instead of paying peanuts, it wouldn't matter that you were allergic to them.
One of the reasons the council was considering this is it would mean a discount on the wages bill, given the current political climate I wouldn't be surprised to see this idea surface again, and it it does private employers will follow suit.

moneyistooshorttomention

Cant see it personally....as, over recent years, people have become MUCH more determined to have what they personally individually want/need and the first word that would be muttered would be "discrimination". Indeed it would be accurate to use that word too - as some people would be suited (ie those who shopped at Tescos/ate loads of peanuts by choice/etc) and others would be discriminated against for not having their choice.


The potential for employees deliberately creating chaos in any system like that would be huge - by the time everyone had insisted "their" personal requirements must be met/some had been photographed trying to spend their vouchers in a different shop that didn't accept them/articles about Tesco profiteering from this/etc/etc.

People would just go "off piste" in all sorts of ways to deal with any attempts at anything like that.

I think that's actually something that might cause people to worry about a thing that would never happen in a month of Sundays.

GreyQueen

I've often been amused at working for the same local authority that I rent my home from and pay my council tax to. My wages come in, sit for a week, then almost 50% of them leave on those two bills alone.

It's like, hello, money, goodbye money. I suppose it all makes work for the working (wo)man to do.

I'm just about old enough to have had paypackets in reality, rather than a metaphorical one. Small brown manilla envelopes with your payslip, banknotes and coins, how quaint it seems.

Yesterday I was talking to an acquaintance from Hungary, who is in his sixties. His parents went through their country's hyperinflationary period post WW2 (the more famous Weimar Germany hyperinflation was post WW1). He describes how all shop-keepers had little scales, and would weigh in tiny amounts of gold, such as links from a customer's gold chain, to pay for groceries etc.

FerFal, on his blog, shows some jewellery which he and his wife have inherited from their families who had to do things like this in Spain, including what is now a gold chain bracelet but was originally a necklace. Selling the links a few at a time was what had kept one woman fed...

This isn't ancient history, people, this is Europe 3 generations back.

jk0

The SHTF problem that I most often have is my computer packing up. This seems to happen two or three times a year.

This item might interest you guys:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/361275560044



It is a front panel hard disk socket for a tower pc. I have a spare hard disk which I insert in this once a week and 'clone' the entire hard drive. Then I remove it and put it in a drawer.

This has already rescued me on a couple of occasions where updates and viruses have disabled my machine. I simply tell the machine to boot from the cloning software cd, and then clone the main hard disk back from the socket drive.

The reason for removing the drive, is that certain viruses damage or stop from working everything connected to your pc. Thus, a backup disk plugged in will also be damaged, and you certainly can't boot up from it.

nuatha

jk0 wrote: »

The SHTF problem that I most often have is my computer packing up. This seems to happen two or three times a year.

This item might interest you guys:

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/361275560044


It is a front panel hard disk socket for a tower pc. I have a spare hard disk which I insert in this once a week and 'clone' the entire hard drive. Then I remove it and put it in a drawer.

May I suggest an external USB drive is actually more useful.
Whilst I applaud your backup routine, in the case of hardware failure you need to move the cradle to another machine - or fit the hard drive into a USB caddy.
I recommend partitioning hard drives and separating out the system from document storage (and separate partitions for media if that doesn't change regularly). System I'd backup on the 1st Sunday of the month (and before any major software installs) documents/data gets backed up every Sunday as well as session or daily backups of files I've been working on. (Depending on my paranoia level, session backups can be every 15 minutes on a major job - done to USB pen drives, Paranoia level is determined by how much I stand to loss if I don't have an up to date backup)

Frugalsod

Karmacat wrote: »

I first went to Greece in the 1970s, and it was common for change in shops to be given as sweets....

That is what is happening in Zimbabwe. The government has introduced a new currency and the shops try to give it as change but the locals will not accept it and demand some sweets instead.

Frugalsod

nuatha wrote: »

May I suggest an external USB drive is actually more useful.
Whilst I applaud your backup routine, in the case of hardware failure you need to move the cradle to another machine - or fit the hard drive into a USB caddy.
I recommend partitioning hard drives and separating out the system from document storage (and separate partitions for media if that doesn't change regularly). System I'd backup on the 1st Sunday of the month (and before any major software installs) documents/data gets backed up every Sunday as well as session or daily backups of files I've been working on. (Depending on my paranoia level, session backups can be every 15 minutes on a major job - done to USB pen drives, Paranoia level is determined by how much I stand to loss if I don't have an up to date backup)

Macs come with Time Machine, the option to use an external drive as a back up which can be made to run constantly.

I would also keep a bigger drive to do a complete clone of your drive as an additional back up. and reclone the main drive regularly. If you are having problems with the hard drive it might be better to scan the disk and once you have backed up reformat the drive and rebuild your filing system from your clone or back up. This will fix the bad sectors on the drives or block them permanently.

jk0

nuatha wrote: »

May I suggest an external USB drive is actually more useful.
Whilst I applaud your backup routine, in the case of hardware failure you need to move the cradle to another machine - or fit the hard drive into a USB caddy.
I recommend partitioning hard drives and separating out the system from document storage (and separate partitions for media if that doesn't change regularly). System I'd backup on the 1st Sunday of the month (and before any major software installs) documents/data gets backed up every Sunday as well as session or daily backups of files I've been working on. (Depending on my paranoia level, session backups can be every 15 minutes on a major job - done to USB pen drives, Paranoia level is determined by how much I stand to loss if I don't have an up to date backup)

Thanks Nuatha.

I have a separate hard disk connected by USB, if that's what you mean. I've had it for years. It's a complete nightmare.

Firstly, regarding backing up, the drive gets a completely random drive letter assigned to it. This means that auto backup software can't find it half the time.

My cloning software can't see it either. The one I have is called Acronis True Image HD. This requires me to boot up from the CD, so presumably no USB drivers are loaded.

I tried 'System Restore' also recently. It chuntered away for ages, and said it had been unable to work.

Thus the only solution was the one I have chosen. I also have Mozy online backup which saves my documents automatically twice a day when the computer is idle. I had occasion to need three weeks work back last year, due to forgetting my routine, and fortunately Mozy saved my bacon.

Edit: By the way. Good idea about needing another socket for a different pc. I just ordered one.

Butterfly_Brain

Peeps head around the door

Been MIA for a while what with ill health and DD's BF's Mum's death, funeral isn't until 26th so there is no closure yet and as he lives with us, things have been a bit fraught.

Then it was DS's 21st party on Saturday and getting the seeds in,plus all the other things us women have to do, I just don't seem to have a lot of time these days.

I am in a state of shock that the Tories got back in :mad::eek::mad: which means that things will get even worse for the most needy now, especially as Ian Dungcart Smith has been reappointed.

Then reading the papers, I found this which is very worrying:

http://sgtreport.com/2015/05/un-lawyer-calls-ttp-ttip-a-dystopian-future-in-which-corporations-and-not-democratically-elected-governments-call-the-shots/

We should hold Cameron to his promise that if something from the EU affects our Sovereignty we will have a referendum.
But he is a connsumate liar and we will be sold to the US corporates and the US Health vultures will steal our NHS from us and Monsanto will bring their poison into this country.

We are living in scary times:(