Sunday 31 January 2016

Think I'm still loosing weight

My size 12 trousers are starting to feel loose when I don't pull them up over my belly so hopefully it won't be long before I'm back down to size 10 again!

It's only taken 14 years!  lol

It also means that when I slip those size 10 clothes over my thighs and they actually fit, without cutting off my circulation, I'll have lost 9 clothes sizes since leaving hospital in March 2003!

It's taken almost one and a half decades but the end is in sight now!

Little Mitzi the poo machine!

Just cleared up and binned a few days worth of poo from our little pup and she's a poo machine for such a little girl!

Couldn't be without her now though!

Saturday 30 January 2016

My new mobile phone has just arrived!

So far so good with it... it didn't come charged up so haven't been able to play with it yet, but it's definitely here and my sim card is in it, the charger for my Windows phone fits in it too which is great, but it didn't come with any instructions or a case, but assuming I can work out how to use it that isn't a problem and I've just ordered a case for it for four quid plus postage too so it's no big deal... I just hope all the buttons are in English not Chinese or German is all!  lol

Get paid on Monday, then...

I'll get paid on Monday, then the bills will come out next week, paid again on Tuesday and I can start saving up to pay my credit cards off!  Yay!

Friday 29 January 2016

23 emotions from Facebook


Just seen this on Facebook and wanted to share it here!


My credit score has improved! Yay!

I've just checked my credit score after getting an alert overnight and it was because of a £300 increase in my Studio credit limit which has improved my credit score slightly!  Yay!

Hopefully paying off my 3 credit cards in the next 18ish months will improve it even more!

My new score is poor but at least it's not very poor any more!  Woopeedoodahday!

Thursday 28 January 2016

OK, so, I hope I've got my maths worked out right this time!

I get £760 a month in benefit money
My bills come to £460
Which leaves me with £300
Right so far?
February and March money into my savings accounts is £600
April I use the £300 for domain stuff
May is only £37 so £250 into my savings which makes £850 yeah?
June is another £300 into my saving which adds up to £1150 and I'm only half way through the year
July I use £300 for the domain stuff
August and September is another £600 which takes it up to £1750 in my savings
October and November are another £300 for domain names and hosting but for the sake of easy maths, let's say I have £250 left over to go into my savings which takes it up to £2000
December is Yule but I can use the £2000 savings to clear one of the credit cards, BC, which will save me £75 a month starting in 2017 and I just repeat it all again to clear off SB and CO then that's all my debts cleared!  Woohoo!

Wednesday 27 January 2016

This domain hosting thing is expensive, but so worth it!


£37 at the end of February for one lot of hosting
£290 at the end of April just for the domain names and £37 for the hosting of one domain
£37 at the beginning of May for hosting
Another 7 domain names in July then that's it until October then a couple more in November but I'll still be able to put at least £250 away on top of the £150 going in to my second account every month except April so while I won't be paying off the credit cards this year like I'd hoped, I will at least be able to make a dent in them by the end of the year.

Not as easy to do as I'd hoped but so worth it!

First day fully on this laptop

Today is my first day with everything on my new laptop... just got to find a way to download my emails from the server into WLM now!

Tuesday 26 January 2016

Money, money, money and my plans for it

I don't get paid a fortune every month, but after all my bills have come out I've got about £300 spare and it's going to be an expensive year for my domains and hosting and I owe the hubby £150 so I'll put the spare money into one of my savings accounts at the end of every month, pay Steve back and use the rest of the money to go towards paying off my credit cards.

I'll have about £3000 saved up in my savings accounts after paying for all the domain stuff and paying Steve back that I'll use to pay off two of my three credit cards... I've just got to stop spending stuff!  lol

At last!

I've just finished adding all my email addresses to WLM so just got to download all the emails and then I can officially say this laptop is my current laptop!  Yay!  :-D

Given up on getting my email to download, so...

...I'm hoping Namehog will be able to re-jig my domain cpanel passwords so that I can set them all up again!

*sigh*

Monday 25 January 2016

Still waiting for my email to open! Still!

