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

EssexHebridean

Hello SH - yep - the I'm a member at our local Anytime Fitness and once you've been a member for a month that allows you to use any of their gyms. I'm not entirely sold on the nearer-to-work one but I suspect as much as anything else it's because it's a VERY different style and atmosphere to our local one, and the machines are a different make that took some getting used to. Next time I go I'll have my workout notes from last night which will make it easier, plus of course I'll also know where things are etc. 


Milann I do like a "nice" hotel here and there for the airshow stuff - due to finances I've frequently ended up in places that are a little more "Fawlty Towers" in their nature though!  

And on the subject of airshows - my Airtattoo tickets are now booked. NOT cheap - as predicted - the three days of the show come in at £155.75 (ouch!) and that includes one of them being at a special "Earlybird" price - I'm surprised those are still available, Some sort of £5 discount for the Sunday one, not sure why - plus a £10 discount for booking multiple days. I will thoroughly enjoy myself though so it's a worthwhile spend. My accommodation for this one is also already booked AND I've already paid more than 50% of the cost of it too - There is £115 to pay which should come off the card at the beginning of July. 

So that marks today as definitely not a no-spend day then! MrEH has also topped up his Oyster card today too - he's had additional days travelling to the office this week, but on the flip side of course we use less power at home on those days - although not enough to balance out the travel obviously! 

I've embarked on a little "E-decluttering" mission - essentially really thinking about emails I receive to work out if they are still of value to me. Some things I'd been auto-opted into when I've entered competitions etc - those can mostly just go without a second thought. Some are where I have previously bought from the company concerned or booked an event through them - and I no longer want them because the purchase was a one-off (Hygge bands - I have plenty for my needs for the forseeable future and I know where to find them once I do need to buy more) or because I'm no longer interested in the events (a couple of companies who organise running races - not something I'm interested in right now, at least. And some were signed up for because I was interested, but the content has changed - Clearscore is a good example here as these days they mostly seem interested only in flogging loans and credit cards, or creating a sense of panic around our fictional "credit score". There will be others as well - and of course going forwards it will reduce clutter. I'm also making sure to check for junk items on a daily basis and block the senders and indeed the domain name as a whole in some cases. I've been doing that last for a while and definitely get less junk and spam now than I used to! 

In general stuff - a load of laundry went through overnight and MrEH hung it outside this morning - the load he put out yesterday was lovely and dry and can be folded and put away tonight. We're approaching the bottom of the laundry basket again! I want to try the machine on a shortened load at some point and see how that compares with the full length - there is a theory which says these shortened sequences can be MORE power hungry than the longer ones, but I'm not convinced. So - last night's - standard sized load, 20 degrees, 2hr34 minute cycle. I want to play initially with a simple "Time saver" which knocks that time down by half. Whether it will be possible to tell just from our regular energy monitor I'm not sure - it's not practical to use the plug-in one on it though.  Curtains were also opened wide first thing (free solar heating! ) AND some windows thrown open to air the place a bit before we went out. Tea tonight is a stir fry - I was a bit at a loss to decide what to use as the protein element but I've decided on mince - I've a pack in the fridge that needs dividing and freezing and I can get away with just a quarter of it for a stir-fry I think - so not entirely traditional but will taste good I'm sure! That will also use up the spring greens from the veg box, one giant leek, a carrot will go in whether MrEH likes it or not, and some of the veg box red peppers (pointy curly ones - very odd but perfectly tasty!) Oh - the rest of the bag of spinach too I think. Ideally I want to prep a cheesy cauli and pasta bake tonight too - that will get split into a single portion for me tomorrow evening, and a double portion for Friday, and I'll shove some chopped up chorizo in it too for a bit of a flavour kick. 

Right - I'm away to get stuff done.

girlatplay

I think when aviation photography is your hobby you know it's not going to be cheap.  It's something you love, totally worth it.  Plus, you have no debt!!

All sounding good in your world.

milann

Sounds like you’re busy. The veg box sounds interesting 👍

beanielou

You work hard & play hard.
What's not to like!

Sunshine_girl2

Sounds like you have lots of lovely things planned , look forward to your photos of the air shows . 

EssexHebridean

girlatplay said:

I think when aviation photography is your hobby you know it's not going to be cheap.  It's something you love, totally worth it.  Plus, you have no debt!!

All sounding good in your world.

Exactly - this, and this! It definitely is worth it to me too - the social side as much as anything.

Beanie  - yes indeed - definitely nothing to not like there! SG2 - I love planning out the shows I'm going to do - always good fun! 

Milann the veg box is an "oddbox" one - we're not fussed about organic stuff but are bothered about food just getting wasted so it's pretty much ideal for us - I need to remember to sort out the dates for the upcoming month as there will be a delivery we'll need to skip I think. 

EssexHebridean

Good morning all - and "good" it really is here as once again we have relatively mild temperatures, sunshine and blue skies! We had to aim into London early this morning as MrEH is keen to get away from work early this evening (he has a rugby match to play - unusual for a Thursday but it does leave him a little short for time on the "usual" timings we operate on office days) so I was able to squeeze in a sunny 5 mile cycle before work exploring a few different roads. Should be able to get a small amount of additional distance done after work too but it probably WILL just be relatively little I think as I can't risk being late back to meet him at the car. 

