So it Begins - The Accountability

InDebtEnby

I gave up my audible subscription about a year ago and use the Libby app, since you already have a library card, you should also be able to use it. You can borrow eBooks if you have anything other than a kindle too.

sams247

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82041556#Comment_82041556

Ooooh……..goes to look 😊

sams247

Well………….. it’s pay day.

Debt Part 1.  I’ve had an uber busy day and work was long and I had very little time to devote to my sideline new hobby

Paid normal bills.  Paid lowest I could on owed credit cards, loans etc.  Felt truly odd thing to do but I do get the important strategy of having an Emergency Fund.  Up till now every emergency (car needing tyres etc) has been scraped at or credit card. So, the extra I did not pay to the debts went into a shiny new Starling account pot I labelled Emergency Fund.  Not imaginative but clear.

I had to (truly) curb my instinct to ‘pop’ into the supermarket to just get a few bits now I had the money, I know full well that I would have spent £30 at the least on things not on any list and gone home a happy but less monied person.  I will do the new plan of a big shop at Aldi tomorrow. 

I contacted my electric bods as the bill was always sent 5 days before payday and would come out as a ‘late payment’ (with no penalty to be fair) on my statement.  So I spent 20 minutes chatting to a nice lady who said yes of course they could move the billing date to coincide with my payday.  And it was done.  Don’t know why I never did that before as it always irritated me.

I pay all my bills etc on payday so I know I owe nowt and I can see what I have left (never much but at least I know).

Food
An odd day.  I had an early breakfast of fruit, a twirl and a handful of mixed nuts as I dashed out the door for the long drive to my medical appointment.  Once home I had a lunch of oven fish n chips.  And a kit kat.  Tea was a Caesar salad wrap, crisps and milk.  Not a healthy day and all meals felt rushed.

I am internally sulking as my fridge is empty and I so hate that.  One shelf in my freezer is also empty, and it makes me edgy.  I am trying hard to tell myself I could last two months on what I have, but my mind says in two days I starve.  I comforted myself with endless meal planning and tonight I shall be watching Australian MasterChef.

Today I had no moment of joy, surprise or frustration.  Not sure I had a moment.  Just plain old busy.

Quote – No one is too busy to tell you how busy they are

 

sams247

Oh boy, is it hot!

Debt
None of the totals that I paid off yesterday have been updated, so I guess we are waiting for humans to do that tomorrow. So I'll work out my new total owed tomorrow.

At the moment I'm not sure what else I can do except keep going and try and learn more ways to be frugal in my life. I'm looking forward to doing the food shop and seeing if doing one big shop deters me in any way from overspending on food this month.

Food
Today I went out for lunch with friends, we had a really lovely Sunday roast at a village pub. 

I did not really have any occasion to celebrate Father's Day when my father was alive, so I didn't really miss sending him a card this year.

Breakfast was a very simple cheese and tomato omelette, lunch, as stated, was a wonderful Sunday roast with turkey, roast potatoes, roast parsnip, carrots, red cabbage, and cauliflower cheese. Oh, and stuffing. We even went so far as to have pudding which for me was a mango cheesecake. Needless to say, it was all amazing. 

Tea will be much more in the way of snack and I have a tomato tart ready and waiting. If I feel like it, I'll add some of the tomatoes and cucumber that are beginning to look a bit sad in the fridge as well. I don't normally put tomatoes in the fridge but these were looking like they needed to chill and I cannot believe how empty my fridge is. It has been a long, long time since it has been this empty. I confess to opening the fridge door a couple of times just to feel sad. What peculiar things we do to ourselves.

I think my favourite meal has to be a roast dinner, or really good egg and chips

Moment of other.
Most of work seems to consist of people saying how hot it is in varying descriptions and utterances of discomfort. And I can't help but agree with them. I put out a dish of water for the birds in case they were suffering in the heat. But they have studiously ignored it. One Wood pigeon scampered towards it excitedly and I swear it just looked at me in disgust when it saw it was water and not food. But I shall leave it there in case some nighttime creature gets thirsty.

