Getting up again

leanne77

Did overtime like a good person. Came home and accidentally fell asleep for three hours, have done very little.

Did do swagbucks. Couldn't get one of the videos to download and hissed and cursed for a bit. Played weird game with cannibalistic dolls which was actually quite fun. Made target 30 bucks.

Had cheesey scrambled eggs for dinner (at 1.30 in the morning, which is a bit ridiculous even for me) as a treat for doing overtime. Hen-friendly eggs and nice cheese are two things of the most expensive things I buy so I try not to buy them too often. Also Green & Blacks 70% dark chocolate. Best ever chocolate. Have already eaten 1 bar on excuse this week has been hard. Probably spent 1hr s worth of extra money already. Sigh.

However have made healthy(ish) salad for lunch tomorrow instead of sandwiches and instead of chocolate have yogurt porridge.

Shopping list for tomorrow after work - cooking oil, mini tomatos, carrots, yoghurt. Should be under £5 target. Also check to see marg is on offer. Let's see if writing this here will make me stick to the list.

Giblet - procrastination is probably my biggest sin. My big push currently is to procrastinate by doing useful things instead of just lounging around. It seems to be working okay at the moment but I think I'm going to have to break out a priority list and get some important stuff actually done (Still haven't opened my birthday cards from last month, nor have I put the hoover away, I'm getting quite used to walking around it. Must do stuff)

BILLIE

Hi Leanne not sure why either of is are up at silly o clock in the morning but heh as I am thought I would respond ! I think procrastination is a son we all fall fowl of - how many weekends have I spent just sitting, supposedly chilling only to regret that nothing has gotten done come Monday morning !!! Right tomorrow use and move the Hoover and then sit and open your cards - okay?? Night x

leanne77

okay, not been succesful at the updating thing. have been doing overtime which has to be good but is exhausting and then going out with friends over the bank holiday (that seems a long time ago now).

also got slammed by a wave of why do anything at all and got sucked under for a couple of weeks. i can manage work and stuff when i'm like that but anything but most basic tasks at home all seem sort of pointless. dunno why i do that but even writing about it i can feel it creepying over me. so onwards.

Last day of overtime today. Which is sad from a money perspective, but is actually something of a relief. Yesterday I came home feeling like death warmed over and did absolutely nothing but glaze at the internet, couldn't even tell you what I was looking at.

Today however I felt much better and managed tidying up the kitchen, an email I was putting off (harder than it sounds), bought margarine, flour and peanut butter, oh and four bars of cheap chocolate, cooked proper dinner at decent time (missed dinner last night as too much effort), logged in to mse (also harder than it seems, strong temptation not to, or to start a new diary, or put everything off another day and extend procratinating indefinitely), and will very shortly log off and go to bed early.

success (sort of)

tomorrow will actually added up money owed and put it in my signature

leanne77

All my debts have now been wriggled onto a 0% credit card (and rounded up ever so slightly in process) and I have a firm figure for my debt - £650.

Which is sort of ridiculous but on the other hand I bought some badly needed storage for my craft stuff. And I now have two small chest of drawers and the hope of not going mad when I sit down at my desk, just as soon as I sort my craft stuff neatly into the drawers. It is such a relief to have somewhere to put things.

But then I also bought a bunch of stuff that wasn't really needed at all, all though it is very nice to have. I just need to pay for it.

Since I have the debt on 0% I'm going to concerntrate on building up a £500 emergency fund and just pay the minium for now. I can afford £50 a month, and there's my overtime money coming. And I signed up to Co-op and I'm hoping to get £100 from that. So hopefully it wont take too long to get to £500 and then I can start seriously paying down debt (touch wood, and the washing machine don't break).

leanne77

Just got my pay slip, get paid tomorrow and the overtime has kicked in, I get paid

£1,179.61

which is amazing and an extra £279. :j

£100 is going to Sainsburys to order in a 6 month + supply of basics (cleaning stuff, canned stuff etc) If I'm lucky I can get my shopping budget down another £10 a month for a bit which would be great. I know I'm still technically spending the money, but if I can just hit the grocers section and avoid the rest of the store I can save a lot of money by not being tempted by other stuff.

Also having a a lot of stuff in store soothes my panicky but what if I lose my job attacks that lead to uncontrolled buying of duplicates and stuff I already have in store. it pretty much all gets used in the end (toliet rolls dont extactly go off) but I do not need for than six months supply of stuff. i really, really don't. So rather than mad purchasing of stuff on special, I'm going to try and be organized and have a nice little store cupboard. if I get my shopping budget right down, I can save up another surplus and do it again.

