The grumpy thread

[Split_Pin]

I think very few people have a choice about whether they can put a bit by for a rainy day. Something always pops up which obstructs saving, like a leccy bill, puncture, busted fridge. Trust me, it always happens. The path to hell is paved with good intentions as they say.

 

I expect some draconian replies, about spending, ways of life etc.

[messerschmitt owner]

I have two month's salary saved up in a bank account and the means to make cash quickly, having squandered my hard earned, not on fancy holidays, but on slightly more sensible purchases. My lifestyle is such that as a family we could cut back by £3-500 a month and not have a much lowered standard of living. However, if my main bank account had been with RBS group, I would have been unable to transfer money to sort out the lack of cash in the bank account to pay for the mortgage, etc. When the bank computer crumbles, and money is needing paid to other banks/services, those businesses will be less understanding of you as a customer. Not being able to withdraw money apart from over the counter, nor be able to deposit money with any kind of guarantee that it will be paid into your account is a gross failure of a major bank.

 

Assuming, that, as many people do, I had all my eggs in one basket and accounts with RBS group only, I would have been in the situation of having that money in the bank but the inability to get it out and to use it when required. It is a right royal f*** up on RBS's account and I am sure they'll be seeing a few customers moving from them.

 

Having been through the credit card thing, I still have one but the balance is paid in full each month - as I get cash back on fuel and groceries. However, if the bill hadn't been paid, and I had no access to the cash in my account, I would have been up shit creek without the ability to feed the family or get to work.

 

And they want us to go cashless/cardless with a stupid microchip in our mobile phones!!!

[ashmicro]

I have some sympathy for what Pete says - if you can put something away, you should, but I know not everyone is in a position to do so.

 

I don't have a credit card, not for any moral or ideological reason, I'm just shit scared of bills. I don't even have a contract phone.

 

However, I keep a grand in the house in my gun safe.

[Ross_K]

I learned this years ago when on the dole. If my Giro didn't arrive then I couldn't eat. Made sense to save up a giro for emergencies like this and have a fortnight to sort things out rather than just going straight to panic stations. Doesn't matter what job I'm doing, for the first few months I live like I'm on a giro and spend the least amount possible in order to build up a float.

 

Huzzah for you. Now I realise that you're probably trolling, but let me ask - do you have a family? It doesn't sound like it. If I didn't have a wife and kids I'd have shitloads of cash in a high interest savings account somewhere, just as you wisely suggest. I have known people who saved money while on the dole. They usually lived with their mum and didn't have rent or other bills to pay, so I can't say that I used to take them (or their financial advice) seriously.

 

If the float is getting low then cut out all non-essentials until it's back up to scratch.

 

Umm. The situation for a lot of people is that they've stopped paying their mortgage in order to buy food and keep the lights on. "Non-essentials" doesn't exist for those people.

 

I don't have a credit card. Don't believe in 'em, don't use credit for anything. Can't afford something? Don't buy it.

 

I pay mine off in full every month so I don't pay any interest. It's not a luxury item for me anyhow - it's a tool I use to keep out of debt, not the other way around.

I realise as well that many people just make the minimum payment and it costs them.

[Mr_Bo11ox]

INTERNET DEBATE!!!!!

 

 

A particularly poor one even by GOM standards. 1.8/10

[warren t claim]

Can't afford something? Don't buy it.

 

^^^^^^^^^^This^^^^^^^^^^^^^

[Ross_K]

INTERNET DEBATE!!!!!

A particularly poor one even by GOM standards. 1.8/10

 

Come on - it's better than the shite about the mouthbreathers driving Picassos the other day.

[willswitchengage]

Can't afford something? Don't buy it.

 

^^^^^^^^^^This^^^^^^^^^^^^^

 

If that was true then we'd be thirty years behind in terms of consumer capitalism.

[warren t claim]

Can't afford something? Don't buy it.

 

^^^^^^^^^^This^^^^^^^^^^^^^

 

If that was true then we'd be thirty years behind in terms of consumer capitalism.

