Thursday 20 Jan 2001

What a beautiful walk to work today. Bright blue sky, but very cold. I didn't even take my gloves off this morning which is unusual for me - my hands can get quite hot on the 30 minute up hill walk.

I had to stop at Sainsbury's on the way, so left about 10 minutes early. The cats are eating me out of house and home and I had to get them some dry food. I have a feeling that Boris, John and one other of Lydia's cats are coming in to help themselves at night. I shall have to make sure that there is little wet food left down at night as it is more expensive, whereas dry food is relatively cheap. Alternatively, I'll ask Lydia for a pack of dry food from time to time. As I am already looking after 2 of her cats and she gives me a pack of wet food once a week (when she remembers :-) ). Also, Victor, my own big cat, likes the Sainsbury's chicken roll slices - which I tend to have in my sandwiches. In fact he prefers these chicken slices to almost anything else, so they were also on my shopping list.

Milk. What are your opinions on milk? Milk is made to encourage the healthy growth of babies, whether they are human or other mammals. Should we as full grown adults continue to use milk? It has been suggested that the continuation of milk use has been one of the factors for the increase of cancerous tumours. Many people have very small benign lumps, me included, which can turn cancerous and grow as a result of the continued consumption of milk. I haven't read any statistics (I should do that!), but it would be interesting to know if any indepth studies have taken place and a maximum intake of milk has been set. I cut out all dairy products from my diet a while back and I certainly noticed a difference in how I 'felt'. I lost weight and didn't get bloated at the end of the day. Unfortunately, the alternatives - I chose soya - are quite expensive by comparison and as I am on an extremely tight budget at the moment, I have gone back to standard dairy products.

I also cut out wheat from my diet and combining that with dairy alternatives I lost a stone (14 pounds) without really working at it. My weight has crept up again over the last 2 years. I know this works for me and can't wait to get back to it, when the income allows.

Because I don't work on Wednesday, Thursday tends to be a day of catching up and today has been no exception. So by 12.30-ish, I was back to doing the next task. The stationery orders always take a while because I need to ring the 3 suppliers I use regularly to see who can do what at the best price. It's quite time consuming and I have others things that need to be done. I finally received 2 quotes for the items I needed and naturally went for the one where most items were cheaper and those that weren't were reduced to reflect the other quote! So I saved about 50%, not bad for 45 minutes work!

By the end of the working day I was completely shattered. As soon as the cleaner, Keith, turned up I was off. That doesn't happen very often. it usually takes me 10-15 minutes to get out of the building.

Getting started, pensions and jobs

Hello and welcome to my first post. I've been blogging for some time, but this is related to one of my part time jobs. The website is http://www.walkbristol.co.uk/ and the blog is here http://walkbristolramblings.blogspot.com/. I hope the standard will improve over the months AND that I will have something interesting to say. Let me know if I'm just rambling and not saying anything new. I will just be talking about the things I do, the jobs I apply for, the epiphanies (if any) resulting from the OU degree I've just started. Don't be shy! I'd love to receive your comments - good or bad (although any abuse will be instantly deleted), and any questions you have about anything I will try to answer in my own inimitable way.

I had a visit today by my nice young financial advisor to talk further about a pension, I shall be getting a letter to download and sign tomorrow to transfer all the funds from one scheme to a pension scheme! I really can't get to grips with the fact that I will have to retire one day and need to make sure that I have some income, especially if there is no State Pension available by the time I get there.

I also applied for a job the other day! it is at a new Holiday Inn that is opening in March. I've a read receipt for the email I sent with a current CV, but that's all, so far. I'll let you know when I hear any more.