General Chat

Hi Di~~

Yes I did misunderstand, whilst I knew your e'er was man and you looked after his mum , I thought it was her going into respite care...makes sense now you've explained , thought it a bit odd .. t'was my way of thinking !
Hope all goes well for her op and e'er gets some 'me time' in respite care.
Sounds as if you have 2 to look after not one !

Glad to hear your hip is a bit better:)

Hope you've escaped the bad snow, we seemed to have so far; 3 inches is just a dusting for us !..lol

Sandie.x

Hi Sandie
yes my employer is a man and he is the one I look after hun not his mum, he is physically and mentally handicapped and though it is his mum who tell's me what is needed to be done for him he is actually the one social services refer's to as my employer ( sound's complicated I know ) but that's how the law look's at it, his mum is classed as his main carer and I'm employed to help her look after him. I know your next question will probably be ( but you do thing's in the home to help her ) that is all part of his care, helping to do his washing, ironing and cleaning of the house is all classed as helping him to live at home. When I do thing's like helping with the gardening, changeing the curtain's and moving furniture around for the decorater to do the decorating or other thing's she need's help with that is not part of everyday care for her son she pay's me separately to do those thing's.

Edited=Sorry forgot to answer your question about snow, as of yet we haven't had any and hope it stay's that way at least till christmas.

Diane

Phew Di,

It does sound complicated from a layman's point of view:) or a dumbo like me !
Have to go on the lappy now !! Hubby's going to bed.

Sandie.x

Not to worry Sandie a lot of people don't understand how some-one who is so disabled can be classed as my employer, but not all disabled people are unable to sort their own care out so as far as the law stand's it is easier to put them all in one catergory and think of them all as capable and able to arrange there own care. Most people like my employer are usually in residental care and the court's are given the responsibility for their care which is handed over to social services.

Diane

Diane

My husband works for Social Services, in the finance Dept, but i've not heard him mention of anyone in your kind of circumstances.
Of course if he he discusses work no names are mentioned for confidentiality reasons.

Glad you've missed the snow hun:)

Had the plumber back today to look at 3 leaks! He solved 2 ,1 on rad , 1 on on left hand side of shower ,but now hubby has put almost all the flooring down, dau noticed the leak back on the right hand side of the shower:((...................First phone call in the morning, second will be to the company we had the flooring from..hubby is one sheet of flooring short::(
We don't really want to buy another boxful if we can help it, but if needs must so be it....However......
I don't like the wooden flooring anyway , would much prefer carpet... a disscussion for the morning me thinks.lol...Just one 'tile' away from it being finished
I said if I didn't like it I would have it carpetted again, whicch he agrees with ,cos he laid pine wood flooring once before,but didn't lay double
insuation as he had this time and neither of us liked it that time.
But it still feels coldd and echoey to me !

Sandie.x

Sandie ~~~

I'm employed via the Direct Payment system and ILF ( independant Livieing Fund ) so Social Servises don't actually deal with my circumstances directly, all they do is pay my employer money into a bank account in his mother's name for 12hrs care and the rest of my hrs ( 33 ) are paid for by ILF who also pay the money into the same account, then my monthly time sheet is sent to an organisation who work out my tax and insurance payment's and send a wageslip to my employer saying how much has been taken out and the amount my employer should pay me.
Your OH will have heard of both Direct Payment and ILF as they have been involved with payment for care for some time, in fact Direct Payment is going to be used in the payment of care a lot more soon but I think it now has another name but not sure what it is called.
I bet you will be glad to see the work finished in your bathroom hun.

I'm going to get a lecture for being up so late ( from are Aussie friend's ) so I'd better get myself off to bed hun which is were you probably are now and have been for some time lol.

~~~~~~~~~ to my Aussie friend's who are about to arrive.

Diane

Hello miss Diane who is in bed now, you're older than me so I can't lecture you lol!!! ya have to respect your elders:-))

Sandie, you could lay some very large rugs on your floor boards:-)) Hope you get your leaky pipes fixed:-)

I love wooden floor boards, though we have white tiles in our kitchen and dining room, I loath them because the grout gets dirty and is very hard to clean. Last week while I was cleaning them, I pulled a muscle in my neck and back and have been in agony for the last few days, (saw the physio on Friday) its starting to feel a little better now.
In future, I'll get someone in to clean them - OH's orders!!!

The sun has just come out, thank goodness and its stopped raining, sigh of relief!!

Lovely to see you, Janet:-) I hope you and the family are all well:-))

~~~~~~ to everyone:-))

Carole xxxx

Hello to all those who I haven't seen around for a while. Hope you are all well and either keeping warm or cool as the case may be.

