Life is a minestrone as the song says - my new diary

teapot2

Oops have been absent for longer than I thought though I have been reading diaries - just not adding to mine.  Had a bit of a slump in December, combination of work, lockdown and the anniversary of OH's death and just never got back here.  I did get the work mentioned above and the zoom interview wasn't as intimidating as I thought it might be.  
Finance-wise I've cleared 3 CCs completely and have one left which I plan to be rid of before the 0% runs out in December.  Have been working hard and saving what I can, my EF is now up to £10K and I'm saving up now for repairs to the house - am about £2K on that.  I'm still working exclusively from home and no plans to rush back to the City and commuting.  Though that makes getting anyone in to do the work on the house tricky in terms of noise and disturbance.  What I don't want to do is arrange the work, take time off then have the work postponed by the trades person which seems to happen all too often.  I moved almost all of my money into PBs like lots of other folk, which reminds me that I applied for FD account switching my TSBee one which no longer pays interest.  After the initial confirmation of my application its all gone quiet so might need to chase that up. 
On a happy note, I have a new to me cat after losing my much loved big old furry boy in February last year.  He is another old boy but very sweet, he's the biggest cat I've ever had and was headed for cat rescue if no one took him - I'm a bit of a sucker for old cats that none else wants.  He's been here a month tomorrow and has settled in well and we are getting to know each other. 
Have had both my jags - second one 2 weeks ago and no side effects with either.  Was on a bus for the first time in over a year when I went to get the second one , wondered if my bus pass would still work and happily it did  
Enough waffling from me - will deffo try and get back into posting.

beanielou

How awesome to hear from you.
You are doing so well.
Great news on the debts & one cc to go 
So pleased that you have another cat.
He sounds a right charachter..

Karmacat

Lovely to see you back, teapot, glad you're okay, and wonderful that you have a new-to-you cat not having the commute must free up a lot of time and energy,  all sounds good.

teapot2

beanielou said:

How awesome to hear from you.
You are doing so well.
Great news on the debts & one cc to go 
So pleased that you have another cat.
He sounds a right charachter..

Thanks Beanie, cat is lovely, he is sitting next to me on the arm of the settee - I may be in love already 😍 🐾🐾

teapot2

Karmacat said:

Lovely to see you back, teapot, glad you're okay, and wonderful that you have a new-to-you cat not having the commute must free up a lot of time and energy,  all sounds good.

Thanks KC, not commuting gives me back over 3 hours a day!!! I certainly have more energy but am pretty sure I don't use the extra time constructively always but thats ok too 🙄🙄

beanielou

teapot2 said:

beanielou said:

How awesome to hear from you.
You are doing so well.
Great news on the debts & one cc to go 
So pleased that you have another cat.
He sounds a right charachter..

Thanks Beanie, cat is lovely, he is sitting next to me on the arm of the settee - I may be in love already 😍 🐾🐾

Dident take long for me to fall in love with Summer 

teapot2

Went to the local GC yesterday with family as wanted to get a scratching post for new to me cat as well as some compost and a few plants.  I'm growing some from seed but won't have enough I don't think.  Its been so cold and wet up here that everything in the garden is weeks behind except the weeds.  It all came to about £65 but I had enough in PP from surveys to cover this so have transferred the money back into my current account.  The weather isn't looking great for the next few days but will get on with some planting and weeding when I can.
Bumped into a friend at the GC [in a socially distanced way] and managed to work out who it was despite the mask we've arranged to meet for lunch next week which I'm looking forward to as not seen her since last Oct/Nov.

teapot2

Haven't managed to put the plants I bought in the week in the garden yet due to the weather.  Its been so cold, wet and windy for what feels like weeks now.  For the first time in years the DD for gas and electric hasn't covered the monthly bill twice now I've paid in an extra £30 to cover some of it and am hoping the weather improves enough to not need the heating at all soon.  I will claim the £6 a week for WFH when I do my self assessment tax return and that will help.  The way my energy tariff works is that I pay more in the winter months and less in the summer and it normally balances put over the year.  I usually manage to build up a bit of credit over the summer even though I'm paying less but not looking likely this year.  
I picked some rhubarb in the garden earlier and have made chutney with it, kitchen smells lovely now and it was easy to do so I'll leave it to mature for a while if I'm not too tempted🤤🤤 .  I do have a jar of bought chutney to finish first though.....
I heard from FD who texted to say they hadn't managed to open my account in time to complete the switch date they gave me.  No problem as there are no DDs on that account so I'm not in a rush with it.  I've now had some paperwork in the post and have returned the document that I had to sign so think I'm just waiting for a PIN then will be good to go.  

teapot2

So, next month I reach State Pension age, I'm eligible for the full amount and will have 46 qualifying years, there were 4 years when I eventually went to Uni that I didn't have qualifying years. I must have been on PAYE somewhere quite early as I had qualifying years before I left school!!  I've already claimed the pension and then they asked me to send in a document last week so hoping that there won't be any hitches or delays.  I've been reading some of the FIRE thread and suspect I'm weird as I like my work and am not in a huge rush to stop though I'm planning on cutting down.  Can't quite see what that will look like yet largely because everything still seems uncertain in life at the moment.
I've got a really small private pension pot so had a Pension Wise meeting to see what my options are, wasn't hugely useful as the guy was clearly going through a script and a lot of what he was telling me wasn't relevant to the amount I have available.  The most helpful bit was the email they sent after with different options listed so I could go through that at my own pace.

beanielou

Hope everything with your pension goes well 
My mum is still working in her very late seventies!