Five Year Fix, Five Year Plan

FlacosFloozie

Glad you made it out to the motorsport event! Its always good to do something totally unrelated to work.

We spent about 5k having the back garden done as the soil was so heavy it really needed dug up and removed. If we'd had more time we could have been more frugal and hired rotavators to mix gravel and sand in but I just knew I'd never have the energy to finish it. Debating doing something to tidy up the front garden this year. We have a lovely cherry tree which has doen well but the turf isn't great and the borders are struggling.

VintageHistorian

We paid £3k just before the pandemic to have patio slabs and a small strip of grass dug up and replaced with stone chips and a brick outline. It's not a huge space but I think it took about 4 days for it to be all done. I suspect we'd be looking at closer to £5k nowadays, but it looks so much better (also makes the space look larger) that it's actually nice to look out the back window!

Merlin's_Beard

Thanks @FlacosFloozie and @VintageHistorian - those kind of figures were sort of where I was thinking. Hopefully patio, garden path, some topsoil (maybe get them to put a raised bed as well?) And then I have a base to put plants into.

Merlin's_Beard

Very MSE things - cleaned the car at home instead of handing it off to a car wash. Not very MSE things - I think it's leaking oil again. Will have to try and get the garage to look at it on my day off (please let it not be as expensive as last time).

Also not very MSE - starting electrolysis on some stubborn chin hairs. I promised myself I'd give myself that once the house and emergency fund were sorted. It would have been more MSE to not have grizzly bear genes, but you can't pick your family!

Also pruned back the front hedge to try and stop it invading the pavement, and to try and get it a bit more level. Because they got planted in the really high heat, there's a massive variation between the weedy half dead things that were in full sun, the half hearted things that got a bit more shade, and some big sturdy things that were replacements this autumn. They look like a right hodge podge, but hopefully they look more the same size now.

savingholmes

How was the electrolysis? It's something I've considered but not properly explored.

Good luck with your garden plans.

Merlin's_Beard

savingholmes said:

How was the electrolysis? It's something I've considered but not properly explored.

Good luck with your garden plans.

It didn't hurt much more than laser (have previously tried that and it didn't work; some lighter hairs and mainly just that they're tenacious little so and so's) - like a little pinching burn that lasts less than a second each time - and it took about 30-45 minutes. The electrolysist said that she'd expect that to go down time wise as the sessions progressed, and to expect 18 months of 4-6 weekly treatments with occasional top ups after.

The hardest part for me with anything like this is reconciling spending money on anything so non-functional and trying to justify it to myself and the nagging voice in my head (really, it's simple. It genuinely does bother me, there is a way to hopefully make it better, I would rather spend that £45 on this than any of the other possibilities, so it's a reasonable thing to do). 

Merlin's_Beard

Car thankfully is fine - no oil leak detected! Incredibly relieved about that - didn't really fancy pulling from garden fund to fix the car.

(It was so much easier when there was a big 'house deposit' fund and it was just nebulous)

Merlin's_Beard

Dentist off the to-do list - finally an NHS opening appeared in a local village. Thankfully no work needing doing either - just the dentist reminding me that braces/Invisilign are an option (maybe one day, my wonky bottom teeth do stop stress ulcers healing, but lets get other things sorted first.) Next appointment booked for 9 months.

Trying to get through to the hairdressers for an appointment as my next to-do thing.

Then garden landscaping phone calls (I'm now absolutely procrastinating on this one because I don't really know what I'm doing so I'm avoiding the phone call. Yes, I know this is ridiculous when about 10% of my actual job is phone calls but personal ones make me nervous).

Social wins - pub quiz with colleagues. Good time had by all. Obviously still procrastinating on anything else in this area.

Health wins - not sure if I've mentioned this before, but finished Couch to 5k! And then repeated the run several times. This has been a real struggle that has taken ages to do, and with lots of injury setbacks so I'm very proud of myself there.

Yoga has been a bit of bust this week - pub quizzes and Friday night emergency op plus evening webinars don't really go well with sticking to a routine, and I've just not picked it back up. Several weeks behind now.

Reading has gone to pot as well, which is always another warning sign that my routine has gone to pot and my mental health is all over the place. Ditto my food spend is a bit ridiculous and over my budget already and we're only half way through the month.

Hopefully this week will be a bit more sane and I'll get to sleep before midnight and regain some balance.

Cat is currently enjoying the (switched on!) electric blanket and snoring over the TV. Do not have the heart to steal it back off her.

savingholmes

Well done on the dentist and the running.

Cat taking the Mickey 

South_coast

Hope the Friday night emergency op was on a patient and not you! Congratulate yourself on those wins, you're doing really well ❤ The rest will come