Diane - you have a good memory. That lady lives on the other side of me to the man I mentioned before. Her villa is attached to mine, his isn't (thank goodness).
She was such a lovely lady for three years, friendly neighbour to all of us and insisted on bringing in my bin, although I told her many times I could do it myself. Sometimes knocked on my door with a hot cup of coffee for me and we would have a chat - not often, but I enjoyed her company.
We were advised that she had not been paying her quarterly fees and after talking to her, suggesting she try to pay 'some' rather than nothing, she agreed, but continued to pay nothing and to ignore letters from our Strata manager. We delayed it for as long as we could, but had no choice but to authorise legal action.
I first noticed that my bin wasn't being brought in any more, then I received notes in my mailbox suggesting we are making her 'starve'. Calling us 'the enemy'.
To shorten the story, we found out she was starting a business and all her earnings were going into it. She thought that it wouldn't matter if she made up her fees after her business got underway.
She hasn't spoken to anyone within the complex for more than a year now. Nobody sees her unless they see her drive in or out to work. She takes her dog for a walk at 5am - I think. Nobody is actually up to see for themselves. I don't even know if she still has the dog. He is quite old.
I understand that she owed money elsewhere, for the same reason. Seems she was starting the business with no money behind her and was hoping that everyone would wait while she used the money she owed to them. It doesn't work that way.

We have quite a lot of people that live like that here in NZ Berona. They don't give a monkeys that the rest of you pay as you go and it is tantamount to stealing, she would probably be horrified to think of herself as shoplifting but the reason that so many items are so costly is the rest of us pay the cost for those that steal. I know of someone who would be horrified to shoplift but was quite happy to pay with dud cheques.

Sandie hope you sort out your leaks.... and you are not echoing around the place like some of the posts on this thread.

Sorry Tec that the All Blacks beat the Welsh, for the first half I thought the Welsh played really well and were giving as good as they got and then it just all turned to a soggy rice pudding for them. But they sang lovely.
That is the first time I have seen that haka performed - my OH said do you have to watch the Rugby, so I blamed you. LOL ------- not really, just said I need to keep up with the play.

Carole I hate cleaning the bottom piece that one can't reach beneath the stationary panel on our shower door. The panel overlaps the bit at the front and there is a lower narrow ledge and I have to use a toothbrush to clean in there. I assist this practice with bad language and my tongue poked out of the corner of my mouth for extra effect. - Also why do they make these things that have narrow little connecting bits that are extremely difficult to clean?

Will be out later today and was busy yesterday so maybe tomorrow.

Persey @ 1.43am 29th November 2010.

Oh and I saw where they papered a wall sideways on one of those do it up programmes and thought they should have said "don't try this at home!"

Good day to all folks~~~~

Bright blue skies, but freezing cold here, the 3 inches of snow is still on the ground but main roads are clear.:)

Di hi~~~~
I knew about ILF from working in what was the Social Security and hubby has just explained to me about Direct payments and ILF, he also does the auditing on the Direct payments !
He discovered an overpayment last yr of £16000 where someone had spent their DP on a TV and shoes and clothes.The chap is severely disabled physically , hence the amount he gets is very high, 24 /7 care but he has all his marbles.
DP is meant to cover what is included in their health care plan not that sort of thing.

Carol hi~~~
I intend to to put teal coloured rugs down in the bathroom..if I don't carpet over ; it looks so nice and would be easy to keep clean...I think I'll go for the rugs first.lol

Berona hi ~~
Sorry to hear you are having probs with you neighbour , been there ..bought the t shirt as they say but it's not pleasant !!

Hi~~~~~ to everyone else who will be popping in~~~~~~
Have a good day or a good sleep:)

Must go and finish the veg for lunch before hubby gets back from the DIY store for his bathroom flooring!!

Edit sorry Perse didn't see you there , this screen seems all upside-down to me, yeah hope to get the leak asap...only one now, others fixed .
Sandie.x

Did not see you either Sandie cause I took my post away and tinkered with it.

Sometimes I read from the bottom up and then the next time from the top down and sometimes when I submit I get the same page and other times it takes me back to the original page 1.

Otherwise the last page is often page 1 as well.

