Five Year Fix, Five Year Plan

savingholmes

Enjoy your socialising.

My fave secret santa was decades ago - "red, round and nifty for less than one pound fifty". I gave someone a windup robin I think and was given a tall pack of pringles.

rtandon27

ooooooo - Second Date - now you will have us all on tenterhooks until you decide to spill the beans - lol

Sending you all my socializing vibes - heaven knows I'm not using them at the moment, so someone needs to make use of them! - LOL

Merlin's_Beard

Haha you guys. There's not much to tell at this point! Off the apps, one coffee and a bite of lunch today, no hugely horrendous red flags, and conversation went okay, no game playing afterwards just an invitation to meet up again.

Still very much "we'll see!" territory.

Merlin's_Beard

Definitely grateful I have tonight at home - with the amount I've been out I can feel myself getting snippy at people in work because it's just Too Much. Poor planning on my part! Out tomorrow night as well.

But. Had an email from HMRC saying that my tax code had changed - they wanted to take money off me - I dutifully rang them to ask why, and to check what and if my reductions had been approved. The guy on the phone had no record of them, so I spent a bunch of my day off collating both deductions (professional membership invoices), and travel expenses, and pension stuff, and submitting that. so we'll see how that all shakes out. (I thought I'd done this in May but I was having such a bad time it's possible I absolutely did not)

I am also frowning at the wh1ttards black friday sale because I was hoping to stock up on fancy things. However their definition of "amazing discounts" and mine do NOT align (come on 25% in a BF sale is "distinctly average at best discounts")

However I do really want fancy hot chocolate.

Merlin's_Beard

So... I bought a piano (digital, not expensive as far as these things go and on a black friday deal, solidly researched, my parents christmas and birthday present to me.)

Now all I need to do is stick with it, but it's something I've wanted to learn, basically, forever. And it would have been insane to buy one when I was moving around and renting was dictated by who would accept the cat.

Financially I'm looking very thin on the ground right now, but I think I have to look at things at the end of December, because I a) brought lots of things forwards in terms of household stuff because there were BF sales, b) have a piano sized hole that won't be there in a few weeks,

(and c) was also not entirely controlled in terms of things I wanted rather than needed, so a month of being good might make that look better! I started with a holiday and ended with a sales, and the results aren't great! 😂 I think definitely when it comes to 2026 I ought to think about using the things I HAVE rather than buying more things that I might one day have time to do)

KajiKita

Oooh, well done 👍 You’ve been talking about that piano for ages 😊 Lovely that your parents could help too 😊 Do you already play or do you have a teacher lined up? 

There’s a poster here called Foxgloves, I think, who ‘shops from home’ a lot, reusing and repurposing the resources she already has. Reading her posts has made me more aware of trying to find a solution with what I already have, rather than always buying again or new. 

KK

South_coast

Ooh, you've just made me think of this: https://www.raptitude.com/2017/12/go-deeper-not-wider/

Merlin's_Beard

South_coast said:

Ooh, you've just made me think of this: https://www.raptitude.com/2017/12/go-deeper-not-wider/

This is DEFINITELY the heart of my problem - it's less that I want "stuff" and more that my interests are far, far wider than the time and energy I have available.

(I keep saying I'm frontloading retirement. I better retire early and live to 105.)

Maybe I need to combine this and foxholes idea, and try and actually finish - or start - some of the things I've got lying around the house. The craft corner of shame has a LOT in it.

@KajiKita I know how to read music to a certain degree - I played clarinet as a teenager, which is still lying around the house somewhere - so treble clef is easy enough, and I know enough theory to know how to read bass clef even if it's only with the fluency of a foreign language. And I can one-hand sight read and plunk out notes. So I'm going to try with apps and books to start with - I get some free trials with the piano so I've activated one of them.

(My three biggest challenges - technique, in the form of hand/finger placement, which I think the apps and the book can teach me with their numbering. And then practicing bass clef and co-ordinating multiple notes and hands, which I think is just a brute force practice thing.)

Most of my Christmas cards sent off, with the exceptions that I might be able to hand over via family network and a friend that's moving (I also want to cross stitch her a small "happy new home" thing which isn't started yet).

I don't do Christmas presents for many people, but they're all done with the exception of a) my work secret santa which hasn't arrived (due 21st November - I've emailed), and b) my dad, who is impossible and whose latest hobby is walking to one local shop, checking the price of bread, then walking to the other and then going back if it's cheaper in the first place (I come to my MSE ways honestly, but also he's got too much time on his hands in retirement).

(In terms of organisation I can do things three weeks early or three hours late and there's nothing in the middle)

KajiKita

That sounds like a solid foundation 😊
I wonder though, if it would be worth talking to a local piano teacher about just a few lessons to get you started - just so you don’t start by picking up any awkward postural habits or positions that will be awkward to unlearn in future? 

Well done on the Christmas presents! Thats going some 😊👏 Would your dad appreciate an illustrated heath robinson book. A friend introduced me to it and I bought for my dad for his birthday - also flipping awkward to buy for 😉 and he loved it 😊 

What’s in the craft corner and what would be the easiest to finish? Thats what I do when I get stuck … 😉

KK

killerpeaty

Oooh, congratulations on getting the piano. It'd be interesting to hear how you get on with learning. 

You could get your dad a membership to something like national trust or the local theatre? I hear retired people love to have memberships to things (so do I)