Gotta open WLM before I can back the emails and accounts off so I'm going to leave it to open overnight and take it from there.

It's me own fault for having over a hundred thousand emails unread and closing WLM in the biggest email folder on the whole frigging laptop.

I know I should be grateful for my new laptop and I am, I'm just getting so frustrated now!  It's the only thing I've got left to put on my new machine!

Sunday 24 January 2016

Just gotta sort me email now, then I'm good to go!

Just gotta back up my emails and email accounts on my old machine, transfer them to this machine et voila!  :-D

Saturday 23 January 2016

Just got a few last minute things to back up, then...

...I'll be on my new laptop!  Yay!

I know my user name and password for GigaNews now too so I can get that set up as soon as the back ups and emails are sorted!

Thursday 21 January 2016

I love my new laptop, but...

...I don't like having to install everything again!  lol

I'm so proud of myself!

I managed to put the battery into the new laptop and set it up with everything it needed and the only thing I needed Steve's help for was setting up the cable connection!

Just gotta put Windows 10 onto it and wait for the back-up to finish on this machine then move everything over et voila!

Just waiting for the phone now

The suede protector spray came with the post, so I'm just waiting for the phone now!

Blimey Charlie! A day early!

My new laptop has just been delivered! 

I was expecting it tomorrow so I'm just waiting for my back up to finish then I can open it up to have a look and play!

Woohoo!

Excitement rules!

I think Mitzi prefers...

...walking up and down the street 6 times instead of her usual 3 - I'm willing to bet that it'll go back to 3 again if it snows!  lol  The pup really doesn't like being cold!  lol

Wednesday 20 January 2016

Oops!

Just accidentally taken double dose of my AD and now I'm paranoid about it!

I feel nauseous, shaky, more unstable on my feet than normal, like I've got cotton wool in my head and just generally woozy.

Thinking on it, I've done it before and I woke up the next morning just feeling stupid but within 36 hours I was fine again... I hope it's the same again this time!

If I die of an accidental overdose then thank you for reading my blog and thank you to my friends for their caring and support over the years.

Please beware - this is a political rant!

Just spoken to me mum and our Prime Minister promised that he wouldn't cut rural bus routes.

The village my mum lives in has never had a good bus service - before I moved to Gloucester with Steve there was 1 bus each way to Oxford 6 days a week, 2 buses a week each way to Banbury and 1 bus a week to Chipping Norton.

David Cameron has cut all bar the Chipping Norton bus which is stopping on 13th February.

There was a temporary shuttle bus to Deddington but that stops in June as well.

That means my mum will be restricted to the village shop which is being sold so she won't have access to anything at all except 2 pubs!  She's that rural!  Yes, totally serious unfortunately!

My mum can't help thinking that if the town and city buses were reduced from every 5 minutes in rush hour to one every half an hour and used the money they would save to feed into the rural routes then that would more than cover the rural bus route costs.

FFS Mr Cameron, keep your promises to those with no choice about the transport!

Wish me luck!

Just sent Speckles' Diary off to a SCBWI to see what age she thinks it's suitable for and the overall feel of it and stuff.

I wrote it for YAs but after KISS being knocked out of the UV longlist at the first hurdle because it was more suitable for MG than YA I'm not so sure any more!

This year will be my writing year and I won't query agents until I've got every single MS the best it can possibly be during the first half of the year and won't start even thinking about the queries until at least August then I'll query at least 3 agents at a time and work methodically through the Yearbook until NaNo then take it from there.

Got to plan out my next NaNo novel soon too!  lol

Mitzi's walk this morning

I only usually walk the pup up and down the road 3 times but she carried on walking past the door after trip number 3 so we walked up and down the road another twice and she decided to stop on the way back on trip number 6 so we carried on with that walk then came home,,, our poor little girl shot in the door as soon as I opened it and jumped straight onto the sofa!

It's a beautiful but cold and frosty morning out there and as soon as we came in and closed the door, my glasses immediately steamed up with the temperature difference!

Laptop has now been dispatched

My new laptop was dispatched yesterday afternoon with an estimated delivery date of Friday 22nd so I've just got to hope that everything will be backed up onto the external drive by then!

