A busy weekend
My house is screaming for a thorough cleaning - and I just shut my ears. And hope I will not have any surprise visitors.
But it has been a busy weekend nonetheless. And a nice one. We probably watched too much tv, but what can a fan do when there are world championships in ski flying *and* a world cup race in biathlon on? At least I managed to get some ironing done while watching both Janne and Frode compete in their respective disciplines. And Roar of course - he was the big champ of the weekend, after all. Janne is better at jumping than at flying, I have to admit. But Frode won Saturday's sprint race, so there was enough reason to squee. And I really like Roar as well, he is my second favourite ski jumper.
I also did a BSG marathon with The Husband; he is now all caught up - we watched 2.03 through to 2.06 on Friday evening and 2.07 to 2.10 on Saturday, rounding it off with 2.11 and 2.12 last night. As I also did a simultaneous watching (and chatting!) with muridae_x on 2.12 on Saturday late afternoon, it was a frakkin' galactical weekend.
I will write up my comments and thoughts on the latest episode in another post, if time allows.
So, that was the nice part, let's get to the "busy" one. We started sending out notifications to anyone who draws money from or puts some into our bank account, because we switched said account in the first week of the year, when The Husband was home injured. Our old account was just too expensive in handling fees to bother any longer with, and so we set up a new one. And now we have to inform newspapers we have subscriptions with, the local gas and electricity company, insurance companies, the town council and a whole load of others that we do have a new account.
And then, one day soon, we will cancel the old one. Which is a good and necessary step. But we have had it for almost 20 years, ever since I began working for the bank it was with. But their fees are ridiculous, their service is lousy, all the more for employees (who need not be treated as customers, apparently) and I stopped working for them three years ago. Mind, they did not manage to either inform the health insurance about that, which they should have done, nor send me my final tax card. I had to do the first one myself and remind them of the latter - and then got a written statement of my latest earnings from them, as they could not find it. Oh, and I never got a letter of reference either.
Okay, so I had actually stopped working for them three years prior to that, when the little girl had been born, but my contract lasted until her third birthday, when by law they would have had to take me back at the same conditions as before; it was me who then terminated the contract, as working for the same 24 hours per week as before was impossible to organise. And of course there had been major re-organisations within the company, but I still think that that is now excuse for such a chaotic way of handling personnel files.
Feels good to be finally completely rid of any connection to the bank.
The next thing we did was plan for the redecoration of the girl's bedroom. She has been surprisingly cooperative when I suggested removing some of her babyish stuff during the week. So yesterday morning we set about and sorted through it all. We as in The Husband and me; she was upstairs in her brother's room and watched him play computer games. (Btw., there is an ETA to my Saturday post about that!)
This made for much, much easier sorting, and a very generous throwing away of no longer needed things. She turned up at one point, though, and declared that with being almost six years old now, she is too old to play with dolls any longer. I very much doubt that this conviction will hold true for all eternity, so I decided to pack up the dolls and clothes and put them into a box to be stored at my parents' house, just in case.
And while we were sorting and discussing possible furniture changes and the like, I had the idea to have the girl have my room, the one I currently use as an office. It is a bit larger than hers and her furniture would fit in much, much better. So we asked her, she was okay with it and we will now plan a room-to-room move. Which means that I will have to once again set up my computer downstairs, in The Husband's office, then pack everything that is in this room into boxes, then paint the room, then move the girls' stuff in and *then* paint her old room and move my stuff into that. Seems we will be busy for the next months.
We will of course plan everything on the computer prior to even moving one book. That is what we bought the nifty ArCon software for when we moved in, after all.
Being on the subject of moves and re-decoration, we next discussed son#1's room and the necessity to give him a new desk - he has had the old one since he started school more than 8 years ago and has grown out of it. (We also want to use it for the girl, as its height is adjustable.) We went to IKEA's website and found *just* the desk for him.
And to not give any second thoughts a chance to interfere, I went to IKEA this morning and bought it. Son#2 had been nagging me to go back and buy some more oat biscuits, so it was a good thing to do in any case. And I just love IKEA trips!
Back when I was a teenager and living 100 kilometres from the nearest IKEA, any trip there was a major excursion, one that needed begging with the parents to go there, careful and thorough planning, the browsing of catalogues and writing of lists. And more often than not it would end in frustration, because the main item, the one that was the reason for actually doing the trip, would inevitably be "currently out of stock".
It is much, much nicer to decide on a whim that it is IKEA day today, get into the car and be there 25 minutes later. And if big item #1 is not there - wo-hooo, that is a valid reason for another trip next week or the one after.
I have managed to not go to IKEA for as long as two years in a row, but once the decorating bug bites, a trip is inevitable. Even if we rarely buy furniture there any longer - now that we have moved into our own home we have been going for higher quality stuff. But little bits and pieces, pictures, frames, rugs and the occasional plant make a trip there worthwhile.
