The advice thread for random problems #4

[watermelon sugar]

Not really a problem, more general advice

Looking for good cook books, I have bored of lunch an pinch of nom, I need ones I can reheat in a microwave as I take dinner into work so anything that's mostly pasta or fish is out as I've found that those dont reheat great

If it's not slow cooker then I prefer ones I can make quickly as usually I don't have much time to put something together so either I need to shove it all in the slow cooker in the morning or make it within the hour before my work

I have this and it’s great

There’s also one called the ultimate air fryer cookbook

 

[Snippysnips]

I have this and it’s great

View attachment 2811563

There’s also one called the ultimate air fryer cookbook

Thanks will check them out, really loving using the air fryer so would love to use that more

 

[Pinkpenguinx]

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Would you have gravy with a chicken and leek pie?

Absolutely not
Cant stand gravy on anything other than a roast dinner and that's at a push too
With chicken and leek = NO
I am a southerner though don't get all the gravy hype, horrid
Will I be banished for stating I don't much like gravy

 

[Dogtanian]

The sledgehammer idea, while funny, definitely has merit. One thing you can do is tear the computer apart, take out the harddrive, and recycle the rest. If it still turns on, you can wipe the drive with a tool like CCleaner which will run over the whole disk flipping all bits to 0. This is especially important for HDDs - Fragmentation often meant you could recover bits of data from disk sectors that were set as "free for overwrite" that weren't yet overwritten.

You can do the same (overwriting everything) for SSDs as well.

Or you can smash them to bits

I didn't realise people were laughing because they didn't believe me.
One of the more fun jobs in our IT department is to take a stack of around 50 hard drives into the car park on a nice day, line them up and then give each a good whack with a sledgehammer to destroy the internal workings. I don't know what happens with them afterwards, I guess they get dumped with the general waste.

Oh yeah and gravy on a pie all the time. Maybe a light one for chicken and leek though.

 

[watermelon sugar]

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Absolutely not
Cant stand gravy on anything other than a roast dinner and that's at a push too
With chicken and leek = NO
I am a southerner though don't get all the gravy hype, horrid
Will I be banished for stating I don't much like gravy

I had it with gravy it was well nice, I’m northern so I’d probs have gravy on my cornflakes

 

[stargirl23]

I’m not northern but I’d happily have gravy on anything cheesy chips and gravy is my obsession

 

[Tanne1999]

Having a row with my sister at the moment about self employment and needing to declare she’s selling some MLM (that was a row in itself)

She is adamant she doesn’t need to declare it as it’s not ‘full time employment’ and it’s ’just to make money on the side’. She also claims UC so I said she needs to be careful doing stuff like this as it could affect her claim. I’ve told her she needs to sort it out and register as self employed and declare this income, she said she doesn’t and that none of her friends who do similar ‘work’ declare it.

Someone back me up here before I end up losing my tit with her

 

[cwymmie]

Having a row with my sister at the moment about self employment and needing to declare she’s selling some MLM (that was a row in itself)

She is adamant she doesn’t need to declare it as it’s not ‘full time employment’ and it’s ’just to make money on the side’. She also claims UC so I said she needs to be careful doing stuff like this as it could affect her claim. I’ve told her she needs to sort it out and register as self employed and declare this income, she said she doesn’t and that none of her friends who do similar ‘work’ declare it.

Someone back me up here before I end up losing my tit with her

She needs to register with HMRC as self employed. She then has to complete a self assessment online if she is earning over £1000 a year through this self employment.

She also must tell UC that she is self employed. Each assessment period they will then require her to list her earnings and expenses and they’ll work out from that how much to deduct from her UC claim.
She needs to be aware also that there is a minimum threshold that UC will expect her to earn via self employment. The rules are different if she has children under 3, but if they’re over 3 and she earns under that threshold they will declare that basically it’s not worth her time and she will need to seek different employment or earn more. Self employment and UC can be tricky to navigate.
But yeah she’s absolutely breaking the law and evading tax if she’s earning over £1000 a year.

