Steel Kitten: goals

Showing posts with label goals. Show all posts
Showing posts with label goals. Show all posts




I was pleased to see the back of last week. It was very stressful for me but I'm hopeful I have resolved the problem, which my current reading list should hint at its identity. 


I start my working week on Tuesday but lately my brain has convinced itself it should start Monday evening at 11pm. It rolls around all the work issues I could face the following day until I fall into a fitful dozing session around 3am only for me to jolt awake 15 minutes before I am due at my desk at 8am. I reached screaming pitch last Tuesday morning. After having a week off I looked just as tired on my return as on my leaving. The problem - in a nutshell - is my own inability to say 'bugger off' when yet another impromptu zoom meeting/call/instant message rolls in from my colleagues. The constant interruptions and lingering meetings mean I am behind on my work. That is what is keeping me awake worrying.


I spent the whole week being ruthless with my time, blocking off my calendar, refusing meetings, not answering the phone, blocking everyone on video-conferencing software and cracking through everything I had been behind on. My entire calendar is now blocked off in chunks over the next few weeks to accomplish a list of goals to get my backlog of work completed. Anything else is secondary. I sellotaped this phrase to my screen as a reminder to use it: “I’m sorry I’m completely scheduled this week with no free time, perhaps we can put something in the diary for next week or the week after?” Funnily enough, it sorted out a lot of people who just wanted me to do their work/ thinking for them on the spot. The rest had to be dealt with by blocking on video conferencing software so they couldn’t get through to me. I set my profile to Do Not Disturb and now no-one gets through unless on a safe list, and only my manager and the CEO are on it.


The second step was resigning from a social committee at work. I was flattered to be asked a year ago to represent my department. In  all honesty I knew it wasn't a good fit for me but decided to give it a go. I hated it. The emails were never-ending, the zoom meetings impromptu and stretched out by extroverts who loved nothing better than to wile away the time yakking - meanwhile my workload was piling up behind me and I was behind on my promises. The final straw was volunteering me to represent an additional 'hobby' club at work. Enough was enough. I felt like a massive weight had been lifted the second I pressed 'Send' on my resignation message. They weren't that happy but I don't care any more. I can't do hobby stuff in deference to my revenue-generating work.

-oOo-



Despite the heat this weekend I decided to get out and go to a car boot sale on Sunday, the first one for quite a few years. I have got out of the habit of doing them, not sure why, Probably because I got fed up with bringing a load of stuff in and not having a place to put it. We really got back into the gardening again lately so I was on the lookout for anything gardening related. 



Didn’t find much in that respect, however, I did find a brand new leather belt for Martin (£1.00), six new handkerchiefs (50p) to replace some that are fit for the rag bag, two Oxford pillowcases (£1.50), a Stephen Fry book (50p), a piece of Laura Ashley fabric (£2.00, about 2m) and two dresses (£3 and £2). Total spend £10.50 plus sunburn. I got that for free.


-oOo-


Thursday was our 15th wedding anniversary and we went out  to the local Nepalese curry house to celebrate (coincidentally, it was also five years since we completed on the property). It’s the first time I’ve been out for a meal in 15 months and it was absolutely wonderful. But there were signs all around of the fallout from COVID-19. The food is very good and the restaurant used to be packed with tables crammed in cheek by jowl. Now of course with social distancing the tables had to be a prescribed distance apart and there weren’t that many people eating. In the old days  the place would be full, despite being a Thursday night. This time there were only six tables out of a possible 15 and by the time we left at 8:30pm just three tables remained. Another post-COVID change was with portion sizes. We normally have a Tandoori mixed grill, which comes out on a sizzle platter and is absolutely piled with meat. This time the meat was all neatly arranged on the platter with no piling - as sign of economies to avoid having to put the prices up on the menu (and probably incur more expense having them reprinted). There was enough food though, but I guess we'd used to taking some home in containers and having it the next day.

                                                                            -oOo-



I've been trying to propagate as many of our existing plants as possible in an effort to reduce our garden spending. Over the years the driveway has been a good source of thyme, oregano, poppies, foxgloves, gooseberries, strawberries, alchemilla, wallflowers, fleabane, lavender, bluebells, nigella, aquilegia, tomatoes, spinach, and buddleia. Every now and then I have a wander round, dig them up and pot them on. I find the occasional self-seeded sweet pea but that does not like being transplanted so it has to take its chances against the cars. 


It's very helpful on months like this one, which is shaping up to be a pretty expensive month. We’ve managed to have the house insurance, classic car insurance, an oil delivery and payment for having a Wills updated all come in the same month. I did start the Will process quite a long time ago but what with work being busy and the solicitor going off on holiday, we’ve only just now managed to go in last week and sign them so that’s one worry off my mind. 


