Ding! Ding! All change, please... (now replaced with new diary on MFW)

badmemory

As you have discovered it isn't knowing that you will have to deal with stuff you have never had to deal with before for someone else.  It is the not knowing what you are dealing with that is the real problem.  Ignorance can never be a good look.  I confess to liking being in control & the thought of someone else doing that is not a happy one.  However the thougtht of someone else messing up because I didn't give them the right info is an even less happy one.

savingholmes

Thanks @Starlight_at_Sea that's really helpful.

EssexHebridean

Well just look at all the chat around this subject - I’m very glad it’s been prompted! 

MAB we have our financial summits roughly ever three months depending on what’s going on - but do chat about things as needed in between times too. 

I’m on the iPad so replying individually to everyone is tricky - but one comment that did stick out to me was this

badmemory said:

Personally I think if you are in a conventional living arrangement (as in married with 2 kids type) then the POAs are more important than a will as the rules of intestacy will apply.  But if you don't have a POA you can be stuck with difficulty accessing money & with doctors/hospitals refusing to tell you anything.

- particularly the bit in bold. This is categorically incorrect I’m afraid - EVERYONE with children should have a will, and that will should set out clearly the arrangements for what should happen regarding the care of the children in the event of the parents both dying. I’m not for a moment saying that POAs aren’t important - and for people without children they may well be at least of equal importance to a will, but as soon as there are children involved, wills are essential.

Ironically for two people working in the legal world we don’t have wills OR POAs at the moment - although both are on the list to be done. Shameful, I know! My Mum has just finished completing the forms for hers - which is reassuring. Her and Dad both having wills made life easier when he died for sure - it’s amazing how many financial organisations first question is “who’s the executor of the will?” plus Mum and me both being executors made it easy for either of us to deal with things. The other thing I plan to set up for myself is a living will/advance directive as for me, that’s also an incredibly important thing. 

I’d like to thank all those who’ve contributed on this one - and I definitely don’t see it as any form of hijack! It’s such an important subject - and one that Martin has covered a fair bit in his “Three D’s” items on his TV show and the radio. A friend’s family are currently in the middle of dealing with a parent’s rapid descent onto pretty severe dementia so that aspect is fairly fresh in my mind - we’ve been through the dementia thing with both my Nan and my Gt Aunt too. 

I’m going to do a separate post with the routine stuff I think. 🙂

EssexHebridean

Walk and gym this morning, and yoga this afternoon, plus a wander to the chemist and back this afternoon too means my movement is well and truly ticked off for the day today! I’ve also remembered why I usually prefer to leave more than 2 days between gym visits as I’m seriously sore around the arms and shoulders today! 

The risotto last night was delicious - it’s such a good way of stretching a couple of sausages to feed both of us! We’re going takeaway tonight I think - I’ve left the decision with MrEH and thought he could yet tell me he’d sooner have something else I suspect that’s not going to happen! I still need to plan out food for the weekend too - and I’m planning on making it pretty much entirely from the freezer though as it’s not like we’re short of things to eat. 

My new verification code for my Principality account arrived so I got that sorted this afternoon, so I can now get in to the online stuff there which is useful - I’m not keen on not being able to see where my money has gone! Oh and I dropped the foldy bike off on the way back from the gym too - the chap is going to look at it tomorrow and drop me an emai or give me a call about it. 

Other than that I’ve done a bit of pottering about - nothing much to do on the housework front as it was all tidy for the photos of course, we’ll probably just runJaws round later but that and a quick swish over the it hen and bathroom should be OK for tomorrow. Bizarrely we now have TWO viewings tomorrow as well - funny how the outgoing agents have suddenly got their act together! 🤣

Banks checked and fine - again the intention on grocery shopping this week is to keep it as low as possible but MrEH tells me he needs instant coffee so we’ll try F@rmF00ds for that and see if they have it in stock. I’ll probably do some spending from my personal spends tomorrow as I think I plan to head off to rugby with him in the afternoon - it’ll be fun to try the new camera out with some rugby stuff I think and the weather forecast is now dry! Chances are I’ll want a cuppa during the match and probably a drink or two in the bar or back at our own club afterwards. Might have to buy lunch as well thinking about it as it won’t be practical really to take anything with me. 

Right - time to find out what he wants to do for tea tonight I think! 

jwil

Really interesting discussions thank you.  Age UK have a 'Lifebook' which is a really handy prompt for getting all the information together, and includes things that I hadn't considered as well. https://www.ageuk.org.uk/information-advice/money-legal/end-of-life-planning/lifebook/

EssexHebridean

Thinking about it jwil I knew about the "Lifebook" as my Great Aunt had completed it - mind you in her case it created more questions than it did answers, that might just have been her being awkward though!   It's a really useful thing though isn't it - and as you say, a great way of prompting people to think of things they might otherwise not have done.

Back at the start of another week then - with a nice mix of sociable and restful over the weekend and a good sleep last night to start thigs off well. I am however nursing a rather sore and bruised ankle after I quite literally got tackled by two players while on the touchline photographing the rugby on Saturday afternoon - they came running in, changed direction last minute far too late for me to get out of the way, and my lower right leg took the full brunt of two pairs of swinging legs as they skidded over the line. First time I've ever found myself in the position of just being unable to take any sort of evasive action - I've got a big bruise on my left hip as well where I landed and generally feeling pretty sore although I think I did get off fairly lightly in the circumstances! Annoyingly I was intending to go to the gym this evening but think I should probably skip that now as I'm wary of putting too much strain on the ankle and allowing for where the bruising is some stuff is going to just be downright uncomfortable anyway. Cycling seems to be pretty OK so I might head off for a longer ride after work instead. Other than that it was a good afternoon on Saturday - hopefully they'll be able to get the vets team properly back together for some regular matches next season. 