 

[Snippysnips]

Having a row with my sister at the moment about self employment and needing to declare she’s selling some MLM (that was a row in itself)

She is adamant she doesn’t need to declare it as it’s not ‘full time employment’ and it’s ’just to make money on the side’. She also claims UC so I said she needs to be careful doing stuff like this as it could affect her claim. I’ve told her she needs to sort it out and register as self employed and declare this income, she said she doesn’t and that none of her friends who do similar ‘work’ declare it.

Someone back me up here before I end up losing my tit with her

Just had a cousin get caught out on something very similar, thought she was getting away with it for months till they showed up to her door with a 6inch file on her, they had been watching an collecting information for months an now she's screwed

Your sister may think she is getting away with it now because nothings happening, but it could be months or even a few years down the line before she is caught, they spend months gathering evidence before you realise

 

[TheGlossy]

I’m about to lose my marbles!

Late fall, I woke up one morning to a pile of ants in front of my toilets. I got rid of them and didn’t see any for two weeks. Exactly two weeks later, they were all over the kitchen & bathroom. One night, hundreds of them came out in line in the bathroom.

Ever since, I’ve been spotting them around the kitchen & bathroom (sinks, fan, oven, kitchen counters). I spotted a few coming out of the the hot press.

A contractor came over and blocked the problematic areas in the bathroom. He checked the kitchen and noted everything was clean (I’m a clean freak). He said he’s never heard of this and it’s really unusual.

After he worked on the bathroom, it seems the ants decided to just migrate to my wardrobe. I’d never seen one in the bedroom before!! I saw red!

He asked if I had neighbors on the same floor. I do have a plant obsessed neighbor on one side & an unclean group of people on the other. One side apparently had an untreated leak with a flooded floor for a while and my ant problem got far worse after they started refurbishing that apartment.

I’m a very clean person and don’t live at ground floor level. I told the contractor these must be coming from somewhere in the building because they can’t just have randomly popped up on my floor. He said that’s for sure.

I’ve been at my current place for four years and I’m honestly contemplating leaving. I’ve been advised to use an ant bait, but I’m afraid the issue might get worse.

Any advice?

I’m not in the UK.

 

[Hastaggifted]

Would you move to NI to self build if it meant leaving the house and area you love but you would be mortgage and debt free. Live in the countryside with no neighbours. Your husband could work less hours and you'll have a better quality of life?

My husband has decided that's what he wants to do, he just needs to convince me and our kids.

We'd have about 200k in the bank after selling our house.

He's a builder and thinks he could buy land and build a house for 150k

His uncle is selling 3 acres with planning permission within a 12 acre field

To add, I've never been to NI, never shown any interest in visiting. I've been with my husband 18 years and he's only been over a few times in those years for funerals.

Not particularly close to family. Take my mum shopping a couple of times a week. No proper close friends.

Would you?

 

[Lollylaylow]

Would you move to NI to self build if it meant leaving the house and area you love but you would be mortgage and debt free. Live in the countryside with no neighbours. Your husband could work less hours and you'll have a better quality of life?

My husband has decided that's what he wants to do, he just needs to convince me and our kids.

We'd have about 200k in the bank after selling our house.

He's a builder and thinks he could buy land and build a house for 150k

His uncle is selling 3 acres with planning permission within a 12 acre field

To add, I've never been to NI, never shown any interest in visiting. I've been with my husband 18 years and he's only been over a few times in those years for funerals.

Me, like a blooming shot! But I love peace and solitude and would love to have land to grow things maybe raise some animals, keep the kids from being immersed in the www and SM etc but sadly no one can answer for you

 

[Hastaggifted]

Me, like a blooming shot! But I love peace and solitude and would love to have land to grow things maybe raise some animals, keep the kids from being immersed in the www and SM etc but sadly no one can answer for you

That's the dream. Pigs & chickens, Growing as much as our own food as possible. My head says yes but its the thought of leaving everything I've ever known. We're going during Easter Holidays to visit

 

[Lollylaylow]

That's the dream. Pigs & chickens, Growing as much as our own food as possible. My head says yes but its the thought of leaving everything I've ever known. We're going during Easter Holidays to visit

I have everything crossed that its perfect for you. Although do be aware ( as I'm sure you are, as you always seem sensible) what's lovely for a holiday might not be great for permanence. Just try to look at it with realism and don't get caught up in someone else's enthusiasm. I have a friend who has just moved to a very isolated place he is loving it says so much space for the kids ( he was in London ) they all seem to be having a lovely time and it has been a hard winter there so the worst is over in that respect but what about when his children are teenagers. So have a look at what there is for your children when they are older and other things like that. But oh I envy you

 

[Piff paff puff]

Would you move to NI to self build if it meant leaving the house and area you love but you would be mortgage and debt free. Live in the countryside with no neighbours. Your husband could work less hours and you'll have a better quality of life?