I've had a few nice little frugal wins though (although not quite on the scale to balance the outgoings). 


The boss stumped up £20 per person to cover snacks and drinks for Euro finals night so we had pizza delivered. 


The regular savers matured so that was £100 in interest. 


Then I realised that the healthcare plan I have at work has a dental and optical component to it that I hadn't used so I quickly ruffled out my receipts for my sight tests, glasses and dental check-ups since February and put the claims through. That should pay me back about £120. My firm 'gives' us about £250 to ‘spend’ within the health plan, and you can shape different components to suit your circumstances. If it costs more than £250, you can pay extra out of your salary. I have a basic health plan, which reimburses me £60 for sight tests and £60 for dental check-ups and hygienist fees, as well private consultancies, hospital treatment if necessary for any illnesses, and complementary heaIthcare (physio, acupuncture, etc). In addition I've chosen critical illness cover to pay out a lump sum of £50,000 if I become seriously ill. That costs me £5 a month. Absolute bargain. 

                                                                            -oOo-

So, all in all, a quiet but productive week. I successfully cracked through a load of work and accomplished all but one of my goals. Tonight will tell...will I sleep or not...?

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My week of annual leave passed by all too quickly and work looms tomorrow. 

Still, I managed to get done a lot of the things I wanted too, including a trip on Thursday to David Austin's rose gardens and plant centre over near Wolverhampton. Beautiful roses and now was definitely the right time to visit, as almost every rose was in bloom. I have a ridiculous amount of photos of my favourites to pore over for ideas.




The one above is stunning - a ground cover rose called Raubritter.


This one was a lovely mauve colour with yellow centres called Blue for You. Very strong fruity scent.



And this one - Old Pink Moss - was a very close match to the rose that I found in the churchyard when scattering my mother's ashes. Again, very strong scent.

I was incredibly restrained and came away with only one rose - Blue for You.



I do intend to buy Old Pink Moss at some point. Raubritter is also a contender just for its sheer exuberance. It is ridiculously prolific - it immediately cheers me up just looking at it. David Austin does have incredibly healthy good quality roses. I've got some in the garden already. This is Gertrude Jekyll out by the back door. 






-oOo-

 
I was in Lidl's on Friday and I happened upon one of these - the £1.50 fruit and veg box. 




I'd heard about these mythical creatures on various frugal blogs but never actually seen one in the flesh. That's because I was looking in the wrong place. My local Lidl keeps them by the tills, not in the fresh produce section where I had been looking. I decided to road test one. 




Absolutely gob-smacked at the sheer amount of stuff here, especially the amount of fruit. There were  another two large potatoes that aren't in the picture because I put them to the side out of shot when unpacking. This will last us most of the week. I already had a cauliflower in the fridge so today I'm going to use all of it up by doing a large dish of cauliflower in white sauce. I'll freeze half and the rest will be for dinner tonight to go with a lamb casserole I made yesterday. I've also got a vegetable lasagne to do for the freezer to use up some aging veg so I might lose the aubergine in there, perhaps slice it up and use it to replace some of the pasta sheets. 

-oOo-

After my last post Maria asked me about the gluten free cake recipe I used. 


It’s a basic mix that I used for non-gluten free Victoria Sponge cakes but I swopped in Doves Farm self-raising flour and made up only about a quarter of what I normally do, so only 2-3oz of butter, sugar and flour, 1 egg, bit of baking powder and vanilla essence, 1oz of flour for ground almonds and the fruit sliced on top. I gleaned from the internet that the key to gluten free baking is to make it a bit wetter than you think you should so I thought in this case the fruit would add the needed liquid as it cooked down. However, it seemed to make a very damp cake and while very tasty it was thin and fell apart easily. I decided to go back and do it again, this time doubling the amount of mixture to make it sturdier. In effect I was making one layer of what would have been a Victoria sponge.


I should add I also had a plan B, which I believe is essential to successful cooking. If it didn’t work I could dump it in a bowl with some cream and make it look like a deliberate effort at a dessert. 


Good that I had that plan because it didn't work 😁


Well, it sort of worked. The fruit disappeared into the depths of the cake. I see now why sponge flans were invented. 




Still tasted lovely but I may not worry about trying to perfect this. I think this is a case of how fruit behaves in a sponge unless the sponge is baked first and you add the fruit later (i.e. a flan). 