I don't think I'd mentioned - I've been "decluttering" at the office for the past little while - clearing masses of files which are old enough to no longer need retaining. This morning I have waved Mr Boss off with SEVEN of those big "really Useful" plastic boxes full of files which - as we speak - he is hopefully hurling into a giant industrial shredder. The difference in the rooms in the basement that we use for storage is incredible and I still have plenty more to go even before I can star cracking on with the next year of shred-worthy stuff! Having cleared the floor of one storeroom completely yesterday I also shoved the Henry round down there - it looks SO much better. I mean I've got an absolute mass of files to lug down there to fil it all up again, but still! I also had a rake through a drawer this morning and found no fewer than FOUR empty aerosol air-freshener sprays so those have all gone in the bin, and once the plastic boxes are back here I have plans for one of those being used for a load of other paperwork clutter which will be able to go on the NEXT visit to the shredder. It all feels rather satisfying! 

My hotel for the Eastbourne Airshow got booked this morning - making good use of the passenger time on the commute to discuss with my pal, agree where we'd book and get it sorted. I've opted to pay at the property rather than in advance, and it's also fully cancellable until the last minute in case things change. It was also an unexpectedly bargainous £210 each for a place that looks OK as well - that's room only, but for three nights, so should do nicely. We'll just revert to the "airshow standard" of a nice W3thersp00ns brekkie each day I imagine! I really MUST sit down with my planner at some stage and decide on where else I want to go - I want to be really mindful of days off this year too though so need to fit in with that as well. I really fancy Southport again but that needs thinking about as it's a heck of a long distance so I'd want to be sure of decent displays - and I suspect the military displays, particularly any from overseas, might be a bit limited this year. We're sure as heck not going to see the stunning Ukrainian air force jet that has displayed over here in the past - sadly that will be fulfilling a rather more vital role back at home. 



I'm going to make use of a slightly earlier return home this evening to get ahead of myself before what is looking like a busy weekend. I've got to prep food for tonight and that will also be a "cook once, eat twice" for tomorrow - I had been planning to do that last night but once MrEH said about getting away from London earlier tonight it made sense to leave it as obviously tonights will take less heating up from just-cooked and assembled. I also want to get a load together to go through the WM overnight - that will be mostly sports kit, and do at least a 15 minute tidy round the place. I may also try to put together at least the start of next week's meal-plan I think - the stir fry last night only used one bunch of spring onions and one head of spring greens so putting another stir-fry on the list for early next week makes sense. I'll probably use part of the remaining leek (they are HUGE!) to add into my cheese sauce for the bake tonight - it's a good way of cramming a bit of extra veg into the mix! I've made a start on a shopping list too - so far just the basic items I know we'll need, with the addition of some more storecupboard topping up too. At some stage we need to work in when we're doing shopping - possibly tomorrow evening. 

As this warmer, sunny weather looks like continuing for a while, and we are out for good chunks of the next few days, I took the chance to adjust the heater timing for our "controllable" heater down for the next few days - particularly for saturday when we will be busy all day there's no point in having it running for its normal timings - I'll just need to adjust it back afterwards though. with the way fuel costs are increasing shortly I think "every little helps" needs to be OUR watchword now - never mind that supermarkeT who've adopted it! 

EssexHebridean

Well that’s felt like a moderately productive evening. MrEH drove to the rugby club where he leapt out and made a dash for the changing rooms, and I swapped to the driving seat and brought the car home. Set to and got my dinner sorted - plus two portions for tomorrow evening (which I’m REALLY looking forward to because tonight’s was DELISH!) which are now tucked away in the fridge. Also managed to pack everything aside from 2 mugs into the dishwasher and set it to run later, given the bathroom a swish round, cleaned all the mirrors and had a general tidy up. Hopefully that all leaves me a little bit ahead of myself for tomorrow. 

Banking all checked and fine - I don’t think we’re going to get away without sticking some more fuel in MrEH’s car early next week though which is annoying - having said that there is a tiny sign of fuel prices beginning to fall a fraction round here (aside from the duty cut) so maybe by the time we do there will be at least a little bit of a saving. 

Now - just time for a yoga session to wind down for bed I think! 

Cheery_Daff

Excellent work! 

No sign of prices dropping here yet, but they don't seem to be rising each day either which is an improvement. Paid 180p near home for one car this week, and 179.9p near work for the other 🙄

EssexHebridean

Honestly Cheery - it’s mad isn’t it - the supermarket filling stations round here didn’t top 180, but the independents were all above that level! 

Well good morning lovely DFW’ers - are we all basking in this glorious sunshine? I do hope so! We have windows open EVERYWHERE this morning to make the most of it, and we’re hoping it stays nice for the memorial service this afternoon - the church and churchyard look fabulous in the sun! 

So far this morning I have emptied the dishwasher and got the few bits that didn’t fit in last night loaded in as well, we’ve been for a short walk to get MrEH’s newspaper, we’ve both taken LFT’s ahead of seeing my parents later, ordered another box of tests, I’ve made and eaten porridge, MrEH has refilled the bird feeders, done some plant watering and is now getting stuck in to his morning’s work, and I’ve whizzed round with a bin bag, collected all the rubbish and taken it to the big bins outside. I thought I’d nip on here and post while finishing my second brew of the day, then it’ll be a quick sort out of washing - dry stuff in and the stuff that went through last night outside to dry - before I head off to the gym. Need to take flip flops and a towel (and fresh clothes) as I may as well shower there too. 

My airshow ticket spend has hit the CC so I’ve transferred money from my airshow savings account to clear that off. A quick tally-up says that we have spent just about £90 on groceries so far this month, plus the £13 we paid in cash to the lamb man (which I have already extracted from the food account) - there should only be another two weekly shops during this CC month though so I’m confident we’ll come in under budget - the only question is how far under budget can we get it! Next week’s meal plan needs to be heavily freezer-orientated so I shall get my thinking cap on and work something out on that when I get back from the gym, I think!