In the week I plan to go to the charity shop to take the last of the bits and pieces that I sorted out that I will not be listing on Vinted. One of the charity shops I go to does a special offer in the week where you can buy a book for 50p or 10 books for a pound,  needless to say I always get 10 books!  I tend to get a mixture of books to read, cookery books and children's books for the grandchildren

sams247

Debt and food
As I am trying to bring down the cost of my monthly food, I'm doing both debt and food together today. 

I went out to do my main shop at Aldi, ordinarily I use Ocado and top up from either Aldi, Tesco or Waitrose during the month. And when I say top up, I mean buy things I want rather than need. So having written a comprehensive shopping list and compared it to all shopping sites, I arrived at Aldi with set list in tow.

There were a few items that Aldi did not have so I also called in to Tesco on the way home to get these bits and pieces. When I did the price comparison, like for like, Ocado was going to cost me about £116, and I spent £74 in Aldi and a further £8 in Tesco. I did not stick to my list. I bought extras and things that caught my eye. Having still come under budget, I should feel pleased with myself but knowing that I readily threw things into the trolley that weren't on my list, I have to say there's a long way to go yet.

Everything is either in the fridge or has been to decanted into appropriate containers and thrown into the freezer.

Tomorrow I start cooking some of the bits I have planned to cook, and I reserved £10 of my monthly food bill to go to Iceland tomorrow (because it's old lady day)

The challenge from here on in will be to not continually go to supermarkets to top up or buy extras or get extra food. I'm not kidding myself, I know I will do that once or twice but hopefully I should still come in under budget. I think the month before last I spent probably over £300 on Food.

I have been looking for some more food storage boxes that go neatly into the freezer and that also fit into my small cool bag that I take to work. The ones I use at the moment I got from IKEA, I was hoping to find some in the charity shops, but I've had no luck. If I don't find some soon, I will go back to IKEA.

Moment of joy
Coming home, laden with bags to throw into the fridge and freezer and finding three letters on my doorstep from my brand-new shiny penpals. Very happy with that.

liselle

£land have good little storage boxes

sams247

Debt 
Today I am going to get some actual real cash out of my account in the hopes that this encourages me to spend less money. Many people say that it's harder to spend cash rather than just swiping a card which seems like not spending at all. So I'm going to put that into testing phase.

I also planned to a couple of charity shops, but it is so darned hot I gave that a miss. Thank you @liselle for your suggestion, I'll have a look see next time I'm in town.

I have strong suspicions that my outside storage cupboard has now become a home for mice and as it is actually attached to the the house I'm going to get some humane mice traps to see whether these are house mice or field mice. In a previous home I had house mice because my next-door neighbour was a hoarder and according to the people who came to clean up his house the place was absolutely overrun with them.

Food 
Iceland, my plan of spending £10 allocated, when a tad awry but not too bad, it came to £13.54 in total.  I also spent £3.50 in Farm Foods.  So really, still showing old habits but nowhere near as bad as it can get.

This morning breakfast consisted of testing out the muesli I bought from Aldi. This did not go well. It is a lot cheaper than the one I normally get from the refill shop but I have to say it was a lot, a lot less pleasant. I even topped it with all the usual trimmings– blueberries, fresh cherries, banana, and mixed it with Greek yoghurt and honey. Even with all of that, it was not nice to eat. I suspect it's probably what you get used to so I'm gonna keep going and see if I can adapt my taste to this version of muesli.

Lunch was salad with mozzarella and some really nice on the vine tomatoes, and tea will be fish pie. I normally add prawns to my fish pie mix but with a mind to keeping prices down, and the fact I have run out of the prawns I usually use - no prawns for me today. I top my fish pie with a mix of sweet potato and white potato mash

Moment of surprise - Being woken up at 7 am with the doorbell ringing. Turns out this was a very keen Amazon delivery person. I suspect they're keenness was based on wanting to get their deliveries done before we turned into a scorched earth society

sams247

I don't know if anybody's noticed out there, but it's kind of hot. I hung up some washing today and it immediately burst into flames, it's that kind of hot. I put water out for the birds and there are two rooks currently waiting for it to boil so they can make a cup of tea. It's that kind of hot.

I have a friend who writes to me from America and when I wrote and said that we had a heat warning on its way he said remember to close all your doors and windows and put your air-conditioning on. Ha ha ha ha ha air-conditioning! As if. I don't think he's going to believe me when I tell him that most British homes don't have air-conditioning.