-oOo-


I was heavily focused on financial stuff this weekend. I've worked out that to retire at 55 (in seven years) I need to have a minimum of £350,000 and we're already a good part of the way there, which is encouraging. I used Guiide and Firecalc for the basic calculations, which showed me that £350000 will give me a 91% chance of retiring without running out of money. For a 98% chance of never running out of money I need £400,000. Up until last month I couldn't see how it was possible to build this because we needed the money we had saved to cover the shortfall between Martin's former salary and current pension income. However, a combination of my recent pay increase, Martin no longer having work expenses and our reduced spending has shown me that actually it is possible. This month we are on track to pay all of the bills without touching any of our savings. Every month that the savings stay the same or increase brings my retirement that little bit closer. 


I've not included everything in the figures. Inheritances are excluded, even those we have been told we should get later this year, as to me that is an added bonus. Until that money lands in our bank account it isn't real. I have also ignored the house equity, keeping that 'in reserve'. The plan is that sooner or later Martin and I are going to downsize - perhaps 7-10 years - at which point the remainder of the mortgage will be paid off and we will have some extra cash in the bank for our retirement. If it all goes wrong over the next few years, if the markets take a heavy downturn and take years to recover, if I become ill and can't work or lose my job and can't find another, then there is always that to fall back on.

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I've been meaning to do an update on where I am with some of the goals I mentioned in this post. (I haven't updated on our financial/retirement goals for a long time because we've been at that really boring stage where nothing really interesting happens, just the numbers go up slowly and steadily. However, I will be updating you in the next few weeks because things are going to be a bit exciting soon. I shall say no more!)


Art - ended up expressing myself creatively in a different way to painting - sewing! I haven't done anything with the sewing machine for a couple of years then suddenly I had an urge to pick up the fabric one Sunday evening and make myself a couple of face masks. Can't believe I actually did it instead of making excuses, as I have done every week since last year's lockdown! 



Striking while the iron was hot, I decided to make a plastic bag holder with a gorgeous Emma Bridgewater tea towel I was given. I knew I would never use it as a tea towel, as it was too nice to ruin, but wanted to see it every day. The tea towel was already seamed so all I had to do was sew the long edges together and then thread some elastic through the bottom seam. It already had a hanging loop on it.



Because of these two projects, I've slightly adapted this goal to include anything crafty, and this month I have a goal to make a new cover for my buckwheat hull pillow. It's 20 years old and has holes, but is a vital for me to comfortably sleep so I will find a suitable fabric from my stash, use the old cover as a template and reuse the zip. 


Also, I found myself a free art history course to do - History of Art and Western Civilisation - over at the Smarthistory.org site but I haven't started it as I keep being side-tracked. I'm only really interested in the Renaissance and Pre-Raphaelite period, but some of the other historical periods (particularly Egypt) look so interesting I might go through those as well.


The Gothic - After my last post I had a good clear out of my wardrobe, getting rid of anything that didn't 'spark joy'  and went on a hunt for some basic additions to my wardrobe. This is rare for me. I hate a) shopping and b) paying full price for anything 😊 I found only one item I liked but unfortunately it was so poorly made I sent it straight back when it arrived.


Cheap sweatshop clothes made of thin, shiny unflattering material. I'm not sure what I thought it would be made of when I ordered it but lesson learned. I'm back to square one. I'd like find something made of a reasonable-weight cotton or jersey that is sustainably produced and isn't so thin it shows my underwear. It's actually a really tall order.


When I started looking at other aspects of how I dress I realised I have been hiding parts of myself because I don't want to have to deal with other people's silly comments. For example, I like strong, dark coloured nail polishes and winged eyeliner but don't often wear them as they can attract somewhat negative attention. So, last month I ordered a couple of nail polishes - black and petrol blue - and a liquid eyeliner for myself and have started wearing them. I've only had one person comment during a meeting to say I was doing so well to get dressed nicely and do my make-up and nails every day. It was a genuine compliment and made me feel good. 


Jigsaw puzzles - actually managed to get three done in the last month and am on to my fourth. 





Martin made me a jigsaw table for Christmas using the base of an vintage ironwork garden table that the previous owners left behind. He made it so it can sit flat or at various angles and is just the right size for a standard sized 1000 piece puzzle. This is it at the highest angle but I rarely have it up that high, it's usually only about 3-4 standard books high.



Reading - I manage to read five books in January.

Wedlock, How Georgian Britain's Worst Husband Met his Match by Wendy Moore
A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens (better late than never!)
Can't Hurt Me by Dave Goggins
The Sixth Extinction: An Unnatural History by Elizabeth Kolbert
Zero Waste Home by Bea Johnson

I'm happy with that!


