Business Banking
Posted: Fri 8 November, 2013 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: 2013/14, Business, Customer Services, Cynicism, Five Year Plan (now Ten), Own Business, Project 42, Work-related | Leave a comment »As part of Project 42, I’m looking at getting back to having a limited company, and as a result of that I’m doing some research (again) on company formation agents, business banking, accountants, other management services etc., and generally getting myself a bit swamped. And as always, it’s all a bit of a minefield, a crap-shoot of hoping to find a company that’s merely slightly less grim than the others.
Business banking is a major culprit on this one – all the business banking people seem to be just as shit as each other. There really are no redeeming factors – and indeed, there’s even less on offer for new accounts than there was a few years back when I did this last.
I’m still somewhat gunshy about using an account to keep track of the business again – after my last one went bankrupt just before time to do the Tax Return, having taken all the fees etc. in advance, and leaving me properly In The Shit.
There seem to be more companies doing on-line management services for limiteds now, although they’re certainly not cheap. (And in a couple of cases don’t appear to want any new business, as they haven’t bothered answering even basic questions)
There’s no real hurry for these decisions to be made, thankfully. It’s all just research, figuring out the best deals etc. before I take the leap.
In the meantime – if anyone has any recommendations on business banking accounts, I’ll be interested to know it.
The Coming Year
Posted: Tue 5 November, 2013 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: 2013/14, 42-43, D4D™, Domestic, Finances, Five Year Plan (now Ten), Getting Organised, Own Business, Project 42, Work-related | Leave a comment »As is tradition chez D4D™, this is where I list out some of the things I want to do in the coming year. I’ve kind-of nicknamed it “Project 42” this year, for no particularly good reason (other than that it’s the year of being 42 – which, as everyone knows, is also the answer to Life, the Universe, and Everything) but it’ll do.
The top two stay the same as last year, but there’s some extras that I want to get done or work on, as well as a bundle of other stuff that’ll come up along the way. Anyway, these are the main bullet points…
- Weigh less
- Write more
- Take the IAM advanced driving test
- Sort out my own company again – although there’s a lot that goes into that
- From there, develop a couple of business ideas
- Keep on rebuilding finances throughout the year.
That’ll do, I think
The Last Year
Posted: Mon 4 November, 2013 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: 2012/13, 41 - 42, D4D™, Domestic, Five Year Plan (now Ten), Getting Organised, Work-related, Writing | Leave a comment »Since this time last year, my plans were simple – well, the main goals were, anyway.
The plans, laid out on my last birthday were
- Weigh Less
- Write More
With those simple plans, I actually did OK over the last twelve months – and got a lot more stuff done besides.
For weighing less, I’ve lost just over a stone in the last year. Could be better, could be worse. I’ve monitored my food intake etc. over the year, and kept track of health/exercise/etc., but it’s not been as good as I wanted it to be either. Something to be continued with over the next year, anyway.
For writing more, that’s kind of worked and kind of hasn’t – it depends on what you class as ‘writing’. I’m writing more on D4D, and I’ve written some other pieces along the way (or at least started them, although I’ve also locked up on a couple when they’ve not worked out) so again, successful, but could do more.
I do feel that this last year has laid a lot of groundwork for the next year – I’m getting back into the swing of things, building up my own plans and routine, and generally feeling a lot more prepared for the coming year than I did this time last year.
Getting Darker
Posted: Thu 31 October, 2013 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Change, Commuting, Depression, Domestic, Driving, Time, Work-related | Leave a comment »Last weekend, we switched back from BST to GMT, which is just another major clue that winter is just about here. (If you’ve missed the storms/gales, fireworks, X-Factor, Strictly, autumn leaves, shorter days etc.)
Thankfully, the gaining of an hour doesn’t usually affect me too much – the loss of one in spring usually hits me a bit harder, but still not all that much.
However, it appears to have somewhat confused the cats, who really don’t know what to make of it all. Food times have been disrupted, as well as everything else.
