EH - Essex > Hebrides...the next step of the adventure?

EssexHebridean

Yes - I'm not looking forward to having to do the commute 4 days a week again - it's at least an hour on the way in most days, and that's only 19 miles!

I completed the Travelodge survey yesterday and ticked yes to getting a follow up from them about the alarm, so we'll see. It would certainly appear that they're not volunteering anything currently though. 

So - today then - gym this morning, then joining the "fuel trail" around the town to see whether I could track down any diesel. First petrol station I tried was the bigger T's - joined the queue but after 15 minutes plus is became apparent they were letting anyone who approached from the back way cut into the queue - I reckoned it was going to be well over another hour at best so I gave up there. Tried the second T's and in spite of them having told MrEH this morning when he got his paper that they had enough diesel to see them through most of the day, they had closed.  On to another one - and the queue there was crazy long AND running from a direction that meant I couldn't easily join it, so eventually I decided to head for the BP nearest to the motorway - a lot further round but I had a feeling they might have been prioritising that one with deliveries and so it proved as I managed to get £35 worth there - not a full tank but that's fine as I didn't need a full tank. We'll now use my car for the commute tomorrow to preserve the fuel in the Peugeot for the trip to Cornwall. 

This afternoon I've applied for the new Santander account and that is already open and ready to go - the switch should start on the 1st which should mean it completes at the tail end of the following week which fits nicely with the first "lull" in payments going out. MrEH will give the new account details to his payroll department tomorrow ready for his October pay (and impress upon them that they MUST pay it to the new account - they have form!) The new account already appears on the app too - which is super-quick. My pay goes to my account anyway (although that probably does need changing at some stage) so I just need to decide whether to transfer my joint account contribution to the new account or the old one...probably the old one, this month, then everything is squared up. 

I've also
- washed and re-proofed my waterproof coat and one pair of walking trousers so they're ready for Cornwall. MrEH has decided that his coat will be OK for this trip, but it will need re-proofing ahead of the winter I think. 
- done one load of washing up, just the pots in soak to finish now
-emptied the WM this morning and hung the load on the airer
- reloaded the WM once the coat/trousers were out - that load will go through tonight. 
- harvested another handful of runner beans, and two monster courgettes. Honestly - you can't take your eyes off the little blighters for a minute!

Dinner will be tagliatelle (or maybe spaghetti) with chorizo and assorted veg in a tomato, rocket and onion sauce.

Need to decide where to put the joint account surplus this month yet too - although we might possibly just use it to offset some costs from the Cornwall trip. October is looking like a potentially pricey month as we also have a couple of days in Edinburgh for a pals birthday party so that might be a good plan. As far as Cornwall goes the accommodation is all paid for but there will be food, drink, diesel, as well as anything we pay to visit of course, plus oddments of parking etc. We're going with friends who will likely want to eat out most of the time, which is fine, but I'll be looking to balance that at least a bit with some easy quick meals at the house before a wander to the pub - which is a solution everyone will go for! We've already agreed we'll get pizzas to stick in the oven for the first night. I've also changed up some Clubcard vouchers to use towards a trip to the Eden Project too which will be ace, it wasn't open when we were down last. 

EssexHebridean

The next few days are going to mostly be about using up the odds and ends of fresh food, and getting stuff sorted to go away I think. Last night's tea was as planned. Tonight will be home made haggis from the freezer, with the  remaining sweet potato and ordinary potatoes combined into mash, and a good heap of runner beans each too.  Tomorrow I'm thinking of some form of stir fry although I'll need to give consideration to what the protein element will be. 

I'm in the office today so by the time we get home it will pretty much be time to cook tea and get the odd jobs done before sitting down, but I'll need a list for tomorrow I think. Did the car > Office commute on the new foldy bike this morning and sadly it's nowhere near as nice to ride as the old one was, which is a shame. Perhaps it will improve as I get used to it, we'll see. 

£9.99 will be coming out of the car budgeting account for MrEH's car's AdBlue - but at least it will have stopped shouting at him every time he starts it now.   

Santander have confirmed the new account, and I have just emailed MrEH to remind him about making sure his payroll department have them. Once that account is set up properly I will have an easy way of making OP's to my 0% card too which should incentivise me to get going with surveys again, although annoyingly it looks like I can't do Prolific ones from work any more - need to have a look and see if I use Edge as a browser instead it will let me, but I think it's something to do with our ISP here. 

Just had a free lunch thanks to Boss having pizza yesterday and there being some over so that was a nice treat - my usual roll brought from home is now in the fridge and will get taken back home tonight, one of us can have that tomorrow instead. Also means MrEH can put off baking more rolls until Friday morning. 

Looks like we'll be stuck with the EDF variable tariff for our gas for a while at least as barely anyone will now even offer to supply us thanks to the tiny usage. It's a pain because it means EDF can basically stick the standing charge as high as they want and we're left with no choice. Hopefully once the current situation with prices rocketing and the new price cap settles a bit we'll have more options again, but I'm not hopeful. 

Only other really MSE thing today is that I've done the round-down on both the joint account and mine - only pennies but it all mounts up. MrEH should get paid tomorrow, I will more likely be Friday I'd guess. Hoping so anyway as I'd really like to do the money-shuffle before the accounts get changed around.

savingholmes

Sounds like you are being very productive and MSE. I am glad you won the national fuel hunt. It seems to have settled down around here...

EssexHebridean

Thanks SH - I was definitely relieved to have got fuel! 

Today will be a fairly busy one I think. We’ve been for a walk before MrEH started work this morning - thankfully the threatened heavy rain hadn’t arrived so we only got mildly damp! 😂 Plenty of time for it to tip down though as I need to head to Al’s in a bit for oddments of shopping. We ate the last two apples yesterday but more worryingly have no crisps in the house at the moment - that needs fixing! Also want to grab something to go with stir fry this evening - possibly turkey but will see what they have. 

DW already emptied and refilled with the odds and ends that wouldn’t fit last night, and WM emptied and hung on the airer inside due to the rain. Dehumidifier on in the room with it so hopefully everything will dry today. WM is now on again with a load of towels. Also popped the vacuum round earlier too. I’m on a roll this morning! 😁

Next job is to pop for the shopping - that should take me to my daily step goal too!

Annoyingly the replacement folding bike also turned out to have an issue as the seat dropped twice on me last night while I was riding it nearly depositing me into traffic both times. It got taken back to a Halfords in disgust on the way back home - I’m really unimpressed with them, if they don’t have folk who can set up a bike safely then they shouldn’t offer it as a service. In fairness the guys who I saw last night were massively apologetic and said it absolutely shouldn’t have happened, and have promised to ensure that this time it’s gone over with a fine-toothed comb and returned to me 100% right - fingers crossed. If it’s not right this time round though they will be refunding me and I will be making an official complaint to both Halfords and Raleigh. 

EssexHebridean

Al’s done. £10.60 spent but that includes a jar of salted caramel spread which will be put away for Christmas, a jar of peanut butter which I will be taking to Cornwall (not taking a jar of the Proper Nutty stuff with me as that’s too nice to share! 😆) and a pack of Pork Loin steaks half of which will get frozen. Also got yogurts with a long enough date to do the first few days when we get back, milk for MrEH (half of which will get frozen) and fruit. 

Jobs for this afternoon then
- I need to roast then freeze some courgettes I think - and probably blanch & freeze some cabbage too. Hoping to use some more cabbage, one courgette, a load of runners and some of the remaining and now slightly tired kale in the stir fry tonight. 
- Marinade the pork steaks ready to throw in the wok later
- freeze the rest of the rolls MrEH made this morning - he’d forgotten I still had mine from yesterday. 
- sort out clothes for Cornwall
- email high-res version of a photo to one of the former Reds team members who’s asked if he can get a copy
- a couple of 15 minute blitzes to get the place looking a little tidier.

MrEH has been paid so I have shifted the surplus from September to savings ready to use against Cornwall spending. Also done a round-down into the VSP account. 

I’m hoping Lakeland hurry up and send us some new special offers as I could do with one of their 20% off codes - our bread machine is in desperate need of replacing now! 

Sunshine_girl2

I got a 20% discount code yesterday with other vouchers from Lakeland , maybe yours are on the way . 

EssexHebridean

Ahh excellent @Sunshine_girl2 that's great news - thank you! I did think it had been a while since I'd seen anything from them so it figures it might be due!   

One large courgette has been roasted along with an unexpected tomato windfall - our friend upstairs was going away today and had half a large pack of baby tomatoes left over so donated them our way. They've been frozen as the basis for a nice pasta sauce. The remaining courgettes just got roasted plain and then loose frozen - those can then be used as needed. we have 5 2-person portion sized bags of blanched cabbage added to the freezers, and the beans are blanched and now in loose freezing ready to transfer to a bag. Tea ended up without the pork being marinated, and I gave up on trying to use the kale - although not as tired as I expected no way will it last until we're back and I can't think of any logical way of trying to preserve it. I did also use up the end of a bottle of hoisin sauce though.

When we're back we need a proper freezer audit and then a plan to work through them I think - I can see some nice cheap shopping weeks on the horizon!

RosaBernicia

Wow that's very organised EH - am taking notes, need to work on my cooking situation in a bit! 

EssexHebridean

It was organisation through desperation Rosa! I was looking at all the stuff in the fridge and thinking “aargh!” 🤣🤣 All done now though - I even remembered this morning to swap the loose frozen beans from the tray into a bag. 

Everything was slightly turned on it’s head here this morning as it was bucketing down first thing so we delayed heading out for a walk. That in turn meant a slightly shorter walk for MrEH too as he needed to get back to start working. Breakfast was toast as we decided to use up the ends of a couple of loaves from the freezer, so a nice Friday morning treat there! 

I’m also considering not going to the gym today after all - I’ve got a bit of niggling in my hip on one side, and I’m a bit wary of risking making it any worse before needing it for some probably quite hilly walking next week. I’m going to do some yoga/mobility this morning, and then see how it feels this afternoon, I think. 

Bank checked - we have both now been paid. Part of the money shuffling is done but now the Nationwide app isn’t updating balances so I’m at risk of confusing myself if I carry on. The main transfer to the joint account has been done though, and also my surplus into my various pots. At some stage and ideally today I need to set up a transfer path from my personal account to the new Santander account too - I’d rather do it sooner than need it while it’s less convenient next month as it will need a card reader for the first transaction.  (Oh, and a log out and back in again sorted the balances issue with Nationwide so all transfers now sorted.)

Had a bit of a review/think about finances generally last night, in particular the two 0% cards. Mine had the cost of my new phone bought at the end of last year transferred to it, and is coming down nicely with a £40 a month payment. Good incentive to get more surveys done there to set off against it, but either way it will only have £50 or so left on it when the 0% expires next May. MrEH’s one has the deposit for the car, the cost of my folding bike, and the balance of the  money for the laptop that needed replacing last year, and he tells me that is now sitting at just under £1700, with payments at £50 a month and at 0% until the end of next year I believe. We will probably look to find a new fee free 0% option for that, but I’m also planning to pay extra off it from time to time as well, so that may not yet be needed. The money to clear both immediately if needed is sitting in savings anyway.

In financial good news, we got an email yesterday from Marcus Bank to say the interest rate there is increasing a little which is a good sign. Now waiting to see if Coventry will follow suit!

Cheery_Daff

Excellent work there EH! You're very organised and on top of things with the financial stuff.