A whole new world, for now

beanielou

doingitanyway wrote: »

Stop this now. Your postings are becoming dangerous to read

:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

in_need_of_direction

It's been an odd few days. Had a bit of a crisis Thursday night when we got a call at 11.35 where we could hear a tv in the background but no one spoke. When it disconnected, we checked and it was from my mother. Cue made dash to hers to find her watching tv and claiming not to have called us. The phone was still connected though. Took a while to get to sleep after that one. Friday and my friend came up and structure is starting to appear. She also left with 8 items that I will never again see. Always a positive. I then drove to the hospital and dropped in the letter to sick friend stopping off for mcflurries and applie pies.
Yesterday I spent £85 in m&s mainly on whoopsied food. I think it may have been due to store closure for our bank holidays but I have never managed a haul like it before.
OH is restarting Atkins so there was lots of really good quality protein. I also bought desserts and a packet of choc Brazils that I binge ate last night. Am annoyed with myself as I do a weekly weigh in on a Sunday morning. Don't understand why I continually self sabotage.
So weighed in this morning. Mr Wii shows a downward trend but weight is as it was last week so didn't manage a full pound. Also, only managed soup for two out of the target three days but that was a combination of the soup not being great and OH being at home for 3 days.
We have finally confirmed that my business related email has been erratic when sending stuff with not everything going through. This is dangerous so today will require saving stuff while OH migrates to a different service provider that will hopefully be more reliable. There is also laundry to be done as outside drying looks feasible.
And, saving the best bit to lays, my friend's temperature and crp count are both heading in the right direction. I am so so grateful.

Hope everyone has a Sunday that gives them all that they want and need.

beanielou

Wow to amazing bargains

Hope you get email sorted out.

Cherryfudge

Just catching up - you've had a lot on your plate this week (but less on your waistline ). Well done for keeping communication going with your Mum, and I'm pleased for your friend whose health is looking better. Is the email sorted out yet?

in_need_of_direction

Email is up and running. Only concern remains that I don't know how much went into the ether never to reappear. Still, I'll follow up a few with calls over the next while and keep my fingers crossed. There was a lot of work for no reward yesterday. However, I'm so glad my OH is tech savvy.

Laundry got done, m&s dinners were made, spoke to overseas sis and dd has obviously noticed an imminent birthday as she finally bothered to get in touch. The power of Percy pigs and tea bags. Having now got a file structure, headway was made on sorting stuff too. Also managed a non driving day. Today might be another but that's dependent upon the outcome of a few phone calls as one may result in an 80 mile round trip.

I need to get cracking on a report today that will not be well received. I think I was commissioned in the expectation that I'd say everything was great and, it's not. Can't see there being much repeat business from there!

I need to make a list. There are so many things I want to get done admin wise, client wise, house wise and garden wise that I'm all in a tizzy. First thing though is to get some soup on to cook before it gets too much warmer.

in_need_of_direction

Well, had an expected caller yesterday which resulted in an outlay of £250 for work that had been pending for quite a while. This was paid for with the £200 emergency cash, £35 from my purse and £15 that cleaned out the £1 savings. My friend was happy to have a hospital visit yesterday which was great. This required a raid on the 20p tin to cover car park costs. While I was there she got word of discharge so I stayed until her hubbie came to get her and then picked my OH up from work on way home.
So, soup didn't get made yesterday but all the ironing has been done. It was just easier to do piecemeal stuff while dealing with workmen interruptions. The heat was a nightmare though.

Today I have a work call at 9.30 which may require some tweaking. I will make soup and this evening I'm meeting some friends from ex job for dinner. It should have been tomorrow but I rearranged when I received an email with 50% off in pizzahut this evening. One friend is picking me up since I drove last time which is nice.
This is the first time I have ever really worried about diesel costs. When I was working, I just saw them pretty much on a par with taxes. If the car needed fed, it got fed. Previously when cash strapped, I didn't have a car as I couldn't afford the lessons or the car. It's a new and somewhat different financial worry.
I'm also struggling with managing other finances but can't really talk to OH about these as he's currently keeping things afloat. Despite my efforts, I really can't manage on £200 for all non bill expenses which is what we have budgeted. We had no joy at all on ebay I really need income to start coming in. I have to send a birthday parcel to dd today or tomorrow and am dreading what it will cost. Still, I suppose that's what emergency funds are for. Still, here endeth the moan. Onwards and upwards.

