January
Posted: Tue 13 January, 2015 Filed under: Domestic, Driving, Festering Season, Finances, Getting Organised, Thoughts Leave a comment »Financially, January for me is always a bit of an odd one – mainly through being slightly disorganised, but slightly through the whole ‘working as a contractor’ thing.
For a number of reasons, January has a number of extra expenses in it that are a pain in the arse. High among those extras is the car MOT/service, and car-tax/road-tax renewal, which come in as well as the usual monthly bills. Additionally, a couple of utility bills come in within that time as well – quarterly billing being the shit-head bastard it is – which also adds to it.
And of course December is always a short month (i.e. I don’t work the full month, because it’s got a bundle of Bank Holidays and so on around the Festering Season) so unless I work the bit between Christmas and New Year, it all becomes a bit tight anyway.
All combines, it just makes January a bit interesting. Doable, but interesting.
The car MOT is booked in for this time next week. I’ve already had to buy two new tyres – I know they’re borderline OK, but that means it’s time to replace them, I’m not risking an MOT fail and having to buy them from the garage! – and also a new headlight bulb, as that went while I was driving last week.
So yeah, it’s all a bit interesting, but still fine and dandy. Life could be worse, frankly.
Bah Humbug, and all that
Posted: Thu 25 December, 2014 Filed under: D4D™, Festering Season 1 Comment »
Yes! It’s here!
It’s Christmas Day, which means that by the end of the day all the Christmas tat will be over and done with. Happy, happy day.
I’m offline for the day, so have a good one, whatever you’re up to.
Worryingly Organised
Posted: Wed 24 December, 2014 Filed under: Animals, Domestic, Festering Season, Getting Organised, Shopping 1 Comment »At the moment, along with being quite chilled and content with things (as written about previously) I’m also feeling quite organised – far more so than is common at this time of the year.
With the exception of one present that hasn’t arrived (despite being ordered on the 3rd) it’s all been pretty easy this year. Of course, it helps that I don’t buy stuff for loads of people and all that, but even so it’s all come together and been organised way in advance. By mid-month I didn’t need to buy any more presents – things had suddenly come together for the two more-awkward-to-buy-for people through odd confluences of coincidence, none of which I was complaining about at all.
I’ve managed to avoid all the festive retail bullshit – some of which was due to being organised, some due to the absolute joy of online shopping and letting the stuff come to me – although I did have to make one collection from a local food store. (Mind you, even that was organised to happen between 7 and 8am, enabling me to go in, collect, pay, and piss off without the hysteria of other people’s panic-purchasing) The rest of the supermarket food shop was done online and delivered painlessly – although working from home has helped on that score too, enabling me to be available when I’d usually be at work.
I’ve even got a number of things organised for next year – even down to having pre-booked the necessary parking requirements, as well as pet-sitter/feeder and the like.
It’s really quite worrying – things aren’t supposed to run this smoothly! But I’m going to appreciate it for the moment, and all well and good.
Knackers
Posted: Tue 23 December, 2014 Filed under: Advertising, Charm School, Festering Season, News, People Leave a comment »Among the things that have amused me today, the image on this BBC story about German Christmas Markets made me chuckle.
After all, how many times do you get to see the word “Knacker” on the BBC? And particularly in connection to the whole Festering Season…
Knackers to German Christmas Markets
It probably says a lot about my mindset that it was the word ‘Knacker’ that I noticed first out of the entire thing…
Christmas Cheer
Posted: Sat 20 December, 2014 Filed under: Creativity, Cynicism, Festering Season, Media, People, Thoughts Leave a comment »As always in the run-up to the Festering Season, the BBC is currently promoting the Eastenders Christmas Day special.
I don’t watch soaps, haven’t in years, and I really don’t get the appeal of them in general. But even in that sector, I truly don’t understand why so many people keep on watching Eastenders. It’s such an unremittingly depressing programme, one where nothing has a truly positive outcome. Even happy occasions – births, marriages etc. – have to have a downside, a negative touch. (Who’s the father? Who’s had an affair? What other explosion of emotion will happen?)
Christmas is, as always, the worst of all. There’s apparently going to be someone effectively going through the throes of a breakdown, so on Christmas Day there’ll be millions of people watching this whole thing of someone’s life collapsing around them.
Maybe it’s about making people feel better about their own lives – that no matter how bad they get, the people on Eastenders are suffering worse. I don’t know. But it’s a mindset that I simply can’t get my head around.
Decorative – the Exception
Posted: Thu 18 December, 2014 Filed under: Cynicism, Domestic, Festering Season Leave a comment »Of course, following on from my post yesterday morning about Christmas house decorations being more tolerable this year, I came across this twinkling monstrosity during my evening walk in the village.
I’d take it all back, but actually this one – from what I’ve seen – is more the exception than the rule this year…