Exercise - some good and bad here. Managed 300 crunchies for 24 days, then my birthday happened. I didn't do any that day as my brain talked me out of it, and then the curry and alcohol that night upset my system for days. In the last seven days of the month I did a grand total of 200 crunchies. Oops!Bit of a fail there.


Still, in January I completed 7,400 crunchies, walked/ran 68km and did 27km on the exercise bike (last two days of the month; Martin bought a secondhand one for my birthday and I finally got it set up). I also managed 4 sessions of bodyweight circuits and 3 yoga sessions. I lost 4lbs in weight, no longer have a bad back and my posture has improved. 


Something definitely to be said for strengthening your core!
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Cold and snowy here this morning, although it doesn't stop the cats, who have been shooting in and out since 7:30am. Sometimes I wish I had the zest for life that they do!

So I went to Morrisons early one morning to do the weekly shop and endeavour to practice some zero waste principles. It wasn’t that easy this week it has to be said; a lot of what I bought had packaging because there was an absence of anything else to buy that had little or no packaging. For example, I buy Knorr stock pots, which come in small plastic pots, because they are gluten free and have recyclable packaging. I’d like to hunt down a large bottle of concentrated stock or find a gluten-free stock cube that has compostable packaging and not foil. Using my own homemade stock is fine for recipes requiring large volumes of liquid, but not for adding concentrated flavour in dishes like chilli or bolognese.

I did make several good decisions that I'm pleased with. I put back two organic chickens that were half price and going out of date. I put them in my basket but realised as I was walking round that I already had a whole chicken, two chicken crowns and a roasted chicken in the freezer, and I was just buying them because they were a bargain not because I needed them. That was £12 saved.

Martin asked me to get some flowers for Audrey’s birthday, which I did and I made sure they were in paper wrap not plastic, however, that decision bought its own issues - the price label was not peel off and tore the packaging. 

I bought bacon from the butcher’s counter instead of off the shelf like I usually do but I had stopped short of taking my own containers as I felt too self-conscious about doing it. I knew that I could wash reuse the thin plastic bag a few times but I could not reuse the plastic container that comes from the pre-packaged stuff on the shelf.



Audrey had asked me to buy some individual creme caramel’s for her but for the second week running Morrison’s had run out. I realised I had a packet of make from scratch caramel in the cupboard and thought I could make them up into individual pots (paper inner bag and a carboard outer packet). However, I lacked small containers at home to do them so I made the conscious decision to buy six small plastic storage containers with lids so I could make a pint of caramel and then dispense it into individual pots. Yes, I bought plastic but it is highly reusable and stops 6 individual pots going out the door each week. I may have to buy more as Martin often has individual trifles as well, and that's another 6-7 pots a week out the door. Give him a whole trifle and he will eat it - at one sitting  - so I will try and make up some individual ones for him too. 


We had roast lamb (all of the ingredients out of the freezer and fridge) for Audrey’s birthday and Martin asked me to pick up a Pavlova and a birthday cake. I decided to make them both myself. The pavlova was very easy, I had eggs from my chickens, sugar/ cornflour/vanilla extract in the cupboard and bags of frozen pre-prepared summer fruits in the freezer. The only thing I had to buy was whipping cream which of course has a plastic pot, but those pots are quite a convenient 9-inch size and I often keep them do use for seed pots. I used a Hairy Biker's recipe for the base, and it was lovely.


The cake was a different matter. OMG, the icing! I forgot how hard it is to do writing! I had all the ingredients to make up a Victoria sponge in the cupboard but I didn't have, and what I ended up buying, was marzipan and soft icing for the cover, and edible flowers and icing paste for the decoration. Of course those have got their individual packaging too. I had a complete brain failure in front of the shelves and ended up buying the lot. I could not remember how to make up a thick enough paste to do the icing, whether or not I had the colouring for the writing, and where on earth my icing kit was. It’s been that long since I’ve done any icing at all! I was standing there, blocking up the aisle, lost in thought so decided to just get those items on this occasion before I was on the receiving end of any more dirty looks and tutting from masked shoppers. 

But, in reality I’m not going to need to make proper occasion cakes that often as we only generally tend to have iced cakes on our birthdays and Christmas, so a maximum of, say, five cakes a year. This is one of those scenarios when buying a cake may be more zero-waste than making one, and something to consider in the future. It won't be as personal though, which perhaps is more important. 

