22 Foxhole East

DrCarrie

Oooh, have a lovely time in London, the Sky Garden is really lovely. Hope the skies stay clear for you.

f0xh0les

12.10 this morning.  Stressy night sleep as I know I have to catch a train today.  Dreams filled with Hatt Manc0ck, of all things (bleugh!!! ) try arranging his life in your dreams!

Yesterday I did the Te$c0, Lid1, Frozen Foods From Farms, and the Wading Bird Store shopping, the ground coffee was finally back in stock, so bought 4 packs and will buy another 4 or 5 on payday.   Should take me up to the turn of the year.

Going to use my free C0sta C0ffee drink in my travel mug (for extra green points on my card),   remember to take  my water bottle, on the plus side, dinner tonight will be on expenses, breakfast tomorrow on expenses (will go to supermarket and buy breakfast and lunch within £ allowance, I will take my porridge pot with me as a back up) and home in time for supper at 8.30pm   Then my next day off will be Thursday 17th! I am working Sat/Sun/Mon/Tues/Wed - remember I  only applied for a 16 hour a week job?

So what did I do this morning? Got up and cleaned the gas hob, so it is back to being white, not black and orange (bleugh again).  Then the scales surprised me with another drop.  Thank you scales!

apple_muncher

Can I borrow your scales please!

crazy_cat_lady

Oh f0xh0les - so much has happened at your end while I've been in my little pool of isolation at home.
Congratulations on becoming MF, and I completely sympathise with your ds struggles. I only have the one and I swear he will be the end of me...

f0xh0les

Hey there !! 

Today's DS3 annoyance, was the request we go to town to get him a coat (not that we tried that last week or anything) so we went to Primarni, to the Maxx of TK, S&M, and finally Direct Sp0rt, where I spent nearly £50 on a Big Jungle Cat brand black jacket exactly the same as  ALL the ones he rejected in ALL the other shops.  It was on sale though.  They have to start choosing their own damn clothes!! Bought DS1 and DS3 something beige in Gr3ggs for their lunch, and toddled off to work for 4 hours.  They decided to take themselves off and buy another lunch straight afterwards in a Japanese place.  

Had a man ask where we kept the 'potato openers'  - obviously to open the skin of the potato (bless!), helped with thermal cups for a couple whose mother is in the same state my step-gran was in, and were trying to make kitchen adjustments so she could stay in her own home.... and got seriously weirded out  by a thief who kept stealing partial jars of things in the space of time between me tidying a shelf, doing the opposite shelf, and turning back again.   Half a pot of peppercorns,  most of a jar of nutmegs,  a jar of gummy sweets, the lid off another jar,  2 jars of chutney from an 8 pack, it was just random and odd.    They need to get a better hobby.   Oh well, tomorrow is another day, and I am going to bed.  Night all!

f0xh0les

12.9 this morning. Yay! 

Tonight I am excited, I am playing the 'will my expenses be paid tomorrow' game.

 It is a total mystery.

A game of chance.

f0xh0les

No expenses yet. Just paid out for the kids bus passes to school. £50 gone.  £150 in total on bus fares  just for the kids, since I started work. I would like, at some point, to be paid for the 3 sales jobs, the expenses for the 3 sales jobs (including train travel) and for the department store work - first pay cheque will be for 6 weeks work.

 My day-to-day account is not looking good right now. I will only have £100 left to do the rest of the month after today - so I am going to have to claw some back from savings.

