Teetering on the brink

EatingBeans

Is it crazy that I am really excited about it being 1st September - i.e. when my ‘no spend’ commitment for the month really begins? 😂

August was tough, but at least the debt balance tipped in the right direction even if it was just a tiny bit. 

Weight today was 204.8lbs - exactly matching the average for last week. ✅ Goal is still to lose 1lb a week. 

New £5’s goal for the month is being set at £100. It doesn’t seem like a huge amount in the grand scheme of paying the debt down, but at the same time it feels like lots when I have no clue where it will come from! 

New month’s spreadsheet all now set up - it had a little wobble and refused to update changes for a while, 😅 but tech issue resolved and all sorted now. 🤞 

Back at work today and crazy busy again. Worst of all I have to go into the office on Thursday and Friday this week so I have to rustle up something to wear! 😬 I am determined not to spend any money so it looks like I will be spending the evening trying to work out which tops I already own that I can realistically put with my new suit trousers and get away with. 

The good news is, I get a roast cooked for me tonight! 😁 dd2 was due to cook it yesterday but with all the excess Olio food, and noone being around/hungry, we agreed that she will cook it tonight instead. I am thoroughly looking forward to it despite the fact that I forgot to buy stuffing. 😬 

Well over half of the salad bags have now been eaten by something or someone (or turned into pesto). Since the use by dates were 30th August, I think I now have to concede that the rest just need to go in the wormery. I’d say we did pretty well using them up though! Big dog seemed more than happy to eat lettuce as a topper to his meals, however little dog looked at me like I was trying to poison her (but being a labrador, reluctantly tried it and soon scoffed it down)! 

Time now to start eating from stores again as most of the fresh Olio food has now been eaten.  

I will need a Morrisons order next week as I will have run out of hay for the guinea pigs by them. Bizarrely, despite trying out many sources of hay from all different places, Morrisons hay tends to be the best in terms of value for money. It can be mixed quality sometimes but the chop length is good and since they tend to use it as much for bedding as they do eating it works out really well. I add a fresh couple of handfuls every evening, they eat the best bit and the bits they don’t eat forms a new layer of bedding. At the end of the week the whole lot comes out and we start again. The bags are absolutely rammed full (unlike most other places), and the price is cheap. 👍 It does however mean that I need a Morrisons delivery even if I am now mostly shopping at Aldi. I wonder if it will let me just order just shavings and hay for the month as one shop. The deliver guy might think it a bit odd but hey ho, as long as it goes over the minimum delivery charge it shouldn’t matter right? 🤔

themadvix

Trust me, the delivery guy will have seen weirder.... my husband used to deliver for Ocado - the stories are interesting! An entire order of guinea pig stuff will be the least of his worries!

stymied

I’m only on £4.30/£70 cash out minimum on TesterUp since Friday but at least I only have to play games to “earn” the money. May make a change from surveys towards those elusive £5’s?

pam74

Just sneaking in to say that on TopCashback today only there is a £5 bonus on topgiftcards if you buy a gift card for £20. Morrisons is an option for a gift card. You have to activate the offer first. It tracks straight away and you can use the gift card straight away and withdraw the bonus £5 to your bank. Hope that helps. 

EatingBeans

stymied said:

I’m only on £4.30/£70 cash out minimum on TesterUp since Friday but at least I only have to play games to “earn” the money. May make a change from surveys towards those elusive £5’s?

Hi @stymied I’ve considered testerup a few times but never actually given it a go as I thought it would be impossible to actually earn anything, but £4.30 since Friday sounds pretty good tbf. Thanks for the tip, you’ve convinced me to at least have a go with it. 😁

EatingBeans

My god I need a new job. How can it be that at the same time as being super excited about it being September and getting down to the challenge of tackling the debt, I am also feeling really quite angry at the rubbish I have to put up with at work? I’ve been back just one day and they’ve already annoyed me to the point that my brain just wont let it go. 😕 

I started the day nice and relaxed, determined to put the whole interview week of craziness behind me. But no. My lovely line manager welcomed me back and arranged a catch up with me, but noticing my diary was insanely busy gave me the option to rearrange it to when suited me - he’s so kind and thoughtful. 

His manager (who happens to matrix managing me), was rather more annoying as always! He just keeps adding more work for me even though I am already way past capacity - something I highlighted to him during my week of hell. Is he supportive? Hell no! We have never got on well but now I didn’t get promoted I just want to tell him where to stick his argument that the other Scrum Masters are managing two teams so somehow I should too, despite only being allocated 0.45fte of the time to even being a Scrum Master and getting paid at least £10k less than the others! I asked him to prioritise which chunk of work/team he wants me to do because I can’t do it all, and he tells me I have to prepare a detailed plan for each bit of work I am doing and then meet with him to discuss it all before he even considers it. I literally brought up my calendar and asked him to point to a time when he thinks I can even meet him (let alone the prep work), in amongst my almost continuous back to back days of meetings (set to continue at least all of September). His answer? I should fit it where I have booked a tiny bit of time for actually doing tasks (a total of 1.5hours spread over the entire day). The whole reason for blocking that out of my day is to stop anyone booking more meetings, because, funnily enough, all the meetings I have generate work for me to do! I have noone to delegate to - all the senior people delegate to me! 

In a separate meeting, the guy who interviewed me (my matrix managers boss), caught me after everyone else had left and decided to ask me how I was feeling after the interview. He had clearly heard how upset I was over it from the lady that gave me the news and wanted to reassure me that I gave an outstanding interview and that they really debated over the decision because it was so close. Apparently this was somehow supposed to make me feel better? Er no, not when I’ve heard it repeatedly and the reason given for my not being able to succeed is outside of my control! Apparently he is looking at future project allocations and plans to allocate me to a project where I can take full control of something sufficiently complex that I can score better next time around. Hmm, so that’s code for, we know you can totally do the job (which he acknowledged several times), so we are going to give you the job but without the pay (again), and wrap it up as something that is apparently doing me a favour?! Seriously? De ja vu. 

I should leave. I don’t want to leave but I know I REALLY SHOULD leave. 

Thanks for listening. 😕

EatingBeans

Anyway… most importantly, today has officially been my first NSD of September. 🎉

Cherryfudge

Well done for the NSD - doubly difficult when work is being rubbish. Keep your eyes open because there may be another job one of these days.

For what it's worth (and a bit late for your recent roast dinner) stuffing is really easy to make. I sauté some onion, add sage (fresh or dried), blitz up a few slices of bread, mix the lot and season, beating in an egg if I have them. Then add just enough water to bring it together and it goes in the over with the roast. I'm sure Olio could help with that!

EatingBeans

Weighed in this morning at 204.4lbs, 0.4lbs down on yesterday. ✅

I got my first cash come into the back towards my £5’s goals - the £2.50 from the ebay sale last week. 

My child benefit came in short this month so I now need to call them and find out why. I completed the update they asked for about dd1 so I’m thinking they either didn’t process it in time or they also required an update about dd2 and I didn’t get the letter. Either way, I am not looking forward to sorting that and being short is really not helpful atm. 

Cherryfudge

I hope they get the CB back to how it should be.

£2.50 is a really good start. The snowball has started to grow!