My husband has decided that's what he wants to do, he just needs to convince me and our kids.

We'd have about 200k in the bank after selling our house.

He's a builder and thinks he could buy land and build a house for 150k

His uncle is selling 3 acres with planning permission within a 12 acre field

To add, I've never been to NI, never shown any interest in visiting. I've been with my husband 18 years and he's only been over a few times in those years for funerals.

Not particularly close to family. Take my mum shopping a couple of times a week. No proper close friends.

Would you?

Country dweller here couldn't live any other way and never have. Your circumstances are perfect! Go and live your new beautiful life

 

[Mamacita]

Would you move to NI to self build if it meant leaving the house and area you love but you would be mortgage and debt free. Live in the countryside with no neighbours. Your husband could work less hours and you'll have a better quality of life?

My husband has decided that's what he wants to do, he just needs to convince me and our kids.

We'd have about 200k in the bank after selling our house.

He's a builder and thinks he could buy land and build a house for 150k

His uncle is selling 3 acres with planning permission within a 12 acre field

To add, I've never been to NI, never shown any interest in visiting. I've been with my husband 18 years and he's only been over a few times in those years for funerals.

Not particularly close to family. Take my mum shopping a couple of times a week. No proper close friends.

Would you?

I wouldn't as living in the countryside is my nightmare so you really need to make that decision based on what you like. The benefits you said it would bring you sound great though so if you can imagine yourself living in the countryside then go for it.

Not sure where you live now so it might be the same but weather in NI can be really miserable.

 

[Snippysnips]

Would you move to NI to self build if it meant leaving the house and area you love but you would be mortgage and debt free. Live in the countryside with no neighbours. Your husband could work less hours and you'll have a better quality of life?

My husband has decided that's what he wants to do, he just needs to convince me and our kids.

We'd have about 200k in the bank after selling our house.

He's a builder and thinks he could buy land and build a house for 150k

His uncle is selling 3 acres with planning permission within a 12 acre field

To add, I've never been to NI, never shown any interest in visiting. I've been with my husband 18 years and he's only been over a few times in those years for funerals.

Not particularly close to family. Take my mum shopping a couple of times a week. No proper close friends.

Would you?

It would depend on me an how far from towns/city's it would be, I love the idea of living in a countryside, used to go up into the country every summer to my aunt's an it was nice but she was miles from a town an even further from a city an at times it felt lonely an you had nothing to do but just take a walk round the countryside, I once went to London an got such a buzz from the whole "city life" that it made it even worse because there was so much you could do in London, and as much as I don't think I could live in a city because I think eventually it might become too overwhelming with people, I also don't think I could ever cope with living miles away from that either, am sorta happy in the middle

It would depend on how far away you were from towns/city's, it might seem a lovely break but you have to ask yourself if you would be able to cope with hours drive into towns or city's, would the kids be happy not being able to just nip into town for the cinema an something to eat with you or a friend? Would you be fine internet ordering the majority of things? In the winter are you fine being snowed in? I don't know what weather is like in NI so you might not be as bad but my aunt got snowed in every winter, she'd need to order in weeks worth of food an home school the kids because they couldn't see the roads to drive, they never seen other people during that either so they were totally isolated

Am not trying put you off, living in the country can be amazing for some but you need to think of the reality of it an what country living can really be like

 

[Lollylaylow]

Does anyone know why when looking at car MOT status online most have a long history of all the MOTs but some only have the last MOT?

 

[Justmechan23]

Does anyone know why when looking at car MOT status online most have a long history of all the MOTs but some only have the last MOT?

Would it be the age of the car? In the UK MOTs are only required on cars over 3 years old

 

[Lollylaylow]

Would it be the age of the car? In the UK MOTs are only required on cars over 3 years old

No, I'm only looking at old cheaper cars. Im poor