Five Year Fix, Five Year Plan

KajiKita

I really enjoyed Lessons in Chemistry , hope you do too 😊

I liked Malta, loads of history and every possible food option you can think of. The bus service is really good - get a weekly ticket and you can ramble around almost anywhere. The boat trip to Gozo is horribly busy but Gozo itself is lovely - much quieter than Malta with a really tangible atmosphere 😊

C’mon then, HOW on earth do you come in under budget on food spend??! I need some advice here!! 😊😉👏

KK

killerpeaty

Very social! I'm glad you're enjoying this book more than the last.

Well done on your month!

savingholmes

Well done on the socialising - I trust you had plenty of fun along the way.

My new build gardens always squelched. I dug ditched around the lawn between them and the flower beds and added gravel. That helped.

Merlin's_Beard

Life update, because I've been a bit remiss, although mainly that's because nothing has happened to me.

LOVED Lessons in Chemistry. This is perhaps the favourite of the books I've had to read for book club. Main character felt like an actual person with conflicting wants and desires and needing to take the least worst path instead of having a great one magically open up for her, even if it ended well.

Planted some snowdrops that @redofromstart kindly sent over, and the weather kindly obliged when the heavens opened up about ten minutes later and watered them in.

Planted a large amount of perennials in the garden, still not sure of spacing but I whacked them in and we'll see what lives and what dies.

They were a batch, so I ended up gifting the cat-toxic ones away on the local free to a good home whatsapp group. I could have asked for some money for them, but to be honest I was more bothered about them going to someone while they were still good. 

Second comedy gig was great!

Also booked a weekend away with friends at a comic con in May (absolute nerd that I am), so train/hotel/entry tickets all paid for.

Flight tickets to Malta booked as well via a friend who works for an airline, so a bit of a discount there. Still haven't sorted hotel. It's looking like it's ridiculously expensive (for me, this is over £100/night). To be fair, after paying for the weekend in May I don't think I have enough left in the YNAB free spend money without pulling from other categories, so maybe this is a next month problem.

Went to look at a local garden furniture clearance sale at the weekend, but nothing good there- either massive sets (which won't fit in my garden or look oversized), or tiny coffee tables.

I desperately need to try on the dresses that I own to see if I have something good for this wedding that's coming up.

KajiKita

And I LOVE your review of Lessons in Chemistry - summed it up perfectly 😊❤️
Aww to the Redo snowdrops - hers are very good at spreading 😊 Did you see last week’s GW - Monty was saying that all of the snowdrops in his garden at Long meadow had come from one clump that a friend had given them 32 years ago and every time they flower it reminds him of that friendship 😊🤩
Glad you are making positive plans to socialise and good luck with the dress trying 😊

KK

LadyWithAPlan

KajiKita said:

And I LOVE your review of Lessons in Chemistry - summed it up perfectly 😊❤️
Aww to the Redo snowdrops - hers are very good at spreading 😊 Did you see last week’s GW - Monty was saying that all of the snowdrops in his garden at Long meadow had come from one clump that a friend had given them 32 years ago and every time they flower it reminds him of that friendship 😊🤩
Glad you are making positive plans to socialise and good luck with the dress trying 😊

KK

Love this Monty quote..

Have fun with the dresses .. Merlin - you can always look at local tailors etc to make small necessary adjustments if you not good at that - I am going to classes to learn so I currently always ask a friend who does dress making professionally. 
You have lots of fun travel ahead I was once on a comic con panel bizarrely - people there are always such real fans ... whats your favourite nerd out character apart from the GO gang of course (my favourite)



@killerpeaty i bizarrely also have a small DB  as did 5 years at a bank in my first real job  - they dont do them any more and I had no idea what a gift it was or I would have contributed more .. to be honest I don't think I was that aware I even was making such valuable pension contributions beyond seeing money come out my payslip each month... !
It is worth about £6.5k+  a year now  so not huge but every penny helps and inflation linked -  when I asked for the cash in value (only so I could see the value of it not cos I planned to move it) it was worth over £240k or something insane 8 years ago... it also kicks in at 60... If i knew then what I know now
But we all make the choices we do .. pointless to regret as I am also desperately trying to fill up my  sipp...whilst saving for a bigger deposit...

savingholmes

Love the sharing of plants. That's community right there even if it's different to the old days.

Glad you enjoyed the gig. The comic con sounds great too. They always look so colourful in movies.

Merlin's_Beard

Definitely appreciate the community here in many ways, and the snowdrops are a brilliant, tangible, reminder of that that hopefully I'll get to see every year.

@LadyWithAPlan I'm going with a group that are all fans of the same tv show, so we'll be a bunch of pirates with any luck (my cosplay is really just slightly different dressing up so nothing spectacular). But I am a proper, proper, TV nerd and the same group of friends has many Good Omens/ Doctor Who fans especially, so we should have a fab time.

redofromstart

I really hope they take for you.  I started with a plant tray full from my Dad when we moved here 17 years ago, and I have shared and split them ever since as they are one of my favourite plants to the point that we have metres of them.  I havent split any for me yet this year and it is probably the last chance in the next week or so.  The bare root stuff from JParkers is looking good as well and really needs to be planted in a permanent home, but it is so wet underfoot that I can see it drowning.  

Kajikita was sharing pictures of primulas on her diary which is another great sharing plant.  

Merlin's_Beard

Oh, and the other big news - I have a dining room table! Only took me 18 months, but that, and a display cabinet, got delivered on Tuesday. There were two specific things I mentioned I wanted in the house on the first page of this diary - a small garden to play gardener in, and a dining room table, and I've got both now.

(It's nothing particularly special, just a mass produced oak thing from a land where you might make furniture of that particular wood, but it's mine and it's here and I love it)

It also means that the small collection of fancy gin and definitely not fancy wine bottles can stop sitting on the floor in the corner of the kitchen diner in an exceptionally untidy sprawl that's been driving me absolutely bonkers.