Put away your purse & become debt-averse

foxgloves

@Deni_debt-free_dreamer - Yes, there's not much we can do about commuting. Mr F is thinking about asking if he can wfh once a week, so that would be over 200 miles saved a month. How annoying about that survey. I had a similar thing on the site you mention earlier this week. It was quite an interesting one & was decent pay, but I got part-way through & a message appeared to say there was a connection problem. I waited a little while & it returned to the screen I was on but it was completely frozen & I was unable to proceed in any way. I did file it as a problem & it was suggested that I message the researcher. I did this, but to no avail as they just sent me a de-briefing for the study, when what I wanted was to be able to resume it. Grrrr.

@QueenJess - Agree it's really worth checking seed boxes before trotting off to the garden centre. I like to think I pretty much know what's in mine, but if I'd gone off to buy this year's seeds without first checking & writing a list, I'd have ended up spending way more money, as I had a lot more seeds left than I remembered. 
I hope you can get your rhubarb going. It likes a reasonable amount of water - ours is in a sunny spot but only starts to droop in very strong sun. Do you know if your rhubarb is an old one? If it is, this could explain the lack of productivity. It's possible to rejuvenate it by lifting it, chopping it in half with a sharp spade & replanting as two separate crowns. We did this (maybe 3 or 4 years ago?) & it did the trick. Now I have two crowns, I can alternate the one I put the forcing crock over each year for an early spring pink crop - the forced one does go on to produce a main crop of stems as well. You could be right about the currant bush though. If they are competing for water, nutrients & light, then the rhubarb could possible be sulking. They seem to like home made compost if you have any. I'd say anything's worth a try to get yours going as you like eating it.
F x

foxgloves

Hello Friday Frugalistas,
I still haven't taken the calculator to my energy price rises letter. I have a few financial tasks to do on Monday morning, as well as my usual Monday morning budget updates, so I am going to have a proper look at it then. If I do it today while Mr F is off, I shall just be ranting on about it & I need to sit & look at the figures in a pragmatic way (first.....shall probably be ranting later!) 
Woke quite early today, which was just as well as the cats did too & were so utterly fading away from malnutrition that I was forced to dish them up a few biscuits before they fainted. Litter trays absolutely toxic this morning - I'll say this for them, their bowels work!
Oh & then there was a Thing on the lawn.
Busy morning in town. Decided not to pop to the coffee shop (we're having coffee out tomorrow) which meant we could park for free as could get everything done within the 2 hours. Market, pet shop, building society, post office & supermarket. Almost stuck perfectly to the list - we just bought duplicates of 3 items which were on offer, then a few vouchers knocked £4 off our total bill. We did spend a little at the market on fresh veg & a pork roasting joint, but I am expecting us to have come in at a lower grocery spend than last week.  
Did a joint effort on cleaning the house. I put it to Mr F that if he did the vacuuming & litter trays, I'd do both the kitchen & bathroom. Quick work with us splitting the labour, then we stopped for coffee & the very current topic of the cost of living crisis came up again. We are both on the same page with how to tackle it, I think. I feel grateful that we are in a position where there are some things we can cut. I feel desperately sorry for people who are already struggling financially, as it is going to mean lean times with very difficult decisions. It worries me that many will add to their debt load by having to use credit to pay for essentials.
I think we are all having these conversations at the moment. Complete strangers seem to be striking up conversations about how much they have seen petrol selling for on their way into town & our butcher says he's starting a loyalty card as he said some free meat every few stamps may well help a few people out with their food budgets. Ah well, let's step up control of all those things where we still have some influence. It's all we can do.
When we got back from town, Mr F noticed the Thing on the lawn & pointed it out. I said 'Yes, I told you about the this morning'. He put his boots back on & stomped out to look at it. Next thing, he's windmilling his arms around trying to get my attention to go out & join him. He said he reckoned it was organic, but couldn't tell whether animal or vegetable in origin. I asked him if he'd turned it over. No. So I did it & it was the oddest thing........ an ancient & completely mummified large bird in a seated position with its head under its wing. I assume that at some point, it died in its sleep & the local jackdaws have fished it out of a chimney while looking for nest sites & just dropped it in our garden for a laugh. At least it wasn't a dead tortoise, which is what it looked like from the window first thing without my specs. Oh, I do drone one about some rubbish, don't I?
Off to get a pile of cook books out now to look for some new economical recipes. Chilly grey drear outside. Mr F has just offered to turn the thermostat up by half a degree. I said no, I'd rather fetch extra socks & he can put his hoodie on.... & the kettle.
Got to keep on this.
Love F x