Tuesday 19 January 2016

Third time lucky?

My back-up finished within 4 hours which surprised me, but when I checked on the external hard drive, I soon found out that none of my documents or programmes or anything like that were backed up and I reckon it's because I didn't allow the Administrator privileges, so I'm now deleting the back-up to try again!

I hope it'll be third time lucky for me!

Second attempt started

Just started backing up my whole C drive again... I know it will take many hours to back up 400GB but it's for the last time and I've started early so hopefully it'll be done by bed time!

Monday 18 January 2016

Will have to do the backup tomorrow

I put my laptop on the floor and accidentally detached the power lead which stopped the backup so I'll start the backup again as soon as I've taken the pup for her walk and hopefully it'll be finished by the time I head to bed!

Wish me luck!

Backing up the whole of my C drive in preparation for...

...getting my new laptop at the end of this week!  I'll need to get a new, bigger backup dooberry at some point too, but that can come out of my secondary account  :-)

Is my maths right, please?

Starting in February I'll have £200 spare every month after all my direct debits have come out.

£200x5 is £1000 yeah?

That goes towards paying off either my BC credit card that I owe the most to or CO that is due to be paid off in August 2019 with my current payment plan.

The only one I'm paying interest on is BC because apparently they reduced it when we were with the debt management bods.

Then I'll have £200 in June to pay for my prescription pre-payment card, my mum's birthday gift and our anniversary gift.

I'll save up again between July and September so that's another £600 yeah?  Then I've got Steve and C's birthday's in October which I'll pay for with the £200 from the October money, another £200 in November and the final £200 of the year goes on Yule gifts.

So, here's the maths:

5X£200=£1000 + £600=~£1,600+£200=£1,800 yeah?

I think that pretty much pays off CO so I've only got BC and SB to pay off then it's just charities and stuff but it'll save me £50 a month on my CO bill that I can then use to pay off SB and BC next year... I really can do this!

Things to put on my new laptop as soon as it arrives

Anti malware bytes
AVG
Chrome
Firefox
Bookmarks
Ad blocker
Windows Live Mail
yWriter
Office
Filezilla
Roboform
Nectar toolbar
PSP
Windows Live Mail
Xnews
Skype
Sim City 4 Delux
Theme Hospital
Rollercoaster Tycoon Delux
Printer software
Kindle software

Sunday 17 January 2016

That's it for spending until June now... it has to be!

Just bought meself the laptop for £350 so that has to be it until my prescription pre-payment card in the middle of June, my mum's birthday on 24th June and our anniversary on 29th then that's it until October.  I'm going to beat my spending addiction this year!

Definitely not flat!

I took a bottle of water up to the bedroom and put my boots on instead of my shoes.

The shoes are definitely not flat heeled like the description said they were... that was my whole reason for getting them!  *sigh*

Saturday 16 January 2016

Especially for M care of Facebook


Naughty word alert!


1,500 posts!

This is post number 1,500 so I've been a chatty bunny and want to thank you, every one of you, for reading my blog... especially since I've been doing it daily!  It means a lot to me that you read my mumbo jumbo every day!

It *must* be cold if...

...Steve's cold!  He's got plenty of padding so I reckon he's loosing weight too!

Everything is dispatched from Amazon now

I'll hopefully get the suede protection spray on Monday then as from Wednesday for a week or so, I'm expecting my new android smartphone!

That'll have to be it with my spending for a while though 'cos I need to save up for a new laptop!

Friday 15 January 2016

My pills were delivered this afternoon and...

...I've got to make an appointment with my GP for a meds review at the end of April.  Hopefully he'll agree to me keeping on with what I'm taking already... why fix what isn't broken?  :-)

Thursday 14 January 2016

Another one from Facebook for M


I love these boots!

Considering they cost less than 15 quid and I've never worn long boots in my life before, they have totally changed my opinion.

The only thing that could be improved is for them to come ready protected instead of buying the spray from Amazon and risking getting it wrong!

My boney ankles are really obvious and the reason I haven't worn boots before now, but these boots cover my ankles and don't rub them at all!

