Learning to walk before I run

Watty1

edinburgher said:

It is looking like Evri have lost the £200 coffee maker I sold on eB@y. I haven't swore once

Has it turned up?

L9XSS

How did the Whiskey sale go? I’ve had mine valued and it’s around 2.5k. I’m holding onto it for another 10 years though.

edinburgher

@Watty1 - it has not I was forced to make a refund to the buyer yesterday before eB@y found against me and made me provide one. I totally understand from the buyer's POV - they spent £205 and got nowt for 3 weeks bar my apologies... After fees were refunded I found myself £197 out of pocket. I am now bricking it that Evri won't refund the cost, even though it was insured, as they have an exclusion for "kitchen appliances". This is confusing however, as they provide the example of white goods and talk about items with glass pieces or delicate circuitry (none of which apply to a bean to cup coffee maker, which was a big plastic lump). I guess I wait and see, it's in the lap of the gods, or Evri's claims department, both of which have approximately the same level of power over events... I will never use them again, this is the second parcel they've lost or destroyed.

@L9XSS - I got a little over £500 after fees, within 10% of my best case scenario.

Holiday had a few nice bits but holidaying with a teething baby was pretty miserable and probably wasn't worth the money. We returned home to beautifully finished staircases and a few annoying surprises (italics as nothing surprises me re. contractors these days). Surprise 1) Large amounts of trade waste dumped in our spare room and at the back of the house. Not a problem as I had expected there to be waste but it took me 2 hours to corral + a trip to the recycling centre to dispose of all the offcuts etc. and additional time to tidy up. Surprise 2) floor fitter used brown/goldish coloured silicon to fill small gaps around some of the stairs. He also seems to have got small smears of this, silicon-y handprints etc. on several of the walls Unfortunately this means I'll need to get the emulsion out again and also a tin of eggshell to touch up woodwork. I don't mind this too much (can't make an omelette without breaking eggs) but I do resent the time it will take me to fix. Still, beautiful rock solid bamboo floors, will try and do some pics over the next week or so.

Extension budget is now dead in the water (sub-£1,000) and hopefully all that's left to pay for now is perhaps another £50-100 to the architect for revised plans for the Council. I am financially, mentally and emotionally exhausted and could use another holiday already

£51.05 paid off the largest CC today, we are currently standing at -£4,500 walking around money, which doesn't feel too bad, all things considered?

edinburgher

Third last extension-related expenditure paid for (bar architect and eggshell), in that I have just purchased 4 interlinked smoke alarms, an interlinked heat alarm and a carbon monoxide detector with a sealed 10-year lithium battery. Relatively expensive at £312.47 as I went for a well known brand with good specs, thank goodness they last for a decade! I got cashback on the purchases via Ch@se, a few pennies cashback from TCB and N3ct@r points for the carbon monoxide detector. You can't put a price on safety and peace of mind and it will doubtless help us tick a few boxes with the cooncil should they decide to visit for the purposes of building standards. Relatively positive in that a good chunk of the money came from "Home Maintenance" as opposed to "Extension" - the need to get new smoke alarms wasn't as a result of the attic conversion, even if it precipitated it.

Now I just need a tin of paint, a day or so to touch up paint and fill in dents and to get the architect to advise what we need to do to finish off the project/inform the council and maybe another couple of days tidying and getting DD1's old room ready for DD2 to move in. Should be finally, absolutely finished by the end of November at the very latest The reason for the relatively long possible timeframe vs. days of effort required is because I don't get days "off"

savingholmes

Glad the stairs are done. Sorry the contractor left a mess 

edinburgher

£51.26 paid off the largest CC (1% + a few quid from my personal spends account). Back to work, slog slog slog

jak

Wow, your work men sound like they've been a nightmare! Thank God it's all finished now! 
I can relate to getting angry very quickly too. It doesn't happen often but it's like a red mist when I lose my temper. I found counselling really helpful. I went through the nhs steps to well-being and they were a big help to me. I happens much less often now and I know what to do to calm myself down x 

Suffolk_lass

I also have a somewhat explosive temper that was very much in evidence this week. Having returned from holiday to chaos and sticky, dirty house as 30 year old DS resembles 14 yo teenager in terms of looking after anything except the cat (who adores him). It wasn't this, but it did add massively to the number of tasks I was attempting to juggle simultaneously as I had no list (I love a good list as it parks stuff outside my brain).

It was that I worked really hard all day to get stuff sorted and finally, about 5.30pm I suggested a cup of tea, put the (stove top aga cream) kettle on and then forgot it for over an hour. Completely wrecked the paint which burnt really badly. I was furious with myself, really upset and ranting and raving with much use of the F swear word. A quick check identified the new-price is now £96 - up £16 from what we paid last year for a house Christmas present (after DH did the exact same thing to the previous (second hand, £25 red) version.

It is only as I am reading your diary (22 posts since last time I logged on) that I am reminded of some good breathing techniques and my work-trained wellbeing freebie - One Moment Meditation (the link is to the YouTube clip) - Martin Boroson has also published a book on this. I can only say it really works for me and I used to sit and play it over headphones at work and at home, just to revisit the discipline of it. Ahead of any pursuit of counselling and as a stress management technique, this, with my lists was a lifechanger and now I am going to do it again

edinburgher

@Suffolk_lass - thank you very much for the suggestion and for sharing your own experience of losing the rag - I love how open and honest we MFWers are (in our own anonymous way)

I am really sorry to hear about the kettle, do you think you might be able to pick up another secondhand one if you look around? It sounds very much like the feeling that I get when a new mobile phone gets scuffed or scratched for the first time - it has taken me over 20 years to get over reacting crossly to that!

Work has been torrid this week. I'm still aiming to apply for the job vacated by my boss but am feeling slightly queasy as I go up and down waves of self-doubt. On a good day, I think I could absolutely do the job, or grow into the job, on the bad day my imposter syndrome tells me that I'm not even good enough for the job that I have. Which is nonsense, because they'd find a way to "manage me out" if that was the case. Work has also been horrible because I've had to start a process with an employee who I manage that relates to poor performance. It's not quite disciplinary but they are an experienced worker (not a very speedy one) and they loathe me for it! Unions may be getting involved, that will be a first for me. I feel like I have been sold a pup with this employee, boss was only too glad to shift them on to me

Finances have been ticking along nicely. I made tens of pounds on Prolific this week (have lost track somewhat), have kept up the debt repayments and had a few wee extra bits of free money/offer money turning up, including a big river voucher for switching a tiny pension that exists solely to be switched for offers

£136.99 paid off the larger CC today (3% of the total + £7 from my personal spends account). It should dip below £4,000 by the end of next week. I also treated myself to a new F1tb1t (my old one no longer has a visible display (although it tracks steps)) and the strap is broken and not worth replacing. There was a good wee deal over on HUKD (S3nse 2 + 1 year of premium membership to F1tB1t's nice to have reporting tools for £39.99). This particular tracker is very much the baby of their range and is the older model but if I get a couple of years out of it, I'll be very happy at that price.

badmemory

If your boss has landed you with a "pup" to manage he must think you are capable of doing his job!  So get that application started.