Aaaaaand... relax!

I'm now £280 lighter but I've got a clear, safe, tree-free back yard that's completely free of the Norway Maple, the Budleija bush and all the other weeds that were growing in it.  I've got the card for the company and he's offered to sort the concrete out for me so that all the gaps and holes are filled in to hopefully stop it from happening again.

Apparently there were two Norway Maples growing and I didn't have the first foggiest clue about the second one, but it's all gone now so I can start from scratch again whenever I want to.  I'm thinking I'll get a bird bath or bird table or something like that, but no more plants.

I've gotta stay out of my back yard "until tomorrow" which is no problem at all, but it's one less thing for me to worry about now and I can finally breathe.

Thank you Gaia, thank you Green Man and thank you Loki!

Today (13th July 2026) I'm grateful for...

...not snacking all morning after I'd had my breakfast and before I had my lunch.  I haven't got anything snackable, but if I had then I wouldn't have been able to finish my lunch and would then be hungry and snack again before my tea, which I wouldn't have and I'd be hungry at bedtime then!  Thankfully it was a cycle that I managed to avoid starting on, even though it was very tempting and it won't be so easy starting tomorrow 'cos I've got lots of snacks coming with my groceries.

I'm grateful that I've kept myself hydrated so far today and that I've put my personal phone and Visible on to charge up, so they will hopefully both be good to go before bedtime.

I'm grateful that my rubbish and recycling were both emptied this morning and I was able to bring the containers in and put them back into their homes reasonably early this week.

I'm grateful that today has been a good day so far and I'm gonna spend the rest of the afternoon and part of the evening hopefully finishing off going through Steve's current account statement so that I can start on his savings account that I didn't even know that he had until the bank told me so it'll be both interesting and heartbreaking to see what he was using that account for.

Nite nite orl

It's been a very long, totally exhausting day today and my weight is under where it's supposed to be again, so no more exercising until Monday at the very earliest again now and I'll be having chocolate and crisps and creamy drinks at every opportunity until then.

I'm expecting 3 deliveries tomorrow, so I hope I don't forget!

I've got 4 more months of Steve's finances to go through, then his savings account which I didn't even know that he had and it's just getting worse and worse!

My last two pills of the day have been popped and I'm heading off to beddy-byes now.

I'll see you all in the morning.

Nite nite orl

Well, I'm...

...up to August 2022 with Steve's bank statement now and it's not getting any better unfortunately.  He's been having literally 2-3 take-aways a night, most nights, and spending around £40 on each one, so it's no wonder that I had to keep bailing him out, really.

He hasn't discovered porn shows yet... there were a few early on, but they didn't cost as much as his more recent ones - I think he's using the porn that's available right now, rather than the individual shows he was paying for in his last few weeks.

I'm just over half way through his current account so far, so just got another 5 months to go through, then his savings, then that's it then.

Not a happy bunny right now, but it needs to be done.

I'm...

...absolutely knackered after waiting up for yesterday's delivery and only just getting 6 hours of sleep, so I'm gonna take my pills then head straight on up to beddy-byes for an early night tonight and I'm really hoping that I'll be asleep as soon as my head hits the pillow tonight!

I've finished the editing now and I've made a start on Steve's bank statements so I'm gonna try and do a bit every day with that so that it's not so overwhelmingly frustrating for me.

I'm gonna have a peach instant tea tomorrow after breakfast and me-friendly creamy hot chocolates for the rest of the day 'cos I need and deserve both of them!

Can someone remind me to put the vegan mayo onto Olio tomorrow please?  I'm gonna keep eating the fruit for my lunches so don't need it any more and don't want it to go to waste.

I'm also expecting my Omegas to turn up tomorrow and they are due around lunchtime, so it'll be early exercises (assuming my 'Morning Stability' score is high enough) and a late lunch of 2 apricots, 10 cherries, a banana and a large pear tomorrow.

Mornin' all

Well, after my delivery arrived so late last night, I dragged myself on up to beddy-byes.

I managed 6 hours of sleep according to my HLTH band.

I'm feeling really rotten today after such a late night and not taking my APs so barely sleeping.  My 'Morning Stability' score is 3 so, even though I technically can do my laps and exercises, I know I'd end up on the floor unable to get up, so I'm not gonna risk it today.

I've taken my blood pressure and it was 109 so at the high end of my normal range.  My morning pills have been popped and my breakfast eaten and the washing up done.  The daily virus scan was clear, so I'm gonna get my breakfast photo up, then today's to-do list, then hopefully finish the read-through and any last minute editing of my memoir today.