These are definitely my favourite piece of footware since my pixie boots in childhood!

Live in the UK? Love shopping on Amazon?

I've just ordered 4 months supply of vitamin B12 from Amazon for 10p!

Why?  How did I do it?

I joined a site called I love to review at the end of last year and in exchange for an honest review I get things for free or heavily reduced.  The B12 pills I got today cost me a grand total of 10p including postage thanks to the I love to review site.  They are usually £25, in the sale for £10 and the voucher from the site gave me £9.90 off the sale price and because we've got Prime, postage was free and the pills will be here tomorrow!

Our poor postie is going to hate me!  lol

Why?

Because the B12 will be here tomorrow, the suede protector will be here in a couple of days for my new boots and my phone will be here at the end of next week.

Steve bought a box full of snacks from Amazon that arrived this morning too!  lol

Something I've just seen on Facebook for M


Wednesday 13 January 2016

Almost fell over this morning!

I put my new socks and shoes on this morning to take Mitzi for her walk and within 2 steps after closing the front door I almost fell over!  The heel on the shoes are bigger than I was expecting so I wobbled when I put my foot down and if I hadn't had my quad cane I would have been on the floor, unable to get up!  :-(

Tuesday 12 January 2016

Namehog are ace!

All the domains and hosting I've got are provided by Namehog and they are the best hosting company I've ever found!

They aren't free but it is so worth spending your money with them... they are fast, reliable, amazing and their support is fantastic!  I was having email problems with one of my domains and after 2 screenshots the problem was fixed straight away!

Thank you for your help this afternoon, Luke J!

Another one for M from Facebook


January sales are great!

For £29 you would usually be able to get just one pair of shoes in a High Street shop.

For the same price, I got a pair of wonderful boots, a pair of shoes and 5 pairs of socks and they were all delivered to me so I didn't even need to leave the house!

I love online shopping I do!

These boots are gorgeous!

Just put the BHS boots on and I love them already... as long as they last longer than 20 days they will be my best footwear purchase so far!

My BHS order has just arrived

I ordered a pair of boots, a pair of shoes and 5 pairs of socks off BHS and they've just arrived so I've got to break them in now... oh joy!

68% off on my new smartphone on Amazon yesterday!

I ordered a new Android smartphone to go with my SIM card last night.

It should have been £125 but I only paid £40 for it!

It'll take longer to get to me 'cos it's coming via China Post but hopefully it'll be worth it by paying 68% less for it than it usually is.

Monday 11 January 2016

What an amazing little girl!

I've been trying to teach the pup to lay down and to roll over for about a week or 10 days and the pup has just done it for the very first time!

I'm so proud of our little puppy!

RIP David Bowie

Apparently he fought a courageous battle with cancer for 18 months but passed away this morning at 69 years old... that's younger than my mum is now and the same age as my dad was when he died of the same thing 5 years ago!

RIP David Bowie and your friends, family and fans are all in my heart today.

Sunday 10 January 2016

My little nephew...

...is standing up with support now... he'll be toddling before the parents know it!  lol

Saturday 9 January 2016

Just changed one of my email passwords...

...just need to remember what it is now!  lol

Someone needs to look at their notification programme! lol

I've just had a notification email to say the sim card has been dispatched so someone needs to have a look at their sending notification system!  lol

Today's post has already been, so...

... I'll be getting the new sim card on Monday - it was a bit much to expect of Royal Mail really to deliver it in 18 hours!  lol

Blimey Charlie! I'm impressed with the speed!

I only created my account and ordered the sim yesterday afternoon, but it's already on the way to me!  It took literally 5 hours from first finding out about them to them actually getting it sent!  Hopefully it'll arrive with today's post which will make it less than 24 hours!  That's impressive by anyone's standards!

Double the length this morning

I usually walk the pup up and down the street 3 times every morning.

My legs felt OK this morning so we doubled the length of the walk to 6 times up and down the road.

Steve said the usual morning walk is 60 yards which means that the pup walked 120 yards this morning and she's now sat on my foot bless her tiny little puppy dog heart!