Sun_Addict

What a bizarre thing to find on your lawn! 

foxgloves

@Sun_Addict - I know! It honestly looked like it could have come from a mummy's tomb. 
F

Pollie

Now is the time to expunge  the phrase 'cost of living'  from the English language and replace it with ' cost of existing'!!

foxgloves

You make a good point there about the accuracy of economic terminology @Pollie. Inequality is so hard wired into our society that while very many people will struggle to afford the basic necessities, others will barely notice any dent in their wealth at all, including all the millionaires in the current government.
F

Deni_debt-free_dreamer

hi foxgloves & followers
I hope Mr F gets to do a day from home; individually we are stuck if we need to drive somewhere and public transport is not an option but employers could be more open minded and understanding.    Me and most of my colleagues think there is an element of presenteeism but mainly that our public sector employer wants us back in the office to spend money on the high street.  I don't live in the county where i work so i spend my money where i live not where i work!  I always take my lunch with me as it is more MSE and i have done so for years.   
i have also struggled to get meds down my cats, i have put the teeniest bit of a tablet in their food and we had a stand off all day until i gave up!  Must try harder??
I am hosting my book group this eve so i have put on my heating - it really pains me but it'll be off as soon as they leave 
love Deni x

Onebrokelady

foxgloves said:

Hi @Onebrokelady - I am far from cheerful about all the crazy price increases - the thought of 10% inflation hoving into view, as I have just read in the 'Guardian' fills me with dread, but so much of it is outside of our control. However, my thinking is that if we behave as though there is absolutely nothing whatsoever we can do to shore ourselves up against the storm, we will lose control of some of the variables over which we do have at least some agency. So I'm looking particularly at banking as much credit on my energy account as possible, going through my large collection of cookbooks for about a dozen or so new economical meals to cook & not spending money unnecessarily. Yes, we have savings pots, but even with those, I will be considering properly whether we do need the item or could wait a bit longer or shop from home. I will also be making more effort to add to the presents stash throughout the year. I already do this, but I think efforts had slipped in the last couple of years. 
Enjoyed your experiences of the cats/tablets issue. I can tell you work in the medical profession! I think I cave in too quickly to the sad eyes, droopy-whiskered starving cat act. We still have a flea/tick tablet to get down Soot & Ash so will have to see how Round 2 goes!
F x

Working in health definitely hardens you to the sad eyes droopy whiskers act 😀

QueenJess

I very successfully shopped from home this morning. DS is going to a child’s party tomorrow and I needed to wrap the present, but I don’t have any appropriate wrapping paper and although I thought I had lots of gift bags, it turned out they were either wine ones or Xmas bags.

So I got some of that brown packing paper that came with a recent parcel, used some rubber stampers from my craft drawer to stamp “happy birthday” and a picture of a 🎁 on it. Then managed to wrap it up and tie together with a nice red ribbon (free from a delivery) without using horrible plastic sellotape and added a tag I cut from some nice sparkly green card (craft drawer). Job done! 

DS is also hand making a birthday card, so very frugal and eco friendly today! Even the present is plastic free (recycled colouring pencils with a colouring book and a small chocolate). I liked it so much that I’m going to do the same thing for another party he is going to next week!

foxgloves

Oh, now that's proper shopping from home, @QueenJess, well done! Some of my most striking Christmas gift tags last year were home made ones, & so simple. I drew round my Christmas tree biscuit cutter onto green card from craft stash (I was given this so not even a purchase), cut them out, punched a hole through each one & added a loop of gold ribbon yarn rescued from my Mum's yarn stash. 
My recycled wrappings stash must have saved ££s over the years & does feel more sustainable, esp when it's reuse of foiled type stuff which can't go in the recycling bin.
F