Cazmanian_minx's MFi3 diary

Kaz2904

Told you you'd get it. Now when can I move in?

kassytbag

congratulations and im with pandora - you have to share the recepie - im dribbling already!!!
well done once again

cazmanian_minx

OK, for anyone who fancies trying it:

Best-Ever Brownies

185g unsalted butter
185g best-quality dark chocolate (I use Lindt 85%)
85g plain flour
40g cocoa powder (I use Green & Blacks)
50g white chocolate (again, G&B)
50g milk chocolate (ditto)
3 large eggs
275g golden castor sugar

Cube the butter & the dark chocolate, melt in a bain-marie over a saucepan of boiling water (or microwave gently!). Cool mixture to room temperature.

Sieve the flour & cocoa powder together.

Chop the white & milk chocolate into small chunks.

Whisk together the eggs & sugar until they go creamy.

Pour the cooled chocolate mix over the eggs & sugar, fold in.

Sift flour & cocoa onto chocolate/egg/sugar mix and fold in.

Stir in the chunks of milk & white chocolate.

Pour into a lined square baking tin and bake for 25 mins at 160 (fan oven) or 180 (normal oven). The top should have a shiny crust and the edges should just come away from the sides.

Should come out looking something like this:



(one of my pictures from earlier - a bit out of focus though!)

Caz

cazmanian_minx

I knew it couldn't be that easy!

Telephone call from mortgage brokers to OH this morning.

"We're ever so sorry, the building society has just rung us - there's no problem with you, you've passed all their checks, but they've updated their terms and conditions and no longer lend on properties in Scotland."

:mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad: :mad:

Quite why said building society didn't notice that the postcode was about as far north in Scotland you can go without falling into the Pentland Firth when the application first went in is beyond me, but it's cost us ANOTHER week of wasted time. Fortunately (or not, as the case may be), approval of the sale is still stuck at the Office of the Public Guardian, so we do at least have time to start the application process all over again.

Excuse me while I go and thump a wall very hard....

Caz

cazmanian_minx

I did the magazine transcription job today and emailed it back with the invoice. They owe me £165 in total now, hopefully £105 of that should turn up in the next week, or I'm going to start making legal noises at them. The transcription CD from the university still hasn't turned up and I suspect it's stuck in the Royal Mail backlog somewhere. I don't know how big a job that's going to be - usually they tell me roughly how long the recordings are in the email offering me the work, but they didn't this time, which probably means it's a short job.

Good news: I had two of my photographs accepted to a stock photo website :j Bad news: in a week they've had 1 view and no downloads! I need to build up a collection of around 800-1,000 photos to make a serious income from it and it's going to take time. I've been learning a lot about stock photography over the past fortnight and if I want to be any good at it, I need to start taking commercial shots rather than pretty ones. Still, I have my light tent and I managed to buy a second hand Benbo Trekker tripod on eBay last week, so I shall keep practising. I have to do some more eBay photography tomorrow, so I'll grab a selection of random items from around the flat and have another go. Business and food-related stuff seems to sell well and I've got plenty of both of those sorts of things!

Oh, nearly forgot to add, the flat roof got replaced today and the boards underneath the felt were basically sound :T They've replaced the edges where the felt had come away and the boards had been exposed to rain and rotted, but the main roof was fine, which means £500 less between us to pay. The bill's still going to be about £750, but I have that safely tucked away in the mortgage offset account.

Caz

cazmanian_minx

A quick calculation to cheer me up this morning:

Current outstanding mortgage: £27,623.70

Minus offset savings: £5,036.05
Minus cash in current account: £294.02

Equals: £22,293.63

or £10,999.39 (33%) paid off! :j :j :j :j :j

The situation won't last for long, because I have my share of the roof bill to pay, but the one good thing about the delay with the new house is that it's giving OH more time to stick money aside, so he'll need less of my offset savings to make up the deposit.

Caz

Kaz2904

Aaargh- it's a difficult ride for you isn't it!
Like you said though the longer it drags on the more time you have to be able to save up some money for it.

cazmanian_minx

We've nearly reached the point of no return and it's all getting a bit tense. The seller's solicitors have written back, striking out our clause about 'subject to mortgage valuation survey', so we no longer have the option to back out if we can't get a mortgage once missives are concluded (which they haven't been, yet).

So, step forward the Chelsea Building Society who a) lend on Scottish houses, b) allow overpayments of up to 20% a year, c) have a very quick electronic applications process and d) don't do their own survey, they just need a copy of ours. OH will find out on Monday whether they'll accept him as a borrower, then we can instruct a local surveyor and as long as he values it at £88k or above, we're good to go. If that falls through, our last hope is the Ecology Building Society, who'll lend on a heap of stones in a field, but we'd be locked in for 4 years instead of 2.

I've had a remittance advice from the university, which hopefully means my £11 will reach my bank account next week. Still waiting on the magazine, I'll chase them again next Friday and I'm not accepting any more work from them until they've paid me for the last 2 lots.

The website is nearly ready to go, which means I'm going to have to close my eyes, take a deep breath and spend a large amount of money on stock some time in the next fortnight. I've given myself a deadline by putting a notice on the front page saying OPENING IN NOVEMBER! so I've got to do it now!

Caz

setmefree2

Good to hear all your news. Good luck....you're not really buying a heap of stones in a field are you?:eek:

cazmanian_minx

setmefree2 wrote: »

Good to hear all your news. Good luck....you're not really buying a heap of stones in a field are you?:eek:

It was close at one point - we were trying to buy a derelict Grade A listed mill with the aim of getting the waterwheel working again and using it to power the house:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/22544094@N00/396793198/in/set-72157594546848608/
but got outbid (we had it surveyed and found out all the roof beams needed replacing). This is the house we're buying:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/22544094@N00/1366290031/

I've been having a busy weekend - 7 CDs and 2 books have gone up for sale on eBay (they didn't have screens on Amazon) and I've just put in a mahoosive stock order which should be arriving on Tuesday.

If you'll forgive me getting philosophical for a moment, I think that aiming to be MFi3 is about pushing yourself, pushing the boundaries of what you think you can do and taking a few calculated risks that you maybe wouldn't do otherwise. I'm not great with heights and I'm really not great with stepladders, but this morning I climbed up a stepladder, got up the nerve to jump up from the top of the stepladder to a scaffolding platform, climbed up a fixed ladder and stood on top of the new flat roof on my second-floor kitchen, about 45 feet up, looking out over Croydon. And you know what? Once I was up there, it was fine. I'm really proud of myself for a) going up there and b) getting up there and down again without Tony (downstairs neighbour and freeholder, who was up there doing a bit of maintenance on the window frames while the scaffolding's up) having to rescue me. I reckon if I can do that, I can take on the world and win :j :j :j

Caz