I was very pleased to only put out one bag of recycling this week, although before I could get a picture the local litter womblers picked up all the recyclable litter from the neighbouring lanes and placed the bags outside on my drive for the dustman as they went past! So everyone walking would have thought I had THREE bags of waste. The Womblers normally put a printed group 'Womble' sticker on them so the dustman know they are not someone's personal rubbish but these bags didn't have a sticker. 

Oh, how I gnashed my teeth when I saw that!

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So, I'm getting close to fever pitch at the moment.

I always thought I'd thrive if I was put into a situation where I couldn't go anywhere, as long as I had my books. Well I have my books - and much more besides - and I'm not ok. I didn't realise how much I needed useful revenue-generating work.

Since being furloughed I've worked hard to keep active, even going so far as to put together a schedule for myself, but the uncertainty surrounding whether I will have a paying job or not at the end of all of this is weighing me down. I'm sleeping badly so every 2-3 days I resort to taking a pill just to get some rest and allow my body to repair itself, although it usually means I'm a bit too sleepy the next day to do anything worthwhile. I'm having to carefully plan any big jobs to coincide with the point where I am rested and awake.

There's another aspect to furlough that people don't really talk about, and that's the rejection and loss of self-esteem. You think you are a necessary part of the team until furloughed, and then you realise that you have been classed 'a non-essential worker'. It feels like a slap in the face. In fact, I feel exactly as I did when I was made redundant in 2013: unnecessary. I'm not someone who deals well with being considered unnecessary. What makes it a bit worse is I know that my firm is ok money-wise, with plenty of reserves on the bank, so this was just to grab some free money. Three people have handed in their notice since and two have already gone. I wonder if the management will ever grasp the damage they have done.

Anyway, that's how my week has been. Don't get me wrong, I've been keeping my mouth firmly shut and ploughing on ahead with things round here. Being furloughed on full pay is a gift. It's just that bloody word (and its synonyms) going round and round my head: unnecessary (unneeded, pointless...).

Right, moan over. Shut yer face, Sarah.

So, we're cleaning up the 'building site' at the back of the barns.


We've not been successful trying to get rid of the 3,000+ bricks to anyone so we've been skipping them. I decided to bite the bullet and just turf them out. We've been here four years in July and enough is enough. Once clear, I'll be siting a greenhouse down there, as it is a wonderful warm spot next to a wall that gets the sunshine most of the day and I can grow lots more tomatoes for pasta sauces.

Talking of tomatoes, I ordered some tomato plants from a local nursery that was doing a lockdown special delivery service for people in my postcode so I managed to get eight + growbags: six for the mini greenhouse and two for hanging pots.






The hanging pot I got from a charity shop for £2, along with a couple of retractable pulleys (also £2) for easy watering.


I was delighted to find someone had stuffed two brand new hanging pouches in the growbag box when I opened it up so I shall be finding some plug plants to go in those this year.


I decided to plant up some heavily sprouted Tyson potatoes, left over from our last sack, in the pig pen, as it has lovely friable fertilised soil thanks to the efforts of our last two pigs.







I've also planted another pear tree and blackcurrant bush that I bought way back last summer and gave my blueberry a good water and feed. I was annoyed to find my two cranberries didn't make it through the winter. They were completely dead with rotted roots so I've yanked those out.

Finally, I have a few self-seeded gooseberry bushes, a tayberry and a loganberry still to plant up, but not today. Today it has been raining and it was really needed. Loving the sunshine and all, but it felt weird to be watering dry pots every day in mid-April 😁




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So, I didn't quite make it. I managed to make it through Viking Britain but by 10:30pm last night I still had 300 pages of Volume 3 of War and Peace to go. It would have taken me another 3-4 hours to complete so I decided to call it a day and read the rest over the next couple of days.

So, how did it go?

Viking Britain by Thomas Williams
This was a very good and dense read. Viking history is always something that has been on the periphery of my interest in early British History. I've always had more interest in the Iron Age, particularly the Roman occupation era, as we made massive strides in food production due to all the new varieties of fruit and veg brought over by them. I hadn't appreciated until I read this book just how entwined our history is with the Vikings and how they changed us. This took me a massive 8hrs and 5mins to read, mainly because I kept stopping over words and how to pronounce them plus making notes. I've found some interesting info that I want to explore, like the fact that my home town in London was the scene of a battle between the Anglo-Saxons and Vikings. Also, Lincolnshire has some interesting Viking history that could warrant a few days out to explore. Overall, a good thought-provoking read.

