Staying on track to be MF and ready to support my daughter at 18

ElmoR

Emerging from the work tunnel for a brief spell. After reams of risk assessment paperwork we delivered our first face to face lab practical sessions and everything went ok, if a bit weird. No signs of having been infected either but we were pretty good at staying 2m apart and everyone had masks on. Some more face to face sessions in November, and not feeling quite so apprehensive now I know it kind of works. Fingers crossed that our campus remains at the relatively low levels ...

New glasses arrived. Huge improvement for screen work. Fewer headaches

Half term for daughter and she needs it. Her new college made it to Thursday before needing to move online for lessons, amazing effort by the teachers and pupils to avoid covid cases and spread. She's had 6 weeks back in lessons and it has made such a positive impact, getting to know her new teachers (who are all lovely and passionate about their subjects). The step up to A levels is quite a big one it seems - she's covering stuff I did at University decades ago. It looks like she has also passed the point where I can help her with homework on some subjects.  They've also invested time and effort with dual face to face and online lesson delivery for those who did have to self isolate, so they have a very slick system now. Must remember to individually thank every teacher at parents evening (in whatever format that takes?!).

Garden news is a bit limited. I have coriander coming out of my ears and a few spring onions. Going to plant some autumn garlic this weekend. Also going to attack a straggly cheeseplant and hope it transforms it?

Financially, we are holding our breath for the end of the month and final mortgage payment day on Nov. 4th...it still feels like a dream, that I will wake up any second and we'll be back in the £100K territory. It's hard to process which I suppose is because you have the debt for decades and it feels it's a forever thing

Preparing for a puppy has not been very MSE. We had to buy a storage unit to pack away a lot of toxic/hazardous stuff (bog bleach etc) and chewable stuff. It has also prompted a huge clear out of our daughters old toys into boxes in the attic eaves. Who knew we had so much moshi monster kit? I think the cats are onto us, the crate with mattress and snuggly vetfleece blanket has been claimed by them already. They both had their slightly late (oops) booster vaccinations at the vets this week too -all very efficient with distancing and one way system, relieving us of £75. One cat had lost 200g and the other gained 200g so we figured that one must have eaten the other's breakfast that day??

To try to recoup some of the pet outgoings, I used the govt tax microsite to claim for the working at home tax refund. It was extremely easy to do. Will see what that results in to counteract some of the recent spending flurry.

So it's white knuckles and butterflies in the stomach now til the start of next month...

Have a good weekend all

ElmoR xx

Baileys_Babe

11 sleeps and then you will be mortgage free @ElmoR

South_coast

YAY! Nearly there! And then on to FIRE! I am super excited for you 😀😀😀

Cheery_Daff

Ooh, this is all very exciting!!! So close now!!!

Don't know what happened to my notifications from your diary,  I've missed your last few posts,  sorry! I would have been in here commiserating about work stuff otherwise.  I don't think i've ever worked so hard as these last few weeks I'm normally pretty good at keeping evenings and weekends free but have been doing 10-12 for days for about 4 weeks now and it's doing me in.  We DO have pastoral responsibilities,  well, technically 'advising' on the work side but because they know us they usually come to us first before student support.  And yes,  that role has increased massively with all the uncertainty. 

Things are selling down now though as we all get a bit more used to it. I did ONE day of face to face classes before our department went all online again,  which is fine by me - we don't do anything practical,  and while the university would like us to do some face to face,  we're don't NEED to, 
and with so many people either ill  or isolating the logistics were getting silly. And whatever the rules are officially,  our small dept felt it was irresponsible making loads of people move unnecessarily in a high risk area,  so online we are. 

Might try your cuddly toy trick though!!

Glad your daughter is enjoying college.  It must be so strange for young people starting a new venture this year.  Our lot are SO stressed about this,  and added to that VERY much feeling like they're being blamed for spreading it when the vast majority have only moved back because they were told they had to, and so many are now isolating in small flats away from their families. Hope your daughter continues to thrive!

Glad you're enjoying the gardening too! I've never managed to make coriander grow,  I'm quite jealous!

Sorry, waffling... do let us know when to celebrate with you!!

ElmoR

Thanks for your excitement B_b, S_c and Cheery

Tried to do the maths (not my strong point) to find out what we will have saved by doing the overpayments. According to the calculator we saved approx £5,400 and have wiped @10 years off the term. Where's that beer mug emoji when you need it!

Sounds like your department is quite a sensible one Cheery. Ours has been too. My subject area is lab based so I wanted to make sure that the final year students get some lab project work for their CV and interviews as talking points. Otherwise, I would be entirely online delivery too. I can't say that this is the hardest I ever had to work though - when I started out at the bottom of the ladder a couple of decades ago, I was loaded up with an absolutely insane teaching load (that did lead to part of a grievance a few years later). But this semester comes close with 7 modules and having to dream up materials for the blended learning. Combined with all my grant applications being rejected this year and the EU funding (I have normally be successful at securing) being cut off, the FIRE planning has a whole new urgency

One more female professor looking for the exit door...