Confused don't be just play along, Agatha Christie wrote the book it is called "It's all done with Mirrors." And it is no use going to the help clinic it is closed for alterations - Do you think they might get in an Irish paper hanger to do the job?

1.56am and am off to bed - gotta go and order a small kitchen blind later today.... Pxx

Hi everyone
just popping in to say hi till later as I am watching a couple of thing's on TV.

Sandie you are right DP is not meant for personal item's but for the care you need, this is what will be a worry when they change the care allowances, they intend to allot amount's to all care uses depending on the amount of care they need. They will either manage it themselves as is done now or they can arrange for a manager that will be provided by social services to manage the money alloted to them, or something like that as it isn't clear exactly how the new system will work.

See you all later

Diane

It is now officially Christmas.
We walked into the market square while it was snowing this afternoon for the official turning on of the Christmas lights. The brass band was playing and it was all very jolly, flipping freezing though.
It just said on the local news that last night the weather station just three miles from here recorded it's lowest overnight temperature. It was minus fourteen. No wonder I woke up during the night feeling cold, my feet were out of the duvet for some reason.

That all sounds very festive Linda.
I used to love to hear the Salvation Army Silver Bands playing carols in the towns at Christmas time, but haven't seen them for years as I no longer frequent the towns at Christmas period. I assume they still do it.

We always have a large Christmas tree on a grassy area here in the village, donated by a local land owner..A nearby resident used to run a cable from his house for the lights, but along came Health & Safety, and pulled the plug on that. Consequently there were no lights on the tree for three years until the community had raised sufficient funds to have the Electricity Co install a proper and legal electricity supply.

It was so cold here last night we left the heating on all night - a few miles away they had a record low of minus 23 C, While we only had a tropical low of minus 18C. Everything is just frozen and white.
I filled the bird feeders four times today, and the garden was full of birds of all sorts all day - I wish everyone would feed them in this weather.

Tec................7-50pm

Hi ~~

Just been out for a walk ( 5pm ) ..was looking for a 90 yr old lady who walks her white Alsation bitch: she won't put her on a lead and won't let anyone walk her. I know the times she walks so just wanted to walk with her to make sure she didn't slip in this icy weather.. but I missed her, will ring her to to see that she's OK.

Linda, it was -5.5 degrees when I was out walking , didn't feel that cold I must say, must be getting used to the cold after living so high up for over 30yrs, Minus 15 last night !
Just cos the lights are turned on and the brass band is playing it 's not officially Christmas in my book, it's not even December yet !
Here speaketh the biggest Xmas party pooper ever, wish I could go to sleep on Dec 1st and wake up Jan 7th (hubby's birthday ) Right old misery g*ts aint I..?

Carol~~hi
Hope your neck is feeling better hun:) Stuff the housework !!

Going for tea now
~~~ to anyone who pops in later, I'll be watching the' X factor' at 8pm and then ' I'm a celebrity' will come back after... probably have loads of pages to catch up on then .lol

Sandie.x

Persey, Congratulations to the All Blacks, they played well as usual. I suppose the result wasn't too bad for the Welsh everything considered. Yes the singing was good - maybe there should be a singing contest between the All Blacks and Welsh rugby teams - we stand a better chance of winning that lol.

~~~~~~~~~~to Diane, hope you're warm enough!

Tec.........8-05pm

Hello all - hope you are all well and keeping warm. At the moment - 7.43am - it is pouring with rain. There is a magpie sat on the railings of our front verandah shaking the rain off his wings and looking thoroughly miserable.

I'm also concerned about my son who is driving on the roads for 45 minutes going to work. As I told him - I know he's careful but what about the others on the road.

I may miss some or all of you as I have to go out early this morning.

S x

Good Morning Sue,

I hope the rain clears, especially as you have to go out.
Maybe the soggy magpie would like to come in for breakfast?
I'm sure your son will be fine, but yes you do have to look out for other drivers.

Tec..........9-pm.

Hi Tec - I think the rain has set in for the next couple of days. Carole has had loads of rain so I think she's sent it up here. Thanks a lot, Carole!!

Have you done anything interesting today?

S x

Sue maybe Carole is just thinking of your garden and the veggies, in case you have adry spell lol.
No haven't done anything interesting today - so cold I don't feel much like moving far away from the fire, I find this excessive cold makes me tired all the time - maybe just lazyitis.

Tec................9-23pm.