War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy
After the first couple of volumes I had almost lost the will to live. I was just not feeling inspired or interested in what was going on. That's a bad sign for me. I have to be interested in what I am reading. However, because of the challenge I ploughed on and I'm glad I did. The third book has been great so far. Very exciting and I'm looking forward to completing it. I can see what Tolstoy is leaning towards as the story unfolds - the characters develop, change, find their purpose, do away with fanciful things and embrace greater self-knowledge and mastery over their former selves. His characters struggle with what they think they should do compared to what they want to do. Nice to see that is an age-old struggle. He was a bit of a self-improvement junkie was old Tolstoy 😁


I can confidently say that had I not set myself such a big challenge I wouldn't have come as far as I did. I'm not a great fan of SMART goals (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Time-bound). If I know I can achieve them I don't want to do them - where's the challenge? 😁 I could have set myself the goal of reading War and Peace in seven days, but I knew I would accomplish that no problem at all. I needed something to really stretch me and 7 books in 7 days did. It also taught me a lot.

1. Never judge a book by its cover.
I had firmly held beliefs about what The Handmaid's Take, Pet Sematary and The Book Thief would be about. I was completely wrong. I've realised I'm too judgemental and too quick to jump to conclusions, and not just about books.

2. I spend too long on the internet.
Most of my reading had to be done interspersed with work, and to fit everything in something had to give, which was the internet. I'm pretty shocked at how long I spend on the internet in the evening.

3. I can focus better when under time pressure
Work expands to fill the time available. I knew that but still I was surprised at how much I could get done in 30 minute and 60 minute spurts. Setting my phone alarm stopped my mind from buzzing, something I'm still not sure why would happen, and my focus was laser-like. I know some people practice this type of time-chunking (the Pomodoro technique is an example) but until this challenge I hadn't appreciated its power.

4. I can't speed read a non-fiction book.
Viking Britain showed me that something with lots of facts needs more careful consideration. I need to understand what was written in the context of what I already know, or in some cases what I think I know but am wrong about.

5. Keep going. You never know what is around the corner
In the past I would never have persevered with a book I didn't enjoy in the way this challenge made me do with War and Peace but I'm glad I did. I could never have guessed the third book would be so good. Lesson learned.



I've thoroughly enjoyed this challenge. Martin likewise with his. He completed his challenge at 11:58pm last night. He built the plane he wanted, from scratch out of balsa wood and plans, tested it around 4pm yesterday to make sure it flew (which it did, brilliantly) and then covered it with white film. At some point he'll put some more detailing on the wings to jazz it up a bit but considering this was a large sheet of paper and rectangles of balsa last Tuesday afternoon he has achieved something fantastic.

We've already decided to do another challenge, perhaps next month. This time mine will be something crafty.
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Well, the stack of read books has got higher.

Just to recap, the '7 books in 7 days challenge' started last Tuesday and ends at midnight tonight, during which time I have to complete seven books.

At the time of my last update I had completed three books and was about to start book 4. So how has it gone? Pretty well. I've completed five books and am currently reading my last two.

Pet Sematary by Stephen King
Again, I had an idea in my head what Pet Sematary would be about - and I was completely wrong 😁
By the way, the spelling is deliberate - in the book the burial ground was named by local children and that's how they thought Cemetery was spelt. The plot worked out completely different to how I thought it would. Overall it was a good book, however, unlike 'Salem's Lot', which I read between Christmas and New Year, I wouldn't read this one again. Now I know the twist, I can't forget it. I also thought the book shouldn't have ended where it did. It needed to go on. It took me 4hrs and 26 mins to read.

The Martian by Andy Weir
Having seen the film I knew how the book would go, and it was almost exactly the same. A bit more technical stuff and a big bit had been altered in the film, quite a technical bit, so presumably that was to aid understanding for the audience. There's only so much science stuff you can introduce in one go to a non-scientific audience. I really enjoyed it and finished it in 5hrs and 3 mins. It took longer as I stopped every now and then and read back on some of the technical stuff as it was being explained. I will probably go back and read it again at some point.


Where am I now?
On Saturday I started War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy (translation by Anthony Briggs). By yesterday evening I had completed two of the three volumes in 8hrs and 50m but made a decision to read the third volume today and instead begin reading Viking Britain by Thomas Williams around 8pm yesterday.



Why? Because War and Peace has been very hard going and I'm a bit tired of reading it. I've not really found it that interesting on the whole, although there have been some very nice scenes here and there where I was emotionally stirred and got into what was going on. I'm hoping it is just the translation because it feels very disjointed, and the way women are portrayed is misogynistic, which I find difficult to put up with but have to remember it was a feature of the times Tolstoy lived in. I've struggled and have fallen behind in my timings, but then it wouldn't be a challenge if it was easy. 😁

So very shortly I'm going to start reading Viking Britain again (I got about a third of the way through that in 2hrs 41m yesterday) and will complete that, have a late lunch and then it's on to the final part of the challenge - the third volume of War and Peace.


