Tag: banking

Posted on
by

Walking has been the main non-work activity of late:

  • Circuit of Shipley Country Park – 3 miles. Chilly, although little snow on the ground. Some parts of the water table were making a break for the surface, resulting in mud.
  • Matlock to Clay Cross (specifically, to the pub if it were open) – 7.5 miles. Snowy and icy, although I managed to keep upright. Exciting bits included a peregrine falcon munching on some sort of rodent, and icy roads where the surface was still frozen but underneath had thawed so flowing water underneath was visible. Less exciting bits were fields where both the snow and ice had melted, resulting in liquid mud.

In annoying news, Natwest Group (and therefore Royal Bank of Scotland t/a Childs) are migrating over to Mastercard. I’d opened the curent account on the basis that I like to keep both systems on hand in case of outages and I already had enough Mastercards, both debit and credit. My existing Visa cards with HSBC were shortly going to migrate to Mastercard (well, when they were not letting them expire and closing them down), so the move to RBS kept that avenue open. I’m not going to change account again, so I’ll probably give it a few months and open a Barclaycard to keep the Visa route open.

I sent the Pinephone to a good home. I’m told that the replacement screen is now fitted and functioning fine. I was contemplating offloading the Pinebook due to its separate ongoing issues, but I’ve noticed another OS distribution that may or may not have less faults, so I’ll give that a go at some point.

Not much else to say really. Work, offy and bed have been the routine for far too long now.

Posted on
by
  • You know how I mentioned about the free money piss-take in Episode 25-38? Guess who isn’t coming back now that the gib-me-dats are finishing‽
  • Autumn is approaching. The central heating is starting to kick in in the mornings, and as a Norfern Munkey, I don’t keep it set very high. So, yeah: chilly.
  • Some interesting beers are coming up at the pub. I may need to travel in on bus/rail, or take a growler, to have a go.
    • No, I don’t use Untapdd. Those particular beers aren’t on the brewery website.
  •  Ha, look what showed up:

    Child & Co branded bank card, cropped for obvious reasons
    Child & Co branded bank card, cropped for obvious reasons

Posted on
by
  • In another round of “throw some shit and see what sticks”, the pub now has to close at 22:00. As well as robbing me of a couple of hours of wage a week, it won’t make any difference to the pox. Particularly if everyone is milling the streets looking for taxis at the same time, it may encourage take-up. Maybe that’s what the Government wants so they can bump off a few pensioners/benefit claimers and save a few quid. Cynical me, no?
  • Took a day trip out to Newark. The usual round of Castle Barge, Just Beer, Prince Rupert, Just Beer again, and the Arse Doctor. Richard introduced me to the concept of beer cocktails, learnt from the landlady of the Trafalgar Bay in York. One of these was the ‘Black Forest Gateaux’ – consisting of one part Samuel Smith Chocolate Stout and one part Samuel Smith Cherry Beer. We clocked that Just Beer stocked the Chocolate Stout and made a subsitution of Lindeman’s Kriek for the cherry component. Works extremely well.
  • The Derby car club electric cars, which were of the Renault Zoe variety, have been replaced with new BMW i3 models. They have the benefit of a greater range (160-200 miles compared to the 60-80 miles of the Renault); but the interiors are made of the world’s cheapest plastic and they drive like a dodgem. The brakes automatically apply when the accelerator is released, whereas the Renault coasts when you come off the gas which is more akin to the behaviour of a fossil fuel motor. I’ll probably get used to it over time.
  • Some person on the internet may have revealed how to get an ordinary current account with a private bank. Despite my recent slimming down, I may have drunkenly opened an account using said method.

Posted on
by

Following last week’s credit card farce, I applied for another – Halifax Clarity – and was surprised to be accepted at the same limits as Tandem. There’s no cashback, which doesn’t really bother me, and no foreign exchange fees, which I do need. Result.

Started doing Couch to 5K, the main aim being to be in a fit state to do a Parkrun. I’ve learnt so far that where I live is very hilly, and I definitely have calf muscles.

Sunday saw another visit to Newark. Unlike the previous attempt, the Castle Barge was open but with a rather uninteresting beer range. Inevitably, I ended up in Just Beer instead.

Posted on
by

The Grannywagon got though its MOT without too many issues. The garage recommended a flush as the emissions readings were a tad high. This seems to have improved cold running, there’s no longer a large white cloud coming out the exhaust for the first mile.

Gave a blood donation on Thursday, taking my total to 51. This was followed by a rather nice curry.

Tandem Bank rather annoyingly decided that from March credit card holders need to pay them £5.99 a month to keep their card, or GTFO. Since for my use case, the cashback and savings interest earned would be less than the monthly fee, I’d be paying for no benefit. The card will be taking a trip through the shredder, and I’ll be off come March.

I had to visit the Sheffield garage to do some tech work. Turns out a ‘quick job’ takes four hours and several phone calls to the ticket machine supplier to get a smart card profile set up.