PositiveBalance’s Diary: In Search of Positivity, Balance and a Positive Bank Balance

PositiveBalance

DedicatedDFW wrote: »

First thoughts with your brother and GF coming over would be to do a come dine with me type meal if thats possible ? You could take it in turns as to who does starter / pudding and main meal maybe even set a maximum budget for each too to keep it fair? I'd be suggesting things like hearty stews / casseroles / chilli etc. so can be filling and if there's any left ideal to freeze My Mr can eat what is for him 1 portion and which i would say is a generous 3 portions :eek: so i understand what you mean about having someone who eats alot - thats the good thing with things like chilli and stews i think aats you can bulk it out

Ooo er, that's posher than what we normally get up to: I'm sure it will be OK with a bit of planning... I shall make it so.

DedicatedDFW wrote: »

Couldn't really follow your work post but best of luck with the job hunt xx

Sorry, I was trying to be deliberately vague as this is a public forum, but basically my working conditions are a total nightmare due to my boss's behaviour and it has just escalated to even more to the point of no return.

DedicatedDFW wrote: »

Remember hon, times are like this sometimes where it seems like there's just one financial drain after another - your budget was very well thought out and planned and it will get better x

Thanks, but it all feels a bit too squeezy bum time at the minute...I'll just have to hold on and see!

edinburgher

Anyone got a magic wand handy?!

No - but I've got a magic boot

A few questions about your diary to date PB:

1. Why are you renting a 2 bed when there's one of you?
2. Why is your food spend so high? Mrs E and I get £250, including lunches, between us
3. Do you think you can justify £80-100/mth on hobby classes when you owe that amount on a monthly basis for 5 *years* if your debts had to be paid now?

Before any thinks I'm a troll, I've been a MSE buddy of PB for years. What I will say, however, is that DFW can be a bit of a love-in and that difficult questions can be helpful

Ps. Hope I'm not being too hard on you, but if you need to change jobs etc. you'll need to be on the ball re. managing your costs.

PositiveBalance

edinburgher wrote: »

No - but I've got a magic boot

A few questions about your diary to date PB:

1. Why are you renting a 2 bed when there's one of you?
2. Why is your food spend so high? Mrs E and I get £250, including lunches, between us
3. Do you think you can justify £80-100/mth on hobby classes when you owe that amount on a monthly basis for 5 *years* if your debts had to be paid now?

Before any thinks I'm a troll, I've been a MSE buddy of PB for years. What I will say, however, is that DFW can be a bit of a love-in and that difficult questions can be helpful

Ps. Hope I'm not being too hard on you, but if you need to change jobs etc. you'll need to be on the ball re. managing your costs.

!!!!!!! I just wrote a huge message and it was eaten by the computer! :mad: :mad: :mad:

I'm too tired to reply again now...nice to see you back again, though, Ed, after your end-of-January hiatus!

edinburgher

Try writing it in notepad, then pasting it into the board if you're having difficulties

PositiveBalance

I tried that with word, but then some of the words come back stuck together. Technology hates me. Perhaps it would be different in notepad, though.
Right, in answer to your questions:

1) All the one bed flats went before I could get my hands on them. Seriously. It wasn't even funny in the end. And I got a very, very good deal on this flat: two bedrooms, part furnished for the price of a furnished one bedroom flat that I couldn't even get to see since they kept getting snaffled up by other viewers before I got within a mile of the front door! (Also, realistically, seeing how much stuff I have is scary and there's no way I could have fitted it into a 1 bed flat. I need to sort and Ebay more than I have been doing, then use it as a money making space with my Special Earning Skills.)

2) I didn't have a clue have just been going round buying and eating randomly, so I just asked myself what I thought I was using weekly, and mulitplied it by the number of weeks in the month (although there were 5, not 4, d'oh!). This is obviously a mad amount, so I'm going to try to cut that total down significantly this month. I've been food shopping this week and spent little, and I hate wasting food so I am going to try to eat what I've got instead of throwing away.