But it has been a busy weekend nonetheless. And a nice one. We probably watched too much tv, but what can a fan do when there are world championships in ski flying *and* a world cup race in biathlon on? At least I managed to get some ironing done while watching both Janne and Frode compete in their respective disciplines. And Roar of course - he was the big champ of the weekend, after all. Janne is better at jumping than at flying, I have to admit. But Frode won Saturday's sprint race, so there was enough reason to squee. And I really like Roar as well, he is my second favourite ski jumper.
I also did a BSG marathon with The Husband; he is now all caught up - we watched 2.03 through to 2.06 on Friday evening and 2.07 to 2.10 on Saturday, rounding it off with 2.11 and 2.12 last night. As I also did a simultaneous watching (and chatting!) with muridae_x on 2.12 on Saturday late afternoon, it was a frakkin' galactical weekend.
I will write up my comments and thoughts on the latest episode in another post, if time allows.
So, that was the nice part, let's get to the "busy" one. We started sending out notifications to anyone who draws money from or puts some into our bank account, because we switched said account in the first week of the year, when The Husband was home injured. Our old account was just too expensive in handling fees to bother any longer with, and so we set up a new one. And now we have to inform newspapers we have subscriptions with, the local gas and electricity company, insurance companies, the town council and a whole load of others that we do have a new account.
And then, one day soon, we will cancel the old one. Which is a good and necessary step. But we have had it for almost 20 years, ever since I began working for the bank it was with. But their fees are ridiculous, their service is lousy, all the more for employees (who need not be treated as customers, apparently) and I stopped working for them three years ago. Mind, they did not manage to either inform the health insurance about that, which they should have done, nor send me my final tax card. I had to do the first one myself and remind them of the latter - and then got a written statement of my latest earnings from them, as they could not find it. Oh, and I never got a letter of reference either.
Okay, so I had actually stopped working for them three years prior to that, when the little girl had been born, but my contract lasted until her third birthday, when by law they would have had to take me back at the same conditions as before; it was me who then terminated the contract, as working for the same 24 hours per week as before was impossible to organise. And of course there had been major re-organisations within the company, but I still think that that is now excuse for such a chaotic way of handling personnel files.
Feels good to be finally completely rid of any connection to the bank.
The next thing we did was plan for the redecoration of the girl's bedroom. She has been surprisingly cooperative when I suggested removing some of her babyish stuff during the week. So yesterday morning we set about and sorted through it all. We as in The Husband and me; she was upstairs in her brother's room and watched him play computer games. (Btw., there is an ETA to my Saturday post about that!)
This made for much, much easier sorting, and a very generous throwing away of no longer needed things. She turned up at one point, though, and declared that with being almost six years old now, she is too old to play with dolls any longer. I very much doubt that this conviction will hold true for all eternity, so I decided to pack up the dolls and clothes and put them into a box to be stored at my parents' house, just in case.
And while we were sorting and discussing possible furniture changes and the like, I had the idea to have the girl have my room, the one I currently use as an office. It is a bit larger than hers and her furniture would fit in much, much better. So we asked her, she was okay with it and we will now plan a room-to-room move. Which means that I will have to once again set up my computer downstairs, in The Husband's office, then pack everything that is in this room into boxes, then paint the room, then move the girls' stuff in and *then* paint her old room and move my stuff into that. Seems we will be busy for the next months.
We will of course plan everything on the computer prior to even moving one book. That is what we bought the nifty ArCon software for when we moved in, after all.
Being on the subject of moves and re-decoration, we next discussed son#1's room and the necessity to give him a new desk - he has had the old one since he started school more than 8 years ago and has grown out of it. (We also want to use it for the girl, as its height is adjustable.) We went to IKEA's website and found *just* the desk for him.
And to not give any second thoughts a chance to interfere, I went to IKEA this morning and bought it. Son#2 had been nagging me to go back and buy some more oat biscuits, so it was a good thing to do in any case. And I just love IKEA trips!
Back when I was a teenager and living 100 kilometres from the nearest IKEA, any trip there was a major excursion, one that needed begging with the parents to go there, careful and thorough planning, the browsing of catalogues and writing of lists. And more often than not it would end in frustration, because the main item, the one that was the reason for actually doing the trip, would inevitably be "currently out of stock".
It is much, much nicer to decide on a whim that it is IKEA day today, get into the car and be there 25 minutes later. And if big item #1 is not there - wo-hooo, that is a valid reason for another trip next week or the one after.
I have managed to not go to IKEA for as long as two years in a row, but once the decorating bug bites, a trip is inevitable. Even if we rarely buy furniture there any longer - now that we have moved into our own home we have been going for higher quality stuff. But little bits and pieces, pictures, frames, rugs and the occasional plant make a trip there worthwhile.