Friday 8 January 2016

Just ordered a new SIM card and mobile number

Just spotted an ad for a very new mobile phone SIM card provider and everything is free for the first month then only £8.99 a month after that.

It's such a new company that I'm one of their Beta testers, whatever that means! 

I got to choose my new mobile number and everything is free for the first month then only £8.99 a month after that for, if I remember correctly, 1GB of internet, with 1,000 voice call minutes and 1,000 texts then it's £5 pay as you go if I get close to my limit before the end of the month.  That ain't going to happen so as long as I keep a tenner free in my account each month I've just found a great back-up provider!

I'll try and remember to update you when I get the SIM card and put it into my phone!

Thursday 7 January 2016

Brilliant little hearing aids!

I ordered 2 behind the ear hearing aids from Amazon just over a year ago and it was wonderful to be able to hear again, I just couldn't put them in without a mirror and taking my (very strong) glasses off so they added several minutes to each morning and I still couldn't be sure I'd put them in properly.

I ordered 2 more with Steve's Christmas gift voucher for Amazon and they arrived this morning.

They are brilliant little things and took seconds rather than minutes to put in and I didn't even need to touch my glasses let alone take them off!

I is a happy hearing bunny now!  Yay!

Wednesday 6 January 2016

Too late to back out now!

Just bought a course of lessons from a SCBWI member that'll teach me how to stop drawing stick men and hopefully well enough to give an idea of what I want my characters to look like in picture books!

I'll never be an artist, I already know that, but I want to be able to draw for my own benefit more than anything!

Can't help thinking that...

...if America built homes with bricks and mortar instead of thin bits of plywood then more homes would stay up and would be livable for literally hundreds of years instead of only 10 or 20 year and would help deforestation and flooding and stuff too!  That's without taking hurricanes and stuff into account!

That's just me though, after all, what do I know?  ;-)

Tomorrow at the earliest

My hearing aids will be here tomorrow at the earliest and the 27th at the latest... can't wait to hear again!

Tuesday 5 January 2016

Great stuff! :-D

I've spotted the laptop that I can get as soon as next month!

It's less than £350 and I've already got £200 in one of my savings accounts, another £100 from my secondary bank on 15th January plus any I've got left over at the start of February and I can put the order in!

It's got double the memory of this laptop, 2.5 times more hard drive space and I can get an extended warranty for less than £20 as well as a bag all for under £500!

This laptop has done me well for the last 5ish years but it's about time it claimed it's pension now!

Think I've worked out...

... why I can't get the Download Manager or Poser to work - my poor old laptop hasn't got enough memory in it!

So, what I'll do is just concentrate on my writing until I can afford a new laptop then I'll get one with the biggest hard drive and most memory I can afford and it will hopefully all run easily then!

Hopefully it'll only be a couple of months before I can afford a 2tb hard drive with 12gb memory if I put at least £100 into my savings account each month!

Just gotta be patient!  lol

Going to give Poser one last try, then...

...if it doesn't work without the Download Manager I'll give up and concentrate on Manga Studio  *sigh*

Monday 4 January 2016

Good people are like...


Coughs, colds and flu

I've had a cold for the last few days.

It's been very mild and I'm almost over it now.

I read on the NHS site about the difference between a cold and the flu at the weekend and thought back to my childhood illnesses last night.

I realised that I have had flu because there were a couple of times that the cold was so bad that I had to miss school and couldn't get out of bed for a week but I reckon they were minor flu or an extreme cold and it's only happened twice in my life so I reckon I'll have a flu vaccine if I'm offered it this year  :-)

Happiness


I depend on a man


Pretty much sums up everything I stand for


Saturday 2 January 2016

Saw C today instead of tomorrow

I met up with C today for an afternoon drink because he's got something on tomorrow and I'm so glad we met up today... the weather was awful though!  :-/

Friday 1 January 2016

52k words written out of the 100k I'm planning

Just gotta write at least 2k words a day now and then I can work on my Toni trilogy!

Happy New Year!

I hope all my friends and family have a safe and happy 2016!