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

savingholmes

Lovely photos. 

I'll follow your vacuum stories with interest. Would a robot be short enough to fit under my bed? That would be a big win...

milann

Pleased you got your vacuum sorted. We bought a stick eufy a couple of months back. It suits us but we don’t have pets. I’ll still get my ‘proper big’ vacuum out once in a while though. 

Photos are fantastic. It must be quite an experience to fly in one of those beauties.

beanielou

Fantastic pictures.

Suffolk_lass

I should have mentioned that we saw a Spitfire and a helicopter flying over our campervan last week - we think the helicopter was filming as they circled around a fair bit. We were quite near North Wield airfield

EssexHebridean

OOH SL it's North Weald I live quite near - there's at least one Spitfire based there and another couple that use it as a temporary base from time to time as well. Thanks to SH, Foxgloves, milann & beanie for the comments and for popping in too! 

I may just be a Sh@rk convert. It arrived yesterday - we were very good and followed the instructions to fully charge the batteries before using, so gave it a first run round when we got back after popping out in the afternoon. First reaction was "Yep, it does the job" but nothing much more as it didn't feel as though the suction was actually that strong. Then I realised that I wasn't having to do the usual faffing around going back over, and over, and over areas to pick up odds and ends. And THEN I went and empties the dust bucket...well Oh. My. Goodness.... Decided I might as well carry on round and get that battery fully emptied - although having been right round once I figured it wasn't going to pick up much more.... (you can see where this is going can't you?!) Yep - had another OMG moment when emptying the dust bucket for the second time! I'm certainly impressed - I'll whizz round again probably tomorrow night for long enough to completely empty the other battery as well - and that reminds me, the charger dock needs to be plugged in via a timeswitch so it can be set to only charge during the off peak hours

A challenge to the Ombudsman decision has been dispatched off this morning as when MrEH went through the bills in detail alongside the Ombudsman ruling it became very apparent that UW had simply not bothered to include one of the payments we made in their disclosure to the ombudsman. I've also uploaded the nonsense we got back from them a few weeks ago suggesting that our final bill from them was based on estimated readings due to our readings being out of range... honestly, where is that eye rolling emoji when you need it? It does rather seem that UW's billing is so difficult to understand that even they get confused by it - well that or they just chose to lie to the ombudsman service - we'll let them be the judge of which! We do know from previous experience though that the Ombudsman service REALLY don't like companies telling them fibs - our award against Virgin Money a good few years ago was increased as a result of them telling lies so it will be interesting to see what is said this time. 

EDF also need keeping an eye on as they have chosen to use an estimated reading (and estimated a LONG way under) in spite of having got a physical reading from us over the telephone on Friday. While only a couple of £'s different, when your usual gas bills including the standing charge come in at less than £12 that's an appreciable percentage so I will be challenging it if the correct one doesn't appear in a few days.  I've not heard anything further yet from either them or GE on the switch either so I'll be keeping a close eye on that one, too. 

Shopping done yesterday - £28.40 spent which included a few storecupboard oddments. 
A bit of meal prep also done yesterday - tatties chunked and roasted ready for using in a frittata tonight, a tray of assorted veg roasted ready to use with couscous probably tomorrow, and a chilli done which will do Wednesday night's dinner probably, and then a meal for next week as well. Tonight when I'm prepping other veg for the frittata I'll do what I did last week and cook up the half pack of bacon and a whole punnet of mushrooms and then half of that will get frozen ready for use in probably a risotto next week - thus paying it forward for future us both in energy terms and time as well.

I'm definitely liking being back into the routine of more thinking ahead in relation to food - that also feeds in well to my intention of making this an "Observant October" with regard to all things MSE. Ultimately nothing is getting cheaper is it, and so we feel that a bit of time right now refocusing on the various aspects of keeping our own internal costs and also footprint generally down will pay off later in the winter. I think we all know that a lot of it is habit-related too - so building small habits now will hopefully mean savings later. So for October I plan to:
- get back properly into the surveys habit
- Remember to pull curtains and close blinds once the light starts dropping in the evening
- Use our existing timeswitches where they can be helpful - starting with that charging dock for the Shark
- Review savings options and what is outstanding that needs doing going forwards - we actually did this last night and made some decisions about our plans for regular saver accounts etc. 
- at some stage during the month I want to do a review on whether there is anything else we can shift to ensuring it ONLY happens on the off peak electric rate. 
- contact the flooring man to get a quote and hopefully get the work underway ASAP as that will help with insulation. (That is an email which the longer I leave it the more froggy it is becoming so I need to JFDI!) 
- Continue with the habit of meal planning

Yesterday we reviewed the tins in the storecupboard so I have an informed view of what is in there now and know what I want to purchase. I need to break it to MrEH that the list we started with the tins also needs to have dry goods added as well - he'll be utterly delighted. I DID manage to get some bags of 32p pasta yesterday so those are now stacked up in there. 
I've just contacted our windows & doors man about him having a look at the front door as it's catching when it unlocks, and also hanging slightly squiff in the frame with the result that I'm not totally convinced that the seal is going to be as effective as it might. I suspect it's as simple as needing a slight hinge adjustment, but I'm not willing to risk having a go myself! 

