My previous post wasn't a whinge by the way, life is what it is, to be lived, enjoyed, struggled with, whatever you choose, I'm happy with my life, very happy.
I'm very tired today, I babysat for a few hours after work so didn't get home til after 6.
We have a weeks leave next week, it would have been nice to have gone away, but half term is way too expensive for us to consider even with L&M's overtime, unfortunately someone forgot to sign off the overtime sheet, so he will not receive payment now until 31st October so we won't have any extra money to spent at all.
Scrimping and saving, ranting and raving. Past retirement age.
Thursday, 24 October 2013
Tuesday, 22 October 2013
Debate
There was a debate on the MSE forums a couple of days ago, someone commented about 'smug pensioners living on benefits paid for by taxpayers money and sitting on savings built up during times of plenty'. Times of plenty? I think I blinked & missed them.
I was born in the early 50's my parents & I lived in a house with no electricity, no indoor toilet & a cold tap in the kitchen, the only heating was a paraffin heater, the bath was a tin bath hung in the outhouse. We moved a few times and by the 60's we lived in a flat with a gas fire in the main room and a bathroom, there was a gas heater for hot water in the bathroom, there was only cold water in the kitchen. Midway through the 60's my parents split up, I had to move to an unheated bedsit & change jobs as mine didn't pay enough to live on. Even with my new job I couldn't afford clothes or bedding, I slept under a couple of coats. Friday was pay day, I bought a loaf of bread and a piece of cheese, I ate cheese sandwiches for 3 days and bread and scrape the other 4 days.
I married in the 70's and coped with the bread shortage, the sugar shortage, the 3 day week. After a while we bought our first property, a 2 bed house with, you've guessed it, no heating. My kitchen consisted of an old butlers sink, an old cocktail cabinet and a freezer, no cooker for the 1st year, I managed with a camping cooker, I had a twin tub washing machine and we slept on 2nd hand bunk beds. We had planned to fix the place up immediately, but by the 80's the mortgage rate went sky high, sometimes as high as 18% or 19%.
The kitchen was finally improved when we needed to move for work and the house was unsaleable as it was.
Life carried on and things did get better, but the kids, 4 by now, and I were always dressed in 2nd hand clothes, most of our furniture was 2nd hand and I still had a kitchen with a mish mash of cupboards and only one ring worked on my cooker.
Towards the end of the 90's, I was left a legacy, £25k, I spent some of it on having a proper fitted kitchen, no more doors hanging off, no more sagging drawers and a cooker that worked, woohoo!
Within a few years the kids had left home & my marriage had gone down the pan & I was living in a small flat with draughty windows, a badly fitting door, heating I couldn't afford to put on and only the clothes I stood up in.
I've worked since I was 15, I had 10 years at home raising 4 kids who are all tax payers, I'm past retirement age, but still working because I can't live on the £110 a month the government kindly allow me.
I was born in the early 50's my parents & I lived in a house with no electricity, no indoor toilet & a cold tap in the kitchen, the only heating was a paraffin heater, the bath was a tin bath hung in the outhouse. We moved a few times and by the 60's we lived in a flat with a gas fire in the main room and a bathroom, there was a gas heater for hot water in the bathroom, there was only cold water in the kitchen. Midway through the 60's my parents split up, I had to move to an unheated bedsit & change jobs as mine didn't pay enough to live on. Even with my new job I couldn't afford clothes or bedding, I slept under a couple of coats. Friday was pay day, I bought a loaf of bread and a piece of cheese, I ate cheese sandwiches for 3 days and bread and scrape the other 4 days.
I married in the 70's and coped with the bread shortage, the sugar shortage, the 3 day week. After a while we bought our first property, a 2 bed house with, you've guessed it, no heating. My kitchen consisted of an old butlers sink, an old cocktail cabinet and a freezer, no cooker for the 1st year, I managed with a camping cooker, I had a twin tub washing machine and we slept on 2nd hand bunk beds. We had planned to fix the place up immediately, but by the 80's the mortgage rate went sky high, sometimes as high as 18% or 19%.
The kitchen was finally improved when we needed to move for work and the house was unsaleable as it was.
Life carried on and things did get better, but the kids, 4 by now, and I were always dressed in 2nd hand clothes, most of our furniture was 2nd hand and I still had a kitchen with a mish mash of cupboards and only one ring worked on my cooker.
