Reply to: test please delete

[NickFitz]

Thunderstorm!

[ladymuck]

Evening all

It's been a dull, wet day today. Rained all day off and on (mostly on). Currently 14 degrees and the high was 17. Barometer down to 988 mBar.

Today I did half a day of work, to complete the two days I can bill this week for with this faff of a gig. I shouldn't complain, but I can, so I will.

I did intend to pop to the shops but the weather doesn't make me inclined to want to leave the flat, so I won't.

Lunch was a bacon bap.

[NickFitz]

Depending on the bank you are paying from, somewhere between 30 seconds and 2 minutes. But, for safety sake and to justify the fee (£25 from memory for a large transfer), they will say a day.

Congratulations!

Cheers!

It took a few minutes for the money to come through to my account yesterday, but my sister's (which left the account a few minutes before mine) didn't arrive until today! Very odd

Halifax use one account for paying off mortgages with the mortgage account number as the reference. I don't know how automated the process of allocating the funds to the mortgage account is, but their documentation assures me that they'll acknowledge payment within fifteen days

[WTFH]

Not sure how long it takes for the money to arrive with the Halifax and be allocated to the account; the bankers here said that I might have just missed the cut-off for today in which case it would go through tomorrow, so I added a day's interest just in case. That'll be refunded if it does, in fact, get there today, so I'm not bothered about it

Depending on the bank you are paying from, somewhere between 30 seconds and 2 minutes. But, for safety sake and to justify the fee (£25 from memory for a large transfer), they will say a day.

Congratulations!

[NickFitz]

Mortgage paid off!

I popped over to one of the few remaining neighbourhood branches, which is over in an area with a mainly Muslim population, some Sikhs and Hindus, and very, very few people who would tick "White British" on a form. There was a steady stream of people coming and going during the thirty minutes or so it took to work through all the security checks and so on, doing what looked like business banking for small shops and the like, which is presumably what keeps the branch alive when all the others have been closed. I lived in that area a number of times over the years, on three of the four sides of Spinney Hill Park, and it's nice to go back there; I have lots of happy memories associated with that bit of the city

The bankers were a bit flummoxed at the way funds had gone back and forth between there and the Halifax over the last twenty-four hours, so I explained how I'd been led astray by the deceptive content on the web site and how all the different transactions fitted together, which satisfied them that it wasn't some kind of weird money laundering scheme that didn't actually achieve anything

Not sure how long it takes for the money to arrive with the Halifax and be allocated to the account; the bankers here said that I might have just missed the cut-off for today in which case it would go through tomorrow, so I added a day's interest just in case. That'll be refunded if it does, in fact, get there today, so I'm not bothered about it

It was still quite pleasant on the way over but it had gone dark and was starting to rain heavily by the time I got out. It's eased off a little now, but I think that's probably the sunshine done for the day

[WTFH]

Afternoon all
30+C by the pool, which is “refreshing”, i.e. unheated. I am here exercising my RoS (right of sunshine)

[NickFitz]

Lunch: cocktail sausages and a bag of plain crisps

Still sunny spells here; some big lumpy clouds, but nothing that looks ominous at the moment

[NickFitz]

Banking done, such that I can pay the mortgage off when I get around to driving over to the nearest branch.

Yesterday, I'd transferred a load of money over to the Halifax as the relevant page on their website said I could pay the mortgage off from any Halifax account. Then I discovered that this isn't true, it can only be done from a current account, and I had a savings one. I could have faffed around opening a current account with them, I suppose, but who knows what that might involve? So I wanted to transfer the money back, but there's a daily transfer limit! I transferred as much as was allowed to get things started, then phoned them up to see what could be done.

A very nice lady with a Scouse accent told me they have a High Value Payments team that can do up to £100K/day, but you have to specifically ask to speak to them - they aren't mentioned anywhere on the website that I can find - so to call back today when they'd be available. So I just did that, and explained everything to another very helpful lady (Welsh accent) who sorted it out

She had to go through all the fraud stuff that I heard repeatedly yesterday, but halfway through she suddenly burst out laughing! She quickly apologised, and explained that she'd just noticed the reference I'd used for the payment last night: "FFS"

[NickFitz]

Morning denizens

Sunny start, though it seems from the watery evidence to have been a bit rainy overnight. Currently 13°C with an expected high of 16°, while the barometers have plummeted to 973/981mB. There's a 45% chance of rain in the next hour and then similar odds of more this afternoon and into the evening and overnight

Time to do some banking. The burden that is wealth!

[DoctorStrangelove]

Morning.

Thursday

Grey.

Dark.

Dank.

Dreary.

Dire.

Wet.

Sunless.

Chilly in here at 16.9 deg, 18 deg in the kitchen, 16 in the leanto.

981 mBar, 28.968 735.8 in Hg, 14.2282 Torr, psi, (down from 985 last night), 77% RH (Lidl electric).

Meanwhile on the 16th of November 2019 LM was doing her VAT return & some OU stuff: the Book was Opened, whereas NF had pressed a switch into use that he'd purchased some 3 years earlier, and I detailed all the stuff in here that's been bought & never used, the Lexmark printer from 2002 winning in those stakes.

[NickFitz]

Some rain here too, but not too bad. More due tomorrow though

Tonight's viewing was the Gloucestershire police thing :

And amidst all the other excitement, I'd completely forgotten about the new Apple Watch arriving this morning. This has now been unboxed and set up. My ECG is normal, apparently

Finally, some more of Burmese Days has been read

Early night now. Tomorrow, I pay off the mortgage, which will involve a trip to an actual bank branch

Goodnight all

[ladymuck]

Sausage, egg and chips for dinner.

Much rain this evening. Later than forecast, the afternoon being quite sunny for a brief time.

The recycling bin for the flat upstairs has gone missing. It was there on Monday but not returned when emptied on Tuesday morning. The lad who lives in that flat is quite confused.

[NickFitz]

Tea: pork cutlet with chips and beans

That reminds me, I need to put the dishwasher on

[xoggoth]

Been giving lot of my money to my sons recently to avoid the **** Labour tax raid on Oct 31st.

Unconnected, I'm surprised most of Russia is on Google Street View.

[NickFitz]

Congratulations feels like the wrong thing to say, considering the events that had to take place for this to be a possibility. However, being mortgage free is definitely cause for celebration.

Cheers! Yes, it seems a bit odd to be pleased about it. Then again, our Mum was always absolutely determined that we would get it, which was one reason she and Dad wouldn't consider the idea of going into a home. They'd started with nothing (they initially lived in a spare room in her cousin's house, which is where my brother was born) and they wanted us to get the fruits of their labours, and she very specifically wanted me to be able to clear my mortgage - she said so about a month before she died