What does affect me the most, though, is the fact that I’m now leaving work and driving home in the dark. I don’t mind night-time driving, but still I find the darkness affects me just because it reduces the amount of available sunlight I get during the day. Indeed, the next time I’ll be even close to driving home in daylight is at the end of February.
As with previous years, I always found that the thing that affected me the most with getting home in the dark was getting back to an unlit house. Particularly when I was in Manchester, that return to a dark and empty house was very unpleasant, and since then I’ve always made a point of having at least one light on a timeswitch, so it’s on when I get home. It’s a ridiculous thing, but it makes such a massive difference in my head – very strange.
Redirected
Posted: Mon 21 October, 2013 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: Central Bedfordshire Council, Commuting, Customer Services, Cynicism, Domestic, Driving, Work-related | 2 Comments »This morning – and for the next two days – it turns out that Bedfordshire Council (Sorry, Central Bedfordshire Council) are resurfacing the road outside my house. (Again)
As work is (apparently) due to start at 8am, and go on ’til at least 6pm – i.e. the entire time I’m usually away from the house – it’s not too bad. However, it would’ve been nice to be warned about it in advance, which would’ve meant I might have parked elsewhere, for example.
It’s obvious that the warnings haven’t gone out at all, as there were also school buses and bin lorries trying to get down the now-closed road while people were working on it.
I don’t mind too much – it just means I find and use a different route to/from work today and tomorrow, which is always entertaining. But I can only imagine how many unwarned people there are who are going to be noticeably affected by the lack of warning/notice/signage about this over the next couple of days.
Not, mind you, that I expect anything less from the twunts that run the council…
Domains
Posted: Fri 11 October, 2013 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: 1BEM, Customer Services, Domestic, Literacy, Own Business, People, Thoughts, Work-related | Leave a comment »I have too many web domain names – although I’ve been divesting myself of some of them over the last year, acknowledging projects and ideas that will never happen (and some that I can’t even remember having) as well as some where their lifetime has expired and I’ve no intention of renewing them.
However, domain renewal has a lot of automated processes, and one part of that is automatic reminders that get sent out about each domain.
And each email looks like this…
Your domain, [x] is due to expire on [date].
It is manadatory, that you receive this email for each domain you own, 28 and 7 days prior to your domains expiration date.
Yes, a spelling error and a punctuation one. I didn’t notice it for a while, because I usually ignore those mails just from the subject line. But now I’ve noticed it, that “manadatory,” drives me crackers.
I’ve written to the company involved, asking them to change it, but nothing’s happened. It’s nothing major in the grand scheme of things, just something that annoys me on a regular basis.
Having Time
Posted: Tue 8 October, 2013 | Author: Lyle | Filed under: 2012/13, Commuting, Domestic, Driving, Health, Travel, Weigh Less, Weight Loss, Work-related | 2 Comments »With the job change, I’ve just regained about 2½ hours a day. My commute has gone from 45-50 minutes each way to 20-25, which gives me the best part of an hour straight away. However, I was getting to Cambridge 45-60 minutes early, and leaving 45 minutes late in order to avoid the really slow/shit traffic on the dire sections of road. So that’s another 90-105 mins regained too.
With that time, my primary aim is to get back into doing something healthier, the cycling, maybe some workout stuff as well. That’s the plan, anyway.
However, despite the new workplace being a lot closer, I’m not planning to aim (yet) for cycling to work and back. Even the shortest route is a ten-mile journey, and some of the roads are pretty dodgy. I might explore a bit, see how things, go, but for now that’s firmly in the “see what happens” side of the list.
When all’s said and done, I’m just glad to have the time back, alongside having a better contract that’s making me happier too. I don’t mind idiot commutes (as regular readers know anyway) when it’s a job I’m enjoying, and when I’m happier with how work is coming along. When it’s a shit job though, the crap commute just exacerbates everything, makes me even less happy, knowing that I’m wasting even more time, that the entire thing is just a faff, and one I can’t be arsed with. It also turns out that when I’m down about my work, it also has a lot of knock-on effects on other bits of my life, as well as my self-image/ego/whatever, which I plan to write more about for tomorrow.