I wanna go through Steve's bank statements and come up with a spreadsheet of his incomings and outgoings so that I can see what he really spent his money on when I paid him for the vast majority of household bills - I know it was £70-£100 a day on porn and that he paid for private shows at least once a week at about £1000 each too, because it was his last transaction before going into hospital then passing away, so I wanna see the exact numbers.  It'll break my heart but I need to see just what his payments were for so that I can put that part of my grief away.  I'm dreading it, but I feel like I have to find out the truth once and for all.

Time to get the breakfast photos resized and put up on this blog and Instagram now, as a slow start to my day I reckon.

BBS

I've just seen...

...an email from my water company with suggestions on how to use less water during the heat wave.  Out of the 4 things they suggest (3 things in the email and 2 in a text, one of which was repeated), I only use 2 of the things (washing machine and showers) and I already do what it suggests (full loads in the washing machine and shorter showers) because I only use the washing machine maybe 2-4 times a month and I've had a grand total of 2 showers in the last 6 weeks and get washed in the kitchen sink instead, so I don't know what else I can do!

I'm secretly hoping I'll get a pleasant surprise with my first metered water bill in September/October kinda time 'cos I already use as little water as I can!  It's been around £750 billed every 6-ish months so I'm hoping it'll be considerably less next time I get my water bill!

It's officially...

...warmer weather, because my electricity bill was under £100 for the first time this year (I think) which is a huuuge relief 'cos it means that my central heating didn't really come on last month.  It was about £200 a month in the depths of Winter, but now that it's half that, I can finally breathe and relax without worrying about how I'm going to scrape the pennies together.

I've got...

...Steve's bank statements now and I've already found two bills that I paid him for that were several hundred pounds difference every month.  The first one was our phone/TV/internet which was £66 a month, then there's his domain names and hosting which was £12, Netflix was £10, electricity was £114, TV license at £22, Prime at £8, mobile phone at £27, I then paid him £3910 in one day for some reason, then there's 3 payments to "Jade Witter" for £2920 which I'm assuming was for 3 private porn shows (I didn't know he was using porn until I started cancelling his payments)... I'm only up to April 2022 (Steve passed away in December 2022) and I was moving across over £400 a month to "cover the bills" so lets see what the actual cost was, shall we?

£259 in actual bills coming out of his account.

I paid him £450 a month.

£450-£259=£191 a month going on porn and take-aways, plus the thousands to "Jade Witter" and covering any other bills that he couldn't afford each month is a lot of money going into Steve's account out of mine and him getting credit for "paying all the bills".

I know that it's too late to do anything about now, but I'm incredibly disappointed by how much he was lieing to me each month.

Time for pills then bed now I reckon.

I've just...

...checked my bank balance and can cover all my bills for the next 5 weeks - only just, but I can.

That means that I can put 100% of my income into my "big bills" account to go towards paying for the entire central heating replacement in a few years 'cos it needs total replacement every 10 years apparently.

I can do this money handling/budget thing after all, without going short and affording my bills each month too!

Aaaaaand...

...relax.

I've just summoned up the courage to talk to someone at Steve's bank about getting the statements for the last year of his life.

The man I spoke to was brilliant and it was sorted within 3 minutes.  The statements will be with me between 5-7 working days, so hopefully by next weekend I'll be able to go through them all and see just how many take-aways Steve had and how much he spent on them as well as what he spent the many thousands of pounds I gave him to apparently help him to pay his bills was actually spent on.

I know that one of the bills (the electricity) that I paid through him each month was already significantly less than what I was paying him for it, but I want to see what else he lied about too.  I know that the night before he fell over in the bathroom he spent over £100 on 3 take-aways so it's no wonder that he was so tired and sleepy during each day with having to stay awake to order each take away, answer the door, eat and hide the containers from me before deciding that he was still hungry and repeating it again!

I was so proud of him for reducing his portion sizes with the meals I made for him... but I didn't know anything about his multiple nightly take-aways every night!  It's no wonder that he had a pre-paid delivery subscription with Just Eat really!

I think I've earnt a chocolatey reward now and it's another thing that I can cross off my to-do list at last!

Have I found...

...a combination of trackers and apps that work for me and my health and let me track and pace rather than track and push??

I've just added the Nutracheck app to my personal phone and that seems to track the calories and exercise that I want without the steps.  Hopefully between that counting my calories and exercises without the steps and constant pushing and the Visible tracking my health and encouraging me to pace, I might have found the combination that works for me!

It's gonna take a while to add all my meals in, but I've got both sets of breakfasts (without the juices) for both warm weather (the choccie Weetabix) and cool weather (the toast) as well as 3 drinks (caff and decaff coffee and the drinking chocolate - I've just gotta add sugar and cream as appropriate), I've potentially found a good starting point to work from.  It's just a smidgen under £40 a year for membership, but it could, potentially easily pay for itself within weeks!

