22 Foxhole East

trix-a-belle

thanks for the heads up people, just applying as invigilator at my old high school up the road

f0xh0les

Mr T0sc0 has just given me £7 in vouchers, so that will help with the festive b00ze - DS3 asked if I was going to make one of those cakes in the red tubs as mine are nicer than the ones you can buy - he means Xm+s Puddings - and that means stout and sherry at the very least, and brandy and amaretto for Xm+s Cake.

Think we have DS1 home Sat-Sun-Mon, then he is going back, and then returning Fri-Sat-Sun.  Which is a bit odd, but why not? It is reading week, so he has no lectures, and food from my pantry is much cheaper than buying his own.

We have 2 stubborn radiators that are not heating up - I suspect the pin in the thermostatic rad valve, so WD40 and a little hammer bang is on the cards, will have everything toasty for #1 coming home.

Picked up 8 quite large bags of peanuts and raisins for 20p each, so they will go in the box destined for the festive feet warmers. There, I have made a start.  If I can pick up a few bits and things on ys every week, and hide them away in the box, then it should be relatively painless. It is bizarre what they reduce, and with quite long dates on most of them.

I need some more pine cones to fill the grate in the living room, and the back room, and then put some twinkly lights through them, it looks festive and psychologically makes the room feel warmer having a glow in the fireplace.  Will try and arrange a weekend trip to the park/canal and enlist short people's help. DS3 has grown again.  He won't be shorter than me for long now - he reaches my eyebrows (or the absence of them).

So I am at work tomorrow (taking it gently and slowly, until the clients come in and then it will just be manic and bedlam), and then later on at home,  I am going to make inroads into cleaning and clearing a bit more of the ground floor (the top 2 floors are fine) aiming on clearing a square meter, and bringing a bit more order to my chaos, whilst not letting on I am really clearing a space for THE TREE or if I find a c/s bargain item,  TWO TREES.  Shhh! Who knows, it might end up as THREE TREES!!

Did tidy one more box of tat from the downstairs bathroom while nobody was looking, so another half a meter cleared.  Slow progress, but still progress.

VintageHistorian

I was just thinking the other day f0xh0les, I know food banks make up Christmas food boxes for clients but I was wondering what was in them? I assume mince pies and a few chocolate treats but I wasn't sure what else there might be? Also are there any supplies that tend to run very short around Christmas or in the New Year?

kerri_gt

VintageHistorian said:

I was just thinking the other day f0xh0les, I know food banks make up Christmas food boxes for clients but I was wondering what was in them? I assume mince pies and a few chocolate treats but I wasn't sure what else there might be? Also are there any supplies that tend to run very short around Christmas or in the New Year?

I was actually wondering the same too. Suspecting that food banks may actually end up overrun with well meaning mince pies and xmas puds but short on other items.

That reminds me, I need to dig out and wrap some gifts I bought for out local 'Giving Tree' (pic a name on a tag which is either a child of a certain age or elder person identified as vulnerable and attach it to  gift for them) It all went a bit tinsel tits up last year as i left it late, bought a gift on the Sat to wrap and take to store on the Sunday,  then BoJo grounded us all overnight and the store had to shutter as it wasn't considered essential. Did manage to get the gift donated in the end thankfully.

f0xh0les

2 x soup

2x beans

2x tomatoes

1 box breakfast cereal

2 x  veg (peas/corn/carrots)

2 x meat product

1 x fish

2 x fruit

1 x custard/rice pudding

500g pasta or rice

1 jar pasta sauce or a curry/chilli sauce

40 teabags or 1 jar coffee

1 litre milk

1 litre fruit juice or cordial

1 pack biscuits (chocolate covered biscuits,no matter how cheap, are appreciated by our clients)

Chocolate bar / cake slice

Couple of packets of crisps/salty snacks

Packet noodles / pot noodle / cup soup

Packet of instant mash

Seasonally appropriate items, like mice pies and Xmas Pud, stuffing, gravy etc or some stocking filler type body lotions/soaps/bath stuff

Most of our clients don't have zero money, but have enough to buy a pack of sausages and a loaf of bread and some butter which would take them quite a long way with the stuff in the box, but the knowledge they have food in the cupboard helps them stop worrying.  We have people who come in have had rice and salt and pepper for breakfast, as that is all they had in, they have not had a cup of tea for 2 days as they had no milk, so it either keeps them going until they get their  payment of benefit or wages in a couple of days time, or it means they are able to eat well and not worry about only feeding their kids. 

