Posh Mosh

There’s nothing quite as magical as live music on a summer evening.

Glastonbury would have been grand - especially on the one year it didn’t rain - but that would have meant pre-planning and a level of organisation that neither Kevin nor I are capable of, so...

We hit the Scottish Proms instead.

Free tickets (always a bonus for the recovering shopaholic on a budget) and two fabulous friends to go with were all we needed for the perfect evening.

Okay, so it’s not quite as rock n’ roll as Glasto but we had balloons, flags and even a fainting female as we danced around in the standing area, or ‘mosh pit’ as Kevin kept calling it.

We must be getting old if we think that’s a mosh pit. Maybe next time we could persuade the conductor to crowd surf.

Cars, Cuts & Colleagues

My new job - which I'm loving - has been keeping me fairly busy over the last couple of weeks, hence the lack of blogging.

The main focus of my busy-ness has been an overwhelming obsession with my commute and how to precisely time my entry onto the motorway roadworks (scattered with signs proudly announcing their completion in 2011), so I can soar through with a maximum of speed and a minimum of swearing.

So far, there has been very little in the way of speed and a marked increase in words that I would never say in front of my mother.

But when I took the job, I knew the commute was going to be bad.

What I hadn't banked on was today's budget announcement, which startled me so much I almost swallowed my own tongue! I am one of those unfortunate souls who not only works in the public sector, but also happens to buy things and with VAT hitting 20%, that hurts!

By a fabulous stroke of luck though, one of my colleagues lives nearby and as of today we've decided to thumb our noses at the budget, and cut our costs by entering the realm of the car sharing commuter.

Let's just hope there isn't a tax on that too...

Hey Small Spender

One week on from my promise to control my cash flow and, so far, my £5 a day rule is working rather well.

The money from cashing in my Premium Bonds has been put towards a credit card debt and I even managed to sell something on Ebay for more than twenty pounds, which has to be a record for me.

During my year of not shopping I sold a jacket on Ebay and failed to take into account the fact that the buyer was overseas. She got a complete bargain at 99p and I ended up six pounds out of pocket to cover the postage.

Anyway, this week’s only weakness was forgetting I had committed to a work’s night out, but as the meal came to just £15 a head and I’d been carrying the same crisp fiver in my wallet for three days without breaking into it, the evening still fell within budget and I was able to enjoy my grub guilt free.

And it seems I’m not the only one to be curbing my cash withdrawals to a minimum.

HSBC and Barclays have said that their cash machines will soon be issuing £5 notes again to help credit crunch hit customers manage their money.

Let’s hope more banks follow suit and start listening to their customers’ needs again.