Teetering on the brink

EatingBeans

Bagged up £18 worth of coppers ready to go to the bank whilst waiting for the engineer to switch over my broadband. Run out of coin bags so that’s all I can prepare for now. The ridiculous thing is these weren’t even from my coin collection, they were just in a Tupperware container full of change that I had been using as a door stop! 🤦‍♀️ I remembered just throwing coins in there as I was cleaning up the last house ready to move here, (the down the back of the sofa type finds), but I had no idea how much was in there and just never got around to sorting it out. That’s just the coppers so it will be interesting to see how much it totals!

Meanwhile, the engineers are already probably cursing my job. First question, “where is your BT phone connection?” er… not the faintest clue. 🤦‍♀️ oops.
Thankfully he found it in my meter cupboard which I had, by absolute fluke, unearthed at 7am this morning. I am not usually one for reorganising the house in the early hours of the morning but I had had a shuffle around to move my older puppy’s crate to another room for the day as he gets stressy with workmen in the house - his crate is his happy place but it also happens to be right next to the modem. 

Found the connection point ✅, is it still working ❌. He called his mate in for reinforcements and off they went up the street to try and solve the issue. Back in about an hour he said… 😬

EatingBeans

Turned into a semi-productive day.
Internet installed, I decided to pick the dds up from college to save them standing in the cold and wind for the bus. Plus it gave me an excuse to be near the bank.

Turns out there is no need to bag coins to bank them anymore as you just chuck all your mixed change into a machine and it counts if for you. Who knew! Sadly, since I did not know, I only brought the cash I had bagged, so another trip to the bank will be required at a later point. But, I did at least park on a side street and walk into town to avoid paying for parking, and I was able to help dd1 sort out how to access to her Child Trust fund whilst we were there, so that was another job done. 👍
Oh and in case anyone is wondering, yes, the bank still takes old style £1 coins. 😁

Back home, back to trying to reconnect everything to the wifi. Rather annoyingly I’ve already lost the piece of paper that the password comes on! As usual I put it somewhere “safe” so the dogs didn’t eat it, and then forgot where the safe place is. 🤦‍♀️ Thankfully, knowing that I do this all the time, I took a picture of the paper as soon as he handed it to me. 😁 Certainly a relief an all but I do wish I had a memory that wasn’t just about competing with a goldfish! 

Several hours later, most things are now reconnected to the internet, heating included thankfully. But the tv says no. We have two fire sticks in the house, both without remotes. One long lost (see earlier comment about memory), the other broken by a puppy who clamped down just a bit too hard in a game of, “I stole the remote so chase me, chase me”. 🤣

Now, much as it pains me, I am going to have to buy a new remote. I don’t actually want a new remote as controlling the tv with the app on my phone is way better - one less thing for the dogs to run off with. And I sure as hell don’t want to PAY for a new remote - negating some of the savings from switching broadband providers. But, I do apparently NEED a remote to change the settings and link the fire sticks to the new wifi, so a new remote shall begrudgingly be purchased. I draw the line at paying for postage though so we will be without a tv until dd1 places an Amazon order for upcoming birthday purchases and I will tag it on to that. 

Since I was out I also decided to fill the car up with petrol - can’t remember the last time I did that! I am sure I will still come in under budget for petrol again this month so I’ve decided to shuffle an extra £5 a week from petrol to spending money starting from next month and see how I get on. I still haven’t decided what to do with any spending money left in the pot at the end of the month. Pay it off debt, move it to a generic Emergency Fund, or just roll it over to the next month and have a bit more to spend? 

Oh, and I dropped another parcel to the post office, this time using the service where they print postage label there for you. So much easier than faffing around with the printer at home and made me stop to question if I still need the ink service I currently pay for. It’s only £1.49pm but I am trying to remember when the last time was that I needed to print something that wasn’t just an address label. 🧐

EatingBeans

The jury is still out on the ink subscription. If I cancel the plan then I would need to buy proper cartridges to print anything and the cost of the cartridges would mean I would need them to last for around two years just to break even. Entirely possible that they would dry out in two years sitting in the printer so if I am going to cancel the plan I might as well sell the printer. But it’s an old (very reliable but not worth a lot) printer which occasionally I use for scanning and the dds for printing the odd page. Conclusion, the ink subscription stays for now but if the printer dies then I will just cancel it and we will go without. 

Or maybe that’s another thing I could sell to the dd1! 🤣

Thoroughly enjoying a lazy Saturday morning today. Actually got a lie in for a change. Literally never happens but the puppies were quite happy to stay in bed so I seized the opportunity.

Finally got up, grabbed a coffee and started listing on eBay until dd2 also got up and sent the pups into crazy mode. 