Yes, it was good to keep it all together in FitBit, but it really wasn't working for me and it feels like maybe Gaia has had a hand in me finishing with it and finding the Visible and Nutracheck apps in its place.

It's gonna take a while to get everything added in for lunches especially as they are so varied, but so far so good!

Aaaaaand... relax

That's the plug sorted out and a quick and easy £85 for a 10-15 minute job.  It was £100 including the plug but I can use the sink as a sink instead of just a tap now, which is a relief!

I'm gonna go and crack open a J2O in celebration now.

It's definitely worth...

...me having my solar panels because I've been credited with well over £300 to my electricity account, which has comfortably paid the last 2 months of bills and added to my pre-paid electricity account too!

I've got over £500 in my electricity pre-payment account which I reckon will see me at least half-way through Summer before I need to top it up again!

My roof is far from in the ideal position, but after the solar panels were installed, I just forgot about them and got a nice surprise a couple of times a year!

If you want free money/free electricity, I reckon it's definitely worth it to get solar panels fitted then you can just sit back and relax while the light/sun powers your home for a few months every year!

Today (7th May 2026) I'm grateful for...

...pain.

Why?

It's a pretty bizarre thing to be grateful for, right?

It's proof that I'm still alive and can still feel something.

I'm also grateful for putting the tomatoes and plums on Olio and I'm hoping they'll go soon.

I've got an Olio-er coming tomorrow for the peppers, spinach, mocha and ice cube trays as well as a Freegler coming in the afternoon for the air freshners, so I'm grateful that they will hopefully all be gone by this time tomorrow.

I'm also grateful that I can just about cover 6 weeks worth of bills with the money I've got left in my bank account atm.

As well as checking that my next OddBox subscription box is things that I'll actually use.

Oooh!

I've just seen my solar panel export statement thingamejig and they have sent £341.67 to the National Grid, so I'll hopefully be getting that put onto my electricity account soon which is basically a month of free electricity in Winter or about 2 months in Summer, just by getting the solar panels installed and leaving them to do their thing!

I like free money lol

Mornin' all

Well, I've had a reasonable start to the day and my official weight is that I've lost 1kg in the last 7 days and I'm now below where the nurse wants me to be, but still in the healthy weight range for my height.  I'm gonna try doing my laps and exercises once a day, every other day this week to see what that does to my weight next week.

I've taken my blood pressure which was a bit high for me, but still low in the reference range that medical bods use.  I've also popped my 9 morning pills and had my breakfast and run the daily virus scan, so I'm all set for the morning now.  I finished off the juice this morning and put the empty, washed-out bottle into the recycling, so I hope it's available with tomorrow's groceries otherwise I'll have to have water with my breakfast.

I've decided against getting washed and changed today but I will tomorrow instead.

It's my payday today and a quick bit of maths (that I hope is right) means that my OCD is happy with how much I'll be left with after all of my bills have been paid, so that's a relief.

This first blog post of the new day and week is getting a touch long, so I'm gonna publish it and get my first 2 meal photos up before my to-do list now I reckon.

BBS

Tomorrow morning between 9am and 10am...

...I'm finally getting my bathroom sink plug fixed/replaced after it siezed up after about 2 months lol

It'll cost me £100 and as long as it doesn't sieze up while it's down, then that'll be another thing ticked off my list and I'll just have the two doors and the stair wall to sort out then :-)

Today (20th April 2026) I'm grateful for...

...Loki behaving Himself and getting my delivery to come after I'd finished my laps and exercises this morning.

I'm also grateful that my delivery seems to be appropriate sizes and that I could put most of my ginger beer into one of the items and still have 3 left over that there wasn't room for.

I'm grateful that I've paid my water bill and that it was considerably less than I was thinking.

I'm also grateful that I can afford to splash out on some me-friendly sweets with tomorrow's groceries and that the vegan bacon was a little bit cheaper than normal, so I've added a couple to my basket to give me a bit of variety if they are in stock tomorrow.

I'm grateful that I got today's plan knocked on the head so quickly today and I hope it's the same again tomorrow.  I've gotta remember to put the bags in front of the door after I've done my laps in the morning.

I'm grateful that my pills are kicking in and I'm gonna shut up, get the last to-do list together then head on up to beddy-byes.

That's a relief!

I've just got and paid my water bill and I was expecting it to be a lot more expensive than it actually was... about £160 for October 2025 to March 2026 and I was thinking it'd be at least £500!  I can cope with a £350 (2 x £160 + extra for Summer drinks) a year bill!  It was part standard and part metered so my next bill in around September/October kinda time will apparently be fully metered, so it'll be interesting to see what my next bill is like!

I can breathe for a while now though, so that's a relief.