There is nothing in the boxes that is going to set their world on fire, but it will keep a soul together for 3 days (they say) or 6 if you are careful.

And yes, mice pies come in from September - kindly donated by the supermarkets who can't sell them in September. We get crates of them, and then loads dumped on us in January along with other stuff they did not sell like jars of goose fat, and venison curry.

VintageHistorian

Thanks @f0xh0les - like @kerri_gt I was thinking there's probably things you get swamped with that aren't that helpful.

And I'll keep the chocoloate biscuits in mind! I always try to chuck in a bar of Galaxy or other nice chocolate but I'll make sure good biscuits get included in future donations. It's amazing how much better you can feel after a hot cup of tea and a nice biscuit.

f0xh0les

We are always short on coffee in smaller jars, meat product - the stuff like chicken curry in tins, meatballs in sauce, thicker chunkier stews, mince in gravy etc.  Well meaning people tend to give larger packs of things, but really a lot of our clients are single people, so a massive 7kg sack of rice or chapatti flour gets sent to a local hospice / charity feeding the homeless / a charity doing community baking etc.  We try to waste as little as possible, and have a network of other local projects we shunt things sideways to, and they shunt things our way when they have excess.

It is always worth firing off an email to the foodbank you are local to and asking if they are short of anything this week - sometimes we literally have 100s of bags of flour and sugar, and no cooking oil, and the next month the other way around.

We have a table for the clients who come in, where they can pick up other things they might need that do not go in the box, and of course a massive amount of fresh veg - but we have no idea what we are getting until it arrives 20 minutes before the session and it could literally be 6 crates of butternut squash, 3 crates of limes, 3 crates of courgettes and 2 sacks of celeriac - and we end up with 70% of it still there at the end,  or it could be strawbs, potatoes, carrots, onions, lovely normal fruit that people know what to do with, and  at the end we have empty boxes and dust. 

It is either one or the other

Deni_debt-free_dreamer

that's really helpful f0xh0les, i hadn't really thought about provisions for single people as i was thinking of families - even though i'm mostly a single household!  but thankfully not in need of a food bank
Deni x

f0xh0les

That is the list for a single person, the boxes for 2 people basically have more tea/coffee and more pasta or rice, then any children involved get a single box as well, so a family would end up with quite a lot of food if there were 3+ people.  So a larger pack of biscuits would be in involved, we have on occasion been supporting families of 7 or more, and then we just go wild in the aisles on larger size items.  

On top of that we do vegetarian boxes (pulses subbed for meat and fish and veggie curry tins/ the odd veg balti Frey Bonitos pie) vegan boxes (mine are a thing of beauty), gluten free, diabetic, halal (tend to be fish only), and for someone with kettle only cooking facilities, or microwave only cooking facilities - usually those just released from prison in a temp hostel, or fleeing a domestic violence situation, or kids just leaving care, or the council refitting gas services and leaving the resident and their family with a microwave for a week, on a pre-payment card meter. 

Found three local schools/colleges online this morning through a web site called e-teach  (must be from Yorkshire) who are advertising for invigilators, so will get on with that later.

The sun is shining, it is a cold but crisp and dry Autumn day.

Deni_debt-free_dreamer

I've just checked on Fb and the local foodbank is asking for teabags (especially boxes of 80s) but has plenty of coffee.  When i go to the SMs the collection trolley is often on the way out not the way in so i forget to look at the list of items they need.  
good luck with job hunting
beautiful day here in the NW, mr blue sky