3) That's a fair point. To be fair, I never actually have that number of lessons per month as my teacher is often abroad, so I have started transferring the money I would have spent on the lesson straight over to my savings account before it can get used for something else. I saved £40 doing that last month, and I have already saved £20 this month. I'm reluctant to give up my lessons altogether as my teacher is literally world class - I would go so far as to say the best in the world - at what is taught, so the chances of ever getting a teacher this good again are slim. And I may not live round here forever. It's also not impossible to think that teacher might move as well. I may start myself some sort of offset challenge in the near future when my spare room is cleared out. (This is my only social life at the minute as well!) Having said that, though, commiting to a college course at the same time was daft. The skills will be useful, but I could have got by without them for the minute. I will have to watch my habit of enrolling on courses: I have a bit of a learning problem...in the same way that alcoholics have a problem with too much drink! (I'll ban myself for the foreseeable future.)

PositiveBalance

So, spendies over the last few days:

£11.70 joined union cos of problems at work
£53.01 petrol
£7.65 prescription
£22.62 food shopping (including a bottle of white for making risotto which was all duly freezed in ice cube bags for next time...apart from that one tiny glass...and some cola for when DB comes around)

I've been a good girl and taken lunch to both days of the week, meaning £6 into the lunch pot, bringing the total to £11.

DedicatedDFW is talking about having some sort of Ebay challenge as I am just pants at getting round to listing. Thanks Dedicated! :T

Other than that, there were some temporary flat issues last night so that and doing the shopping took up all my job hunting time. I need to spend an hour or it now before I go to bed, and should have spent more time on it tonight in general. Bad PB!

And with regards to my mobile, I normally have loads of minutes left on my contract, but I have spent so much time on the phone to the electricity company that I used up all last months minutes and I have used up the vast majority of this months minutes already! There's no way I will make it through until my renew date, so I rang up and added another 100 minutes onto my contract for £5 as it will work out cheaper overall. (And thank heavens for those 'Say No to 0870' and the like apps as I would be bankrupt ringing the 0870/0845 numbers.

I'll post it when I do.

Nanight all!

DedicatedDFW

Suggested challenge duly posted on my thread hon - let me know what you think It'll be a bit of a challenge for me too as the 11 items i got ready this week i won't count

PositiveBalance

I just sold an item on Ebay for £3. It's not much but it's a start and what I hope is the first of many other items to find new homes! :T

edinburgher

1) Would you consider a flatshare when you clear out some carp?
2) Good stuff, trim that budget (says me, who's having takeout pizza tonight )
3) You've identified another issue - your SOA isn't accurate

I think you should try another SOA, maybe try the old spending diary if you need to. No figure for entertainment etc. seems a bit whiffy!

Well done on the eBay item - I just cleared out half of our spare room and it was a royal PITA. The Post Office I go to has the grumpiest looking staff *ever* :eek:

PositiveBalance

edinburgher wrote: »

1) Would you consider a flatshare when you clear out some carp?
2) Good stuff, trim that budget (says me, who's having takeout pizza tonight )
3) You've identified another issue - your SOA isn't accurate

I think you should try another SOA, maybe try the old spending diary if you need to. No figure for entertainment etc. seems a bit whiffy!

Well done on the eBay item - I just cleared out half of our spare room and it was a royal PITA. The Post Office I go to has the grumpiest looking staff *ever* :eek:

1) Depends on the sharee: I don't know any people who are looking to share at the minute, and although I had some good flatmates at uni, I had some shockers as well, and I am reluctant to put myself in that position again. Even if I did, I now have furniture, so I'm not sure how easy that would be. Perhaps fate will intervene at some point. I wouldn't rule it out, but I'm not actively looking, either.

2) Pot. Kettle. Insert the rest of the words yourself! :rotfl:

3) Yes and no: that was kind of me factoring something in, but yes, you are right. I'm just not sure how much to add. Ideas, please! It also leads to the following...

Today I also brought my lunch to work, meaning an extre £3 to the pot (:D) and I REALLY wanted to buy some coke at work and also this evening at college, but I bravely resisted meaning an extra £2 to the pot. :j The pot now contains a rather healthy £28 (:j :j :j) and I have to go to a Friday and all day Saturday event that I bought the tickets for a little while ago. It's too far away to come home for lunch and dinner, and while I can bring something to eat for lunch, I would struggle with having somewhere to eat for dinner as it will be dark/cold and not possible to sit outside, so I think I will have to eat in the restaurant. I'll have to buy some drinks during the day as well (will do my best to bring what I can with me, but I won't be able to drink 'unofficial' drinks in the concerts as it will be too obvious. Plus I have to pay for parking etc. This could get expensive, so I will bring the money I have saved up in the pot, and try not to go overboard while there. (It would be oh-so easy!)

And on an unrelated matter....oooh, it's cold here! :eek: