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

greenbee

Scottiedog_3 said:

greenbee said:

 ( I don't have banisters on the landing, the stairwell has bookcases instead - cheaper, more useful, less dusting)  

Eek! That would be illegal in Scotland as a breach of building regulations.  Elderly people can easily stagger into bookshelves...🤔

Why is it more likely that they're stagger against bookcases than banisters? At least they wouldn't risk getting an arm or leg stuck between them.

They comply with building regs. They're more solid and secure than banisters, and there's less chance of anything dropping on the head of people passing downstairs. I haven't just stuck a load of freestanding bookcases round the edge of a hole. 

Some people have glass panels, some even have walls round their stairs. Banister rails and spindles aren't the only legal option.

savingholmes

Enjoy your composting. I looked into one of those last year - but they'd sold out - and now I have different calls on my £

EssexHebridean

capuchin said:

Unsure if you're ready for that step yet, but have you seen the bungalow in Lochmaddy up for auction? Looks like it needs quite some work, but with 12KW of solar and 16Ha~ it looks quite promising. (Price of Tesla powerwalls notwithstanding!)

Just checked and yes, we did know about that one - it's an Assignation of Croft Tenancy though - and we would be highly unlikely to tick the boxes for the authorities as we wouldn't be resident yet - it's a shame as there really is all sorts of potential in the building!  if you go to Primelocation and put in "Lochmaddy" and "this area only" then the other one there - the detached 3 bed, is one we actually viewed a couple of years ago. I absolutely fell for it but it needed FAR too much work sadly, and had issues with the build methods that would have caused us massive hassle with insurance etc. 

Cheery - definitely get your big things dealt with first! 

Goodness greenbee that was a busy day! I agree with you about the "one thing leading to another" too - one of my favourite methods of tidying up is to set a timer for 15 minutes and literally just wander round from room to room finding things that aren't where they belong =- so something from the bedroom that belongs in the front room, then something else from front room > kitchen, Kitchen > spare room and so on. I find it's a brilliant way of making a real impact in a short space of time. 

*waves at ScottieDog and SH*

EssexHebridean

Banking checked - little flurry of activity on the joint account this morning as the mid-month DD's go out - as far as I can think there is just Prime and the broadband to go now, oh, plus the gas payment but that's teeny - it will be interesting to see who takes it this month too - UP or EDF. so just under £40 in DD's still to go, assuming UW have done as they promised and changed the date of theirs to the beginning of the month, that is. Jury is out on whether that will have happened TBH - I don't have masses of faith in them! That means that we can make the decision on how much to send to PB's this month, shortly - exciting! (well, not *that* exciting but I'm quite easily pleased around such things!)

Updates:
Prolific: £12.04 paid/£3.13 pending
OnePoll: 335
NSD's - still on 9/18 I think 
Overnight electric: £1.14 - 2 x NSH's hot water from cold, WM. 

I'm resisting the temptation to turn the heater input down on the NSH's we have on. Neither are massively high, but in theory the hallway one *could* go down a degree - but doing that will mean the temperature in the core of the flat will drop a bit of course, and at this stage in the winter we think we will be better served by keeping the baseline temperature up - if we do suddenly get a cold snap then it will be less difficult to deal with if we have a higher starting point. We are leaving the front room door half open when we are in to allow the extra warmth generated from the hallway heater and anything gained from cooking activity to drift through to the front room too, which is enabling the heater in there to stay slightly lower than it otherwise would. I'm actually reasonably comfortable with where we're at on overnight use at the moment too - in spite of the increased costs over this time last year. 

Aims for this week
- get Prolific to £20 and cash out
- continue building OnePoll
- three more NSD's - unlikely I'll make more than that as MrEH will need an Oyster top-up. we might also need diesel - we'll see. 
- Start to look around and build an ongoing list of "small things"
- Next week's meal plan/shopping list.
- Decide on next PB purchase. 
- Keep an eye for a response from UW - chase up and threaten escalation if nothing by Wednesday?
- Keep an eye for account incentive to do paid from Sant-And-Er -they seem to be filtering through.
- Broadband switch - hoping I can instigate this slightly ahead of our official one year date - I think I should be able to though as we'll be over the year by the time it goes through. 

I also want to factor in at least a 15 minute burst of doing "something" around the house each evening - some days that might be as simple as getting washing sorted, sorting out rubbish/recycling etc, other days it might involve a bit more, but actually just doing a few bits each day saves it mounting up and keeps the place nicer around us. 

Happy Monday - and indeed new week - all! 

RelievedSheff

The mild weather so far this winter has done us all a favour with keeping the bills down so far. We have built up a fair amount of credit which should see us through the winter months comfortably. I think this month we should also add a little bit more credit to the account balance but then the next few months will eat into it.

milann

I’m liking the 15 minute burst idea - think I’ll have a go at that 👍

RosaBernicia

Also liking 15 mins... was just thinking last night I have to accept I don't have large blocks of time any more.  I'd go back to my FlyLady book, if I could find it...

EssexHebridean

We said precisely that about the milder than expected temperatures yesterday RS -  although I'm not convinced it can last for all that much longer.  Because we changed supplier in the autumn we don't have that luxury of having built up the usual pre-winter credit this year. 

Milann, Rosa - the 15 minute idea really works. I just set a timer and then go at whatever the task at hand is until the timer stops. I also find the best way of ensuring it stays effective is to make sure that when that timer stops, other than perhaps just finishing something I am right in the middle of, I then stop, at least for a while. The incentive of "only doing X for 15 minutes" is lost if you let it roll over into a mega-cleaning or tidying session. It works well for stuff like shredding too - and is just the right length of time to stop the shredder overheating as well! 

I think the premium Bonds will increase by £250 this month. That leaves slack in the account for putting MrEH's next Oyster top-up on the joint account not the credit card to begin that process of transferring "routine" spends away from the CC, and setting some money aside to offset against potentially higher electric bills.  

GeorgianaCavendish

15 min bursts sound great, I need to do that! My current method involves doing nothing until it seems desperate and then resentfully spend an entire weekend on it - it is not working well for me 

EssexHebridean

That's precisely the mindset I originally started using the 15 minute thing to get out of GC - doing things in bite sized chunks is far less onerous!