fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #2756 ]

⌈ Secret Post #2756 ⌋

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I tried saving money. It didn't work so well.

I have a four-week work placement starting on Tuesday (well, technically it started last Monday, but since I was getting teeth removed last Tuesday I'm actually starting on Tuesday instead). I had to go and buy clothes in order to comply with their uniform policy, which wiped out what I'd managed to save.

Went shopping with my mum on Friday. My turn to pay. Arrived at the shop a little late and she'd already started filling the trolley. Fuuuuck. She does not keep a running total on her phone's calculator, and it was too late to start, so I had no idea how much it was until it had all been rung up. Nearly £100...

I now have £30 left. I have to sign on tomorrow, and then I have this work placement with shifts from Tuesday through to Saturday. That's six separate all-day bus fares. At £4.20 each that comes out to £25.20. Then I'll have another sign-on next Monday, and the second week of the work placement. I won't get more money in my bank until 31/07. Assuming I need to catch the bus on all but Sunday, that's 10 bus fares needed, £42, with only £30 available to me.

Looks like I'm doing six-hour shifts with no means of getting food. Yay. That or taking a 1hr hike home at 8/9pm.

If your mother started filling the basket before you arrived, you should either have made her pay or put it back and started again. She can pile it high on her turn, on your turn she needs to wait and go with your choices.

Was it food she was buying? Do you have food at home? Could you pack a lunch?

Frozen food to fill the freezer with. Ready meals and stuff like that.

Could you heat up a ready meal and pack it?

Not really. All the ones I like are chicken, and in this current weather...

Invest in an insulated lunch bag and some reusable ice packs--i'd assume the work placement has somewhere to store lunch bags. If they have a fridge you might not need the ice packs. And if there's a microwave, you can heat it up at work. Obviously, you don't have the money for it now, but when you do get some funds...then you'd have it for future placements as well.

Also, if you can eat it (and you're not working at a nut sensitive work site), why not take peanut butter sandwiches? Unless its sitting out in the hot sun, it won't go bad. Its not fancy but beats going without lunch.

All of the actual staff have lockers, but there are none leftover for work placement drones. As the area where we're expected to leave our bags is easy for anyone to access (through an unmonitored door and then through a code-locked door whose code is written on a whiteboard next to it), I won't even be taking my cheap phone with me.

No microwave in the break room, nor a fridge for storing things. Just a kettle and some doorless cupboards.

Well, as long as it won't be out for more than 12-16 hours, you should be fine to eat it anyway (in that even meat won't spoil that fast if you pack it up nicely - possible exception being fish).

Does your workplace have a microwave, or do you have access to one nearby? If so, then just take a ready-meal, don't even bother unfreezing it. If not, then just prepare it, wrap it up tightly, pack it up, and take it with you. If you wrap it just right, you'd be surprised at how long a certain temperature can last. If you need it to keep the heat, then just heat it up as much as you can without overcooking it, then wrap it in multiple, alternating layer of tin foil and plastic wrap. I've done this and still had somewhat warm food nearly six hours later (though it took 8 layers of wrapping, so I usually don't do it if I will have a way to heat it up at work).

Edited (Forgot a sentence, whoops.) 2014-07-21 01:10 (UTC)

Maybe you could budget a set amount for the grocery contribution. This whole "taking turns to pay" thing sounds like a nice idea on paper, but unless you're buying the exact same things in the exact same amounts every week, it's bound to backfire.

Usually it's only £50 at most, which is usually sufficient to top off the freezer. We'd not been shopping, not properly, in over a month however, and that trolley load needed to feed my dad and brother for a week and me for nearly three (they're going camping for 10 days on Saturday).

It's a good thing my brother was out on his work placement, else he'd have wanted to come along and his presence always adds to the bill.

How about instead of week to week turns, each week you both pay half of the total grocery bill? It would make things a bit fairer for both of you, I'd think.

When it's my turn to pay it's usually in the middle/latter half of the month, when she's run out of money to do anything with. Her and my dad's pay comes at the start of the month, and between bills and whatever vehicular or veterinary mishap happens that month, the money soon gets eaten up.

This month it was a £700 bill to make one of the cars legally roadworthy after it failed its annual roadworthiness test. Last month it was £400 in vet visits, x-rays and drugs for a dog with lungworm. I'm hoping that next month is better, that all three of the cars keep working properly (well, once the Freelander is actually fixed again) and the dogs don't have anything happen to them.

Sounds like you enjoy a challenge. Weird.

And did you tell your mom about this? Or did you tell her you don't have the money to foot a £100 grocery bill?

I pointed out how little I had left to her afterwards, but as I'd already agreed to pay that day I didn't feel like I could back down from it. Especially not in the middle of a busy shop with people looking on if she wanted to make a scene about it.

Honestly? You need to stop being a push over, and make sure you budget your transportation costs and don't dip into that no matter what. It's more important for you to get to work so you can make more money.

My advice? Get the hell out of that house as soon as you can.

This. This situation seems a bit screwy, especially if the mother isn't open to negotiating rather than just filling up the trolley on someone else's dime.

Every time this user posts about her family, it's always seems to be about how her family is taking advantage of her money. It's kind of depressing.

This is always easier said than done. I know someone whose family has a similar living situation. Everyone still lives at home and paychecks go towards the family for things like food and paying off debt. And that's the problem. The debt. Without the extra paychecks they'd be screwed. Even if the debt isn't their fault, it's difficult to leave your family in a tough spot. Not saying OP's situation is the same, but that it's not always easy to do.

[ SECRET POST #2756 ]

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