A short time later, pups had their lunch and were back to snoozing so I took the opportunity to count the remainder of coins left in my door stop pot. Yes, I now know I can just pour it in the machine at the bank but I was curious how much my door stop was worth. Total counted today, £126.46, together with the £18 counted from it previously, meant my door stop was worth a ridiculous amount of £144.46! And, being just a Tupperware tub, it didn’t even look nice! 🤦‍♀️ 

Now, being the adorably cheeky thing that dd2 (the youngest) is, she came to help count when I was half way through. Ahh, a lovely bonding moment right? Well yes, but then we get to the end and she claims £8 in “the redistribution of wealth tax!”🤣 There is a standing joke in our house where I keep threatening to apply this “tax” to dd1 (the eldest) as she, despite paying her way already, has lots of disposable income, whereas dd2 and I, well, don’t. Cue 15 minutes of haggling and I got it down to £6 plus she had to get me a big bar of galaxy out of it. Sure, I could be mad at the theft of my cash, but I considered it a teaching moment in how to haggle. Only problem is, she is getting rather good at it!

Thankfully, I quickly sell another three things on Ebay which brings in £9. It kind of balances out right? And at least I got a big bar of chocolate out of it. 😁

the_end_of_the_rainbow

What a lovely surprise.
Have you decided which debt to throw it against? Do you still have your TSB overdraft at 39%
Perhaps you could add your debts to your signature together with the amounts paid to date?

EatingBeans

Hi @the_end_of_the_rainbow sad to report that yes, I still have the overdraft. 😩 It currently stands at £1139.90 “owed” but since I currently hold my savings pots in the same account (the money I put away for annual expenses), the actual balance is £389.52 so that is what I pay interest on. The plan is to keep throwing everything I have at the overdraft until the balance of the actual account becomes positive, then I will just pay a small amount to the owed element each month and move my focus onto the credit card charging me the highest interest. In effect I will treating the remaining “owed” element of the overdraft like I would a 0% deal on a credit card. Eventually it will get whittled down but I see little benefit in continuing to focus on that one when others are charging me higher interest. 

Unfortunately, always focusing on highest interest rather than smallest balance means I get left with lots of bits of balances all at different rates and ending at different times. With 20 different balance/money transfers split across the 4 different credit cards, I worry that posting it all on my signature might be a bit confusing. I have thought about it though and to help me remain accountable, I decided I am going to post my soa summary at the end of each month to show overall progress, alongside the debt I am focusing on for the next month. That way, when I give updates through the month I can share how much is left of the debt I am focusing on. So, as of today, I am focusing on the next £389.52 of my overdraft. 😁

Jellytotts

Is it worth asking in a local  free FB group if anyone has a spare fire stick remote hanging about?  Or ask in CEX, they may have one you can borrow/have

EatingBeans

Just checked out CEX website for a Fire Stick remote and bizarrely it is cheaper to buy one from Amazon! Makes absolutely no sense but hey, still a good idea though. I might ask a neighbour or two if they have a remote I could borrow.   

DrunklMunkee

Hey there @EatingBeans; just jumping in to let you know I am still supporting you from the sidelines. 

I haven't been too well for the last few days. I have been hit by the dreaded norovirus, and my poor ole tummy feels like it has been put through a spin cycle.

Glad to report I am now on the mend - but craving so many different food items that it may be unwise to go on an unsupervised shopping trip without a responsible adult (I will be just filling the trolley with loads of yummy food, otherwise). I have a particular yearning for a New York cheesecake. I am hoping that by writing that down, I will realise how silly I am being.......

....... still hoping.

Anyways, I am away to catch up on my spreadsheet, so I know that I cannot, after all, afford a blowout on cheesecake, and then I will pop back and sing/trumpet/laud your progress.

Ooooh - before I do go. I will point out why I stopped by your diary. I have a recipe that I have been meaning to try - and it was your user name that made me think about it again. This is where the technically-deficient tries to post a link.....

https://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/sausage-butter-bean-stew

Woo-hoo. still got it after all these years.

So - I have the butter beans & gonna use some cumberland sausages that I have in the freezer (another craving is spice, spice & more spice) & serve with a load of mash (potatoes to use up). This is tomorrow's task, so wish me luck that the stomach approves

EatingBeans

Hey there @DrunklMunkee ! Sorry to hear that you haven’t been feeling well. Norovirus is evil.
The recipe looks nice, thanks for sharing! I do hope your tummy is feeling better if you are going to try so much spice and sausages. Good luck! Clearly we don’t have to worry about the cheesecake 😉. 

I can totally sympathise with the cravings thing though. I swear since I banned takeaways from 1st January my body has been going into withdrawal! Lord knows what the fast food places put in them but I swear they are actually addictive. Against all odds we have stayed strong and not given in. 🎉 It seems mental to be so proud of that when it’s only been 3weeks by my gosh it has proven much more difficult than it seemed when I set up the rule! Giving up chocolate will have to come later. One step at a time! 

EatingBeans

Oh dear. Just for a chuckle I thought I would check out my affordability score on MSE. Nothing really a surprise to me but seeing a disposable income score of 0/100 didn’t exactly have me laughing. 😬 I mean I know they just create some of these scores based on models of how much an average person in my situation would have, but gees, you could have at least given me 1/100 to give me some hope right?! 

Ah well, I made another sale for £1.75 so that should help! 🤦‍♀️