Spendy-ish over the weekend - we had to pop into town on Saturday morning for my eye test and I nipped into Primarni for a pair of much needed new black leggings (£5), and B00ts for my daily summer makeup (£10.99) -  food, a cuppa, and beers at rugby. Then yesterday I popped into the charity shop as I was passing and bought an armful of books, all at 50p each and it makes me SO cheerful to have a nice little stash of reading material sitting waiting again! Shopping was done mainly at T's, with a quick diversion into Farmf00ds for MrEH's coffee, and we also got sidetracked into The R@nge to buy some plants ready to get our pots planted up for the summer. A pack of lobelia and one each of white and red petunia should add a bit of a splash of colour all round with any luck! 

The outcome of the second eye test was interesting - as I discovered that the original prescription actually had the left eye dropped by a step, in spite of us having a conversation during the original eye test about what my left eye prescription was. The glasses have now gone off for a reglaze with the correct prescription in the left eye - and I am extremely glad I wasn't persuaded into taking them away originally as let's be honest, that wasn't an issue that was going to be overcome, was it!  I'm still somewhat unimpressed - and plan to ask them when I collect the first pair of glasses what form of discount on my second pair when I order them I can expect by way of an apology for the mistake. We'll see what they say. 

Meals are planned out for the week - with quite a focus on using stuff from the freezers. Shopping would in theory have been fairly light but we needed loo rolls, which always makes a hole in the budget. I want to do a proper freezer audit ahead of next weekend I think so I can really shop with what we have fully in mind. I know we have more mince than I thought we did so that might prompt some form of batch cook over the weekend at some stage depending what else we get up to. 

EssexHebridean

Well good afternoon all - happy Tuesday! Frankly I'd be at least reasonably content with it if I can avoid getting soaked on the way back to the car as I did last night - I was a very soggy EH indeed all the way home yesterday after being unable to avoid the heavy rain as I left the office! 

All is ticking along steadily here - the M@rcus interest landed this morning - usually due on the 22nd and 23rd but the pesky weekend got in the way! It's landed now though, and I updated the account bonuses while I was in there checking too. Currently we still have surplus in the joint account - my suspicion is that MrEH will need to feed his Oyster tomorrow but there is plenty enough in there to cover that, and as the car was topped up with diesel at the weekend that is all good too - so we should also end the month with surplus which is lovely! He'll get paid on Friday as well as it's the last working day of the month so hurrah for that. 

I've done some credit card money shuffling - the laptop is now cleared off - and I've managed to grub together money for my share of that from various personal savings pots too rather than needing to raid my long term pot at all, which I was very pleased about. I'll be having another look to see if I can manage to shave some of what I need for the camera off by nicking some more from my pots too - realistically my presents account is probably a little better off than it really needs to be, and there's likely just over £100 in my "fun" pot I can take too - although I will need to be mindful of possibly needing some of that for bits and bobs on holiday. I'd ideally like to be able to just take a round amount from the long term pot - I'll need to have another think. (This is the modern online banking equivalent of shaking the piggy bank isn't it!)

Stir fry last night was lush - I'll be buying those garlic and herb prawns again as they were really tasty. Also used up half a courgette, some of the mushrooms, the last of a bag of kale, some of a massive head of broccoli and some of the pepper I froze last week, plus the two tubs of cooked rice from the freezer as well. I remembered to get the lamb and chickpeas out ready for tonight so those have been defrosting in the fridge and doing their bit to help keep the energy use down. NOT keeping the energy use down was the fact that it was so flipping chilly overnight that we stuck the hallway storage heater on boost for an hour first thing this morning just to take the chill off - in fact it's occurred to me that it may have also taken a bit of charge while it was on at that stage too so I should probably remember to switch it back on again this evening and see if anything hot emerges! I'm getting mightily fed up with the weather not warming up now I have to say - there was actually a layer of frost on the windscreen this morning which is patently ridiculous at nearly May! Pah! MrEH brought the bedding plants we'd bought indoors last night as he was wary of the frost and it was clearly a good decision. 

Starting to give some thought to what we might do over the weekend now. We need to make time for some voluntary role work for definitely although we got a good chunk of a big task done last night. It's going to be a largely home based weekend I think although we may head off somewhere just for a day one day or another - we want to get those pots planted up (might need compost, come to think of it) as well. MrEH is grumpy because the rugby match he was meant to have been playing in on Saturday has been called off - although at last count there was some discussion around whether his other team might be able to get a game somewhere... I'm just rather looking forward to a 3 day week to be truthful, and then another 3 day week the week after! 

foxgloves

Two 3-day weeks will be lovely, @EH. I'm sure you'll get your containers planted. I'm fed up with the unreliable weather too. It makes grow-your-own a whole lot more difficult when we keep getting a warm day, two cold ones, a warmish one, 4 cold ones, some iffy ones, then bloody frost at the end of April, grrrr. I really want some consistency now. Veggie plants alive, but way behind where they'd normally be because of the fluctuating temperatures among other things.
Am hoping that last night's stupid frost is the last of it.
F

SkyChild

Love that your diary reads much the same as mine would if I had one!
Much grumbling about unreliable frosts and needing compost here too... My delphinium plug plants which were out hardening off are now well and truly deep frozen. Serves me right for being optimistic.

savingholmes

Ouch to being rugby tackled. The perils of photography! Eeek. You seem to have borne up well.

Glad that SS are sorting your glasses.