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Happy New Year everyone...and Happy New Decade too.

It was a very relaxing Christmas...no-one to entertain so much laying around watching box sets and drinking mulled wine. I love the stuff. I must be the only person I know who actually uses those little sachets of mulled wine spices that invariably turn up under the tree.

The New Year has started pretty quietly too. We excelled ourselves at work and need only nine completed claims in January to stay on course with our targets (normally it is in the high 60s). We achieved that last week 😁 so my work is a bit threadbare at the moment. Martin is likewise quiet on his delivery - Amazon has taken away its delivery business and now has a delivery department so the major rush didn't really happen before Christmas or in the New Year. No bad thing - I've never seen Martin so relaxed in the run up to Christmas in the 16 years I've known him.

All this has meant that we are both getting a little 'itchy' for something to do. I'm taking part in the 20 20s for 2020 (see my last post) on MSE so I have lots of interesting little things to do each day in 20 minute spurts. Saying that, however, I'm still feeling a bit...unchallenged, as is Martin.

That is, until he scampered into the room last night and declared he was going to build and fly a model aircraft from bare plans by next Tuesday. He said he needed something to really challenge him to blow the cobwebs away. He had everything he needed to do it and was going to start today.

His enthusiasm was so infectious I was suddenly overcome with a desire to do something as well. As one of my goals is to read 60 books this year (20 each of classic fiction, non-classic fiction and personal development/career), I thought I'd kick start the process by setting myself a '7 books in 7 days' challenge while the company is quiet and my inbox temporarily empty.

I let Martin loose in my unread collection of books and he chose the seven:



He chose War and Peace as one of them. 😱 Evil man.

So today I got up early and made a start. I selected the book that was the smallest and had a decent sized font, on the basis that I would get a quick win under my belt. That ended up as Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird.

I've always been a quick reader. I learnt that if I a) hold the book further away and b) take in 3-4 words at a time I can read faster. Most people read one word at a time. Sometimes, depending on the font and print size, if I put my finger in the middle of a line I can see the whole line in one go. I could probably read faster with proper training but I'm concerned I would sacrifice comprehension reading fiction. I did try once a few years ago - I ordered a photoreading course but the first exercise, designed to set a baseline from which I would improve, saw me achieve a score of 9/10, rather than the expected 1-2/10. I ended up sending it back. Tim Ferris has an interesting article here on how to increase your reading speed - it's quite technical but good.

Anyway, I set the timer for one hour of focused reading, interspersed with one hour of work, each one giving a different part of my brain a rest. I was reading about 75 pages an hour and it took 4hrs and 4 mins to read. I thoroughly enjoyed it. I've only ever seen the film To Kill a Mockingbird with Gregory Peck once in my life but it made a strong impression on me. This book was everything I hoped it would be and I heartily recommend it if you haven't read it.

I'm going to cook dinner shortly and then it's on to book 2: The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. I've earmarked War and Peace for the weekend - I'm going to need two full focused days for that one!


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As Christmas Day is almost upon us, I thought I would wish you all a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, and thank you all for still coming by to visit, even when I haven't been around much to post.

It's not been a great year for me, but I can see light at the end of the tunnel and am looking forward with a new sense of optimism to 2020. It's the start of a new decade, and somehow that fill me full of hope.

Today will be a quiet one, very little work is waiting for me in my inbox so I'll tidy, clean a bit and make some plans for the New Year. I'm quite liking this post on MSE; 20 things to accomplish in 2020 So I'm going to sit here and have a think about what I could do to join this challenge.


So, have a wonderful time everyone and I'll see you again soon.

xxSteelkittenxx
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I underwent a lot of quiet reflection during our holiday.

 We've been here for two years and during this time we have not made any major changes to the smallholding. The plans we had before we moved here revolved around making us as self-reliant as possible by growing our own food and producing our own energy. Smallholding, homesteading, pioneering, that has been a strong interest of mine for many years but I was having problems making it a reality here.

 At the point we went on holiday I was drifting, wanting to do more but just not. I've felt a bit like we've been flirting around the edges of smallholding. I keep animals, but only during specific months; I don't keep them year round or breed them. I grow some fruit and veg but not extensively and in any great quantity. I harvest some of the existing fruit from the trees but not in any great quantity. We have wood burners but buy in logs instead of sustainably harvesting from our own property and finding free logs. We have a funky old (probably useless) well and plenty of roof space that yields thousands of litres of rainwater and sunshine every year yet we pay full whack for mains water and electricity. 

