Showing posts with label advertising. Show all posts
Showing posts with label advertising. Show all posts

Wednesday 28 March 2012

Just a quickie..

Just a quick ask, my Google adsense pin came through last night which I set up. My grand total is currently hovering around the £12 mark, so I ask any visitors to the blog to please click on an ad on your way through and I'll be extremely grateful! I'm hoping that around May time I can buy some new spring clothes with this money as my wardrobe needs a bit of a spring injection as everything is looking a bit tired.

Happy hump day x

Wednesday 14 March 2012



This morning I took advantage of Starbucks latest promotion. The American coffee house giant has introduced a new policy in that they no longer call out your coffee by its name, instead they will be calling out your name. This marketing stunt is designed to make Starbucks appear more personal, setting it apart from the Costas, Coffee Republics and Cafe Neros. Today they were giving away lattes free of charge as long as you tell the barrista your name. The giveaway has gained loads of coverage on the net and is one of the top topics on social networking site Twitter, to find out more here's the BBC's take on things: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-17356957. Having weaned myself off of coffee shop take aways it was a nice mid-morning treat to enjoy one knowing it hadn't cost me anything.


In other news, there's nothing more to really report; enjoyed a fairly frugal weekend of Saturday night drinks (I drove so ended up only spending about a tenner) though I did buy a £10 H&M voucher off my friend as she was given it for Christmas and nothing in the shop fits her. I might save it for my sister's birthday in June to go along with the Marmite set I picked up for her in the Boots sale.

On Sunday we made the most of the sunny spring-like weather and cycled over to Richmond Park and enjoyed a picnic as the sun set. We then cycled over to our friends new flat who have just bought their first home, then back to ours to whip up some carrot soup for the week. I bought a huge bag of carrots for 50p from Asda, chopped them up, threw in half an onion lingering in the fridge along with some vegetable stock boiled it up and blended. It made six portions of soup which should be my lunches for the week. Its been surprisingly filling and at less than 10p a portion great value for money.

Finally, yesterday I really needed to pick up a few bits from Sainsburys so dipped into my Nectar poitns- what would have been a £5.30 spend ended up costing me just 30p. Oh and the water bill has come in for the next year at £80 each, which works out at £6.60 per month, which is liveable. We're paying in two installments the first due at the beginning of April. then the second at the beginning of October. I've picked up another extra bar shift on Saturday which should hopefully cover this half. And lastly its official, our rent isn't going up because 'we've been such good tennants' in the words of our landlord... the same day the oven broke sods law ay? 

Sunday 4 March 2012

Rain rain go away....

I'd hoped that we could go marching into March with positivity on the financial front, but its been a bit of an odd week. On Wednesday my mum rang me while I was on the train on my way to work to tell me that my Dad's company has had the financial funding from the Germans pulled and they've all been told they could either receive a letter telling them they're redundant at any time or they could turn up in the morning and the gates be locked and they get nothing in terms of redundancy pay.

She said that a lot of people that work there take the mick by calling in sick lots and being late, and that there is a lot of office staff who do nothing and my Dad has been told that everything to do with him is excellent so he may be one of the last left but it seems like a bit of a sinking ship. I always get the urge to look around to see what's out there in terms of work as soon as the alarm bells start ringing but she said he hasn't looked for anything yet. The thing is, all he needs is some work for the next three years and then he gets his MOD pension. My mum's wages should cover the mortgage and bills etc so it won't be a complete catastrophe, but my Dad has been made redundant about five times and the last time he spiraled into depression so it's not exactly welcome news.

On Thursday I went into work and found out there were two redundancies at our London office, one an account manager dealing with new business. I guess if that's his full time job and the new business isn't there, or providing as much income as the company want that's his job over. The next was one of the creative team on my floor, apparently his role had changed a few times and he was doing bits and bobs so I guess his role just doesn't exist any more. Then Friday afternoon came and news from downstairs told us of an account director had been told he was also being made redundant. The reason for this is because the head of the company wants the younger grads to develop, but he didn't rule out taking another account director on in the future so that suggests they wanted to get rid of him on the grounds of either his performance or that he didn't seem very well liked, I'm not sure.

The strange thing is that this year we had a work Xmas party where there hadn't been one for three years previously as there wasn't the money for it, then over a company call we were told the company performed much better than expected in January...so it was a bit of a shock for this to happen. At the moment our team is making 7% more money than predicted, unlike quite a few departments. I just can't help but worry, especially as my biggest client Loyds Banking Group has put their call center recruitment on hold for quite a while (although things with this account seem to change within the space of a day).

It just seems that no-one is really safe at the moment, and everything has a knock on effect. If clients don't have jobs to advertise, we don't have jobs. With unemployment at a 17 year high (I think that's the latest figures) and with the cost of living ever increasing (I caught site of the cost of petrol today- ouch!) I just don't know how this country is going to get out of this mess. It seems the only real option is upping sticks and moving to another country for a better quality of life.

Anyways, enough of the doom and gloom though the weather certainly isn't helping matters, I guess I can only work towards our goals in the here and now- I don't have a crystal ball so can't predict the future. This weekend has been a good one money wise, I set aside £20 for Friday and managed to squeeze in a pub lunch in aid of the redundant people (kind of weird, what do you say to people in that situation if you don't even know them that well?!) and drinks out, as well as a nighttime bike ride- saves on cab fares! I then did a mystery shop combined with an essentials food shop and pound world trip for toiletries, batching them all together to save time and petrol.

Then in the afternoon after getting our room straight I got a call from the BF, someone at the pub had a family emergency so couldn't come in- could I cover? I had no plans and wasn't feeling all tired so said yes to some extra pennies.

The pub manager also popped in today and wants the BF to have everything sorted for his promotion within the next three weeks so I really hope he gets that sorted out so he can help me with this saving lark- I think then it will feel like we are both in the same boat and it may feel a little easier, even though he is much more blase and laid back about the whole situation.

Today the weather is pretty grim so I think it will be another lazy/organising type of day.