 

I must admit that I'd never buy something like a car on finance. With my lifestyle of occasional bouts without work it wouldn't be a sound idea anyway, that doesn't stop all and sundry trying to make me take out a low rate personal loan every few days though. I'm a good example of why the credit scoring system is fundamentally flawed, I'd pass all sorts of credit checks and don't have any CCJs and my credit score is very high, sadly my ability to repay a large loan doesn't seem to be an important factor in lending me money. Anyway, the thought of being tied down to ownership of a car for five years would give me sleepless nights and I'm pretty sure I'd spend the entire loan duration unable to maintain a workable erection knowing that for the last year of the agreement every monthly payment would be the equivalent of the cars value.

[cort16]

Choose Life. Choose a job. Choose a career. Choose a family. Choose a fucking big television, choose washing machines, cars, compact disc players and electrical tin openers.

Choose good health, low cholesterol, and dental insurance. Choose fixed interest mortgage repayments. Choose a starter home. Choose your friends. Choose leisurewear and matching luggage.

Choose a three-piece suit on hire purchase in a range of fucking fabrics. Choose DIY and wondering who the fuck you are on Sunday morning.

Choose sitting on that couch watching mind-numbing, spirit-crushing game shows, stuffing fucking junk food into your mouth.

Choose rotting away at the end of it all, pissing your last in a miserable home, nothing more than an embarrassment to the selfish, fucked up brats you spawned to replace yourselves.

Choose your future. Choose life...

But why would I want to do a thing like that? I chose not to choose life. I chose somethin' else. And the reasons? There are no reasons. Who needs reasons when you've got a Brown and Gold TR7 arriving next week?

[warren t claim]

Classic!

[tonedepear]

I'll readily admit if I'd had >£300 quid left for this month a week ago, that brown TR7 may well have been mine, and I'd be living off beans this week.

[Split_Pin]

Lol @cort!

I've got PF PROJECT as an earworm now!

[Negative Creep]

 

I must admit that I'd never buy something like a car on finance. With my lifestyle of occasional bouts without work it wouldn't be a sound idea anyway, that doesn't stop all and sundry trying to make me take out a low rate personal loan every few days though. I'm a good example of why the credit scoring system is fundamentally flawed, I'd pass all sorts of credit checks and don't have any CCJs and my credit score is very high, sadly my ability to repay a large loan doesn't seem to be an important factor in lending me money. Anyway, the thought of being tied down to ownership of a car for five years would give me sleepless nights and I'm pretty sure I'd spend the entire loan duration unable to maintain a workable erection knowing that for the last year of the agreement every monthly payment would be the equivalent of the cars value.

 

 

Aside from my Student Loan, I've never had any sort of finance, loan, layby, buy now pay later and so on. Simple reason is that I wouldn't trust myself and generally am not bothered about getting the latest thing. I only got my first credit card a few weeks ago, but have yet to use it. Although I admit it may be used to get the Yugo back on the road.........

[Cavcraft]

Choose Life. Choose a job. Choose a career. Choose a family. Choose a fucking big television, choose washing machines, cars, compact disc players and electrical tin openers.

Choose good health, low cholesterol, and dental insurance. Choose fixed interest mortgage repayments. Choose a starter home. Choose your friends. Choose leisurewear and matching luggage.

Choose a three-piece suit on hire purchase in a range of fucking fabrics. Choose DIY and wondering who the fuck you are on Sunday morning.

Choose sitting on that couch watching mind-numbing, spirit-crushing game shows, stuffing fucking junk food into your mouth.

Choose rotting away at the end of it all, pissing your last in a miserable home, nothing more than an embarrassment to the selfish, fucked up brats you spawned to replace yourselves.

Choose your future. Choose life...

But why would I want to do a thing like that? I chose not to choose life. I chose somethin' else. And the reasons? There are no reasons. Who needs reasons when you've got a Brown and Gold TR7 arriving next week?