Cherryfudge

£250! That's a lot of money... thank goodness you had your EF. I'm assuming, though, that it will eventually be recouped when you are paid for your work?

Lovely that you were able to spend time with your friend and that she's out of hospital again.

Cars are costly as well as useful, and so much depends on where you live and work. If you can't walk everywhere, I suppose the best thing is to try to plan to the nth degree and maybe have an errands list so you aren't making separate trips for odd items of shopping. I like the idea of a 'no-drive' day.

Re: the £200 for other expenses, I think that at some point you will need to have some sort of conversation about it, even if it's just asking him to look over your expenditure and suggest tweaks. I'm sure Martin says somewhere that the reason most budgets don't work is that people set the amounts first then try to live with them, rather than seeing what they need and setting the figure accordingly. Of course, the trouble with this is that it doesn't magic up the necessary sums for increased budgets. If you want any feedback and suggestions you are of course always welcome to post the details up here and we'll try to find some wiggle room.

I haven't looked in detail but I know there are 3bay boards on MSE and maybe they could help you with selling?

Hope today's work goes well.

parsniphead

I'm glad you got to see your friend in hospital, the letter must have worked.

Enjoy your treat at Pizza Hut tonight, especially with a 50% discount.

in_need_of_direction

Cherry, the plan is definitely to replace the cash fund. As soon as income starts to trickle in, I plan to replace my seed money in £500 increments. Then anytime I get a Bank of England note, which aren't that common in NI, it'll go in the purse until I get back to the magic £200.
Currently, I'm trying to make every car journey count and am walking or busing where practical and feasible. I'm also mindful to remain within the mileage allowance for the contract car which is almost a double incentive. My poor OH now knows that if I've no other need to drive, his salad will be coming from the local co-op. Having said that, buying it there generally gets me 5% loyalty while 1% goes to the local running club that does the couch to 5k training.
Work stuff got done and issued yesterday but soup was not made. Cleaning the oven took forever. My own fault for letting it get that bad but still. Three different attempts using a time left me a bit light headed. Today some oldish citrus fruits will be cut up, placed in cold water and placed in the oven at a reasonable heat. This will reduce the chances of anyone being poisoned by lurking fumes!
The £200 is an arbitrary figure that accords to what OH contributes less bills. This covers food, diesel, entertainment, meals out, haircuts, etc. it gets supplemented when I do a monthly draw of expenses from the business and with any other amounts that might come in such as PA, ziffit, money owed by DD, etc. in reality it's not doable esp when OH is eating from the Atkins plan with all three high protein meals a day coming from the household. I'm also struggling a bit with isolation so tend to meet former colleagues and friends at lunchtimes, meals out, etc. it's weird. My two employments ago featured people getting together in each other's houses, last employment didn't do that. So, even last night which with the voucher, came to a grand total of £18.57 for three, puts a strain on the budget and a drain on savings.
On the plus side, other than the attack on the cash fund, the emergency money has so far remained intact. Today I must make soup. Tomorrow, I have a coffee break meeting with one of the former partners from my last job. He referred the sept job to me which was nice. However, it's a meeting that I will drive to for appearance purposes but I can also get to asda for groceries, do a chazza drop off of a few items and collect a prescription, etc. included in the chazza bag is a replacement sponge for a super mop that broke over a year ago. Yesterday I sorted through the cleaning supplies. I found three items that belong in the garage, various bits and pieces of empty packaging. 4 cans of oven cleaner, clearly the intent has been there and 8 cans of furniture polish, all unused for at least the time I've been at home! I also have two bottles of household ammonia unused as I've no idea what to use them for!

Today I have a dilemma. I have pre sale access to see a band I really like. Do I hit on reserves to get the tickets or do I forego a fairly rare night out for me and OH?

Cherryfudge

Sorry, I didn't mean to come across as critical. I just meant that your pay from the work should hopefully cover your outlay.

Well done on the clean oven and organised car use. It sounds as though your social meetings are also a networking opportunity, so could some of the costs be claimed from the business? Just a thought.

My cleaning supplies are similar to yours: there are always multiples of glass cleaner for some reason. We don't live in a greenhouse! Ammonia... all I know is not to let it come into contact with bleach. I believe it's commonly used in the US, but that's not helpful, is it? And I also have oven cleaner though it's incompatible with the oven we've had for at least the last five years.

Tickets: oh so tempting! Is there anyone who would like to buy you a ticket as an early present? I can absolutely see it's an opportunity and if it were me I'd find a way.