Debt
One of the credit cards that I negotiated a 0% interest on has contacted me to say they wish to review the decision. They can review as much as they like, nothing has changed. But I shall be polite and see what they want. I'm wondering if perhaps it is just a computer generated time thing.

I did go and get cash out yesterday, and then at the next three purchases paid with my card before I remembered a I had cash to use. I remember the concern felt by my generation when some shops said they would no longer accept cheques. We had paid for so much with cheques we could not imagine a world were they would become obsolete. And yet here we are finding it strange to have cash in our bag.

Food
One of my hobbies, unfortunately linked to my food obsession, is discovering endlessly new recipes to try. 99% of these recipes I never do try but I enjoy imagining that one day I will. Anyway, today's breakfast is a quick adaptation of a recipe I copied down from the Batch lady. When I made the fish pie last night, I made two - one to eat and one in the freezer. But I also kept back some of the sweet potato and white potato mix and I pan fried that this morning with a little bit of butter, and on top of that I added a fried egg and some sliced avocado. The Batch lady just uses just sweet potato but this way I made the most of what I cooked last night so I'm happy with that. And I have to say it was really very nice.

Lunch will be smoked salmon, crackers, vine tomatoes, cucumber, and a little coleslaw. Tea will be a vegetable tray bake that I cooked at the same time as the fish pie last night so I simply have to reheat it in the air fryer. I added some garlic to it and I will drizzle over some sweet chilli sauce when I serve it.

sams247

This months fail
Muesli - did NOT like the Aldi one
Ricotta - tried this as a healthier/less additive item instead of philadelphia. Turns out I don’t like Ricotta

We have barely started and yet here we are at fail. In the past two days I have bought things that I don't need but did want, I have bought food I don't need but definitely wanted. But the success thus far is that I am aware of what I do in a way that I denied before. And there's always another day to try again. So I shall not be punitive in my thoughts but I shall encourage myself to continue on my journey.

Breakfast today was muesli (a new one as I really couldn't continue with the Aldi one), topped this with some blueberries and bananas, and a drizzle of honey and some Greek yoghurt. Lunch will be a small margarita pizza with the last of the vine tomatoes and a little coleslaw. Tea tonight is the last of the vegetable frittata's and I'm gonna do some oven chips and baked beans with those to have a nice comfort tea

Yesterday I watched one of the local cats drink the water I'd put out for the birds. I can't begrudge a thirsty cat but it is ironic that the one singular creature I do not want in my garden is the one creature that sat out there drinking the water. I'm not against cats, but I am completely against the cats that chase all the lovely birds in my garden.

sams247

I have done a lot of travelling this weekend, so although I haven't really spent anything extra on food, I've certainly spent more on fuel for the car. But that's about my only extra expense this weekend. Food wise I packed lunches for each day, and on one occasion, I also packed a tea. I made use of cool bags and ice packs to keep everything as cold and fresh as I could. The only disaster I had was that the coleslaw in one pot leaked but it just made the cool bag a bit messy and no great disaster.

I had budgeted for ice creams for the family, but somebody else bought those so happy days.

I pay my electric bill monthly as it fluctuates and this seems to suit me. This months bill was slightly lower than I expected, which was nice, so I had £6 left over from what I'd put aside. I put that into my emergency savings pot.

To my mind, my fridge is now looking empty, even though I know there is food on every shelf. The temptation to go shopping just for a few bits is nagging me.

My father-in-law was addicted to gambling, he would celebrate winning £50 even if he had spent £300 to get it. I tell myself it is know where  as intense, but my fear of having not enough food even though I can clearly see I do have enough food, sometimes it seems to parallel that addiction. It is a constant working progress.

Today I had muesli with Greek yoghurt, pineapple, pear, mixed nuts, and honey for breakfast. Lunch is some teriyaki ‘chicken’ leftover from the weekend, with the rest of the salad, and some mini cheesy hashbrowns. Tea will be teriyaki ‘chicken’, salad and coleslaw wraps with a side dish of tomatoes and cucumber, a bowl of sweetcorn, and some kettle chips.