 

 

A better way to turn this 'debate' on it's head could not be conceived.

[Ross_K]

I don't know what the big stigma about credit cards is. As long as you're not carrying a balance from month to month, they're great.

 

With my billing cycle I can fill the car on say the 7th of July and not have to "pay" for it until the end of August. No interest.

 

Obviously GR-∞ if you have no self control...

[Guest]

Take car to A\C specialists. Asked them to find out why the compressor loses gas.

 

Get a call ten minutes ago. 'Car's ready' they say.

 

'Really? What was wrong with it?'

 

'It was just in for a re -gas', they say.

 

'No,' I said. 'You were looking at it to see why the compressor loses gas, not just to re-gas it.'

 

'Well, we've regassed it and it's not losing gas.'

 

'The gas lasts a day and then the compressor gurgles its tits off, the switch stays out and then doesn't work, so it's escaping from somewhere. I asked you to find out why it's losing gas not just to re-gas it.'

 

Aaargh. Yes, I realise you have to re-gas an empty compressor to test for leaks, but either I did a crap job of explaining what I wanted or someone wasn't listening properly.

[Ross_K]

FUCKING CYCLE LANES!

 

Have you ever seen shit like this? This is half a mile away from my house.

 

The right hand lane where the blue 206 is parked has been turned into a massive cycle lane (heading out of town ). Have you ever seen a cycle lane that wide? I could be wrong but I doubt London or New York has cycle lanes that fucking wide.

 

Outside the double hatched lines you have parking spaces and a loading bay. So if you park here and step out you're standing into the path of oncoming bikes.

WHAT THE FUCK??

 

Also, notice the pole behind the temporary road narrows sign. That's gonna be crashed into as soon as the sign's gone...

 

Words defy me. Whatever tofu-eating wanker came up with this idea should be castrated and fed his own balls.

[cort16]

Mmmm Cupcakes

[Ross_K]

Mmmm Cupcakes

 

I think it's something like €20 for 6 cupcakes. Recession?

[willswitchengage]

FUCKING CYCLE LANES!

 

There's an amusing flickr group shit cycle lane that exhibits some more - although mainly from the cyclist's point of view. Exhbit A, from where I used to live:

 

Bus shelter on Bristol Road, Bournbrook by pluralzed, on Flickr

 

Welcome to Edgbaston - sign on Bristol Road, Bournbrook by pluralzed, on Flickr

 

This is a "shared use" pavement where the users are cyclists, pedestrians, bus stops, signs and other pieces of furniture. An abosultely bonkers, dangerous and patronising idea that cyclists and pedestrians can "share" the pavement together - cyclists travel at about 15mph on average, would you have a shared use road like that? Birmingham City Council's "transportation strategy" is full of blindingly cheapskate shit like that. Generally I don't use cycle lanes - they're slow and dangerous, unless they're done properly like in London or Brighton and not by dithering councils who seem to like to put in a token few feet of them or these ever now popular "shared use" paths in some pathetic effort to claim they're making their wards more sustainable.

[Negative Creep]

I see your shit cycle lane and raise you

 

 

https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=dock+r ... 5999999999

 

The far side used to be a busy two lane road until those tossers at the council turned one half into a bike lane which never gets used.

[Ross_K]

All that road wasted. It's probably used by a single solitary council worker. There must be an EU grant available to councils to fuck up their roads and piss motorists and pedestrians off.

 

The fucking cyclists around here don't even use these massive cycle lanes. Give me strength.

[autofive]

just had an 'altercation' with a prick in a silver pug 206.