Towards the end of the 90's, I was left a legacy, £25k, I spent some of it on having a proper fitted kitchen, no more doors hanging off, no more sagging drawers and a cooker that worked, woohoo!
Within a few years the kids had left home & my marriage had gone down the pan & I was living in a small flat with draughty windows, a badly fitting door, heating I couldn't afford to put on and only the clothes I stood up in.
I've worked since I was 15, I had 10 years at home raising 4 kids who are all tax payers, I'm past retirement age, but still working because I can't live on the £110 a month the government kindly allow me.
Sunday, 20 October 2013
Blaming Bright House
I've just read FQ's post about companies making money out of the poorest people, and whilst I agree that the poorest suffer, no one forced these people to gamble, to get a Wonga loan or to buy from Bright House. Sometimes things happen, something breaks, goes wrong or whatever, if people are borrowing money to buy food then that's appalling, but too many people borrow so they can buy the latest bit of frippery.
How about if, just for once someone decided to, shock horror, 'Go Without!!!
Read this blog http://hardshipandhope.blogspot.co.uk/ if you want to know about going without, this couple managed without a fridge for most of the summer, I'm not saying it was easy, but they did it.
How about if, just for once someone decided to, shock horror, 'Go Without!!!
Read this blog http://hardshipandhope.blogspot.co.uk/ if you want to know about going without, this couple managed without a fridge for most of the summer, I'm not saying it was easy, but they did it.
Today's bargain
Another gammon joint reduced to £4.99, sliced thickly this time, more suitable for ham, egg & chips or ham with onion or parsley sauce, mash and cabbage.
You know you aren't a time waster when
You turn up at A &E, go into triage and get wheeled straight through to a room and from there through every test area they have, X-ray, CT scan, blood tests. Within an hour I was on a ward, catheterised and attached to 3 drips. All this on a Sunday too.
The staff were in the main fantastic, one person was horrible, more of her later, the food was good, but I was unable to eat, the only bad thing was the lack of shower facilities, there was one small toilet with a tiny sink but no shower or bathing facilities for the 6 people on A ward. I tell you you haven't lived until you have tried to manoeuvre yourself, a pole with your drip attached and a catheter which is a large hard plastic container measuring approx 18ins by 12ins and weighs a ton, through a door into a small room containing 12 to 15 'cowboy hats' full of urine that are waiting to be measured!
Of the one unpleasant staff member, Racsha the Remorseless, maybe not actually unpleasant, just uncaring and thoughtless, despite wearing a large and vacuous smile she always left my food out of reach, moved my call button behind my head (no I wasn't being a nuisance I used the button twice in 7 days). She moved my water out of reach & threw a pair of DVT socks at me. The list goes on, but it was nothing personal she was the same with everybody.
The staff were in the main fantastic, one person was horrible, more of her later, the food was good, but I was unable to eat, the only bad thing was the lack of shower facilities, there was one small toilet with a tiny sink but no shower or bathing facilities for the 6 people on A ward. I tell you you haven't lived until you have tried to manoeuvre yourself, a pole with your drip attached and a catheter which is a large hard plastic container measuring approx 18ins by 12ins and weighs a ton, through a door into a small room containing 12 to 15 'cowboy hats' full of urine that are waiting to be measured!
Of the one unpleasant staff member, Racsha the Remorseless, maybe not actually unpleasant, just uncaring and thoughtless, despite wearing a large and vacuous smile she always left my food out of reach, moved my call button behind my head (no I wasn't being a nuisance I used the button twice in 7 days). She moved my water out of reach & threw a pair of DVT socks at me. The list goes on, but it was nothing personal she was the same with everybody.
The £60 apple
For my birthday last year Lizzie & my L&M both bought me some small fruit trees, by the time my L&M had bought large tubs to plant them in, extra compost and various other stuff he worked out that he's spent £60. This is the sum total from the 7 fruit trees, one spectacularly wonderful apple.
It tasted fantastic, but then for £60 I'd expect it to!
A daily Joy
This is the first of a few posts I composed while I was recovering from my illness but was unable to post for an assortment of reasons.
This beautiful lavender plant was given to me by a friend from work, it sat for many weeks on the table on the decking. When I was first able to get downstairs it was August and warm & sunny I sat on the decking with my breakfast (made by hubby) and I ate my breakfast and watched the the fat bumble bees buzzing in and out the lavender. It was a daily joy at a time when I was feeling particularly rough.
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