Maybe my mojo will return and it's a temporary feeling of glumness?! You know you are screwed when you have so much stuff to feel happy and thankful for but you wake most nights having teaching anxiety nightmares!! You are in the class, the students are already arriving, you didn't know you were teaching that session, and you don't know the material or have that expertise...!!!

Anyway, roll on Nov 4th and cake day

ElmoR xx

Cheery_Daff

Roll on cake indeed!

I've been trying to focus on grant funding this year (and for the past few) as well - I keep hoping that if I throw enough out one will stick So far in 2020 I've had 2 shortlisted (hooray!) but not funded, and two where the funder has withdrawn the funding stream altogether after all the applications were in Understandable but what a waste of everyone's time. Two more due to be submitted in November, and another in January, so fingers crossed. Tis indeed exhausting on top of teaching etc - but most of them will buy me out of at least SOME teaching so will at least shift the balance.

I'm still heading for prof (well, heading for the thing before prof!) but even now I'm looking forward to being out the other side

Baileys_Babe

Cheery_Daff said:

Roll on cake indeed!

That is just a waste of cake 🤣

ElmoR

Cake doesn't last long in our home Baileys, no danger of rolling in it!

It's heartening to hear your work ambitions Cheery. There weren't many females around 20 odd years ago, but it's certainly improving, though the challenges are different and still tough. I'm a big fan of lowering the ladder to help others up, but I find that my immediate colleagues don't seem to want to hear?! I am presumably now so old that I am not 'happening' enough? Out of touch? One of my male colleagues (who recently retired and is lovely) said that it was because I don't have grey hair, a deep voice and wear a tweed jacket with patches. The grey hair has been accomplished recently though. Am always happy to mentor though. At your stage, my advice would be to just keep doing what you are already doing - bunging in those bids, stay positive. Get involved in collaborative bids, even small ones. Get yourself onto a peer review college too (seeing and assessing other people's bids help you shape your own). Small bids (eventually grow into larger ones and) are easier to win. Eventually that determination pays off. Twenty years ago, getting started, I wrote about 15 or 20 bids a year (I was a bit work obsessed, it was before my daughter came along) and would be successful in 1 or 2 of those. Once you get a few, you have a track record and they can help get more. Find a mentor who will read your bids too. I found that the feedback from my male former postdoc supervisor was invaluable - men seem to use a different language in their bids, or that's what I found?!

Send me a message if you ever want to natter

ElmoR xx

Cheery_Daff

Thanks for all your suggestions ElmoR, you're very kind always good to have people forging the path ahead it makes such a positive difference to those of us following. I've sent you a PM xx

ElmoR

Hello all. What a wonderful week

It's done. We are mortgage free

It was a bit confusing sorting the last payment out, the bank made a mistake but we got there in the end. The account has completely disappeared from my app so it must be real. I'm wondering what happens about house deeds and things like that now, I suppose I will have to message the bank and ask, they don't offer much by way of help.

Each evening, when we come home from our evening walk, I've looked at the house and thought 'it's ours, completely all ours'. Wonderful feeling. Plus knowing that the insane level of money budgeting each month can ease slightly.  Only slightly because now I would like to keep up the habits and aim them towards reaching an early retirement goal. It won't be super early because I still have 8 years of NI stamps to collect (darn that working abroad). Am coming up to 52 at the end of the month, so that'll be 60 as a realistic goal. Plenty of time to see our daughter through whatever she decides to do after school etc.

Does anyone know of, or seen on the forum, a spreadsheet template that people use for retirement savings planning? The spreadsheeting approach has been my number one tool in staying on track and motivated this far, need a new one for the new goal

Weekend-wise, we are still preparing madly for the puppy. 8 sleeps til we collect her. DH is currently dehydrating bits of liver to make healthy snacks I'm more interested in what foods he can dehydrate for us to eat? We still need to finish plugging gaps in our back garden fencing and gates. We are a crate short too...The vet is booked for vaccinations and a local trainer booked during December for a basic puppy training course over 6 weeks. Need to shop around for insurance, though might get a better deal if we combine the moggies too. Pets are definitely not MSE.

Have another non MSE plan that has seeded in my head too - I'm wondering about rigging up a solar powered heating system for the greenhouse? Does anyone have any tips on going about that? I've watched some videos (mainly by people in very cold places like Alaska and Canada, but Yorkshire seems blooming cold to me as a southerner) and it seems do-able but how to do it in a MSE way??

Have a good weekend all,

ElmoR xx