With the rest £150 is going to my emergency fund and £29 to the credit card. That will put me in a great postion to get everything paid off asap.

I am really grateful for the overtime now, even if May was mostly a blur. I can't wait to update my totals tomorrow. I'd do it now but it feels like cheating until I can actually move the money.

Now I just have to do the writing I completely neglected in May. So tomorrow I need to clear the backlog of washing up, complete 1 piece of work and pay wages to various pots and accounts. Then I can sit back and feel virtuous.

leanne77

Payday today. I have updated my signature with money gone to my emergency savings and credit card but my savings pots are a bit up in the air as I'm having to cycle my money a bit to meet the co-op criteria and get the bonus £100.

I've spent £60 to book a train ticket to go see a friend in June. £60 is the saver version, so in theory this is MSE. It was mostly covered by my saving pot for travel which is basically for visiting friends who've moved away.

The cats have unhelpfully broken their water fountain. They have not done this by jamming it, or even by knocking it over, but by disassembling the plug. I have no idea how they managed this.

It was a big fancy black plug and I knew I'd weakened it by pulling on the top side of the plug, but even so they managed to completely pull off the top cover of the plug so it was in to pieces internal wires all tangled and exposed. I'm not prepared to risk sticking it back together given it's a water fountain and I don't want to accidentally electrocute me or the cats.

So a new water fountain is required. One of my cats isn't fussed but the another adores it. I have a cat savings pot but the pair of them are dreadful spendthrifts and live permanently in their overdraft. It might have to wait until the new credit card month kicks in which means I can put off paying for it all until the month after.

There's a little bit more overtime at work and I was so tempted to say no, but I was good and said yes instead. That will be another bit more money to chip away at the credit card. But I have to get up early so must go to bed now or it just wont happen.

leanne77

Things seem to be alarmingly positive at the moment. I'm feeling centred and in control and stuff is shifting. Just hope this focused mood lasts over the weekend and I can get things done.

Another couple of hours overtime tonight. It is very strange that just as I decided I needed to get serious with my debts that all this vertime is suddenly available. It's at least 18 months since there was an oppertunity like like this. Very lucky really.

Another bit of luck, or maybe a sign. I ordered some expensive things over the internet, they weren't anything I needed, just nice. I didn't want to cancel them because it seemed mean to put somebody else because I'd overspent. Anyway something went wrong somewhere and they've canceled my ordered. No idea why but that money is on it way back to me. I figure that has to be a sign to do useful things with it instead of spending frivilously.

Celebrated by spending £70 on offer cat food that will take me through to January. The rest of the money, once its worked its way through paypal, will go on the credit card.

Co-op seems to be working out okay, so I'm hopeful I'll actually get my £100.

If things keep working this well, I might grit my teeth and try ebay again. (Last time it was like banging my head against a brick wall, I was so relieved when I stopped)

leanne77

I'm feeling quite proud of myself. Had a rather productive weekend.

Managed to clear out the box room (also know as the dumping ground) and it is now tidy! You can even see the carpet. I'm also on the way to getting my whole flat straight. Of course once it is straight I'll have to do proper deepcleaning. And there are a number of drawers that might explode if I open them but it makes such a difference to have space.

The catfood I ordered has turned up and is piled up waiting to be stashed in the attic. I was so lucky to buy it bulk on offer. Saved 40% and I'm sorted until next year.

And with the catfood came cheap eggs. Generally eggs seem to cost a small fortune because I wont buy non-free range (Does anyone else get a massive headache trying to buy hen-friendly eggs? I'm happy to pay I just want to be sure they are actually hen-friendly. I have been told if they're organic then the hens cant get treated with antibiotics, which is obviously not hen-friendly at all) but they were on offer too.

So with extra eggs I was able to make chocolate cake. (Sponge cake is very egg intensive) and it is lovely. I also made pasta salad for lunch this week and really I am feeling super organised.

Even better I am starting to think of things I would like to do. Previously I wouldn't have been able to tell you a thing that I would like/plan towards except maybe pay off my mortgage which is a bit of negative want unless you have something to pay it off for which I didn't. And now I kinda of have plans forming, it's really very odd, good but odd.

Moneywise I have spent £33.57 at Sainsburys which is slightly more than half of my grocery budget but I always spend a bit more at the begining of the month. (My month starts on the 21st) Sainsburys have started doing 69p vegtables, no clue where they got that idea from, which is nice.

Everything seems to be going well, and I just want to keep it going. It's usually about now I crash and wreck all my good work. So I'm going to try really hard to keep going.