 It took until almost the end of the holiday, nearly three weeks away from normality, for the penny to drop. Being interested in something is not being committed to it. For a long time at the old house I was interested but not committed to living well there because I never considered it my home. We bought the old house with the intention to renovate and move on within a couple of years but we got caught by the recession and ended up living there for 11. We decorated it with sale in mind, keeping colours neutral and never quite unleashing our creativity. Everything was done with The Sale in mind. I got used to being interested in how much I could make but not committed to living in the house and I brought that here with me.

There's a difference between interest and commitment. When you're interested in doing something, you do it only when it's convenient. When you're committed to something, you accept no excuses - only results.

KEN BLANCHARD
I haven't allowed myself to emotionally attach to this place, I'm still not committed to it. I'm not psychologically invested and this has translated into taking the minimal actions I need to maintain the smallholding, I haven't been putting in the daily effort needed to develop and deepen my commitment. I couldn't see it while knee deep in daily life here, I needed that time away to develop that perspective.

 So, when we got back I took a look around. I actually do love this place. The peace, quiet and space, even though I don't always find it easy to live with my MIL which, if I'm honest, has contributed to me feeling unsettled.

 I pulled out my plan for the smallholding. By now we should have: 

  • a polytunnel in the paddock
  • part of the front lawn laid to veg beds with the aim of achieving sufficiency in 90% of our fruit and veg for 5-6 months of year
  • increased the energy efficiency inside the house to the maximum possible to try and get us to an EPC rating of B of above (currently D)
  • completed some kind of resource generation activity, such as solar panels, a rainwater harvesting system or growing our own biomass to burn to achieve 50% sufficiency in energy. 

So far, all we've done is installed a new efficient boiler outside when the old indoor system became dangerous, and replaced a few halogen bulbs with LED ones when they blew. 

 I realised I couldn't make up for lost time but I could make a start. 

Over the last month I found some cheap collar boxes on ebay and have begun arranging them to create an area of raised beds to the side of the house. The small patio garden will get higher beds and more soil. 
Over the last couple of weeks I have expanded the fruit trees in the paddock with raspberries, black, red and white currants, a gooseberry and a couple of tayberry bushes in front of that. All of these either came with us or were bought last year but never planted up.

The fencing is all temporary so I can make changes if necessary, but at some point over the next 12 months permanent stock fencing and a gate will go in. At the moment the chicken pen forms one side of the section, but I'll be moving that back by a pen length and adding a fenced area for chicken scratching. 

Talking of chickens, we now have three new ladies in the chicken pen, who moved in about two weeks ago at the ripe old age of 22 weeks old. They are part of the commitment plan, as they need daily care and attention. 

Finally, solar panels. I've wanted solar power for many years, but have never been able to take that step. Obviously at the old house my lack of commitment to living there wouldn't allow me to make that jump. It's not just the upfront cost but also because you commit to a) being settled in one place for a long time and b) changing your energy usage behaviour, which includes quite close monitoring of the system. A lack of commitment doesn't go hand in hand with having solar panels. 

 MIL and I are both here during the day, and we tend to run our household electrical devices then. With solar, we could get quite close to the maximum benefit possible by running all our devices when the panels are generating electricity at the peak times during the day. In addition, there are the Feed-In Tariffs (FITs), which pay a householder with solar panels a small amount of money to generate and export their surplus energy to the grid. It's only about 9-10p a kWh but it is a handy little bit of extra money into the household and is index-linked for 20 years. However, this is coming to an end on 31st March.

 I did a few calculations, working out the theoretical return on the money from the panels being drip fed into pensions vs just putting it directly into pensions, and while the panels just nosed ahead they had the added psychological benefit of the satisfaction from producing part of the energy we consume and lowering our bills. How much they lower our bills by is down to us and our consumption habits.

 I took a deep breath, did some ringing round and quote gathering and a few days ago we placed an order for a 6kWp system for the south-facing roof of the barns. We're aiming to reduce our electricity bill by 50% through a combination of using what we generate, changing our consumption habits and the FITs. In addition, we decided to have an iBoost fitted to our immersion heater, which is a diverter system that directs a small amount of surplus electricity to our water tank to heat it instead of the boiler firing up. So we estimate that for six months of the year our boiler probably won't be firing at all, which will help lower our annual oil bill. 

So, the solar panels team is coming next week to put the panels up and by next weekend we will be generating some of own power. It's only a small step, but psychologically it feels like the biggest one to date because of the mindset shift that comes with it.

 This smallholding is my home and I am committed to it. 

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