Right - I reckon that's more than enough waffle from me! Have a good Monday all! 

lucielle

Once back off my holidays I think we need to re focus and get in the mindset of meal prep and trying to be frugal.  Glad you like the Shark.
L

starnac

I love my Shark. DH and I had a proper "grown up" moment about 2 Christmases ago. FIL got us vouchers and there was nothing we needed so we splashed on a Shark and we love it! 

Meal prep sounds fab. Well done. 

Off to have a catch up around diaries. 

EssexHebridean

Hey L - the more that join in on the re-focusing thing the more fun it'll be I reckon!

Starnac - good to see you lovely! And yes - that WAS a grownup moment! 

I made it to the gym last night so will need to update my signature. And cycling to the office from the car this morning FINALLY felt slightly easier I think.

Well last night's tortilla omelette using the previously roasted potatoes was GORGEOUS! So much added flavour from doing the tatties that way, and the fact that they kept a good part of their crunch was a bonus too as it added a really nice texture. I cooked some chunks of chorizo, and bacon and mushroom as well, threw the tatties in to heat through them added to the lot on top of the beaten eggs and cooked as normal, finishing under the grill once I'd topped it off with cheese. Served up with a big pile of salad with a dressing made using oil from a jar of sun dried tomatoes and vinegar from a finished jar of pickled beetroot - yum! 

Tonight will be a fairly standard-for-us tuesday tea of couscous with roasted veg and halloumi - there's a reasonable chance that will also end up with at least some salad leaves alongside as we got two big bags with the veg box! I need to remember to box up the pomegranate seeds we froze at the weekend too - I was a bit miffed to realise that T's have stopped doing their frozen ones - they were really convenient. It may be that they do them seasonally mind you as nobody else seems to have them frozen now either. MrEH will be at Rugby training tonight so my plan is to catch up on some TV while processing some more pics from Saturday. 

I had a small win yesterday - Mr Boss and I were emptying the bins in the office ready to put the bag out for collection - we emptied Mrs Boss's bin only to see a plastic thing and a cable drop into the bag - I rescured the cable first and it was a perfectly good USB to mini-USB charging cable so I nabbed that. Then we looked at the plastic thing - about 4" square and quite flat, with mini USB input on one side....a bit of googling revealed it to be a phone charger - one of those you just lay the phone on tp of and it charges it. Looks to have been sent to Mrs Boss FOC as an advertising gismo from a supplier she uses, and she'd just dumped it! It will surprise NO-ONE to know that I nabbed it! Tried it out yesterday afternoon in the office and it works a treat so it's now gone home (because otherwise Mrs Boss will come in, see it, and throw a strop no doubt!) where it might be useful.

Banks checked and all fine - and I have remembered to shift the money for the two Sant-And-Er reg Savers across from the feeder account this month so avoiding "aargh why haven't we got any money" type panics later in the month!  Last night's "organised October" discussion was about whether we would be following plan A and still applying at least some of the funds from the maturing RegSaver accounts in the new year to PB's - and we have decided we will, as at some stage MrEH in particular is going to potentially run into tax issues with savings interest (Sorry - we're thoroughly aware that this is an incredibly "first world" problem, however, as Mr Eh said last night, it's a problem he'd sooner have that the "why are we in the red and how are we going to pay this bill" type conversation we were having 20 years ago) so removing a chunk of our savings from the equation seems sensible. I now have an ISA and some of my money left to me by my great aunt is now stashed in there. MrEH will be opening an ISA later this week for some of HIS personal savings and probably a lump of joint money as well.  It does stick in the throat doing the PB thing again really considering ERNIE has been ghosting us since March!  

Grocery spend so far this month £106/£200 so that's OK - month finishes on the 10th so one more weekly shop to consider. Not sure why I thought there was another veg box to come in the month - there's not, so it'll be just the weekly shop next week to add in, and my plan is that will be kept fairly low. 

Surveys:
Prolific: £3.14 paid/£2.75 pending
OnePoll: 652 Points
Ipsos: 517 points
I DID complain to Ipsos last week in the end after yet another survey that asked me lots and lots of pretty personal questions then told me I wasn't eligible. Not impressed.  

beanielou

I have given up on Ipsos for that very reason.

EssexHebridean

Oddly enough Beanie today it was at least giving me the 3 point screen out compensation AND screening me out on the first scan of demographic information. Maybe complaining did some good! 

I feel as though we’ve had a rather productive day today - the chap turned up to fix the garage door first thing - turned out to be quite a complicated repair MrEH tells me involving a new section of door frame having to be patched in, but having put my own car back into it when I got home I can now confirm that it locks quite beautifully again - in fact better than it ever has in the time we’ve been renting it! Then just before lunchtime the chap who fitted out windows and doors a few years ago called - I’d texted him about the issues with the front door having dropped. He said he was able to pop round almost immediately and thankfully Mr EH was in of course so that got done too - as we suspected it was a quick job involving tightening the hinges! 

I also fired off an email to the chap we’re hoping can quote for the floor so fingers crossed we hear back from him - I’m really keen to get that done ahead of the colder weather as it should make a decent difference to the insulation through the hallway. 

Got home in good time just to scale off the little wins for the day, and ran the big boat vacuum round again - yes, cue another pretty well filled dust bucket - oh dear! I have to confess I’m seriously impressed - I honestly didn’t think it would be quite as good as it is! It’s the fact that even though it went round the whole place such a short time ago it’s still got out so much more today too - amazing! I’m really not one to rave about stuff like vacuum cleaners either so it goes to show quite how good it is! 🤣