It really annoys me how long it takes some people to actually pay you for the work you do.  I temped for years, so am used to the 'oh you missed the cut off for payroll this week' nonsense, but at least that was only weekly not monthly.... and I cannot really complain, as I at least have savings to dip into, and I am certain the money will appear at some point. But I do like to stick to my budgets - and last night DS4 came home with the £300 week in Cornwall letter  - that the elder 2 went on - DS3 missed out due to the 'vid.  That was a bit of a surprise! Another wodge of cash to find - actually, my expenses alone would pay for it. 

kerri_gt

@f0xh0les it frustrates me too, esp waiting for expenses - i.e. cash you've hoofed out of your own pocket for someone else's business benefit. Imagine the reaction if you were rostered in for a shift and said 'sorry you've missed the cut off, I'll do it in 3 weeks'

I'd be tempted to think about the bus fare as what you get back in your time not ferrying the boys around - plus it's great independence for them, and I love the ingenuity of taking the bike and pocketing the cash....Dragon's Den in a few years for that one I bet!

I do like the term 'potato opener' I might have to adopt that. 

f0xh0les

They love their new found independence, and the ability for bike-boy to borrow bus-boy's pass at the weekend and nip into town with an elder brother.   Plus nobody has to ring me to say a lesson has been cancelled, can I come and pick them up.  The amount of trash food they are buying on the way home, however, is obscene.  Oh well! Can't control what they eat outside the house when they get to that age.  They have to learn for themselves.

f0xh0les

Woah!! Other people's families eh?? 

Kids' Auntie has left, with a case jam packed full of biscuits, sweeties, toastie loaves, and strawberry milkshake powder.  Arrested development I fear, emotionally anyway.  Weird, weird weirdness.  She is going back to a month worth of holiday due to her from her current job, then a month on unpaid holiday (in 2 African countries and their native animal highlights), and then starting a new job with a much much much higher salary than her current very highly paid job.  Good for her! After paying for said holiday this week, she is now pleading poverty (??????) and giving it all the 'Oh poor me!! I can't afford anything' routine .   Bizarre.  

Then the normal - all English people are fat and lazy, and there are too many migrant workers / immigrants, the country looks run down,my  DH (her brother) obviously doesn't love her, waah!! yada yada yada'.   What can you say to that except, well thanks for that dear, see you in another couple of years?   Bonkers people.

The retail work experiment is now grating.  I do not know how people think it is ok to shove their rubbish under the racks of clothes, or - yesterday's highlight - leave a full tray of sweet waffles and chocolate sauce and ice cream  hidden in with the kids stuffed toys.   By the end of my shift I was in double figures just with takeaway coffee cups of varying fullness that had been left on the display cases, in with the books on the shelves, or hidden behind the pasta (?)  Surprisingly I was in single figures for plastic drinks bottles.  It was raining though.  Who shops with food in their hands??? Obv Lei'ster people do.

Yesterday was a trial, nobody wanted to look for whatever it was they came in for,  they came straight off the escalator and demanded to know where X was, if we had Y,  and another thing, why is the store so busy - erm, possibly because you were not the only person to wake up and decide to  shopping today??  and when exactly  did a bottle opener become a Bar Blade??  How very manly!  It is a stupid brand name anyway.    What next?  The ARCHIMEDES wine releaser tool?  The M0THERSUCKER Pneumatic Manual Drain Blockage Destroyer ? (plunger)

But the thing that really annoys, is that they expect you to stay longer at the end of the night, and it is every night,  to make the store presentable,  ok, you are paid for the extra minutes,  but you don't actually know what time you are going to finish, or which bus you are going to be able to catch - and at nearly 10pm they are not that regular.  Only got accosted by 3 men begging in less than 100m last night, but it annoyed me.   They were in much more danger than I was, and they did not even know it.   Did I tell you that when the clocks went back the manager gave us all a personal attack alarm?  Charming!

Roll on payday!! A week today. 

I am not working until 4pm today, so I celebrated by going to the dentist, was back home by 9.25, it cost me 2 and a half hours' pay, but if I did not go, they would take me off the NHS books, so I had to really, anyway, got the all clear for another 6 months.   Did the postal panel, just chillin' for the rest of the morning, and need to make something for the kids' supper, as both me and DH are out tonight and they have to fend for themselves from 4 - 10pm at the latest. Not ideal, but there you go.  Will make a big pot of stew, and they can feed themselves.