percival

And my earnings have decreased by a third.

so this means a serious lifesyle change:
- cooking instead of takeaway dinners
- not letting good food go to rot in the fridge because I am too lazy to cook it
- taking my own lunch and snacks into work
- proper bookkeeping (c.f. Europcar scare)
- buying far fewer books
- taking back books to libraries on time, and taking out far fewer

... and finally, most importantly ...

apart from the trip to Germany in February to retrieve much of our furniture, NO trips abroad. These four trips to Germany (Christmas, christening, 60th birthdays) have made a major dent in our savings, not to mention the big American holiday. Since we want to pay off as much of our mortgage as soon as possible, we will only travel within Scotland.

So - no Iceland. Heck, by rights, we couldn't even afford my trip to Texas now!

Strange, this: if the landlady hadn't been so stupid to mention that she was thinking about getting an agent in, we would NEVER have bought the flat, because we were extremely comfortable where we were.

On the other hand, seeing that I've decided to become a good book keeper, I can't go on a healthy detox diet now. Two sets of deprivations are just too much, folks. (But then, merely cooking my own food will probably make my eating a lot healthier than it is right now.)

The life of luxury was nice - now back to reality!