Get a grip woman!

themadvix

It definitely feels like a cream of tomato soup day Agree with Karma, snuggled up in your camper with a simple meal cooked on a 'camping' stove in the rain sounds like bliss. Looking forward to similar soon.

C preparations? Nope, none of those here, although I think a few people on the list will be recipients of homemade preserves etc. this year. Maybe once we're back from our holiday (first week of October), I'll deign to consider C.

EssexHebridean

Caught up - hopefully the bit of Essex you were in has now dried up as much as the bit I’m in - annoyingly it committed to being dry again just too late for me to revert to my “plan A” of using the bike for my travels of this morning. Typical! 

Suffolk_lass

We are back from our brief sojourn - just four nights, five days away. Hard to believe both bathroom and kitchen could need so much remedial activity to restore even to the semi-squalid state I can tolerate, after DS has been house sitting. I found raspberry filled croissant wrappers, a multi-caramel filled doughnut box and snack bags - his diet is eating habits are just terrible.

We had a pleasant enough time but one of the friends had a go at me for suggesting I was looking forward to a decent pension percentage increase next Spring, in the context of the CPI being likely to be 10% this month. He is 60, still working full time, and is clearly concerned about prices rising. They said they have reduced their electricity by 40% by line drying clothes instead of 2.5 hours in the tumble dryer... per load. Blimey, no wonder he still thinks he needs to work full-time. He made reference to his mortgage (still?!) fixed rate and energy fixed rate finishing in February and March. I am deliberating whether to send him an email with some suggestions. The radio item I am listening to just said if your fixed rate mortgage is due to end within six months, start looking now as 6+% is a possibility if the economists and market analysts are to be believed.

Anyway, we have brought in all the bedding, tins, packets and jars of food, in addition to all the fridge freezer contents. The van will be SORN'd from Saturday 1st October so a small VED refund might help next month. I want to make sure everything cycles through so things like a plastic pot of dried pasta, and one of cereal have been recombined with the kitchen ones. So hopefully no stale food here and no OOD tins in the van to be found next year!!

Our October trip is a fortnight and will involve Mum's house and a rental cottage. I think the small jars and packages of herbs, spices and lazy chilli might come with us, although I am hoping for a couple of pub meals and some local shopping to support the economy there, rather than taking everything with us.

Karmacat

Sorry to hear of the negatives in your time away your friend still working FT at 60 sounds worried about his own financial position, for sure.  2.5 hours in the dryer per washing machine load?  Good heavens.  Well, even environmentally, its a good thing to knock that on the head!  Hope you come to a decision you feel comfortable with about sending an email with help suggestions - you're wonderful at helping other people on here (including me) you have an amazing breadth and depth of knowledge about how to do all sorts of stuff, not just moneysaving, but people on here are possibly a different kettle of fish.  Good to hear you're already planning for a (very soon ) October trip!

badmemory

What a plank for assuming you would be happy to get 10%.  Relieved maybe.  But only because any increases you suffer will be way more than that 10%, milk over 50% anyone.  Perhaps he thinks you waved a magic wand so you got rid of any debts/mortgages!  I thought he was too old to be part of the entitled to generation.

Suffolk_lass

badmemory said:

What a plank for assuming you would be happy to get 10%.  Relieved maybe.  But only because any increases you suffer will be way more than that 10%, milk over 50% anyone.  Perhaps he thinks you waved a magic wand so you got rid of any debts/mortgages!  I thought he was too old to be part of the entitled to generation.

I think I walked into it rather. He had just told us his wife is now a pensioner (also 60), in receipt of a small NHS pension, and I suggested that if CPI is 10% this month, she will get that index-linked increase next year. Well he just flew at me to make the point that it in no way makes up for the increases and then he said nobody manages within their pension income. I said that wasn't the point I was making, I was trying to say something positive to her. He challenged me about managing and suggested I don't and I said actually we do. I think our other friend was rather shocked as he is Mr Frugal but rich, whereas the other one is a "best of everything" with a very spendy, unwaged wife. We have concluded the £65+k motorhome must have gone on the mortgage, for them to be feeling the pressure.

Of course he could draw down from his TFLS, maximising the capital payout and reduce his hours, if he wanted to reduce the mortgage, get more time to enjoy himself and still get the 10% increase next year himself if he would stop to think.

Apparently the towels come in all stiff if they are line dried. Personally I find that is only really if you have used the amount of detergent they recommend; too much and it hasn't rinsed through properly. And 10 minutes in the TD at the end soon sorts out the fluffiness!

EssexHebridean

We do it the opposite way round with towels if they've gone a bit crispy then the next time through the wash they'll get a 30 minutes tumble dry before being put outside to finish off trying. All the benefits of the lovely outside dried smell with a bit more softness. (Interesting by the way - up in the Hebrides EVERYTHING comes off the line softer than it would at home - we think due to the amount of blowing around things get while they dry up there). 

Whn we go away self catering our policy is that we will cheerfully take with us stuff that it really won't be worth buying a full packet or jar of while we're there - classics are marmite and various herbs and spices we use a lot. We also usually take HM marmalade and/or jam (as we can't get anything as nice in the shops!) and my favoured peanut butter. 

Humdinger1

@Suffolk_lass it is incredible how many people keep spending up to the very edge of the abyss and over it! Not wanting to sound smug but there are still numerous people out there due for a major LBM, no? Times are worrying but I for one am giving daily thanks that i got shot of 140k of debt (excludingthe mortgage) several years ago.  The lessons I learned en route will never be forgotten and that is the size of the wake-up call I needed.  Terrifying at times but nowhere near as bad as it would be now.  Maybe it's worth asking your friend if he'd like to hear more on your philosophy @Suffolk_lass so he can feel it's an exchange of ideas? He really does need your wisdom love Humdinger xx 

Edited to add: I now earn what I would have previously considered a pittance but have learned to manage on it...previously, debt was gobbling up all available cash and still wasn't satisfied!

Staffordia

I am also looking forward to the CPI increase to my pension. I see it as small recompense for the years of either no pay rise or less than 1%.

badmemory

I have never forgotten owing my father £280 back in 1991.  That is never ever going to happen again.  He never criticised, never asked when I would repay, I think he would have happily given it to me (my mother wouldn't).  Repaid next payday.