 

First he tries to pull out of a side road in front of me, trying to bully me into stopping (I was travelling at roughly 40mph and had no intention of slamming on the brakes on a wet greasy road), then when i drove around him screams up behind me and sits 3 inches off my back bumper edging in and out until he plucked up the courage to overtake me, Forced to drive over the chevrons in the middle of the road, in a 30mph zone, through a village, I accelerated keeping him alongside me until he spotted the roadsign and kerb in his way. He must have taken this personally and he then followed me through two junctions onto a smaller road then tries to overtake again. Once alongside I keep him on the wrong side of the road approaching a 60mph right hand bend. He is forced to pull in again, and follow 3 inches behind. I then take an unclassified road (tarmac farm track really) as a short cut, he overshoots the entrance to the road, then he must have reversed and he's behind me again. After half a mile of this shit I stop in the centre of the road, he gets out looking like an 8 stone schoolboy and I drive away.

 

who are these tits who think a poxy 206 can accelerate quicker than a 2.9 granada?

[TimothyClaypole]

Mmmm Cupcakes

 

I think it's something like €20 for 6 cupcakes. Recession?

 

- Best bake your own to add to the thrifty advice:

 

 

Very roughly work out to about 30 pence each or there abouts.

[tonedepear]

just had an 'altercation' with a prick in a silver pug 206.

 

First he tries to pull out of a side road in front of me, trying to bully me into stopping (I was travelling at roughly 40mph and had no intention of slamming on the brakes on a wet greasy road), then when i drove around him screams up behind me and sits 3 inches off my back bumper edging in and out until he plucked up the courage to overtake me, Forced to drive over the chevrons in the middle of the road, in a 30mph zone, through a village, I accelerated keeping him alongside me until he spotted the roadsign and kerb in his way. He must have taken this personally and he then followed me through two junctions onto a smaller road then tries to overtake again. Once alongside I keep him on the wrong side of the road approaching a 60mph right hand bend. He is forced to pull in again, and follow 3 inches behind. I then take an unclassified road (tarmac farm track really) as a short cut, he overshoots the entrance to the road, then he must have reversed and he's behind me again. After half a mile of this shit I stop in the centre of the road, he gets out looking like an 8 stone schoolboy and I drive away.

 

who are these tits who think a poxy 206 can accelerate quicker than a 2.9 granada?

 

Wasn't the former mrs-tone was it? (Hers is an na 1.9 diesel one mind, so if she did keep up as described, I'd be quite proud of her)

[Guest]

And the fuckwittery continues.

 

I'm now without a car for the evening because the AC specialist has decided to keep my car in the workshop overnight without ringing me to say that they're not finished with it. After our previous conversation they promised to 'ring straight back'.

 

Went to get the car anyway on the Met to find the garage closed. No missed call, no explanation, fuck all.

 

Not impressed lads, not impressed. Lucky I'm not going out tonight, innit? You can fuck off if you think I'm paying several hours of labour to do something I didn't ask you to do. At no point did you say you needed the car overnight. What was wrong with calling me to say either way? Eh? It's not as if you didn't have my number, is it?

 

Fucking pathetic.

[RedSparrow]

Can't afford something? Don't buy it.

 

^^^^^^^^^^This^^^^^^^^^^^^^

 

If that was true then we'd be thirty years behind in terms of consumer capitalism.

 

So? Why do we judge how advanced a society is by the rate at which it consumes pointless consumer crap?

[eddyramrod]

Selling cars. Or in fact, not selling them. Three cars to sell, all in the local papers and on an expat forum; some on assorted specialist websites, not to mention Facebook. I have flyers all over the place, including propped up in the front screen of the pickup, which is the cheapest of its age and type around. The Granada is a (supposedly) desirable-spec cult classic and incidentally one of the earliest survivors. The A40.... well frankly it's a basket case and I wasn't expecting that to be an easy sale. But seriously, after nine months of constant and savage reductions, I can't believe I still have the other two. Worse... I'm getting exactly no phone calls on them. Time is now against me, in a Labour/Conservative kind of confrontational manner. This is not good.

[messerschmitt owner]

Eddy

see if the IMF will bale you out - or, even better, the Germans.

 

Price must be an issue if they have not sold.

 

If it's any consolation, on the BX, one half hearted email about it. Nowt more.